Our Distinctive Doctrine & Getting Credentials - Knowing What We Believe is Important
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Seeking credentials with the Assemblies of God is a great step in pursuing a vocational calling. The AG continues to be a relevant, paradigm changing movement with global impact, multicultural influence and participation and has held true to its Sixteen Tenets of Faith since its inception. After all, our purpose in this cooperative fellowship is too evangelize the world and hold to purity of Biblical doctrine that does not change with the passing of time or culture.
So, coming up on your interview with sectional and district leadership you can expect, for any level of credential, to be asked about the distinctive doctrine we maintain that separates us from the Nazarene, Free Methodist, Evangelical Free, and Calvary Chapel as well as a host of other non-denominational evangelical groups. This is our Pentecostal Distinctive - the Baptism in the Holy Spirit with the initial physical evidence of speaking in tongues.
By this point you already have had to acknowledge that you have experienced the Baptism of the Holy Spirit with speaking in other languages and that you believe in this experience which is a secondary experience to our salvation. However, are you aware that it is anticipated that you have a full understanding of this vital teaching that our movement holds in esteem? Unlike other evangelical groups, we believe this was a vital experience given to the church, planned for by Christ and foreshadowed and communicated at least as early as the Baptism of Jesus when John the Baptist.
16 John answered, saying to all, “I indeed baptize you with water; but One mightier than I is coming, whose sandal strap I am not worthy to loose. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire.
Luke is often not recognized as the Theologian he was, nor for the fact that he wrote more content found in the New Testament then Paul. In fact Luke and Acts could have easily been the epistles of Luke 1 and 2. Luke tracks the teaching of Christ and the historical experience of the Baptism of the Holy Spirit throughout the life of Christ and the formation and work of the Early Church. In the Assemblies of God we recognize that the last days began with Pentecost and are still continuing on today until Christ returns, and that the Baptism of the Holy Spirit as initially evidenced with speaking in other languages, along with the gifts of the Holy Spirit have never had a break in their existence, but were intended to be a part of the fiber of the church until all knowledge is fulfilled at the second coming of Christ.
Just a sideline - you cannot make a doctrine from experience, but we are expected to fully experience the doctrine of the Word of God especially that which Jesus promises! The Baptism in the Holy Spirit is one of those promises made to the entirety of those who chose to follow Christ, it is not a gift of the Spirit, but the gift OF THE SPIRIT.
Take into account that as Jesus ascended into Heaven as seen in Acts 1, He promised to send power to the church.
8 But you shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you shall be witnesses to Me in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.”
Jesus had already breathed the Holy Spirit on the disciples prior to His ascension as recorded in John
21 So Jesus said to them again, “Peace to you! As the Father has sent Me, I also send you.”
22 And when He had said this, He breathed on them, and said to them, “Receive the Holy Spirit.
This is the equivalent to our receiving a measure or deposit of the Holy Spirit at salvation that Paul mentions in Ephesians 1.
13 In Him you also trusted, after you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation; in whom also, having believed, you were sealed with the Holy Spirit of promise,
However, Jesus promised a second experience, one He told his followers to go and wait for in Jerusalem. In fact, He told them to do nothing until this power had come upon them, which tells us of the importance Christ placed on His church receiving not just the deposit of the Holy Spirit at salvation, but the fullness of the Holy Spirit the Baptism of fire that John prophesied Messiah would bring.
In John 7:37-39 Jesus promises an infilling an outflowing of the Spirit like rivers of water.
37 On the last day, that great day of the feast, Jesus stood and cried out, saying, “If anyone thirsts, let him come to Me and drink.
38 He who believes in Me, as the Scripture has said, out of his heart will flow rivers of living water.”
39 But this He spoke concerning the Spirit, whom those believing in Him would receive; for the Holy Spirit was not yet given, because Jesus was not yet glorified.
In Acts 2, every Pentecostal AG preachers’ chapter case and point, we see the gift of the Spirit given, the outpouring of the Holy Spirit in power upon the church! Acts 2:1-4
1 When the Day of Pentecost had fully come, they were all with one accord in one place.
2 And suddenly there came a sound from heaven, as of a rushing mighty wind, and it filled the whole house where they were sitting.
3 Then there appeared to them divided tongues, as of fire, and one sat upon each of them.
4 And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak with other tongues, as the Spirit gave them utterance.
What happens here? When the power comes down and fire appears upon the heads of all in the upper room they begin to speak with other languages, earthly languages represented for sure but Paul also mentions languages of angels in his dissertation on the gifts of the Spirit, a whole separate charismata from the Baptism. These tongues appeared to be a common thread of evidence that the individual believer had received the immersion (baptism) of the Holy Spirit and power that accompanies that - the tongues were simply an outward evidence proclaiming to those around and to the individual believer - you have received Jesus’ gift of the Holy Spirit and His power.
