Mark xi. 24, "Therefore I say unto you, What things
The Baptism With the Holy Spirit 231
the meeting in the early morning hours and took a
train for a city in Wisconsin, and I soon received word from that city that thirty-eight young men and boys had been converted while he spoke. Another young man, one of our students in the Institute, went to an-
other part of Wisconsin, and soon I began to receive
letters from ministers in that neighbourhood inquiring about him and telling how he had gone into the school-
houses and churches and Soldiers' Home and how there were conversions wherever he spoke. In the days that
followed men and women from that meeting went out
over the earth and I doubt if there was any country that I visited in my tour around the world, Japan,
China, Australia, New Zealand, India, etc., in which I
did not find some one who had gone out from that
meeting with the power of God upon them. For me
to doubt that God fills men with the Holy Spirit in answer to prayer would be thoroughly unscientific and
irrational. I know He does. And in a matter like
this, I would rather have one ounce of believing ex-
perience than ten tons of unbelieving exegesis.
xnd last step is faith. We read in Mark xi. 24, "Therefore I say unto you, What things soever ye desire, when ye pray, believe that ye receive
7. The seventh a
them and ye shall have them." No matter how definite God's promises are, we only realize these promises
experimentally when we believe. For example we
read in James i. 5, R. V., " But if any of you lacketh
wisdom, let him ask of God, who giveth to all
liberally and upbraideth not; and it shall be given him." Now that promise is as positive as a promise
232 The Person and Work of the Holy Spirit
can be but we read in the following verses, " But let him ask in faith nothing doubting : for he that doubteth
is like the surge of the sea driven by the wind and
tossed. For let not that man think that he shall re-
ceive anything of the Lord; a double-minded man,
unstable in all his ways." The baptism with the
Spirit, as we have already seen, is for those believers in
Christ, who -have put away all sin and surrendered ab-
solutely to God, who ask for it, but even though we
ask there will be no receiving if we do not believe. There are many who have met the other conditions of
receiving the baptism with the Holy Spirit and yet do
not receive, simply because they do not believe. They do not expect to receive and they do not receive. But
there is a faith that goes beyond expectation, a faith
that puts out its hand and takes what it asks on the
spot. This comes out in the Revised Version of Mark xi. 24, " Therefore I say unto you, All things whatsoever ye pray and ask for, believe that ye have re-
ceived them and ye shall have them." When we pray
for the baptism with the Holy Spirit we should believe
that we have received (that is that God has granted our
prayer and therefore it is ours) and then we shall have
the actual experience of that which we have asked. When the Revised Version came out, I was greatly puzzled about the rendering of Mark xi. 24. 1 had
begun at the beginning of the New Testament and
gone right through comparing the Authorized Ver-
sion with the Revised and comparing both with the
best Greek text, but when I reached this passage, I was
greatly puzzled. I read the Authorized Version,
The Baptism With the Holy Spirit 233
u What things soever ye desire when ye pray, believe
that ye receive them and ye shall have them/' and that
seemed plain enough. Then I turned to the Revised
4C All things whatsoever ye pray and
Version and read,
ask for believe that ye have received them and ye shall
have them." And I said to myself, " What a confu-
sion of the tenses. Believe that ye have already re-
ceived (past), and ye shall have afterwards (future). What nonsense/* Then I turned to my Greek Testa-
ment and I found whether sense or nonsense, the
Revised Version was the correct rendering of the
Greek, but what it meant I did not know for years. But one time I was studying and expounding to my church the First Epistle of John. I came to the fifth
chapter, the fourteenth and fifteenth verses (R. V.) and
I read, " And this is the boldness which we have to-
wards Him, that, if we ask anything according to His
will, He heareth us : and if we know that He heareth
us whatsoever we ask, we know that we have the
petitions which we have asked of Him." Then I un-
derstood Mark xi. 24. Do you see it ? If not, let rne
explain it a little further. When we come to God in
prayer, the first question to ask is, Is that which I have
asked of God according to His will ? If it is promised
in His Word, of course, we know it is according to
His will. Then we can say with I John v. 14, 1 have
asked something according to His will and I know He
hears me. Then we can go further and say with the
fifteenth verse, Because I know He hears what I ask, I know I have the petition which I asked of Him. I
may not have it in actual possession but I know it is
234 The Person and Work of the Holy Spirit
mine because I have asked something according to His
will and He has heard me and granted that which I
have asked, and what I thus believe I have received
because the Word of God says so, I shall afterwards
have in actual experience. Now apply this to the
matter before us. When I ask for the baptism with
the Holy Spirit, I have asked something according to
His will, for Luke xi. 13 and Acts ii. 39 say so, there-
fore I know my prayer is heard, and still further I know
because the prayer is heard that I have the petition which I have asked of Him, i. *., I know I have the
baptism with the Holy Spirit. I may not feel it yet but I have received, and what I thus count mine rest-
ing upon the naked word of God, I shall afterwards
have in actual experience. Some years ago I went to
the students' conference at Lake Geneva, Wisconsin,
with Mr. F. B. Meyer, of London. Mr. Meyer spoke
that night on the Baptism with the Holy Spirit. At
the conclusion of his address, he said, " If any of you wish to speak with Mr. Torrey or myself after the meet-
ing is over, we will stay and speak with you." A young man came to me who had just graduated from one of the
Illinois colleges. He said, " I heard of this blessing
thirty days ago and have been praying for it ever since
but do not receive. What is the trouble ? " " Is your
will laid down ? " I asked. " No," he said, " I am
afraid it is not." " Then," I said, u there is no use
praying until your will is laid down. Will you lay down your will ? " He said, " I cannot."
