Question About The Gift Of The Holy Spirit

Dear Brother Carter,

Are you familiar with Franklin Camp’s teaching on the gift of the Holy Spirit? He was a non-instrumental preacher. From what I can digest, he taught that the “gift of the Holy Spirit” was purely miraculous for the apostolic age. As his defense he points to the prophecy of Joel as fulfilled in Acts 2:38, 8:20, 10:45, 11:17; Ephesians 3:7, 4:7. I take this teaching to mean that the Christian today does not receive the Holy Spirit at baptism.

In his 1972 book, The Work of the Holy Spirit in Redemption, Camp quotes Lipscomb, Brents, Boles, and Campbell as holding this position (pp. 131-2). He writes in concluding his defense on page 155, “If the gift of the Holy Spirit is a non-miraculous gift that one receives when baptized, what does the Spirit do? Those who believe the Spirit leads and directs only through the Word are faced with explaining why one has received the gift of the Spirit, but the gift does not do anything for the Christian apart from the Word.” What are your views on this?

ANSWER:
I've not come across this particular view before. However, I believe the truth to be neither the extreme that he proposes, nor the opposite extreme that he refutes in his conclusion that you quoted. He is knocking down a "straw man" here. His argument is only valid against the polar opposite of his view, but not against the Biblical truth.

I know some of my brethren disagree with me on this, but I firmly believe the Holy Spirit can and does work apart from the Word. Let me explain. I am not saying that I believe in the miraculous gifts today. I am saying that I believe in the providence of God and the leading of the Spirit today. I believe it goes against Scripture, experience, common sense, faith in prayer, etc. to say the Spirit works only through the Word today. He will never work contrary to it, but always in harmony with it.

Have you ever prayed for guidance and gotten it? Have you ever struggled with the meaning of a passage of Scripture, prayed about it, meditated upon it and then had some event in your life "turn on the light" for you? Have you ever studied a subject in detail only to be questioned about it within a short period of time (maybe even the same day)? Have you ever had an experience in soul winning where you "happened" to say just the right thing although it had never occurred to you before that time? Have you ever believed that God put you in contact with just the right person at just the right time? I can answer yes, many times to each of the above questions. I believe that is God's providence or the leading of the Spirit.

Call it whichever you wish, I'm not sure they are two different things.

As to the question of what the Spirit does, I think the above paragraph is a partial answer. However, the Scripture fills in the rest. The Spirit produces the fruit of the Spirit in our lives, Galatians 5:22-23. The Spirit bears witness with our spirits that we are the children of God, Romans 8:16. The Spirit makes intercession for us according to the will of God, Romans 8:26-27. The Spirit leads the sons of God, Romans 8:14. The Spirit convicts the world of sin, of righteousness, and of judgment, John 16:8.

This is just a partial list off the top of my head, but I think it clearly demonstrates that there is much work the Spirit has done, is doing and will continue to do besides the miraculous.
Remember that the church at Rome had the Spirit dwelling within them, Romans 8:11. However, Paul longed to see them that he might impart some spiritual gift to them so that they would be established, Romans 1:11. What gift required the presence of an apostle to impart? Obviously this is a reference to the miraculous gifts. They already had the indwelling of the Spirit.

Don't forget either that all the crowd on Pentecost was promised the gift of the Holy Spirit if they were baptized in the name of Jesus, Acts 2:38. 3000 responded and therefore received that gift, Acts 2:41. However, only the apostles were doing wonders and signs, Acts 2:43. In fact, nobody but the apostles are recorded as doing miracles until we come to Stephen in Acts 6:8. OF course, the apostles had laid their hands on him in Acts 6:6. Don't overlook the fact that he was described as being full of the Holy Spirit before the apostles laid their hands on him or he did miracles, Acts 6:3,5. Clearly he had the Spirit, but didn't work miracles.

Regarding the fulfillment of the Joel passage, there is no doubt that the events of Pentecost, Samaria, Cornelius, even Philip's daughter's who prophesied were foretold by this passage in Joel. However, his argument as I understand it has a couple of flaws here. The first is that the prophecy involves more than just the miraculous outpouring of the Holy Spirit. It also involves salvation for all who call on the name of the Lord. There were those who did this in the aforementioned events, but does that mean it no longer happens? Certainly not. Another problem is that this really has no bearing on whether the Spirit indwells us in a non-miraculous way today. If the prophecy is only about the miraculous, it has no bearing on anything else. If it is about more than the miraculous, his argument fails because something besides the miraculous was prophesied. Either way, the argument fails to support the assertion.

Much more could be said here. These are just my thoughts as I'm sitting here this moment. However, I think this is sufficient to set a few things in order in this regard. I'd be happy to discuss it in more detail if you'd like. Hope this has been helpful.

God Bless,

Terry Carter

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