Table of Contents
Top 20 Reasons why all Believers can and must Speak in Tongues When they are "Baptised with the Spirit"
By Abraham Israel
1) Tongues are a Sign and a Supernatural Confirmation from God that we are "Baptized with the Holy Spirit and Fire."
John the Baptist said to people who wanted to get baptized with water, "I indeed baptize [i.e. immerse, soak, overwhelm, bathe and dipped repeatedly until you are full of it] you with water unto repentance, but He who is coming after me is mightier than I, whose sandals I am not worthy to carry. He will baptize [i.e. immerse] you with the Holy Spirit and fire." (Matt 3:11) and thus pointed to Jesus as the supernatural Baptizer with the Holy Spirit. This shows to us that the very Gospels start with the message of the "Baptism with the Holy Spirit". All the Gospels that the Apostles wrote carry the same message without fail (Matt 3:11; Mark 1:8; Luke 3:16; John 1:33). This clearly points out to us of how important God considers this experience of being "Baptized with the Holy Spirit" is to a believer. We can even say that the reason Jesus came to this earth as told by the John the Baptist who is the last and the greatest of all Old Testament prophets, is to "Baptize [His People ultimately] with the Holy Spirit" (Matt 3:11; 11:11-13). Moses in the Old Testament longed for all of God's people to get filled with the Spirit of God and Jesus fullfilled it in the New Testament (Num 11:29; Acts 1:4-5, 8). When this same promise of Jesus was fullfilled on the day of Pentecost, Luke the writer says, "2 And suddenly there came a sound from heaven, as of a rushing mighty wind, and it filled the whole house where they were sitting. 3 Then there appeared to them divided tongues, as of fire, and one sat upon each of them. 4 And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak with other tongues, as the Spirit gave them utterance" (Acts 2:2-4). This above verses shows that the moment the 120 disciples got filled with the Spirit immediately they showed a outward evidence of speaking in tongues as the Spirit gave them utterance. It says they by their own choice began to speak in tongues as the Spirit gave them utterance. The Holy Spirit can only give the utternace in our innermost beings. It is we who choose to cooperate with him and speak it through our mouth. In other words, the Holy Spirit will only give the believers a prompting or an urge to speak, but will not force anybody to speak in tonges or will not superimpose His will on someone to make them speak in tongues without their consent or willingness (1 Cor 14:32). The Holy Spirit is a gentle person like a dove who will do something, only as much as we give Him permission to work through us (Luke 3:22). So if we in our mind are not sure about the will of God to speak in tongues, we will not have faith enough to utter the tongues that the Holy Spirit gives through our mouth. As in the first day of tongue manifestation, still the same way Jesus baptizes people with the Holy Spirit. Just the way He started 2000 years ago so will He be forever, as Jesus has not changed ever since and will not change in the future too (Heb 13:8). When Apostle Peter saw people of different nations and ethinicity gather together to see what this big sound of tongues are, He began to explain that this was what was spoken by the prophet Joel (Acts 2:5-21). We are sure from Acts 2:16 that tongues was preplanned and foretold by God even from the Old Testament times to make this New Covenant to be a supernatural covenant of signs and wonders.
2) Do not just be blessed with fountain measure of Holy Spirit's power for yourself, but become a conduit for the river measure of Holy Spirit's power to flow through you and bless the ends of the earth.
When we get born again, we receive a fountain measure of Holy Spirit's supernatural spiritual power of God, like water from a fountain which will spring up in to everlasting life (John 4:14). But when we receive "the Baptism with the Holy Spirit", from that time a river's measure of Holy Spirit's supernatural spiritual power, symbolically like a flowing rivers of water start's to flow out of us to make us a powerful witness of Jesus to out city, state, nation and even to the outer ends of the earth (John 7:38-39; Acts 1:8). When we receive the river measure power of the Holy Spirit, we cannot stay quiet anymore and we will begin to be a witness to others in the power of the Holy Spirit (Acts 1:8). God might have been thinking of you when He really spoke the promise "2 I will make you a great nation; I will bless you and make your name great; And you shall be a blessing. 3 I will bless those who bless you, and I will curse him who curses you; And in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.” (Gen 12:2-3) to Abraham in the beginning. Why? Because Apostle Paul clearly said Christ has redeemed us from the curse of the law "that the blessing of Abraham might come upon the Gentiles in Christ Jesus, that we might receive the promise of the Spirit through faith." (Gal 3:14). This Blessing of the Spirit was uniquely given to Abraham even at that time of nearly 2000 B.C itself, which made Abraham to walk in such terrific faith and enjoy God till his death at his old age. This blessing of receiving "promise of the Spirit through faith" made Abraham to inherit all the promises of God. Jesus as the son of Abraham [i.e. his Seed (Gal 3:16)] has now made the same priviledge of Abraham to be available through Himself to us. By faith we have now not only become the sons of Abraham when we believed the Gospel of Jesus Christ, but now we are "blessed with believing Abraham" (Gal 3:7-8). The same way God blessed Abraham through giving him "the promise of the Spirit", now we are eligible to receive the same "promise of the Spirit" through asking Jesus Christ to baptize us. Like Abraham was made a blessing to all the families of the earth, Jesus by baptising us with the Holy Spirit is able to make us a blessing to all the families of the earth. Are you ready? You are asking me for what, to be baptized with the Holy Spirit. Like Abraham receive the Spirit by faith and become a blessing to the whole earth! When you receive the "promise of the Spirit by faith", automatically the external evidence of the internal filling of the Spirit which is speaking in tongues and the succeeding reception of power to be a witness will come upon you (Acts 2:4).
3) All the Apostles who wrote the Bible by inspiration spoke in tongues.
Almost all of the Apostles who were with Jesus spoke in tongues "Peter, James, John, and Andrew; Philip and Thomas; Bartholomew and Matthew; James the son of Alphaeus and Simon the Zealot; and Judas the son of James [along]... with the women and Mary the mother of Jesus, and with His brothers" (Acts 1:13-14) were all baptized with the Holy Spirit and spoke in tongues as the Spirit gave them utterance (Acts 1:13-14, 15; 2:1, 4). Apostle Paul who later joined the apostolic company and wrote one third of the whole New Testament also spoke in tongues (1 Cor 14:18). Do you think that God would have given all these Apostles the gift of Baptism with the Holy Spirit with the evidential manifestation of tongues, if it were optional or not that much important. Why should Jesus command these Apostles not to depart from Jerusalem or go straight away to witness for Jesus, but to wait for the "the promise of the Father" which He had been been telling them even before his death in those past years (Acts 1:4; John 7:38-39; Luke 11:13). This makes us realise the importance of all the believers to be baptized with the Spirit along with the external evidence of speaking in other tongues.
4) The Apostles were Born Again before Pentecost but received the the Holy Spirit Baptism only on Pentecost.
Many believers wrongly mix each other and fail to understand the difference between having the Holy Spirit as a gurantee seal in us while being born again, with the experience of receiving the fullness of the Holy Spirit in Holy Spirit Baptism. You see the Word of God clearly differentiates both the experience uniquely. Apostle Paul says in Eph 1:13-14, "13 In Him you also trusted, after you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation; in whom also, having believed, you were sealed with the Holy Spirit of promise, 14 who is the guarantee of our inheritance until the redemption of the purchased possession, to the praise of His glory." This preceding verses shows that when we trust God after hearing the word of truth in the good news of our salvation, we were sealed with the Holy Spirit who is the gurantee of our inheritance until the day of Rapture, in which God will raises us in that glorious eternal body which dies no more and makes us possible to live with God in joy forever after (1 Thess 4:14-18). Here we have not asked for the Holy Spirit, but we believed the Good News of salvation and automatically the Holy Spirit come in to us and stays with us forever as a gurantee of our salvation that leads us to freedom from sin, sickness and death progressively (Heb 13:5-6). The key word in being born again is "THE HOLY SPIRIT IN US", "The Holy Spirit comes in to us" and we become conscious of HIS PRESENCE within us in our spirit-man when we are born again (John 3:5-8; 1 John 3:24).
The Holy Spirit was with the Apostles to save and protect them from all the insidious plans of the enemy during the time of their apostolic training mission in which Jesus sent them to destroy the work of Satan and his cohorts (Jer 20:11; 30:11; Acts 18:10; Luke 10:17-20). The moment Jesus sent the apostles, first the twelve and then the seventy all two by two, to go and preach the kingdom of God and heal the sick (Luke 9:1-2, 6; 10:1-9), the very anointing that was upon JESUS came upon these apostles as a blanket by impartation for the mission. When the demons shuddered and subject themselves to their word of command they were amazed (Luke 10:17). But Jesus encouraged them not to be excited about this phenomenon, but to rejoice that their names were written in heaven as God's children, because this anointing was not authorised by God at that time to stay in them after the mission (v. 20). But Jesus promised them that he is giving to them authority over all demons in the future after his resurrection (Luke 10:19; 28:18-20). When these same apostles tried to cast out demons after their apostolic mission training was over, they did not succeed in driving out demons because the anointing was not inherent in them at that time which only Jesus understood (Matt 17:14-21; Luke 5:33-35). One reason the anointing was not able to stay in them was because they were not born again at that time. How do we know that all these apostles and disciples were not born again? Jesus blew upon them and imparted the Holy Spirit in them only after His resurrection (John 20:21-23). Once this happened the transferance of the Holy Spirit in to the believer's started to happen through the Good News of the Gospel which the apostles started to preach. All the sins of people were forgiven when the Apostles chose to preach the Gospel to those who received it willingly, and the sins of people were retained when the people who heard the Gospel rejected their Gospel message (Acts 18:5-6). Jesus just days before His death on the cross had clearly expressed the status of the Holy Spirit with his disciples and apostles saying, "the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees Him nor knows Him; but you know Him, for He dwells with you and will be in you." (John 14:17). This preceding verse clearly shows that the Holy Spirit was with the apostles and protected them physically before the death of Jesus on the Cross, but as Jesus promised the Holy Spirit came in to them only after his death on the Cross when he blew upon them (John 20:21-23).
If all the apostles had received the fullness of the Holy Spirit at this time when Jesus blew the Holy Spirit upon them, why should Jesus again instruct all of them to wait again for "the promise of the Father" before his ascension (Acts 1:4-5, 8)? This shows that the Baptism in the Holy Spirit is a unique and a seperate experience apart from the born again experience of all believers. Jesus did not instruct the unbelievers to ask for the Holy Spirit before they could be saved hearing the Gospel of their salvation. This Holy Spirit Baptism is a gift of God which is only available for God's children and that is why it is called in an intimate familial way as "the promise of the Father". But Jesus instructed the believers to ask for the Holy Spirit by faith to become a witness for Him in the city, state, nation and to the ends of the earth (Luke 11:9-13). The Apostle Paul commanded all the believers to be filled with the Spirit without fail, this is fullness of the Spirit which gets started when we first get baptized with the Holy Spirit (Eph 5:18). The fullness of the Spirit is like a person receiving a licence from God to receive the Holy Spirit without measure (John 3:34). Once they are enlisted and given the rights to draw a immeasurable amount of the Spirit, they can get filled as many times as they want and as often as they want (Acts 4:8, 31). The apostles received the Holy Spirit Baptism only on the day of Pentecost with the evidence of speaking in tongues which the Holy Spirit gave (Acts 2:1-4). So we might be a believer in Christ Jesus, but if we have not yet received Spirit Baptism we must seek the Lord Jesus to fill us with his fullness like the Apostles.
5) Speaking in Tongues Brings refreshment to our Soul.
When the Apostle Paul was speaking about the sign tongues which God gives as a warning to unbelievers through a believer, he was referring to the Scripture from Isaiah 28:11-12 which actually says, "11 For with stammering lips and another tongue He will speak to this people, 12 To whom He said, “This is the rest with which you may cause the weary to rest,” And, “This is the refreshing”; Yet they would not hear." In this verse God clearly reveals that He will speak to the unbeliever through the stammering lips [i.e. Tongues] of His people. But the hidden truth in it is interesting. But God foretells that many will reject the message that will come as a sign to them to turn to the Lord and His ways. Paul quotes the same Scripture in 1 Cor 14:20-22 to indicate that God even during the Old Testament times was foretelling about the New Covenant Tongues, which acts as a sign to unbelievers but a message of rest and refresment to the believers from God. The Church or an individual can worship God in tongues. Worshiping God in Tongues will always brings refreshment and rest to the weary believers, we can continue in this highest form of worhip to God by faith if all the believers are informed about Tongues and are Spirit Baptised (1 Cor 14:23). But Apostle Paul's only concern was with those who have not yet received Spirit Baptism or are uninformed even though they are born again. When such people are present in the midst of all the people of God in a Spirit Baptized Church, the Church should not continue to worship in tongues as usual, because these people do not understand by faith the value of heavenly language. Immediately they will think that such a Spirit Baptized Church has gone fully out of mind and is fit for only mental hospital. So Paul says and insists that when such uniformed or unbeliever is present in the Church, either the sign tongues should operate supernaturally to touch unbelievers directly or tongues with interpretation should come out (1 Cor 14:9-13, 20-25).
