Reading:
Acts 18:24-19:6a.
"Did
ye receive the Holy Spirit when ye believed?"
Let it be said at once
that we are not here attempting to expound the person and
work of the Holy Spirit, but are seeking to emphasize the
importance of the Holy Spirit's personal presence within
believers.
The
Terms Explained
First let us examine
the terms that we are employing in our sub-title, 'The
Essential Seal and Constitution of the Christian Life'.
When we use the word
'essential', we are thinking of such a statement as that
made by the apostle Paul in his letter to the Romans:
"If any man hath not the Spirit of Christ, he is
none of his" (Rom. 8:9). This clearly indicates that
the possession of the Holy Spirit is essential and
indispensable to the Christian life.
Then, when we go on to
speak of the 'seal', we think of other words such as
those used by Paul in his letter to the Ephesians:
"Having... believed, ye were sealed with the Holy
Spirit of promise" (Eph. 1:13). Note that it was the
Ephesians to whom was originally put the question:
"Did ye receive the Holy Spirit when ye
believed?" Upon their testimony of faith, they did
receive the Holy Spirit, and, years afterward, the
Apostle wrote to them the words that we have just quoted.
The word 'sealed' implies 'putting the seal upon a
transaction': something quite certain, quite precise,
belonging to a moment; a definite act - "ye were
sealed with the Holy Spirit".
And then when we go
further and speak of the 'constitution' of the Christian
life as by the Holy Spirit, we think of such words as
those used by the Lord Jesus Himself to Nicodemus:
"That which is born of the flesh is flesh; and that
which is born of the Spirit is spirit" (John 3:6):
indicating a definite, distinct, different kind of
person, one with a different constitution, a person who
is constituted in a different way. "That which is
born of the Spirit" is different from
"that which is born of the flesh". One is
flesh, the other is spirit.
Many other Scriptures
could be added to these to explain and define our
sub-title.
Initial
Reception of the Holy Spirit
Now when we come to the
passage which we have read, and from which I have taken
the question that is placed at the head of this chapter,
we find an incident with several features of very great
importance. I think we shall see, as we proceed, that
this is something of great significance. But first we
must translate it correctly. It may be that you have in
your hand the old Authorized (or King James) Version.
That is very good, but it is not always correct in the
sense of being up-to-date. That version reads: "Have
ye received the Holy Ghost since ye believed?" Now,
the word here in the original text does not mean
'subsequent to your believing'. It does not mean: 'Did
you, at some subsequent time after you believed, receive
the Holy Spirit?' The Revised Version corrects the
translation and says: "Did ye receive the Holy
Spirit when ye believed?" And that is
correct, and true to the whole teaching and meaning of
the New Testament. The point is that believers in the
Lord Jesus Christ are supposed to receive the Holy Spirit
at the time when they believe, when they
definitely exercise saving faith in Him.
(a)
What the Passage Records:
The Foundation of a Great Church and of Great Ministries
The importance of this
incident is seen in two aspects. Firstly, you note that
this is the beginning of a great church - the church at
Ephesus. Little need be said, to those who are familiar
with the New Testament, by way of emphasizing or proving
the importance of the church at Ephesus. It was to that
church, as to one of a circle, that the Apostle Paul
wrote the greatest document in the history of the world.
That is not exaggerating at all. The greatest document
that has ever been written is Paul's letter 'to the
Ephesians' so-called. It was probably a circular letter
to a number of churches, of which Ephesus was one. But no
greater letter or document exists. I invite you to
investigate it and see if you can exhaust it. It will
take you back into eternity past; it will take you
through the outworking of the counsels of God through the
ages; and it will take you right on into "the ages
of the ages", showing you God at work in Heaven, in
earth and in Hell, in the whole universe: a mighty,
mighty document, written to the church that we see here
in our passage coming into being.
Note, then, the place
of the Holy Spirit in the foundations. How careful the
Apostle was to make sure that the beginning was right,
that the foundation was sound! It was going to have to
carry an immense superstructure, and it must be
trustworthy. Hence to the nucleus of that great church -
perhaps only twelve disciples - he puts the question:
"Did ye receive the Holy Spirit when ye
believed?" Think of the ministry of the Apostle Paul
subsequent to this question. For three years he tarried
at Ephesus, and at his final interview with the elders or
leaders of that church, during the course of his last
journey before his imprisonment, he was able to say to
them, in retrospect: "I shrank not from declaring
unto you the whole counsel of God" (Acts 20:27). For
three years, such a man as this was giving out all that
he then could give of his knowledge of the Divine
counsels.
