Resetting your Baptismal GPS

Act 19:1-7

Pointing people to Jesus Christ

In the days before we had GPS and car satellite navigation you would have to study the street map before you left for somewhere you haven’t been before, you would then have to rely on your memory to get to the place but more often than not you would find yourself getting lost and eventually pulling over to check the map again. But even the GPS isn’t fail proof, I found myself sort of lost the other day when my GPS froze I had to still pull over to reload it!

In our reading from Acts we are told about Paul coming into the city of Ephesus and finding some disciples who had heard about Jesus but hadn’t received the Holy Spirit – in other words Luke is saying they weren’t Christians. But these disciples were different and very quickly Paul picks up that they have been on the wrong journey they had heard John the Baptists testimony that the Christ was to come but they had missed the Pentecost message, it may even be said they hadn’t heard about the resurrection. We don’t know the exact details but what Paul does is he gets them to pull over in their spiritual journey and explains the scriptures to them and how Jesus Christ fulfills them, I am sure he would’ve spoken about Pentecost and the work of the Holy Spirit. These men hear the message of Jesus Christ and are baptised receiving the Holy Spirit and they were back on track.

On Friday I had the opportunity to spend the day with the Finnish Lutheran community in their summer camp which was being held in Kurrajong. I was running a course on looking for the real Jesus Christ using the DVD resource titled, the Christ files, I will be running the same course in our Parish this year. But what was interesting was the discussion that took place in our small group. We started talking about how people easily get off track and get spiritually lost.  How there are so many people who call themselves believers, yet like the men Paul meets in Ephesus, they have the wrong picture. They look at Jesus and say he was a good man, but when it comes to the crunch of committing to discipleship, they don’t want to have anything to do with it. But God uses people like you and I to help people and show them the real Jesus Christ. Maybe there is someone he is calling you to spend time with to reveal the true Jesus Christ?

At the beginning of our passage Luke mentions Apollos – we hear about him in different places in the New Testament. He was an eloquent speaker, extremely intelligent and trained in the Old Testament scriptures. What we know is that before Apollos was taught the full gospel message by Aquila and Priscilla, his understanding of the gospel was limited. Yet he was teaching in Ephesus between the times of Paul’s visits to the region. It seems he was going solo, working outside of the church. It would seem that Apollos had missed the memo about Pentecost (and the Great Commission) too. But Apollos is taught the complete message by the two Christina women in Ephesus and becomes a great pastor in the early church.

Why do I mention Apollos? Well it would seem he may be the reason why these men were off track.  These 12 men probably heard Apollos preach and took up his teaching – he would’ve been a brilliant speaker trained in the art of persuasion. This incident reminds us that those who preach in the church must have a clear understanding of the gospel, training in the scriptures and called by the church or appointed by the congregation.

So Paul helps the men to discover the real Jesus Christ. It shows us that Paul wasn’t just in the public places preaching but worked in small groups to teach people about Jesus; as a result of his teaching these men become Christians through the gift of Baptism.

The journey starts by Paul asking a simple question, “Did you receive the Holy Spirit when you believed?” I often find people, when they find out I am a pastor will talk about how they used to go to church, my question is ‘so why don’t go to church now?’ All of us have the ability to ask faith questions when we are invited into people’s spiritual lives to see where our starting point is in the pursuing faith relationship.

This passage, “Did you receive the Holy Spirit when you believed?” is often misinterpreted in the Christian church where some may teach that you need to demonstrate an outpouring of the Holy Spirit through some outward gift – usually speaking in tongues. But what Paul says is that baptism and the Holy Spirit go together, they can’t be separated, that is why it’s important for us who were baptized as children to know that we received the Holy Spirit and the gift of faith.

For some people it is important that there is an outward sign of the Spirit and God decided it was important for the former disciples of John the Baptist to see that had the Holy Spirit (just as he did with the Samaritans). This is not a universal example of baptism but a local one, just as the case may be today. Baptism for us today as it was in the early church was a sign that you were a Christian, it removes doubts, and it stands up against the attacks of the devil. Faith and baptism go together.

Now we as people who have received the Holy Spirit in baptism and most of us as children, we can still receive and outward sign of the Holy Spirit to help us in our faith journey, to reassure us that we are connected with Jesus Christ through the Spirit. But this isn’t the primary focus of this passage for Luke. Instead Luke draws us to look at the ministry of Jesus Christ through the work of the Holy Spirit and how we can bear witness to Jesus.

I remember in a previous congregation I was contacted by a family who wanted their child baptised. I made an appointment to meet with the mother and the grandmother. They had some very loose connection with the church. Anyway after some interesting discussion I felt prompted to ask them a question, so I said, “do you believe in Jesus Christ?” “Do you believe he died and rose again on the third day?” Well the answer came back oh no, we just believe in some spiritual force that is out there, it could be God. So I proceeded to talk about Romans chapter 6 where Paul talks about baptism as connection with Christ’s death and resurrection. In the end they decided not to have the child baptised and they didn’t want to learn about Jesus and join the congregation, if only I had an experience like Paul where they turned to Christ hearing his call!

Sometimes we need to speak up when the truth of Jesus is absent to help another person. We may not get the results we desire but the truth needs to be said. But so often we feel ill equipped to do this. Where do we find the knowledge to ask the right questions to lead a person to the truth? It’s not the just the job of the pastor because I don’t live next to your neighbour I don’t have lunch with your work colleagues, I don’t sit at your dinner table with your family and friends when these opportunities arrive, this means that as disciples of Jesus we need to be ready to loving and gently correct a person and point them to Jesus Christ.

We have an Alpha course coming up – this is a great opportunity for you to refresh your faith and reequip you in the knowledge to share your faith and point people to Jesus. It is also the perfect opportunity to invite your family and friends along to hear about the Christian faith. But all knowledge of God comes to us through his word – this is the place we start to gain in our understanding of God, along with a life of prayer and worship.

We can always be searching for the real Jesus Christ in our life. We can seek biblical and doctrinal purity, we can try to be the best disciple we can and there is nothing wrong with this it good to strive to be the best follower of Christ, Paul was always advocating for clear understanding of the gospel message. But above all for Paul the message was as simple as Christ died for our sins in accordance with the scriptures, that he was buried, and that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the scriptures  and that he appeared to Peter and then to the twelve.

This is the core of our faith and the heart of the gospel message.  This is the truth in which the church is grounded. The ministry of the Holy Spirit is to point people to Jesus Christ. In our church that happens when the word is preached and as God calls his people to him through baptism and as we gather at the Lord’s Table for Holy Communion. It is God in Jesus Christ who comes and finds us and gives us his love and calls us into his family.

As we leave this place we will come across people who have a mixed up view of God, they may take a little bit of Jesus, mix it with Buddha and stir it with a big of feng shui. There are people who are lost in the world, pulled over looking at the map, tapping their spiritual GPS’s only to get nowhere. Each one of us carry the gospel message with us, we bear witness to the truth. So may you leave and be bold like Paul in Ephesus to preach Jesus Christ, to hear the spiritual cries of the people close to us and point them to Jesus Christ through the power of the Holy Spirit