hich Paul meant it.
They had not yet come to _their_ Pentecost. In the R. V., Paul's question
is rendered, "Did ye receive the Holy Ghost when ye believed?" Proving
(1) that it is possible to "receive" the Holy Ghost at the moment of
believing, and (2) that it is possible to believe without "receiving," as
has already been pointed out from the rendering of the A.V. After Paul
had instructed them more fully in the word and way of the Lord, we read
that "the Holy Ghost came on them." From this we gather that these men of
Ephesus obtained a blessing subsequent to their conversion, spoken of
here as "receiving" the Holy Ghost, as the Holy Ghost "coming" on them.
This is in strict accord with what Paul himself says of this event when
writing to the Ephesians in Eph. i. 13, "After that ye believed, ye were
sealed with that holy Spirit of promise." First they "believed," and
then, some time after "believing," they were "sealed," they "received,"
they were "filled." From these four cases--(1) Apostles, (2) Samaritans,
(3) Saul, (4) Ephesians--we conclude that in New Testament times men
actually lived as Christians, were saved, converted men, and yet knew
nothing of the "Filling" with the Spirit--this knowledge, this blessing
coming to them some time after their being born again. Yet this is the
very thing some to-day deny! Whom are we to believe? These objectors or
the Sacred Record? The Divine Word declares it, and there is then no room
or need for argument. So we affirm that it is equally possible for
believers, for saved, converted men, to live in our own time, as well as
in Bible times, without the "Fullness;" nay more, it is possible for them
to live for years, then die and go home to Heaven to be there for ever
with the Lord, and to have known nothing on earth of what it was to be
"filled with the Spirit." But what a loss they have suffered! Eternal,
irreparable loss! So we conclude it is abundantly plain from Scripture,
that for the regenerate soul there is in Christ another blessing over and
above the being born of the Spirit, spoken of as "the Fullness of the
Spirit." "I am amazed at a man like you going to these Conventions," said
a man to his minister once. "What new thing can these Convention speakers
tell you? it is all in the New Testament." "Yes," he replied, "that's the
trouble; and we have left these things in the New Testament; whereas we
want to get them out of the New Testament; and into our hearts and lives."