When they heard this, they were baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus. And when Paul had laid hands on them, the Holy Spirit came upon them, and they spoke with tongues and prophesied.
Acts 19:5-6 NKJV
When Paul arrived in Ephesus, he found a group of Jewish disciples whom he assumed were Christians. He soon discovered that they were still following John the Baptist by waiting for the coming Messiah. When they heard the Jesus story they were joyously baptized in His Name. I’m intrigued by the events that immediately followed.
- Paul laid hands on them and the Spirit came upon them.
- They all spoke with tongues and prophesied.
Look back in verse 2 where Paul asked, “Did you receive the Holy Spirit when you believed?” And they responded, “We have not so much as heard whether there is a Holy Spirit.”
It seems that Paul expected they would have a tangible encounter with the Holy Spirit after they believed. Sometimes I wonder if we have stopped expecting reality. We expect people to listen to a nice bible lesson, but do we really expect them to have a personal encounter with God the Spirit? Should we be telling them that there is a Holy Spirit and what He wants to do for them? Maybe we ought to be laying hands on people more often.
Notice also that these brand new believers began to speak with tongues and prophesy. Have we allowed ourselves to see tongues as too controversial to actually encourage their use? Do we give the impression that prophecy is to be practiced only by the “mature” believer? I think it’s possible that our concern that our gatherings be respectable has resulted in them being entirely predictable. Maybe it’s time we got a little less comfortable and a lot more available. The old saying is, “I’d rather have a little wildfire than no fire at all.”
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