The other best thing that Apostle Paul suggests is to speak in the know language of the hearers inside the Church even if one unbeliever or uninformed believers are present inside the Church (1 Cor 14:19). In the same way Apostle Paul exhorts to prophesy in the known language to the unbeliever or uninformed believers if they are not using Tongues inside the Church, so that the secrets of those peoples heart may be revealed and that they might fall on their face and surrender their lives to receive the Lord, and get the Holy Spirit Baptism for themselves and move in to deeper spiritual dimension of experiencing God in their very own lives (1 Cor 14:24-25). When we use supernatural sign tongues moved by the Spirit, it may be a direct message to the unbeliever in his know language or may come as tongues which will get interpreted a little while later through the gift of the interpretation of tongues in the known language of the hearer. God says that the same tongues which acts as a warning sign to the unbeliever, will bring rest and refreshment to the weary people of God, who by faith act as the God's mouth piece to bring the message of God through speaking in the supernatural earthly and heavenly language of tongues. The more we pray in tongues in our personal prayer to God, the more we will supernaturally experience rest and refreshment from heaven (1 Cor 14:2, 4). All our weariness will flee and a new strength of the Lord will descend upon us to resist the devil and walk in the perfect will of God (Neh 8:10). One of the powerful way to receive the supernatural ministry of being strengthened in the inner man with might by the Holy Spirit is to speak in the supernatural God given language of tongues which edifies the inner spirit-man (Eph 3:14-16; 1 Cor 14:4). Praise the Lord!
6) There are three different types of Tongues mentioned in the Bible.
They are a) Tongues of Men (1 Cor 13:1), b) Personal Tongues to God (1 Cor 14:2) and c) Tongues of Angels (1 Cor 13:1). All these different types of tongues on the outside may look the same, but it has different functions as it comes through us. Differnt types of emotions and authority may accompany each type of tongues as we speak the utterance which the Holy Spirit gives us (Acts 2:4).
a) Tongues of Men
Tongues of Men are the first type of tongues which the person who speaks may not understand, but people hearing us may understand it as a sign from God to turn them towards God to receive their salvation (1 Cor 14:22). For example, we see in Acts 1st Chapter when the 120 disciples of Jesus waited through prayer and expectation to receive "the Promise of the Father", on the appointed time of God on the day of Pentecost in the Acts Chapter 2, God filled all of them with the Holy Spirit in a spectacular way and as a external evidence of the Holy Spirit filling, they all began to speak in tongues as there appeared to them divided tongues, as of fire. As a result the One Spirit sitting upon each of them, they were all continuously filled with the Holy Spirit from that time onwards (Acts 2:3). This was a special occasion in which the Lord created a great spiritual fanfare by suddenly sending a sound from heaven, as of a rushing mighty wind. It filled the whole house and the sound was so loud that all the people who were around in Jerusalem came by curiosity to know what was happening inside this upper room (Acts 2:5-6). God may use a spetacular demonstration to draw the attention of people any moment he decides. But that does not mean that He will do the same thing in the same way all the other times. Once the people of various nations and tongues came to see what was happening, then God used the apostles to speak the known language of the hearers. This is what is known as Tongues of Men. In other words, to speak in tongues which other men around us understand. As the Scripture says, "everyone heard them [i.e. 120 disciples of Jesus] speak in his own language." (Acts 2:6). These men who had come to celebrate the festival of Pentecost from around the world were all amazed and marveled to see that these Galilean disciples of Jesus speak in their own languages fluently. They heard them speak the wonderful works of God in their own native tongues. Many were amazed and perplexed what this could mean? Still other local people who did not understand what these disciples of Jesus were speaking, mocked the apostles and their company saying that they were full of new wine (Acts 2:7-13).
In the suceeding verses, Apostle Peter clearly began to preach and say to them that it is a sign that God has sent from heaven to them to get saved (Acts 2:14-21). Then he began to tell that the outpouring of the Holy Spirit that they were seeing and hearing was a sign that Jesus has already become the Lord and Messiah of the whole world (Acts 2:32-33). When they heard this, they were cut to heart and asked for a way to get saved. Then the Apostle Peter directed them to salvation by repentance and Water Baptism. Then they were directed to the same experience of receiving the gift of the Holy Spirit and then Apostle Peter promised everyone that all those who are saved are eligible to receive the same gift of the Holy Spirit (Acts 2:37-39). All these believers who received the gift of the Holy Spirit "42... continued steadfastly in the apostles’ doctrine and fellowship, in the breaking of bread, and in prayers. 43 Then fear came upon every soul, and many wonders and signs were done through the apostles." (Acts 2:42-43). This clearly shows that the gift of sign tongues that the Lord used through the apostles brought nearly a flock of three thousand souls at a time (Acts 2:41). Praise the Lord!
If we need such a harvest of huge flocks to come in to the Church, we need such sign tongues to operate again in all our Churches. These are weapons that the Lord will give to those who are thirsting to fulfill God's will for themselves and their Churches. This sign tongues and the succeeding filling of the Spirit, immediately made those people become obedient to apostolic doctrine and moved them all deeper in to fellowshipping by the breaking of the bread. Then we also see that a spirit of prayer coming upon all of them, as a result of it a Holy Fear came upon all the souls and made the apostles to freely move in signs and wonders. This is the reason Apostle Paul exhorted the Church to move in prophetic sign tongues or prophecy when a unbeliever or an uninformed person comes in to the open to all Public Church Service, so that when the secrets of their hearts may be revealed, they might fall down on their faces and will worship God through receiving Him as Lord and Saviour. Then he said that these uninformed person or unbeliever will become a carrier of the report that God is among us to may people in their own circles (1 Cor 14:22-25).
When a person get baptized in the Spirit, God might give a sign tongue as a external manifestation of the internal filling of the Spirit like it happened on the day of Pentecost. This does not mean all the times God fills any person, a sign tongue must be there in manifestation. It is God who chooses to release a sign tongue at a particular time, so we cannot demand it or make it as a standard formula to authenticate that the Baptism in the Spirit is genuine or not. We will see in the succeeding two types, how God chooses to release other types of tongues as a external evidence of the internal baptism in the Spirit.
b) Personal Tongues to God
In this second type of tongues, neither the one who speaks nor the one who hears will understand the tongue language spoken. Certain people asked me, if nobody understand the tongue why should somebody speak such thing. Does it not look gibberish? To God the Spirit who originates the utterance in our spirit and makes us to freely choose to speak it out through our mouth as a prayer to God knows very well what the contents of the words are (Acts 2:4). Some times when we check out the ASCII [i.e. American Standard Code for Information Interchange] code of the computer we use, we will get confused by the numbers like 1011100 111111 we see. But internally the computer understands each code of 1 as on and 0 as off and thus a group of numbers like 1010001 to be of a particular alphabet or sign and it will process it inside this way. In the same way, during the starting time of the 20th century when the whole telecom technology was at its infant developmental stage, they first used the telegraph to send messages thousands of miles away. Even until recent development of internet and satellite technology and its easy availability in the 21st century, telegragphs were widely used. In it when the person on one end of the telegraph machine hits a particular key it will produce a sound very unintelligible to our ears. But because of practice, these men who used to send messages would hit various keys continiously to produce TAK TAK TAKA TAKA sounds. The person at the other reception end thousands of miles away will receive the sound in that frequency with the same sound produced at his end. But the beauty of it is, the man who receives the sound will substitude an alphabet for each sound and will bring a beautiful message out of it. If a human mind could interpret such sounds and decrypt a message out of it, how much more God who created us all with such brains could understand and decrypt the unintelligible sound that comes through our mouth as a prayer to him. If a computer could process all the numbers which look so unintelligible to us and make very accurate calculations and supply answers to us, how much more the God who hears the unintelligible or gibberish crypted language from the Holy Spirit would answer us accurately according to our need.
Apostle Paul has clearly said in 1 Cor 14:2, "For he who speaks in a tongue does not speak to men but to God, for no one understands him; however, in the spirit he speaks mysteries." Those who pray in such Personal Tongues, pray to God and not to men, no one understands him [i.e. that includes himself]. Such prayers are encrypted in the spiritual realm so that no devil or his demonic minions will ever be able to understand it. They will be terrorised by such prayers that are sent to God in a encrypted way. But in the spirit-man he speaks mysteries to God intimately. All the needs that he has in the recess of his heart, the future that God has pre-planned for him and the needs of other people around him may be prayed in a mysterious encrypted way to God through these types of Personal Tongues to God. Such prayers are purely done by faith in the Spirit who generates such prayer in our spirit and God the Father who receives the petition in heaven and decrypts the prayer to answer it. Because praying in the Holy Spirit by faith builds our spirit and edifies our mind to accommodate more of God in us, these prayers are a supernatural faith-building prayers (Jude 20). The more the Lord lives in us by our increased faith, the more we will supernaturally live and exhibit the signs, wonders and miracles of God naturally and easily in the natural realm of time and space. Tongues does not originate in our soul-mind, but deep within our spirit-man which is interpenetratively connected to the Spirit of God when we were born again (John 6:63; Rom 8:16; 1 John 3:24; 4:13).
For example when all the pagans in the House of Cornelius [i.e. the Roman centurion of the Italian Regiment] heard the Gospel of Christ through the Apostle Peter, they were instantly born again and were successively filled with the Spirit. As they were baptized in the Spirit with external evidence of speaking in tongues, those Jewish elders who came with Peter the Apostle to do ministry were utterly astonished, because until then they thought that only the Jews were entitled as the children of God to receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. This time the sign tongues did not manifest through these people who showed the external evidence of the internal filling of the Holy Spirit, but this time it was the personal tongues to God that accompanied the Baptism in the Holy Spirit. How can we say that? Because Acts 10:46 says, "For they [i.e. Peter and all the Jewish ministering elders] heard them [i.e. newly Spirit Baptized converts] speak with tongues and magnify God." Here the tongues they spoke nobody understood because they magnified God by speaking to Him (1 Cor 14:2, 16-17). But the elders knew that all of them were speaking in tongues by hearing them utter unintelligible words through their mouth. By this time all of them were convinced that when God gives utterance to people, it can be in various types it can operate. So without doubt they knew that this utterance in tongues was directed towards God and that they do not need to understand it. Another thing that we can learn from this is, if Peter and the apostolic company who accompanied him knew themselves that the Gentiles have received the gift of the Holy Spirit only by hearing the people speak in tongues, how can some of the people of God in our 21st century end time Church say that they can be baptized in the Spirit without the external evidence of Tongues? Are we greater than the 1st century apostles and their company through which God released this New Covenant phenomenon of the receiving the gift of the Holy Spirit with the external evidence of speaking in tongues? Has God in some other area of the Gospels or the Epistles promised to fill the believers without the external evidence of Tongues? If our answer to all of the above question is a big NO, then why do we still dispute that when a person is born again he has already got the filling of the Holy Spirit. When we are living in the lack of understanding the word of God rightly, or may be still holding to the traditions of our fathers and valuing it more than the truth we see in the Bible, we will not be able to receive the gift of the Holy Spirit, the very reason for which Jesus came to the earth (Hosea 4:6; Matt 3:11; Luke 3:16).
c) Tongues of Angels
This is the third type of tongue that may operate through us as the Holy Spirit gives utterance to us (Acts 2:4). In this type the one who speaks the utterance of God in tongues will not understand the language that comes out of their mouth. But the demonic angels and even God's angels will understand when we speak the utternace that comes out of our mouth. It is in this type we speak "the tongues... of angels" (1 Cor 13:1) authoritatively to the angelic spirit beings. Many times extreme authority of God manifests along with the words that come out of our mouth. Mostly we may not be seeing any angels with our physical eyes when we speak this type of angelic language, but mostly God will internally with in us will open our spiritual eyes to see what is happening in the spirit realm as a result of what we are speaking. Some times after we speak such angelic tongues authoritatively, we may feel the whole atmosphere being cleared of demonic occupation. Praise the Lord!
