There is a difference between immediate and ultimate goals. Success with an immediate goal makes it possible to reach an ultimate goal. But failure in the immediate prevents us from reaching our final goal.
Bowlers know this. Each lane not only has ten pins at the far end, it also has markers on the lane itself. A good bowler knows how his or her ball rotates as it is released from a hand. Bowlers will aim at a marker in the lane as an initial target. Yet they receive no points for hitting it. Points are only given when the ultimate target is hit—the pins at the end of the lane.
Likewise, salvation was not the ultimate goal of Christ’s coming. It was the immediate target…the marker in the lane. Without accomplishing redemption, there was no hope for the ultimate goal—which was to fill each born-again person with the Holy Spirit. God’s desire is for the believer to overflow with Himself, that we might “be filled with all the fullness of God.” (Eph. 3:19). The resulting fullness of the Spirit was different than anyone had ever before experienced. For that reason, the greatest of all Old Testament prophets could confess: “I need to be baptized by You,” meaning, “I need Your baptism…the one I was assigned to announce!”
The baptism in the Holy Spirit makes a lifestyle available to us that not even John had access to. Consider this: We could travel off of this planet in any direction at the speed of light, 186,000 miles a second, for billions of years, and never begin to exhaust what we already know to exist. All of that rests in the palm of His hand. And it’s this God who wants to fill us with His fullness.
That ought to make a difference!
Excerpt from When Heaven Invades Earth by Bill Johnson