The Ongoing Ministry of Jesus: The Baptism with the Holy Spirit

By Daniel Kreller

Jesus did not baptize anyone with the Holy Spirit during his ministry on earth. It was only after his death, resurrection, and ascension back to his Father, that he began this ongoing ministry from heaven. This book discusses the importance of Spirit Baptism, the purposes for which the Spirit is given, and the various manifestations of the Spirit-the gifts and fruits of the Spirit.

For this book I draw upon my own experience of Spirit baptism, and my years of experience with the manifestations of the gifts and fruits of the Spirit while serving in the ordained ministry. I discuss such ministry gifts as wisdom, knowledge, prophecy, faith, healing, miracles, tongues, discernment of spirits, and deliverance. I also discuss such character gifts as love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, gentleness, faithfulness, kindness, self-control, and forgiveness. I clarify that though Jesus did not meet the Messianic expectations of many of his contemporaries, his ministry of Spirit baptism does fulfill prophetic expectation and is an essential ministry for establishing the Kingdom of God on earth. Ultimately, the role of the Spirit is to unite us to Jesus and the Father, and through them to one another. The Spirit confirms to us that we are children of the heavenly Father.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Daniel Kreller
• Release date: Apr 30, 2020
• ISBN: 9780463786109

Daniel Kreller

The son of a Baptist minister, I was ordained in the Episcopal Church in 1977. I studied for the ministry at Princeton, General, and Union Seminaries. I served as a parish priest for 40 years. I have a particular interest in the healing ministry and the Jewish roots of Christianity. I am married and have a grown son and daughter.

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The Ongoing Ministry of Jesus

The Baptism With the Holy Spirit

The Rev. Daniel W. Kreller

Published by Daniel W. Kreller at Smashwords

Copyright 2020 Daniel W. Kreller

All rights reserved.

Dedicated to Francis and Judith MacNutt

Table of Contents

A Challenge to the Reader

Foreword

Jesus Was Baptized with the Holy Spirit

The Paradigm of Jesus’ Baptism with the Holy Spirit

United to Jesus

The Witness of John the Baptist to Jesus

The Real Messiah?

Does God Have a Son?

Jesus’ Own Witness to His Role as the Spirit Baptizer

Jesus Explained the Work of the Holy Spirit

What the Resurrection Appearances of Jesus Reveal About the Holy Spirit

The Holy Spirit Brings the Grace of Forgiveness

The Holy Spirit Illumines the Scriptures

The Holy Spirit Empowers Our Witness to the World

The Holy Spirit Facilitates the Formation of God's Kingdom

A New Teaching

A New Ritual

A New Holy Day

The Risen Jesus’ Agenda

The First Pentecost After the Ascension

The Ministry Gifts: Tongues

Prophecy

Healing

Discernment of Spirits

Wisdom and Knowledge

Faith and Miracles

Character Gifts: Freedom

Love, Joy, and Peace

Patience, Kindness, Generosity

Faithfulness, Gentleness, Self-Control

Accessing the Gifts and Fruits of the Spirit

III. The Bride and the Body

Afterword

Cover image

About the author

A Challenge to the Reader

Jesus taught that there is one sin that cannot be forgiven. His teaching on the unpardonable sin, as it has come to be called, is recorded in the Gospels of Mathew, Mark, and Luke. Mathew’s version reads, Therefore, I tell you, people will be forgiven every sin and blasphemy, but blasphemy against the Spirit will not be forgiven. Whoever speaks a word against the Son of Man will be forgiven, but whoever speaks against the Holy Spirit will not be forgiven, either in this age or the age to come (Matthew 12:31,32).