Speaking in tongues is not the gift itself, the gift itself is the Holy Spirit, but tongues was the initial physical evidence that it had occurred. Like saying you get wet when it rains. The dampness you feel upon your person is the first evidence you experience that rain is falling from the sky. Of course the presence of the Holy Spirit in one’s life is going to produce other evidences, but when this overflowing Baptism takes place, tongues was the choice of the Lord to be the first tangible sign that the power had fully come upon a person.
Baptism means immersion, immersed in the presence of the Holy Spirit! Remember however, that Jesus said in John 7 that it would not just flow into us, but would flow out of us. There must be evidence the Holy Spirit is flowing outward, and certainly on the Day of Pentecost all the people on the street witnessed this evidence as they heard the miracle of the proclamation of the Lord’s mighty deeds being spoken in their own languages.
5 And there were dwelling in Jerusalem Jews, devout men, from every nation under heaven.
6 And when this sound occurred, the multitude came together, and were confused, because everyone heard them speak in his own language.
7 Then they were all amazed and marveled, saying to one another, “Look, are not all these who speak Galileans?
8 And how is it that we hear, each in our own language in which we were born?
9 Parthians and Medes and Elamites, those dwelling in Mesopotamia, Judea and Cappadocia, Pontus and Asia,
10 Phrygia and Pamphylia, Egypt and the parts of Libya adjoining Cyrene, visitors from Rome, both Jews and proselytes,
11 Cretans and Arabs—we hear them speaking in our own tongues the wonderful works of God.”
12 So they were all amazed and perplexed, saying to one another, “Whatever could this mean?”
Perhaps because tongues was what the Lord used to divide mankind at the Tower of Babel when man was in rebellion He would now unite His church on the day His church was birthed by releasing tongues for all the languages of the world to hear of His power, not in the ability of the believer but by HIs mighty power an evidence of our full surrender to the Spirit.
James mentions that no man can tame the tongue, but we know the Lord can and we know He did and that He still does!
8 But no man can tame the tongue. It is an unruly evil, full of deadly poison.
Now, this evidence not only happened the first time the Jewish believers received, but also the first time a Gentile believer received.
44 While Peter was still speaking these words, the Holy Spirit fell upon all those who heard the word.
45 And those of the circumcision who believed were astonished, as many as came with Peter, because the gift of the Holy Spirit had been poured out on the Gentiles also.
46 For they heard them speak with tongues and magnify God. Then Peter answered,
47 “Can anyone forbid water, that these should not be baptized who have received the Holy Spirit just as we have?”
48 And he commanded them to be baptized in the name of the Lord. Then they asked him to stay a few days.
Notice the Jewish believers were astonished because the Gentiles received the same evidence as they had, they spoke in tongues! It was this evidence that was used by Peter with the council that they should accept Gentiles into the church. They received the Spirit just like us.
15 “As I began to speak,” Peter continued, “the Holy Spirit fell on them, just as he fell on us at the beginning.
16 Then I thought of the Lord’s words when he said, ‘John baptized with water, but you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit.’
17 And since God gave these Gentiles the same gift he gave us when we believed in the Lord Jesus Christ, who was I to stand in God’s way?”
18 When the others heard this, they stopped objecting and began praising God. They said, “We can see that God has also given the Gentiles the privilege of repenting of their sins and receiving eternal life.”
6 So the apostles and elders met together to resolve this issue.
7 At the meeting, after a long discussion, Peter stood and addressed them as follows: “Brothers, you all know that God chose me from among you some time ago to preach to the Gentiles so that they could hear the Good News and believe.
8 God knows people’s hearts, and he confirmed that he accepts Gentiles by giving them the Holy Spirit, just as he did to us.
What was the same, the fact that they spoke in tongues.
Some have said that tongues is not mentioned every time in the book of Acts that someone receives the Holy Spirit/ Baptism of the Spirit, but realize that in literature when a precedence is set the full explanation does not need to be fully recited. For example to say the Holstein cow is black and white, we can assume every time a Holstein cow is mentioned it will be black and white and that these words do not need to accompany this every time mentioned in the same piece of literature.
We do, however, see that a group of believers baptized by John not only receive Baptism in water in Jesus name, but also the Baptism of the Holy Spirit with this same evidence of speaking in other languages at a latter point in the book of Acts.
1 And it happened, while Apollos was at Corinth, that Paul, having passed through the upper regions, came to Ephesus. And finding some disciples
2 he said to them, “Did you receive the Holy Spirit when you believed?” So they said to him, “We have not so much as heard whether there is a Holy Spirit.”
