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The second chapter of the book of Acts is one of the most exciting and important chapters of the Bible. It was the birthday of the Apostolic Church. It was the beginning of a new time period called "Grace." It was the first time that anyone ever received the gift of the Holy Ghost. It was when the followers of Jesus became "carriers of Jesus."

Before Jesus' ministry even began, we were told that His purpose in coming was to put things in place so that man could receive the Holy Ghost. John the Baptist taught people to not believe in him and exalt him because:

Jesus used various metaphors to symbolize receiving the Holy Ghost. In one place it was said that He would baptize you with "Holy Ghost and fire." In John chapter 3, He told a man named Nicodemus that "you must be born of the water and of the Spirit" and then likened receiving the Spirit of God to the wind:

In the very next chapter (John 4), Jesus spent time to talk to a Samaritan woman about salvation, and He said that the Holy Ghost was "living water" that would quench her spiritual thirst and bring life everlasting. He said that this "living water," this Holy Ghost or Holy Spirit, only He could give and that the woman needed this living water!

There are two very important facts that most Christians and even many preachers fail to realize when they study the scriptures:

The first is that the Dispensation of Law did not end and Grace did not begin until the death of Jesus Christ. Jesus came to bring a new testament or a new "covenant" with mankind. Under the Law, to be saved a man had to take a lamb to a priest and have the priest kill the lamb for him as a sin offering. But Jesus was coming to be the sacrificial lamb and also our High Priest. Today, we live in a different time period than law because we live after Calvary; after the cross. Jesus was our sacrificial lamb (John 1:29) so we no longer have to kill animals. Jesus is also our High Priest (Hebrews 4:14) and so you no longer confess your sins to an ordinary man, but to Him directly! The book of Hebrews makes it clear that this "new agreement" or "new way to be saved" did not begin until Jesus died. Let me read the scripture in "The Message" version so that it will be easily and quickly understood:

What that means is that during the life of Jesus Christ, everyone that He talked to and saved, was saved under the rules of Law. The new agreement did not begin until after Jesus' death. I want you to realize what that means. I've heard so many preachers teach and preach about the thief on the cross and say "see, that man didn't have to be baptized in water or with the Holy Ghost to be saved." "He didn't even have to repent." And so from that scripture, they teach that all a person has to do to be saved today is just say "I believe on you, Jesus."

But wait a minute!! Jesus wasn't dead yet, when He talked with the thief on the cross. If He wasn't dead, then they weren't under Grace yet. The thief on the cross was saved under Law. He needed a High Priest to confess his sins to, and a sacrificial lamb to be offered for his salvation. Jesus Christ was his High Priest. Jesus Christ then died becoming his sacrificial lamb. The thief on the cross was one of the last people saved under Law. Go study your scripture: before Jesus died there were three hours of darkness, and before that three hours of darkness both thieves were railing and cursing Jesus, and AFTER that three hours of darkness, one of them had a different attitude. The onlookers did not hear nor see anything that was going on in that three hours of darkness. There is no events recorded that went on in that time, but I can tell you one thing that what was going on during that time period: Jesus was revealing Himself to those thieves and one of them listened. When the darkness cleared and the onlooker could clearly see what was happening again, one of the thieves had a different attitude! Some of the bad things that have happened in your life and the reason that God has allowed "darkness" into your past was because He was trying to reveal Himself in the darkness!

So you'd better change your theology if you are going to use the thief as a model for salvation. He lived in a different time than you. He didn't have to be baptized in water to be saved, but you and I do today! Water Baptism is absolutely necessary for salvation. 1 Peter 3:21 says that we are saved by it. Jesus said that it saves us (Mark 16:16). Peter repeatedly commanded people to be baptized in the name of Jesus. And the scriptures teach that Jesus is the only name that saves us. When Peter and John got arrested for preaching about the power of the name of Jesus, they told the Jewish leaders:

Every time someone was baptized in scripture, they were baptized in the name of Jesus (Acts 2:38; 8:16; 10:46; 19:1-6; 22:16). If you have not been baptized by complete immersion (going completely under the water) in the name of Jesus Christ, you absolutely must do it! It is essential for salvation. You are not going to make heaven without it!

