Introduction
What is the work of the Holy Spirit?
The work of the Holy Spirit is to glorify Jesus as He said, “He shall glorify me: for He shall take of Mine and shall declare it unto you.” (John 16:14)
How is the work of the Spirit represented in the Bible?
Various terms and analogies are used to teach us this. One of these is baptism.
Baptism of the Holy Spirit
How is baptism a picture of the work of the Holy Spirit?
Because baptism represents a cleansing, and the Bible speaks of being baptized with the Holy Spirit. The meaning here is that the Holy Spirit cleanses us from sin just as our outward bodies are cleansed from filth and other impurities.
What does the Bible teach about being baptized with the Holy Spirit?
First, we find that this event actually occurred on the day of Pentecost. This is the day when Jesus poured (Acts 2:17-18, 33; cf Acts 10:45) out the Holy Spirit upon His assembled people in Jerusalem. This entire event is described by Jesus as a “baptism.” (Acts 1:5) Jesus had ascended into heaven and had received the Spirit of God from the Father. (Acts 2:33) Now, Jesus baptizes His people in this Spirit. This was the inauguration of the new covenant for which the people of Israel had been waiting and looking for so many years. (Acts 2:16) This was an event of such massive significance in the history of God’s redemption that it was accompanied by various signs and many miracles. (Acts 2:2-4, 43)
Second, Paul is the only author who tells us anything about what this Spirit-baptism actually means.
What does Paul say about Spirit-baptism?
First, he says in his letter to Corinth that this Spirit-baptism resulted in our saving union with Jesus Christ. For in one Spirit we were all baptized into one body–Jews or Greeks, slaves or free–and all were made to drink of one Spirit. (1 Corinthians 12:13)
Why do some translations render this verse “For by one Spirit…”?
| Greek | ASV 1901 | NASB 1977 | ESV 2011 |
| καὶ γὰρ ἐν ἑνὶ Πνεύματι ἡμεῖς πάντες εἰς ἓν σῶμα ἐβαπτίσθημεν εἴτε Ἰουδαῖοι εἴτε Ἕλληνες εἴτε δοῦλοι εἴτε ἐλεύθεροι | For in one Spirit were we all baptized into one body, whether Jews or Greeks, whether bond or free… | For by one Spirit we were all baptized into one body, whether Jews or Greeks, whether slaves or free… | For in one Spirit we were all baptized into one body—Jews or Greeks, slaves or free… |
The issue is how to understand the preposition in the phrase ἐν ἑνὶ Πνεύματι at the very beginning of the verse.
- The ἐν could show agency which would mean that the Holy Spirit is the One who baptizes people into the body of Christ. This is the idea behind the NASB update of what was originally in the ASV.
- If you connect this verse with what happened at Pentecost, then this meaning is not correct since at Pentecost the Spirit was not the One doing the baptizing but was that which was poured out upon the assembled believers. If Paul is speaking here of what happened at Pentecost, then the original ASV translation (…in one Spirit…) is correct.
- A better translation than all of these is to use the English preposition “with” which better captures what happened at Pentecost where the Spirit was poured out on the assembled believers. The baptism there was not an immersion which is implied by the use of the preposition “in” but a pouring which is better represented by the preposition “with.”
What other reason can be given in defense of the translation “in” or “with?”
The fact that Paul goes on in this verse to say that we were all made to drink of one Spirit. (1 Corinthians 12:13) This supports the idea that the Spirit here is not the one doing the baptizing but is Himself poured out upon the believers.
Is it wrong to understand Paul here as teaching that “by one Spirit…” were baptized into Christ?
Not necessarily. It is true that when the Holy Spirit is poured out on us, He goes to work on us. He joins us to Christ, makes us a new creation (2 Corinthians 5:17), plants His fruit in our soul (Galatians 5:22), and much more.
Why do you say this baptism was a cleansing?
Because the external ritual involved the application of water to individuals for the purpose of cleansing.
How can you show this from Scripture?
First, we see so many purification rituals in Israelite religion all of which were types of this Spirit-baptism.
