Question
In Acts I read that there was 120 who were baptised in the Holy Spirit. How is it that you can believe that The Holy Spirit is not ment for all? There were miracles in the Old Testament and in the New up until the Apostles died? If God is truely the same yesterday, today and forever…as it says in His Word…then why would He stop doing the miraculous after the book of Acts? That would be a contradiction would it not? would not God himself be lying? Heaven forbid…
Answer
In your question above, you have made some claims about God and His word based extremely loosely on 2 or 3 passages.
Let’s take your logic to it’s conclusion. In the Old Testament, God required animal sacrifices. Every day. In the New Testament, He requires none. Does that mean that He is not “the same yesterday, today, and forever”? Is that a contradiction that proves God is lying?
In the Old Testament, God’s chosen people were the Jews. Gentiles were heathens, totally unacceptable to Him. In the New Testament, Jews are no more acceptable than Gentiles: every person who does His will is accepted. Does that mean that He is not “the same yesterday, today, and forever”? Is that a contradiction that proves God is lying?
God has had a plan for man’s salvation since before time (Ephesians 3:1-7). According to Paul in this passage, not all parts of His plan were revealed at the same time. The Jews under the OT had a part of the plan, but not all of it. The Christians under the NT got the rest of it. The best part for us is that we have the Bible. According to Paul (1 Cor. 13) and James (1:25), it is “perfect” or complete. Paul states in 1 Cor. 13 that spiritual gifts (the ability to perform miracles) were not “perfect,” and that something better would be coming along (“When that which is perfect has come, that which is in part shall be done away.”)
The portion of the Holy Spirit that was given to men to perform miracles has in fact passed away. It was only intended as a temporary way to prove that the men who performed the miracles were indeed from God. Now we have the Bible, and again, according to Paul in 1 Cor. 13, the completed Bible is better than the ability to perform miracles.
Read Acts 8. It clearly teaches that the only men who could pass on the ability to perform miracles were the apostles. Now that they are dead, how do you propose that men receive the ability to perform miracles today?
We still have a gift of the Holy Spirit, the same one that was promised in Acts 2:38. That gift is very different from the gift of miracles, which was only temporary.
By Michael Molloy