Here was a church being
founded and formed for tremendous purposes and with
tremendous capacity. What spiritual capacity it requires
to be a church like that - to be able to take all that an
apostle such as Paul could give! That is a very testing
thing. Those who minister in the Word of God, and in the
Holy Spirit, know very well the capacity of their hearers
by the liberty that they have to give the message.
Sometimes they find themselves limited because their
hearers cannot take more. They may not know the people,
but they are conscious of the limitation. At other times
they find themselves completely released, able without
any difficulty to give all that they have. They are
moving in the Spirit, and those to whom they minister
have capacity.
Now these people at
Ephesus had capacity. In those three years they could
receive "the whole counsel of God", and later
they could receive this matchless letter which the
Apostle wrote from his prison. A church with such
capacity - and, let me add, Christians with such capacity
- must know in a very real way what it means to receive
the Holy Spirit. The receiving of the Holy Spirit is the
beginning, the foundation, of all the work of building
and enlarging.
Paul's ministry was a
great ministry here, amongst these believers. Let us
recall that Timothy, also, was a minister of the church
at Ephesus, and that his ministry was enriched,
constituted, inspired, instructed, by Paul himself. Paul
was able to say that Timothy had followed his teaching
and conduct (2 Tim. 3:10). Yes, Timothy had been in close
association with the Apostle, for a long time and over a
wide area, and he ministered at Ephesus. And then we
remember that the great Apostle John was an elder of the
church at Ephesus. What wealth John has given us, in
Gospel, Letters and Revelation! What a church this was!
What a church it became from these twelve believers! And
it all sprang out of the receiving of the Holy Spirit. I
commend to you a study of the place of the Holy Spirit in
the letter to the Ephesians. He has a very large place in
the letter from beginning to end.
(b)
What the Passage Teaches
The first aspect of the
significance of our passage, then, is the church itself
and the ministries that were fulfilled in it. Let us now
come to the second aspect - namely, that which the
passage teaches. You notice that it can be divided into
three sections. The middle section is the Holy Spirit:
that is central, that is the focal point of everything.
Then on the one side of that you have a section circling
around the word 'disciples' - "Paul... found certain
disciples" - and on the other side a section
circling around the word 'baptism'. You have the Holy
Spirit in the centre: then, on the one side disciples, on
the other side baptism.
(1)
The Work of the Holy Spirit
We must recognise,
first of all, that Paul's question concerning the Holy
Spirit must have had a good reason. I do not think it was
just a casual or formal question - that Paul arrived
there and in a quite casual way, without any special
point or object, put this question to these people:
"Did ye receive the Holy Spirit when ye
believed?" We are bound to believe that Paul had a
reason, and a very good reason, for asking the question.
We are left, of course, to surmise, to conjecture, but
the issue of the question shows that Paul had discerned
something. He had detected in these disciples some lack.
And his discernment enabled him to put his finger right
on the spot, as we say.
Now, when Paul puts a
question like that, we have to bring to it all that Paul
would have brought concerning the Holy Spirit. We should
need to go to all his writings, and to his own personal
experience, and gather up, if we could, all that Paul
knew and all that Paul had experienced as to the place,
the work and the importance of the Holy Spirit. And that
was no small thing! Paul has set forth what he knew about
the Holy Spirit from many different aspects.
(a)
Union with Christ
To begin with, Paul has
made it clear that without the Holy Spirit there is no
union with Christ. Union with Christ is the very heart of
Christianity: it is the great, great theme of Paul; and
union with Christ is the work of the Holy Spirit. To
quote one of his own fragments: "He that is joined
unto the Lord is one spirit" (1 Cor. 6:17). All that
Paul knew and had experienced about the Holy Spirit
focused upon this great matter of union with Christ, and
he brought all that into his question. The question could
have been put in other ways. Paul could have raised
directly the fundamental question of union with Christ.
Or he could have spoken of the new creation: Paul has a
good deal to say, both directly and by inference, as to a
new creation in Christ Jesus. And from these and many
other suggestions and indications, we see that Paul
thought of the Christian life as a kind of spiritual
counterpart to the material creation. He said: "God,
that said, Light shall shine out of darkness... shined in
our hearts, to give the light of the knowledge of the
glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ" (2 Cor.