I've heard people quote Ephesians 2:8-10 about how that we are not saved by works but by faith alone and say "see I don't need to be baptized." You'd better check your theology and not believe that lie from the pits of hell. We are not saved by works, in other words by trying to get good enough for God, I agree. But water baptism is not a work. Repentance is not a work. It is simply obeying a command of God! Listen to the words of Jesus:

It wasn't enough to just believe on Him, but they had to "continue in His Word!" And He commanded them to be baptized in His name! Water Baptism is a commandment of scripture for this time period called Grace! And that is why everywhere they went, the disciples preached you "must be baptized in Jesus' name."

In our text, Peter said to be baptized "for the remission of sins." Your sins are not truly washed away until you have been baptized in the name of Jesus. If I spilled an ice cream cone on your shirt and left a large stain and then asked you to forgive me, that is repentance. You have forgiven me, but the effects and stains of my accident are still there on your shirt. It must be washed away with water before it will no longer be there! That's what water baptism does in our lives, washes away the stains of sin from our spiritual man! They are washed away in the blood of Jesus Christ! Colossian chapter 2:10-11, tells us that not only are our sins removed from our spiritual man at water baptism but that we are "buried with Christ in baptism." When we are baptized, we are going into a watery grave with Jesus Christ. Your old sins are gone and you are given a clean future from which to start over again.

Some of you are wondering what all of that has to do with my sermon title. Water Baptism is a burial. In order to participate you must first die in the Spirit. You will never get to heaven without being baptized. You will never be what you should be on earth without being baptized in the name of Jesus. But despite all of that, look at it this way: God has promised to wash every one of your sins away. He has promised to help you overcome and get beyond your past failures and shortcomings. He has promised to "remit" your sins and wash them away when you are baptized. Why would you not want to be baptized? Why would you reject His Word? God is saying today that somebody needs to die out to man's traditions and die out to your old man. And they need to bury that man in the waters of baptism. Someone needs to say "If I will just die; God can move!" He can move beyond your past. He can forgive everything that you've ever done and erase the scars to give you a new tomorrow. But you must "die!" You must be buried with Him in baptism!

Can I preach to you today? In our other text, Jesus said:

When I get baptized, I am hating my old life so much that I am burying it! I'm putting it all the way under in a watery grave! But, oh, when I do that, it brings forth "much fruit!" My life really begins to blossom! Not only will you not go to heaven and not have your sins washed away without water baptism, but your life will never be as blessed at it should be without that watery burial! If you will just die, then God can bless you!

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So the first thing that most people don't realize about scripture is that Law didn't end and Grace did not begin until Jesus' death. The other thing that most people don't realize is that despite Jesus continually talking about it. And despite all of the scriptures that it was coming. Nobody ever actually received that Holy Spirit like Jesus was talking about until AFTER He died on the cross and rose again! Nicodemus was told "you must be born again" but he was not born again of the Spirit at that time. The woman at the well was told that she needed this "living water" but -- go back and read it -- she never actually received the water at this time.

Somebody said "is there scripture for that?" I'm glad you asked -- let me show you scripture for what I'm preaching to you today. Turn to John chapter 7:

Jesus was in town for the "Feast of Tabernacles." For seven days, the people came together and thanked God and offered sacrifices in thanksgiving and prayers for all of the nations of the earth. But on the eighth day, they offered sacrifices for Israel, and so the eighth day was considered special and a "great day." At the end of the sacrifices, the priests would go to the pool of Siloam and they would bring a drink offering of the water from that pool and pour it out upon the altar. And Jesus is standing there, knowing He is about to die and thus usher in a new time period where the Holy Ghost would be freely given and as He is watching that water being poured out upon the flesh on that altar something comes over Him so much that He jumps to His feet and screams with a loud voice:

There Jesus goes talking about that living water again! What are you talking about Jesus!? Luckily the scripture goes on to tell us:

He was talking about the Holy Ghost! When Jesus saw that water being poured out upon that fleshly sacrifice, He got to thinking about what was going to happen on the Day of Pentecost when the living water of the Holy Ghost would pour out upon a living sacrifice of men and He got passionate about it!

And notice what else John tell us in John chapter 7: "the Holy Ghost was NOT yet given because that Jesus was not yet glorified." What does glorified mean? The Living Bible puts verse 39 this way:

In other words to receive this "living water" Jesus had to first die, be buried, be resurrected, and return to heaven! Therefore to find an example of someone receiving the Holy Ghost, you have to look AFTER Jesus ascended into heaven, because only AFTER that happened would the Holy Ghost be poured out.

