Let’s continue our look at the MPS Papers. Just a reminder, the stated intent of these papers is to “provoke thought and discussion”, not to layout the PAOC’s official position on these matters.

The second paper was written by respected pentecostal scholar, Roger Stronstad (author of The Charismatic Theology of St. Luke and co-editor of Full Life Bible Commentary to the New Testament, a fine (if terse) resource I picked up back in my Seminary days). Without further ado, here’s:

Paper #2:
Baptized With The Holy Spirit
by Roger Stronstad

This 12 page paper is a summary of Biblical references to “baptized with the Holy Spirit”, along with some interpretive comments. I’ll sketch out the primary evidence, but you really should read this paper for yourself. Regardless of your opinion on these matters, Stronstad’s survey is a concise yet comprehensive window into the idea of Spirit-baptism in the New Testament (NT).

• There are seven NT references to Spirit-baptism: 1 Corinthians 12:13; Matthew 3:11-12; Mark 1:8; Luke 3:16; John 1:29-34; Acts 1:4-5; 11:15-17. Paul’s reference belongs in a different category since the Spirit does the baptizing instead of Jesus. The gospel passages are all parallels. That leaves us with only three references to Spirit-baptism, all recorded by Luke.
• The first (chronological) reference (Luke 3:16) is John the Baptist’s prophecy that his successor would baptize with the Holy Spirit and fire. This prophecy has no Old Testament (OT) antecedents—it is unique to John the Baptist’s ministry. His successor (Jesus) was subsequently baptized in water (Luke 3:21-22) where the Spirit came upon him with visible and audible signs to commission him for Spirit-empowered ministry.
• Next, in Acts, we have four examples of Jesus baptizing believers with that same Spirit. Stronstad describes each incident with four categories:
  1. In Jerusalem (Acts 2:1-4)
     1. Previous spiritual state: believers
     2. Experience described: baptized, empowered, filled
     3. Signs: wind, fire (classic theophany images), unlearned foreign languages
     4. Explanation: this is the fulfillment of Joel 2:28-32—the Spirit of prophecy is now upon them
  2. In Samaria (Acts 8:5-25)
     1. Previous spiritual state: believers
     2. Experience described: received, fallen upon
     3. Signs: none mentioned explicitly (Stronstad notes that Simon saw an “unidentified sign” (Acts 8:18)
     4. Explanation: none given
  3. In Judea (Acts 10:1-11:18)
     1. Previous spiritual state: believers (not necessarily in Jesus, but in the Jewish God)
     2. Experience described: fallen upon, poured out upon
     3. Signs: speaking in tongues, exalting God
     4. Explanation: this is the fulfillment of John the Baptist’s prophecy which puts Cornelius in the same company as the disciples who received the same gift in Acts 2:1-4
  4. In Ephesus (Acts 19:1-7)
     1. Previous spiritual state: believers
     2. Experience described: received
     3. Signs: speaking in tongues, prophesying
     4. Explanation: none given
• Jesus’ Spirit-anointing is equivalent to the Spirit-baptism of his followers which means it is a subsequent event to salvation which commissions and equips believers for prophetic ministry.
• The actual Spirit-baptism is “objectively imperceptible”, so Jesus gives signs to make it experiential.
• Stronstad ends with a metaphor: the four experiences in Jerusalem, Samaria, Judea, and Ephesus are like the four walls of a building, “trued” by Jesus’ own baptism-commissioning experience. The roof of the building remains under construction today as believers continue to build on the scriptural paradigm.

After reviewing the biblical data afresh, my mind branched off in two directions:

1. What about the rest of the NT? It’s clear that for Luke, a vital part of the Christian life is being commissioned to prophetic ministry via Jesus’ Spirit-Baptism. Stronstad was clear, however, in saying that “the term ‘baptized with the Holy Spirit’ is distinctly Lukan”. If we’re to build a solid doctrine here, we need to explain why this major Lukan theme isn’t given preeminence in the rest of the NT, specifically in Pauline literature. Could it be that the experience was so normative, it required no further explanation? What do the early church fathers have to say about this? Please note that this isn’t a criticism of Stronstad’s paper, as these topics are outside its intended scope.
2. Prophetic Ministry: Here’s what I’m most excited about. Maybe it’s because of my infatuation with Ezekiel, but if the purpose of Spirit-Baptism is to equip believers for prophetic ministry, we need to do a much better job in describing what prophetic ministry is. In my experience (35 years of church life and counting . . .), I’ve run across two main views on prophecy:
   1. It’s primarily an OT thing that isn’t relevant in the modern church. I don’t know any pentecostal minster who would express it like that, but there are many whose praxis betrays this bent.
   2. It’s primarily future-telling that should be taught and encouraged in the modern church. This is where pentecostals have the potential to degenerate into fortune-telling charismaniacs.

   If our distinctive pentecostal experience—Spirit-baptism—is a commissioning to be prophetic witnesses, we need to better understand what Biblical prophecy is. Brueggemann’s The Prophetic Imagination is a good place to start. How are we pentecostals doing at offering a prophetic critique of culture? Do we stand for love and justice in the face of Empire? Do we most resemble Elijah or Ahab? Are we more at home with Jesus or Rome? This direction would allow us to be both faithful to our roots as Spirit-empowered witnesses while also providing rationale within our fellowship’s DNA to take social justice concerns seriously. Didn’t Jesus’ brother say something about widows and orphans? What if that concern was central rather than tangential to our pentecostal milieu?

< Paper #1: Pentecostal Identity—A Pastoral Perspective by Peter Cusick and Brandon Malo

Paper #3: Defining Eschatology by Van Johnson >