Why is it all manner of sins can and will be forgiven but not this one? A device that the Rabbis use helps me to understand the reason. The Rabbis speak truly when they declare that Yahweh God has life in himself and gives life to all. To illustrate this, the Rabbis say the four consonants, YHWH, in the Divine Name, Yahweh, stand for the gift that God desires to give, the hand of God that holds the gift, the arm of God that extends the gift, and our hand into which God places the gift. What is the gift that God desires to give? The gift is life itself. But there is no life without the Spirit, which is the very life-giving breath of God. One can readily deduce this from the second creation account where Yahweh formed Adam out of the dust of the ground. Yahweh then breathed into him the breath of life and Adam became a living being (Genesis 2:7). When God grants life, he does so by gifting his Spirit to those that he is calling forth to life. Thus, the gift that Yahweh holds in is hand is the Holy Spirit, whom the Nicene Creed aptly names, the Lord, the giver of life.

In his teaching on the unpardonable sin, Jesus was simply acknowledging the truth that there is no life without the Spirit, and that if one refuses the offer of the gift of the Spirit, he or she is refusing life itself. Not only that—in refusing the gift, one is rejecting the giver of the gift, Yahweh God, whose great desire is to gift us with his life. Then, the case is that Yahweh is holding the gift of the Spirit in his hand hoping to place it into our hand, but if we close our hand to the gift, we place ourselves in a perilous position. We cut ourselves off from life and its source in God. If we deliberately and persistently do so, we have willfully chosen death over life.

In the Christian view, Jesus is the arm of God that extends the gift of the Spirit to us. He is the one Yahweh God, whom Jesus calls the Father, has anointed and appointed to give a further measure of the Spirit. He is the Spirit baptizer. One can be forgiven for not knowing this. When as the Son of Man he lived and died as one of us, it could well seem that he had come and gone like the rest of us. But if one is blessed to be drawn to him and has come to understand that he rose and ascended back to the Father to begin his ministry of pouring out the Holy Spirit upon those that believe in him, well, then, one can repent and be forgiven of their ignorance and error that, previously, they had taken no account of him.

So, I challenge each reader, to keep an open hand, an open heart, an open mind. God desires to gift you with his Spirit. What follows is my feeble attempt to describe what I know and understand of this gift as I have experienced it in my life.

Foreword

I will not reproach anyone who is ignorant of the ongoing ministry of Jesus. I once was, too. My childhood religious instruction had given me the impression that the ministry of Jesus ended with his death upon a cross. His sacrificial death opened the way of salvation for all who believe in him. Having accomplished that, his work on earth was done and, by virtue of his resurrection and ascension, he retuned triumphant to his Father in heaven. One day, at a time determined by his Father, he will come again to gather up all that believe in him, both the living and the dead, and usher them into his everlasting kingdom.

As I grew out of childhood I began to wonder if what I had been taught, and had come to believe, was true. Not that I wondered if it was false, rather, I wondered if there was more to the truth. I was baptized in water and made my profession of faith in Jesus at 13 years of age, on the cusp of adolescence. Having done that, my eternal future was secure and I could rest easy. But what of my immediate future, the years I would spend in this life until I died, or Jesus came again? At 13, I was just beginning to contemplate how I would accomplish what Freud called the two great tasks of life—love and work. As I began to look toward my future in this world, I realized I was looking into a void, into the unknown. I didn’t know whom I would love or what I would do to fill my days. That caused me more anxiety than attaining life in the World to Come!

Before adolescence I wasn’t aware of the void of time. Like all children I still dwelt in the reverie of the moment, whether it was catching fireflies in a jar on a summer’s eve, or pressing my thumb into the frost on the windows of our home on a cold winter’s night. Children live in eternity, or some semblance of it, with no urgency to make the most of their days. But, then, we are forced by virtue of our maturation to leave eternity, to leave paradise, and grow up.

Not every child makes that transition. I know of a young man, for example, who took his own life near the end of his first year in college. He had accomplished a lot by that time. He was an honor student, an Eagle Scout, and so on—all a parent could hope for. The note he left behind, before he cast himself off a parking garage on his college campus, stated that he had accomplished all he desired and wanted to see what was next. Apparently, he wanted to leap from the semblance of eternity that is childhood to the real eternity beyond this life, without going through the struggle to live in this world and fill its void.