- Purification for priests (Exodus 29:1-9, 30:17-21, 40:3-32 – Psalm 26:6, 73:13)
- Leprosy (Leviticus 13:6, 13:34)
- Day of Atonement (Leviticus 16:20-28)
- Bodily discharges (Leviticus 15:1-29, Deuteronomy 23:10-11)
- Cleansing of the Levites (Numbers 8:5-7, 19:7-22)
- Contact with the deceased (Leviticus 5:2, 16:4, 16:24, 11:24-28, 11:39-40, 22:4-6 & Numbers 19:11-13)
- Unsolved murders (Deuteronomy 21:1-9)
The author of Hebrews speaks of these purifications:
The Holy Spirit is signifying this, that the way into the holy place has not yet been disclosed while the outer tabernacle is still standing, which is a symbol for the present time. Accordingly both gifts and sacrifices are offered which cannot make the worshiper perfect in conscience, since they relate only to food and drink and various washings [or baptisms], regulations for the body imposed until a time of reformation. (Hebrews 9:8-10)
Second, we can see the practice and understanding of New Testament baptism which also was a purification ritual.
What are these baptisms in the Old Testament?
The author refers to various baptisms here. In subsequent verses, he mentions some of these:
For if the blood of goats and bulls and the ashes of a heifer sprinkling those who have been defiled sanctify for the cleansing of the flesh, how much more will the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered Himself without blemish to God, cleanse your conscience from dead works to serve the living God? (Hebrews 9:13-14)
Where do we read about these baptisms in the Old Testament?
The ritual mentioned in Hebrews 9 is explained in Numbers 19.
What was the purpose of this ritual?
This was a ritual for returning a person who had become unclean to a state of ceremonial cleanness again. This ritual was specifically for people who had in some way come into contact with a dead person either by direct contact, or by being in the tent when someone had died, or even accidentally touching a corpse or human bone in a field.
What exactly was involved in the performance of this ritual?
First, the water of purification לְמֵי נִדָּה had to be prepared. This special water had ashes mixed in it. To prepare these ashes, the priest took a red heifer which had no blemish and had never been used for plowing, killed it and burned it. As the animal burned, the priest would add to the fire some sticks of cedar, a branch of hyssop, and some scarlet yarn. When all this was burned, the ashes were collected and stored in a container outside the camp.
Whenever someone became unclean in the ways described above, they entered into a state of uncleanness for seven days. In order to become clean again, someone would run and fetch this container of ashes. Some of this ash was then mixed with water, and this mixture was sprinkled on the unclean person. This sprinkling would take place on the third day and on the seventh day. If this was done, the person became ceremonially clean on the seventh day.
What is meant by being unclean or being ceremonially unclean?
A person who was unclean was not allowed to participate in the worship of the Tabernacle (or temple) and was, in a sense, placed in a temporary position of probation. If they failed to deal with their uncleanness, they would be permanently cut off from God’s people. In the above instance, Moses taught the people:
Anyone who touches a corpse, the body of a man who has died, and does not purify himself, defiles the tabernacle of the LORD; and that person shall be cut off from Israel. Because the water for impurity was not sprinkled on him, he shall be unclean; his uncleanness is still on him. (Numbers 19:13)
A person who was unclean was not necessarily a person who had sinned; many of the situations that made a person unclean involved no sin such as the above when someone died in your tent (Numbers 19:14).
What exactly was this water of purification?
In Hebrew, the term is לְמֵי נִדָּה which is literally “for a water of impurity” or water for the removal of impurity. As described above, the water itself was made from the ashes of an animal which had been killed as a sin offering. Again, the symbolism here is key.
Why does the author of Hebrews call this a baptism?
Because it involves the key idea of baptism which is purification.
What other baptisms are found in the Old Testament?
The author of Hebrews refers to “various washings” in the Old Testament ceremonial worship as baptisms. Hence, wherever there is a washing, we can conclude that this was understood by the New Testament church as a kind of baptism; cf. Leviticus 6:28; 8:5–6; 14:8–9; 15:5, 11-12. The real meaning of these rituals was understood as well; cf. Psalm 51:2, 7; Jeremiah 2:22; 4:14.
How common were these washings?
These ritual washings must have been a near daily occurrence in Israel. The ritual of the red heifer would have occurred at least as often as someone died. It is no exaggeration to say that these purification ceremonies would have been routine in the life of a typical Jew.
The Seal of the Spirit
What is the seal of the Holy Spirit?
This is something spoken of by Paul in three different places:
- “And it is God who establishes us with you in Christ, and has anointed us, and who has also put His seal on us and given us His Spirit in our hearts as a guarantee.” (2 Corinthians 1:21–22)
- “In Him you also, when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation, and believed in Him, were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit…” (Ephesians 1:13)
- “And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, by whom you were sealed for the day of redemption.” (Ephesians 4:30)
Ephesians 1
What is Paul’s teaching here?
