Claretian Teaching Ministry

A young lady told her pastor she was “fed up” with her work environment. She was the only one there with any religious ideals, and wanted to quit. He asked her, “Where do you put the lamps in your house?” Taken aback by the question, she responded that they would be placed in otherwise dark areas. Her own mind was enlightened by her very answer to that question. His question was a one sentence thought-provoking commentary on Christ’s words: “Let your light shine before men, that they may see your good deeds and praise your Father in heaven” (Mt 5:16).

“Lighting a candle” may be as simple as lighting up one’s face with a smile when it’s difficult, or a word of encouragement to a downcast coworker; it may be the example of a brief “Bible-snack” during one’s lunch hour, or a clear answer to a spiritually or morally confused employee. “In everything set… an example by doing what is good,” is Paul’s simple advice (Ti 2:7). That “everything” embraces a myriad of opportunities that present themselves to us daily for a prudent and loving response.

Tryout Paul’s checklist of good example opportunities: “in speech, in life, in love, in faith and in purity” (1 Tm 4:12).

Fr. John Hampsch – “One-Minute Meditations for Busy People”

   In a town where gambling was illegal, two judges were arrested for violating that ordinance. They each agreed to preside at the other’s trial. The first judge found his confrere guilty and gave him a fine of $100. Then they exchanged places as judge and defendant. The second judge also declared the other one guilty, but fined him $200, Of course, the defendant indignantly claimed that the decision was unfair, since they were equal partners in the violation. In explaining the apparent inequity, the second judge replied, “I decided on a heavier fine, since there’s too much of this illegal gambling going on in this town; this is the second case like this presented to this court today!”

   No one gets through this life without being victimized by injustices in one form or another, and “when they fall victim, they shall receive [only] a little help” (Dn 11:34), Not all injustices come from unjust judges like the one in Jesus’ parable of Luke 18; most come from commonplace sources. Arrows of injustice are aimed at us from, among others, bankers charging hidden fees; clerks refusing refunds; shoplifters that cause inflated prices; con men; prejudiced teachers who underscore students; bosses who promote favored employees; unscrupulous auto mechanics, plumbers, or appliance repairmen; pilfering maids; duplicitous salespersons; lawyers or doctors who gouge exorbitant fees from clients or patients; inheritance-usurping relatives; burglars; reputation-corroding neighborhood gossips; and cheating spouses who shatter a marriage,

   All of these, of course will have to give an exacting account of their actions to the God of justice, but that’s their problem, not ours. “[But he who] trusts in the Lord…through the steadfast love of the Most High he shall not be moved” (Ps 21:7, 14), Hence, our problem as victims of injustice is striving to keep ourselves continually immersed in that “steadfast love [that] surrounds those who trust in the LORD” (Ps 32:10),

   This means learning to depend on the Lord as David did when persecuted by Saul: “The LORD is my strength and my shield; in him my heart trusts; so I am helped, and my heart exults” (Ps 28:7). Being persecuted brought David to the brink of utter desperation: “Preserve my life, for I am devoted to you; save your servant who trusts in you, You are my God” (Ps 86:2)

   From such a great expert in trusting we can learn that either our loving God will restore our rights or he will give us the strength to sustain the hardship resulting from the adversity, as he applies it to the glory of God and our welfare: “No good thing does the Lord withhold from those who walk uprightly” (Ps 84:11).

Fr. John Hampsch, cmf - “Pathways of Trust”

  A woman asked her friend how she could stay so calm in the midst of heavy pressures in her nerve-racking job. The answer was as simple as it was profound: ”I’m too blessed to be stressed.”

The Age of Anxiety. That’s the label often attached to the turbulent, war-ravaged, terrorist-threatened time in which we live and try to survive. The experience of a deep inner peace is a rarity in our age. Even when peace of mind is attained, still peace of soul is fleeting-the supernatural peace that Jesus promised (Jn 14:27): “My peace I give to you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled, and do not let them be afraid.” This is what Paul refers to: “The peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus” (Phil 4:7).

The ever-deepening turmoil provides a gargantuan challenge for us in seeking to cultivate an exquisitely refined faith in our Creator. This requires us to recognize that Jesus is the Alpha and Omega-”the pioneer and perfecter of our faith” (Heb 12:2). When our faith has become a truly finished or perfected faith, it becomes an imperturbable trusting conviction that God alone will have the last word on the entire world and world events. That will not occur “until the time of universal restoration that God announced long ago,” as Peter proclaimed in a sermon (Acts 3:21). Until that “Day of the Lord,” we must at least try to make sense out of the chaos that shatters our ailing world.