What was curious to me about his act is that the church in which he was raised believes taking one’s own life is a grave sin, one that could be considered a mortal sin, if done with full knowledge and deliberate consent. His body was laid to rest in the church’s cemetery so it was presumed that he was not fully knowledgeable when he committed the act. At the burial mass his life was commended to God’s infinite mercy, trusting that the young man’s soul was not lost to eternity. I do not believe his soul is lost, but I do wish, before he acted, he had found the rest for his soul that I have found. I do wish he had understood that Jesus didn’t die for him just so he could be saved from sin, even the grave sin of taking his own life. Jesus died to give him more life, and not just in the next world, but here and now in this present world. Jesus gives this life by baptizing those that believe in him with the Holy Spirit, the Lord and giver of life, as the Nicene Creed names him. The baptism with the Holy Spirit is Jesus’ ongoing ministry, the one he began when he rose and ascended back to the Father and continues until the day he comes again.

I do believe if the young man had received the baptism with the Holy Spirit, and experienced its blessing, he would have been in a very different frame of mind and not even contemplated doing what he did. But, when I was his age, I didn’t yet know of the baptism with the Holy Spirit either. Not until my third decade of life, did I experience it, and by that time I was an ordained priest in the Episcopal Church. What led me to it was the witness of others that had received the baptism, and my own awareness that there was more to the spiritual life than what I had experienced thus far. As Tommy Tyson, a Methodist evangelist I knew, liked to frame the question of the baptism with the Spirit, Has what happened to the first disciples at Pentecost happened to you? Until I received the baptism, I could only answer that question, No it hadn’t. But after I received it, I could attest, Yes, it had.

My purpose in writing is to share from my own experience and understanding what the Baptism with the Spirit is, why it should be desired, and how to receive it. The young man that took his life wrote that he felt fulfilled and wanted to see what was next. In the New Testament’s understanding, what comes next after Jesus opened up a way of salvation through his death, resurrection, and ascension, is the baptism with the Holy Spirit. Jesus said as much to his disciples on the evening of own death when he declared, Nevertheless I tell you the truth: it is to your advantage that I go away, for if I do not go away, the Helper (the Holy Spirit) will not come to you; but if I go, I will send him to you (John 16:7). Notice Jesus refers to the Holy Spirit as the Helper. The Spirit helps us with those tasks we undertake in life—love and work. Freud, being an atheist, conceived of these tasks in a secular way. But theists, like myself, recognize they are spiritual tasks. How much better can they be performed if we have the help of the Helper sent by Jesus to do so? The Helper, if the young man had known him, would not have helped him die, rather, he would have helped him live, and to live life fully.

* * * * *

Jesus Was Baptized with the Holy Spirit

I mentioned in the Foreword that the Methodist evangelist Tommy Tyson addressed the issue of the baptism with the Holy Spirit with the question, Has what happened to the first disciples at Pentecost happened to you?

Pentecost corresponds to the Jewish festival of Shavuot that follows Passover. Passover is the celebration of the deliverance of the people of Israel from Egypt where they had been subjected to bondage. God, whose Name is Yahweh, led the people of Israel out from Egypt into the wilderness to Mount Sinai where he entered into a covenant with them. Yahweh promised to be their God, and the people promised to serve Yahweh. The terms of their service were laid out in the Torah (the Teaching) that Yahweh gave to Israel through Moses. The whole of the Torah can be summarized in the two great teachings to Love Yahweh your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your strength (Deuteronomy 6:5) and to Love your neighbor as yourself (Leviticus 19:18). Shavuot is the festival that commemorates the covenant between Yahweh and Israel. Since Israel arrived at Mount Sinai 50 days after their exodus from Egypt, it is also referred to as Pentecost, the Greek word for fiftieth.

