The Foundational Truth of Baptisms by Ian Clayton

The Foundational Truth of Baptisms 

(an extract from Ian Clayton's new book “Realms of the Kingdom Volume 1)

Hebrews 6: "Therefore, leaving the discussion of the elementary principles of Christ, let's go on to perfection, not laying again the foundation of repentance from dead works and of faith toward God; of the doctrine of baptisms, of laying on of hands, of resurrection of the dead, and of eternal judgment; And this we will do if God permits” (Hebrews 6:1-3).

All these truths are basic foundational truths that every believer needs to know about. We need to get to grips with them and understand what they mean. There are many different baptisms mentioned in the Bible, but the following eight are the main ones:

1. Baptism into the Cloud of Glory: the ‘preparation for relationship’.
2. Baptism of Repentance for the Remission of Sin: the ‘preparation for restoration’.
3. Baptism of Water: the ‘preparation for a renewed life’.
4. Baptism in the Holy Spirit: the ‘preparation for revival’.
5. Baptism of the Holy Spirit and Fire: the ‘preparation for renewal and refreshing’.
6. Baptism into His Death: the ‘preparation for resurrection’.
7. Baptism of Unity: for the ‘preparation of the release of blessing’.
8. Baptism into the Father: to ‘identify with the Nature and Character of the Father’.

Commonly, only two or three of these baptisms are taught, but every one of them is vitally important. The first and last on the list above are the least taught:

1) Baptism into the Cloud of Glory: This is the Preparation for Relationship "All were baptised into Moses in the cloud” (1 Corinthians 10:2 KJV). This is baptism into the Cloud of Glory. It is immersing yourself into that cloud. The baptism into Moses is a baptism into the marriage celebration, the marriage covenant and the marriage lifestyle with the presence of God. When the glory of God came down onto the mountain, the Bible talks about a cloud that formed over the mountain (Exodus 19:16). In Hebrew the word for ‘cloud’ or ‘covering’ is ‘huppah’. It was a round cloud that came onto that mountain and sat like a bridal huppah. The Bible says the mountain shook and that the Israelites were terrified of what they saw (Exodus 19:18; 20:18). It says: "...all the people saw the thunderings and the lightnings..." (Exodus 20:18 KJV). Then God told Moses not to even let them come near the mountain because if they touched it they would die. Barriers were put around it so not even animals could go there, because God had come down and was asking them, "Will you marry Me?” Moses went into that huppah (or cloud) and the Israelites were terrified by the lightning and thunder that was coming out of the mountain. The Hebrew interpretation of lightning is "glorified fire"; you can see it. You cannot see thunder, but the Bible says all the people saw the thunderings and the lightnings. The Hebrew understanding of thunder is ‘glorified voices of fire’. So when they came to the edge of this mountain they saw glorified fire and glorified voices of fire. It is important to understand that in Hebrew the voices of fire were saying, “Will you marry Me?" We do not teach He continues to create all the time. The mountain is forever growing because of Who He is. He is forever creating, so it just grows! Shaking and earthquakes often happen, and so diamonds fall off the mountain. So there is a cascade of diamonds coming off the mountain and the oil of the presence of God flowing off the mountain, so you get diamonds and oil mixed together. The Bible talks about the River being as clear as crystal. It is as clear as crystal because there is crystal in it. But you cannot see the crystals until you jump in! There are jewels in the River. You can pick them up and put them in your belly!.

.

.

.

.

8) The Baptism into the Father: To Identify with the Nature and Character of the Father.

(On one of Ian’s visits to heaven he meets with Enoch on the side of a river in heaven): 

Enoch is amazing! He does not waste words or mince about with what he says, because he has walked with God for so many years. He said to me, “Don’t we have a triune God?" and I said, "Yes, hallelujah! We have a triune God." What do you say when somebody makes a statement like that? He said, “We have a triune God, great! Tell me who you have identified with?" About now I started to feel like there was a shark chasing me! I said, "Well, I have been baptised in water and I have identified with Christ; and I have been baptised in the Holy Spirit and I have identified with Holy Spirit.” He said, "And?” I said, "Well, I have been baptised in the Cloud.” He said, "No, no I am not talking about the experiences. I am talking about the relationships with the people you have been baptised into, because when you get baptised into a person you get baptised into His nature and His character." Then he made this statement to me, "You have identified with Holy Spirit and you have identified with Jesus in the waters of baptism and in the natural world on the earth. What have you done to identify with the Father?” I came back to the religious, “There is no doctrine about doing anything like that. You show me that in the Bible."He said to me, "Don’t you think there is a River in Heaven for a purpose?” You get these slaps (in the Spirit) when you try and justify yourself! It is the flesh, even in Heaven you still try and justify yourself! I said, “Yeah, I have been in the River down there in Eden." He said, "No, I am talking about the River here, which flows pure as crystal.” He said to me, "You need to immerse yourself in the River, because the River comes straight from Him. The only way you can identify yourself with Him is to immerse yourself in what comes from Him.” I had experience of the River that runs through Eden and by then it is watered down a bit and there are many tributaries of the presence of God that run into it that bring other things into that River, which make it what it is. In the River in Eden all the diamonds are on the bottom and the water runs clear as crystal. It runs clear like water, although it is like oil and like water. My expectation was that it would be the same.