Bertrand Russell, in a humanistic revision of the scriptural pericope “Fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom,” said, “To consider fear is the beginning of wisdom.” If his revision was correct, however, he didn’t say how to conquer fear. His commentators felt compelled to complete this unanswered inquiry by conjecturing that to conquer fear and attain its opposite—inner tranquility—is a matter of exercising a kind of faith that relies on a controlling Power greater than oneself. In Christian theology that is simply referred to as trust in God.

John H. Hampsch, cmf – from Pathways of Trust

   There’s a story about a little old Irish lady returning from a pilgrimage of the shrines of Europe, who was questioned by the customs agent regarding a bottle in her luggage. She protested that it was Lourdes water from the famous shrine where she had witnessed several miracles” When the skeptical customs agent smelled the bottle’s contents, he informed her that it was contraband whiskey. “Glory be to God!” exclaimed the little lady! “Another miracle!”

   It isn’t hard to expose a counterfeit faith. But at venues like Lourdes where miracles really do happen, faith is more often transformed and uplifted than exposed as sham. Of all its many acclaimed miracles its greatest miracle might well be the widespread flourishing of faith, as countless tourists with merely sightseers’ curiosity find themselves absorbing the spiritual mindset of devout pilgrims. Lourdes entertains an average of 6 million visitors each year- 8 million expected this jubilee year, the 150th anniversary of Mary’s apparitions to St. Bernadette. Hardly any visitors remain untouched by the vibrant faith that permeates the very atmosphere of this remarkable heaven-chosen site. Like the hub of a cartwheel toward which all spokes converge and from which they radiate, Lourdes is the global focal point of many aspects of faith.

   Bernadette responded to the many skeptics who doubted her apparitions:

   “I am here to tell you what happened, not to make you believe.” But by God’s grace her compelling testimony aroused in them a faith that blossomed and spread far afield like wild roses. That phenomenon continues even to this day 

   For instance, many pilgrims come to Lourdes with an inferior type of faith called the “faith of urgency” (”Please, please, please, help me, Lord!”), and find their faith burgeoning into a “faith of expectancy” (”Of course you will help me, Lord!”). This expectant faith, a charismatic gift granted by the Holy Spirit, cannot be contrived by human effort, but only petitioned. (The reason for this I explain in my book, Faith, the Key to the Heart of God.) Most significantly for Lourdes devotees, Paul in 1 Cor. 12:9 links this faith charism with the related charisms of healing and miracle-working. This is the kind of expectant faith described in Hebrews 11: 1, and especially in James 5: 15: “Prayer offered in faith will heal the sick.” Jesus speaks of this expectant faith in Mark 11 :24: “Whatever you ask for in prayer, believe that you have received it and it will be yours.”

   Another “spoke” radiating from this “hub of faith” is the hallmark of Lourdes-namely, the virtue of faith-also called doctrinal faith. This kind of faith is reflected in the many penitents making life-changing confessions, and those eagerly receiving the sacrament of the anointing of the sick.

   Even more pivotal in this Mecca of belief is the doctrinal faith that experiences Jesus’ Real Presence in the Holy Eucharist. The fervent Mass attendance and countless devout Communions, as well as the Eucharistic Benediction and procession with the Host-bearing monstrance used to bless the sick, all contribute to an incandescent flow of Christ-focused love. Jesus’ mother, who “magnifies the Lord” and who persuaded him to work his first public miracle at Cana, delights in the hidden miracles of grace and soul-healing that inundate her spiritual children as they adore her Divine Son in his Eucharistic Presence. A highlight in my own priesthood recently was the Easter Sunday Mass that I was privileged to celebrate at the apparition site itself.

   On the centennial of Lourdes in 1958-half a century ago-while I was preaching at the apparition site, I hurried to finish my sermon when I noticed a group of pilgrims waiting for their cardinal chaplain to celebrate Mass at that altar. Their shepherd was Cardinal Roncali, later elected as Pope John XXIII.

