Be Baptized With The Holy Spirit

[Sam]

This is from page 16 of the February 1962 issue of Voice Magazine published by the FGBMFI (Full Gospel Business Men’s Fellowship International). It is my understanding that it is from a message delivered before a group of ministers at Sacramento, CA.

Be Baptized With The Holy Spirit
by Billy Graham

We have learned much about the power of the Holy Spirit. You know, in the main denominations, we have looked a bit askance at our brethren fro the Pentecostal churches because of their emphasis on the Holy Spirit.

I wonder if one of the secrets of Pentecostalism cannot be learned by our main stream churches by placing emphasis on the Holy Spirit. I am sure that my Pentecostal brethren that are here today would agree with me that there have been extremes and excesses that have embarrassed many of them at times, but I want to tell you I believe the time has come to give the Holy Spirit His rightful place in our preaching, in our teaching, and in our churches! We need to go back and study again what Paul meant when he said, "Be filled with the Spirit.” We need to learn once again what it means to be Baptized with the Holy Spirit. I know that we can rationalize, and immediately ten thousand theological questions arise and we try to figure it all out; but brethren, I want to tell you that we need to accept, we need to get something! Give it any terminology you want, but we do not have the same dynamic and the same power the Early Church had.

They had no Bibles, no seminaries nor Bible schools, no radios, no telephones, no printing presses, nothing! However, they turned the world upside down in one generation! What did they have? They had an experience with the living Christ! They had the filling of the Holy Spirit!

Look what we should be doing with our churches and seminaries, and all the other factitious that we have.
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In the above article, Billy Graham said that we --he and other church leaders--needed to find out what the Apostle Paul meant when he said "Be filled with the Spirit" and what it means to be baptized in the Spirit. He seems to imply that the two terms refer to the same thing.

When John the Baptist came as a forerunner of Jesus, he presented Him in a two fold manner. First, He was the Lamb of God who was to take away the sins of the world. Secondly, He was the One who would baptize people in/with the Holy Spirit. John presented Jesus as both Savior and Spirit Baptizer.

The idea that an experience called the HGB (Holy Ghost Baptism) is available as a separate and subsequent experience to the salvation or born again experience is the basis of the modern day Pentecostal movement. We who call ourselves Pentecostal or Apostolic trace our history back to Topeka, Kansas in 1901 and to Azusa Street in California in 1906. In 2006 many Pentecostal churches and organizations (including Oneness Pentecostals) celebrated a Century of Pentecost.

The consensus of opinion among those who call themselves Apostolic or Pentecostal was that in the first century, the early Church preached salvation through Jesus Christ and also preached a subsequent empowering, often imparted by the laying on of hands, described variously as:
a baptism in the Spirit,
receiving (making room for) the Holy Spirit,
the Holy Spirit coming upon or falling upon,
a filling of the Spirit.

This emphasis on the filling or empowering or baptism of the Spirit seemed to be neglected after the first three centuries of the church as the church became popular and part of the political structure of Rome. Throughout the centuries since then there have been reports of people being empowered by the Holy Spirit and recurrences of the gifts of the Spirit such as healing, miracles, prophecy, and tongues, but there has been no unbroken chain of these experiences. Then, in the late 1800's in India, Armenia, and in the Tennessee/North Carolina area of the U.S., people began to again experience this empowering work of the Holy Spirit accompanied with speaking with tongues. On January 1, 1901 at a Bible School in Topeka, Kansas a group of students received the experience of speaking with tongues. That message was then preached in Kansas, Texas, and in California, where in 1906 a group moved to an old livery stable at 312 Azusa Street and there thousands received an experience called the Holy Ghost Baptism and they spoke with tongues and prophesied. From Azusa Street the experience spread and today it is estimated that there are over 500 million people in the world who consider themselves Charismatic or Pentecostal.

It is my opinion that this HGB which releases the gifts of God in His people is what Billy Graham was speaking about whether he realized it or not. It is also my opinon that this HGB experience is available to any of us today who wish to receive it.

[bibleman]

Sadly, we as Pentecostals have wandered from our roots (generally speaking) and in that wandering I believe that we drift further from the love of Christ. Perhaps this is why the healing touch of the Holy Spirit seems harder to find.

I believe that there needs to be a resurgence of pentecostal truth that focuses on waiting for that power from on high , the gift and promise of the Father !

Feel free to link to www.jamesjosephdoyle.com where I have written more on this.

Regards

James