Now when they heard this they were cut to the heart, and said to Peter and the rest of the apostles, “Brothers, what shall we do?” And Peter said to them, “Repent and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins, and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit." (Acts 2:37-38 ESV)
In Acts, chapter 2, God pours out the Holy Spirit on some 120 believers who are waiting in Jerusalem as Jesus commanded them to do at the moment of His ascension into heaven. The outpouring of the Holy Spirit is accompanied by miraculous signs - a wind blowing inside the house, tongues of fire alighting on each person, and their declaring the glory of God, speaking in languages they never learned.
Onlookers wondered if they were drunk. That sparked a sermon by the apostle Peter. He told them that the believers were not drunk, they were filled with God's Spirit, as prophesied in Joel 2:28-29:
“And it shall come to pass afterward, that I will pour out my Spirit on all flesh; your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, your old men shall dream dreams, and your young men shall see visions. Even on the male and female servants in those days I will pour out my Spirit."
Then Peter declared the Lordship of the very Christ (Greek version of the Hebrew Messiah) whom they had crucified, but whom God had raised from the dead. On hearing this, they were cut to the heart. There was the conviction of the Holy Spirit that they had sinned in putting Jesus, the Messiah, to death, and an urgent sense of the need of forgiveness.
"Brothers, what shall we do?" In His prevenient Grace (the grace that draws us to Jesus Christ), God brought them to the sense that they were lost without Him and needed to be forgiven for their sin. Godly sorrow brings repentance that leads to salvation and leaves no regret, but worldly sorrow brings death. (2 Corinthians 7:10 NIV) Sometimes God makes us miserable with our lives so we will look for a better way in Him. Holy discontent leads us deeper into the sanctifying work of the Holy Spirit.
Even as a believer in Jesus Christ, there are times when we sense there is more than we have experienced. More holy love. More power to turn from sin. More fullness of the Presence of God. The sanctifying work of the Holy Spirit leads us to, "What shall we do?" Peter's answer was simple and profound:
“Repent and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins, and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit."
To repent is to turn around and go the opposite direction. To repent is to stop running away from God and turn around and run to Him. To repent is not only to be sorry for our sin. It is to flee from it. Some forms of Christianity today seem to be a fluffy, no-repentance-needed self-help religion. Godly sorrow brings repentance. And to repent is to align all of life with the Kingdom of God which leads to redemption by aligning our lives with the Redeemer in a living relationship.
That leads us to baptism. To be baptized is to publicly confess our faith in Jesus Christ and essentially say to the world: I belong to Jesus. In baptism, I commit my life to live to honor Him. If I am baptized as an infant, my parents make this public confession on my behalf and promise to raise me in that faith. I then confirm my baptism by my own confession in Confirmation when I am old enough to make that commitment for myself.
We Methodists believe baptism is more than a public profession on the part of the person being baptized. Baptism is a Sacrament - a means of grace. In baptism, we act to commit ourselves to the Lordship of Jesus Christ. And in baptism, God acts to claim us as His own and fill us with His Spirit. We practice baptism with the laying on of hands to impart the Holy Spirit into the heart and life of the one being baptized. The Living God proclaims over us what He proclaimed over Jesus at His baptism: "This is my beloved Son (child) in whom I am well pleased." (Matthew 3:16-17)
This is why we do not re-baptize people. There is no need to do so. God has claimed us in our baptism, and He is faithful. It is fully appropriate to renew our baptism and recommit our lives to the Lordship of Jesus Christ, but one is only to be baptized one time.
The thing we must not miss in Peter's response to their question is the second part. Repent and be baptized...and you will be filled with the Holy Spirit. What has just happened to the disciples in the upper room is meant for all believers in all places for all time. God wants to put His Spirit into our lives. He wants to do more than live beside us, He longs to dwell within His people. And it is this indwelling Presence of the Holy Spirit that sanctifies and transforms us in holy love. It's like it says in "O For a Thousand Tongues to Sing":
He breaks the power of cancelled sin
He sets the prisoner free
His blood can make the foulest clean
His blood availed for me
If you are a Methodist and know the song, admit it. You didn't just read that, you sang it in your head!
In justifying grace when we give our lives to the Lord by faith in Jesus, our sin is cancelled. In sanctifying grace as the Holy Spirit transforms us in the power of the holy love of Jesus Christ, the power of cancelled sin is broken and we are set free to be holy. We are set free to walk away from sin into righteousness. We are set free from enslavement to the addictions to this world that separate us from God.
Repent. Be baptized. Receive the Holy Spirit. Then walk in that Spirit into a life that is free to honor God in all things. This is the life to which we are called. A life that is redeemed by the Redeemer. A life that loves God with heart and soul and mind and strength and loves our neighbor as ourselves. All this is the potential of our baptism and the reality of a Spirit-filled life. Now, we simply walk in it by faith.