Living Hope Fellowship Church

GET THE HOLY GHOST

Training Material

by Pastor Kevin Badgley

GET THE HOLY GHOST

Preface

 (you need the Holy Ghost)

          God gave a commission to go into all the world and preach the Gospel.  There is more than salvation.  There is power to keep it!

          Acts 2:38‑39 says, “Then Peter said unto them, Repent, and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins, and ye shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost.  For the promise is unto you, and to your children, and to all that are afar off, even as many as the Lord our God shall call.” 

          God has provided power over the devil to us by the gift of the Holy Ghost, and He has commanded us to receive it.  You can get it, and learn how to operate in it, and grow up into a son of God!

GET THE HOLY GHOST

by Pastor Kevin Badgley

TEACH THEM

          Matthew 28:19‑20 says, “Go ye therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost:  Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you: and, lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world. Amen.” 

          We have not fulfilled the Great Commission of the Lord to go into all the world!  Jesus wanted his disciples and consequently their disciples, every single generation, to observe whatsoever He commanded, and He has given us the same ability to do it.  

EQUIPPED

          Receiving the Holy Ghost is not a “holy suggestion”.  It is a holy commandment.  Now, can you be born again and go to heaven without the Holy Ghost?  Yes.  Can you receive Christ on your death bed and not get baptized in water and still make it to heaven?  The thief on the cross did, but this is not God's “ideal”. 

          We don't send soldiers out with everything they need ‑ except for guns and ammunition.  We send them fully equipped!  It is precisely the same thing if we send missionaries out to the four corners of the earth who have not received the baptism of the Holy Ghost!  Those who they convert to Jesus in highly oppressed lands are often destroyed in short order.  There is very little allowance for the miraculous.  The baptism of the Holy Ghost in itself is miraculous.

          Not everyone is saved, and not everyone is filled with the Holy Ghost, but God wants them to be.  God gave a commission to go into all the world and preach the Gospel.  How awful to go and teach someone a limited amount of knowledge and to limit their resource when the lack of these could destroy them!

          Scaffolding is built beside a structure in order to work at high elevations.  However, if someone hasn't given them all the materials and instructions on how to build scaffolding, it could destroy the one relying on it.  This has happened for two thousand years, off and on, in the church.

          It makes me angry that some churches send people into foreign fields where people die for their faith in Christ, without mentioning to them the power of the Lord Jesus in the baptism of the Holy Ghost.  They give them enough to get saved, and that is all.

GROWING

          If it wasn't for the baptism of the Holy Ghost, I wouldn't have stayed saved!  For some of us it takes more than just the gospel of repentance ‑ it takes power to remain saved, and it takes power to grow!  If I'm not doing something, then I’m going to go backwards.  Some have a natural tendency to want to get to a plateau and stay there. It is easier to sit than it is to go on and grow.

          As a kid I used to have growing pains.  My mama used to call them charley horses, and my legs would really hurt!  My mother would just tell me that my bones and muscles were stretching out.  I thought I was going to be a hundred feet tall, since I had such growing pains!  Without those growing pains, I would have been stunted.  When the gospel of Jesus Christ is preached without the WHOLE gospel, it automatically stunts growth! 

          How many people stay saved?  There will always be martyrs, and some of them will be filled with the Holy Ghost, but Jesus never, ever intended for the church to go without the baptism of the Holy Ghost!  Without the Holy Ghost you have a limited gospel. 

IT'S FOR YOU

          This is Peter's first sermon in Acts 2:38‑39:  “Then Peter said unto them, Repent, and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins, and ye shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost.  For the promise is unto you, and to your children, and to all that are afar off, even as many as the Lord our God shall call.” 

          You cannot receive the baptism of the Holy Ghost unless you are first saved; you have to be bought by the blood of Jesus. 

          The Holy Ghost tongues are for a sign, and signs follow them that believe.  However, you aren't supposed to follow signs.

          Look at Verse 39 again:  “For the promise is unto you, and to your children, and to all that are afar off, even as many as the Lord our God shall call.”

          This goes with John 1:12 that says, “But as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on his name:”

It is a three‑fold thing:  they receive Him, they receive power to become, and then they become ‑ sons of God.  Sons of God translate, sons of God do God's work in the earth, and sons of God rapture! 

          We have a promise of being sons of God, but we have not yet attained it.  Whosoever will, may come, but it is up to the individual.  Now, what about the people who are insane and others who are bound and cannot make a decision?  It is required on the part of a believer to pray for the victory for them.  In the Bible it mentions the man with a lunatic son.  The son had no control whatsoever of his own condition.  He couldn't help himself.  His father couldn't help him.  A still greater tragedy was that the church and the disciples of Jesus couldn't help him either.  Why?  The disciples weren't filled with the Holy Ghost yet! 

