Baptism of Water, Holy Spirit, and Fire | Matthew 2-3 | Gary Hamrick

[Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] [Music] we're into the Gospel of Matthew now in the New Testament and we're gonna be looking at chapter three today last week we looked at Matthew chapter 1 the genealogical record of Jesus leading up to his birth then chapter 2 of Matthew gives us details about the birth of Jesus which we read every Christmas so I'm gonna skip chapter 2 and go right to chapter 3 today and when you go from matthew chapter two to matthew chapter three you are advancing about 28 years matthew leaves the end of chapter two with jesus being around age two and he begins chapter three with jesus launching his public ministry at the age of thirty so we're advancing about twenty-eight years from Chapter two to chapter three the gospels are pretty much silent on the childhood of jesus with the exception of the Gospel of Luke Luke Luke mentions one incident that happened when Jesus was twelve years of age and Jesus was at the temple court area and his family accidentally left him and that's the whole other story but we'll see that when we get to the Gospel of Luke that's the only other reference we have to any of Jesus's childhood when he was 12 years that one incident found only in the Gospel of Luke otherwise Matthew Mark and John are silent about his childhood and that's the same here with Matthew as we go from chapter to chapter three he skips the childhood of Jesus he goes right from Jesus at age two to Jesus launching his public ministry around age 30 and at the beginning of chapter three here you will notice that we are introduced to someone who was familiar to the Gospels he is the one who will herald the arrival of the Messiah he is none other than John the Baptist so the first twelve verses here devoted to John the Baptist and Matthew gives us some information about him and so I'd like to read verses 1 through 12 here from Matthew chapter 3 and then we'll we'll just kind of focus in on verse 11 in particular but this is what it says here in verse 1 in those days John the Baptist came preaching in the wilderness of Judea and saying repent for the kingdom of heaven is at hand for this is he who was spoken of by the prophet Isaiah saying the voice of one crying in the wilderness prepare the way of the Lord make his paths straight now John himself was clothed in camel's hair with a leather belt around his waist and his food was locusts and wild honey so you get the idea this guy was just a great outdoorsman you know just to eating a bark and locusts and you know this kind of stuff and wearing outfits made of camels hair and leather so you know and just kind of picture kind of this wooly creature you know bears grill just a little bit out in the wilderness and weathered and all that good stuff so here he is a real mountaineer kind of a guy verse 5 and then Jerusalem all Judea and all the region around the Jordan went out to him and were baptized by him in the Jordan confessing their sins but when he saw many of the Pharisees and Sadducees coming to his baptism he said to them brood of vipers they caused some snakes here who warned you to flee from the wrath to come therefore bear fruits worthy of repentance and do not think to say to yourselves we have Abraham as our Father for I say to you that God is able to raise up children to Abraham from these stones and even now the the axis laid to the root of the trees therefore every tree which does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire I indeed baptize you with water unto repentance but he who was coming after me is mightier than I whose sandals I am not worthy to carry he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire his winnowing fan is in his hand and he will thoroughly clean out his threshing floor and gather his wheat into the barn but he will burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire let's pause there and pray Lord as we bow our heads and our hearts before you we just humble ourselves in your house today we're thankful for the opportunity to once again start to regather in the church and we just pray now that you'll be glorified in our time and your word that you use it to strengthen our hearts I know Lord we're still separated in large part some watching most watching online some gathered here but together Lord we just thank you that we can join in reading your word studying together fear from Matthew 3 use it to speak to our hearts today and strengthen us Lord continue to bring healing to those who are sick continue to eradicate this virus we pray and help us to return back to full ministry here Lord as soon as possible so we we thank you for the stave giving us bless again all the dads on this Father's Day and thank you for being our Heavenly Father in Jesus name we pray amen you will notice here that it is not John the Methodist it is not John the Lutheran it is not John the Presbyterian it is John the Baptist and even though I joke about him he's not really a part of a denomination but the reason he's called John the Baptist is because the main focus of his ministry involved what baptizing people so that's the reason he's called John the Baptist he went around baptizing people and he said here in particular in verse 11 that's gonna be our