3 And he said to them, “Into what then were you baptized?” So they said, “Into John’s baptism.”
4 Then Paul said, “John indeed baptized with a baptism of repentance, saying to the people that they should believe on Him who would come after him, that is, on Christ Jesus.”
5 When they heard this, they were baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus.
6 And when Paul had laid hands on them, the Holy Spirit came upon them, and they spoke with tongues and prophesied.
7 Now the men were about twelve in all.
Many have tried to make a doctrine from individual experience that is not based in Scripture for Spirit Baptism. They have cited personal experience as evidence, and perhaps there is an evidence there, but the Lord has shown us a demonstration of initial or first tangible signs of being immersed in the full power of the Holy Spirit.
Believers often have powerful experiences of the Spirit flowing into their lives in seasons of prayer and time at altars, but it is that overflowing from the depths of our being that Jesus spoke of that become tangible evidence of the Baptism.
Imagine with me a glass of water and a faucet. An empty glass which represents our life, is filled with air, let us call that our spirit man. The water in the faucet is the Spirit. Let’s say the glass is 8 ounces in size. At salvation we receive a measure of the Spirit when we yield to Christ our hearts and confess our sins. For some an ounce of water or a few ounces of water, and some even receive the Baptism simultaneously. Most do not, but as they come to understand the love of Christ and truth of His Word they surrender more and more and the water flows into their lives displacing the air. Many believers live with their lives filled with seven and nine-tenths ounces in the glass. In fact many during periods of time in prayer or at an altar call have had that glass full to the top.
Yet there is the last place of full surrender and yielding, a place no man can tame, but as yielded to Christ He takes the reigns and pours not only into, but overflowing out of our lives (immersed) with His Spirit. Now see the glass with water spilling over the sides and into the sink. The glass is now fully immersed with water and overflowing into the realm around it - this is the picture of the power of the Holy Spirit pouring into our lives and overflowing our lives into the world around us. Of course if you s top the flow, if you drink from the glass, if it is poured out to others without being refilled, that flow ceases, which is why we need to come back to the never ending source at the faucet.
Many say I am full of the Holy Spirit, and that may be so, but the Lord wants us to be immersed and overflowing. How do we know this is occurring, there must be some outward, tangible, physical sign, and for that reason the Lord chose tongues. Something man could not tame on his own, but in surrender to the Lord can experience.
One other area where error occurs is the confusion between the teaching of Luke and the teaching of Paul. One is presenting the Baptism of the Spirit while the other a teaching on the gifts of the Spirit.
Please note there is a great dIfference between the Gift of the Holy Spirit given by Christ to the individual and the Gift of tongues given by the Holy Spirit through an individual to the church as Paul speaks of in His teaching in 1 Corinthians 12-14. Still today many have experienced the filling power of the Spirit almost thinking they had been fully immersed in the Spirit, but not having this first tangible sign of speaking in tongues they have used Paul’s teaching on the gifts of the Spirit, which vary amongst different believers, to confuse Luke’s explanation of the Baptism of the Holy Spirit.
Tongues is the first tangible evidence of the Gift of the Spirit when Jesus gives His Holy Spirit to an individual believer to edify and empower them. The gift of tongues is one of the nine gifts of the SPirit an actual gift in itself that proceeds from the Holy Spirit through an individual for the benefit of the church receiving a message. This gift requires a second gift of the Spirit called interpretation. In both instances we see the presence of speaking in other languages, however, they proceed from different sources to different recipients for different purposes.
For over a hundred years now, the fellowship of the AG has cooperatively adhered to this reality based in Scripture. Yes, people have other evidence of the Spirit at work in their lives, like the fruit of the Spirit, but there has been no other unilateral evidence for having received this Baptism of the Spirit given in Scripture. This same evidence has been experienced worldwide and even by the deaf and mute.
Why is knowing this so important? Well, you are seeking to join a movement where this Biblical interpretation in the context of Luke’s writing is what separates us from other Evangelicals. Our growth and blessing in the AG have been founded in this expression, and if it is to be taught and maintained in our movement all seeking credentials should understand and agree as this is what we mean when we say we have cooperative fellowship - for the agreement of what we believe and teach. If we are to join a movement and be credentialed to serve, there needs to be a demonstration of not only understanding but believing these truths, our distinctive truths based in the Word of God.
Your confidence of knowledge in this area in addition to personally experiencing this distinctive gift with its initial physical evidence is assuring us that you not only are passionate for Christ and work for the Kingdom of God, but that you also understand the source of that power that exploded on the day of Pentecost to give birth to the living church of Christ.