Some times we may not even realise that we are speaking in angelic language if the authority of God does not accompany it, but every thing that God releases through us will always accomplish its purpose before it return to God (Isaiah 55:11). Sometimes God may even choose to give such type of tongues as a external evidence to the internal Baptism in the Spirit that takes place. Usually it is God who chooses which type of Tongue we should speak at a particular moment. But that does not mean that we cannot start or stop to speak in tongues at our own will after we are baptized in the Spirit.
In other words once we are Baptized in the Spirit and are filled with Him, we can choose to speak anytime or any place in tongues. It is like God has already given you a master key to open or close up the cathedral inside your spirit-man in which the Holy Spirit is always ready to pray faithfully with you and also wants to speak through you to God the Father in Heaven (Rom 8:26). Unless we let the prayer which the Holy Spirit is praying for us to flow through our mouth in agreement on earth, it cannot be made effective to come to pass in the spiritual realm (Matt 18:19). When we pray in tongues we pray in agreement with the Holy Spirit and the Father God will 100% of time will hear our prayers, will then anwers it 100% without fail. This is the reason a mighty man of God like Apostle Paul said to the tongue speaking fanatical Corinthian Church, "I thank my God I speak with tongues more than you all" (1 Cor 14:18). Apostle Paul who wrote the one third of the New Testament by revelation knew how important it is for him to edify himself in God through tongues before he can effectively edify other in the Church (1 Cor 14:19).
Paul in Ephesians reveals the purpose of the mysterious grace of tongues which God had given to him powerfully by saying, " 8 To me, who am less than the least of all the saints, this grace was given, that I should preach among the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ, 9 and to make all see what is the fellowship of the mystery, which from the beginning of the ages has been hidden in God who created all things through Jesus Christ; 10 to the intent that now the manifold wisdom of God might be made known by the church to the principalities and powers in the heavenly places." (Eph 3:8-10). This preceding verses reveals that Grace of God was given to Paul and to the Church of God to 1) Preach among the Gentiles [i.e. a person whis in not Jewish, people of all nations, pagan or a heathen] the unsearchable riches of Christ after being edified greatly in tongues (1 Cor 14:18-19), 2) to make all [i.e. men] see the fellowship of the mystery through tongues (1 Cor 14:2) and 3) finally all this is done to the ultimate intent that now the manifold wisdom of God might be made known by the Church [through speaking in angelic tongues] to the principalities and powers in the heavenly places. Praise the Lord!
This shows that God has a higher purpose to proclaim His GLORY to all the angels in the heavenly realm though the tongues of angels which he chooses to release through the human vessels like us inside the Church. We need to get renewed in our mind with the purpose of God regarding tongues rather than hold on to some useless tradition which hinders God from moving powerfully through us because of fear operating in us through a subtle religious unbelief. When we are operating in this higher spiritual realm, all we need to do is to remember the following word of God which Jesus spoke to us and answer in faith to throw away our own unbelief. Remember Jesus is saying to you now, " 9 “So I say to you, ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. 10 For everyone who asks receives, and he who seeks finds, and to him who knocks it will be opened. 11 If a son asks for bread from any father among you, will he give him a stone? Or if he asks for a fish, will he give him a serpent instead of a fish? 12 Or if he asks for an egg, will he offer him a scorpion? 13 If you then, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask Him!”" (Luke 11:9-13). When you are operating by faith the gift of the Holy Spirit and as a result speak in tongues without understanding what you yourself are speaking, God will not give you a demonic utterance through you by forgetting just for a moment that you are His child. Instead, according to the previous verse in Eph 3:8-10, God will use you to speak authoritatively to demonic hordes and will make it flee by the anointed commands of tongues in angelic language that comes out of your mouth by faith. If we have fear, we cannot operate the gift by Faith. Choose Faith and reject fear to be a effective army general of the end time Lord's Army.
7) The Spirit Baptism is for all believers
Many good and great teachers of the word of God in the Body of Christ whom I respect greatly for their sacrificial life and deep knowledge in the Word have been proclaimers of the doctrine that the Baptism of the Holy Spirit has either ceased in the first century or it is only for some people in the Body of Christ. This is due to lack of the fullness of the anointing which reveals experientially the word of God regarding the Baptism in the Spirit, this lack in understanding have also happened to these people of God due to ignorance, spiritual pride or lack of knowledge in their spirit-man due to sincerely holding on to the traditions of their forefathers and elders. I have seen a whole denomination that has been so zealous for the Lord and his word being denied this Spirit Baptism experience just because the founder of this great revival move of God said that when he asked for tongues, God said to him that he will give him a special love for people instead of this genuine Baptism of the Holy Spirit. One thing I have learned from this is, a man of God cannot take his followers beyond his very own spiritual experience with God. One exception to this is with the enlightened believers like the Berean Christians who were commended by the Holy Spirit for searching the Scripture to find whether their founder Apostle said something from the word or from his own experience (Acts 17:10-11). These radical bunch of believers will be like a ball of fire used in the hands of the Lord. They will never be satisfied until they get confirmation from the Word that the man of God whom they heard said something from the Scripture and not just from his own experience.
Not even one Scripture faintly suggests that the experience of the Holy Spirit Baptism has ceased in the first century itself with the apostles. Instead the writer to the Book of Hebrews boldly proclaims, "Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever." (Heb 13:8). In other words, Jesus who baptized the first century believers and apostles with the Holy Spirit and Fire is as much eager and ready to baptise the 21st century believers in the same way. Not even one apostle who wrote the New Testament said otherwise.
The other reason of saying that the Baptism of the Holy Spirit is only for some believers is based on taking the Scripture in 1 Cor 12:28-31 that says, " 28 And God has appointed these in the church: first apostles, second prophets, third teachers, after that miracles, then gifts of healings, helps, administrations, varieties of tongues. 29 Are all apostles? Are all prophets? Are all teachers? Are all workers of miracles? 30 Do all have gifts of healings? Do all speak with tongues? Do all interpret? 31 But earnestly desire the best gifts. And yet I show you a more excellent way." out of context and say because Apostle Paul asked "Do all speak with tongues?", it means all believers do not speak with tongues. This is a lack of understanding and falsely interpreting this Scripture out of context by pulling just part of the word rather than taking the whole Scripture in the context in which Apostle Paul has expressed the truth. This is a poor exegetics in theology. Even devil pulls just a Scripture to quote to Jesus, but Jesus found it to be false based on the powerful interpretation of contextual interpretation of the Holy Spirit and refuted Satan with the word of God again to defeat him (Matt 4:5-7). LOL! The truth is Apostle Paul did not speak about the evidence of tongues that accompanies the Holy Spirit Baptism but he was speaking about speaking in tongues within the Church 1) We know that Apostle Paul was speaking about tongues spoken within the Church specifically, which is a specific gift which God gives to a particular believer at a particular time because in the same 1 Corinthians Chapter 12 he mentions different kinds of tongues and interpretation of tongues for the profit of all the believers within the Church (1 Cor 12:10, 7). 2) When apostle Paul asks the various questions to the believers in 1 Cor 12:28-30, he appeals to the ascension gift of Jesus from Eph 4:11 which is given to only some, some, some....people within the Church and not to all. These some people are gifted to the Church for the equipping of the whole Body of Christ and bring it to maturity in doctrine, faith, unity and keep the Body of Christ from deceitful and desctructive doctrine of demons and lies (Eph 4:12-15). This shows that Paul was not speaking about the tongues that accompany the Baptism in the Holy Spirit which is given to all believers. In Acts Chapter 2 God gave it to all the 120 disciples, then in the same Chapter Apostle Peter promised all the new converts that the gift of the Holy Spirit is for them all and their relatives who are far off as many as of them who will be saved (Acts 2:38-39), then at that time when Evangelist Philip led many to Christ the Apostles laid hands on the new believers and got all of them filled with the Spirit (Acts 8:14-17), then in Cornelius house all the people who were present were filled corporately by the Holy Spirit (Acts 10:44-48) and finally in the Church of Ephesus when Apostle Paul laid hands on the believers to impart the gift of the Holy Spirit, all the believers without fail received the Holy Spirit Baptism (Acts 19:1-7). If God had filled all the believers in the first century without fail at all instances and not even at one place did the apostles say to any believer that it is only for some believers, it shows that we in the 20th and 21st century have wrongly understood it due to peoples opinion. Let us uphold the truth that the Holy Spirit Baptism is for all believers. 3) To all the questions that Paul asked, the answer he expected from the reader was a BIG NO (1 Cor 12:29-30). He said this not to inform all believers about a truth, but to make them understand the divine gifts of the Holy Spirit which He had freely given to as many people who desired to operate within the Church by faith (1 Cor 14:1). Because God used many people with the gift of tongues and interpretation, some people got jealous about those who were used by God in this way and began to loudly speak in their personal prayer tongues to God within the Church, without knowing that those people who spoke under the unction of the Holy Spirit within the Church is a gift specific to be used only within the Church for the profit of all. These people who spoke loudly in their personal prayer tongues and stopped were not able to interpret what they have spoken to the Church or no other person was moved by the Spirit to give out its interpretation (1 Cor 14:5, 12-13, 18-19). This was a big problem within the Church, so Paul taught in Chapter 12 of 1 Corinthians about the difference between the personal prayer language and specific gift of tongues that the Holy Spirit gives at a certain place, at a certain time for a some specific person. All believers can be used by the Holy Spirit as He wills with any of the twelve gifts of the Spirit (1 Cor 12:7-11). When Apostle Paul asked, "Do all speak with tongues?" he did not stop over there but continued saying, "Do all interpret?", thus implying that he spoke about the gift of tongues and interpretation that the Holy Spirit gave to people within the Church to edify the Body of Christ, and it was not about personal prayer language that is given to all believers by Jesus as a gift to be a mighty witness to all the world (1 Cor 12:7-11; 14:5, 12-13, 18-19; Acts 1:4-5, 8).
8) There are mainly three different ways in which God usually releases the Gift of the Holy Spirit or the Baptism in the Holy Spirit to all believers within the Church.
These can categorized as a) Personal Holy Spirit Baptism (Acts 2:1-4), b) Impartational Holy Spirit Baptism (Acts 19:1-7) and c) Corporate Provedential Baptism (Acts 10:44-48; 11:15-18).
In the following explanation of the three different ways of receiving the Gift of the Holy Spirit [Note: not the Gifts of the Holy Spirit which are the gifts given to be used within the Church for the profit of all (1 Cor 12:7-11)], I will point to the Scripture and then share personal experience of myself and others who have received Holy Spirit Baptism in three different ways in the last few years.
a) Personal Holy Spirit Baptism
This first method of filling is mostly used by God when there is a total lack of revelation of the Holy Spirit Baptism and a specific believer or believers in a group stand on the Word of God continuously to receive it supernaturally without any human intervention.
We see the apostles who were instructed by Jesus to wait for the day of Pentecost to receive "the promise of the Father" (Acts 1:4) which is the Baptism with the Holy Spirit (Acts 1:5). Jesus clearly told them to wait until the day of Pentecost, so that on that exact day of Pentecost they shall receive the power when the Holy Spirit has come upon them and as a result of it they shall be a witness for Jesus in their city, state, nation, nations and even to the end of the earth (Acts 1:8). They believed this promise of Jesus with their whole heart after His ascension to the right hand of the Father in Heaven and then waited in prayer with great expectation in the upper room where Jesus had HIS LAST SUPPER with the apostles (Acts 1:9-11, 12-14; Luke 22:12, 14-23).
Because they were believing in the promised word of Jesus, when the appointed time of God came they were all filled in a personal way without any human messenger or intervention by any apostle to release the impartation upon them. The Chief Apostle Jesus Himself baptized them with the Holy Spirit as He had previously promised them (Heb 3:1; Matt 3:11; Acts 1:5).
