We want to learn how to be filled with the Spirit and how to maintain that fullness.
A worshiper can never stay defeated. In worship we can become so full of the Spirit, that in His presence we can directly receive from the Holy Spirit himself. The Holy Spirit is a genus at worship, and can teach us so much.
The tabernacle of David is being raised up. There are other aspects of the tabernacle of David, but worship is foundational. Our worship has to go beyond the veil.
The Holy Spirit is pictured as the river of life; He flows from the throne of God, from heaven down into our spirit.
When we worship the Lord in spirit, our spirit touches the Lord becoming aware of His presence. His Spirit fills our spirit and then our soul.
The life of God flows out of heaven into our spirit and then into our soul and body into the atmosphere around us.
When a person is filled with the Spirit those whose spirits are open to the Lord can sense the Lords presence being around us.
In the midst of our worship there must be not only a giving of praise unto the Lord, but also a drawing from Him.
We need to concentrate as we worship, we need to focus until we have an awareness that we are drawing or pulling down. When we worship we lift up our hands. As we reach up to the Lord, we draw from Him, but we also give Him praise at the same time. With an almost explosive concentration, yet without any physical activity, we need to get the sensation of lifting up to the Lord. The sensing of our spirit ascending to the Lord, we are approaching His throne. We reach up as though we were projecting ourselves right into His presence.
The Lord is a fountain, and it’s all by grace. We may have some deep needs inside, but the Holy Spirit can take care of them if He is filling our life. So we don’t worry about anything; but only trust Him. Without self-condemnation, we just reach out and embrace the lord, and the Holy Spirit will convict us and show us what is wrong, and displace it with His Spirit.
We are under grace, the empowering presence and nature of God that transforms our life. God gives us many promises and sets many blessings before us which we can draw from.
God has spoken the new creation into existence by His word in eternity. The word became flesh and our old man died with Christ on the cross, and His Spirit was transferred into us.
By His faith we lay hold upon what Jesus has already provided for us in the eternal realm and it becomes manifested in the time and space realm.
We can believe for something good if we love the Lord. How do we love the Lord, we let His love fill us through the first love gate in our spirit and it then just flows back to Him. He loves us; and we can reach out and draw from Him.
We need to let our worship change a little: and speak in tongues, sing in tongues a little. The Holy Spirit tells us in I Corinthians 14 that in tongues we give thanks well, but our understanding is unfruitful. This means that the Holy Spirit is using our subconscious mind, and bypassing our conscious mind; therefore our understanding is unfruitful. The subconscious mind becomes more accurately the voice of our spirit than does your conscious mind. When we speak in tongues, it will come more directly from our spirit. When you speak in tongues you edify yourself, while in prophesying we edify someone else, but the blessing boomerangs back to us.
When we are concerned about being full of the Holy Spirit, we speak in tongues. Do not be afraid it will be mechanical if you have already been worshiping in the Spirit; just quietly let the flow of tongues come forth. You may say, “What if it’s me?” Of course, it is you; it isn’t someone else. We speak in tongues as the Spirit gives the utterance. “I’m afraid it will be in the flesh.” Suppose it is at first—what is meant by the flesh, anyway? Is there anyone who isn’t in the flesh? In any manifestation, at the very best there’s a little flesh. What we’re concerned about is that it not be all flesh.
We just exercise our will. With the moving of the Holy Spirit, the human initiative is such that the instructions regulating tongues are given as though it were our responsibility. And if it’s our responsibility, it’s something that we can start and stop almost at will. Forget everything else, just begin, let the tongues flow and edify yourself. Do it with real faith. Don’t be bound, thinking, “Oh, I’m afraid of this or that.”
One of the most common causes of problems is guilt—that we become our own judge, jury and executioner. Self-condemnation freezes people spiritually because they do not judge correctly; they just create a hell for themselves, and there they stand, condemned and guilty. Forget that.
The Holy Spirit comes to minister grace to us— we need to draw it in. As God begins to deal with us concerning our problems and sins, then we get down on our face and repent for all we’re worth; but don’t try to usurp the work of the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit is the One who convicts the world of sin; and who are we, to condemn what God is bringing forth? Until God condemns it, leave your heart alone.
But when you see God put His finger on something, then repent quickly. People, who go into introspection, trying to find out what is wrong, will find many things; but many times they are the trivial, nonessential things that God doesn’t care about, while they overlook the things that God would put His finger on.
When we open our heart to the Lord, we don’t condemn ourselves; we just start drawing from the Lord. When there’s a flow of tongues, and we are rejoicing, it won’t be long before the problem (if there is one) will come to the surface. Then we can deal with it by saying, “Lord, forgive it and cleanse me”; but if we struggle with it ourselves we can’t handle it.
Receiving the Holy Spirit should not involve any spotlight of attention. It should be a simple experience that opens the door to a blessing the individual will walk in the rest of their life and on through eternity.
The Holy Spirit will abide with us forever. To receive a sweet flow of tongues it will help if we realize that though our knowledge and understanding is unfruitful, we still know our general goal and direction, which is praise to God. If we simply concentrate on praising God, tongues will flow much easier than if we stand back and wonder, “What am I doing? What am I saying?” Be aware that it is a flow of beautiful praise to the Lord. Although we don’t know what we are saying, we do know the general idea of it and immediately the tongues will flow much easier.