   One very apparent dimension of doctrinal faith profluent at Lourdes is warm and loving devotion to Mary, especially under the title of her Immaculate Conception. That term attests that by exclusive privilege she was conceived without original sin and remained free of all personal sin also. She waited until the 16th apparition to identify herself under that title, significantly announcing her own sin-free conception on the anniversary of her divine Son’s sin-free conception-the feast of the annunciation, March 25. Mary’s Immaculate Conception-in the womb of her mother, St. Anne-had been an ancient Church teaching, but proclaimed ecclesiastically as dogma only four years prior to the Lourdes apparitions; it needed a devotional promulgation among God’s people. The Lourdes event provided an ideal stage for such a devotional faith response,

   Why did Mary say, “I am the Immaculate Conception” rather than “I have the privilege of the Immaculate Conception”? She chose to use a metonym or synecdoche, that is, a figure of speech by which a noun symbolizes a person or something else; thus, the phrase “tribute to the crown” means “tribute to the king.” If reported as a metonym from a slow-witted and unconversant child like Bernadette, who would never employ a sophisticated figure of speech like a metonym, the doctrinal revelation in that apparition would be more believable. The newly proclaimed dogma would thus be less easily refuted by skeptics.

   The faith ambience of Lourdes filters down from the sacraments to the sacramentals. Thus, the many candles blessed for the spectacular candlelight processions are sacramental symbols of the light of faith, referred to even in the candle blessing prayer itself. The world-renowned Lourdes water! now established as a sacramental and flowing at 30,000 gallons per day, began as a tiny trickle of mud scratched by Bernadette to a miraculous flow of water, the symbol of life. She often insisted to inquirers that the water had no healing power in itself; it is healing-effective only when used with the prayer of faith. This decimated the false faith of those infected with “sacramental superstition.”

   On the first pilgrimage that I shepherded to Lourdes, one lady suffered crippling pain from phlebitis in her legs. A nurse in our group prayed with deep faith at the apparition site and then sneaked up behind this lady and splashed Lourdes water on her legs. Astonishingly, she was cured totally and instantly! That triggered a resurgence of faith in our entire group-and even more cures.

   Pope Benedict, on his recent jubilee visit to Lourdes, recalled his predecessor, Pope John Paul II, whose intense Marian devotion was epitomized in his Marian coat of arms motto: Totus Tuus (All Yours). He affirmed that this reflected a life completely oriented to Christ through Mary, implying the Vatican II statement that all authentic Marian devotion is Christocentric. He said, “Whoever opens his heart to Mary is actually accepted by her and becomes her own.” This, he said, eventuates in a truly spiritual and mystical experience.

   It was that theme that I tried to present in my book, Scriptural Basis for Marian Devotion. Permit me to close by quoting a passage from that treatise:

   Any Marian devotee, trying to explain to a non-devotee the awesome interior love surges or even the exterior phenomena experienced at a Marian shrine, would usually get a disappointing response of calloused indifference. A deep and abiding awareness of Mary as our spiritual Mother is one of the most beautiful, comforting and spiritually uplifting insights granted by the Holy Spirit-undoubtedly part of that “knowledge, spiritual wisdom and understanding” that Paul prayed would be granted to the Colossians (Col. 1 :9) and to the Ephesians (Eph 5:17). As stated in Lumen Gentium in Vatican II, all authentic Marian devotion is ultimately Christocentric; hence all Marian devotees will have a much richer devotion to Jesus because of it.

   One of the greatest rewards of filial Marian devotion this side of heaven is the incalculable joy engendered by deep devotion and love toward Mary. There is a joy in honoring God, the Divine Artist, by admiring Mary, his creatural masterpiece; the joy of being, in some way, another Jesus for Mary; the ineffable joy of feeling constantly secure and at peace because of reliance on her fathomless protective love; the joy of experiencing success in all our work done for God’s glory, as she teaches us to “Make our paths straight .. and give health to the body” (Prov. 3:6-8); the joy of making her known, loved and served; the joy of seeing her honoring God who “has done mighty things for her” and to see herself honored by humans of “all generations that will call her blessed”; the joy of growing in love of Jesus under her tutelage; the joy of bringing happiness to Jesus by honoring Mary, and happiness to Mary by honoring Jesus. The saintly Marianist Brother Leonard once wrote: “To give Jesus the delight and joy of loving Mary through me and in me, and to give Mary the Joy of seeing her Son live in me-what a glorious thought!” Can it be true to say that those lacking a fervent devotion to Mary are missing something very rich in their spiritual life? The question almost answers itself. May God be praised for creating Mary, his masterpiece! +++

John H. Hampsch, C.M.F.