verse we're focusing on today he said I indeed baptize you with water you can circle the word water and your Bibles are highlighted if you have an electronic Bible he says I indeed baptize you with water unto repentance but he who is coming after me mightier than I whose sandals I am not worried that a Kerry who's he talking about Jesus he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit Circle that Holy Spirit and Fire Circle fire well we have here presented in verse 11 are three types of baptisms that John the Baptist tells us about the baptism of water the baptism of the Holy Spirit the baptism of fire John says I'm doing number one but number two and number three come from Jesus and the truth is that as believers if you're believer in Jesus Christ you either will or should experience all three of these you either will or should experience all three of these so we need to understand what all three of these are as John the Baptist presents these things now let's start with first things first and just understand the basic the word baptized in in English is from the Greek word baptizo and baptizo means you immerse submerge or to overwhelm that's what the very word baptize means and the first of the three that he mentions here is probably the one that we are most familiar with and that is the baptism of water and there are actually two types of baptism of water that are mentioned here in the Gospels and the first one is the one that John was actually practicing John's baptism was a baptism of repentance in anticipation of the Messiah and so the prophets foretold that one would come as a messenger a herald announcing the Messiah and and that's John the Baptist in fact in fact Matthew quotes from Isaiah the prophet saying he is the one who was foretold by the ancient prophets John the Baptist would come to announce to herald that that the Messiah that Jesus has come onto the world scene and so in anticipation of the public launch of Jesus ministry John the Baptist went around preaching repentance and asking people to come to that place of surrender because Messiah was here now Jesus would not be publicly recognized until in fact Jesus himself comes to be baptized by water John the Baptist at first I thought you know I'm not worthy to do this Jesus says well this is the fulfillment of the father this is kind of the the coronation of the public ministry of Jesus and so John the Baptist baptized is Jesus but John the Baptist was the one who said behold the lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world as Jesus was coming to be baptized John the Baptist specifically is pointing people to Jesus listen this is the lamb has come to die for the sins of the world and so that was John's role he was to prepare the way of the Messiah announced the way of the Messiah and so people were coming to John to be baptized in the Jordan River and it was in anticipation of the Messiah so they were coming basically saying baptize me immerse me in water as a symbolic gesture that I come when to to repent of my sins to turn from my sins and to turn towards the Messiah anticipating his his arrival onto the world scene that was John's baptism but we know practice at baptism anymore because Messiah has already come so we're not we're not anticipating Messiah we're not baptizing an anticipation of a sight because Jesus has come so what we do today the water baptism that we practice is Jesus's baptism and Jesus's baptism was a baptism of regeneration in proclamation of the Messiah and so regeneration just means a new birth and when we come to salvation when we come to faith in Jesus we are what the Bible says is born again and then because we're born again we are water baptized not as a necessity for salvation but to identify with Jesus that our sins have been forgiven we've been washed we've been cleansed and and we identify with the risen Lord and we live a new life so we're renouncing the old life and we're living a new life for the glory of God and so water baptism is also symbolic of a surrendered life but not an anticipation of Messiah in Proclamation we're making a proclamation through water baptism that we have trusted Christ as our personal Lord and Savior this is what Jesus said in Matthew 28 part of what we call the Great Commission when he said in verse 19 go therefore and make disciples of all nations baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit so this is the type of baptism that we practice today it is a baptism that identifies with the finished work of Christ it's an individual saying that they have by faith accepted Jesus and now they want to be baptized as an external act that communicates an internal work the internal work of a heart that's been changed through faith in Jesus Christ and so we're water baptized in obedience to the Great Commission to do as Jesus told us to do not because it's required for salvation but as a demonstration of our salvation proclaiming Jesus as our Lord and Savior now if you have a church tradition like I do and some of you do and some of you don't some of you we're not raised in the church and you you come to Cornerstone and this is all kind of new to you but in the tradition I grew up in I was baptized Methodist style and Methodist style baptism was when you're an infant you're sprinkled with