Here is what the Scripture says about what exactly happened on the day of Pentecost, "1 When the Day of Pentecost had fully come, they were all with one accord in one place. 2 And suddenly there came a sound from heaven, as of a rushing mighty wind, and it filled the whole house where they were sitting. 3 Then there appeared to them divided tongues, as of fire, and one sat upon each of them. 4 And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak with other tongues, as the Spirit gave them utterance." (Acts 2:1-4). As they were with expectation to receive the Holy Spirit Baptism, they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and as a NT evidence of the internal filling they externally began to speak with tongues, as the Spirit gave them utterance. As the fire of the Holy Spirit appeared to them in divided tongues, one Spirit sat upon each of them. As the Spirit of God sat upon each of them they continued to speak in tongues as of fire (James 3:6). The first thing that the Holy Spirit takes over when He comes upon us is our tongue which can either bring heaven on earth or hell on earth in manifestation. No man can tame the tongue even though it is the smallest member in our body, but the Holy Spirit will take over more and more to make the same tongue a blessing to nations around the world (James 3:8-10; Prov 18:21).
The following is my testimony of how I got the Gift of the Holy Spirit through the way of Personal Holy Spirit Baptism,
I used to see Benny Hinn’s, ‘This is your day’ program each day in the morning when I was in my home town. One day an aged man of God was invited for the show. He had a special anointing over his life, especially in the area of giving of the Holy Spirit with the laying of hands. When he prayed for people many received the ‘baptism of the Holy Spirit’ with the evidence of speaking with new tongues.
He was speaking in details about this tongue speaking. He discussed in the talk show that our mind should not be used and should be kept blank while trying to speak in tongues. And this tongues comes from your spirit as the Spirit of God gives you the utterance.
He also told about a woman believer who tried to receive new tongues for years and she prayed and prayed and nothing happened. One fine day this man of God was invited to their church one day. And he told her the same thing that she should not use her mind but let prayer come from her spirit. Even if she will get just one word she should by faith open her mouth and should speak it and it will come. Finally she received it. This encouraged me very much.
That night as usual as I went to the open-terrace to pray. Then as I began to pray, I prayed ‘Lord I would like to pray in tongues’. Then after I finished praying like that, I felt some sort of utterance coming from my spirit up to my throat. So I opened my mouth and by faith I prayed out the utterance but kept my mind blank.
At first it was a sort of one word and repeated phrases in tongues came out. Then I grew bold and began to speak it loudly. Then tongues came flowing out of my spirit. Also I felt refreshed and edified in my mind every time I prayed in tongues, so it became a habit.
Now these days I realize, how privileged I am to speak in tongues as I willed. It is truly a supernatural heavenly language. I thank God that I speak in tongues more and more. Praise be to God!
b) Impartational Holy Spirit Baptism
This way of imparting the Gift of the Spirit was the most used in the 1st century by all apostles and believers. In this way, the apostles or believers will lay hands by faith on the person who wants to receive the Gift of the Holy Spirit. If the person who wants to receive the Gif of the Holy Spirit is thirsting for the infilling of the Holy Spirit like in the first century, they will all receive the gift of the Holy Spirit without fail immediately.
You see, why some people do not receive the Holy Spirit when a apostle or believer today lays his hands on them the first time is, 1) Because they might not be thirsty and desperate enough for a immediate release of the Gift of the Holy Spirit upon their lives (Isaiah 44:3). Jesus is longing to give to people the Gift of the Holy Spirit and he has promised to give to all without fail (John 7:37-39; 14:15-18). It is up to us to move in faith and receive it like Abraham did in the Old Testament time itself (Gal 3:14). 2) When a person is already filled with a lot of religious unbelief due to tradition passed from their forefathers, this will act as a stone before the tomb of Lazarus. What did Jesus say to the people? "Take away the stone". Infact, if the stone had not be removed in obedience to the command of Jesus, perhaps Lazarus would have never been raised from the dead (John 11:38). But thank God they did and Lazarus received the life of God within, in the same way as we begin to obey Jesus and break the stones of unbelief and humble ourselves before God (Acts 5:32; James 4:6; 1 Peter 5:5-6), Jesus will immediately release the Gift of the Holy Spirit to come upon us. What does the word of God say regarding this, " 6 But let him ask in faith, with no doubting, for he who doubts is like a wave of the sea driven and tossed by the wind. 7 For let not that man suppose that he will receive anything from the Lord; 8 he is a double-minded man, unstable in all his ways." (James 1:6-8). 3) Our eyes must be fixed on Jesus and not on the person whom God uses to impart the Gift of the Holy Spirit to us (Heb 12:2). Jesus is the Baptizer with the Spirit, so we must look unto Jesus by faith and should be asking Him, even as the apostle or believer moves by faith to impart the gift of the Holy Spirit upon us by their faith (Matt 3:11; Luke 3:16; 11:9-13; Acts 1:4-5, 8).
God chooses which way to release the Gift of the Holy Spirit upon our lives. If we are asking the Lord for personal Holy Spirit Baptism, when God has already given a brother who is filled with the Spirit and is used to impart the Spirit by faith, then we are denying ourselves the oppurtunity to get filled with the Spirit because of our spiritual pride. There are no second grade fillings in the kingdom of God. Whether God uses a great man of God or a young fellow to impart the gift of the Holy Spirit, it is all equally precious because it is not the instrument through which it has come that matters, but it is from whom it has come spiritually. True Spirit Baptism always comes from Jesus who is the Baptizer of all believers. Even for a great man of God like Apostle Paul who ultimately rose to be one of the greatest apostles of all time with a earth shaking apostolic ministry, was humble enough to receive his Spirit Baptism from a unknown believer who came and prayed for the miraculous healing of his eyes and then imparted the Gift of the Holy Spirit along withit. We can never see this humble apostolic king maker Ananias again in the whole Bible, he chose to stay behind the scenes after this great event and be a usual obedient man to the voice of the Master (Acts 9:10-19). This Anointing worked so powerfully upon Paul that he immediately went out and preached Christ to many people (Acts 9:20). Then we see the Apostles Peter and John going in to the already harvested field of Philip the evangelist, just to impart the Gift of the Holy Spirit upon the new believer's and make them a mighty witness for the Lord in the neighboring nation of Samaria (Acts 8:14-17). These apostles laid hands on them and they all received the Holy Spirit (Acts 8:17). Then Apostle Paul on his third missionary journey [i.e. A.D 53-57 (Acts 18:23-21:16)] met some weak believers in the city of Ephesus and enquired whether they have received the Holy Spirit or not. They said to him that they have not even heard about the Holy Spirit and thus were outdated just with the baptism of John for repentance and not the latest "Baptism with the Spirit" which John's Baptism pointed to and that which Jesus gave. They have some how failed to update themselves with the present truth of the gospel of Jesus Christ. Then Paul understood that they were powerless believers due to lack of knowledge. First he baptized them in water for salvation and then laid his hands on them with faith to impart the Gift of the Holy Spirit. As a result the Bible says, "....the Holy Spirit came upon them, and they spoke with tongues and prophesied." (Acts 19:6). Praise the Lord! Nearly twelve of them were immediately baptized with the Holy Spirit with the external evidence of speaking with tongues and they all even prophesied immediately (Acts 19:7). Praise the Lord! The same things will happen to you too as you believe for a mighty filling of the Holy Spirit through this way called "Impartational Holy Spirit Baptism".
The following is a testimony of a dear Brother and friend in Christ who asked for the Baptism in the Holy Spirit and received it recently through this method in our ministry,
Dear friends,
I was born and brought up in a christian family. In 2000 I became a true born again Christian. Eventhough I was saved I did not know much about the Holy Spirit Baptism. In 2009 my friend pastor Abraham Israel told me about Holy Spirit Baptism and how it is important for a powerful Christian life. From that time onwards I was searching evidences for Holy Spirit Baptism in the Bible and Dake's Reference Bible. Then I received much revelations from the Book of Acts regarding the Holy Spirit Baptism. After that I prayed earnestly for Holy Spirit Baptism to become a reality in my life.
In 2010 January God gave me a Promise from Isaiah 44:2, "For I will pour water on thirsty land, and streams on the dry ground" regarding Holy Spirit Baptism. As I was reading so many testimonies about Holy Spirit Baptism, my hunger and thirst increased much to receive it. On 22 April 2011 Pastor Abraham Israel was praying for me to receive Holy Spirit Baptism by laying his hand on me.That time I had so many doubts about speaking in tongues. But Pastor and myself were continuously praying. That time God was removing all the barriers (i.e. unbelief, confusions, fears, shameful thoughts, wavering mind and doubts) from my heart to obtain Holy Spirit Baptism. Pastor was praying in tongues and he clarified all my doubts from the Scriptures regarding tongues. Then I was suddenly filled to the overflowing through the Holy Spirit Baptism and began to pray in tongues.
After that I felt much peace in my heart and my concentration level in Bible meditation increased much. God revealed so many things related to tongues from 1 Corinthians 12th, 13th, 14th Chapters. Then I told my friend Deep Kamal Bhora about my Holy Spirit Baptism. Next day he called me to pray for him over mobile phone for Holy Spirit baptism. Then I prayed for him and asked him to continuously pray for it.Following day he called me and told that he also has obtained the Holy Spirit Baptism. Immediately both of us started praying in tongues through cell phone.
This is my humble tesimony and may God Bless You through this.
Yours Lovingly,
Nicodemus Peter [E-mail : nicodemu2000@yahoo.com]
c) Corporate Provedential Baptism
This is the third and the final method of Holy Spirit Baptism, God may sometimes choose to use this method to fill us with His Holy Spirit. As we see in the heading, this third kind of Holy Spirit Baptism is 'corporate' which means 'united, joint in a group for one purpose' and also 'providential' which means 'the act of sovereign Spirit impartation which happens when God is pleased to move sovereignly upon a group of people and fill all the entire seeking thirsty congregation or a group of worshippers with His Spirit'. The receivers need not necessarily know all the details about the Spirit Baptism or the external evidence of speaking in tongues always. If they are spiritually hungry enough for God to fill them with Himself, it is enough for God to take over them and fill them with His Spirit. Also we may teach the word of God regarding the promise and the Gift of the Holy Spirit to the uninformed people [i.e. believers] and make them move in faith to receive the Gift of the Holy Spirit corporately (Luke 11:13; James 1:6-7).
We see in Acts 10th Chapter, Apostle Peter was sent to preach the Gospel to the Gentiles by God, he was so prejudiced in his mind that God has to show him a vision and make him understand that it is He who is sending him to preach the Gospel to the Gentiles (Acts 10:9-23). When Peter went with his Jewish apostolic company, they were very apprehensive to even preach the Gospel to the Gentiles (Acts 10:34-43). But God had a perfect plan in His mind, he not only wanted the Gentiles to hear the Gospel through Apostle Peter and be saved, but He wanted all of them to be blessed by the outpouring of His Spirit upon them and as a result of it be eligible to successively be filled to the full with His Spirit, along with the New Testament external evidence of speaking in tongues perpetually.
Here is what had happened, " 44 While Peter was still speaking these words, the Holy Spirit fell upon all those who heard the word. 45 And those of the circumcision who believed were astonished, as many as came with Peter, because the gift of the Holy Spirit had been poured out on the Gentiles also. 46 For they heard them speak with tongues and magnify God." (Acts 10:44-46). We see in the above Scriptures, that the Holy Spirit fell upon all those who heard the word. This implies that each person will become eligible to receive the Holy Spirit, only when he receives the Word of God and are saved by it supernaturally (1 Peter 1:23-25). Once a person is saved, he is ready for the Baptism in the Holy Spirit.
Here a group of seeking souls were present to hear the word of God, and there God poured out His Spirit and blessed them all with the Holy Spirit Baptism. This shows that God by His providence will fill many people sovereignly if we choose to obey His command and preach the word of God to all people (Mark 16:14-20). Some times we may not be able to understand like Apostle Peter and his Jewish apostolic company of how God can bestow the gift of the Holy Spirit freely upon people who have no previous spiritual knowledge, spiritual walk or good past spiritual reputation to receive this gift of the Holy Spirit with the evidence of speaking in tongue (Acts 11:15-17). But the bottom line is, the greatest giver of all good things is the Father who is in heaven. He freely gives his goodness to the deseving and undeserving people to show that he gives because it is in His nature to forgive and then give.... (James 1:17-18; Matt 5:45).
