Hi pastor John,
I have a question. How would you know if a person who has Holy Ghost and the person who doesn’t have?
Thank you.
Leika
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Hi Leika.
That is THE question of the ages. Every wise follower of Jesus asks it.
Jesus told Nicodemus that when a person is born of the Spirit, the Spirit always produces a sound:
John 3:8. “The wind blows wherever it will, and you hear its sound, but you don’t know where it’s coming from or where it’s going. So is everyone who is born of the Spirit.”
When the Spirit was first given, the people who received it spoke in tongues; that was there sound the Spirit produced:
Acts 2:2. And suddenly there came a sound from heaven like a violent, rushing wind, and it filled the whole house where they were sitting
- And there appeared to them divided tongues like fire, and it sat upon each one of them,
- and they were all filled with holy Spirit, and they began to speak in other tongues as the Spirit moved them to speak.
Afterward in Acts, whenever people received the Spirit and the sound of the Spirit is mentioned, the sound was speaking in tongues (Acts 10; 19). But when men began to teach that there was no sound, that one could receive the Spirit without the sound that Jesus said would always be there, the apostles had to defend the truth, the “faith that was once for all delivered to the saints” (Jude 1:3). To make sure that God’s children were not taken in by the new doctrine of false teachers who taught men that they could receive the Spirit of God without the sound being there, John wrote this:
1John 4:
- Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits, whether they are of God, because many false prophets have gone out into the world.
- By this, the Spirit of God is known: every spirit that confesses Jesus Christ when he has come into a person is of God,
- and every spirit that does not confess Jesus Christ when he has come into a person is not of God. And this is that of the anti-Christ which you have heard is coming, and now, already, it is in the world.
In spite of what Jesus said and the apostles taught, the doctrine that people could be born of God without the sound of the Spirit was so attractive to sinners that it won the day, and thus, the seed of Christianity was sown.
Unfortunately, many who truly do receive the Spirit do not follow it, and their behavior demeans the wonderful work that God once wrought in their heart. They will have blood on their hands in the Final Judgment. These are the “foolish virgins” of which Jesus spoke. Those children of God look like and act like the world. On the other hand, some people without the Spirit behave themselves so well that they may look like and act like believers. But in an Assembly of saints, they cannot worship in the Spirit with God’s children; nor can they sense in their everyday life what God is feeling and thinking.
In such cases, the Spirit inside of you, the Spirit that made a sound when it came in, has to let you know who has the Spirit and who does not, and it always will. Many times, we feel a connection with someone we meet, although nothing has been said. Then we find out they received the Spirit in the past. That holy connection is sweet.
If you read my recent booklet, The Sound of the Spirit,* you will see that the sound made by the Spirit may not always be in a clear language, but it will always be there.
I hope that answers your very good question.
The saints here greet you in the love of Christ.
Pastor John
* Going to Jesus.com – The Sound of the Spirit at Spirit Baptism