water because John Wesley preached infant baptism and he made some arguments from Scripture that that you know some some would agree with I don't agree with infant baptism we dedicate infants but but so I was baptized I had no choice in it I'm like you know a few weeks old and so I had no stay in the matter and so my parents had me sprinkle actually my grandfather was the past for the time so he baptized me sprinkled me then I got saved as a teenager and then I started reading the Bible and realizing that water baptism scripturally speaking is a declaration of your faith in Jesus well I couldn't declare my faith in Jesus when I was a few weeks old so I realized I've not really been baptized so I was sprinkle as an infant got saved as a teenager and then actually when I was starting to date Terry I was like 21 then I realized I need to be water baptized so my uncle who was a pastor at the time baptized me in a fishing pond on the other side of Frederick so everybody has your story and I would encourage you if you have not been water baptized since coming to faith in Jesus that you should consider that again not as a requirement for salvation but just in obedience to identify with the finished work of Christ my life under the water is past cleansed I come up out of the water a new person to declare my relationship with Jesus so here at Cornerstone we do practice baptism by immersion we will dunk you and I'll hold you under depending on how much sin I think is in your life no I won't do that I won't do that I've only lost three no I know I haven't lost anybody and to be honest with you some people have physical limitations where they can't be immersed and so it's okay well you know take like a pitcher of water a cup of water and pour it over somebody so it's not again we're not dogmatic about it because it's not a Salvation issue but it is in terms of how it should be practiced the reason we practice immersion is again the very definition of the word baptize baptism means overwhelmed submerge immerse so that's why we do that and and so you know every time we go to Israel by the way it's always a great time I've I've probably baptized a few hundred people now the Jordan River so it's it's just a wonderful identification with the finished work of Christ that's what we practiced today Jesus is baptism not John's baptism but that's a baptism of water the second thing that John talks about here in this verse is the baptism of the Holy Spirit and I find it a little bit humorous that the first person who talks about the baptism of the Holy Spirit was a Baptist now if you don't get that joke is because you haven't been around church very long but but most of my Baptist friends not all most of my Baptist friends believe that the gifts of the Spirit ended at the end of the Apostolic age and would not embrace what we call today the baptism of the Holy Spirit as as an experience that a person could have today there are some within Christianity some circles that would say the baptism of the Holy Spirit was something that was relegated to biblical times first century and then when the last of the Apostles died that ended the Apostolic age in that that ended those spiritual gifts I don't hold to that interpretation of Scripture I still believe the gifts are available today I still believe the baptism of the Spirit is available today and I wish I had more time to develop this the fact is that the baptism of the Holy Spirit deserves an entire Sunday by itself and probably a series of messages which we will get to eventually when we get into the book of so what I'm gonna share with you now in the next few minutes is a very cursory overview of the baptism of the Holy Spirit and probably the quickest and and most distinct way that I can communicate the baptism of the Holy Spirit has just one aspect of three that we're looking at today is by pointing your attention to three different prepositions that are used not just in the English language but in the original Greek language of the New Testament to communicate the threefold Ministry of the Holy Spirit the first preposition that we see used in scripture about the Holy Spirit is the word with the word with the Spirit is with us to lead us to Christ I'm gonna read out of John's Gospel chapter 14 you can just listen or turn there I'm gonna read verses 16 and 17 this is John 14 verse 16 Jesus speaking here he says and I will pray the father and he will give you another helper that's Capital age that's the spirit that he may abide with you forever the Spirit of Truth whom the world cannot receive because it neither sees him nor knows him but you know him for he dwells with you and shall be in you the first preposition that Jesus uses there and it is para in the Greek PA RA is that the Holy Spirit is presently present tense with you now Potter in the Greek means around or near he's not yet in you Jesus uses the next preposition in the rest of that verse in future tense he said he said there people don't understand I'm about to say to you but you know him for he is with you present tense and shall be in you future tense I'll get to second preposition in a moment first the idea of width what does it mean when Jesus says the Holy Spirit is with you the the first thing that the Holy Spirit does in in bringing us into