Jan. 11, 2026 Acts 19:1-7 “Spiritual Baptism”

06 Jan Jan. 11, 2026 Acts 19:1-7 “Spiritual Baptism”

Jan. 11, 2026    Acts 19:1-7          “Spiritual Baptism”

There are times when I have to be careful with what I say about a topic because it might be a hot topic for somebody.  It seems to me that it is always election time and some are offended if I’m too much Republican or too much Democrat.  Sometimes people will think of me as too liberal or too conservative.  As a pastor I really have to walk a fine line and it usually isn’t much of a problem.  It has been a lot easier since I retired.  But as long as my main boss is Jesus Christ, then I don’t have to worry a whole lot about human labels because they change all the time anyway.  All this carries over into my interpretation of the Bible.  My interpretation is usually what the Bible tells us.  I try not to let our culture influence me too much.  There are many things mentioned in the Bible that are permissible in our society but the Bible tells us that they are wrong.  I will error on the side of the Bible because I truly believe that it is the inspired word of God.  Today’s Scripture talks about one of those so-called gray areas of the Bible.  I actually think that it makes baptism very clear but some may not agree with me.  Let’s let Paul help us to see how all this applies to us today.

Martin Dale tells this story and I may have told it before.  It may seem hard to believe but I may have run out of stories after 19 ½ years of preaching.  But here goes anyway.  It seems that there were 2 farmers in Kentucky who also owned racing stables.  These 2 men were great rivals in just about everything they did.  One spring, both of them entered a horse in the local steeplechase.   One of them decided to get the edge so he hired a professional jockey.  The race was finally on and both horses were well ahead of the others, leading the race.  They came to the last jump and it proved too hard for both horses and they went down throwing their riders.  But this didn’t faze the professional jockey.  He simply got up and got back on the horse.  He still won the race easily.  He was feeling pretty happy when he went to the paddock and found the farmer in a fuming rage. The pro jockey asked what the problem was.  After all, he did win the race.  “Oh, yes,” roared the farmer. “You won all right, but, you won the race riding the wrong horse.”  The same thing can happen in life.  You can get to the end of life and you find that you are on the wrong horse.  That is no place to be.

This Sunday is the Sunday where we celebrate the baptism of Jesus Christ. Baptism may be one of those confusing terms that we find in the Bible.  I say that it is confusing because there are so many interpretations of baptism.  We are confused as to when we are to baptize.  Do we baptize infants or do we have to wait until they are adults?  Then there is the question of how to apply the water whether it is by sprinkling or immersion or whatever.  This has been such a sore spot over the years and centuries that wars have been fought over baptism.  Denominations have been started in battles over baptism.  So this is not something that we should take for granted or lightly.  This is serious.

So let’s begin by looking at the passage in Mark 1:9-11.  All the Gospel writers talk about the baptism of Jesus.  Therefore this is very important.  However, no one really addresses why Jesus had to be baptized.  Have you ever thought about that?  I mean, Jesus is God.  Why would God need to be baptized?   I did a little reading in the commentaries on this because I don’t want to get it wrong.  One of them talk of 3 reasons and I will give you 4.

The first reason was an act of obedience showing that Jesus is in full agreement with God’s overall plan.  The second was that it was an act of self-identification with the nation of Israel.  Remember that the nation of Israel is still important to these people even though they are ruled by Rome.  It is still important today.  The third was a self-dedication to the messianic mission He would be on.

The fourth reason is one that may be the most important one yet.  We all know that Jesus was fully God but we sometimes forget that He was also fully human at the same time.  Don’t ask me how this works because it is one of those dichotomies in the Bible that just defy our senses.  But then again, the Bible is full of these little things that just don’t make sense to us.  One mystery is the Trinity.  How can 3 be 1 and 1 be 3?  It doesn’t make sense.  Anyway, maybe the human Jesus needed to be baptized to show us the way.  All I’m trying to say is that there were reasons why Jesus needed to be baptized and I doubt if we will ever agree on these either.

But I think that we can agree that Jesus was baptized.  As I said all 4 Gospel writers talk about this so it must be important.  A few years later, and we don’t really know how long, Paul writes about this.  He begins this reading by talking about how he came across some disciples.  One of the things we have a tendency to do in our modern Bible reading is that we assume things that might not be true.  Paul talks to these disciples.  Now what we have to understand is that this doesn’t necessarily mean that they were disciples of Jesus.

There might be two reasons why we know that these aren’t disciples of Jesus.  The first is that Paul refers to them as some disciples and not the disciples.  The other reason is by how they answer the questions Paul has for them.  Many experts feel that they might have been disciples of John the Baptist.  You see, in those days it was a very common practice for church leaders and other leaders to have disciples.  These were basically people in training under a master which is exactly what the disciples did under Jesus.

So Paul comes along and asks if these disciples had received the Holy Spirit when they believed.  They replied that they had never even heard of the Holy Spirit.  They had received their baptism from John the Baptist.  If you remember John baptized for the repentance of sins.  That was it.  It was Jesus who came along and baptized not only for the forgiveness of sins but also with the Holy Spirit.

