Deeper Life #323

And, behold, I send the promise of my Father upon you: but tarry ye in the city of Jerusalem, until ye be endued with power from on high.

—Luke 24:49

EVERY SPIRITUALLY MINDED PERSON OUGHT to study the difference between testifying and preaching. It is the duty of every born-again person to testify to what the Lord has done; but it requires a new discipline and the mighty baptism of the Holy Spirit before one is sent out to preach.

Our Lord distinctly told His spiritually quickened disciples that He would send the authoritative “promise of the Father” upon them (Acts 1:4) to prepare them for the work of preaching. However, in subsequent generations, there has not been sufficient distinction made between receiving the Spirit for spiritual quickening, and the baptism with the Holy Spirit for service.

The following notation from one of the most profound European scholars on this very matter ought to carry considerable weight. I refer to Bishop Westcott, in his commentary The Gospel According to St. John. The bishop says:

The presence of this new life of humility in the disciples, communicated to them by Christ, was the necessary condition for the descent of the Holy Spirit on the day of Pentecost. The spirit which the Lord imparted to them was His Spirit, or, as it may be expressed, the Holy Spirit as dwelling in Him. By this He first quickened them and then sent them, according to His promise, the Paraclete, to be with them and to supply all power for the exercise of their different functions. The relation of the Paraclete to the Pentecostal gift is therefore the relation of quickening to the endowment; the one answers to the power of the resurrection; the other to the power of the ascension. The one to victory; the other to sovereignty.

Prayer Thought: Spirit of the Living God, fall fresh on me!

SUGGESTED READING: ¹The former treatise have I made, O Theophilus, of all that Jesus began both to do and teach, ²Until the day in which he was taken up, after that he through the Holy Ghost had given commandments unto the apostles whom he had chosen: ³To whom also he shewed himself alive after his passion by many infallible proofs, being seen of them forty days, and speaking of the things pertaining to the kingdom of God: ⁴And, being assembled together with them, commanded them that they should not depart from Jerusalem, but wait for the promise of the Father, which, saith he, ye have heard of me. ⁵For John truly baptized with water; but ye shall be baptized with the Holy Ghost not many days hence. ⁶When they therefore were come together, they asked of him, saying, Lord, wilt thou at this time restore again the kingdom to Israel? ⁷And he said unto them, It is not for you to know the times or the seasons, which the Father hath put in his own power. ⁸But ye shall receive power, after that the Holy Ghost is come upon you: and ye shall be witnesses unto me both in Jerusalem, and in all Judaea, and in Samaria, and unto the uttermost part of the earth. ⁹And when he had spoken these things, while they beheld, he was taken up; and a cloud received him out of their sight. ¹⁰And while they looked stedfastly toward heaven as he went up, behold, two men stood by them in white apparel; ¹¹Which also said, Ye men of Galilee, why stand ye gazing up into heaven? this same Jesus, which is taken up from you into heaven, shall so come in like manner as ye have seen him go into heaven. ¹²Then returned they unto Jerusalem from the mount called Olivet, which is from Jerusalem a sabbath day's journey. ¹³And when they were come in, they went up into an upper room, where abode both Peter, and James, and John, and Andrew, Philip, and Thomas, Bartholomew, and Matthew, James the son of Alphaeus, and Simon Zelotes, and Judas the brother of James. ¹⁴These all continued with one accord in prayer and supplication, with the women, and Mary the mother of Jesus, and with his brethren.

—Acts 1:1–14