Spirituality kills

There are very few old school atheists around today. Most people believe in god, an unseen spiritual world and the existence of evil. Most people pray especially when facing difficulty or illness. There are numerous books on “higher consciousness”, “channelling”, “conversations with God” and your “personal angel”. Day time talk show hosts advocate prayer, though it’s your preference as to who or what you would like to pray to. Our world is very spiritual, but they have no clue about Jesus.

We could have been in Ephesus in the 1st Century. A very spiritual city - even boasting the temple of Artemis - but ignorant about Jesus. They prayed, recited special chants, wore good luck amulets to ward of evil and also believed in the existence of personal “spiritual assistants” who helped out from time to time. The average Ephesian practised magic as a way to manipulate whatever god was available to help in the desired way, like getting a girl to like you.

Paul entered the city and taught about the real God Jesus. Many Ephesians believed the truth about Jesus and according to Acts 19.19, “A number who had practised sorcery brought their scrolls together and burned them publicly.”

The mass book burning bonfire was not protest action against the government for poor service delivery, but a visible demonstration of their repentance. Many realised that not all spirituality is good. In fact, spirituality without Jesus is useless, so you might as well burn your (very expensive) books on Wicca or higher consciousness.

However, you (yes YOU!) may say, I don’t worship any goddess or practise magic! Well, our gods and our magic are much more subtle today.

We worship gods like Economy-God, who even has his own prophets called “economists”, who preach sermons called “business reports”. We listen intently to these sermons and if the Economy-God does well our country will be blessed and all will be well.

We revere Money-God. He loves being worshipped at stadiums and his instrument of praise is the vuvuzela. When Money-God, also known as Fifa, hears his praise-summons he will come and bless our country and all will be well.

We venerate Child-God. We give Child-God all he wants lest his holy wrath descends on us in the form of a temper tantrum.

We honour Me-God. Me-God’s preferred place of worship is the divorce court, where Me-God can maintain his happiness, hobbies and Sony playstation.

Of course we also adore Sex-God, Status-God, Comfort-God and Mother Earth.

The truth about Jesus demands repentance: that we stop worshipping false gods and turn to the real God who has made himself known. How about a mass bonfire today as a visible demonstration of our repentance? We could burn our porno collections, our books on white magic, copies of the John Edwards show and all our little black books with cell numbers of old girl/boyfriends. In other words, we turn from these false gods in our lives and we worship Jesus.

The next blog will be on the acceptable “magic” we practise today, and why that too is useless.

Have you experienced the second blessing?

Pentecostals often refer to and preach from Acts 19:1-6 to promote second blessing theology (SBT). SBT teaches that the normative Christian practice is first to accept Jesus as Lord and then, secondly, to have another separate, distinct experience of the baptism of the Spirit. During this second experience the Christian is said to be filled with the Spirit, normally this “blessing” is accompanied with speaking in “tongues”.

In Ephesus Paul found twelve “disciples” (v1). Normally in Acts “disciples” refers to Christians, but it turns out from Paul’s questioning that these people are not Christians, but repentant Jews. Paul probably thought they were Christians at first.

To gauge their spiritual state, Pauls asks (v2), "Did you receive the Holy Spirit when you believed?" Paul did not ask did you receive the Spirit when you attended the course or when you prayed a special prayer or when you truly entered a new level of obedience in your Christian life! Paul associates receiving the Holy Spirit with believing (i.e. believing in Jesus).

They answered (v2), "No, we have not even heard that there is a Holy Spirit." Naturally Paul is bewildered so asks (v3), "Then what baptism did you receive?" Paul wants to know whose teachings there are following, with whom they associate themselves with. They reply (v3), “John’s baptism”. In other words, these disciples had agreed with John the baptizer that they should repent and await the promised king, who would baptise – not with water – but with the Holy Spirit (v4).

We realise, with Paul, that these “disciples” were repentant Jews awaiting their promised king, not Christians. The Holy Spirit is instrumental to Christian conversion and life (Romans 8:9) and they had no clue about him!
These “disciples” were like many people today. They have heard of the reality of God, a promised king, of sin, of repentance, but have no clue about Jesus and therefore they do not have the Spirit’s empowering presence.

What’s the remedy? The disciples receive instruction about Jesus (v4-5). Here is a good lesson: For a person to receive the Holy Spirit, they need instruction – not about the Spirit – but instruction about Jesus! The disciples learn about Jesus, the promised king, and receive baptism in Jesus’ name and as a result immediately and inevitably receive the Holy Spirit (v6).

Becoming a Christian and receiving the Spirit are aspects of the same experience and go hand in hand. It is impossible to have one without the other, as Paul wrote to the Ephesians years later in Ephesians 1:13 “…Having believed, you were marked in him with a seal, the promised Holy Spirit…”

The visible evidence of the baptism of the Spirit was speaking in tongues and prophesying (v6), as sometimes happened elsewhere in Acts.