More About the Holy Spirit Today we will continue with a few more points about the Holy Spirit.
The gift of the Holy Spirit arrived during the celebration of the Pentecost. This occurred after the death and resurrection of Jesus. This event is often now referred to as the founding, or the birth of the Christian church.
Acts 2:1 When the day of Pentecost came, they were all together in one place. 2 Suddenly a sound like the blowing of a violent wind came from heaven and filled the whole house where they were sitting. 3 They saw what seemed to be tongues of fire that separated and came to rest on each of them. 4 All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other tongues as the Spirit enabled them.
This wasn’t the first appearance of the Holy Spirit. Work of God’s Holy Spirit was apparent in many Old Testament events. When Jesus was about thirty years of age, He was baptized. At that event in his life, we know that the same Spirit descended upon Him in the form of a dove.
Mt 3:16 As soon as Jesus was baptized, he went up out of the water. At that moment heaven was opened, and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and lighting on him.
The special event described in Acts 2 was like the special baptism with the Spirit of Christ’s new church, just as Jesus had promised.
Where does the Holy Spirit dwell? Within us…
1 Cor. 3:16 Don’t you know that you yourselves are God’s temple and that God’s Spirit lives in you?
Rom 8:9 You, however, are controlled not by the sinful nature but by the Spirit, if the Spirit of God lives in you. And if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he does not belong to Christ.
Both of these books of the New Testament are letter of instruction sent by the Apostle Paul to these churches. His instructions remain very valuable for us today. They are like source books with answers to church questions and problems in the past and today.
In many ways Paul is providing reminders of basics, such as this – that when we receive Christ into our lives we have God’s Holy Spirit within us. His Spirit carries out the purposes of God and applies the fruits of Christ's redemptive mission to the lives of believers.
When does a person now receive the gift of the Holy Spirit? When accepting Christ? At baptism? This seems to be a frequent question. Many people connect this wonderful event with baptism. I think this is because Christ commanded us that part of the process of bringing new believers to him (the Great Commission) involves baptism in the name of the Holy Spirit as well as the Father and the Son.
Mat. 28:19 Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20 and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”
However, we know that this was not always the case. An excellent example was when new gentile believers received the Holy Spirit as Peter was witnessing to them, before baptism. In fact, it amazed the believers that accompanied Peter.
Ac 10:44 While Peter was still speaking these words, the Holy Spirit came on all who heard the message. 45 The circumcised believers who had come with Peter were astonished that the gift of the Holy Spirit had been poured out even on the Gentiles.
With this evidence, it seems that receiving the Holy Spirit is linked to that point when a person accepts Christ and believes.
Receiving the Holy Spirit for some people is a profound experience, but for others it is more subtle, not like the “tongues of fire” mentioned above in Acts 2 on that day of Pentecost.
But you can be confident, when you accepted Christ as your Lord, you also received the Holy Spirit as Jesus promised.
For many of us, it simply takes some time for us to learn how to recognize the promptings and guidance of the Spirit in our lives. That is an exciting part of our Christian journey. We will talk more about that in the future.
We have mentioned baptism in this post, so next time we will discuss scriptures related to baptism.
Blessings,
Larry | 
