This is the Truth Network. My friend, the New Testament speaks of this experience called the baptism with the Holy Spirit. Is it water baptism? Is it the equivalent? Is it new birth?
Is it confirmation? Or is it any other Christian experience or sacrament?
Well, stay with us, listen, and learn. You're listening to Until He Comes, a blend of prophetic and practical biblical studies with Dr. Greg Hinnant, author of The Second Coming of Christ, His Appearing, His Return, Our Preparation. And now, author and teacher Greg Hinnant. Welcome to the broadcast, my friend.
We are continuing our series on tons of fire. Our text is Acts 2, verses 1 through 4. If you haven't read that, I urge you to read it. There we find the record of the Birth of the Church and we see the first experience of the baptism with the Holy Spirit.
Now in our last lesson we continued our study of eight facts that are biblical. and reveal something about these tongues of fire. And we were examining the point that these tongues of fire were received through, given in, and a part of The baptism with the Holy Spirit.
So we learn then that Jesus and his Father We're both on board with this experience. The father had said in the Old Testament in Ezekiel thirty six, twenty six and twenty seven. That is plan was to take out the stony heart From his people and put in a heart of flesh, meaning here. responsive to God. open.
soft, pliable. And then he said very clearly, he would put his spirit within them.
So he was predicting regeneration and the baptism of the Holy Spirit. In the form of his promise. That's why Jesus said in Acts 1:4 that his disciples would soon receive in his words the promise of The Father. We also looked at John chapter 4, verses 10 through 14, Jesus' interview. with a woman by the well in Saikar.
He said to her essentially, if you knew me, that is, if you were have a saving revelation of who I am. You could ask me. and I would give you living water. That would be an artesian well within you. And we likened that, we paralleled that to the Gihan spring, which is giving water to Jerusalem for hundreds of years.
And so now we want to move on and see that Jesus also promised rivers of living water would flow out of the spirit baptized believer. Our text is John seven, verses thirty seven through thirty nine. In the last day, that great day of the feast, Jesus stood and he cried, saying, If any man thirst, Let him come unto me and drink.
Now, what's important here is This was a day At the end of Sukkot, When the high priest and others made a great show of taking water from the pool of Salon which had come originally from the Gihon Spring, and they would fill a vessel with it and take it in a grand procession back to the temple to the altar and pour it out on the altar. Wow. to remind the people that God had given them water when they were in their wilderness wandering. years.
So it was on this particular day Where Yahweh was being presented Demonstratively. Pictorially. in actual experiments as the giver of water. or the water of life. Jesus took this occasion and he was essentially saying, Look, I am.
the one who gave you water. in the wilderness. Just as he said, I am the light of the world. I am the Bread of life. I am the good shepherd.
I am the door. He could have said, I am the water of life, or offer it. Jesus was filled to the full of the Holy Spirit.
So now he says, if you're thirsty, Come to me and drink. And he that believes on me, as the Scripture has said, out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water. What's he talking about?
Well, the reference is to Ezekiel. 47, 1 through 12. where Ezekiel is shown A river of life. or the river of revival, or the river of God flowing out from the temple, meaning its source Is the God within? Flowing out And then increasing in its depth, which means increasing in spiritual power, as it flows down toward.
The Dead Sea. And when it touches the Dead Sea, it gives life. to the Dead Sea. The waters are miraculously desalinated. Presently.
The Dead Sea is many times more salty. than the oceans. and it cannot support. fish that can't live there. It has other minerals in the water as well.
But in the millennium, and Ezekiel 47 is in his prophecies of the millennium. The river of God will flow from the throne of Christ to the In the newly raised hill or mountain of the Lord, where the fourth temple. will be erected. It will flow out. It will flow to the east.
Down into the Valley of the Dead Sea, and when it touches it That body of water will come to life.
So, the principle here is that this river of life, sourced in God Himself, brings life. and fruitfulness wherever it goes. Life and fruitfulness wherever. It goes. And Jesus was saying, I'm the source.
