The Holy Spirit and His Gifts | Page 20

So I said to this minister, "As long as you let women being preachers bother you, it will hinder you. The devil will use anything he can to get your mind off of God and on something else to try to bring you into confusion. Just stay open to God and let Him tell you whatever He wants to tell you. If you knew everything you should know and if you were everything you should be without the Holy Ghost, what would you need Him for?" This minister finally received the baptism in the Holy Spirit. And, sure enough, when he was filled with the Holy Spirit, it was a woman preacher who prayed with him! After he was filled with the Holy Ghost, he said, "Now I believe in women preachers!" It didn't take him long to change his mind. Actually, when you get filled with the Holy Ghost, you will see that a lot of things you thought were so important, aren't so important after all. And a lot of your prejudices and preconceived notions will fall away to the truth of God's Word as you get your mind renewed (Rom. 12:2). This minister went back home and within one month's time he had gotten sixteen believers filled with the Holy Ghost. Particularly in the days of the Charismatic Movement, one saw denominational people get filled with the Holy Ghost. That number is still multiplying even today. For instance, with just this one man in a few days' time after he was filled with the Holy Spirit, the number of believers filled with the Holy Spirit was multiplied by sixteen. I rejoice in what God is doing in these days! To be honest, as a young preacher I didn't believe I would live to see the supernatural in demonstration as I saw it during the Charismatic Movement of the '60s and '70s. If someone had told me years ago about what would be happening now, it would have been beyond my comprehension. Years ago, I never would have believed certain things to be possible that have happened even in my own ministry! For example, a minister from the denomination I came from was filled with the Holy Ghost. He was the pastor of a church with two thousand members enrolled in the Sunday school program alone. This pastor's deacon was also filled with the Spirit. In fact, this deacon was filled with the Holy Ghost first. Then the deacon kept talking to the pastor about it and finally got him to attend a Full Gospel meeting. The pastor saw what the Bible has to say about the Holy Ghost and was filled with the Holy Ghost and spoke with other tongues! This deacon's brother was a member of a Pentecostal church and had been for nearly twenty years, but he had never received the Holy Ghost. The pastor and the deacon brought the deacon's brother to the meeting so he could be filled with the Holy Ghost too. It used to be the other way around: Pentecostal people usually got denominational people filled with the Holy Ghost! But we have lived long enough to see things change because now sometimes denominational people are the ones getting Pentecostal church folks filled with the Holy Ghost! I preached a meeting in a denominational church in Texas once where ninety-five percent of the church received the infilling of the Holy Ghost and spoke with other tongues. It was a glorious service filled with thrilling testimonies, and the service had that warm glow to i BƖ