One day, I was called by the director of the Springs Rescue Mission. He told me that his secretary, Debbie, had been seeking the baptism of the Holy Spirit for a long period of time. The trouble was that although she'd gone to many various churches and denominations, and had been prayed for many times, she wasn't filled with the Holy Spirit, and she could not receive her prayer language. The director asked me if I could help her. I told him I would be glad to speak to her. I explained to her, first of all, that the baptism of the Holy Spirit was a separate and distinct experience from salvation. Jesus stated in Mark 16:16, "He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved; but he that believeth not shall be damned." I showed her in Acts 8:5 how Philip went down to the city of Samaria and preached Christ unto them. They responded by believing Philip's preaching concerning the kingdom of God and the person of Jesus Christ, and were immediately baptized, both men and women. The question I asked her was, "But had they received the baptism of the Holy Spirit?" We read in verses 16 and 17 that as believers, they had been baptized in water in the name of the Lord Jesus, but the Holy Spirit had not yet fallen upon any of them. Peter and John then laid hands upon these believers, and they received the baptism of the Holy Spirit. The whole point was that the baptism of the Holy Spirit is an experience distinct from our salvation.

I then asked Debbie why she wanted to receive the baptism of the Holy Spirit and her own prayer language. She hadn't really thought it through. In all of the churches she had attended, no one had ever explained to her the purpose of the baptism of the Holy Spirit. I then began to take her to scriptures in the New Testament that spoke of the infilling of the Holy Spirit and the initial evidence of speaking in tongues. I said, "Debbie, according to 1 Corinthians 14:2, when a person speaks in an unknown tongue, who is he speaking to?" She looked at the verse. "It's God, of course," she replied. When speaking in tongues, a person is speaking mysteries (divine secrets) with his or her spirit. The Message Bible, in verse 2, says that you're sharing intimacies just between you and God. I showed her in 1 Corinthians 14:4 that when a person is worshiping God in their prayer language they are being edified or strengthened personally in the Lord. We continued to look at scriptures. This time in 1 Corinthians 14:14. When we pray with our prayer language, it's our spirits communicating with and worshiping God. Verse 16 of this same chapter says we're blessing with our spirits, that is, praising God. Verse 17 tells us that we're giving thanks very well. The Apostle Paul states in the next verse: "I'm grateful to God for the gift of praying in tongues that he gives us for praising him, which leads to wonderful intimacies we enjoy with him. I enter into this as much or more than any of you" (The Message Bible).

I said to her, "Can you see, Debbie, that this is a God thing? It's not about a denomination. It's not about just an experience. It's about worshiping God, connecting with Him—your spirit with His Spirit—speaking divine secrets and intimacies with the Lord. Debbie, you can have this right now." She said, "No one's ever explained this to me before. I would like to go home this evening, get down on my knees, and ask Jesus to baptize me with the Holy Spirit, and worship Him from the depths of my heart."

I received a phone call from Debbie some days later. She told me how the power of God had fallen on her so strongly that she'd staggered like a drunk. It was such a deep, intimate time with the Lord that her life will never be the same again.

Friend, if you are a believer, if you have repented from your sins, Jesus is waiting for you to ask Him to baptize you with the Holy Spirit. God, our Father, is wanting you to worship Him in spirit and in truth, that is, with all your mind and all your heart. In Luke 11:11-13, Jesus states, "If a son shall ask bread of any of you that is a father, will he give him a stone? Of if he ask a fish, will he for a fish give him a serpent? Or if he shall ask an egg, will he offer him a scorpion? If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children: how much more shall your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to them that ask him?" Have you asked Jesus to baptize you with the Holy Spirit?

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