Quote:
Originally Posted by Charnock
Regarding initial evidence, most OPs teach that tongues are the initial evidence that one has received the Holy Ghost.
Wouldn't that mean that one receives the gift prior to speaking in tongues?
If so, could a person be filled with the Holy Ghost for years prior to speaking in tongues?
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This may or may not be related at first, but your post brought this to mind. So, I felt I should share it.
I believe in
Prevenient Grace. PG is a grace of God whereby the Holy Spirit is active in the lives of people often long before their being born again. This grace has two aspects to it:
Inner Calling - The drawing, or leading, of the Spirit whereby the inner man (spirit) of the individual is confronted with God's reality and their need for salvation. This can be manifest in a hunger for "more", a desire for "change", a spiritual "hunger", a deep "frustration", or any other sense that there is something missing in the core of their being. While the inner man knows the need realized is the need for God, the conscious mind of the soul does not always readily see this. And so an inner struggle between the spirit and the soul often follows. The individual will intellectually turn to their family's religious traditions, work, change of look, style, career, or location might follow. Some turn to drugs, sex, and alcohol to numb the powerful emotions that they are dealing with. The reality is... they are trying to fill the inner hunger of the soul for salvation, but they are looking for God in all the wrong places. Ultimately, this grace will help one come to the end of themselves until their need for God is glaring...and they cry out.
Outer Calling - This is the drawing of the Holy Spirit through the preached Word of God, a witness, or testimony. This leads the soul experiencing the inner calling (above) to the place of consciously having to choose to turn to God and obey the Gospel. This calling can be resisted or it can be heeded.
When both the inner calling and outer calling combine, the opportunity for salvation swings wide open. It is up to the individual to heed call to repent, or they can resist it to the peril of their own soul.
So, in a very real way, the Holy Spirit is very active in the lives of individuals long before their being born again. Learning to sense this work of the Holy Spirit in the lives of the lost is key to reaching people for Christ.
The process of
Conversion results in being "born again".
Repentance
When one surrenders to the Prevenient Grace of God and obey the Gospel, they come to a "saving faith". A saving faith brings repentance. Repentance is when one turns from unbelief, sin, and self in a spirit of brokenness and turns to Christ. It is a dying to sin and self. God then "justifies" the repentant sinner, essentially pardoning them for all their sin and imputing Christ's sinless righteousness on their account. Now they stand before God as though they never sinned.
Water Baptism in the name of Jesus
Once the repentant sinner is justified in God's eyes they are ready. They can now come forward and be water baptized in the name of Jesus to have all their sins erased, expunged, forgiven. In a very real way, water baptism is the very first act of obedience, which is a part of turning to God in repentance. And so, one's initial act of repentance results in water baptism. Repentance is also a work of the Holy Spirit's drawing.
Water baptism symbolically represents our washing and cleansing. When done in the name of Jesus it identifies us with Christ, His burial, and His resurrection.
Repentance without water baptism is incomplete. And though the sinner might have experienced justifying grace upon repentance, refusal to be water baptized in the name of Jesus is failure to obey the Gospel at best, or outright rebellion at worst. And by refusing water baptism in the name of Jesus, the repentant believer will fail in their justification, and fall from the very grace he experienced upon repentance.
Holy Spirit Baptism
The repentant believer is justified by faith at repentance so that they might freely approach God and be born of both water and the Spirit. Being born of the Spirit is receiving the Holy Spirit into one's inner man. This is when God comes to take up residence... in the believer. This establishes a union of spirit, making the believer "one spirit" with the Lord. The believer becomes a living extension, or branch, of Christ Jesus. It is through this union with Christ in the Holy Spirit that one partakes in the divine nature. This divine nature imparts divine life and empowerment. Receiving this through the baptism of the Holy Spirit is known as "regeneration". When this takes place the divine life of Christ, all spiritual gifts, dreams, visions, and every promise of God will flow through the believer. The initial evidence of this experience is... speaking in other tongues. God chooses to demonstrate His presence by taking control of the most unruly member of the body, the tongue. Once one has received the Spirit they abide in Christ and Christ in them. Having a new and abiding nature through the Spirit imparted to their own inner man (spirit), they are now "new creatures".
And so by being water baptized in the name of Jesus and filled with the Spirit, one is truly "born again" of the water and of the Spirit. They are now a child of God, a son or daughter of God. This soteriological reality is known as "adoption".
There are other spiritual realities to experience in Christ such as "sanctification" and "glorification", but these realities outside of the parameters of this discussion.
My point is... the Holy Spirit is involved in the lives of every individual not only before speaking in tongues, but during, and even after speaking in tongues.
The key is to embrace, experience, and walk in the fullness of New Testament salvation. Only then can one experience the realities of justification, identification, regeneration, adoption, and sanctification. Merely saying the "sinner's prayer" and asking Jesus "into your heart" doesn't bring the seeker into these biblical realities. And so, the sinner's prayer cannot save.
P.S.
Since initial justification takes place at repentance, the repentant believer can be water baptized in the name of Jesus and then be filled with the Spirit, or they can be filled with the Spirit first and then water baptized in the name of Jesus. There is no set order to experiencing the soteriological realities of both water and Spirit.
Hybrid Mode