These little hints will help you, but you may need to go a little deeper in this. You may be opening your heart and singing forth in tongues, praising the Lord, but yet not be filled.
When we are filled, we will run over, like an overflowing tank of water. Only then will we have blessing to spare with which we can bless others.
Learn to draw and draw from the Holy Spirit; and after a while you will feel a peace, a fullness, and an exhilarating joyfulness.
We need to receive and maintain the overflow—for that is where the blessing is to other people. We are all much more eager to receive blessing from someone who is bubbling over, and rejoicing in the Lord, than from an individual who is somewhat defeated and not feeling well, yet has the burden to pray for us. It’s the overflow that counts. Be filled with the Spirit; speaking to yourselves in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody in your heart to the Lord. Ephesians 5:18–19.
To minister in the Spirit we have to be filled with the Spirit. I have received a lot of personal ministry from other people over the years, and instead of building me up, it drained whatever life of God I had in me, out of me.
We all need the presence of God, and if our words are not filled with the Spirit, we are not helping people we are pushing them away from us.
The gift of tongues is like a siphon. We can take water out of a tank by siphoning. After you start the siphon, it will continue flowing as long as there is anything in the tank. That is exactly what we do in this—we start siphoning with praise. Sometimes it’s like priming a pump as we enter in by faith. The Spirit of the Lord is upon us, and we simply open our mouth, believing that we will speak forth in tongues. Sometimes it comes quite spontaneously; but whether it does or not is unimportant.
Every individual’s experience is unique and different. We couldn’t use another person’s experience any more than we could use their false teeth. We must have our own experience, in our own special way. But we make a mistake if we stop before we’re filled to overflowing.
With that overflow we will feel the peace, the cleansing and purging of every restraint upon our mind. We can drink and drink without understanding much about the Holy Spirit; but when we hit a certain level, just as if someone had pushed a button, it starts spouting. We drill so deep and then suddenly we have a gusher; and that’s what we want.
When we receive the Holy Spirit we have a deep sense of His presence, an awareness of the Lord; but don’t stop there, as wonderful as it is. Go on until it’s bubbling over.
An experience will be whatever we believe for it to be. We can believe to just get a touch from the Lord, and say, “Praise the Lord; I received the Holy Spirit.” But why not be so filled that it keeps flowing over and over?
Young people who are addicted to drugs find it easier to kick the habit after they are filled with the Holy Spirit and speak in tongues. When we’re filled with the Holy Spirit all the patterns of our thinking and our personality are exposed to God; He’s indwelling us and filling us, and things change. Let’s also see that our children (from about two years old and up) are filled with the Holy Spirit. They need it, for they’re being raised in a day when there’s so much demonic activity.
People are content to settle for too little. We all ought to walk and commune with God, and be temples of the Holy Spirit.
Why don’t people want this deeper mystical walk with God? There’s a reason: a cross is involved with it. Usually people like to receive something if it doesn’t cost them anything. Remember what David said: “I’ll not give unto the Lord that which costs me nothing.” Is that your feeling too? Do you want the cost to be total? Do you want to be a disciple?
Sometimes people have a mental block against tongues because of someone they knew who was a fanatic, and then it seems difficult for them to speak in tongues. They should receive good teaching on it and be in a place where they can receive the Holy Spirit by faith.
Others may have a restraint about tongues because it seems like a repetition of sounds. When Isaiah prophesied about this (and that prophecy is quoted in I Corinthians 14 where Paul speaks about tongues), he said, “With stammering lips and another tongue will He speak to this people” (Isaiah 28:11). People have claimed receiving the Holy Spirit who only stammered, “Ba-ba-ba,” but they claimed the experience and later they went on to clear tongues.
So stammering is all right, and repeating the same syllable over and over is all right. The Holy Spirit could be saying something that you know nothing about. For example, if someone were to repeat over and over, “Amo, amo, amo, amo” you might think it strange, unless you realized they were saying, “I love, I love, I love, I love,” in the language of the early church. When you speak in tongues you don’t know what you are saying.
The handwriting on the wall at the time of Daniel was comprised of only four words: “Mene, Mene, Tekel, Upharsin.” But when it was interpreted, it turned out to be about thirty words: “God hath numbered thy kingdom, and brought it to an end. Thou art weighed in the balances, and art found wanting. Thy kingdom is divided, and given to the Medes and Persians.”
So don’t worry about the sounds that may be coming forth; but ask the Lord to give you a fluent tongue. Ask the Lord also to let you speak to Him in different languages, and watch it change from time to time. Don’t become discouraged if you begin with the same sounds over and over; but don’t be content with that.
You learn things in the realm of the Spirit as well as in any other realm; and soon you will learn, not how to speak a language, but how to be more yielded so that a beautiful flow comes forth. You speak as the Spirit gives utterance, and though you may not be too yielded to it at first the utterance will become more pronounced at a later time as you yield to it.