If you suffer from an inferiority complex and want a Scriptural uplift, spend a meditative moment pondering the common but underestimated statement of the Bible that tells us that we humans are made “according to the image and likeness of God.”

 In the primordial Trinitarian trialogue (Genesis 1:26) God said, “Let us make humankind according to our image and according to our likeness.” (See also Gen. 5:1 and 9:6, and the loss of God-like moral integrity in Eccle. 7:29.) Further references can be found in Acts, 1:26-29; 1 Cor. 11:7; 2 Cor. 3:18 and 4:4; Eph. 4:21; Col. 1:15; and 3:10; James 3:9.

Man is made to the “image” of God by having a spiritual (non-material) soul, as God is immaterial, by having an immortal soul, reflecting the eternity of God, by having an intellect as God does, and by having a free will, as God does. That’s on the natural order, says St. Thomas Aquinas.

On the supernatural order, humans are in the ”likeness” of God when they are in the state of grace (free of unrepented mortal sin), says St. Bonaventure, quoting 2 Peter. 1:4, which states that by grace we are “participants of God’s divine nature.

In reference to the future of our human nature, our “God-likeness” will  reflect a parent-child resemblance, as stated in 1 John 3:2,: “Beloved, we are God’s children now; what we will be has not yet been revealed. What we do know is this: when he is revealed, we will be like him, for we will see him as he is.” 

That’s a thought worth thinking!

Fr. John Hampsch, cmf

The old bromide that says “it’s always darkest before dawn” does not mean—as one comedian quipped—that it’s the best time to steal your neighbor’s newspaper. It’s a maxim that is mean to encourage us to expect ultimate relief from our inevitable troubles, pains, afflictions and misfortunes.

“The Lord will rescue me from every evil attack and will bring me safely to his heavenly kingdom” (2 Tim.4:18).  And for those who patiently sustain their life’s hardships, Jesus reminds them, “Great is your reward” (Luke 6; 23)

 While “all creation groans in distress,” we—if we are authentically Christian—should “hope for what we do not yet have, as we wait for it patiently” (Rom. 8:22:25). With insistent exigency, Paul urges us to follow that advice, because he himself had experienced that dawn-after-darkness state in his celebrated vision of heaven (2 Cor. 12:2). It was so ineffable that he was frustrated in trying to describe that experience: “No eye has seen, nor ear heard, nor the human heart conceived, what God has prepared for those who love him” (1 Cor. 2:9).

That’s the awesome bliss Jesus refers to when he promises us that we “will have treasure in heaven,” if we “lay up treasure in heaven” (Matt. 6:20; Luke 12:33). But to “lay up” treasure in heaven, Paul advises us to “set your mind on things above, not on things of earth” (Col. 3:1-2). That’ not easy when our faith is faltering and those “things of earth” seem to offer the only relief. That’s when we need the motivation to yearn for that magnificent and everlasting “inheritance reserved for you in heaven” (1 Pet. 1:4).

John H. Hampsch, cmf

If you are interested in listening to the entire teaching on this topic, please consider “From Here to Eternity-Our End Time Options” (6 CDs). This as well as all of Fr.’s teachings can be found at www.claretiantapeministry.org.

The tiny daughter of a businessman wandered away from him at a shopping mall, and was lost for several hours. Later, her father told his friend, “I had urgent office work to be done, but I couldn’t even begin to think of that during those torturous hours. I could only pray, ‘God, my child is lost; help me find her!’ At that time God’s grace enabled me to feel a tiny bit of the divine anguish that our heavenly Father feels when a soul wanders away from him.”

All of God’s many concerns regarding his creation are light compared to the urgency of his desire to save even one soul: “God our Savior wants all men to be saved and to come to a knowledge of the truth.” How do we know this is God’s greatest Concern? Because he paid the ultimate price to attain it: he “gave himself as a ransom for all men” (1 Tm 2:6). And his redemptive motive is touching: “He rescued me because he delighted in me. ”

Think again about the anguished love of the man whose daughter was lost in the mall, and its analogy with God’s love. How can it be that God regards my soul and every soul as precious, and yet I can regard it so casually? God’s exquisite love for souls should be replicated in my zeal for my own soul and that of others. All who are precious to him should be precious to me.

