IMPACTED BY THE SPIRIT

JESUS IMPACTED BY THE SPIRIT

Luke 4:1-2 Then Jesus, being filled with the Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan and was led by the Spirit into the wilderness, being tempted for forty days by the devil. And in those days He ate nothing, and afterward, when they had ended, He was hungry.

Jesus was profoundly impacted; and yes, changed, by the Baptism in the Spirit. I can almost hear the protests, Jesus change, impossible. You have to remember that Jesus really did become a man when He took on a human body. He gave up His rights as God, He did not cease from being God, He just gave up His privileges as God. He had to, He came to identify with us and ultimately represent us as our heavenly High Priest. He took on the limitations of being a man, the only difference, He never sinned. He had no fallen nature. His Father was the Heavenly Father, His mother was Mary. Even in His state of sinless perfection, He needed change. He needed the power of the Spirit to accomplish all He was sent to do.
When Jesus was baptized by John the first thing we notice is how the heavens were opened to Him. The Holy Spirit gave Jesus a fresh and more powerful revelation of His Father and of who He was. That is one of the primary functions of the Holy Spirit to us. He opens heaven to us. When we are filled with the Spirit we have an ever increasing revelation of the greatness of God. That is why Paul prayed that the church would have a Spirit of revelation of the height, the depth, the width, and the length of God’s love. Just as the heavens opened for Jesus, they open for us every time we are filled with the Spirit.
The next thing that happened is that Jesus went into the wilderness for a forty day fast. After forty days He became hungry. I get hungry after four hours. Something supernatural was going on in Jesus after His Spirit baptism that was bigger than human hunger. He was experiencing a supernatural increase in His hunger for God. This too is a great function of the Spirit baptism. When we are filled with the Spirit we hunger for God.
Jesus also was anointed with the power of the Spirit to heal the sick and drive out demons. From now on, Jesus began to minister to the hurting at every opportunity that He had. Here is what happened at a home meeting in Capernaum shortly after His anointing.
Luke 4:40-41 “When the sun was setting, all those who had any that were sick with various diseases brought them to Him; and He laid His hands on every one of them and healed them. And demons also came out of many, crying out and saying, “You are the Christ, the Son of God!” And He, rebuking them, did not allow them to speak, for they knew that He was the Christ.”
If The Lord needed the baptism of the Spirit to fulfill His purpose so do we. Let’s go down to the River and dip again, The Lord has some amazing plans for us.