Imparting and Commissioning

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This is Today With Derek Prince. The internationally recognized Bible teacher and author presents to you Keys To Successful Living.

In yesterday’s talk Derek Prince continued with his topic ‘Transmitting God’s Power,’ in which he told how Moses and Elisha used the laying on of hands to set apart and equip for service those whom God had called. Today he will continue his theme by describing how this practice was used in the New Testament to impart healing and the gift of the Holy Spirit and to commission servants for work in the church. Be sure to stay tuned at the end of today’s program for our address and this week’s special offer.

Derek Prince:

In other words, the New Testament assumes, with various exceptions, that a believer shall be a member of a congregation, known to the leadership, recognizing his leadership, and having available to him the ministry of the leadership.

Just let me mention something else. This is not on this subject but in the book of Revelation, chapters 2 and 3, there are seven messages sent, and they are sent to seven churches—only to the churches. Anybody that was not in a church didn’t get the message. I feel God wants me to emphasize this. I feel some of you are like the mountain goats, you’re way out ahead of the herd and you don’t have a shepherd. That’s a dangerous place to be. It’s humbling to submit yourself to human authority but God blesses the humble and He resists the proud. So, you have to choose. Now there are exceptions, there are situations where this doesn’t apply. Don’t be an exception if you should be part of the rule.

Then the next purpose for which laying on of hands was appropriate is for the imparting of the gift of the Holy Spirit. In Acts chapter 8 we read, first of all, how Philip went to a city of Samaria and preached Christ, attested by miracles and signs, and all the people in the city who believed were baptized. So they were saved because Jesus said, ‘He who believes and is baptized shall be saved.’ But, the apostles were not content because they knew there was something missing. So in Acts 18:14 it says:

“Now when the apostles who were at Jerusalem heard that Samaria had received the word of God, they sent Peter and John to them who, when they had come down, prayed for them that they might receive the Holy Spirit; for as yet He had fallen upon none of them, they had only been baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus.”

So that is again, as I pointed out yesterday, a very clear indication that it’s possible to be saved without having, in this sense, received the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit there is spoken of as falling upon them, what I call immersion from above, a Niagara Falls immersion.

“Verse 17 says:
Then they [the apostles] laid hands on them and they [the believers] received the Holy Spirit. When Simon the magician saw that through the laying on of the apostles’ hands the Holy Spirit was given, he offered them money, saying, ‘Give me this power.’”

You see, it says there through the laying on of the apostles’ hands the Holy Spirit was given. And in the next chapter after Saul had had his encounter with Jesus on the Damascus Road, while he was there in a house in Damascus, unable to see, fasting for three days, Ananias, a mere disciple, not an apostle, not a prophet, just a disciple, received directions from the Lord to go to the house where Saul was, lay hands on him and pray for him. It says he laid hands on him and his sight came, he received the Holy Spirit and he was baptized. So, understand the laying on of hands is not limited merely to people with a special ministry. In the context of God’s will, any person can be directed to lay hands on someone else. Ruth reminded me while we were sitting in the office—this is really a rather unusual story. We were in Kona in Hawaii and I’d been very sick. I was still far from recovered. We were walking down the main street and a man ran up to us, came up to us, and said, ‘Will you pray for me? I’m sick.’ I said, ‘What’s the matter with you?’ He said, ‘I was electrocuted.’ If you know what that means, I mean, he received a full charge, he was an electrician. His shoulders were paralyzed, he couldn’t raise his hands higher than that [indicating]. So, I was rather reluctant to do it, in a way, but he was persistent. So we stopped in the middle of the street right outside a restaurant and we prayed. Ruth laid her hands on his shoulders. The next day in the devotions at Youth With A Mission he put his hands right up above his head. He had experienced a miracle through the laying on of hands!

Later on he came to see us when we were ministering in Arizona and he told us that he had been to a doctor for a check up. The doctor said, ‘I’ve examined your shoulders, there’s no way possible that you could ever get your arms above your head.’ Well, that’s just a little example of what the laying on of hands will do.

Again, in Ephesus. We’ve looked at this before in another context. Paul arrived there and found certain disciples but they were only disciples of John the Baptist. Paul explained the gospel to them, they were baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus and, when Paul laid his hands on them, they spoke with tongues and prophesied. So, laying on of hands is a very Scriptural way to transmit the power of the Holy Spirit.