So I said, "Let me at it!” I have been in the River of Life down in Eden. The Bible says it is as pure as crystal when it flows out of the throne. It is pure water when it gets into Eden, but when it comes out of the throne it is crystal. I did not know that and jumped into it, doing what I call a bomb dive. As I jumped into the River I sank into this honey. I went down into this honey, into this ‘quick sand’ substance that is flowing out from under the veil of the curtain, where the throne of God is, thinking, “I am going to die, but I can breathe in water.” I had to make the choice to give myself in surrender to God. 

Baptism of any kind is about absolute surrender. As I sank in I was breathing pure diamonds and oil into my nose, my mouth and my body. I stayed there for about half an hour thinking, "Lord, I am identifying with You, I am identifying with Who You are, in the baptism of the River of Glory.” I stayed there because I wanted to know what it is to be one with the Father, as Jesus talked about in John 17. The amazing thing about the river is that it goes straight through you. It does not push you like the water we have here. There is no resistance in Heaven, because everything is alive there. You are alive and because you are as one with it, the River just goes through you. I was sinking, even as it was moving, crashing loudly out of the Throne. I was thinking, "Hallelujah! This is thrilling! I do not know what is going to happen!" I was trying to get into all my past experiences, thinking, "I am in the river of Ezekiel (Chapter 47) and, Father, this is going to be okay.” I did not really know what was going on. Nobody had ever taught me about this, but I did not really care, because suddenly I was finding that I was changing on the inside without having to do anything. I was beginning to immerse myself in the very nature of the One who made me. I have taught about the skin of God. The reason there are diamonds and oil that flow as part of the River is because God is Who He is. What sheds off Him is the residue and the residue makes a river. It cannot be controlled, it just flows out under the curtain and then it becomes a raging torrent of His glory to the earth. When I came out of the River, just like honey sticks to your arm, my skin was covered with oil and diamonds and my skin looked like the skin of God. I was covered with oil and little diamonds allover my body!

Enoch looked at me and he said, "Now you can relate and identify with the Father because you have been in His nature and His character, because His nature and His character are in the River." I did not know what else to do, I just shouted, "Yahoo - Hallelujah! This feels so good - in fact I do not want to go home!" (But I have a job to do, so I had to come home).

In water baptism we get ourselves immersed in the natural environment in water. When you get yourself immersed in water baptism you are immersed in the new nature of Jesus Christ, the new resurrection power and all the doctrinal things. The same is true with the Holy Spirit because you get yourself immersed into the nature and character of the Holy Spirit. So, suddenly I found that inside of me it was so easy to talk with God as a Friend and as a Father. I could talk with Jesus from my past experience with Him. Previously, however, it was kind of hard to relate to God as my Father because I did not have that immersion process accomplished in my life where I had chosen wilfully to go down and be baptised into the River of the glory of God.

THE LEAVES OF THE TREES

The Bible says there is more there than just a River. I had identified with God and I had this experience of being connected and immersed into the nature of the presence and the person of God. There are other things in that scripture regarding the River flowing out. One of them is the trees and how they cast off their leaves and the leaves are for the healing of the nations. I was busy looking at Enoch and looking at these leaves. If these leaves are for the healing of the nations (Rev 22:2) then I wanted some! I was looking at him and sometimes you do not have to say anything, they know the intents of your heart because it shows on the …………………

Agreeing with Heaven

When heaven and earth agree is a great teaching by Dr. Jim Richards http://vimeo.com/69625628

It is interesting that when the scripture talks about two agreeing on anything, it does not necessarily mean two people, but when we agree with heaven/God about a situation, that is when things change. This is why we are commanded to pray that "God's will be done on earth as it is in heaven".

The other interesting point is that "binding a loosing" does not necessarily apply to spiritual warfare and binding the devil. It actually was an idiom used in those days and means "to declare something forbidden/unlawful or declare something allowed/lawful". 