Hold on to my hand, Lord, and Use me to reach out to others.

Fr. John Hampsch, CMF - from “One-Minute Meditations for Busy People”

I think it was Confucius who said, “Happiness does not consist in having what you want, but in wanting what you have.”

One frequent cause of disappointment, especially in our prayers of petition, is that God does not give us what we want, but what we need. “Your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things” (Mt 6:32). In such a case, we are disappointed because our priorities may be misplaced and our value system inverted.

Occasionally we should ask ourselves what our priorities really are. To help us refocus, Jesus advises: “Strive first for the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well” (Mt 6:33). Attaining this holiness (”righteousness”) should leave us immune to disappointment, because when we have God and his love (manifested by his beneficence toward us), we have everything we need, spiritually. The answers to our physical needs come as an unfailing bonus.

The Israelites, during the great exodus, yearning for the luxurious pots of meat they had enjoyed in Egypt (see Ex 16:3), were disappointed because only their needs and not their wants were fulfilled. Yet they were miraculously fed for forty years by the daily bread of heaven-sent manna and life-sustaining water from a rock (see Dt 8:15-16), along with honey and oil also from a rock (see Dt 32:13), and even their clothing was miraculous preserved for forty years in the desert environment (see Dt 8:4). These are the same three needs-Jesus refers to in Matthew’s gospel (6:31, 33): “Do not worry, saying ‘What will we eat?’ or ‘What will we drink?’ or ‘What will we wear? .. all these things will be given to you.” If our spiritual aspirations are prioritized-seeking first holiness and the kingship of God-then all else will be provided; but we must continually seek first his kingdom and his righteousness.

Our spiritual needs come before, not instead of, our physical needs. Thus, really trusting in God’s promised provisions for our life-needs, with spiritual goals at the top of our shopping list, will immunize us against any disappointment. When our wants are subordinate to our needs, especially our spiritual needs, the art of trusting God without disappointment is the inevitable result, and the reward that awaits us is equally inevitable. It is the one that Paul was allowed to preview: “No eye has seen, nor ear heard, nor the human heart conceived, what God has prepared for those who love him” (1 Cor 2:9).

Fr. John Hampsch, CMF “Pathways of Trust”

An aspiring composer asked orchestra, conductor Victor Herbert to review and play one of his amateur compositions. Seeing that it lacked merit, Herbert turned it down. Miffed, the composer retorted sardonically, “I thought you encouraged home talent.”

“I do,” rejoined Herbert, “but some home talent I encourage to stay at home.”

Life would be heavenly if there were no discouragement, but only encouragement. The closest we can come to that state here is to become saturated with the power of the truism stated by Paul, quoting Isaiah (Rom 10:11): “No one who believes in him will be put to shame.”

Some qualities are truly worth extolling, as Paul urged the Philippians (4:8): “Whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is pleasing, whatever is commendable … any excellence … anything worthy of praise.” God is certainly worthy of praise, having all these qualities, but as applied to him, we don’t think of praise as encouragement (except with the exuberant teen rally, “Go, go, go, God; Three cheers for God!”)

Our encouragement of other humans should, of course, be enveloped in God’s love: “Any encouragement in Christ, any consolation from love, any sharing in the Spirit, any compassion and sympathy” (Phil 2: 1) comes ultimately from “the God of steadfastness and encouragement” (Rom 15:5). It is our duty and privilege to disseminate this God-spawned encouragement, even daily (see Heb 3:13), to “encourage one another and build up each other” (1 Thes 5:11), as exemplified by such champions of encouragement and affirmation as the Cyprian Levite, Barnabas, nicknamed “son of encouragement” (Acts 4:36; see also 11:23). We are called to be transmitters of God’s support, consolation, and comforting presence to others (see 2 Cor 1:4).

Yet here’s the rub: We can’t transmit meaningfully what we have not received meaningfully. We must learn to receive God’s loving support appreciatively to convey it to others appreciatively. The power and influence of your compliment to another will be far deeper if your own soul throbs with the loving affirmation of the Lord, ”I’m so proud of you, my child, for your efforts!”

