This is a Q&A blog post by our Visiting Scholar in Philosophy, William Lane Craig.

Question

When did certain believers in the New Testament become Christians ?

In the instance of the 11 remaining Disciples of the original 12, were they born again believing Christians before the day of Pentecost ?

When the Samaritans believed in Acts 8:12 did they become Christians then? Or, was it not until Peter and John came down in Acts 8:17 and laid their hands on them and they received the Holy Spirit?

Was Saul saved in Acts 9:6 when he said "... Lord, what wilt thou have me to do? Or was it not until Acts 9:17 when Ananias went his way, and entered into the house; and putting his hands on him said, “Brother Saul, the Lord Jesus, who appeared to you on the road as you came, has sent me that you may receive your sight and be filled with the Holy Spirit.”

Were the Ephesian believing disciples Christians when Paul first met them in Acts 19:1-3? Or was it not until after Paul laid his hands on them in Acts 19:6 ... even though they were water baptized in Acts 19:5.

In the God fearing house of Cornelius in Acts 10 verse 44 the Holy Spirit fell on all them which heard the word while Peter was speaking. This is the first biblical example of someone receiving the Holy Spirit and speaking in tongues the first time they hear the Gospel.

It is hard for me to imagine that Peter wasn't a believer when he said in Matt. 16:16 You are the Christ, the Son of the living God.” Verse 17: And Jesus answered him, “Blessed are you, Simon Bar-Jonah! For flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my Father who is in heaven.

So what is the timing, what is the event in light of these Scriptures when someone becomes a Born Again Christian?

William Lane Craig’s Response

The short answer to your question is that a person becomes a Christian when he receives the Holy Spirit. This is called regeneration. As its etymology suggests, “regeneration” (palingenesia) refers to the spiritual quickening of a person that changes him from being spiritually dead to being spiritually alive. Although the word appears only once in the New Testament in a salvific sense (Titus 3.5), the designated reality is captured by a variety of terms. John refers to it as “new birth” or “birth from above.” Being “born of the Spirit” is said to be an absolute requirement of entering the Kingdom of God (John 3.1-15). Paul says that if anyone is in Christ, he is a “new creation” (II Corinthians 5.17). Ephesians 2.5 speaks of God’s “revivification” of dead sinners: “even when we were dead through our trespasses, [God] made us alive together with Christ” (cf. Colossians 2.13).

This spiritual transformation is wrought in us by the Holy Spirit. Titus 3.5-6 says that God saved us “by the washing of regeneration and renewal in the Holy Spirit, which he poured out upon us richly through Jesus Christ our Savior.” Similarly, in John’s Gospel Jesus attributes the new birth to the Holy Spirit: “That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit” (John 3.6). When we place our faith in Christ in response to the Holy Spirit’s drawing, God does not simply declare us righteous, but the Holy Spirit miraculously changes us by restoring the spiritual functioning of the native capacities of our souls.

The Holy Spirit does not simply restore our proper relationship to God, but he comes to indwell us. In John’s Gospel John interprets Jesus’ saying, “He who believes in me, as the scripture has said, ‘Out of his heart shall flow rivers of living water’” to refer to the promise of the indwelling Holy Spirit: “Now this he said about the Spirit, which those who believed in him were to receive; for as yet the Spirit had not been given, because Jesus was not yet glorified” (John 7.38-39). Jesus tells the disciples that the Holy Spirit “dwells with you and will be in you” (14.17). After Jesus’ resurrection, Jesus commands the disciples, “Receive the Holy Spirit” (20.22).

Luke has a powerful, almost physical, conception of the indwelling Holy Spirit, as we repeatedly see throughout his Acts of the Apostles. He refers to the reception of the Holy Spirit as being “baptized in the Holy Spirit.” Although, as your question illustrates, the baptism of the Holy Spirit as described in these stories is variously related to water baptism (sometimes preceding it; sometimes independent of it; sometimes actually coming after it), nevertheless it is clear that in every case the persons who experience a baptism of the Holy Spirit are experiencing an initial work of the Holy Spirit in their lives and not, as Pentecostals claim, some sort of secondary work of grace which puts them into a deeper walk with Christ.

It is through the baptism of the Holy Spirit that we are indwelt by the Spirit and made to be members of the church, metaphorically the body of Christ. Paul states clearly: “For by one Spirit we were all baptized into one body—Jews or Greeks, slaves or free—and all were made to drink of one Spirit” (1 Corinthians 12.13). Here the baptism of the Holy Spirit is the universal experience of the church, the initiating act by means of which we are placed into the body of Christ. So Paul says to the Corinthians, “Do you not know that you are God’s temple and that God’s Spirit dwells in you?” (I Corinthians 3.16).

In the post-Pentecost era the Holy Spirit stands in for the now ascended Christ and becomes so closely identified with Christ that Paul can refer to him as “Christ”:

But you are not in the flesh, you are in the Spirit, if in fact the Spirit of God dwells in you. Any one who does not have the Spirit of Christ does not belong to him. But if Christ is in you, although your bodies are dead because of sin, your spirits are alive because of righteousness (Romans 8. 9-10).

So it is through the baptism of the Holy Spirit that we are placed into the body of Christ, regenerated, born again to new life, and indwelt by the Holy Spirit. It is the presence of the Holy Spirit that determines whether a person is a Christian or not a Christian. As Paul says, anyone who does not have the Holy Spirit does not belong to Christ.

As for your question about the status of the disciples during Jesus’ ministry, you are quite right to say that Peter was a believer, just as Moses was a believer, but Peter was not yet regenerate, for he had not yet come to receive the Holy Spirit.

- William Lane Craig

This and other resources are available on .