Experience The Spirit In Baptism Series

Series: Experience the Spirit

Many Christians cannot define or have a very hard time defining what Christian Spiritual Maturity is or even looks like. Yet, many will say that they want to grow into spiritually mature Christians.

We have learned the importance of the Bible in our spiritual growth.

We have discovered how we need recognize and experience the Spirit even at work.

We experienced the Spirit through prayer, praise and worship a few weeks ago as God’s Presence showed up in that service.

We stressed the necessity of listening to wisdom from above to experience the Spirit in our decision making process of life.

Experience the Spirit through conflict: We also talked about the importance of working through the process of conflict so that we grow spiritually through the difficult dimensions of life. We also made the choice to forgive someone who had hurt us which opens the door to experience the Spirit.

Experiencing the Spirit through Service: The Lord desires us to use our gifts in service to Him and when we do that we will experience His Spirit in the midst of our serving.

Pastor Brian talked about how to experience the Spirit through pain and loss.

Last week at Easter we learn how to experience the Spirit in the Resurrection!

Experience the Spirit in Baptism:

When we experience the Spirit in salvation we go from an aint to a saint. Because “S” which stands for Spirit defines our standing with God.

What is a Saint? – What makes one a Saint?

• Is the type of “saint” Paul is referring too in this passage look like Roger Moore from the TV series “The Saint?”

o The Saint TV show was a spy action series about a thief who only stole from criminals and then usually got them caught and put in prison. He was kind of a "self-hired and self-paid" law enforcement officer. That would be a good enough story line in itself, but there’s another twist! He was constantly chased by a real lawman called Inspector Teal who didn’t see the difference between The Saint (Simon Templar) and any other criminal! That kept Simon looking over his shoulder while he went after the loot!

o See picture on Power point along with theme song on the TV show “The Saint”.

o But his is not the type of “saint” that Paul was referring to though:

• What a about the New Orleans “Saints?” This is a NFL football team and is Paul referring to one of their players? They would be called “saints.”

o No Paul did not mean this kind of “saint.”

• Is the type of “saint” Paul is referring to one of the many “Sainted” saints of the Roman Catholic Church?

o There are more than 10,000 Roman Catholic saints. It is important to note that Saints should not be "worshipped" according to strict Christian terminology. Worship should be reserved for God alone, whereas Saints should be venerated, respected, and viewed as role models.

o The Roman Catholic process of sainthood and of being canonized to the special status of sainthood has no valid biblical basis and we are told by the Word that we are only to pray to God through Jesus Christ. First Timothy 2:5 states, “For there is one God and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus,” But for what ever reason the Roman Catholic church has adopted a sainthood policy. Here is their process of sainthood if you so desire to “sainted”:

SAINTHOOD 101: Rules for Becoming a Saint

In the Catholic tradition, every once in a rare while a human being will lead a life of such incredible virtue that they are deemed to be closer to God than the rest of us, so close they can even bring about miracles. Such a person, man or woman, of any race of nationality, is declared after their death to be a saint. Saints play an important role in Catholicism, providing a human model of perfect virtue. It is also widely believed that a saint in heaven can speak directly to God on behalf of a desperate or ill human being. Thus, for example, many Catholics pray to St. Jude when they are in trouble. The best known saints are ancient – St. Jude, St. Augustine, St. Francis, St. Anne, etc. – but new saints are named in every generation (Pope John Paul II has canonized some 280) and undoubtedly there are people living today who will one day be sainted.

So what does one have to do to become a saint in the Roman Catholic Church?

The following are the basic steps to becoming a saint:

1) The candidate must be deceased for a minimum of five years

2) Even in our modern, fast-paced society, the candidate must have lived a life of extraordinary asceticism, self-denial, faith, good works and inspirational virtue, often helping the poor and sick