True trust in the Lord, among its other purposes, provides a reliance on him to recognize our noble efforts-and also to dissolve our less noble defects-making us ever more buoyed up by his supporting mercy and love.

Fr. John Hampsch, CMF “Pathways of Trust”

Falsehoods are “sticky” for some people; they can’t let go of them.

They continue to believe, for instance, that sunbathing is healthful, or that an alcoholic nightcap improves sleep, or that seatbelts are useless or even dangerous, or that the Pope never goes to confession. One such falsehood that some people cling to is the belief that all Christians are “charismatic” by the fact they are baptized with water and living in the state of grace, especially if they have accepted Jesus as their personal Savior. This position is one that confuses three separate spiritual states: 1) That of a baptized Christian in the state of grace (who is sacramentally and canonically a Christian, “baptized into Christ” (Gal. 3:27); 2) That of a Christian who is “born-again” (”regenerated”). That is, a Christian who has undergone a kind of “conversion.” Or a “metanoia” experience, as the Greek Fathers called it, which involves a knowledge of and commitment to Jesus as one’s Lord and personal Savior (Gal. 2:20). It is a state which Pope John Paul II said is lacking in many “sacramentalized” Christians; and 3) That of a charismatic Christian who has received the baptism in the Spirit as an experience separate from, and usually subsequent to, a “conversion” experience (Titus 3:4-5). Each of these three spiritual states can be lost or diminished in some way. The first, by mortal sin (1 John 5:16-17). The second, by loss or diminution of an abiding commitment to Jesus as Lord (John 15:6). The third, by not “living by the Spirit” (Gal. 5:16-26). To simplify the problem, this three-fold distinction can be reduced to a two-fold one, namely, the uncompromising distinction between a “pre-charismatic” Christian and a charismatic Christian-a distinction that seems to needle many non-charismatics, and raises the hackles of some theologians whom I love to challenge.

The Pentecost experience of becoming charismatic by being “baptized in the Spirit” (Acts 1:5) is something clearly distinct from and beyond the experience of becoming a Christian by being “baptized into Christ” (Rom. 6:3) by water. The two baptisms have totally different purposes. Water baptism makes one a child of God in a special way, grafting one into the body of Christ (Gal. 3:27 Rom. 6:3), while Spirit baptism gives one charismatic power to be an effective witness (evangelizer) in building the Kingdom (Acts 1:8; Luke 24:48-49).

The distinction between various baptisms (plural) is scriptural and described as an “elementary teaching” of Christianity (Heb. 6:2). All four gospels quote John the Baptist emphasizing that distinction: “I baptize you with water, but he (Jesus) will baptize you with the Holy Spirit.” (Matt. 3:11; Mark 1:8; Luke 3:16; John 1:33).

Dissenting theologians claim that it was the Church that corporately received the Holy Spirit at Pentecost, and all Christians partake of that general outpouring-somewhat like a huge vat being water-filled, with many spigots for individuals to draw from the general supply. In this view, the baptism in the Spirit is not an additional experience subsequent to becoming a Christian, but a privilege that everyone experiences by simply being a Christian and thus partaking of the fullness of the Spirit-presence of the Church from the time of water-baptism. If this partaking could be called charismatic, then of course every Christian would be charismatic from the moment of Christian initiation by water baptism. However, this theological theory was disproved by St. Thomas Aquinas, who showed that within an individual, there is a distinction between the “indwelling” of the Spirit (occasioned by water baptism or Christian initiation) and the “infilling” of the Spirit (occasioned by a Pentecostal experience of being baptized in the Spirit).

Jesus also makes the distinction, in a pre-Pentecost discourse with his disciples in John 14:17, by using two separate prepositions: “with” and “in”: “The spirit … lives with you (now) and will be in you (later).” Jesus thus clearly distinguished between two different levels of intimacy by which the Spirit can relate to an individual. The baptisms mentioned in Hebrews 6:2 were referred to by Jesus at the beginning of his public life: in John 3:5 he tells Nicodemus that a person must be “born of water and the Spirit.” Then, at the very end of his earthly existence, just before his Ascension, he again distinguishes between the two baptisms: “John baptized with water, but in a few days you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit” (Acts 1:5).