relationship with Christ and by the way that's exactly the Ministry of the Holy Spirit none of us has come to a relationship and a knowledge of Jesus except that the Holy Spirit has helped us and the Holy Spirit helps us because he brings conviction to our hearts convicts us about sin and reveals to us the truth about who Jesus is such that then we exercise our will to receive him and to invite him to be our Lord and Savior to accept him as Savior but that's the Ministry of the Holy Spirit with us wooing us drawing us leading us convicting us that's the Ministry of wit para that's the Holy Spirit first at work okay then Jesus says in the same verse John 14 17 that the Holy Spirit is with you and shall be in you now the audience he is speaking to are his disciples so there's a specific context and then there's a broader application so we can learn from this as to the Ministry of the Holy Spirit first the Spirit is with us wooing us drawing us but then the Holy Spirit comes in us when we accept Christ as our Lord and Savior when we come into personal relationship with Jesus and we by faith accept him as our Lord and Savior we use this terminology that Jesus comes into our heart well what we really mean is that the Holy Spirit the very presence of God the God's Spirit resides within our spirit mankind is made up of three part parts body soul and spirit now your soul and your spirit are inextricably linked because your soul is the seat of your emotion your will your conscience and your spirit is is what is the it was what houses your soul so the two of those are connected and then what houses your spirit and your soul is your body of flesh well one day when we die our spirit and soul link together and sometimes interchangeably used in Scripture soul and spirit but linked together vacate our body to go to be with the Lord if you know Christ as your Savior okay our fleshly body is just a shell there's just a shell there's an epitaph that I read years ago on a tombstone and that I often quoted funerals just to give people hope but it was about this guy who died his Naas last name was peas like green peas pas the epitaph said here lies the body of old man peas buried beneath the flowers and trees peas ain't here just the pod peas shelled out and went to God and that's and that's the truth that when we die we just leave the shell of our body okay but our spirit is within our bodies presently and when you come into relationship with Jesus by faith the Spirit of God then comes in you comes in you now when exactly did the Holy Spirit come in the disciples the Holy Spirit came in the disciples when they were if he will born again well when were they born again they were always hanging around Jesus they understood who he was they declared Matthew 16 Peters the one who says you're the Christ the Son of the Living God yeah but when did they put their faith and trust in him after he had died on the cross for their sins answer is in John chapter 20 when Jesus appears to them in his resurrected form after he had died rose again from the dead when he first appears to them this is what he says in John chapter 20 I'm gonna read verses 19 to 22 Jesus came and stood in their midst and said to them peace be with you when he had said this he showed them his hands and his side because he wanted them to see the marks of his crucifixion and then the disciples were glad when they saw the Lord so jesus said to them again peace to you as the father has sent me I also send you and when he had said this he breathed on them and said to them receive the Holy Spirit and it was at that moment that they in effect put their faith and trust in Jesus as the risen Lord who had died on the cross for their sins and so when they believed and received they also received the Holy Spirit Jesus brings on them there in John 20 received the Holy Spirit now if Jesus is going to breathe on you and say receive the Holy Spirit you receive a Noli spirit amen I mean it's not gonna be any debate about it it's happening but then it's curious to note that even after Jesus does this in John 20 a few weeks later when he's about to ascend back into heaven in Acts chapter 1 he tells the very same people to wait in Jerusalem for the gift my father promised for in a few days you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit wait a minute wait a minute I thought they got everything back in John 20 you see that's where the third preposition comes into play because the third preposition Jesus uses is the Holy Spirit shall come upon you it is the Greek word a PEP I and the reason why Jesus says I'm gonna read it from Acts chapter 1 that you're to wait for the gift of the Holy Spirit even though in John 20 he had breathed on them that they might receive the Holy Spirit is because there is a difference between the indwelling of the Spirit and the overflowing power of the Spirit there's a difference people can get saved and have the spirit in dwell them and go to heaven that's it's not again you're gonna go to heaven but if you want to live a life of power that the Holy Spirit intends for us to have that's the baptizing work of the Spirit of God which comes upon an individual subsequent to a salvation experience here's what Jesus said in Acts chapter 1 I'm gonna read verses five through eight and he quotes