In these verses, Paul is glorifying and praising God for His plan of salvation and for all the blessings which believers receive when they are joined in a saving union with Jesus Christ. As usual, Paul rejoices that it was not just the Jewish Christians who received these blessings, but gentiles also.
He made known to us the mystery of His will, according to His kind intention which He purposed in Him with a view to an administration suitable to the fullness of the times, that is, the summing up of all things in Christ, things in the heavens and things on the earth. In Him also we have obtained an inheritance, having been predestined according to His purpose who works all things after the counsel of His will, to the end that we who were the first to hope in Christ [the Jewish Christians] would be to the praise of His glory. In Him, you also [gentile Christians], after listening to the message of truth, the gospel of your salvation–having also believed, you were sealed in Him with the Holy Spirit of promise, (Ephesians 1:9-13)
Paul says that the gentile Christians were sealed with the Holy Spirit of promise. What does this mean?
It’s first necessary to understand the use of a seal in ancient times. Seals were used as a mark of identity, ownership, authority, or authenticity. Kings, for example, would seal documents as proof that a given document really was from the king. (Esther 8:8) The more common people would use a seal in the same way that we might use a signature or fingerprint. Merchants would mark their merchandise with a seal to guarantee its authenticity and to distinguish it from the merchandise of others, what we might call branding. Jesus’ tomb was sealed as a guarantee that it had not been tampered with. The scroll in Revelation 5 was sealed with seven seals meaning that it had not been opened. Finally, seals were used as a kind of badge marking an object or person as the possession of someone else. The Code of Hammurabi speaks of slaves being branded (see §226, 227).
What actually was a seal?
It was usually a ring or some object that would impress a pattern or design into some kind of softer material like wax or clay. This pattern became the visible seal that functioned in the above ways.
Which of these meanings applies to Paul’s use of the term here?
The meaning here is that the Holy Spirit is the seal or mark of ownership. A person sealed with the Holy Spirit is marked as belonging to Jesus.
How is the Holy Spirit a seal?
The Holy Spirit is the gift of God which believers receive when they are united to Christ. The Holy Spirit Himself is the seal. Owen writes (p400) that by this sealing, we are not to understand some specific act which the Holy Spirit does in us, but that the actual gift of the Holy Spirit himself to us:
In the first place, it is expressly said that we are sealed with the Spirit; whereby the Spirit Himself is expressed as this seal, and not any of His especial operations, as He is also directly said Himself to be the “earnest of our inheritance.” In the latter, the words are, Ἐν ᾧ ἐσφραγίσθητε, “In whom,” in and by the receiving of whom, “ye are sealed.” Wherefore, no especial act of the Spirit, but only an especial effect of His communication unto us, seems to be intended hereby.
Now when a person receives the Holy Spirit, they are changed. You might say, the Holy Spirit leaves His “pattern” on the person. It is by the ministry of the Spirit that a person is made holy and Christ-like. Macknight says (p322):
Christ is said to have marked the Gentiles as the children of God by bestowing on them the gifts of the Spirit. Hence when Peter rehearsed to the brethren in Jerusalem how the Holy Ghost fell on Cornelius and his company as on the Jewish believers at the beginning, they replied, “Then hath God also to the Gentiles granted repentance unto life.” (Acts 11:18) Others are of opinion that the ordinary influences of the Spirit on the minds of believers are also included in this sealing because thereby they acquire the image of God and are prepared for eternal life. Accordingly, though the extraordinary gifts of the Spirit whereby the believing Jews and Gentiles in the first age were sealed as heirs of the promises have long ago been withdrawn, the ordinary influences of the Spirit of God still remain. And if they produce in any man a new nature, he is thereby marked or declared to be God’s son and that mark or seal is to him a stronger evidence of his title to the inheritance than if he possessed the miraculous gifts, nay than if an angel from heaven assured him of his title. How earnest then ought we to be in our endeavors to obtain this most excellent seal of the Spirit.