When these group of men in the house of Cornelius were born again and Spirit filled successively, Peter and all those Jewish apostolic ministers who came with him knew that they too have received the gift of the Holy Spirit like they received on the day of Pentecost by hearing them all speak in tongues (Acts 10:45-46; 11:14-17). How could we know now in our 21st century that some one has received the gift of the Holy Spirit? The plain answer should be, when we hear some one speak in tongues. If we think we can find it through any other means, we are indirectly saying to God that we are better than Peter and the apostolic company that visited the House of Cornelius, who humbly accepted that the Gentiles have received the gift of the Holy Spirit when they saw and heard them speak in tongues. Some of our spiritual leaders if they were present then, they would have immediately declared to all that it might be a demonic one and would have caused fear to come upon the new converts, as they themselves had not been filled with the Holy Spirit in this way. Shame upon such people who resist God's work and ways!!!
So some of us may be filled with the Spirit through this way of Corporate Provedential Baptism where God comes upon the whole group of people who are present in a particular place and fill them through providential visitation. Praise the Lord!
The following is my testimony of how I have experienced and saw firsthand this third kind of "Corporate Provedential Baptism" in one of our youth meeting recently,
As a whole Church we traveled some 400 plus kilometers and went to attend a marriage of a beloved senior deacon's elder daughter in our Church. It was a fantastic time we had during the time of her marriage. During the marriage, I felt that God wanted to have a meeting together of our youths in our Church the next day. So after the marriage and before the reception started, I told some of our youths that when we return tomorrow to our Church, we will be having a meeting. They agreed and then I also told them that I feel that God will move tomorrow.
Then the reception ended and we traveled through the night in the bus that was hired to take some 60 people from our Home Church. Through out the night time I was praying in the Spirit being burdened in my spirit, but all of our fellow travelers including the young guys slumbered during the journey becuse of the hectic travel they had in the morning. As we stopped in a place to refresh ourself with some tea and cofee, a brother saw me and said that I am so fresh even without sleeping, like a military man. In fact I knew within me why he said that, it is because of the refreshing look the prayer in the Spirit always brings (1 Cor 14:15; Isaiah 28:11-12). We all reached our home in the early morning time of around 4.30-5.00 am. Immediately I hit the bed and woke up around 9.30 am only. Immediately I got ready for the prayer that God has told me, but in my heart thoughts were coming whether the young people who were so tired and got weary by the hectic travel will ever come to the meeting or not.
So around 10.30 am I went to arrange the place and conduct the meeting, slowly some of them one by one arrived. We were around some 13 to 15 young people praying in a room in our Church. We started to worship the Lord and previously God had already given the gift of the Holy Spirit to some 5-6 young people through the way of "Impartational Holy Spirit Baptism". So it was a mixed crowd. Then I was led by the Lord to speak about the fire of God that came upon people in Acts 2nd Chapter, the word was coming out full of authority.
After this God led us all to pray intensely for it. In my heart I was thinking how could I make this tongues to be understood by the young people who have never heard it or even have a faint idea about it previously. Then as we were praying, suddenly I was led to pray in tongues which I normally don't do when some one in the congregation doesn't have a previous experience of receiving the gift of the Holy Spirit. Then as we were praying, the fire of God started to move upon these young people. So after that prayer I asked all of them, 'How many of you are Baptized in the Holy Spirit?', expecting that I need to lay hands on some people to impart the Holy Spirit through the "Impartational Baptism" method. To my relief and surprise, some four young guys whom I know have not received the gift of the Holy Spirit until then lifted their hands. Then I asked them do you speak in tongues, to confirm that they are genuinely Baptized in the Holy Spirit. Then they told me that when I started to pray in tongues, they too got filled by the Holy Spirit and started to speak in tongues individually. Praise the Lord!
Many times God may surprise us unexpectedly by moving providentially and supernaturally in a new way, apart from the standard way and thinking we have to bless people with His precious Holy Spirit's Baptism. Today these young people who were filled on that day are ministering in our home Church powerfully and used by God for HIS GLORY! GLORY BE TO GOD!!!!
9) Blessed are those who thirst for the Baptism with the Holy Spirit
Jesus beautifully said about a individual's personal spiritual hunger in the sermon on the mount, which we usually call as 'The Beatitudes [Supreme blessedness or happiness].' Hear what Jesus says, "Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be filled." (Matt 5:6). Here righteousness means thirsting for the very person of God the Holy Spirit more and more. How can we say like that? Because Jeremiah calls the Lord as "our Righteousness" (Jer 23:7; 33:16). God knows how much we thirst for getting filled with God more and more. According to this thirst He fills each individual with the Spirit of God. If we do not have any thirst, we must humble ourselves of our religious lifestyle before God and then must ask God to give us the thirst to get filled with the Holy Spirit of God more and more (1 Peter 5:5-6). Receiving the Gift of the Holy Spirit is a grace that we receive from God. We cannot and should not strive before God thinking that if we really fast and pray, pray with much striving and become holier than what we are in the present time, may be God will give. This is a false thinking of the religious kind that thinks God will be pleased with our works, but the real thing that God is pleased with will be our faith (Heb 11:6). There is not even one verse in the New Testament that faintly points to any person waiting for a long time before God gave them the gift of the Holy Spirit. The Apostles and the disciples waited for the day of Pentecost to full come because Jesus promised them that only on the day of Pentecost they will be given the Holy Spirit (Acts 1:4-5, 7-8). One of the reason they have to wait for the gift of the Holy Spirit was because the Father God had already appointed the day of Pentecost to be the inauguration day for the New Covenant "[Internal] Baptism with the Spirit and the [External] Fire of speaking in Tongues" and gave it to the Church of all time ahead (Acts 1:7-8; John 14:16; 7:37-39; Luke 24:49). The tarrying prayer they did in obedience to the command of Jesus shows how much they thirsted to receive the gift of the Holy Spirit (Acts 1:13-15). We do not see any apostle advising anyone for even one time in the New Testament to tarry in prayer in order to receive the gift of the Holy Spirit, this shows that we only need to align ourselves rightly in humility before God to receive the gift of the Holy Spirit and need not wait, cry, fast or strive to receive it. Praise the Lord!
Our religious thinking such as being fearful of receiving a counterfeit baptism with the some other spirit, having much unbelief about whether the present time outpouring of the Holy Spirit with the initial evidence of speaking in tongues is really from God or demonic in its origin, lack of knowledge regarding the benefits of speaking in tongues, lack of hunger and thirst for the filling of the Holy Spirit of God and wrong thinking that has come based on the wrong teaching received from the traditional Churches regarding speaking in tongues will all stand as a hindrance to deny a person from getting baptized with the Holy Spirit. These are in one way a false spiritual pride and a lack of trust in the word of God regarding the truth of the baptism of the Holy Spirit.
God has promised to all believer that he will pour out His Spirit on them that are thristy, that too only if they are intensely and desperately desiring to receive the Holy Spirit Baptism as like a dry ground looking for a flood of water. God has promised for all believers saying, "For I will pour water on him who is thirsty, and floods on the dry ground; I will pour My Spirit on your descendants, and My blessing on your offspring." (Isaiah 44:3). If we are really thirsting after the filling of the Holy Spirit, we will surely be receiving GOd's Holy Spirit filling soon with the New Testament external evidence of speaking in tongues. Praise the Lord!
10) One Filling, Infinitely Many Refilling
When we receive the Baptism with the Holy Spirit, we will be filled to the full at that time (Acts 2:4). But we are all broken cisterns or vessels that leak, so we become empty at some point of time. But in returning and rest we shall be saved from dryness (Isaiah 30:14-15). We become dry because we still walk many times under the influence of our sinful nature which makes the living water in our souls to leak (Jer 2:13). Jesus has clearly taught that our old independent soulish nature does not have the capability to hold on the new wine of the Holy Spirit that has been released on the day of Pentecost. If we try to hold it by our own strength, it will soon break. But God has given us a new nature which can make us hold the precious new wine of the Holy Spirit that has been released by God the Father on the day of Pentecost (Luke 5:37-38; Acts 2:13-21). So even though we will walk much under the Holy Spirit's leading as God's sons and daughters (Rom 8:14), still many times in our Christian walk we will be tempted to revert back to our old fallen nature's infulence now and then, and are pulled down in to our inherent weaknesses which are present in our sin nature (Rom 13:12-14; 7:15, 17-20; Gal 5:16-18). As we revert back to do the things that we wish by our own self without the leading of God, we will leak the living water and become dry spiritually. But we do not have to stay that way, if we have been baptized with the Spirit once. The Holy Spirit baptism is a bench mark set by God to position us in a place where we can again and again are eligible to receive more and more filling of the Spirit to the fullness. Praise the Lord!
This is the reason we see that the Apostle Peter and the other disciples who received the gift of the Holy Spirit on the day of Pentecost and were filled to the full by the Holy Spirit did not stay that way the rest of their lives (Acts 2:1-4). As they were human leaky vessels like every one of us, they too needed to be filled by the Spirit again and again (Acts 4:8, 29-31; 6:3-4; 7:55-56; 11:24). Again Apostle Paul who was filled by the Spirit through the method of Impartational Baptism through a disciple named Ananias (Acts 9:17), did not stay that way the rest of his life. But again and again he got refilled by the Holy Spirit (Acts 13:9), and also instructed all the believers to get filled by the Holy Spirit again and again (Eph 5:18; Acts 13:52). May be like the great and mighty man of God Smith Wigglesworth of old, we must learn to say, "I am satisfied only with the dissatisfaction that has to be satisfied again and again.", so that we may be able to get filled with the Holy Spirit always and at all times, again and again and again....Praise the Lord!
11) Deeper Revelation Comes to Us From the Word Through Spirit Filling
In my life a lot happened when I got baptized with the Spirit. Before that I used to study heavily on all topics in the Christian literature world. They were so useful to me, but still I had no clear conviction regarding any doctrine of the Bible. I started to pray regularly in tongues for atleast half an hour to one hour after I received the gift of the Holy Spirit, then a clarity began to come to me regarding the Scriptures from the Bible. The more I read the Scriptures regularly the more I understood the indepth meaning of it. At this point of time I did not realise that praying is a habit of one's own will.
Then when I joined the Bible college to study the word of God further for 2 years, there a Sister who took the subject of the Holy Spirit made it a point and taught us to pray for atleast half an hour daily in tongues. She made us mark in a prayer register which was pasted on the wall of our class room. Daily we used to mark it up. Then it became a habit. Then she again increased the time and made us pray for 1 hour daily. Then for one and half hours and then for two hours daily. It became a habit. Praise God for such a training. We started to regularly pray in tongues two hours daily after finishing our whole day of classes and the home assignments. Why I am sharing this with you is to make you pray in tongues regularly and make it a habit.
When I joined the college, within a week I wrote some tough fifteen to twenty questions from the Bible and asked a teacher whether he could answer those questions. He saw it and said to me to come to him later, then I never got a answer from him. But as I prayed in tongues regularly, before I finished the Bible college, all those questions that I had, the Lord started to reveal it to me one by one right from the word. Then I started to write those revelations in a diary and began to have a strong theology by conviction and passion. Praise the Lord!
In same vein Apostle Paul speaks saying, "7 But we speak the wisdom of God in a mystery, the hidden wisdom which God ordained before the ages for our glory... 10 But God has revealed them to us through His Spirit. For the Spirit searches all things, yes, the deep things of God... 12 Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, that we might know the things that have been freely given to us by God. 13 These things we also speak, not in words which man’s wisdom teaches but which the Holy Spirit teaches, comparing spiritual things with spiritual." (1 Cor 2:7, 10, 12-13). These preceding verse clearly points that the hidden wisdom from the Word of God which has been hidden from the previous generation of God's people and humanity has now been revealed to us. These things God has now given to all New Covenant believers freely, but it is up to us to be in communion with the Holy Spirit and learn from Him the deep things of God. The Holy Spirit will compare Scripture with Scripture and will give an answer right from the word for all the question we have regarding the deep things of God hidden in the Word (Isaiah 34:16). In the Book of Isaiah God has clearly revealed that He will cause the weary people who are thirsting for His word to get rest through speaking in tongues, so that they will receive the word of the Lord, "...Precept upon precept, precept upon precept, Line upon line, line upon line, Here a little, there a little,” through revelation (Isaiah 28:11-13). The God who causes tongues to be a sign to unbelievers, makes the same vehicle to become a capsule for prophetic revelation to the believers who are thirsting for God and His Word (1 Cor 14:20-22).
