Being Filled with the Spirit
Holy SpiritIn conservative evangelical circles lots of debate went on 20 years ago about the filling with the Holy Spirit. The major conclusion that was reached was that we are baptised with the Spirit at conversion. There were several variations on the conclusion, but it was mainly that conversion and baptism in the Spirit are synonymous. Sadly those who didn't quite agree were sometimes considered outside the camp. Even Martin Lloyd Jones was held in some suspicion for his book Joy Unspeakable, which seemed to question this orthodoxy.
I have been thinking about this in conjuction with my reading of Acts. The structure of Acts in several distinct panes, each making the point about how the Word went to a fresh field, was often used in the argument to demonstrate that any account of the Spirit falling independently of conversion was a unique historical event, like a mini-pentecost, for each new sphere. But that it only occured once in each new sphere and therefore should not be normalised or universalised.
I think that the debate considered closed for a lot of years in conservative circles is alive and open again. With more experience of God working, I start to become a little uncomfortable with my previous reasoning. I wonder if I produced a scriptural-sounding justifications for avoiding what the text says, because it didn't cohere with my experience.
It seems to me that there are more and more credible people with deep knowledge of the scriptures taking a view that God often endues with the Spirit subsequent to conversion (whether they refer to it as baptism or multiple fillings). Previously most of the heavy weight exegetical guns were on one side of the discussion only, but now it feels like there are people of doctrinal as well as experiential credibility on both. Very infrequently compared to a decade ago do I hear the claim that contemporary prophecy or a view on second blessing inherently damages a high doctrine of scripture.
Views on this issue are no longer thought by many to be the touchstone of evangelical orthodoxy that defines whether you are a conservative evangelical or not. As a result some possibilities are arising for fresh friendships between biblical Christians with different views on the issue.
I'm grateful to Adrian Warnock and Rob Wilkerson for pointing out this message on receiving the baptism of the Spirit from Terry Virgo. It is a spiritually powerful message. You may not agree with all of it, I am not sure I do. But I challenge you to listen to it without crying out to God for more of the Spirit. As Virgo puts it "God wants you full of the Spirit. Every Christian full of the Holy Spirit is proof that Jesus is ascended."
Listen, bow before God, rejoice and receive.
http://www.newfrontiersusa.org/mediaarchive/media/eqm08_session_003.mp3
Reader Comments (2)
Hi Marcus,
Thanks for the recent posts. Both this one and the others on how to apply Acts to today coincide with issues I've been puzzling about recently (mostly thanks to having a new boss who's more charismatic). I've not had time to listen to the Terry Virgo talk yet but I will try to make the time to do so soon.
These are a couple of my recent thoughts on being filled with the Spirit:
I think my main dislike of the second blessing teachings (by whatever label) has been that they detach the Spirit from conversion and therefore from Christ. I read Colossians 2 that all fulness is in Christ and we are given fulness in Christ through our union with him by faith, and any teaching suggesting that I need something on top of faith in Christ to have the fulness of the Spirit seems to take away from the supremacy of Christ.
However, I think I've allowed that grid to blind me to certain passages of Ephesians where fulness is not something we have yet - in 3:19 and 4:13 fulness seems to be something we have not experienced yet, and this hasn't been part of my thinking. The result is that I've been wrongly nervous of things like praying for more of the Spirit or continued fillings with the Spirit.
I wonder if the solution is something as simple as a bit of now/not yet theology: with holiness I've long grasped that I already am holy in Christ but that my experience of practical holiness is a daily lifelong growing journey as I gradually become who I am in Christ. So why not with fulness? We already possess fulness in Christ according to Colossians. We don't yet experience that fulness according to Ephesians. So what? So we seek to be filled with the Spirit, as in Eph 5:18, (as John Stott says, it's a present continuous plural imperative) again and again so we can become who we are in Christ and experience every blessing that is ours in Christ.
