"And I remembered the word of the Lord, how He used to say, 'John baptized with water, but you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit.'" (Acts 11:16, NASB)
A teenaged girl said in an interview over the weekend at an event commemorating the deeply occulted Harry Potter series, "For the last twelve years, Harry Potter has been my life" (See another teenager's "my life" quote below). Such a life style today is just further evidence of the need for a "power Gospel" in the Twenty-First Century.
"He used to say," means Jesus said it more than once, perhaps many, many times. In our text, his fellow Followers of Jesus were challenging Peter concerning his visit to the house of a Roman soldier. Peter's response was the powerful evidence and confirmation that those Gentiles were now genuine Covenant People, "And as I began to speak, the Holy Spirit fell upon them just as He did upon us at the beginning. And I remembered...."
"How He used to say,..but You will be baptized in the Holy Spirit," was a reminder then as it is today of an in-filling and indwelling which no one on the planet could ever know apart from Jesus Christ. Maybe our Lord, "used to say," frequently something like this: "Never, ever forget that, I am going to send to you the promise of My Father,' and, 'you will be clothed with power from on High.' Only then can you, 'be witnesses to Me.' This will be your power for living, a power which knows no equal. Some will marginalize the Baptism in the Holy Spirit, but only to their own delusion and ultimate demise. My Gospel is, 'the power of God to save.' Everything I have said to you, everything promised of, 'and greater works than these shall you do,' in short, power for living, will come only in the Baptism in the Holy Spirit. Over the centuries there will arise those who will do miracles, as did Pharaoh's priests, which seem to match stride for stride with the genuine miracles of the Holy Spirit. But ultimately, as with those false prophets, 'their folly will be obvious to all.'" But not you; As I have told you many times, "You will be Baptized in the Holy Spirit."
Dwight Moody, one of the "patron saints" of the Fundamentalist movement of the last century, told R. A. Torrey, "Torrey, you have two sermons which you must preached everywhere you go, "Ten Reasons Why I Believe the Bible to Be the Word of God," and, "The Need for the Baptism in the Holy Ghost." These sermons could never be needed more than today. Which will it be for modern churchgoers today, "Harry Potter has been my life," or, "Jesus Christ has been my life?"
Father, in Jesus' Name, if You, "used to say," whatever, may I continue to say and live the same. Amen.
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When Peter, an 18 year old Norwegian, "heard the call to evangelize China, on that day he not only emptied his wallet into the collection plate, but included a small note with the words, 'and my life.'"
"Looking unto Jesus"
Hebrews 12:2
