It was some time in the 1990s when I sought earnestly to receive the Holy Spirit having been challenged by a fellow student a decade earlier about whether I had ever received the Holy Spirit in my experience as a believer. That challenge had ticked away in my mind for years. I did at one time earlier than the nineties receive the power of God on me while praying with an evangelist who had just preached that Christ died for me. It had transformed me in my lying adolescent ways into someone determined to only speak truth, especially teaching me this when I was among other believers. But the question that bothered me was whether I had had the kind of experience of receiving the Holy Spirit like the believers mentioned in the Bible had, and in the early nineties I was earnestly pleading with God in private prayer for this. It was at a moment when my prayer was particularly in earnest that an answer was initially given me as a vision. A bucket of builders sand was tipped out in front of me in this vision and words came very clearly to me ‘Build the Temple’. I struggled to find ways of obeying this, realising that the gift of the Holy Spirit when given to me could be all for the purpose of building up the body of believers that becomes the temple of the body of Christ, as the scripture says. I looked for ways to preach, thinking this would be how I might obey the call. I realised with conviction that I was ignorant of God and could not adequately preach without truly knowing Father and Son and Holy Spirit, so after pondering this I one day asked for this knowledge of this truth to be given me, asking specifically being given interactions directly with Father, and with Son, and with Holy Spirit. There followed three such experiences spread out over several months. The third occasion was where in a service of a Pentecostal Assembly of God I received, by the Holy Spirit upon me, the interpretation in my spirit and mind of a message spoken in tongues by the leader speaking at the microphone, and he then gave the same words I had received in my mind. “Consider the trees. They put forth buds and leaves. They do so by the power of the name of the Lord Jesus Christ.” Here was my moment of receiving the answer to original prayer I had prayed many months earlier, the same kind of gifting the believers mentioned in scripture had received, although it was interpretation rather than speaking in tongues. Months later I was preparing to go to a different church and a message of prophecy was given me. “Israel has sinned, and this is the sign:” and the vision with the prophecy showed me the sign of a black eagle overhead with a white shining eye. I saw it verified in many ways, and spoke it to a young leader of the church I attended. But all this is only the start. I learned to compare the experience to the scripture of the gospel message. I was led by it into more and more understanding of truth, as I had asked, so I could preach it and teach it, which mainly I did online, to try to reach a wide audience. I needed to generalise my own lessons learned into teachings relevant to others. This was a challenge, since how could I apply what for me was mostly experiential and private, to reach a more public audience and be what was needed for building others into the living temple of God. It became clear that the Holy Spirit and experiences transfer what is given by the Father to Jesus, making it known to the believer. It is intrinsic to how Jesus saves those who believe the true gospel message about him. He himself had had his life made holy, set apart by the Father, by this same Holy Spirit. He taught that in his sayings, and in gracious works of the Father giving the Holy Spirit to believers, the believer turns around from lying, sinful ways, into saintliness and right living. It is what makes a believer into one of the true disciples of Jesus, like the sheep of the shepherd. It requires belief in Jesus and then ongoing perpetual keeping of his teachings, which are learned in scripture, in sayings passed on by various kinds of teachings and word of mouth, awareness of the lessons of miracles done in Jesus’ name, gifts of the Holy Spirit given in various ways, and many other kinds of gracious workings of God in believers’ lives. Keeping what is received having faith in the light of the world sent by God, namely Jesus, constitutes the discipleship that leads to eternal life in Jesus, ultimately life after resurrection or giving of immortality when he returns. The knowledge of both Father and Son results from this, and fellowship with Father and Son which can be forever. That is the goal. That is the salvation. That is the building of the Temple. That is eternal life, as Jesus said.
