Jesus Driven Ministry (eBook)

2: EMPOWERED BY THE SPIRIT

THE FIRST ACT OF Jesus’ ministry recorded by Mark shows him identifying with the people. The second shows him receiving an anointing by the Spirit for his work. Incarnation and anointing are both vital aspects of Christian service. One shows how we must be committed to people, while the other shows how we must derive our strength from God. Sometimes people recognized as “Spirit-filled” are insensitive to culture and to human need, and their ministries suffer as a result. But a more serious problem is when people who wisely identify with people and adopt the right methods are nevertheless not spiritually powerful because they rely more on their methods than on the Spirit’s power.

POWER FOR JESUS’MINISTRY

Mark says that after Jesus’ baptism, “when he came up out of the water, immediately he saw the heavens opening and the Spirit descending on him like a dove” (Mark 1:10). The verb translated “opening” (schizö) means to “split, tear, separate or divide.”1 Mark may have been alluding here to Isaiah 64:1: “Oh that you would rend the heavens and come down.” That chapter in Isaiah is an urgent plea to God to save Israel. If Mark has this passage in mind, then he would be implying that God is acting to save his people by sending the Messiah. Now God is anointing this Messiah by the descent of the Holy Spirit.

The Spirit is said to descend “like a dove.” We cannot be sure whether Mark is thinking about the shape of the descending Spirit or the manner in which the Spirit descended. Neither can we be sure of what Mark intends to convey by the dove metaphor, though many proposals are made today. There is some evidence, however, that the dove was associated with the Spirit of God in first-century Judaism.2

This incident also reminds us of Isaiah 61:1: “The Spirit of the Lord GOD is upon me, because the LORD has anointed me to bring good news to the poor.” This is the passage that Jesus quotes a few days later as he inaugurates his ministry in Nazareth (Luke 4:18-19). After quoting a longer portion of this text, Jesus commented, “Today this Scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing” (Luke 4:21).

Shortly after recording the descent of the Spirit, Luke is careful to point out twice that Jesus was proceeding in the Spirit’s anointing. Luke writes that soon after his baptism “Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan and was led by the Spirit in the wilderness” (Luke 4:1). Then after describing the temptation, he records that “Jesus returned in the power of the Spirit to Galilee” (Luke 4:14). Matthew also uses a passage from Isaiah to make a connection between the ministry of Jesus and anointing by the Spirit: “I will put my Spirit upon [my servant], and he will proclaim justice to the Gentiles” (Matt. 12:18, quoting Isa. 42:1). And Matthew records Jesus saying, “ . . . it is by the Spirit of God that I cast out demons” (Matt. 12:28). Clearly then the Gospels present this anointing by the Spirit as the key to Christ’s life and ministry.

BAPTISM WITH THE HOLY SPIRIT

Luke extends this principle of filling with the Spirit, which stood at the heart of Christ’s ministry, to our ministries also. He records Jesus saying that the power of the Spirit is an indispensable requirement for ministry. In Luke’s Gospel, just after giving the Great Commission, Jesus says, “And behold, I am sending the promise of my Father upon you. But stay in the city until you are clothed with power from on high” (Luke 24:49). A parallel statement in Acts indicates that the power spoken of here comes from the Spirit: “And while staying with them he ordered them not to depart from Jerusalem, but to wait for the promise of the Father, which, he said, ‘you heard from me; for John baptized with water, but you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit not many days from now’” (Acts 1:4-5). A little later Jesus says that the coming of the Spirit results in power for witness: “But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses . . .” (Acts 1:8).