Both Passover and Shavuot are pilgrim festivals, meaning, in the days of the Temple, men (and women if they chose to do so) would travel to Jerusalem to appear before Yahweh. Just as Yahweh graced Israel with his presence at Sinai, so he condescended to meet the people in his holy Temple. It was during a Passover festival that Jesus died by crucifixion in Jerusalem, was buried, and rose again from the dead. Luke reports in his Acts of the Apostles that on the 40th day after his resurrection, Jesus ascended back to the Father in heaven. He ascended from the Mount of Olives, which is east of Jerusalem and overlooks the Temple. His disciples had gathered to witness his ascension and then remained in Jerusalem the 10 days until Pentecost (Acts 1:1-14). Luke then reports, When the day of Pentecost had come, they were all together in one place. And suddenly from heaven there came a sound like the rush of a violent wind, and it filled the entire house where they were sitting. Divided tongues, as of fire, appeared among them, and a tongue rested on each of them. All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other languages, as the Spirit gave them utterance (Acts 2:1-4). Recall in the Foreword, I noted that Jesus referred to the Holy Spirit as the Helper. This is what we can see in Luke’s report of that day. The Helper had come to be in and with the disciples to enable them through his power to say and do things they could not do on their own. The rest of the Acts of the Apostles records some of the extraordinary things the disciples were able to do once the Helper had come.

This is what Tommy Tyson meant by asking the question, has this happened to you? He did not mean, have you witnessed such manifestations of the Spirit as the sound of a rushing wind (as in the beginning of creation, Genesis 1:2), or divided tongues of fire that burn but do not consume (as in the burning bush through which Moses encountered Yahweh, Exodus 3:2)? He meant, have you experienced the coming of the Helper to be in you and with you? He meant, has the presence of the Helper enabled you to do things you were unable to do without his help? It is significant that the Helper came at Shavuot, the festival of the covenant. One thing is clear from the Hebrew Scriptures. While Yahweh remained faithful to the terms of the covenant given at Sinai, Israel did not. The people were not able to remain true in their love for Yahweh, or in their love for one another. Though they knew the teachings, they were not able to observe them. They needed help. They needed the Helper. When the Spirit came at Pentecost, the disciples of Jesus were not given new teachings per se, like Moses received at Sinai, rather they were given the help needed to practice what Moses taught and Jesus reaffirmed.

We all need help, even Jesus. And that is why, when he was around 30 years of age, and about to begin his public ministry, Jesus sought out his cousin, John, and was baptized by him in water, with full immersion, as I was at 13 years of age. Water baptism, as John was practicing it, was for repentance. Repentance simply means to turn around. What John was inviting people to do, was turn around from living their lives with their backs to God, thus ignoring him, and face God in order to seek his help. When Jesus came to his cousin for this water baptism, John recognized that repentance wasn’t necessary in his case. Jesus had never turned his back upon God. But Jesus insisted that they proceed. Why? Because Jesus was seeking the other baptism, call it the second baptism, the baptism with the Holy Spirit. He knew he needed the Helper to be with him if he was going to accomplish what God, the Father, had destined him to do. Each of the four Gospels in the Christian Scriptures give an account of Jesus’ baptisms by water and the Spirit which is testimony to their importance (Matthew 3:11-17, Mark 1:1-11, Luke 3:1-22, and John 1:19-34). Their testimony is consistent. When Jesus came up out of the waters of the Jordan River, the Spirit of God descended from heaven and remained with him. It was the Spirit, then, that empowered Jesus as he undertook his ministry. For even though he was, in the Christian view, the Divine Son of God, he had given up his power and prerogatives to live and die as one of us, as a prayer in my tradition states it (The Book of Common Prayer, page 362; see also Ephesians 2:5-8). As one of us, even Jesus needed the help of the Helper. Jesus and the Helper did extraordinary things together. Everyone recognized this, including one of the Jewish ruling elders, a man named Nicodemus, who came to Jesus by night and said to him, Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher come from God; for no one can do these signs you do apart from the presence of God (John 3:2). The presence of God was with Jesus in the person of the Helper.

