The Holy Spirit Touch

"Did you receive the Holy Spirit when you believed?" (Acts 19:1)

"No, we have not even heard that there is a Holy Spirit." (Acts 19:2)

Have you ever been late to a movie - like 30 minutes late? Or you are watching your favorite TV show, but you miss a key episode? These "disciples" have obviously missed an "episode." They are disciples of John the Baptist, but they do not know Jesus and they definitely know nothing about Pentecost, but when Paul tells them about JESUS "immediately they were baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus. And when Paul laid his hands on them, the Holy Spirit came on them, and they began speaking in tongues and prophesying." (Acts 19:5-6) These disciples were open and receptive and hungry for God's touch.

What did they experience when the Holy Spirit came upon them?

Martyn Lloyd Jones describes it this way:

He says it is like a child walking along holding his father’s hand. All is well. The child is happy. He feels secure. His father loves him. He believes that his father loves him but there is no unusual urge to talk about this or sing about it. It is true and it is pleasant.

Then suddenly the father startles the child by reaching down and sweeping him up into his arms and hugging him tightly and kissing him on the neck and whispering, “I love you so much!” And then holding the stunned child back so that he can look into his face and saying with all his heart, “I am so glad you are mine.” Then hugging him once more with unspeakable warmth and affection. Then he puts the child down and they continue their walk.

This, Lloyd-Jones says, is what happens when a person is baptized with the Holy Spirit. A pleasant and happy walk with God is swept up into an unspeakable new level of joy and love and assurance and reality that leaves the Christian so utterly certain of the immediate reality of Jesus that he is overflowing in praise and more free and bold in witness than he ever imagined he could be.

The child is simply stunned. He doesn’t know whether to cry or shout or fall down or run, he is so happy. The fuses of love are so overloaded they almost blow out. The subconscious doubts—that he wasn’t thinking about at the time, but that pop up every now and then—are gone! And in their place is utter and indestructible assurance, so that you know that you know that you know that God is real and that Jesus lives and that you are loved, and that to be saved is the greatest thing in the world. And as you walk on down the street you can scarcely contain yourself, and you want to cry out, “My father loves me! My father loves me! O, what a great father I have! What a father! What a father!”

This filling of the Holy Spirit is something I deeply desire and desperately need. Don't you?

Others who hear the message of Jesus "become stubborn and continued in unbelief, speaking evil of the Way." (Acts 19:9) But God still pursues people. He heals those who are hurting. "And God was doing extraordinary miracles by the hands of Paul, so that even handkerchiefs or aprons that had touched his skin were carried away to the sick, and their diseases left them and the evil spirit came out of them." (Acts 19:11-12)

Did you notice who is doing the "extraordinary miracles?" It's God. It's always God. But notice it is "by the hands of Paul."

When God softens our heart and stirs our affection by filling us with the Holy Spirit the things we touch will point to God's healing and deliverance. We will extol the name of the Lord Jesus. (Acts 19:17) We will confess our sins and throw our idols into the fire. (Acts 19:18-19) We will watch "the word of the Lord continue to increase and prevail mightily." (Acts 19:20)

May we be those who pray for the continual filling of the Holy Spirit. May this kind of renewal and revival happen in us and in our community, country and world. Come Holy Spirit Come. Come Lord Jesus come.

See you Sunday,

Steven Helfrich