I often ask, “How many can say like Jeremiah, ‘His word was in my heart as a burning fire shut up in my bones; and I was weary of forbearing it, and I could not endure it’ (20:9)?”
If we are honest, we realize that the power of the Holy Spirit is clearly missing in the lives of many Christians. But before I continue, I want to tell you about a special event this weekend:
Urgent Message For America: April 25-26. Mark your calendars now. God is our only hope during this pandemic. “Will You not revive us again, that Your people may rejoice in You?” (Ps. 85:6).
I came across an encouraging book a few years ago titled, They Found The Secret. It contains brief biographies of Christian leaders such as D.L. Moody, John Bunyan, Amy Carmichael, Charles Finney, Adoniram Judson, Oswald Chambers, Hudson Taylor, Andrew Murray and more who received a mighty filling of the Spirit after conversion…sometimes years later. In many cases, it wasn’t until they finally surrendered their entire life to God that they experienced such intensity that could only be born of the Spirit.
In the words of Oswald Chambers before the Spirit came upon him, “God used me during those years…but I had no conscious communion with Him. The Bible was the dullest, most uninteresting book in existence.” Then he writes a few years later, “If the four previous years had been hell on earth, these five years have truly been heaven on earth. Glory be to God, the last aching abyss of the human heart is filled to overflowing with the love of God.”
D.L. Moody referred to his experience this way after realizing that his ministry was motivated by fleshly ambitions: “There came a great hunger in my soul. I did not know what it was and I began to cry out to God as never before. Sometime later as I was walking in New York God answered my prayer. I cannot describe it, I seldom refer to it; it is almost too sacred an experience to name…I can only say that God revealed Himself to me, and I had such an experience of His love that I had to ask Him to stay His hand.”
Early in Billy Graham’s ministry a Welsh evangelist told Mr. Graham how God completely turned his life around by the power of the Holy Spirit. Billy realized that he needed this same power and prayed a prayer of total dedication. The story concluded that Billy Graham was a new man from that day forward…there was now power when he preached. Granted, not everyone is called to this magnitude of ministry, but we are all called to be filled with the Holy Spirit.
Click here to read more.
SOURCE: Charisma News
BCNN1 WP 