We could, therefore, take Tommy Tyson’s question about experiencing what happened to the disciples back one step and ask, Has what happened to Jesus at his water baptism happened to you? For, before the disciples received the baptism with the Holy Spirit, Jesus did too, and it is clear he believed it is something everyone needs to experience. This is revealed in the rest of the conversation he had with Nicodemus that centered on Spirit baptism. Jesus referred to Spirit baptism as being born a second time, from above. Here is part of what Jesus said to Nicodemus: Amen, amen, I tell you, no one can see the kingdom of heaven without being born from above…Amen, amen, I tell you no one can enter the kingdom of God without being born of water and Spirit. What is born of the flesh is flesh, and what is born of the Spirit is spirit. Do not be astonished that I said to you, ‘You must be born from above.’ The wind blows where it chooses, and you hear the sound of it, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit (John 3:3,5-10). It is actually the Rabbis that give us a simple way of understanding Jesus’ meaning. They say wherever the King is there is the Kingdom. The Kingdom is not a place, so much as a person, the person of the King. Thus, Jesus was talking with Nicodemus about experiencing the presence of God, the King. Jesus explained, it is through the Spirit, that is, through Spirit baptism, that the experience of God’s presence is granted. And when it is granted, the experience for the one who receives it is like birth. Through it one is ushered into another world, a spiritual world in which one is awakened to presence of God.

The first birth, as Jesus pointed out to Nicodemus, is of the flesh. He meant by that, our birth was the result of the union of our parents that are from below, from this world. Nicodemus understood his meaning for he was puzzled how there could be a second birth without entering again the womb of one’s mother. This raises an interesting question. In the Christian view, Jesus did not have a human father but he did have a human mother, Mary, who conceived him by the help of the Holy Spirit. Was Jesus ever of the flesh, then, if the Helper helped Mary conceive without the help of a man? Here again the Rabbis help us understand these things. They say there are three partners in every conception: the human parents and the Divine parent. The human parents contribute the flesh, the Divine parent contributes the spirit. The flesh is the body of the person, the spirit is the soul. Both are necessary since each person as a living being is a composite of body and soul. Jesus was no different since he had a body from his mother and a soul from God. What was different is that Mary was enabled by the Helper to do what otherwise she could not do on her own. But that is precisely the experience of those who are baptized with the Holy Spirit. The Helper comes to them and enables them to do what they could not do without his help.

* * * * *

The Paradigm of Jesus’ Baptism with the Holy Spirit

Since Jesus too, was baptized with the Holy Spirit, it is instructive to examine the report of what he experienced. In Matthew’s account, which is similar to the other Gospel writers, he says, And when Jesus was baptized, just as he came up from the water, suddenly the heavens were opened to him and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and alighting on him. And a voice from heaven said, ‘This is my Son, the Beloved, with whom I am well pleased’ (Mathew 3:16,17). Three things happened. The heavens opened. The Spirit descended and remained upon Jesus. The voice (of God, the Father) identified Jesus as the Son and lovingly affirmed him. Let me comment on these three things, each in turn.

The heavens opened. This indicates God is about to do something or communicate something. It could be positive or negative—an act or word of mercy or judgment. The Apostle John, in his Book of Revelation, reports a striking example of this. He writes, After this I looked, and there in heaven a door stood open! And the first voice, which I heard speaking to me like a trumpet, said, ‘Come up here, and I will show you what must take place after this’ (Revelation 4:1). After hearing the voice, John was transported by the Spirit through the door into heaven. There he was granted a vision of how God’s mercy and judgment will play out over time, culminating in the creation of a new heaven and earth. This new creation is a triumph of God’s mercy over judgment, such that heaven and earth are joined. God communicated to John through a vision but he often communicates through dreams.