Jesus ascended in Acts chapter 1. And right before He ascended into heaven, one of the last things that Jesus told the disciples was to quote John the Baptist' earlier prophecy with a little extra information:

They didn't yet have the Holy Ghost, but John the Baptist's prophecy was about to come true. Jesus was returning to glory and the Holy Ghost was about to be poured out! And so in our text, we read in Acts chapter 2 about that event:

All of the analogies of the Holy Ghost were fulfilled that day! The Holy Ghost was like the wind that Jesus had talked about to Nicodemus! They couldn't see it, but they could sure feel it! It was like fire! But it was causing a burning within their hearts! They couldn't just sit there! The Spirit of God was there! And as that "living water" began to fill them up, it flowed forth from their mouth in such a powerful stream that the Spirit of God changed their language and they began to speak forth God's praises in a language that they had never learned before! Nobody taught them, but God was doing something miraculous! The purpose of Jesus' coming had come! The Holy Ghost was being given. No wonder Jesus had gotten so excited when He saw that water being poured out on the altar in John 7: He realized that He was about to die and that soon, it would no longer be just a ritual of the law, but a reality of the Spirit! The living water of the Holy Ghost was poured out on the Day of Pentecost!

Peter quoted an Old Testament scripture about the drink offering when he answered the critics on the Day of Pentecost while people were staggering around drunk on the Spirit of God:

So when you read the Day of Pentecost, and how that the Holy Ghost came into the bodies of the disciples realize that it was all of those prophecies being fulfilled! Realize that Jesus had to die for that gift of living water to be poured out! Realize that the Holy Ghost was the reason why He came and died! He had come to bring life everlasting, a living water to His people! He died so that we could have the Spirit of God living inside of us! When He died, it caused God to move in a new way with a much more powerful method! Gone was the ritualism of the drink offering, here to stay was the outpouring of the living water of the Holy Ghost!

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That's an important principle to understand that the flesh of Jesus had to die for the Holy Ghost to be poured out! In today's world, we have too many preachers that refuse to preach about what I am preaching to you today. They are afraid to preach that God still does miracles and the reason is because they have not died out to tradition and trusting within themselves. They do not realize their purpose as a preacher!

Today, my job as a preacher is not to "forgive your sins" because I don't have the power to do that. My job is to point you to Jesus. My job is to magnify Jesus and try to encourage you and provoke you to allow Him to move within your life! I'm like John the Baptist today: I can't save anybody. I'm just His messenger. Don't get your focus on me, get your focus on Him! He is the one who can forgive your sins. He is the one who can wash you clean. He is the one who will baptize you with the Holy Ghost and fire. I can preach with boldness today, because I am not the one on trial today or "on the spot." I know that I cannot do the supernatural. I know that I can't heal anybody with my own power. I know that I cannot fill anybody with the Holy Ghost. But I'm here today to -- without hesitation or doubt -- say that Jesus can! He's greater than me. He's bigger than me. He is not bound to normal limitations and laws. He can walk on the water. He can open the blinded eyes. He can heal cancer. He can make the lame walk again. He can heal your broken heart. He can put your marriage back together again. Hebrews 13:8 clearly states that Jesus Christ has not changed and that He is still the same today as He was then.

There are some preachers today who trust in their own power. They only preach what they can control. They only teach what they understand. They don't want the Spirit of God moving in their services. They don't want the supernatural. They are a little timid to pray for the sick and diseased. They never talk about Acts chapter 2 when people received the Holy Ghost with the evidence of speaking in tongues and stumbled out in the street worshipping God so fervently that onlookers thought they were drunk. They will only release the people to have a spiritual experience to the level that they can themselves give. They can lead people in prayers of repentance, so they make that the high point of their service."

But I'm here today telling you that I don't understand exactly how God heals cancer in the blink of an eye, but I know that He does! I don't understand how God can take deaf ears and unstop them today, but I've seen it! I don't understand how that when the ministers prayed for this lady at the conference that we attended last week, that her tumor under her arm shrank and disappeared while they prayed! I don't understand how exactly how it happened, but God did it! I don't understand how exactly God fills people with the Holy Ghost and takes control of their tongue and causes them to speak in another language that they have never studied nor rehearsed, but it happened to me and it can happen today! I don't understand those things, and they are not things that I -- as a preacher -- can perform on my own power, but God still does those things and God still deals with the supernatural!