4:6). He saw this as the counterpart of the creational
act, or Divine fiat, "Let there be
light". The spiritual counterpart has taken place in
us. In another place you will find that Paul brings in
the Holy Spirit in that connection. He changes his
metaphor, but keeps to his truth: God has written in our
hearts, not with pen and ink, but by the Spirit of the
living God (2 Cor. 3:3).
(b)
Order and Fruitfulness
Paul has many other
allusions to the creation, as he takes it over into the
spiritual life. What a lot he made of the power of the
Word of God in the life - creative power in the life of
the believer! How much he has given us concerning order
as a result of the work of the Holy Spirit! At the
beginning of the Bible we see order developing or
emerging out of the chaos and disruption, under the
influence of the brooding Spirit. Now, in the spiritual
life, under the influence and power of the Spirit of God
in this new creation, the same thing is taking place: a
new order is emerging in the life of the believer. And
as, out of the barren desolation in which the earth is
found at the beginning of the Bible, fruitfulness emerges
and develops, so is it, Paul teaches, with the fruit of
the Spirit in the life of the believer. "The fruit
of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering,
kindness, goodness, faithfulness, meekness,
selfcontrol" (Gal. 5:22,23). Instead of the
barrenness of the unbeliever's life, there comes this
fruitfulness. It is a work of new creation by the Holy
Spirit. And as at the beginning in the material creation
we see a progressive development and growth, so Paul has
much to say to us about growth and progressiveness under
the government of the Spirit of God. A life governed and
led by the Spirit is one that goes on developing,
growing, increasing in Christ. In a life in which the
Holy Spirit is having His way there is no stagnation.
Such a life is not the same today as it was a year ago -
that would be all wrong. The progressive factor in the
new creation, as a part of the work of the Holy Spirit,
is made very clear by the Apostle.
(c)
Revelation of Man's Destiny
How profoundly and how
fully does Paul teach concerning the purpose and the
destiny of man! At the beginning of the Bible we have
hints that God created man with a great purpose and a
great destiny, but Paul divulges it all. He tells us
exactly what was in God's thought before He created man
or the world - what He intended in creating man - what
the destiny of man was to be. All this comes out through
Paul. How is this possible? Because the Holy Spirit
Himself has revealed it to Paul, and then Paul, by the
Holy Spirit, has been enabled to reveal it to us. And by
the same Spirit this great Divine work of a new creation
is to be carried on to its final fulness. The last thing
in the material creation was: "And God saw every
thing that he had made, and, behold, it was very
good" (Gen. 1:31). God entered into His rest. That
is the crowning work of the Holy Spirit: bringing
everything ultimately to the pleasure and satisfaction of
God - not only bringing God into His rest, but bringing
God's rest into His creation.
(d)
New Consciousness and Capacities
Paul goes on to say
much about the new consciousness of the new-creation man
and woman. An entirely new consciousness is given to the
believer who receives the Holy Spirit. All that of which
such a one was entirely unconscious, now breaks forth
into consciousness and becomes the most living reality in
the believer's life - such as the consciousness of God as
Father, the consciousness of Christ as Saviour, and many
other sides and aspects. Every believer who has received
the Holy Spirit knows how true this is. There is a new
awareness in every realm; there are new capacities for
doing and for being what was entirely impossible before.
All this relates to the spiritual counterpart of the
creation - the new creation that is in Christ Jesus; and
it is all accomplished by the indwelling Holy Spirit,
just as the material creation was effected by the
pervading and brooding Spirit of God.
(e)
The Teaching of Jesus
Let us remember,
furthermore, that Paul was an inheritor of what Jesus had
said regarding the Holy Spirit. Now Jesus had said very
much about this matter. At the end of His life here on
this earth, the Lord Jesus had taken many hours, apart
from the world, apart from the multitudes, to be alone
with His disciples. And through those many hours there
was one thing about which He was speaking, in one way or
another, almost continuously. There was one phrase that
was constantly on His lips. "In that day...",
He said, "in that day..."; and when you look to
see what "that day" was, you find that He was
saying: "When he, the Spirit... is come" (John
16:13) - He shall do this and that. It was the coming day
of the Spirit. All that Jesus had said about that day,
and about what the Spirit would do when He came, Paul had
come into, had inherited. Paul had come to know - what
the apostles had dreaded, until they knew it - the truth
of Jesus' words: "It is expedient for you that I go
away: for if I go not away, the Comforter will not come
unto you" (John 16:7). Yes, the disciples dreaded
His going, but they lived to prove that it was, as He had
said, a far, far greater thing for the Spirit to come
than for Jesus to remain in the body. Paul had come into
the reality of that - into the superior greatness of the
Spirit's presence even to the physical presence of the
Lord Jesus.