Binding and loosing therefore means that when we pray, we should be declaring what is forbidden and declaring what is allowed.

How do we know what is forbidden and what is allowed?

Understanding what Jesus accomplished on the cross makes it clear.

If Jesus took our infirmities and carried our diseases (Isaiah 53, Matt 8:17), then it means that when sickness attacks our bodies, it is forbidden or unlawful. The bible says that by His stripes we were healed. Therefore this is what is lawful or allowed. So we must declare "By His stripes we are healed". We must declare this, even if our bodies are sick and hurting because the Kingdom of God operates by faith. 

We see this principle in Abraham's life when God said to him that Sarah was going to have a child. The Bible says he did not consider the deadness of Sarah's womb, Abraham believed that what God said would come to pass. In other words Abraham simply agreed with God and not Sarah's situation at that time. Sarah, however did falter on this aspect of believing God's Word, she laughed out loud when she what God said. (most of us would probably have responded like Sarah did because our world view is usually an earthly or natural perspective of what is possible. When God or someone gives us a perspective of what is possible from a spiritual or supernatural perspective, we might laugh or say it is not possible, but this perspective is not governed by natural laws. The spiritual dimension is a higher dimension. A word spoken in faith is how we operate in the spiritual dimension and can bring about a change in this lower or natural dimension). After several years of Sarah still not conceiving, Sarah decided that God needed some help, so she handed Hagar, her maid to Abraham and said he must sleep with her. This act of unbelief resulted in a lot of problems. 

The bible says that Abraham did not waver in unbelief, he agreed with God and called things that be not (Sarah's ability to conceive), to be as God had said they will be. Abraham is thus called the father of all who believe (Romans 4:11). 

God told Abraham that Sarah would conceive a child and he would become the father of many nations. There was however a period of several years that went by before Sarah eventually conceived. This obviously was difficult for both of Abraham and Sarah and they had lots of opportunity to question God's word to them. The Bible says that Abraham did not waver in unbelief Romans 4:20 "Abraham never wavered in believing God's promise. In fact, his faith grew stronger, and in this he brought glory to God. also faltered since he went along with Sarah's plan, just like Adam did with Eve's. But the bible does not record him as wavering in his faith. We can be encouraged by this because though at times we may falter, we simply need to get ourselves back on track and start believing again and then we will be considered as righteous and our sin of unbelief will be forgotten by God. (Unfortunately, we often still have to deal with the consequences of our unbelief as Abraham and Sarah had to deal with Hagar and Ishmael)

The principle of speaking out the result before it is visible can be seen right at the beginning of Genesis when God spoke and the world came into being. This is confirmed by Paul in several places in the New Testament such as 2 Corinthians 4:13 "It is written: "I believed; therefore I have spoken." Since we have that same spirit of faith, we also believe and therefore speak,"

2 Corinthians 5:7 affirms the principle that faith is not dependant on seeing something first "for we walk by faith, not by sight".   

We are commanded to live by faith: Romans 1:17 For in it the righteousness of God is revealed from faith to faith; as it is written, "BUT THE RIGHTEOUS man SHALL LIVE BY FAITH."

And Hebrew 11:6 tells us that without faith it is impossible to please God: "But without faith it is impossible to please Him, for he who comes to God must believe that He is, and that He is a rewarder of those who diligently seek Him."

And then the bible definition of faith in Hebrews 11:1 "Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen."

So to be able to come into agreement with God we have to walk by faith and we also need to know what the bible says we are allowed to believe for. Our faith can only be established on God's Word to us.

If the gospel is the good news to the poor, what does this mean? If the bible declares that poverty is a curse and we have been redeemed from the curse we should not be permitting the curse of poverty.

If the bible declares that a man can be saved by believing in his heart and confessing with his mouth that Jesus is Lord, then this is what we must declare.

What the bible declares is what heaven declares or what God declares. We simply need to come into agreement with what the bible says and then it will be done for us in our own lives.

We dont need to beg God to do what He has already done. Jesus said "It is finished". He has done all He needs to do in order to accomplish our salvation, healing, redemption from poverty. 

Agreeing with the bible when we pray is very different to begging God to do something. We must see ourselves raised up and seated in heavenly places with Christ. We declare the word of God with authority. What we declare will come to pass. Life and death are in the power of our tongue. Our tongue will declare our thoughts. We need to guard what is in our heart for out of it (our words) flow the issues of life. Our tongue is the rudder that steers our life. Our conversation needs to always be aligned with what we declare in our prayers. If our conversation contradicts our prayers then our prayers are meaningless.