Edwards writes (p231):
And when the Scripture speaks of the seal of the Spirit, it is an expression which properly denotes, not an immediate voice or suggestion, but some work or effect of the Spirit, that is left as a divine mark upon the soul, to be an evidence, by which God’s children might be known. The seals of princes were the distinguishing marks of princes: and thus God’s seal is spoken of as God’s mark, “Hurt not the earth, neither the sea, nor the trees, till we have sealed the servants of our God in their foreheads” (Revelation 7:3); together with: “Set a mark upon the foreheads of the men that sign and cry for all the abominations that are done in the midst thereof” (Ezekiel 9:4). When God sets his seal on a man’s heart by his Spirit, there is some holy stamp, some image impressed and left upon the heart by the Spirit, as by the seal upon the wax. And this holy stamp, or impressed image, exhibiting clear evidence to the conscience, that the subject of it is the child of God, is the very thing which in Scripture is called the seal of the Spirit, and the witness, or evidence of the Spirit. And this image enstamped by the Spirit on God’s children’s hearts, is His own image: that is the evidence by which they are known to be God’s children, that they have the image of their Father stamped upon their hearts by the spirit of adoption. Seals anciently had engraven on them two things, viz. the image and the name of the person whose seal it was. Therefore when Christ says to his spouse, “Set me as a seal upon thine heart, as a seal upon thine arm” (Song of Solomon 8:6); it is as much as to say, let my name and image remain impressed there. The seals of princes were wont to bear their image; so that what they set their seal and royal mark upon, had their image left on it. It was the manner of princes of old to have their image engraven on their jewels and precious stones; and the image of Augustus engraven on a precious stone, was used as the seal of the Roman emperors, in Christ’s and the apostles’ times. And the saints are the jewels of Jesus Christ, the great potentate, who has the possession of the empire of the universe: and these jewels have his image enstamped upon them, by his royal signet, which is the Holy Spirit. And this is undoubtedly what the Scripture means by the seal of the Spirit; especially when it is enstamped in so fair and clear a manner, as to be plain to the eye of conscience; which is what the Scripture calls our spirit. This is, truly an effect that is spiritual, supernatural, and divine. This is, in itself, of a holy nature, being a communication of the divine nature and beauty. That kind of influence of the Spirit which gives and leaves this stamp upon the heart is such that no natural man can be the subject of anything of the like nature with it. This is the highest sort of witness of the Spirit, which it is possible the soul should be the subject of: if there were any such thing as a witness of the Spirit by immediate suggestion or revelation, this would be vastly more noble and excellent, and as much above it as the heaven is above the earth. This the devil cannot imitate: as to an inward suggestion of the Spirit of God, by a kind of secret voice speaking, and immediately asserting and revealing a fact, he can do that which is a thousand times so like to this, as he can to that holy and divine effect, or work of the Spirit of God, which has been now spoken of.
Goodwin defends (sermon 15) the idea that the seal of the Spirit is something the Spirit does to the believer. In other words, the Holy Spirit is the agent of the sealing, not the seal itself.
What can be said of Goodwin’s understanding of this text?
Paul says that it is God the Father who seals us, not the Holy Spirit.
Now He who establishes us with you in Christ and anointed us is God, who also sealed us and gave us the Spirit in our hearts as a pledge. (2 Corinthians 1:21-22)
How will a person know when he is sealed with the Holy Spirit?
Clearly, the seal of the Spirit is to function in the life of a believer as a source of assurance. It gives to every believer a certainty that God will save them at last and bring them into their inheritance. But how does this work? Some believe that this is an experience which God gives to His people. In the previous quote from Edwards, he spoke of those who thought of the seal as an inward suggestion or a kind of secret voice speaking to us and assuring us of our salvation. Goodwin writes (p233) of two kinds of assurance:
But now there is a twofold assurance of salvation, that we may yet go further in examining what is intended in it; for I must sift things to find out what is the proper scope, what is the elixir of the Holy Ghost’s intention.
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- There is, first, an assurance by sense, by conditional promises, whereby a man, seeing the image of God upon his heart, to which promises are made, cometh comfortably to believe that he is in the estate of grace. That there is a use of sense all acknowledge.
- But then, secondly, there is an immediate assurance of the Holy Ghost, by a heavenly and divine light, of a divine authority, which the Holy Ghost sheddeth in a man’s heart, (not having relation to grace wrought, or anything in a man’s self,) whereby he sealeth him up to the day of redemption. And this is the great seal of all the rest.
The one way is discursive; a man gathereth that God loveth him from the effects, as we gather there is fire because there is smoke. But the other is intuitive, as the angels are said to know things; it is such a knowledge as whereby we know the whole is greater than the part, we do not stand discoursing. There is light that cometh and overpowereth a man’s soul, and assureth him that God is his, and he is God’s, and that God loveth him from everlasting.