Warrior Church Home Fellowship Study
Dr. Kevin L. Zadai
Baptism of Fire
Those who repent I baptize with water, but there is coming a man after me who is more powerful than I. In fact, I’m not even worthy enough to pick up his sandals. He will submerge you into union with the Spirit of Holiness and with a raging fire!
—Matthew 3:11 TPT
DISCUSSION:
John the Baptist shared with people who Jesus was and how He promised us that Jesus would come and that He would baptize us with the Spirit and with fire. Jesus spent a lot of time discipling His disciples, and He taught them to go out and do what He was doing. The Holy Spirit not only comes when you are baptized in water as we saw at the River Jordan when John baptized Jesus and He descended upon Him like a dove, but He came as Jesus promised He would on the Day of Pentecost. It’s a historical fact that the Holy Spirit came with fire. There was an earthquake. There was wind and utterance, and they changed to where they were speaking other languages that they didn't know. They were in unity; in one accord.
❖ Luke 3;16 TPT:
But John made it clear by telling them, “There is one coming who is mightier than I. He is supreme. In fact, I’m not worthy of even being his slave. I can only baptize you in this river, but he will baptize you into the Spirit of holiness and into his raging fire.
• It is a commandment to be baptized in water.
• After you get baptized in water you’ll start to see there’s another baptism and it’s the baptism of fire.
• With the baptism of fire, Holy Spirit will come upon you and baptize you in Himself. It’s a different experience than the born-again experience and water baptism.
I remember when I got baptized in water, I had an experience that was so powerful, I literally felt like the water turned into bubbles and I started to feel weightless in the water and the power of God was so strong that they had to help me out of the water.
I couldn't stand on my own.
THE HOLY SPIRIT AND FIRE
When the Holy Spirit came upon me, out of my mouth came another language that I didn't know. That went on for months, where I just prayed in that language. I eventually met people that spoke that language and they told me what I was saying. I was speaking out of various scriptures. Sometimes I had knowledge of things that were going to happen in the future, and they would end up happening. I would know specific names, places, times, and dates, and people would watch it happen. The baptism of fire is when the Holy Spirit comes upon you.
In the Bible, when these things occurred, it was a different experience, because the people were Christians that had professed Jesus Christ, but they had not been baptized in the Spirit. They would ask them in the Book of Acts, have you received the Holy Spirit yet? They said, “We didn't know that there was a Holy Spirit to receive, but yes, we want Him.” They would pray for them and they began to speak in other languages, which we call tongues. It’s an obscure idea because the Spirit is essentially taking over your tongue. It's a sign because there's no way that you could speak that language. I spoke several languages that I did not know.
Sense
When the Holy Spirit comes upon you in this way, it takes you from where you are and into a higher capacity. You can do more with the help of the Holy Spirit than you could a moment ago when He was not helping you or moving, and this is for every year of your life. I believe that the Holy Spirit wants to take you from where you are right now into more of a capacity than you ever even imagined.
We depend upon the Holy Spirit to ignite us with the music we play, and then our creativity starts to flow. I believe that all of us are supposed to experience this creativity. I believe God has put this inside of us, not just musically, but in every area of our lives. Think about it. You can see improvement in every area of your life because I believe that the Holy Spirit stirs up parts of your brain and causes you to operate at a higher level.
Kathi:
The fire is our friend. You want to embrace the fires. And I was reading in Isaiah where it talked about when the presence of God came into the temple and the minister, he was undone, and the angel took a coal from the fire and touched his tongue. He said that his sin was taken away, that he was purged because his lips were unclean. That's what happens when the Holy Spirit starts to move through us. It's like praying in tongues or speaking in other tongues, being filled with the Spirit, what different people call different things. But there's this purifying process that we couldn't do on our own. God knew if he could get a hold of our tongue we would be cleansed. There must be people out there wanting to know how to get filled. God knew if he took our tongue and He got that fire on our tongue, our lives would be cleansed, and they would be purged. There is something about the tongue. James 5:16, says, “When we confess our faults one to another, we can pray and healing will come.” There's something about speech and cleansing, and I know we all want to have that. We know we're destined for purity and we're destined to be clean. God knew that this was one of the key ways to have it happen. It’s through the baptism of fire, and baptism in the Spirit. It has to do with our tongue. It doesn't have to make sense, but it does make sense.
What are the benefits that come when the Holy Spirit comes upon you and what happens to you?
YOUR HELP IS HERE THROUGH THE HOLY SPIRIT
You have to realize where you're at right now, and that the Lord is saying, “You need help, and I have already given Him to you.” It's the Holy Spirit. He's wanting to baptize you in Himself, but He wants to baptize you with fire, which means you're going to be separate. For instance, there's someone watching and I can see you. I can see that you're a lady, and I can see you sitting there and your family is so against you. The Lord said to tell you because there are many of you out there like this, but I saw this one particular lady that you're just wanting to fold because of the pressure, and you feel so isolated. You're standing for the Lord, and everybody around you is not taking you seriously.
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