          The anointing of the Holy Ghost on Jesus was so powerful that He imparted it to the disciples just by speaking to them.  They went and did great works under His anointing which He had prayed down in His prayer language in the baptism of the Holy Ghost.  This still goes on today.  A lot of people are addicted to the anointing that is prayed down by someone else filled with the Holy Ghost, and so they don’t ever seek for the Holy Ghost baptism themselves.  They are spiritually lazy. 

          Also there is a group filled with the Holy Ghost that does not pray enough to be any good to any one!  Therefore, people on the outside are asking, “What is the advantage?” Ammunition just lying in the ammo dump has no effect whatsoever against the enemy.

SAVED AND OBEDIENT

          After Jesus ascended to heaven, the very first thing He did with the believers was fill them with the Holy Ghost!  Sometimes people receive the baptism of the Holy Ghost before they are even baptized in water!  Some people will never be filled with the Holy Ghost because they aren't obeying God. 

          Acts 5:29 says, “Then Peter and the other apostles answered and said, We ought to obey God rather than men.”  Verse 32 says, “And we are his witnesses of these things; and so is also the Holy Ghost, whom God hath given to them that obey him.” 

          God gives the Holy Ghost to them that obey Him.  First you must be born again.  Realize that you can disobey God in a born again condition, just like how, in a variety of ways, a child disobeys parents.  We can disobey by willful sin in outward rebellion, or we can disobey quietly with passive resistance, pretending that we don't hear.  Both are disobedience.  We will answer to God for it.

          What is a miracle?  A miracle is God’s presence working to do that which cannot be done.  Receiving the Holy Ghost is not something that we “do”.  We believe for it and open ourselves up to God.  Being born again first, God tells us to open our mouths wide, and He will fill us.  God knows that you have much to say, but He wants to put His words in your mouth, so that when you speak it will be Him speaking, not you. 

NEED

          Some argue that they don't need the Holy Ghost, because they see the failure of those who would claim to be filled with the Holy Ghost and don't pray.  If all who truly receive the Holy Ghost did what they were supposed to do, there would be no argument to that affect.

          After I got saved I began to realize that I was a candidate for the Holy Ghost.  I had no Pastor to help me, because he didn't believe in it. I was 30 years old when I received the baptism in the Holy Ghost!  I had been searching for a deeper walk in God for six long years.  That doesn't speak well for the anointing in this area!  When you are searching alone, you don't really know where to go and what to do.  You've heard a lot and seen a lot, and you finally say, “God, this is going to have to be between you and me, because I just don't know about this stuff.” 

          I didn’t treat the baptism of the Holy Ghost as something else I had to do, another responsibility, or another burden! Some in their heart say, “Well, I really wish that I hadn’t received it at all, because now I'm responsible for it!” 

          Most church people don't study the Word of God, and they don't seek for the baptism of the Holy Ghost.  Many who do receive the baptism of the Holy Ghost neglect it.  Paul told Timothy in I Timothy 4:14‑15, “Neglect not the gift that is in thee, which was given thee by prophecy, with the laying on of the hands of the presbytery.  Meditate upon these things; give thyself wholly to them; that thy profiting may appear to all.”

YOUR WALK IN THE SPRIT (HOLY GHOST)

          The Lord has emphasized to me to get folks to understand that receiving the baptism of the Holy Ghost is not optional.  It is one of the things that you do in obeying God.

          Smith Wigglesworth said something astounding, something that I'm sure is flatly rejected by much of the church world today.  He said that from the book of Acts on, scriptures were written only for Holy Ghost filled people.  He said you read the Gospels and learn how to get born again, and then you read the book of Acts and learn about the early part of the church.  From then on, by the rest of the New Testament, you learn how to be filled with the Spirit and how to operate in the Spirit. 

          Some people use part of the scriptures to substantiate why they should not receive the Holy Ghost, such as 1 Corinthians 12:30, “. . . do all speak with tongues? . . . .”  However, The Holy Ghost inspired and “wrote” the Word of God, both the Old and the New Testaments.  It makes sense to be filled with the Writer.  We are filled with the Word, so we should be filled with the Writer of the Word.  David said that his tongue was the pen of a ready writer (see Psalm 45:1).  We should be filled with the power of the Holy Ghost.

          We should be filled with the Spirit and sold out to God like the first church was!  Then the difference would be evident between those who profess Christ, and those who really have Him in greater depths. 

          The seven sons of Sceva tried to cast the devil out of a man by using the name of Jesus.  They weren't Holy Ghost filled, because He only comes to those who obey Him.  They were in disobedience, because they wouldn't receive Him!  They thought they could do it without it, but the devil nearly killed them.  Most churches today don’t want to talk about the devil or devil possession.  They consider it dangerous, and rightly so without a clean life and the power of the Holy Ghost.