Actually, there are five main examples in the New Testament and it’s interesting. In two cases, on the Day of Pentecost and in the house of Cornelius, it just came sovereignly from God. In the other three cases, that’s in Samaria with Saul of Tarsus and in Ephesus, it was transmitted through the laying on of hands. So, it’s a question of how God leads. I’ve had the privilege of leading literally thousands of people into the baptism in the Holy Spirit. My particular strength is to get people to believe that if they seek the Lord, they’ll receive. I do lay hands on people but not usually. And I can say by the grace of God I’ve seen thousands of people receive direct from the Lord.

We’ll go on now. The next purpose of laying on of hands is to commission servants of the church, sometimes called deacons. I wonder how some churches would change if they realize that the word deacon in Greek means a servant. I mean, in some churches the Board of Deacons has a lot of authority. How would it be if they were called the Board of Servants? You see, we’ve got some of our terminology mixed up.

Ruth and I were going to Pakistan one time and we had to pass through the examination of the immigration. The man there, the Pakistani, said to me, ‘What are you?’ Well, it was a Muslim country and I thought I need to be pretty careful. Eventually I said, ‘I’m a minister.’ I thought that’s a pretty safe term that most people don’t understand. Well, from then on I got red carpet treatment everywhere. I went to the head of the line and so on. I realized later he thought I was a minister of the government of the United States. You see? So far away are we from the real meaning of minister, which is a servant. If you are a minister, brother or sister, you are a servant. A servant of the Lord and a servant of the Lord’s people.

Well, the church had run into a very good problem in Acts chapter 6, they were growing so fast that they couldn’t take care of all the poor and the widows who needed their attention.

Let me point out to you again another thing about the New Testament church. They invariably accepted responsibility for their widows, it was taken for granted. The problem today is that the government has taken over so many functions that the church doesn’t really realize its responsibilities. But I still believe the church has responsibility for the poor, whatever way that responsibility is carried out.

So, the believers came to the apostles and said, ‘Things aren’t working out right, our widows are being neglected.’ So the apostles said, ‘All right, we’ll take steps.’ This is rather a crucial situation. The twelve apostles summoned the congregation and said:

“It is not desirable that we should leave the Word of God and serve tables. Therefore brethren, seek out from among you seven men of good reputation, full of the Holy Spirit and wisdom, whom we may appoint over this business, that we will give ourselves continually to prayer and to the ministry of the Word.”

What is the apostolic ministry? Prayer and the ministry of the Word. It’s not administration. They said we can get other people to do the administration, we’ve got to stick with our responsibility. So they said, ‘Choose seven men from among you whom you know.’ And, all of them had to be full of the Holy Spirit. Not even a deacon was appointed in the early church unless he was full of the Holy Spirit.

This was the wisdom of the apostles, you see, because they were going to look after the finances. So they let the congregation choose the men, then they accepted the men and ordained them, put them in their office. But after that the congregation could never complain about the men because they were the ones that made the choice. See how wise God is?

So it says they brought these men and set them before the apostles and when they had prayed they laid hands on them. They were ordaining them. If you like to say deacons, but the word deacon is not used there. I would prefer to say helpers. The apostles said we’re getting so busy we need helpers.

The position of a helper was very, very important. It’s interesting to see what happened to two of those men. Stephen became the first martyr and Philip became the God-acknowledged evangelist. So, brother or sister, if you start in the position of a servant, bear in mind it can be a stepping stone to something else. In fact, if you don’t start as a servant you really never will be promoted by God because God only promotes people who start down the ladder.

Announcer:

On tomorrow’s program Derek Prince will continue his topic ‘Transmitting God’s Power,’ giving other examples of how the laying of hands was used in the New Testament to send out apostles for ministry and to appoint elders in the church. This week’s message is available on audiocassette No. RC4166 and also on video. Our special offer this week is The Spirit-filled Believer’s Handbook, in which Derek clearly explains the foundation for Christian faith from Hebrews 6 verses 1 and 2.

To receive your copy of ‘Transmitting God’s Power’ write today and include a contribution of $5.00 or more for audiocassette RC4166 or $14.95 for the video teaching. Include a gift of $15.00 or more for The Spirit-filled Believer’s Handbook.

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