These disciples had come part of the way but they weren’t all the way there yet.  They were still incomplete.  This was a problem in the time of Paul and it still is a problem today.  This is my personal opinion but I think there are a lot of people who have repented but have not asked the Holy Spirit to be part of their lives.  There are a lot of people who tell you they are Christian because they went to Sunday school 40 years ago and they haven’t been back in church since.  There are people who tell you that they are Christian because, well, they just must be.  They live in a Christian country and they sort of believe in God.

All these reasons and more are the makings of some major eternal disappointment.  I don’t know how many times I have walked away from a conversation where I might have planted a seed, but end up with the strange feeling that this person is going to remember this conversation for eternity in the wrong place.  This passage is very important to all people.

There may be some people here today who will say that the Bible tells us that all we have to do is believe in Jesus to have eternal life.  I know the Bible tells us that so I’m not going to argue or disagree with you.  However, we do have a little different meaning of the word believe than what was used in the Bible.  When the Bible talks about believing, it means that you believe totally, with your whole heart.  It doesn’t mean that you believe there is a god out there somewhere.  It doesn’t mean that you believe this part of the Bible and not the next part.  It doesn’t mean that you believe in God as long as you can define God.  These disciples of John were much farther down the road to belief than any of these scenarios I just mentioned.

We have many more people in these kinds of belief categories than any other place.  As a matter of fact our founder, John Wesley, was a pastor for several years before he came to believe.  He was coming back from America when they encountered a storm at sea.  Everyone was terrified because they thought they would capsize and sink.  However, there were a group of Moravians who sang and were cheerful all during the storm.  They were not afraid.  Pastor John Wesley wanted to know what they had that gave them such peace.  So he talked with them and he was told that they had Jesus living in their hearts.  Wesley thought about this for the rest of the trip and it wasn’t too long after they got home that he has a strange but warm feeling in his heart at Aldersgate as the Holy Spirit came upon him. He had been a pastor for years without the Holy Spirit.  I’m not real sure but I believe that is a problem in today’s world also.  We have many pastors who can talk the talk but they have not completed the course by allowing the Holy Spirit in their lives.  Personally, I think they stick out like a sore thumb but that is just me.

This is why you always find me asking the question “Do you have Jesus in your heart?”  I want everyone to have what I have and so many of you folks have it too.  It isn’t enough to just say you believe in Jesus.  You have to believe with all your heart, soul and mind.  This is what they call the spiritual complication of this reading.  I can also read it to mean that it is ok to baptize infants and I’m sure that others would say you have to be an adult.  But I’m not going there today.

So we have spiritual complications in this passage but we also have spiritual transformation.  We have the Good News.  What happened to these people who had already been baptized by John with water?  Paul laid his hands on them and the Holy Spirit came upon them.  Then they began to prophecy and talk in tongues.  Suddenly, a light came on inside them and they were changed.  They would never be the same.

Can you even imagine what it was like for these guys?  Here they are doing what they thought they were supposed to do after their baptism by John.  This was a big deal because John was a leader of the way to Jesus.  But he could only baptize with water.  He was waiting for Jesus who would bring the Holy Spirit into play.  So these guys are kind of standing around thinking they are pretty good people.  They had done this baptism thing and they were all right.  They would get to heaven.

Then along comes Paul.  He is telling them that they don’t have it wrong but they just haven’t finished the process.  Suddenly they can see things they had never seen before.  They had new insight.  They understood what it means to be a real disciple of Jesus Christ as the Holy Spirit came upon them.  As I said their lives would never be the same.

The same thing can be said of many people today.  Many people have been baptized by water but they have never completed the transaction.  When we baptize our infants, we take on the responsibility of teaching these children about Jesus so that they can make that decision.  We want them to invite the Holy Spirit into their lives forever.  We are looking for transformation for all these people.  Most of the time it is not the fault of people for not completing this because they have been told that is all there is to it.  But we need that last step.  We need to invite the Holy Spirit into our hearts to live forever.

One of the problems we have with following Jesus in our modern world is that we think we need proof for everything we do.  We like to understand everything about us.  We have to know.  I think there might even be some people here today who might be a little like this.  If you do then I would like you to explain the law of physics to me or better yet give me a detailed description of the chemical reaction as our bone marrow is triggered to make blood cells.  Or maybe this might be a little easier, explain to me exactly how electricity works.  Or maybe you can tell me the exact workings of the brain especially in terms of our short term and long term memory.

For the most part, I would guess that very few of us could even come close.  Some of these things scientists cannot even explain.  We can’t really explain gravity but we are comfortable in knowing that we will not blow off this planet.  There are so many things that we don’t understand but we just trust that they are there.

It is the same way with God.  There are many things we don’t understand but we have the faith that they are true because the truth or proof is right in front of our eyes and there is no other explanation for it.  How did we get here?  How was the earth formed?  God did all these things.  He did all this and more.  Plus He gave us the mystery of baptism.

You don’t have to understand this.  You just have to believe.  I have never baptized anyone where the Holy Spirit wasn’t present.  Sometimes He is so prominent that the hairs on my arms stand up.  It is the same way with Holy Communion.  God is present.  He is present and loving us in ways we don’t know.

Jesus Christ loves us so much that I will never understand it.  He transforms lives in the blink of an eye and I have seen this happen.  Please don’t worry about how this works.  Learn to rely on Jesus for all things in your life because He will provide if you just follow.  You cannot get away from His love and I praise the Lord for that.  And thank you, Jesus, for first loving us.  Let’s pray.