I once was given a dream that confirmed the essence of what John saw. In the dream I saw two large sheets of cloth stretched out into space. One sheet was blue and the other green. Each was rippling as if a gentle wind was blowing. I then saw a hand, and in the hand a needled and thread. The hand was neatly and methodically stitching together the two sheets. Each downward stroke through the blue sheet and each upward stroke through the green drew the two together. I looked more closely and saw that the needle was in the shape of a cross and the thread was red. The meaning became clear. The blue sheet represented heaven and the green sheet earth. The hand is God’s and through Jesus’ blood, shed in his merciful sacrifice upon the cross, heaven and earth are being joined. Note that Matthew does not say in his account of Jesus’ baptism, that after the Spirit came in the form of a dove the heavens closed. The implication is that when the Spirit comes, the heavens remain open, thus, communication and action initiated by God continues.

The Spirit descended and remained upon Jesus. This was a wholly positive experience for Jesus. The Spirit was sent to bless Jesus and help him throughout his ministry. The reason we know it was positive is because the Spirit descended in the form of a dove and alighted on him. The dove is not a bird of prey. In Biblical imagery, birds of prey are associated with judgment. A bird like the dove is associated with the end of judgment, reconciliation, peace, and renewal. Noah for instance, sent out a dove from the ark to discern if the floods had receded sufficiently for him, his family, and the animals he rescued to leave the ark and repopulate the earth (Genesis 8:6-12). The Spirit brought a profound sense of God’s presence to Jesus, and with that presence, God’s peace. It is true that God’s presence is everywhere and at every moment God’s Spirit is sustaining all things. But it is also true that God makes his presence available in very tangible ways. The purpose of the Temple in Jerusalem, for example, was to be the place where God is present to his people, where his Name dwelt. After his Spirit baptism, Jesus referred to himself as, this temple (John 2:19). He knew God’s presence resided in and with him and that brought him to peace. The Hebrew word for peace, shalom, means total wellbeing at all levels—body, heart, mind, soul, and spirit. If ever there was one who lived life in such peace and wellbeing, it was Jesus.

I too, can testify to such peace. Even before I was baptized with the Spirit, I had a foretaste of it that contributed greatly to my wellbeing. In my first year of ordained ministry I was troubled, wondering if I had made a mistake by becoming a priest. One afternoon I lay down to nap, which is something I never do, but I needed to escape my troubles. I was halfway between sleeping and waking when I saw a dove hovering above me. It was much larger than an actual dove and it did not alight upon me, merely hover in the same position for some time. During that time, I could not move or speak, for my limbs felt heavy and impossible to lift and my mouth was shut up. The dove did not fly away, the image simply left, and when it did, I could move again and speak. The effect it left upon me was a sense of profound peace. In that peace, I spent the next 40 years in ministry until my recent retirement.

The voice (of God, the Father) identified Jesus as the Son and lovingly affirmed him. One could well ask why did Jesus need this affirmation? Didn’t he already know he was the Divine Son of God? But remember Jesus had given up his Divine prerogatives to live among us. For that reason alone, I would think he would have needed the affirmation of his heavenly Father to reassure him. Although truthfully, I do believe that even in his former exalted state the Father continually affirmed Jesus as his beloved. I, a mere mortal, strive to do the same with my two children. They never get enough of it because, as Paul said, love never ends, and affirmation is the essence of love (1 Corinthians 13:8). We see that in the first creation account when at the end of each day of creating, God affirmed what he had made, by pronouncing it good, and on the last day affirming the whole of creation by declaring it very good (Genesis 1:1-31). It is important to note that Jesus received this affirmation from the Father before he began his ministry. It wasn’t an evaluation of his performance—it was the validation of his person. This validation was the sure foundation upon which his ministry was built. Ideally, human parents do not love their children after the fact, after thy have proven their worth. Ideally, they love them because they are their children. That is what we see here in God’s verbal affirmation of Jesus. Of course, human parents can fail their children in this regard and it is truly a significant step spiritually if one can forgive the failings of human parents and receive the affirmation of the Divine parent.

