If we believe we are living in the last days, we need the Holy Spirit desperately! The reason I first received the Holy Spirit was because I knew I had to preach the Gospel – with lives changed, souls saved into the Kingdom! I found Christ when I was 8, was baptised in water aged 12. The first time I spoke in my church I was only 13. I advertised, the people came; I preached, but nobody repented! I was shocked because I had grown up with some of the greatest evangelists. I went home and asked my father, who was a great preacher, one of the founders of the Pentecostal movement in Great Britain, what was wrong? I had preached the same Gospel – from the Bible like my father – but nobody repented. My father said, “Because you have not yet received the Holy Spirit!” That night he laid his hands on me and prayed that I would receive the Holy Spirit – but I did not receive – no fire, no power! But from that moment I had only one desire, to meet with God and to receive His power in my life.
For 3 months I prayed without receiving. But I knew that without the power, the fire, the anointing of God, I could never see men’s lives converted. At Easter we used to have three Pentecostal Conventions in London. I determined to go and not leave until I had received the baptism of the Holy Spirit! The preaching was so long in the morning, there was no time to pray for people to receive the Holy Spirit! As a 13-year old I went up to those great men of God on the platform and said, “I only came to receive the fire, pray for me!” They took me to a small room, laid their hands on me, but their minds were on their lunch! I did not receive the Holy Spirit.
I was searching for something which does not come from men, the real power of God. One of those pastors saw my heart, opened the Scripture to me, then when he prayed and laid hands on me, it was as if the roof came off the building, I saw the Glory of God and felt the fire! The fire of the Holy Ghost, the power of God and the Glory of God came into my life! Now I had to become an evangelist! I had to preach Christ, and see the Power! That baptism was only the beginning!
If you want to be effective in ministry, you MUST be filled with the Holy Spirit! There is a danger today that we do not understand the reality of what the baptism in the Holy Spirit means.
Baptism in the Holy Spirit should be more powerful than in water! – Jesus said, “You shall be baptised in the Holy Spirit.” Why? Jesus said, “Unless I die, you cannot receive the Holy Spirit! But if I go I will send Him – and He, the Holy Spirit, will convict the world of sin, righteousness and judgment – and nothing will be impossible! You will be My witnesses, preach Christ, demonstrate the power of God on earth!”
The revolution when you are baptised in the Holy Spirit, has to be LIFE-TRANSFORMING! In the Acts of the Apostles the disciples received the baptism of the Holy Spirit – instantly they were no longer frightened and ineffective, but filled with boldness and fire! That’s what we need today in the church – a new boldness, a new authority, a new power – which is the result of a baptism in the Holy Spirit!
From the moment I was baptised in the Holy Spirit, my whole life was transformed – not just by the gifts of the Holy Spirit, but absolute change! Saved, baptised in water, now almost 14, that baptism in the Holy Spirit was the greatest change of all, a REVOLUTION in my life! It changed my living, my thinking, my preaching, – a physical and spiritual manifestation that was obvious wherever I went. I was preaching in the school: now my classmates changed, two went on to become preachers; the cynical Scripture teacher, who spent his time criticising the Bible, also changed and started a Bible study group and prayer meeting in the school! Baptism in the Holy Spirit is not just an anointing or a feeling or an emotional experience – it has to be an ABSOLUTE LIFE-CHANGING MIRACLE, a spiritual revolution in your life. If it has not changed you, you need to be immersed and baptised in the Holy Spirit again!
In 1964, only three and a half years after my first visit to Jerusalem, I lost my voice. Unable to preach in my church, I went to the hospital to be told I had throat cancer and needed an operation. I didn’t have time for an operation and, believing God for a miracle because I had seen so many healings in my ministry, I prayed for 3 months. Then, because my faith was strong, I told the doctors that I was healed. They laughed at me, they said that there is no God and the cancer was now so big, I must have an operation within 3 days to remove my vocal chord! I went home in shock – I was an evangelist, a missionary in Israel – and, only 32 years old, my ministry was finished!
I fell on my knees and said, “O God, teach me how to pray!” – It’s one thing to pray when they say you have cancer, it is totally different when you only have 3 days before they take away your voice! I remember crying out, “Oh God, I haven’t yet seen Your power in my life! Oh God, my dream, my vision is not fulfilled! Oh God heal me! I’ve seen so many miracles! But now I need a miracle!” My church members said, “It is so easy for David to see God work miracles when somebody else has cancer. Now he’s got it!” At the end of that day I was not healed.
The next day I changed my prayer to the most dangerous one of my life: “Oh God I believe you are telling me my ministry should be in Russia. If You want me to leave my home, my family, then I need a miracle! Take this cancer out now!” I went to the Word of God. The relationship I have with God is that I say, “Lord, if You want to talk with me, tell me direct and show me in writing, in Your Word!” Men lie, but God is not a man, He cannot lie! The Bible is the most powerful book in the world! All the power and authority that God has is revealed in His Word! – What He says He does! I turned to Romans 8, and read: “When we don’t know how to pray, the Holy Spirit prays for us, according to the will of God.” In that moment, I knew I had the answer. It was the will of God!
Next morning I went to the hospital. There were three doctors, they put the instruments down my throat, pulled them out – three times – and they were angry and began to accuse me, “Who did it? Who operated? – Somebody has cut it out with a knife! The surgeon who operated has left a scar!” I said, “The God you don’t believe in, He did it last night!” God had touched my throat, and touched my life! Now I had to tell my church that I would leave and go to Russia!
But why did this happen? Because I was searching for the power of God in my life. The cancer was the next step, God knew my heart. In 1961 I went to Jerusalem saying I wanted a new anointing, a new fire – and three and a half years later I got the beginning of a new power, a new fire, when God healed my cancer! Without that miracle I would not have known the power of God in my life! I don’t want prophecy, I don’t want emotion, I don’t want to party. I want the Hand of God to touch me. It was one more step towards the real power of God – a baptism of fire!