          Devil possession today is more prevalent than it has ever been.  The devil possessed person doesn't necessarily wallow and foam at the mouth or spit and curse at every breath.  Some of them are presidents and kings.  Some people are full of the devil, but they are able to live and operate.  Just because people are full of the devil does not mean that they are insane.  Not all devils are insane devils. 

JESUS, OUR EXAMPLE, HAD THE HOLY GHOST

          Acts 10:34‑38 says, “Then Peter opened his mouth, and said, Of a truth I perceive that God is no respecter of persons:  But in every nation he that feareth him, and worketh righteousness, is accepted with him.  The word which God sent unto the children of Israel, preaching peace by Jesus Christ: (he is Lord of all:)  That word, I say, ye know, which was published throughout all Judaea, and began from Galilee, after the baptism which John preached; How God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Ghost and with power: who went about doing good, and healing all that were oppressed of the devil; for God was with him.”

          Isaiah 61:1 says, “The Spirit of the Lord GOD is upon me; because the LORD hath anointed me to preach good tidings unto the meek; he hath sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and the opening of the prison to them that are bound;”

          In the New Testament Jesus came to the synagogue, his home church, and read from Isaiah, Chapter 61. He said in Luke 4:18‑19, “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he hath anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor; he hath sent me to heal the brokenhearted, to preach deliverance to the captives, and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty them that are bruised, To preach the acceptable year of the Lord.”  It was by the power of the Holy Ghost He brought deliverance.

          When I got filled with the Holy Ghost I went back to my home church, and the preacher put something like this in the church bulletin:  “Don’t think that every experience is of God.”  It was fine enough council in itself, but that was an attack against me! 

          After I got the Holy Ghost, I began to receive the things of God.  I began to hear things, and things were happening, because it is totally different when you are filled with the Holy Ghost!  It is not like eating and then digesting it to get it in your system.  The Holy Ghost is a direct line to heaven, but that direct line fails when our carnal mind comes in and indoctrinates it.  If people would hush and listen to the Holy Ghost, when they are filled, He would guide them into all truth.  They wouldn't have one flaw in their doctrine or life.  God ordained that we could walk like Jesus and do what Jesus did! 

          If you have the real baptism in the Holy Ghost, and you are living a defeated life, you have ceased to pray like you should.  God says to pray without ceasing.  It is time to get alone with God in your prayer closet.  Without it we confuse people around us.  They look at your life and say, “Is that the baptism of the Holy Ghost?” 

          Ephesians 5:18 says, “And be not drunk with wine, wherein is excess; but be filled with the Spirit;”  When you walk in the Spirit you shall also live in the Spirit, and you won’t fulfill the lusts of the flesh.  The focus won't be on flesh and all of its cravings, desires, and demands.  You will be set free from many things that you fall into on a daily basis.

          The Bible says that He gives the Holy Ghost to them that obey Him, but that doesn't mean obedience stops there!  You need to pray more than ever!  You run out of regular language after a little while, but when you get filled with the Spirit you have another language.

          Acts 11:15‑17 says, “And as I began to speak, the Holy Ghost fell on them, as on us at the beginning.  Then remembered I the word of the Lord, how that he said, John indeed baptized with water; but ye shall be baptized with the Holy Ghost.  Forasmuch then as God gave them the like gift as he did unto us, who believed on the Lord Jesus Christ; what was I, that I could withstand God?”

          How does the Holy Ghost fall on people today?  The same way as “at the beginning” described in Acts, Chapter 2.  These scriptures let us know that this isn’t just a 2000 year old Jewish event.  It is something for every believer. 

          A Christian believer who is not living a victorious life, needs to get filled with the Holy Ghost. The Bible says also that He will quicken your mortal body by His Spirit that dwells in you.  Romans 8:11 says, “But if the Spirit of him that raised up Jesus from the dead dwell in you, he that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken your mortal bodies by his Spirit that dwelleth in you.”  He is talking about being so filled with the Spirit that there is no room for disease. 

          There is no place in the Bible where Jesus was sick or where any of the disciples were sick after they got filled with the Spirit.  They were attacked, and some were martyred, but that isn't the same thing.  You can be so filled with the Spirit that you won't dread your death. 

          Stephen was being totally caught up and preoccupied with spiritual things.  He saw Jesus standing at the right hand of the Father in heaven.  Heaven was wide open to him, but he was a natural man.  His eyes looked past the veil that God had set up since the fall of Adam, and he looked right into the glory while they were stoning him to death, and then he fell asleep. 

          The Old Testament people had faith in God.  They didn't have the baptism of the Holy Ghost.  What greater things we can walk in, potentially, if we get filled and stay filled with the Holy Ghost!