I can illustrate this from my own life. When I was in seminary, I took a class on dream interpretation. We were required to record our dreams and one I had at that time revealed the emotional tone of my childhood. In the dream I was young child standing behind the curtain on the stage of a large theater. When the curtain parted I would step out into the spotlight to perform. When I stepped out the theater was empty. There was no audience, thus, no affirmation. Many years later I received prayer by two members of a healing prayer team. As they prayed, I went back to that scene. This time it was transformed, for when I stepped out into the spotlight the theater was full. In the audience sat God the Father, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit in the center orchestra seats. All of the rest of the seats in the theater, even up to the fifth balcony, were filled with angels. Now that is an audience! That is affirmation!

As the paradigm of Spirit baptism, everything Jesus experienced by it we, too, are meant to experience. The heavens open to us. The presence of God comes to us and remains with us bringing us peace. We are affirmed as beloved children of the Heavenly Father.

* * * * *

United to Jesus

How can I be so confident that we are meant to experience the very same things Jesus experienced by baptism with the Holy Spirit? I can be confident because on the evening of his death Jesus prayed to the Father that we might be united to him, and the Father, and thus also, to one another. He prayed, I ask not only on behalf of these, but also on behalf of those who will believe in me through their word, that they all may be one. As you, Father, are in me and I am in you, may they also be in us, so that the world may believe that you have sent me. The glory that you have given me I have given them, so that they may one as we are one, I in them and you in me, that they may become completely one, so that the world may know that you have sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me (John 17:20-23). The key phrase here is where Jesus speaks of his disciples as having the same glory that was given to him by the Father. To give someone glory is to give weight to that person. So, when Jesus speaks of being given glory, he is speaking of the weighty thing the father did by sending the Holy Spirit to be with him and affirming him as the Son. Holy Spirit baptism is the glory the Father gave to him. Likewise, when Jesus gives glory to his disciples, he does so in and through the same Holy Spirit baptism.

When Jesus prayed this prayer on the evening of his death, he had not yet given this glory to his disciples for he had not yet died, rose, or ascended. Only after his ascension back to the Father did Jesus give the glory of Spirit baptism to his disciples. But his intent was to do so, as he made plain by his earlier remarks to the disciples that evening. He had told the disciples that he was going from them and that it was actually better if he did because then he would send the Holy Spirit, the Helper, to be with them (John 16:7). He said they would mourn when he left them, but only for a little while, because he would return to them. When he returned the world would not be able to see me but the disciples would and because he lives they also would live. (John 14:19) At that time the disciples could not grasp what he meant, even though he explained that, Those who love me will keep my word, and my Father will love them, and we will come to them and make our home with them (John 14:23). When, however, they experienced the baptism with the Holy Spirit, then they understood. For just as the Spirit brought the abiding presence of God to Jesus at his baptism, so the Spirit brings the abiding presence of the Father and Jesus to those that are baptized into him and receive Spirit baptism through him.

That evening Jesus gave the disciples an analogy that would help them understand these things once they had experienced the baptism with the Spirit. It is the analogy of the vine and the branch. Jesus said to his disciples, I am the vine, and my Father is the vine grower. He removes every branch in me that bears no fruit. Every branch that bears fruit he prunes to make it bear more fruit. You have already been cleansed by the word I have spoken to you. Abide in me as I abide in you. Just as the branch cannot bear fruit by itself unless it abides in the vine, neither can you unless you abide in me. I am the vine you are the branches. Those who abide in me and I in them bear much fruit, because apart from me you can do nothing. Whoever does not abide in me is thrown away like a branch and withers; such branches are gathered, thrown into the fire, and burned. If you abide in me, and my words abide in you, ask for whatever you wish, and it will be done for you. My Father is glorified by this, that you bear much fruit and become my disciples. As the Father has loved me, so I have loved you; abide in my love. If you keep my commandments you will abide in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commandments and abide in his love. I have said these things to you so that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be complete (John 15:1-11).