I believe that Apostle Paul who was used by God to bring deep revelation to the Church which other Apostles were not even able to comprehend with their mind (2 Peter 3:15-16), would not have been used in such a way if he could not say "I thank my God I speak with tongues more than you all" (1 Cor 14:18) to a fanatical tongue speaking Church like that of Corinthians. Think about it, the Corinthians were the most fanatical tongue speaking congregation at that time, more than any other Churches which the apostle founded, but apostle Paul was confidently saying to them that he was speaking in tongues more than all of them individually. Apostle Paul was able to clearly expound the Word of God in a revelatory way, remove confusion from this gifted Church and edify them because he edified himself constantly through speaking to God in personal prayer tongues more than all of them individually (1 Cor 14:18, 19, 2, 4-5). Praise the Lord!
So saints, please make sure that you start with atleast half an hour daily in tongues toward God and then keep increasing to one, two and three hours daily for the glory of God from the Word to be revealed to you progressively. Blessings.....
12) To Build a Marvelous Spiritual Building for God to Reside More and More in Us
When we have to speak about God residing in us, we must answer the question, 'How big is our God?' before we can honestly give a good answer for it. God says, "Do I not fill heaven and earth?" (Jer. 23:24b). God can fill heaven and earth. So the question we should ask ourselves is not 'How big God is?' but 'How big a building I have built for Him consciously and spiritually in my life, so that He can be able to live and move in my being (Acts 17:28)?'
Apostle Paul says, "He who speaks in a tongue edifies himself...." (1 Cor 14:4). Here the word 'edifies' in the original Greek language is 'oikodomeo' pronounced 'oy-kod-om-eh'-o' means 'to be a house builder, that is, construct or figuratively be a building, edify, embolden.' So according to this 1 Cor 14:4, the more we pray in tongues, the bigger the building we are constructing for God to live in us. We are the builder and also we are the building. So the bottom line is how big are we going to build the spiritual building for God to reside in us? It directly depends on how much time you discipline yourself to pray to God in tongues each day. I hope that every one of you will be able to say like Apostle Paul some day, "I thank my God I speak with tongues more than you all". Praise the Lord!
The more you discipline yourself to pray to God in tongues each day, the easier it will become, as you become more and more mature over the years to hear God and reveal His word to others. It all starts with a regular time schedule of half an hour, then one hour, then one and half hour and them more....Praise God that the Holy Spirit will keep you refreshed through your spiritual building construction process and I promise you not even a minute of it will ever be boring to you. All you need to do is to make a resolve and be passionately determined to keep up the shedule regualarly. Even if the devil have given you a bad day and you give up on that particular day, don't worry, the next day will be a new beginning and "His Mercies are new each morning" to get yourself up and make up the lost time (Lam 3:21-23). Keep constructing your spiritual building higher and higher as long as you live in this planet earth.
13) Jesus Spoke in Tongues, So Should We
Before some of you pounce on me to ask, 'How can you say that?', let me explain it as clearly as possible. The Bible does not explicitly say that Jesus spoke in tongues, but there are enough evidences that implicitly points to the truth that Jesus have spoken in tongues. These are the following questions that must be answered before you decide to believe otherwise, 1) After Jesus rose from the dead, he promised the disciples that if they believe, they too will speak in new tongues (Mark 16:17). If the disciples never knew what it means to speak in tongues and have not approached Jesus previously before His death to help them speak in tongues, why should Jesus promise these disciples that they too will speak in new tongues as they believe (Luke 11:1-13)? 2) If these disciples were not at all used to hearing the prayer of tongues that Jesus prayed while they were with Him for three and half years, they would have immediately asked Jesus what it means to speak in new tongues? They never asked this question, this give a clear proof that they were used to hearing Jesus speak in tongues before. 3) When all the 120 disciples were filled with the Spirit on the day of Pentecost and started to speak in tongues, Peter was not perplexed or was fearful seeing that they were speaking something that they themselves never understood (Acts 2:1-4). But he clearly stood up and began to reveal clearly from the Old Testament Book of Joel that this was a fulfillment of the OT Promise of God to all true Israelites (Acts 2:14-16). If Apostle Peter himself have never heard Jesus speak in tongues, he would have been more confused when people began to mock them. His boldness to stand in the midst of all mockery, amazement and perplexion of people came from the existing knowledge about tongues. 4) Jesus himself says in Matthew 5:19, "Whoever does and teaches ....he shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven.". According to this verse He himself challenges that those who teach others should themselves do what they teach others. If He himself did not pray in tongues, Why should He promise the 11 disciples, personally meeting them, He rebuked their unbelief and promised, "And these signs will follow those who believe; In my Name they [i.e. you] will speak in new tongues."(Mark 16:17). 5) If Jesus himself did not speak in tongues, why should he baptize all his disciples with the external evidence of speaking in tongues (Acts 10:45-46; 11:15-17). How could he impart to other believers the fire of tongues that He himself did not have (Matt 3:11; Luke 3:16; Acts 2:3-4)? 6) When the disciples asked Jesus to teach them to pray, Jesus told them to ask for the gift of the Holy Spirit which clearly indicates that the prayer that the disciples were asking Jesus to teach them was the prayer of tongues that they have seen Jesus pray all the times (Luke 11:1-13). 7) The one thing that all the four Gospels and the book of Acts and Jesus Himself emphasised is the Baptism with the Holy Spirit and Fire of speaking in tongues (Matt 3:11; Mark 1:8; Luke 3:16; John 1:33; Acts 1:4-5, 8). If Jesus did not speak in tongues and the disciples never heard him speak in tongues, why should Jesus give such a important emphasis to the Baptism with the Holy Spirit and suceeding external evidence of the tongues of fire? This shows that if a person sees with an open mind all these implicit evidences that points to Jesus speaking in tongues, one cannot deny such a concrete evidence that runs as a binding thread that holds the whole of New Testament together. For still detailed explanation about "Did Jesus Speak in Tongues?", click the following link and read the whole article - http://apostolicrevelation.blogspot.com/2011/05/when-jesus-was-baptized-with-spirit-did.html.
14) For Deeper Communion and Intimacy with the Holy Spirit
Apostle Paul gave a beautiful benediction to the Corinthian Church saying, "The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the communion of the Holy Spirit be with you all. Amen." (2 Cor 13:14). The Holy Spirit always yearns jealously to have communion with all believers and to impart a praying grace upon their lives to experience true intimacy with God (James 4:5-6; Zech 12:10; Rom 15:30). The term communion is derived from Latin communio (sharing in common). The corresponding term in Greek is 'koinonia' which is often translated as "fellowship" and it does mean in a deeper lever "intimacy". In classical Greek, it could apply to a business partnership, to fellowship of life in marriage, to a spiritual relationship with God, to comradely fellowship between friends, to a community or society.
So the question we should ask ourself now is, "How can we practically have fellowship, communion, friendship and intimatcy with the Holy Spirit?". When we were born again, we have been sealed with the Holy Spirit in our hearts by God the Father, who has also given us the Holy Spirit as a guarantee of our future inheritance in God until the day of Rapture (2 Cor 1:22; Eph 1:13-14). After receiving our salvation, we have been promised that only a fountain measure of living water which will become in us a fountain of water, springing up in to everlasting life will be available for us to drink. The living water is none other than the person of the Holy Spirit whom we experience in our lives by drinking Him in greater and greater measures. But Jesus promised all believers that if they come to Him again persistently, having great thirst in their soul for more of the Holy Spirit, Jesus will cause rivers of living water to flow out of their heart (John 7:37-39). So to a believer who is just born again and have not experienced greater thirst for the rivers of living water to flow out of his life, he cannot experience the deeper communion and intimacy with the Holy Spirit.
When we receive the gift of the Holy Spirit, we are positioned by JESUS to start a deeper communion and intimacy with the Holy Spirit (Acts 2:38-39; 10:45; 11:16-17). With the gift of the Holy Spirit, God gives a supernatural prayer language of New Tongues for every believer (Acts 2:4; 10:45-46). This open up a new deeper communion and fellowship with the Holy Spirit who intiates and gives the utterance, which when we speak out through our mouth as an unknown tongue, becomes a work of God in partnership with the Spirit of God (Acts 2:4; 5:32; 14:2). Actually this type of prayer is described by Paul saying, "26 Likewise the Spirit also helps in our weaknesses. For we do not know what we should pray for as we ought, but the Spirit Himself makes intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered. 27 Now He who searches the hearts knows what the mind of the Spirit is, because He makes intercession for the saints according to the will of God." (Rom 8:26-27). In the preceding verses, it does not say that the Holy Spirit prays for us in groaning, but it says "intercession [i.e. Tongues].... for us [is made] with groanings which cannot be uttered" which shows that unutterable groans may come from deep within our spirit-man when we pray continiously in tongues. Deeper intercession of groans and next the unknown tongues which are uttered by the Holy Spirit are the words right from the mind of the Spirit which produces prayer in the exact will of God for the saints.
Kenneth E. Hagin explains beautifully saying, "Paul said, "...We know not what we should pray for as we ought: but the Spirit itself (himself) maketh intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered."
P.C. Nelson, a scholar of the Greek, said that the Greek literally reads here, "The Holy Ghost maketh intercession for us in groanings that cannot be uttered in articulate speech." Articulate speech means our regular kind of speech. He went on to point out how the Greek stresses that this not only includes groanings escaping our lips in prayer, but also praying in other tongues.
This agrees with what Paul said in 1 Corinthians 14:14, "For if I pray in an unknown tongue, my spirit prayeth...." Or, as the Amplified translates, "My spirit (by the Holy Spirit within me) prays."
When you pray in tongues - it is your spirit praying, by the Holy Spirit within you. The Holy Spirit within you gives the utterance - and you speak it out of your spirit. You do the talking. He gives the utterance. By this method the Holy Spirit helps you pray according to the will of God, as things should be prayed for."
It is our weakness in the flesh that makes us to pray "I, Me and Myself" kind of useless ineffective prayers. But God who knows the weakness of the sin nature that dwells inside us, which also makes us unknowledgeable regarding prayer that ought to prayed in the perfect will of God, has graciously and mericifully has made a provision to all thirsty believers to overcome this weakness supernaturally through receiving the gift of the Holy Spirit along with the personal prayer language in tongues. True Intercession is not a product of our own effort before God, but is the result of God's power of prevailing prayer which the Holy Spirit Himself makes, being made effective through us who pray the Holy Spirit produced words and groans through our mouth because of His willingness to answer us. C.H. Spurgeon describes it beautifully by saying, "It is a mark of wondrous condescension [i.e. supporting or patronizing attitude] that God should not only answer our prayers when they are made, but should make our prayers for us."
Once we start to pray in tongues and minister the word of God to ourselves and others continiously, the intimacy with the Holy Spirit will tremendously increase. This is what the apostles did after receiving the gift of the Spirit after Pentecost, they continually gave themselves to prayer and the minsitry of the word (Acts 6:4). This tremendously increased their fellowship, communion and intimacy with the Holy Spirit, that they were able to say the very words the Spirit spoke to them face to face from their spirit-man (Acts 10:19-21; 11:12; 15:28). If we cannot cooperate with the Holy Spirit to pray in tongues with groaning, we cannot be able to develop intimacy with the Holy Spirit to know Him and be so clear to hear from Him as the apostles did. Many who greive and quench the Holy Spirit have become so insensitive with spiritual leprosy, that they do not even realise what they are doing toward the Lord by their wayward faithless lifestyle (1 Thess 5:19-22; Eph 4:30-32). If all believers become thirsty for intimacy with the Holy Spirit and develop a lifestyle based on prayer and the word of God, such spiritual leprosy among believers can be totally eradicated inside the Church. Praise the Lord!
15) For Increase in Faith
When we pray in tongues nobody can understand the prayer except our Lord in heaven who hears it eagerly (1 Cor 14:2). But in the content of the prayer, the believer speaks mysteries to God about his own life, about people who have asked for prayer request, about his other relatives and loved ones, about the unsaved people to come in to His Kingdom and for all the saints in the Church. Without our knowledge when all the needs and requests have been conveyed to God with thanksgiving according to the perfect will of God through praying in tongues, a supernatural peace that authenticates that our prayer has been heard by God and the answer is on the way comes to fill us and then keeps our hearts and minds intact, from the attack of fear or doubts from our demonic enemies (Phil 4:6-7). Once we are full of faith, the Lord will move supernaturally and fullfill all the plans that He has for our life. This is the reason Apostle Jude lovingly said to all believers, "20 But you, beloved, building yourselves up on your most holy faith, praying in the Holy Spirit, 21 keep yourselves in the love of God, looking for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ unto eternal life. " (Jude 20-21). May we continue to pray in tongues systematically and habitually inoder to grow supernaturally in our faith and GLORIFY GOD through our precious lives that he has given to us as a gift.
