Baptism in the Holy Spirit

I baptize you with water, but he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit (Mark 1:8).

 

As Jesus was coming up out of the water, he saw heaven being torn open and the Spirit descending on him like a dove.  And a voice came from heaven: "You are my Son, whom I love; with you I am well pleased."

 

It is amazing to me that I grew up hearing these 2 passages read in church, but somehow never connected either of them with my own life.  Would not you think that if someone said to you, "He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit," you would investigate what that meant?

 

Maybe because we were baptized as infants, we thought we had already received the Holy Spirit and that was the end of that.  And of course, we never expect to hear a voice from heaven speaking to us, even if we are baptized as adults.  And yet, if as adult Christians, we belong to Christ and we are IN CHRIST, we should expect to experience what He experienced in the flesh.  He takes on our life that we might take on His life, especially in its relationship to the Father and to the Holy Spirit.

 

John said, "He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit," and Luke adds, "and with fire."  If we have not yet experienced the fire, we may indeed "have" the Holy Spirit, but He does not yet "have" us.  Years ago, a someone I had met only briefly called me out of the blue.  "I don't know why I think you might have the answer to this," she said to me, "but I feel like a numb, dumb Catholic.  I go to church every Sunday, and sometimes the priest fusses about people coming in late, and I want to stand up and say, 'Father, if there were something to be here for, we'd be on time!'  Do you know what I'm missing?"

 

Actually, I did know what she was missing.  Our faith was never supposed to be "numb' and 'dumb,' in her words.  If we look at the Acts of the Apostles, we find fire, the "fire" that Jesus came to cast upon the earth.  We find the Holy Spirit at work on every page, and there was nothing boring about anyone's faith.  In fact, we get the picture of the Apostles hanging on to the Holy Spirit's coattails.  There are no organizational meetings (although there was the first Council of Jerusalem), no "planning sessions."  Rather, we find the early Christians meeting daily in the Temple area, praising God; we find numbers being added daily to the group; and we find the Apostles going about doing the works of Jesus. 

 

If we find our religion boring, non-exciting, maybe it's time to ask for the "Baptism in the Holy Spirit," the one that Jesus promised to His followers as "The Gift of the Father."  I once had a friend who said, "If God is handing out gifts, I'm standing in line!"  That should be our attitude every day:  "Whatever You're giving out today, don't leave me out!"

 

God the Father wants to bestow on us the Gift of the Holy Spirit.  It is the Spirit of His only Son, Jesus, and He wants to fill the entire world with that Gift.  If we and others do not know that we are His beloved children, in whom He is well pleased, we cannot tell others about the Gift of the Father.  If we are not filled with the Spirit of God, we cannot tell anyone about the love of the Father given to us in the Son. 

 

In two of the Gospels, Jesus tells us specifically to ASK for the Gift of the Spirit (Matthew 7 and Luke 11):  Seek and you shall find; knock and the door will be opened....everyone who asks receives.....  Jesus died in the flesh that we might live in His Spirit.  He wants us to know His internal life of fellowship with the Father and with the Spirit.  He wants us to enter even now into the eternal life of the Trinity. 

 

What is it that keeps us from knocking at that door, seeking the Holy Spirit, and asking the Father for the Gift He wants to bestow on us?  Is it fear that if we ask and don't receive, we will be too disappointed?  Is it a lack of faith that Jesus meant what He said?  Faith is believing and acting on what God has said.  And of all the things we are to act on, this is surely the easiest of all:  seek, knock, ask.

 

He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit.  "Baptize" means to immerse completely, to "dye," to "soak thoroughly."  If we have not been entirely soaked in the Holy Spirit, something still remains for us.  Let us not be afraid to ask for this baptism and to continue asking until we receive the Gift of the Father.