Have you ever wondered how Christians receive the Holy Ghost? It is by obedience to the Blood. Some groups teach that it is by obedience to the ministry that we receive the Spirit and other attributes of God, but this is error. It is the same error, which the Catholic Church and all the other denominations preach when they say they are the only true church and unless you belong to their ranks you cannot make heaven.
God’s order of things is such that one obeys the Word of God in order to receive the Blood of Christ which is the life of God. The next step is to obey that which you have received, in order to receive that which you desire. We obey the Blood and we receive the Holy Ghost. When we obey the Holy Ghost, we receive the fullness. This is clearly defined by Jesus Himself in John 14:23.
“Jesus answered and said unto him, If a man love me, he will keep my words: and my Father will love him, and we will come unto him, and make our abode with him.”
The Holy Ghost causes people to speak in tongues, but not everyone who speaks in tongues is filled with the Holy Ghost. In some places, devil worshippers speak in tongues. There are unclean churches who believe in abominable living, they preach and teach abomination for their doctrines, yet speak in tongues. People can speak in tongues psychologically. There are three types of tongues: (a) Tongues from God (b) Tongues from the devil (c) Tongues from the mind of the individual.
Mark 16:17-18, “And these signs shall follow them that believe; (1) In my name shall they cast out devils; (2) they shall speak with new tongues; (3) They shall take up serpents; (4) and if they drink any deadly thing, it shall not hurt them; (5) they shall lay hands on the sick, and they shall recover.”
Of these five signs mentioned, there is only one which could be reasonably shown in a congregation – speaking in tongues. This is surely a sign of the Spirit being within, when involuntarily one speaks another language, whether it be the language of angels, some extinct or living language, it does not make any difference. In some parts of the world, Christians receiving the baptism of the Holy Spirit, in many instances, speak clearly in English which they could not speak before. Yet, their understanding is as unfruitful as those who speak Greek in tongues here in the United States.
An incident occurred with us in India in 1981, which will adequately explain this situation. We were in a meeting with brethren in Velpur, Andra Pradesh State, where they speak only Telegu. We had an interpreter and the Lord said we should speak on the Baptism of the Holy Ghost. The interpreter was somewhat displeased with us and when we were about to commence the meeting, we saw him go off in a rickshaw. We began to preach the word with as much sign language as we could, and with the help of a brother who knew a little English. Suddenly my wife saw an angel standing beside one of the sisters. The chief problem there was that they did not want women to speak in the congregations. However, when the angel appeared beside this sister, she lifted her hands in the air and began to speak in perfect English. Then, another woman, and another woman, and soon the whole congregation began to raise their hands and praise the Lord in English.
We felt so stupid! Here we were trying to make signs to them and talk to them when it now seemed that all of them could speak English. Nevertheless, none of them actually could. They were all speaking in tongues. We did not find this out until they were out of the Spirit and we tried to talk to them. There is a large congregation there now but they have not yet learned to speak English.
Sonlight Devotional 