SPEAKING IN TONGUES

          Some people speak in tongues in church service, but when they go home, they can't.  The Holy Ghost can come upon a person, but some people go into their natural order so fast that He can’t remain on them.  If a person can not speak in tongues at will it does not mean that they aren't filled with the Holy Ghost.  They just don't have the gift of tongues.  They need to seek for that gift. 

          As soon as I received the baptism of the Holy Ghost, I prayed in the Spirit a lot to assure my ability to pray in tongues anytime I wanted to!  I was on the night shift when I received it, and I prayed all the rest of my shift, shutting my mouth only to meet with the public as I passed through the corridors of the prison where I worked as a guard.  I didn't want to say, “Hi” to the captain speaking in tongues!  The only English I used was when I spoke to someone to change keys.  I drove all the way home, about 27 miles, praying in the Holy Ghost.  Then, when I got home I prayed 45 minutes before I went to bed.  I was physically exhausted, but I was so afraid that I wouldn't be able to do it.  I had a hunger for it, and I am telling you my experience.  Being able to pray in the Spirit let me know that He was still with me. 

          I knew Christ, and I knew my life was right according to the Word of the Lord.  The baptism of the Holy Ghost came upon me, and I saw the Lord confirm His Word with signs following immediately afterwards, so I had confidence toward God.

          Some people have a passive mentality, but we should be passionate with God and about the baptism of the Holy Ghost!        

          There are some people who have been filled with the Holy Ghost, and have prayed in tongues, showing the evidence of that baptism, but they cannot “at will” pray in tongues.  I can do it anytime that I want to because that is one of the gifts of the Spirit.  (See 1 Corinthians 12:10.) 

          However, not everybody who is filled with the Holy Ghost can do that.  Some have to have an unction.  God has to move on them sovereignly, or they have to be reading something in the Word and be stirred in the Spirit to pray, or something has to move them. 

          Smith Wigglesworth had that problem and wrestled with it for seven or eight months.  Some people wrestle with it for years.  We need to fervently ask God for the gifts. James 4:2 says, “. . . ye have not, because ye ask not.”  The fervency for going on with God is our main motivation for being filled with the Spirit. 

          You won't spend near the time at the fishing hole that you did before you got the baptism of the Holy Ghost.  He will take away a lot of things out of necessity, but you will see more people healed, and saved, and delivered.  Now, you can either go catch fish or you can catch men!  I don't have time to hunt anymore, except for my socks and stuff like that!  There isn't anything wrong with hunting, but I just don't have time for it.  Prayer and ministry is priority.

STRUGGLING TO GET THE HOLY GHOST

          Why do some people struggle when trying to get the Holy Ghost?  How bad do you want it?  God, a lot of times, makes it difficult on purpose, because if you get filled and then give up, you are in worse shape than if you had never received it.

          With everything we receive from God there is a condition that must be not only met but maintained.  It is a higher level of maintained prayer and study of God's Word.  Unto whom much is given, much is required.  Some are wresting in their mind even while they are saying, “Fill me, Lord.”  They wonder what is going to be required of them. 

          The Holy Ghost gives you power that you never had before.  As we pray we are consumed.  He said that He would baptize you with the Holy Ghost and with fire.  Our God is a consuming fire, and He consumes every thing where He is that is not of Him.  So, if He is in us, and the gift is kept stirred, it will consume everything of us and replace it with Him.  If we keep this channel flowing through seeking the Lord and obedience to God, it continues and soon you can come to the place where Paul walked.  He said in Galatians 2:20, “I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me.”

          That is the process.  You are not a better person because you are filled with Holy Ghost.  You are really just out of the way altogether. 

          Jesus said that God is a Spirit, and they that worship Him must worship Him in Spirit and in truth.  The church is a spiritual entity.  The true church of the Lord Jesus Christ is a spirit being called the Bride.  It is the “flesh” in which Jesus Christ inhabits today on the earth. 

          John 14:16-17 says, “And I will pray the Father, and he shall give you another Comforter, that he may abide with you for ever;  Even the Spirit of truth; whom the world cannot receive, because it seeth him not, neither knoweth him: but ye know him; for he dwelleth with you, and shall be in you.”

CONTACT INFORMATION:

PASTOR KEVIN BADGLEY

LIVING HOPE FELLOWSHIP, P. O. BOX 111, GRAND CHAIN, IL  62941

CHURCH / FAX (618) 634-2541

E-mail  livinghope@hughes.net

www.livinghopefellowshipchurch.org

These condensed Bible studies have been published to help new Christians in their new walk with the Lord.  Kevin Badgley, the author, is the pastor of Living Hope Fellowship Church.

This is a Living Hope Fellowship publication.