Now, how do we get to this river? How do we have in our own personal life an experience? spiritually speaking. of what Ezekiel saw in a prophetic vision, Concerning the Millennial River of God. That will be a physical river.
But, my friends, let me tell you something. Right now, as I'm speaking and you are listening, The river of God is flowing from the throne of God above. With the living water of the Holy Spirit. Rivers of living water are flowing from that thrown above. And They're available to us now.
How till we receive these living waters, these waters that bring life. to the dead fruitfulness To the Baron. Again, because the Dead Sea was barren, but it now was desalinated, and Ezekiel says in his. Description In verses 11 and 12, that After the waters are healed. Great fish, like the fish found in the Mediterranean Sea, will Live and thrive there, and fishermen will come, and there will be a great fishing.
Industry. on the shores of what is now the salty. Barren Dead Sea.
So the river of God above that is spiritual. Brings life to dead people. Before we are born again, we're dead. We're living in spiritual death, separation from God. And it will bring life to the barren.
You know, there's so many Christians that don't have fruit in their life. They don't have the fruit of the Spirit mentioned in Galatians 5, 22 and 23, which essentially are the various traits and characteristics of Christ. We can say the fruit of the Spirit is the fruit of Christ's likeness, and that fruit is formed. As we say, connected to Jesus, and this river flows. But how do we begin?
This river. How do we get this river flowing?
Well, he's telling us. If any man thirst, friend, are you thirsty for more of God? If you're not You may as well just stop listening now because That's what I'm going to talk about. Being thirsty. desiring more of Christ.
desiring more insight from the Word of God. desiring more of an experience, a healthy experience, Of the manifest presence of God, that deep. permeating. Peace. That just shoots through your whole body as you are.
in the presence of Christ, worshiping Him, praising Him, thanking Him, feeding on His Word. interceding for your family and friends and church members. All that pieces. Indispensable. Do you want to have that experience?
Are you thirsty for more of God? If so, come to Him now. He said, Let him come unto me.
Now, what do you do next? He said, Drink. that is, receive, admit into your person. What I'm offering you. And what is he offering?
He says, He that believes on me, this is the key, as long as you continue to believe in Jesus, the river he will plant. in your life and flow through you. will continue to flow. He that believes on me Are you continuing to believe on him today?
Some contradiction thrown you into a tailspin. Confusion. Doubt of God. Or just flat out unbelief. Friend, be recovered today, confess that sin to the Lord, and turn back to Him.
And then you will continue your believing on him. He said, as the scripture hath said, and I've referred you to Ezekiel 47, 1 through 12. out of his belly or innermost being, his core, his soul, shall flow listen to this friend, rivers, plural. It is in the original and in your translation. Not a river, but rivers.
of living water.
So the living water that he gives you. will flow through you. And when it leaves your person it will be It will take the form of many different spiritual distributaries. You know, when a river's flowing and it breaks up into smaller rivers, those rivers are distributaries. And so he's saying there'll be spiritual distributaries.
Branches that flow out of your life. There will be a river of counsel. There will be a river of mercy. There will be a river of intercession. There will be a river of teaching.
There will be a river of preaching. There will be a river of missions, there will be a river of charity. and on and on and on. All these rivers will flow out if you do two things. You come to him.
And you drink.
Now, let's just. Give you a deeper definition of this text in verse 37. Thirsting is your desire to know God or to have more of God. Coming to me, he said, is your experience of coming to Him in salvation. You came to Jesus when you stepped forward, when you heard the gospel and said, I believe that he died for my sin and rose from my justification.
I believe that God put on him The punishment. The judgment, the curse, That was do me. And I believe he took my sin, he died for it, he paid the price, and now I received Christ into my heart. When you did that, you came to me. to Jesus.
You were regenerated. You were born again. But there's more. Come to me and then there's two more key words and Drink. This month, for a gift of any amount, receive Dr.