The disciples were already Christians, of course, as shown by the fact that they had already received spiritual life for having “heard his word and believed in the one who sent him” (John 5:24). Jesus had assured them that they were “clean” (Luke 13:10), with their “names written in heaven” (10:20). Furthermore, the resurrected Jesus had breathed upon them, even imparting the Holy Spirit to activate a ministerial gift of forgiving sins (John 20:22-23). Yet he told them to pray for (Luke 11:13) and to wait for (Luke 24:49; Acts 1:4) a subsequent (and therefore separate) grace of the baptism in the Spirit a “few days” after his Ascension (Acts 1:5)–clearly an additional experience beyond the basic Christianity they had been experiencing.

A close study of the Acts of the Apostles shows that the early Christians regarded it as normal and normative for believers to be baptized in the Holy Spirit; hence, in the early Church a pre-charismatic Christian was regarded as a kind of “sub-normal” Christian. This is clear, for instance, in the case of the converted Samaritans, mentioned in Acts 8, who had fulfilled the two requirements for salvation given by Jesus (Mark 16:16): belief and baptism. Yet, when Peter and John arrived in Samaria, they “prayed for them that they might receive the Holy Spirit, because the Holy Spirit had not yet come upon any of them; they had simply been baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus.” (Acts 8:15-16). They obviously had not received the baptism of the Spirit at the time of their conversion and water baptism. A similar example is seen in Acts 19. Paul found twelve disciples at Ephesus who were believers, and asked them, “Did you receive the Holy Spirit when (or after) you believed?” When they answered in the negative, Paul baptized them. Then, “when Paul placed his hands on them, the Holy Spirit came upon them, and they spoke in tongues and prophesied” (verse 6). If mere believing or being converted carried with it the baptism in the Spirit automatically, then Paul’s question would have been meaningless. The Ephesians’ baptism in the Holy Spirit was subsequent to (and therefore distinct from) their belief in Christ and also distinct from their water baptism.

While the baptism in the Spirit is always distinct from the conversion experience, it need not necessarily be subsequent to it, as in the case of Cornelius’ household, all of whom received the baptism in the Spirit before they were baptized in water (Acts 10:44-48). In recounting this episode at the Council of Jerusalem (Acts 15:7-9), Peter referred to two separate acts: 1) Purifying their hearts by faith (conversion), and 2) Receiving the gift of the Holy Spirit. Paul’s baptism in the Spirit at the hands of Ananias came three days after his conversion on the road to Damascus, and just before his water baptism (Acts 9:3-18). Here again, Spirit-baptism is seen as distinct from a conversion experience and distinct from water baptism.

A common misunderstanding is to regard Spirit baptism merely as a one-time isolated event, rather than the beginning of a “growth in the Spirit,” with a need for “refilling” periodically (by prayer meetings, etc.). Hence Scripture urges, “Let us not give up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing” (Heb. 10:25). When Peter and John joined in a prayer meeting after being released from prison, they were re-filled by a deepened presence of the Holy Spirit (Acts 4:31). The exact translation of Ephesians 5:18 is not “Be filled with the Spirit,” but “Be being filled with the Spirit”-an ongoing receptive experience. Thus, it is clear that the baptism in the Spirit is an experience over and above the experiences of water baptism, the born-again experience, and in general the conversion experience. It adds to the “indwelling” of the Spirit a new kind of presence-an “infilling” that is meant to produce empowerment and growth-a growth in the fruits of the Spirit (Gal. 5:22-23) as well as the gifts of the Spirit (1 Tim. 4:14; 2 Tim. 1:6).

Although Paul found much to criticize among the Corinthian Christians, still he called them “sanctified,” and yet “called to be holy” (1 Cor. 1:2). That is, he attributed to them what some theologians call “positional sanctification,” and yet he urged them to “progressive sanctification.” The growth factor in this “progressive sanctification” is the Holy Spirit himself (I Pet. 1:2; Rom. 13:16), who “helps us in our weakness and … intercedes for us” (Rom. 8:26). Hence, it follows that those with a deeper relationship with this “Spirit of holiness” (Rom. 1:4) through the baptism in the Spirit have an advantage in opportunities for graces inducing that growth. (1 Th. 3:13; John 7:38-39).

Ultimately, in personal self-evaluation, the matter of the baptism in the Spirit resolves itself into a question. And this question is not, “Do I have all of the Holy Spirit?”, but rather, “Does the Holy Spirit have all of me?”