It is unfortunate that there has been so much controversy over these passages. Is the baptism with the Spirit something that happens at conversion, thus initiatory, or is it a second experience of filling that takes place subse­ quent to conversion? The verb baptizö can take both meanings, depending on the context. A popular lexicon says that in Greek literature the word generally has the idea of “to put or go under water” in a variety of senses. Figuratively it could also carry the idea of soaking.3 Baptizö could take the idea of cleansing as in washing and thus refer to what accompanies repentance. Thus this word could be used for the initiation that followed repentance and purifying. The word could also take the meaning of immersion as in a flood, which gives it the idea of fullness. Here the word could be used for an experience of fullness subsequent to initiation. The context helps us decide on the meaning in the particular text in which it is used. Unfortunately the context in the places where the baptism with the Spirit occurs does not enable us to be fully sure which of the two options is meant. The passages from Luke and Acts that we looked at seem to suggest that a subsequent filling is intended because the apostles have already repented and trusted in Christ. The ways the baptism is described suggests that the focus is on filling rather than initiation. Luke 24:49 and Acts 1:8 talk of power. John the Baptist says of Jesus, “He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and with fire” (Luke 3:16). All these verses suggest that an experience of filling is intended. The events recorded in Acts 2 on the day of Pentecost when the baptism first took place bear this out.

Are the instances in Acts examples of a second experience subsequent to conversion? If so, are they normative for all believers? Should all who are baptized with the Spirit speak in tongues? Some say these things are normative, and others say that these instances in Acts were special events in the history of salvation and thus should not be regarded as normative. Today many Christians testify to new power as a result of infilling subsequent to conversion, and they identify these experiences with the baptism with the Holy Spirit. However 1 Corinthians 12:13 says, “For in one Spirit we were all baptized into one body—Jews or Greeks, slaves or free—and all were made to drink of one Spirit.” Here the context shows that the whole church is intended. Then the baptism here is initiatory, taking place when believers were initiated into the church. As we look at the evidence presented above, we should not be surprised that there is controversy on this topic!

My personal opinion is that this issue does not need to be a huge problem. Whether the baptism is initiatory or subsequent, it is clear that the way the figure of baptism is used implies fullness. For a Christian filling is the norm. It is commanded of us in Ephesians 5:18 where Paul says, “Be filled with the Spirit.” If the baptism is initiatory, then filling is implied in that baptism, and the door is opened to pursue that filling through entrance into God’s salvation. What is clear is that God intends all Christians to be filled with the Holy Spirit. So without battling over the time and way in which this happens, I believe our focus should be on ensuring that we are filled. Our lives must be lived and our service accomplished by the power of the Spirit.

Robert Coleman says:

The promise [of the fullness of the Spirit] is not a dogma to be argued, but a reality to be experienced. Nor is it a fringe benefit of a few Christian zealots, or the peculiar teaching of some evangelical churches. True, it may be called by different names and variously interpreted according to one’s doctrinal viewpoint, but the reality of the all-encompassing, Christ-possessing holiness of the Spirit is basic New Testament Christianity.4

FULLNESS AS A QUALITY OF LIFE

The filling with the Holy Spirit has two aspects in the book of Acts. One is a quality of life that should characterize all Christians. The other is an anointing for special challenges.

First, then, the fullness of the Spirit is a quality that characterizes people. When the church in Jerusalem looked for people to take over some of the administrative tasks of the church, the requirement was that they should be “men of good repute, full of the Spirit and of wisdom” (Acts 6:3). Both Stephen and Barnabas are described as filled with the Spirit (Acts 6:5; 11:24). That this is something required of all Christians is evidenced by Paul’s command to “be filled with the Spirit” (Eph. 5:18). But the fullness of the Spirit appears in Acts as a requirement for appointment to service or as a description of people. This shows that some in the church may not have been filled. These are anomalous Christians.

So this first reference to the fullness of the Spirit reminds us that this is something we must seek in our lives and expect from all Christians. This qualification must be taken into account especially when we appoint people to offices in the church. In the first church fullness of the Spirit was a requirement not only for people who preach and teach but also for those doing administrative tasks.

While the book of Acts does not have many references to the fullness of the Spirit as a condition, this subject is a major aspect of Paul’s teaching about the Spirit. Paul lays great stress on the Spirit’s work in the formation of Christian character. The most familiar passage is the one listing the fruit of the Spirit (Gal. 5:22-23). The wording relating to fullness is not...