We can understand the purpose of water baptism and Spirit baptism through this analogy. When one professes faith in Jesus, the vine, he or she is joined to him through the verbal confession of faith and baptism in water. Like a branch, that one is now attached to the vine. Once attached, the life that is flowing through the vine can flow into the branch enabling it to bear fruit. Though the Holy Spirit is not named in the analogy, given the context, it is obvious that it is the Spirit that flows out from Jesus into the disciple, as the lifegiving sap flows from the vine into the branch. This flowing out of the Holy Spirit into the disciples is the experience of baptism with the Spirit. God the Father is named as the vinedresser in the analogy and he tends to the vine and the branches in order that together they bear much fruit. I also think of the Father as the root of the vine because the Holy Spirit is given from the Father through Jesus to those that believe in him, just as the sap flows from the root through the vine into the branches.

Paul in his letter to the Romans writes about water baptism and Spirit baptism, further clarifying how believers are united to Jesus. He says, Do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death, so that just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, so we too might walk in newness of life. For if we have been united with him in a death like his, we will certainly be united with him in a resurrection like his. We know that our old self was crucified with him so that the body of sin might be destroyed, and we might no longer be enslaved to sin. For whoever has died is freed from sin. But if we have died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with him. We know that Christ, being raised from the dead, will never die again; death no longer has dominion over him. The death he died, he died to sin, once for all; but the life he lives, he lives to God. So also, you must consider yourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Jesus Christ (Romans 6:3-11).

It might seem improbable that in order to attain the goal of sharing in Jesus’ life, we begin by sharing in his death. The analogy of the vine and branch helps us understand why this is so. In order to attach a branch to a vine, the vinedresser must cut both. First, a wound is opened in the vine. Since Jesus is the vine, this wounding relates to his sacrificial death, which was ordained by his Father, the vinedresser. Second, the end of the branch is cut to fit the wound of the vine. This wounding relates to the water baptism of those that profess faith in Jesus. As Paul notes this is a baptism into his death. Third, the glory of the Father, meaning the Holy Spirit, heals these wounds and gives life. In Jesus’ case, the Holy Spirit resurrected Jesus to immortal life with the Father. In the case of those baptized into Jesus’ death, the Holy Spirit raises them to a new life of grace in which they are dead to sin but alive to God. This raising to new life by the Holy Spirit is the experience of the baptism with the Holy Spirit. The immediate effect for the baptized is that they begin and continue to bear fruit in this life. One of those fruits is the certain hope, that though we die, we will one-day share in Jesus’ resurrection and the life immortal. Only the Holy Spirit can inspire such hope.

That we are meant to experience what Jesus experienced as we are united to him has been confirmed to me in practice. During the course of my ministry I have prayed with many people about the hurts and traumas they have experienced. I know there is nothing I can do to help them heal, but Jesus can. So, when I pray, I ask the person to go back into a particular scene and invite Jesus into it to see and hear what he might say or do. As they are doing that, I lay my hands on them and pray in the Spirit, in tongues. I have found without fail that people are able to see Jesus as he promised the disciples they would. When they do, Jesus minsters to them in ways that bring healing. For instance, one man I prayed with was suffering from severe depression. He had told me that as a young child the large cross on the wall behind the altar in his Lutheran Church made a strong impression on him for it spoke of suffering. Jesus suffered and this man too, as a child, knew suffering. His childhood image of God was of Jesus dead upon the cross. When we prayed, I invited him to go back into that scene of the cross. He did and reported that the scene was dark and Jesus was dead. He approached the cross and stood about three feet away. Then, he saw the chest of Jesus split open and a dove came out and ascended. The man said this was Jesus’ spirit. The scene brightened and now there were many people standing before the cross. He went up to the cross and kissed the feet of Jesus’ body and tears flowed from the man’s eyes, spontaneously. (This was unusual for he said he doesn’t cry, or if he begins to, it immediately stops.) A path opened for him in the crowd and he began to walk back to town telling people along the way what he had