In Matthew 3:11-12 John points out that the one who comes after him will baptize in two ways:
"I indeed baptize you with water unto repentance: but he that comes after me is mightier than I, whose shoes I am not worthy to bear: he shall baptize you with the Holy Spirit and with fire. He will gather his wheat into the garner, but the chaff he will burn up with unquenchable fire.”
The wheat in Matthew's context is the believer, the ones who embrace Him, and the chaff is the unbeliever, the ones who reject Him. So those who will be baptized by the Holy Spirit are identified as the wheat, which are the believers. The wheat will be gathered into the garner, the barn, which in Matthew, in John the Baptist’s context is the Messianic kingdom.
But those baptized with fire are the chaff, which are the unbelievers. The chaff will be burned up with unquenchable fire. Notice the unquenchable fire, this is the Lake of Fire (Rev. 20:11-15).
So, John the Baptist will baptize by water to repentance. But the Messiah will baptize by the Holy Spirit and with fire on two groups of people, believers and unbelievers. Notice no middle group, either one or the other, there is no middle ground, there is no purgatory or any other such place, everyone will be baptized by one or the other.
This is why Paul writes in I Corinthians 12:13 that by one spirit we are all baptized into one body. Every believer is baptized in the Spirit into the body of Christ, the "Ekklesia", the church. Those who reject the message are destined to have the other baptism, the baptism of unquenchable fire. In this immediate context, the fire is a judgment and not a blessing. Hence, the fire here is not the tongues, parting asunder, like as of fire of Acts 2:1-4, but the Lake of Fire (Rev. 20:11-15).
Arnold G. Fruchtenbaum, Ariel’s: Yeshua The Life of Messiah from a Messianic Jewish Perspective Abridged version (San Antonio, TX: Ariel Ministries, 2018) pp. 85-86.