Hinnant's book, Word Portraits: Five Illustrations of the Mature Christian. This well-researched, insightful book paints five colorful portrayals of the surprisingly similar characteristics between mature Christians and five things: stoneware pottery, eagles, ants, salt, and the biblical wise men from the East. You will be amazed and changed by what you discover. For a gift of $60 or more, we'll send you the complete four-volume Hinnant End Times Prophecy Collection: The Second Coming of Christ, The Tribulation Story, Revelation Notes, a verse-by-verse commentary on Revelation, and the Day of the Lord commentary, which interprets all Old Testament prophecies and foreshadowings of the end times. And if you are a Logos Bible software user, You may purchase all four of these books from the Logos Online Bookstore.
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Now, again, Dr. Hinnant. And Drink. Drink in the water. Coming to Jesus is one thing.
Drinking in the water is different from receiving Christ. In John 1, we're told, to as many as received Him Not the Holy Spirit, but Christ. And they are distinct. Divine persons As many as received him, he gave The power, the authority, the ability. To become the children of God.
So receiving Christ makes you a child of God, but drinking The living water is the baptism of the Holy Spirit.
So he said here. This is the way you can receive my Spirit. This is a companion text to John 4. Four. 10 through 14, which we read in our previous episode.
Now this baptism of the Spirit is not to be confused with With other baptisms or spiritual experiences. It is not. Water baptism.
Some teach that it is, that when you're baptized in water, You receive the Spirit also. Not at all. Not at all. Whether it's paido or child baptism or Credo, Believer, baptism. It is not the baptism of the Holy Spirit, the new birth.
It is not. The baptism of the Holy Spirit. Confirmation, which Some churches hold for their young people At the age of about 12 to 17. No, that's not the baptism of the Holy Spirit, although I will tell you. that that is the doctrine of many.
Protestant Um Groups and also that of the Roman Catholic Church. No, confirmation is not the baptism of the Holy Spirit. They teach again that the gifts of the Spirit are imparted at confirmation. No, that's not correct. It is not the baptism of the Holy Spirit.
Or any other Christian experience or sacrament. Don't confuse them with what we're talking about here in this series, the baptism of the Holy Spirit. There are three baptisms in the New Testament. and three distinct baptisers. That's why in the book of Hebrews we find this in verse one and two.
Therefore, leaving the principles of the doctrine of Christ, let us go on unto perfection, and that just simply means full spiritual growth. spiritual maturity spiritual adulthood, Spiritual Christ likeness. You're fully developed as a believer. Let's move toward that. He's saying, let's move toward spiritual maturity.
Not laying again the foundation, okay, what's the foundation of the Christian life, according to the writer of the Hebrews, of repentance? From dead works. And of faith toward God. He's talking about being saved. Then in verse two he says of the doctrine of baptisms.
Plural. Why would he say there's multiple baptisms if there were not? Clearly there are So we're going to have to do a little brief study here and distinguish these baptisms and the baptizers. Turn, if you've got your Bible, to 1 Corinthians twelve, verse thirteen. Here Paul is writing to the Corinthians and to us, and he says, For by one Spirit and there is a capital S, meaning the Holy Spirit.
By one Spirit are we all baptized Into one body. Whether we be Jews or Gentiles, whether we be bond or free, and have been all made to drink into one spirit.
So he's saying we're baptized into one body. And we received one Spirit. When you are saved, you do receive a measure of the Holy Spirit. We pointed this out. two episodes ago, and discussed it rather thoroughly.
As to what happened precisely in John chapter twenty, when Jesus appeared to His disciples and breathed on them. And said, Receive ye the Holy Spirit. They were regenerated. And they were born again.
So they did have the Spirit. But he says here. The Spirit Himself baptizes us into one body, whatever our ethnic, national, cultural. Status is We are brought into one body. The Holy Spirit baptizes us.