he refers back to the story we're reading here when John baptized with water listen to what Jesus said acts 1:5 for John truly baptized with water but you shall be baptized with the Holy Spirit not many days from now therefore when they had come together they asked him saying Lord will you at that time at this time restore the kingdom to Israel and he said to them it is not for you to know times or seasons which the father has put in his own authority but you shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you there's the third preposition and you shall be witnesses to me in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria and to the ends of the earth you know it's interesting in the Gospels the word love is emphasized over and over again when you get to the book of Acts the word love is not mentioned one time the operative word in the book of Acts is power you shall receive power when the Holy Spirit comes upon you the Greek word for power is Dunamis we get our English word dynamite from that word God wants us to live a powerful life filled with the power of the Holy Spirit that we might be effective witnesses that we might have the fruit of the spirit the gifts of the spirit that we might be baptized overwhelmed by the work of the Holy Spirit which is separate and distinct from the indwelling of the Holy Spirit so I know this has been a quick crash course and we'll talk more about the baptism when we get to the book of Acts but he is with us drawing us he comes in us when we get saved and then he comes upon us and overflowing power and we were baptized by the Holy Spirit you might ask well how do I get that baptizing work of the Holy Spirit and Jesus answers it in Luke's Gospel chapter 11 this is what he tells us verses 11 to 13 he says if a son asks for bread from any father among you will he give him a stone like what dad would say well here's a stone you went up you want a piece of bread but here's a stone instead nobody would do that he says or if he asked for a fish will he give him a serpent instead of a fish or if he asks for an egg will he offer him a scorpion so Jesus saying you know of course not of course not now he's saying but our earthly dads are sinful we're all sinful so in that context the next verse if you then being evil know how to give good gifts to your children how much more will your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to them that ask its Luke 11:13 how do we get the baptizing work of the Spirit of God you ask you ask you say Lord just baptize me overflow your spirit within my heart within my life that I might have boldness and power and the fruit of the Spirit and the gifts of the Spirit and and let God do that overwhelming work of a spirit in your heart and in your life but ask him and God will do as he says he will do the third baptizing experience that John refers to here is the baptism of fire now typically where fire is involved it's not going to be a happy experience and that is the case for the baptism of fire it is usually a a painful experience when when the Lord baptizes us with fire but it is a refining work of God that brings about a better result in our lives because the baptism of fire is either because God is burning something out of our lives to grow us up lori's burning something out of our lives to clean us up the baptism of fire is either for maturity or for purity is one of those are both that there are things in our lives that God sees that we need to grow up concerning so sometimes the baptism of fire is to mature us and then there's some things in our lives that the Lord sees that are sinful and wants us to get rid of and deal with and so he turns up the heat to purify us it's one of those two things the bottom line is he wants us to become more like him and so the Lord will sometimes take us through the fire he will sometimes turn up the heat in our lives to bring about a better result and we can either resist it which makes it more difficult for us or we can just be asking him Lord you know I feel like I'm going through the fire you're taking me through some difficulties here what is it you're trying to teach me what is it you're trying to cleanse me of and this is the way that the Lord works either way the baptism of fire is intended to make us more like Christ I threw a few verses up there on the screen for you here's one 1st Peter 1 6 & 7 this is what Peter said he said for a little while you may have had to suffer grief in all kinds of trials maybe go through difficulties in their lives these have come so that your faith of Greater worth in gold which perishes even though refined by fire may be proved genuine and may result in praise glory and honor when Jesus Christ is revealed so Peter there says not all but sometimes the trials we go through in our lives God has allowed as a way to refine us as a way to mature us or to purify us and these trials have this this way of just you know turning up the heat to expose some of these things in our lives so that so that God can deal with them isaiah 40:8 verse 10 says behold i have refined you but not as silver i have tested you in the furnace of affliction if some of you might right now feel like you're in the furnace of affliction you're going through some things in your life that are very unpleasant very difficult