Is it possible to be a believer in the Lord, and to be His disciple, and yet not to have received the Holy Spirit?
I’ll answer my own question: yes. Of course it is!
From Acts 19.
1 While Apollos was in Corinth, Paul traveled through the interior of the country and came (down) to Ephesus where he found some disciples. 2 He said to them, "Did you receive the holy Spirit when you became believers?" They answered him, "We have never even heard that there is a holy Spirit." 3 He said, “How were you baptized?” They replied, “With the baptism of John.” 4 Paul then said, “John baptized with a baptism of repentance, telling the people to believe in the one who was to come after him, that is, in Jesus.” 5 When they heard this, they were baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus. 6 And when Paul laid (his) hands on them, the holy Spirit came upon them, and they spoke in tongues and prophesied. 7 Altogether there were about twelve men.
They were, “disciples.” They were, “believers.” Scripture tells us this much. Yet they had
not received the Holy Spirit.
Contrary to what myfavoritmartin has said, regeneration does not precede faith. His confusion comes from not being able to recognize that a movement of grace (faith) does not necessarily mean one is justified. Our God is more subtle than an on/off switch in souls.
Faith clearly precedes regeneration in any context-- and anyone who claims, “justification by faith” must realize how silly it would be to claim otherwise. How could faith cause justification (being set right with God, interior renewal, and being filled with the Holy Spirit), if justification (which is identical with regeneration) preceded faith?
Ironically, by saying that, “regeneration precedes faith,” myfavoritmartin in some perverse way rejects justification by faith.
As in all things, there is more gray matter than black and white, which is the ample room into which myfavoritmartin puts his theories.
The first gray area is the cause of faith, as I’ve mentioned. Faith is caused by grace, as believers has quoted, and and I’m sure myfavoritmartin would agree--
no one comes to me unless my Father draw him. Into this gray area they fill in, “one must be regenerate to have faith.” As one can see, it is quite a leap from being moved by grace to being regenerate, but this seems to be what they are conflating.
The second gray area is between faith and regeneration. It is true that regeneration causes the believer to firmly and habitually have the three theological virtues-- faith, hope and love. Because of this, it would be easy to say that the faith of the regenerated believer is deeper than that of the unregenerate. However, it is this area into which myfavoritmartin projects his belief that regeneration precedes faith-- on a leap without grounds from the faith which the unjustified believer has (a la Acts 19), which is itself a movement of grace, but not impressed habitually on the soul, and the faith of the, “regenerate” in whom the three theological virtues reside habitually.
It’s sad that, to keep the failing edifice intact, he has to create more wild and divergent doctrine to support it-- but ultimately any one crack in the great edifice of the Church will necessitate such a thing-- as the building is repaired not around the true foundations but around the error which he perceives to be truth, and thus zealously guards, shifting the building to foundations other than its own.
-Rob
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