Baptism with the Holy Spirit (alternatively Baptism in the Holy Spirit or Holy Ghost) in Christian theology is a term describing baptism (washing or immersion) in or with the Spirit of God and is frequently associated with the bestowal of spiritual gifts and empowerment for Christian ministry. While the phrase "baptism with the Holy Spirit" is found in the New Testament and all Christian traditions accept it as a theological concept, each has interpreted it in a way consistent with their own beliefs on ecclesiology and Christian initiation. One view holds that the term refers only to Pentecost, the "once-for-all" event for the whole Church described in the second chapter of the Book of Acts. Another view holds that the term also refers to an experience of the individual believer distinct from salvation and initiation into the Church.
Before the emergence of the holiness movement in the mid 19th century and Pentecostalism in the early 20th century, most denominations believed that Christians received the baptism with the Holy Spirit either upon conversion and regeneration or through rites of Christian initiation. Since the growth and spread of Pentecostal and charismatic churches, however, the belief that the baptism with the Holy Spirit is an experience distinct from regeneration has come into increasing prominence.
Read more about Baptism With The Holy Spirit: Biblical Description, History, Views, Bible References
Famous quotes containing the words baptism, holy and/or spirit:
“A funeral is not death, any more than baptism is birth or marriage union. All three are the clumsy devices, coming now too late, now too early, by which Society would register the quick motions of man.”
—E.M. (Edward Morgan)
“I myself saw furious with blood
Neoptolemus, at his side the black Atridae,
Hecuba and the hundred daughters, Priam
Cut down, his filth drenching the holy fires.”
—Allen Tate (1899–1979)
“The hardiest skeptic who has seen a horse broken, a pointer trained, or has visited a menagerie or the exhibition of the Industrious Fleas, will not deny the validity of education. “A boy,” says Plato, “is the most vicious of all beasts;” and in the same spirit the old English poet Gascoigne says, “A boy is better unborn than untaught.””
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)