So here we see. The Holy Spirit is the baptizer, not Christ, in this experience. And we're all baptized into one body. What is he talking about? Here, baptism, which means whelmed.
overwhelmed. In this instance, really refers to induction. We're brought into the body. When you're born again, you are plucked from being a member of the body of sin, the worldwide mass of sinners, and now you are a cell planted into or baptized into, inducted into the body of Christ, which is a spiritual unity of believers worldwide. Who does this?
Jesus? Not at all. The Father? No. Does the person do it?
No. The Holy Spirit does it. This happens automatically when you believe. You do not ask for this. He baptizes you into the body of Christ automatically.
Next. Matthew 28, 19. Let's turn there and see. what we found. Jesus is speaking, and he said, Go ye therefore and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and the Son and the Holy Ghost.
Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever. I have commanded you, and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the world. Listen to this. Teach all nations and baptize them in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost.
So he is authorizing his believers to baptize other believers in water. Two questions. What is the substance that they're being baptized with? Water. H2O.
Who is the baptizer? Another Christian. Another Christian. So we see a different baptism and a different baptizer. Acts 1, verse 5.
Let's return to this. We read this in an earlier episode. For John, Jesus is speaking, truly baptized with water, but you shall be baptized with the Holy Ghost. Not many Dave Hence, and if you will then turn to chapter 2, verse 33, we'll see what Peter said about that baptism. He said, In verse 33, Therefore, being by the right hand of God exalted, and having received of the Father the promise of the Holy Ghost, He, that is Jesus, has shed forth this, which you now see and hear.
Now, and this Experience of the baptism of the Holy Spirit, Jesus is the baptizer, not a man, and not the Holy Spirit. And the substance with which we are baptized is Holy Spirit, not water. And not, we're not being inducted into the body of Christ. Three baptisms, three baptizers, very distinct and clear.
So we need to keep these things distinct in our mind and remember them. Let's briefly mention the last point here of this first part of the study. That is, these tongues of fire. Fire. They were spiritual fire.
So when they were baptized with the Holy Spirit on Pentecost Day, spiritual fire entered their bodily temple. Ooh, wow. We could say the church began On fire You've heard people say, Oh, that brother over there, he's just on fire for God. This missionary, man, he's working here, working there, people are being saved and led to the Lord and healed and delivered and churches are being formed. That guy's just on fire.
Well, we mean that they're spiritually fervent. They're burning, they're glowing. That's a spiritual fire sent from the Lord. This was a major part of the establishment of the Acclaisia. I would say, without this.
Without the baptism that set them on fire, spiritually speaking, they never would have spread the gospel as they did. It is essential that we be baptized in the Holy Spirit.
Now do we have to speak with tongues? No, we don't have to. But everything that relates to it in the Bible says it is a healthy. Useful. God honoring, God pleasing experience, and it is Pauline.
Paul said, I thank my God I speak with tongues more than y'all. It doesn't make you superior, not in the least. But it is a wonderful benefit that God offers you. Jude says when we're praying in the Holy Spirit, we build up our faith. And in Romans Eight Paul explains that when we're praying in the Spirit, we're praying perfectly because he The Father knows the mind of the Spirit, and the Spirit is praying according to the will of God.
Now These tongues of fire that we've discussed in this series thus far. Brought spiritual fire wherever they went, and they still do today. If it's a village in Africa, a large metropolis in America. Or some other place on planet earth, when people begin to get baptized with the Holy Spirit, spiritual fire is ignited. Friend, is your fire burning in your heart, or do you need more of the Spirit?
Maybe you need this baptism now so you can be lit or relit. in your inner furnace. To burn with love of Christ and His word. and be Pharma Indians. Work.
Till he comes. We'll continue this series. in our next episode. If this message has blessed you, tell your friends and please consider helping us stay on the air by sending your tax-deductible donation to Greg Hennett Ministries. Also, remember, you may download the Until He Comes podcast from your preferred podcast app.
May you walk closely with Christ and trust and obey Him in your daily tests of faith and patience until He Comes. This is the Truth Network. Uh