very uncomfortable and sometimes it's difficult to know you know sometimes we bring difficulty in our lives because of our own sinful choices sometimes there's difficulty in our lives because it has nothing to do with any of our choices it's just like living in a fallen world and maybe the enemy is up to no good to try to discourage us and then there are other times where the Lord is accomplishing his purposes through those trials and he's allowing those things to expose some stuff that needs to be dealt with that otherwise would not have been noticed had everything been fine and so sometimes the difficulties exposed that stuff have you ever have you ever noticed when when you get into situations where you become stressed that stuff comes out of you that you didn't think was there like where did that come from all those there it just didn't get exposed until the vessel got cracked right it's in the jar nobody knows until it gets cracked and then it spills out and these are the kind of things that God wants to sometimes deal with us here's another verse at a proverbs 17 verse 3 the crucible for silver and the furnace for gold but the Lord tests the heart God is like a refiners fire and just as a goldsmith or a silversmith will turn up the heat in the furnace in order to melt the precious metal in the process what happens is under intense heat the silver or the gold as it's melted and heated the impurities rise to the surface it's called the dross and then the silversmith of the goldsmith can skim those things off of the service so that the metal becomes more pure it becomes more valuable and in a similar way you see God will turn up the heat in our lives to expose the draw so then God can deal with those things that we might be more pure and more valuable and more mature again it's not always pleasant but in the long run in the end if we just press into Jesus trust him through it he brings about a better result maybe God is trying to refine your life maybe he's trying to refine your marriage sometimes he refines a church sometimes a family whatever it might be sometimes God will allow the heat to be turned up to deal with the things that need to be dealt with that we might become more mature and more pure as valuable vessels for him this is what God does now the first two baptisms are our choice the baptism of water is something we can choose to do or not I hope that you will consider it if you haven't been baptized by water the baptism of the Holy Spirit you don't have to pray and ask for that but I trust that you would want that the baptism by fire is God's doing and he does it as he knows that we need it and so regardless all three of these we either should or will experience and so may God do his good work in our hearts amen let's pray together father we thank you for your word today and as we think about these different baptisms we pray Lord if there's folks here that need to be water baptized just as a testimony of their faith they would consider that as a step of obedience as an act that honors you and lord I pray also for those who have never really asked for the baptism of the Holy Spirit you tell us Lord right there in Luke 11:13 if you being evil know how to give good gifts to your children how much more will your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to them that ask it's the Lord we ask we ask for you to overwhelm us and overflow us with your Holy Spirit baptize us Lord with the power of your Holy Spirit embolden us as your witnesses we need your power in a day when we feel our strength is constantly being being drained from us empower us Lord as your witnesses pour out your fruit than your giftings in our lives for your glory and Lord in regards to the baptism of fire if we're going through things right now we pray you would just strengthen our hearts and help us to just lean into you you're always so faithful not to burn us like like to scorch us but you turn up the heat just enough to bring things to the surface that you want us to deal with so that we might become more mature or more pure to be more like Jesus Lord so even though it's difficult I pray for those going through the fire right now that you would at the same time that you're purging of things Lord that you would also encourage them and that even this Bible study today might just be a gentle reminder to them that even though they're going through difficulties in affliction that you're right there with us you're right there with us Lord accomplishing your good purposes in our lives in our homes in our church we trust you we thank you for this time in your word we pray that you'd be with us as we leave here today continue Lord to bring healing eradicate this virus Lord we we're trusting you we're looking to you in these days tension in our country we just pray for your peace that passes all understanding and we love you and praise you together in Jesus name and everybody said amen

Channel: Cornerstone Chapel - Leesburg, VA

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Keywords: Cornerstone Chapel, Calvary Chapel, Gary Hamrick, Biblical sermons, leesburg va, cornerstone chapel leesburg virginia, great sermons by great preachers

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Length: 35min 14sec (2114 seconds)

Published: Mon Jun 22 2020