When Jesus said, “Ye must be born again,” He was not describing a feeling or a decision merely; He was describing a birth — an entrance into a life that was not there before. And the New Testament does not leave us to guess how that birth happens. On the very first day the Church proclaimed the gospel, the people asked the plain question, and Peter gave the plain answer.
“Ye must be born again”
“Jesus answered, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God… Marvel not that I said unto thee, Ye must be born again.” — John 3:5-7
To Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews who came by night, Jesus spoke of two elements of one birth: water and the Spirit. It is not enough to admire Jesus, nor even to believe about Him at a distance; there is a birth to be born. The rest of the New Testament shows exactly what being born of water and of the Spirit looks like when it happens.
The apostles’ own answer: Acts 2:38
At Pentecost, when the crowd was “pricked in their heart” and cried out, “Men and brethren, what shall we do?” Peter did not answer with a prayer to repeat. He answered with the new birth itself:
“Repent, and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins, and ye shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost.” — Acts 2:38
Three things, one new birth: repentance (a turning from sin, the death of the old life), water baptism in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins (born of water), and the gift of the Holy Ghost (born of the Spirit). This is not one option among many; it is the apostolic pattern, and Peter said the promise is “unto you, and to your children, and to all that are afar off, even as many as the Lord our God shall call” (Acts 2:39) — that is, to us.
The pattern is consistent through Acts
What Peter preached in Acts 2 is what the Church practiced everywhere the gospel went:
| Where | What happened |
|---|---|
| Jerusalem (Acts 2) | Repent, baptized in Jesus’ name, filled with the Holy Ghost, spake with tongues (2:4, 38) |
| Samaria (Acts 8) | Baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus (8:16); received the Holy Ghost when the apostles came |
| Cornelius’ house (Acts 10) | The Holy Ghost fell; they “speak with tongues, and magnify God” (10:46); then baptized in Jesus’ name (10:48) |
| Ephesus (Acts 19) | Baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus (19:5); the Holy Ghost came, and they “spake with tongues, and prophesied” (19:6) |
The sign of the Spirit: what Peter twice testified
How did they know a person had received the Holy Ghost? In Acts, the same sign appears: they spake with other tongues as the Spirit gave utterance (Acts 2:4; 10:46; 19:6). And this is not a private opinion — it is what Peter himself testified, twice, when the reception of the Gentiles was questioned.
“And as I began to speak, the Holy Ghost fell on them, as on us at the beginning… Forasmuch then as God gave them the like gift as he did unto us… what was I, that I could withstand God?” — Acts 11:15-17
“And God, which knoweth the hearts, bare them witness, giving them the Holy Ghost, even as he did unto us; and put no difference between us and them.” — Acts 15:8
Both times Peter anchors the Gentile experience to Pentecost — “as on us at the beginning,” “the like gift,” “even as he did unto us” — and at Cornelius’ house what convinced Peter and the six brethren with him was that they heard them “speak with tongues, and magnify God” (Acts 10:46). The audible sign identified the experience as the same one the Church received in Acts 2. Apostolic Pentecostals therefore hold that speaking in other tongues, as the Spirit gives utterance, is the initial sign of receiving the Holy Ghost.
Why baptism in the name of Jesus
Every baptism recorded in the book of Acts is administered in the name of Jesus (Acts 2:38; 8:16; 10:48; 19:5) — not once by a title-only formula. This is how the apostles obeyed the Lord’s command to baptize “in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost” (Matthew 28:19): the singular name in which Father, Son, and Holy Ghost are revealed is Jesus — for “in him dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead bodily” (Colossians 2:9), and “there is none other name under heaven given among men, whereby we must be saved” (Acts 4:12). Baptism is therefore by immersion, in that saving Name, for the remission of sins.
The honest part
This is the Apostolic (Oneness) reading, and it is not the only one held among Christians — so it is set out plainly, with the disputed points named. Some traditions read the “water” of John 3:5 as natural birth or as a symbol rather than baptism; some take “for the remission of sins” in Acts 2:38 to mean “because of” rather than “in order to”; some regard baptism as an outward sign that follows salvation rather than a part of the new birth; and many hold that speaking in tongues is one gift among several (1 Corinthians 12) rather than the uniform initial evidence. Apostolics answer that the book of Acts — the one record of how the Church actually received people — shows a single, repeated pattern, and that Peter, who held the keys (Matthew 16:19), both preached it and twice testified to it. Weigh the texts for yourself: “prove all things; hold fast that which is good” (1 Thessalonians 5:21).