Receiving the Spirit

My friend Pete came back from the school summer holidays and told me he’d been filled with the Holy Spirit. I was envious! I wanted to be filled with the Spirit. So, from that September for four months, I asked the Lord to fill me with His Spirit. Then one afternoon in early January 1976, I found myself in a very unexpected situation with some rather odd people who offered to pray for me to be filled with the Spirit. I said yes. They prayed. And at the end of it all, I had begun to speak in tongues. It was all very quiet and a bit odd, but it did happen, and it proved to be genuine. Fifty years later, I can see that event initiated what has subsequently proved to be a seismic change in my life.

When the apostles encountered the risen Jesus behind locked doors on the first Easter evening, he breathed on them and said, "Receive the Spirit."

A few weeks later, when the 120 believers were gathered together at Pentecost, "the sound like the blowing of a violent wind came from heaven and filled the whole house. All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other tongues as the Spirit enabled them". A crowd of utterly amazed and perplexed onlookers gathered – "we hear them declaring the wonders of God in our own tongues". Others said, "They have had too much wine" - Acts 2 (NIV).

Peter then began one of the greatest sermons in church history with the words, "These people are not drunk" (Acts 2).

Sometimes the Spirit comes very quietly, like breath. Other times, He comes forcefully. On the first occasion, the Spirit chose to highlight the wounds of Jesus’ crucifixion; on the second occasion, the believers were left reeling like drunks.

How do we receive the infilling of the Spirit?

1) By faith. We receive the Spirit because we believe the promises of God. We ask. And we believe that God has put the answer in the heavenly post.

2) Get others to pray for you: It was when the elders laid their hands on Timothy that the Spirit of God gave him spiritual gifts. "Do not neglect your gift which was given you through prophecy when the body of elders laid their hands on you" – 1 Timothy 4:14 (NIV).

In the months after the Spirit gently gave me the gift of speaking in tongues powerful changes began to take place; my prayer life revolutionized – I found I was praying for nearly two hours a day; all hell broke out in my life – I faced severe spiritual opposition; and third slowly, very slowly a deep, deep love of scripture developed in me.