You've come too late to tell me that miracles have ceased or tongues have ceased, of gifts of the Spirit have ceased -- you've come too late to tell me any of that, because I have already experienced it myself! I'm not forcing God to "make something happen by preaching that the supernatural still takes place today." I'm merely pointing out something that God has been wanting to do for a long time! How many services are going on today that God wants to move in; that He wants to heal; He wants to fill, but the people or the preacher or both have not died out to their tradition and their man-made doctrine and so God cannot move because they have not given Him the liberty?!! Somebody needs to get a revelation today: If I will just die to my preconceived notions and expectations! If I will die out to experiencing only what I can understand, then God can do what He wants to do!!! It takes dying to get God moving!

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I must move toward a close.

The Day of Pentecost and the outpouring of the Holy Ghost was more than just a one day deal. In fact, only two chapter later in Acts 4:31, we find the same group of people "receiving the Holy Ghost again." It wasn't that they lost it in that time, but that they were allowing the supernatural to move again. Realize what I am saying: God did not intend for the receiving of the Holy Ghost to be just for that one day and time. Listen to what Peter said to the crowd that gathered after the Holy Ghost was poured out:

Notice verse 39? The promise of the Holy Ghost is "unto you, and to your children, and to all that are afar off?" "Even as many as the Lord our God shall call." Is God still calling people today? Then the Holy Ghost is still being given. Receiving the Holy Ghost with the evidence of speaking in other tongues as the Spirit gives the utterance was not just for the Apostles' Day nor the Day of Pentecost nor for just the Jews. 3,000 more received it that day. In Acts 8, the woman at the well's towns of Samaritans received the Holy Ghost. In Acts 10, the first Gentiles received the Holy Ghost. In Acts 19, some disciples of John the Baptist were rebaptized in the name of Jesus and they received the Holy Ghost and spoke in tongues. Twenty years ago, my wife received the same infilling of the Holy Ghost. Eighteen years ago on a Thursday night of a revival in the summer, I received the same gift of the Holy Ghost as they did on the Day of Pentecost when I came up out of the water from being baptized in Jesus' name. I have been "re-filled" countless times, and one night at a Youth Conference, they had to help carry me out because I got drunk on the Holy Ghost just as they did in Acts 2. You've come too late to tell me that God does not still perform the supernatural!

To finish, I want you to focus on verse 38 of Acts 2:

Peter said "Repent, be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ" and then he said "ye shall" receive the gift of the Holy Ghost. He didn't say "Repent, be baptized and you might eventually get it." He didn't say "Repent, be baptized, and beg God for it." He said "if you do these things, you shall!"

Just as Baptism is a burial, so Repentance is a death. True repentance is more than just saying "God I'm sorry." True repentance is a change of direction. It is wanting everything about your life to be submitted to God's plan. It is praying and crying out to God until every desire and lifestyle that is not like Him is surrendered to Him. It's not just saying "I'm sorry God" with your lips and your mind, but it is completely surrendering your entire being to His purpose. It is deciding that you no longer want to do things your way. You no longer want to hold on to something. True Repentance is deciding that you will no longer serve yourself and that you are going to die out to your old lifestyles and opinions. You CANNOT truly repent and NOT receive the Holy Ghost. The inerrant scripture declare: "you shall receive!"

We obey the Gospel of Jesus Christ by fulfilling Acts 2:38. The Gospel of Jesus Christ is that He died, was buried, and rose again to a new life. The Holy Ghost is the resurrection. The Water Baptism is the burial. The Repentance is the death. For there to be a resurrection, there must first be a death. To receive the Holy Ghost, you must first truly die! And if you will truly die out to yourself today, then it is a promise that you SHALL receive!

It is not an issue of whether or not God will or desires to give you the Holy Ghost. It has already been promised to you. It is simply an issue of whether or not you will truly die. If I will die, then God will move! If I will die out to my pride and my preconceived ideas and to trusting in myself and trying to figure everything out. If I will die out to a world of sin and trusting within mine own self, then God will fill me with the Holy Ghost!

God wants to fill every person in this place with His Spirit. He wants to pour out the living water of the Spirit upon EVERYONE here. God wants to move. He is able to move. He will move. That is not to be questioned. What is to be questioned is will you die out to your sins and preconceived notions? The question is "will you let God move in your life today?" "Will you allow Him to give you the Holy Ghost?"

James wrote:

If you will take the first step and draw close to God then HE WILL draw close to you. If you will truly repent, God WILL fill you with the Holy Ghost. If you will humble yourselves before Him, HE SHALL lift you up.

Repent, and be baptized ... and YOU SHALL receive the Holy Ghost. The key to the supernatural in your life is dying! If I will just die, then God can move!