What Happened in Samaria?

We speak of the baptism of the Holy Spirit as an event that took place in the first century, at the very beginning of church history. That’s correct. Notwithstanding the practices of some charismatic groups, most Christians today do not expect groups of new believers to receive the Holy Spirit accompanied by tongues of fire and the expression of the prophetic word in foreign languages as in Acts 2. If we are honest, nothing that we see happening in those churches today corresponds authentically to the events we read about in Acts.

So then, we consign the baptism of the Holy Spirit to the past, where we believe it belongs. It was a historic manifestation of the power of God by which “in one Spirit we were all baptized into one body”.

Mining the Minors: Amos (27)

Proximity to God comes at a price. God is holy, and those who speak his name and identify themselves with him invariably put themselves in the gravest danger. C.S. Lewis had it right: Aslan is not a tame lion. Judgment begins with the house of God.

That said, where God is concerned, there is no better place to be than as near as possible. “A day in your courts is better than a thousand elsewhere.” Just bear in mind that when you take God’s name on your lips and broadcast your association with him to the world, you make yourself accountable for everything you do and say afterward. God is holy, and cannot allow his name to be associated with sin unrepented.

Israel forgot that. The prophet Amos was sent to remind them that the name of God is holy, and the consequences of defaming it are both inescapable and dire.