Now Paul knew all that
by experience, and he therefore brought all this
knowledge, this spiritual knowledge, into the question
that he put to them. And how the question grows! What a
tremendous question it becomes if it implies all that!
All that Jesus taught and meant about the day of the Holy
Spirit; all that that same Spirit had done in fulfilling
the very words of the Lord Jesus: "He shall guide
you into all the truth... He shall take of mine, and
shall declare it unto you" (John 16:13,14) - all
that had come to Paul. What a wealth we have in Paul's
letters about the Holy Spirit! And all that comes into
this question: "Did ye receive the Holy Spirit when
ye believed?" It is a very big question! Viewed in
that light, I doubt whether there is a greater question.
What a difference it should make to the Christian life if
it is all true!
Let me sum it all up by
saying this: The Christian, the believer, who has really
received the Holy Spirit, is a supernatural being. The
indwelling of the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of God, and His
imparting of eternal life, constitute the believer a
supernatural being, a being who has something within of a
supernatural character, distinguishing him from all
others. It is a deathless life. To receive eternal life
means that there is that within which transcends the
natural order, making the recipient an eternal being, in
the Divine sense, linked with Heaven and linked with
eternity. And the Church in which this is true, which has
truly received and is indwelt by the Holy Spirit, is a
supernatural Body; there is no power in this universe
which can destroy it. History has proved that and will
prove it to the end. Let men and devils combine against
this Church: no matter - it will remain; it is
supernatural.
(2)
Disciples
In the second Place, we
find 'disciples' mentioned here. "Paul... found
certain disciples". They would no doubt have been
people who were bearing the name 'Christian': they would
have classed themselves as such and would probably have
been referred to as Christians. And yet they were people
who, while being called disciples, were yet without the
fundamental essential of the Christian life. What were
they? I think the answer is to be found in Apollos, the
Jew from Alexandria, who had recently arrived in Ephesus
and had previously come into touch with the ministry of
John the Baptist concerning Jesus. We are told here that
he had been 'instructed by word of mouth' [katecheo] (Acts
18:25). Now, what was John's vocation? John's vocation
was to prepare the way of the Lord, to lead on and point
on to Jesus. What was John's message? Repentance in view
of the imminent coming of the Messiah. 'Repent!', said
John. But John had definite limitations. Said he:
"I... baptize you in water... he that cometh after
me... shall baptize you in the Holy Spirit". (Matt.
3:2,11 A.S.V.) That represents a very great difference.
Now Apollos had got all
that, and probably some extra teaching about Jesus,
apparently at second hand ('by word of mouth'). In the
main, Apollos ended where John ended: that is, he was
without a personal experience of the work of the Holy
Spirit through baptism into Jesus Christ. He had,
nevertheless, some particular values on the positive
side. We are told that he was "mighty in the
scriptures" (Acts 18:24): which I take to mean that
he had an unusually wide and deep knowledge of the Old
Testament Scriptures about the coming Messiah - what we
call the 'Messianic Scriptures' - all of which pointed
toward the Christ; all of which rang out the note of
preparation, and especially of repentance, for the Christ
was coming. John baptized with a baptism of repentance in
preparation for the Christ and His kingdom: but there he
stopped and could do no more. And Apollos seems to have
stopped there too. Perhaps he was a mightier man in the
Old Testament Scriptures than even John the Baptist, but
with all his knowledge of the Scriptures he fell short of
the experience of the Holy Spirit. And therefore,
according to the law of ministry, he could not lead these
disciples further than he himself had gone.