16) For Supernatural Praise and Thanksgiving Lifestyle of Power
Praise makes the devil flee. Anointed praise make the devil not only flee but flee in terror. The Great man of God Smith Wigglesworth used to say, some times as I start to pray and praise Him, suddenly I get myself shifted to speak in the supernatural tongues to praise Him, as there remains no further words in my natural mind to praise Him further. True our natural mind has only limited words to express our thankgiving, praise and adoration. With the limited words and phrases we cannot be fully able to praise the Lord as we ought to praise Him, so the Lord provides the supernatural personal prayer language to praise and give thanks supernaturally. The praises and thankgiving that comes out of our spirit-man under the supernatural anointing of the Holy Spirit in tongues are the pure and highest form of praise towards God. There are various instances where the New Testament confirms this.
We see on the day of Pentecost when the 120 disciples and apostles started to get filled with the Spirit and started to speak in sign tongues, the unsaved people from various nations around the world heard it in their own language and said, "11 ...we hear them speaking in our own tongues the wonderful works of God.” 12 So they were all amazed and perplexed, saying to one another, “Whatever could this mean?”" (Acts 2:11-12). In this instance, we see the 120 apostles and disciples of Jesus without understanding with their mind what they were speaking, were able to praise God and glorify him supernaturally because of receving the gift of the Holy Spirit. This created an awe in the heart of unbelievers to hear the gospel of Jesus Christ and be saved. Kingdom transfer from the domain of darkness to light happened instantly because of those anointed praise that came in tongues through the mouth of the disciples of Jesus on this day fo Pentecost (Acts 26:18). Praise the Lord!
In another instance where the Apostle Peter and the apostolic Jewish company of elders went to the house of a Roman Centurion named as Cornelius directed by God through a vision. There Peter preached the message of salvation to the group of Gentiles, while he was still speaking the Holy Spirit fell on the whole crowd of people. These results of Holy Ghost outpouring amazed and astonised the Jews because until then they thought that Salvation and the gift of the Holy Spirit was only for the Jews as God's chosen people. The following Scripture describes what happened next, "45 And those of the circumcision who believed were astonished, as many as came with Peter, because the gift of the Holy Spirit had been poured out on the Gentiles also. 46 For they heard them speak with tongues and magnify God." (Acts 10:45-46). In this instance the religious spirit and the prejudice that accompany it were completely broken by the power of the supernatural praise that came out of the mouth of the new converts who praised God through speaking in unknown tongues. This clearly shows that speaking with tongues in the purest way to magnify and praise God supernaturally. Praise the Lord!
Also Apostle Paul confirmed this fact by saying, "16...if you bless with the spirit,...17 For you indeed give thanks well [supernaturally]" (1 Cor 14:16-17). This was one of the reason why Apostle Paul thanked the Lord for speaking in tongues more than all the fanatical tongue speaking Corinthian belivers individually (1 Cor 14:18). The Corinthian Church was too concerned to speak only in a public setting before men and not in a private setting before God. And that is one of the reason apostle Paul was able to confidently say that he spoke in private tongues more than all these Spiritual Babies who just wanted to flaunt their spirituality before men. May we too like the mighty Apostle Peter and Paul learn to speak in tongues and magnify the Lord with our supernatural praises in private and also in public devotion! Praise the Lord!
17) Increasing Consciousness of the Holy Spirit's Indwelling Presence in Us
When we receive the gift of the Holy Spirit, we are entering in to a privileged zone of receiving an unlimited measure of the presence and the power of the Holy Spirit (Acts 2:38-39; 10:44-46; John 3:34). This is the reason Jesus told a two step process in the realisation of the Holy Spirit, first when someone is born again he will be able to hear the sound of the wind who is the Holy Spirit of God speak in a still small voice inside the recess of their born again spirit-man inside them (John 3:5-6, 7-8; 10:27; Rom 8:16; 1 John 3:24; 4:13; 5:7, 10). But when they receive the gift of the Holy Spirit and start to speak in tongues to God, they will start to feel the very presence of the Person of the Holy Spirit, taking more and more control of their lives and as a result they will start to live effortlessly the very life of Jesus on earth. Apostle Paul who was one of the finest men of God of all time and lived in the first century and wrote nearly one third of the New Testament, surrendered his life progressively in such a way to the Holy Spirit that he said that 'I live, yet not I it is the Anointing of Jesus who is the Holy Spirit of God literally living in my body.' (Gal 2:30, Paraphrased).
As much as we surrender our lives to the Holy Spirit, he will take over us to live the life of Jesus through us. The Holy Spirit will jealously bit by bit will take over our spirit, soul and body, as we surrender ourselves to Him progressively, and then as he takes over each part of our being it will become sanctified and blameless before Men (2 Thess 5:23-24). Jesus himself promised all of us personally saying, "15 “If you love Me, keep My commandments. 16 And I will pray the Father, and He will give you another Helper, that He may abide with you forever— 17 the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees Him nor knows Him; but you know Him, for He dwells with you and will be in you. 18 I will not leave you orphans; I will come to you." (John 14:15-17). The people of the world cannot receive the Holy Spirit because they are not born in their spirit-man. When Jesus said in the preceding verses that the Holy Spirit will be in you, He is referring to a person's salvation experience in which the Holy Spirit will start to live in them (Eph 1:13-14; 2 Cor 1:21-22; Rom 8:8; Heb 13:5). But when Jesus said that the Holy Spirit dwells with you, He is referring to the "Baptism with the Holy Spirit and fire" which John the Baptist spoke about (Matt 3:11; Luke 3:16). Apostle Paul also referred this same things of receiving the gift of the Holy Spirit and praying in unknown tongues when he said, "26 Likewise the Spirit also helps in our weaknesses. For we do not know what we should pray for as we ought, but the Spirit Himself makes intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered. 27 Now He who searches the hearts knows what the mind of the Spirit is, because He makes intercession for the saints according to the will of God." (Rom 8:26-27). So when we are born again we can start to hear the whisper of the Holy Spirit in the recesses of our heart, but when we receive the Holy Spirit Baptism we will be able to hear the clear voice of the Holy Spirit with an ever increasing personal Presence living, moving and speaking through us. When we speak in an unknow tongues that we cannot understand with our natural logical mind, we know that the living Presence of the Holy Spirit is producing it from the recesses of our spirit-man which is inside us. For He dwells within us. Praise the Lord!
The more bigger we build the spirit-man inside us through praying in tongues (1 Cor 14:4), the more the Holy Spirit can live through us by being with us. So we must pray and worship in tongues not ony during the intial time when we receive the gift of the Holy Spirit, but for the consciousness of the indwelling Holy Spirit's presence to increase, we must consistently and habitually set hours each day to pray and worship God particularly in tongues. When we continue to live with the consciousness of the indwelling Holy Spirit's Presence within us, we are bound to think and live supernaturally different from the worldly way of thinking and acting.
18) In Nearly All Instances of New Testament Believer's Holy Spirit Baptism, they Spoke in Tongues and were Endowed with Spiritual Gifts
In all the five instances when the disciples and believers received the Baptism with the Holy Spirit in the New Testament Book of Acts, they spoke with the external evidence of speaking in unknow tongues as a supernatural evidence for the infilling which God had given them. In the day of Pentecost when all 120 believers received the Holy Spirit during the intial Pentecostal outpouring, they all spoke with tongues (Acts 2:1-4). In the succeeding sermon in which nearly 3000 souls were saved, Apostle Peter promised the same gift of the Holy Spirit to all those Jewish new converts and as a result they all continued in this apostolic doctrine by receiving it and having fellowship with the Apostles thereafter (Acts 2:38-42).
After Philip preached Christ to the Samaritans, the apostles from Jerusalem heard this and sent apostle Peter and John to come over there and give an impartational type of Holy Spirit Baptism to them. In this instance too, when the apostles laid their hands on the believer they received the Holy Spirit (Acts 8:14-17). It is not explicitly described here that they all spoke in tongues, but when Simon the sorcerer tried to buy the power of the Holy Spirit to lay hands on people to impart the gift of the Holy Spirit which comes with the external evidence of speaking in unknown tongues, it implicitly shows that all the believers who were given the gift of the Holy Spirit manifested power through speaking in tongues as usual as on the day of Pentecost (Acts 8:18-19; 1:5, 8; 2:4, 6). The question that we should ask here is, Would Simon the sorcerer have tried to buy the power to give the gift of the Holy Spirit, if he were not able to discern it clearly by hearing the external manifestation of the power through speaking in tongues? He would not have come forward to buy gift of the Holy Spirit if there were no supernatural power manifestation through tongues (Acts 8:20-21). One Greek scholar points our that the root word of the Greek word translated "matter" in Acts 8:21 is the same root of the word translated "utterance" in Acts 2:4, where it says, "And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak with other tongues, as the Spirit gave them UTTERANCE." So when Peter said, "You have neither part nor portion in this matter..." (Acts 8:21), he was actually saying to Simon the sorcerer, "You have neither part nor portion in this matter of [supernatural utterance in UNKNOWN TONGUES]". This proves conclusively that a eternal evidence of tongues for the internal filling of the Holy Spirit happened here, same as in the day of Pentecost. Praise the Lord!
Then Saul of Tarsus was supernaturally touched by Jesus on the road to Damascus, as a result of it he was instructed by Jesus to go wait in the city of Damascus where Jesus sent his disciple Ananias to come and do a impartational Baptism through the laying on of hands. Here exactly when Ananias laid his hands on Saul, he was immediately filled with the Holy Spirit (Acts 9:1-6, 17-18). Here also it is not told explicitly that Saul spoke in tongues after he got filled with the Holy Spirit, but from the other Scriptures in which Saul said that he speaks in tongues more than all the fanatical tongue speaking believers of Corinthian Church, shows that he did receive the gift of the Holy Spirit with the external evidence of speaking in tongues (1 Cor 14:18). When does a believer start to speak in tongues? When he receives the gift of the Holy Spirit, so logically it must have been with Saul too (Acts 10:45-46).
Ten years after the Day of Pentecost, when a lot of brand new Gentile converts were Baptized and filled with the Holy Spirit, the apostolic Jewish elders along with apostle Peter heard them all speak in tongues and magnify God (Acts 10:44-47). Twenty years after the Day of Pentecost, when Paul the Apostle heard that the believers in Ephesus were not establised in the present truth of the gospel, immediately he shared to them the Gospel of Jesus Christ with them and then immediately baptized them in water (Acts 19:1-5). Immediately after this, Paul the apostle laid his hands on them to give them an impartational Baptism with the Holy Spirit, immediatley they spoke with tongues and then prophesied (Acts19:6). First they manifested tongues to indicate that they were Baptised internally with the Holy Spirit, then they prophesied after this showing that God had chosen in this instance to give these believers the gift of the Holy Spirit to interpret the tongues that they have spoken (1 Cor 12:10; 14:12-13). These gifts of prophesy may or may not accompany the external evidence of speaking in tongues when a believer is filled with the Holy Spirit. It is Holy Spirit who chooses to manifest a particular gift at a particular time (1 Cor 12:7, 11). This makes us conclude that a person who receives the gift of the Holy Spirit today will likewise speak in unknown tongues to indicate that they are filled internally with the Holy Spirit inside them. All who desires to be filled with the HOLY SPIRIT now in our generation, will also speak in other tongues without which we have no evidence that they are really filled with the Holy Spirit! This is why Apostle Paul wished and desired that every believer would speak with other tongues (1 Cor 14:5). He thanked God that he spoke in tongues more than anyone else because he understood the full scope and value of receiving this supernatural gift of the Holy Spirit.
All believers are entitled to, and should ardently expect and earnestly seek, the promise of the Father, the Baptism of the Holy Spirit, according to the command of Jesus Christ. With this comes the endowment of power for life and service, the bestowment of gifts and their uses in the work of the ministry. This experience is distinct from and subsequent to the experience of the new birth but can occur at the same moment a person is reborn (Luke 24:49; Acts 1:4-8; 2:38-39; 10:44-46; 11:14-16; 15:7-9; 1 Corinthians 12:1-31).