So not exactly a mindblowing theological breakthrough, but it's helped me in the following ways:
1. To my 'conservative' friends I want to say yes every Christian is given fulness in Christ through our union with him by faith at conversion, but that doesn't mean that there isn't growth in our experience of this fulness through our lives. We should seek to be filled more and more and again and again by the Spirit as conservatives seek to grow in knowledge or holiness. And we shouldn't feel awkward when our charismatic brothers and sisters talk about needing/wanting to be filled with the Spirit or about their experiences of it (we've had them too, we've just labelled them wrong).
2. To my 'charismatic' friends I still want to question how some Christians can be said not to have been filled with the Spirit (as Alpha etc claims) when fulness is ours through faith and union with Christ (I'm not convinced by the argument for subsequent baptism in the Spirit from Acts - Chris Green in "The word of his grace" has some interesting thoughts on how Luke uses repetition to signal what we should see as normative and what we should see as unique in Acts that had me pretty persuaded against it; I think this is where charismatics have used the wrong label for a right experience), but I want to affirm and copy their desire for a growing experience of God, because Ephesians seems to me to affirm that we don't get all of it at conversion.
3. In terms of vocabulary, 'baptism in the Spirit' and the 'pouring out' of the Spirit seem to me in Scripture to refer to one-off things that are ours in Christ, so I don't pray for these on a daily basis (and still wince a bit when others pray for these things e.g. before our corporate worship, but that's the pedant in me). But I do pray continually for the 'filling' and 'supply' of the Spirit.
I think this is fairly close to Grudem's view... I look forward to hearing Terry Virgo's thoughts!
Dave
Great comment Dave. I really resonate with Stott on filling being present continuous plural imperative. I also think that we have the Spirit at conversion because if anyone doesn't have the Spirit of Christ they don't belong to Christ. The main issue seems to me to be empowering, and whether it is always (at least in its initial instance) co-terminal with conversion. I think the debate is less important than it used to be because few people are claiming scatty things that need to be resisted for the health of the church. Part of me therefore wants to say I really don't mind what the answer is, one way or the other.
Except, with you, I want to call things properly so that we seek God properly. The "once-off at conversion only" position makes me hesitant for the following reason. It allowed me for years to not actively seek the work of the Spirit in my life, as per the imperative in 1 Cor 12:31 and 1 Cor 14:1. After all if one has it all at conversion, what is there to seek? (At the same time I always had a big nagging feeling in my mind that my experience of the Lord was not what it should be and a long way short of the NT picture).
In my particular case I used the position to legitimise an anti-experiential rationalism that didn't expect God to work (except in conversion). And it would be true to say that I didn't hunger for God as I should as a result.
I haven't read Chris Green's book for a while and probably should again. I used to use the repetitions in Acts as markers for what is unique and what is normative very regularly myself. But again I can say I used to do so to justify not applying some parts, or applying selectively/unevenly. And, in my case (not Chris'), I think that the theology was dictated by (lack of) experience and the hermenuetic principle followed on to (un)helpfully allow me to read the text according to what I already thought. Now of course that doesn't mean I was wrong (possibly an interesting example of reaching a correct conclusion by a wrong route?), but it does mean that when I spot myself doing that we have to go back to first principles and question whether the received wisdom in the normative-formative debate is correct.
As I alluded in an earlier post I am starting to suspect that it is a category mistake, because it forces us to conclude that formative and normative are necessarily mutually exclusive. And whatever conclusion we come to on specific instances, we can't conclude that from the scripture and still get left with anything by way of contemporary experience of God at all.
I'm grateful for the interaction, especially the Colossians/Ephesians contrast. But I am not sure that Colossians is as clear that we have it all now as you suggest. In 1:28-29 Paul labours and struggles to present everyone mature, and it is talking about believers in the church. Similarly in 2:2 his purpose in working is that believers may know full riches of understanding, which is Christ. 2:6 talks about continuing to be built and strengthened. None of which is to say they don't have Christ or Christ has not blessed in abundance. Chapter 3 sounds almost like Peter when he says "if you possess these things in increasing measure it will prevent you becoming unproductive."
Glad to have piqued your interest today. Most of all I hope and pray as I write that it prompted you to pray, express your love to Him and seek him through the day. Blessings