But Aquila and
Priscilla, that fine Christian couple who had accompanied
Paul to Ephesus from Corinth, soon detected the flaw and
the lack, and took him and expounded to him the way of
God more carefully (vs. 26b). His ministry enlarged
greatly after that. Soon afterwards he left Ephesus and
crossed over to Corinth, and it is interesting to follow
the wonderful ministry of Apollos from this point. But I
just mention it for this reason: that when Apollos got
beyond John the Baptist to the real meaning of the Holy
Spirit and of baptism into Christ, it made an immense
difference to his ministry. Paul was able to say: "I
planted, Apollos watered" (1 Cor. 3:6), and much
more. That is no small thing. It illustrates the vital
importance of having the Holy Spirit. Now these disciples
knew nothing about the Holy Spirit. Although they had
dwelling in their midst a man mighty in the Old Testament
Scriptures, and familiar with the teaching of John the
Baptist and his baptism, they could not be led any
further by him. They knew nothing vital concerning the
way of the Lord, although such a man had been ministering
to them.
These disciples, then,
represented a kind of parenthesis, an interlude, a
discontinuity; something held in suspense, as it were,
between John the Baptist and Jesus. And I am not sure that
there are not many such disciples today, suspended in
that gap. Yes, they know something of the Bible; they
know something about Jesus. They have been 'taught by
word of mouth'. But I fear there are multitudes of those
who have the name 'Christian', and who would be called,
or would wish to be called, disciples, who have no real,
personal experience of receiving the Holy Spirit. They
belong to this kind of parenthetical Christianity.
It has not gone through, not gone right on; it has
stopped, it is a discontinuity. But these at Ephesus did
go on, as the record shows us - they did bridge the gap.
(3)
Baptism
We now turn briefly to
the third matter - that of baptism. For it was up to that
that the Apostle led them. From their reply, "We did
not so much as hear whether the Holy Spirit was", we
are not quite sure whether they meant that they had not
heard that there was such a thing or person as the Holy
Spirit, or that they had not heard whether the Holy
Spirit had come. But it is not of great importance. It is
perfectly evident that they knew nothing about the Holy
Spirit. And so Paul says, 'Well, then, into what were you
baptized?' That is the point upon which the big question
turns. "Did ye receive the Holy Spirit when ye
believed? ...Into what then were ye baptized?" These
two things go together; the one question is within the
other - the one resolves itself into the other. "Into
what... were ye baptized?"
What, then, we have to
ask, did baptism into Christ mean? To put it in another
form: Why did the Holy Spirit wait for that testimony?
And in answering this question we touch the greatest
things in the Christian life. Here we really do come to
the 'seal' and the 'constitution' mentioned in our title.
I do not mean that baptism is that, but look behind it
and see what it really meant. You have to go a long way
back to answer the question, What did baptism into Christ
mean? You have to go right back to the beginning. What
was it that happened in the garden, when man disbelieved
God? When man, at the suggestion of Satan, disobeyed God,
he opened as it were a door into his own being - a door
into which Satan put his foot, and from which he has
never withdrawn it. Through man opening himself to Satan,
Satan got a purchase in man's soul, obtained a foothold
in the very heart of man, upon which all the evil powers
have fulfilled the work of Satan in man and through man
ever since.
Make no mistake about
this: the soul of the unregenerate man and woman is in
alliance with the evil powers. It is not a matter of how
conscious you are of it. Try to get away and turn to the
Lord Jesus, and you will become aware that you are not as
free as you thought you were, you have not the ability
that you thought you had. You will wake up to the fact
that you are a prisoner, and that, unless a mighty
deliverer and rescuer comes to you, there is no escape.
That foothold was given; that alliance and link with
Satan was formed; and it remains. The soul of the
unregenerate is linked with Satan, and the evil powers
fulfil all the purposes of Satan in the life.
What is the way out?
The only way out is through death. God pronounced that
upon man. "In the day that thou eatest thereof thou
shalt surely die" (Gen. 2:17). "The soul that
sinneth, it shall die" (Ezek. 18:4). But "one
died for all" (2 Cor. 5:14). Jesus took the place of
the sinner, and died that death; and in His death He
broke that link, He severed that union: He stripped off
the principalities (Col. 2:5); He 'nullified him that had
the power of death, that is, the devil' (Heb. 2:14b). One
died for all. Baptism is our testimony, the believer's
testimony to the double fact that, in the death of
Christ, the man in union with Satan has been removed and
Satan with him, and that, in resurrection-union with
Christ, the Holy Spirit constitutes inwardly a new
relationship. Death is the great divide. Resurrection is
the great new union. Through this new link or
union, Christ and His Kingdom operate. All the purposes
of God are realised - but only realised through
and upon the ground of this union effected by receiving
the Holy Spirit.