19) Speaking in Tongues Makes Us to Yield and Submit Our Tongue More and More to the Holy Spirit's Influence
Apostle James clearly said, "2 For we all stumble in many things. If anyone does not stumble in word, he is a perfect man, able also to bridle the whole body. ...8 But no man can tame the tongue. It is an unruly evil, full of deadly poison." (James 3:2, 8). No man can tame the tongue except the God who created it for Himself. If we are able to tame our tongues and speak the right words of God according to the perfect will of God through the "divided tongues, as of fire" (Acts 2:3) that is set on fire by heaven sent messenger the Holy Ghost Himself, then we will be able to bridle the whole body of ours for GOD'S GLORY the rest of our lives. Praise the Lord!
If we are able to control our whole body, the supreme character of our Lord Jesus which is described by apostle Paul as the fruit of the Holy Spirit will be seen through our lives consistently more and more, even as we increasingly yield our tongue to speak in unknown tongues the deep mysteries of God (1 Cor 14: 2, 4; Gal 5:22-23).
When our tongue is not properly tamed and trained to speak rightly, it can cause much embarrasement to us, our families, our friends and those with whom we come in to contact with. Words have the power to either build or break our lives. As the Bible also says, "Death and life are in the power of the tongue, and they who indulge in it shall eat the fruit of it [for death or life]." (Proverbs 18:21, AMP).
The man of God Kenneth E. Hagin referred the following story in one of his articles named 'Why Tongues?' and it shows how much praying in the tongues by the power of the Holy Spirit can alter and tame one's tongue for the glory of God.
A minister's 12-year-old daughter once lost her temper and was talking rudely and hatefully to her mother. A visiting evangelist overheard the scene. When the girl looked up and saw him, knowing he had witnessed her tantrum, she was embarrassed and broke into tears.
"I'm so sorry you saw me act this way and heard what I said," she cried.
"Honey," he said, "there is One greater than I am who saw you and heard you. You are a Christian, aren't you?"
"Yes."
"And filled with the Spirit?" he asked.
"Yes."
"Well then, the Holy Ghost is in you. He knows what you said, and how you acted. But if you will repent, the Lord will forgive you."
They prayed together. She repented and in a little while began to worship God in tongues.
Then he said to her, "Here is a secret that will help you curb your temper. If you will pray and worship God every day in tongues, it will help you to be conscious of the indwelling presence of the Holy Ghost. If you will remember that He is in you, you won't act that way."
Some years later the evangelist returned to preach at that church, and the pastor's daughter told him, "I have never forgotten what you said. Every day for the past few years I have prayed and worshiped God in tongues - and I have never lost my temper again."
So the bottom line is, no man can tame his tongue with his own power, but yielding the tongue to the Holy Spirit to speak with other tongues is thus a giant step toward yielding our entire members to God (Rom 12:1-2).
20) Praying in Tongues and Worshipping God with Spiritual Songs Gives a Stimulus to the Rising Waves of the Holy Ghost Power
When we pray in tongues, we are releasing the impetus to move the rising spiritual wave of the Holy Spirit that is coming upon the earth to rise higher and higher and keep it rolling on and on in our generation. We set it rolling before any man on earth could see with his natural eyes (2 Cor 5:7). This is the reason God will set the men who speak such mysteries of God to Him in tongues first in to existence around the earth and then will make these men to be used to ride on or go along the mighty wave of the Holy Spirit on a spiritual surfboard (Acts 6:3-4). The late Great man of God Kenneth E. Hagin prophetically said the following things to our 21st century generation, "...God wants to combine a MOVE OF HIS SPIRIT with the solid foundation of BIBLE TEACHING That's been built over the past few decades in the Body of Christ. The combination will cause the next move of the Holy Ghost to be the BIGGEST ONE yet!" Praise the Lord!
The true New Testament worship is the apostolic worship that is purely done by moving full and full in the anointing of the Holy Spirit through the quicked word of the truth. Such worship starts from our spirit-man and makes us to be open hearted with no hidden motives but to worship God for who He is and what He has done for us (John 4:24). Even Jesus said that our Heavenly Father seeks for such worshippers (John 4:23). Apostle Paul spoke about such worship that he did in his personal and public worship alike. In his personal worship he never sought God to give him interpretation for the personal prayers he did in tongues, but in the public worship meetings he always used tongues with interpretation and he himself instructed the believers to do likewise and if they did not get interpretation he instructed them to pray to God in order to get it or else keep their mouth shut (1 Cor 14:13-19, 5).
Apostle Paul says, "12 Even so you, since you are zealous for spiritual gifts, let it be for the edification of the church that you seek to excel. 13 Therefore let him who speaks in a tongue pray that he may interpret. 14 For if I pray in a tongue, my spirit prays, but my understanding is unfruitful. 15 What is the conclusion then? I will pray with the spirit, and I will also pray with the understanding. I will sing with the spirit, and I will also sing with the understanding." (1 Cor 14:12-15). Whether we pray or sing with the spirit, we must also pray or sing with understanding when we are in the public meeting of apostolic saints gatherings. So both are done at the will of the one who operates with the gift of the Holy Spirit within the Church. These gifts have been described in the manifestation of the Spirit category, where he describes it as "different kinds of tongues....the interpretation of tongues" (1 Cor 12:10). Such gifts given for the profit of all are not generally given to all, but generally the Holy Spirit hand picks people and uses them for the profit of all in a particular time and place (1 Cor 12:7). This is why at the end of the Chapter Paul asks the question, "Do all speak with tongues? Do all interpret?"(1 Cor 12:30). Not all will be used at the same place in the same time with the same gift of public tongues of prayer or singing for the profit of all in the Church. This will only create confusion and disorder. Paul clearly says that Holy Spirit will not create such confusion, but they should be careful to follow the divine order of speaking one by one under the unction by the Holy Spirit's guidance (1 Cor 14:33, 26-32).
Paul has clearly instructed believers to be filled with the Spirit and let the word of Christ dwell in them richly, so that they can sing to the Lord and to one another "16 ...in all wisdom, teaching and admonishing one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing with grace in [their...] hearts to the Lord." (Col 3:16). Each apostolic believer should be filled with the Spirit and then practice to speak and sing to the Lord by making melody in their heart to the Lord (Eph 5:18-19). Such worship with the spirit are powerful to pull down the stongholds of the enemy literally down to dust and burn them to ashes (2 Cor 10:3-5). When the devil put Paul and Silas in jail for preaching the Gospel and breaking the hold of the kingdom of darkness over people's life, they immediately started to pray and sing unto God with the spirit (Acts 16:25). Suddenly the whole of heaven started to descend where they were, as a result, a literal earth quake came upon the place and brought the mighty Holy Ghost power upon that place! The result of it was that the foundations of the prison were shaken, and immediately all the doors were opened and everyone's chains were loosed (Acts 16:26). This is true apostolic worship that breaks yoke, shakes the foundations of prisons and loosens the chains of people who are bound spiritually in their lives by the works of darkness. This can happen to all of us as we start to live continiously by praying and singing with the spirit.
As we continue to pray and sing with the spirit, we will be filled with the Spirit. Once we are filled with the Spirit, our inward spirit-man will be renewed day by day as we continue to be filled with the Spirit continuously (2 Cor 4:16). We need to wait upon God and seek for renewal of our spirit-man continually, when we do our part of waiting in His Spirit filled Presence through our prayer and singing, the Lord will renew our strength again and again (Isa 40:28-31) The riches of God's glory which settles upon us permanently during the time of waiting in the Presence of God more and more will then strengthen us with His might in the inner man continually (Eph 3:16). This strengthening will many times end up bringing the refreshing presence of God all around us (Acts 3:19). When the Presence of God envelopes us, the Holy Spirit Himself will become seated upon us in HIS POWER and MIGHT (Psa 22:3; 68:1). At such times of refreshing we will be able to hear the voice of the Holy Spirit very clearly than at any other time (Isa 30:21; Prov 20:27).
Finally we do not know all the saints to pray for them all, so the best way to pray for all of them is to pray with the spirit in other tongues (Eph 6:18). Many times as we stimulate ourselves to flow with the Spirit's guidance in praying and singing with our spirit-man, the Holy Spirit will continually give us more burden to pray and supplicate for all the needs of saints. Sometimes the Holy Spirit may bring the faces of people before us in our mind, so that we can continue to pray knowing that we are making an impact upon their lives for the glory of God!!
Again the man of God Kenneth E. Hagin referred the following story in one of his articles named 'Why Tongues?', and it shows how much praying in tongues by the powerful burden that the Holy Spirit gives can alter the destiny of the person for whom we pray.
An English missionary to Africa was home on furlough speaking at a missionary conference when a woman asked him if he kept a diary. He replied that he did. And she began to relate to him, "Two years ago I was awakened in the night with a burden to pray. I got out of bed and was talking in tongues before I got down on my knees.
For an hour I prayed in tongues - and it seemed as if I were wrestling. When I finished praying I had a vision. I saw you in a little grass hut, surrounded by natives. You were sick. Then you died. I saw the natives pull the sheet over your head and walk sadly outside the hut. Suddenly you came out of the hut and stood in their midst, and all the natives rejoiced."
The missionary then asked her if she kept a diary and requested she bring it that afternoon. Comparing diaries, and making allowances for time differences in England and Africa, they discovered the time of the woman's prayer burden exactly coincided with the time when the missionary was sick with a deadly fever.
His partner was away, and he was alone with the natives. Things happened just as she saw them - the missionary died, the natives saw him die and pulled a sheet over his head - then he rose up suddenly well! Because of the Spirit of God!
This shows how a deep intercessory prayer of tongues that we do with the burden given by the Holy Spirit can alter the destinies of peoples lives for the glory of God. Praise the Lord!
Even in my life, one day in a morning time at around 11 a.m as I was praying in tongues, I felt weak and had a nap. Suddenly a thick darkness began to descend and I felt afraid inside me even though it was a morning time. Then suddenly a vision flashed in which I saw a brother whom I know was trying to buy a very big land in the city which he lives and he keeps buying more and more land. Suddenly I was in the vision, he showed me all the properties he has acquired. Suddenly the scene changed and I saw him buried fresh in a graveyard and I saw demons were controlling the whole area. Suddenly I realted to one Scripture in my mind, "20 But God said to him, ‘Fool! This night your soul will be required of you; then whose will those things be which you have provided?’ 21 “So is he who lays up treasure for himself, and is not rich toward God.”"(Luke 12:20-21). I felt that this Brother of mine was in life threatening danger. Great fear took my spirit man and I started to pray deeply with tongues for nearly more than half a day, and then in the evening the burden got lifted up from me and then I told my dad about it, and left the whole matter.
After nearly a month when I went to a relatives marriage where this Brother had come, I enquired about this Brother from his mother. She told me that nearly a month before exactly at that time when I saw the vision, there was an accident with this Brother's car in a high speed, it went over in the air and it was to hit a tree staight to straight, if not for a two wheeler man who got caught in the crash which avoided that disaster. So likewise many times our obedient prayers can be used by God to spare the lives of people from death and severe accidents. God Himself is limited by our prayer because Satan still stays right here on earth domain as the god of this age (2 Cor 4:4), he will be thrown out of this present earth only when Adam's lease runs out at the end of the Millenial rule of Jesus (Rev 20:7-10). Until then we need to wrestle against the rulers of the darkness of this world, in order to make the will of God to happen in our lives and in the lives of people around us (Eph 6:12). Now as we pray in faith about matters pertaining to this life, God will intervene on our behalf to fulfill His will on earth once again (John 10:10; Matt 6:9-13). Even during the Millenial rule of Jesus on earth, a group of intercessory army of saints will continue to pray for God's will to be done by Jesus and his rulers on earth. They shall praise Him as He will fullfill the will of God bit by bit for this planet earth (Psa 72:15). If Jesus Himself needs prayer to rule in this earth during the Millenium, how much more we need prayer today in our end times, to invite God by faith in order that He may empower us to preach to all the world this Gospel of Jesus Christ, to the dark and dying world with the power of Jesus working with us through the accompanying signs and wonders, it needs Prayer!, Prayer and more Prayer! (Mark 16:19-20).
God does not look for able vessels to be used in prayer, but only available vessels to be used for the glory of God. So why can't you and I be the one available for our Master's use and make an eternal impact upon the lives of people around us in our generation. May we be like David to do all the will of God for our generation and die after we are fully done to inherit the great everlasting glory of God (Acts 13:22, 36; Dan 12:3). Praise the Lord!
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