* Are you
willing that God should lay it down for you ? " "I am." " Let us kneel and ask Him to do it/* We
The Baptism With the Holy Spirit 235
knelt side by side and I placed my Bible open at i John
v. 14, 15 on the chair before him. He asked God to
lay down his will for him and empty him of his self-
will and to bring his will into conformity with the will
of God. When he had finished the prayer, I said, u Is it done ? " He said, " It must be. I have asked
something according to His will and I know He hears me and I know I have the petition I have asked.
Yes, my will is laid down." " What is it you
desire ? " " The baptism with the Holy Spirit." " Ask for it." Looking up to God he said, " Heavenly
Father, baptize me with the Holy Spirit now." a Did
you get what you asked ? " I asked. " I don't feel
it," he replied. " That is not what I asked you," I
said. " Read the verse before you," and he read, " This
is the boldness which we have towards Him that if we
ask anything according to His will He heareth us." u What do you know ? " I asked. He said, " I know if I ask anything according to His will He hears me." "What did you ask?" "I asked for the
cc Is that according to
baptism with the Holy Spirit."
His will?" "Yes, Acts ii. 39 says so." "What
do you know then?" "I know He has heard me." "Read on." "And if we know that if He heareth
us whatsoever we ask, we know that we have the
petitions which we have asked of Him." u What do
you know ? " I asked. " I know I have the petition
I asked of Him." "What was the petition you asked of Him ? " " The baptism with the Holy
Spirit." " What do you know ? " " I know I have
the baptism with the Holy Spirit. I don't feel it.
236 The. Person and Work of the Holy Spirit
but God says so." We arose from our knees and
after a short conversation separated. I left Lake
Geneva the next morning, but returned in a few days.
I met the young man and asked if he had really re-
ceived the baptism with the Holy Spirit. He did not
need to answer. His face told the story, but he did
answer. He went into a theological seminary the
following autumn, was given a church his junior year
in the seminary, had conversions from the outset, and
the next year on the Day of Prayer for Colleges,
largely through his Influence there came a mighty out-
pouring of the Spirit upon the seminary of which the
president of the seminary wrote to a denominational
paper, that it was a veritable Pentecost, and it all came
through this young man who received the baptism with
the Holy Spirit through simple faith in the Word of
God. XAny one who will accept Jesus as their Saviour
and their Lord, put away all sin out of their life,
publicly confess their renunciation of sin and acceptance of Jesus Christ, surrender absolutely to God, and ask God for the baptism with the Holy Spirit, and take it
by simple faith in the naked Word of God, can receive
the baptism with the Holy Spirit right now. There
are some who so emphasize the matter of absolute sur-
render that they ignore, or even deny, the necessity of
prayer. It is always unfortunate when one so em-
phasizes one side of truth that he loses sight of another
side which may be equally important. In this way, many lose the blessing which God has provided for
them.
The seven steps given above lead with abso-
The Baptism With the Holy Spirit 237
lute certainty into the blessing. But several questions
arise :
I. Must we not wait until we know we have re-
ceived the baptism with the Holy Spirit before we take up
Christian work ? Yes, but how shall we know ? There are two ways of knowing anything in the Chris-
tian life. First, by the Word of God ; second, by ex-
perience or feeling. God's order is to know things
first of all by the Word of God. How one may know
by the Word of God that they have received the bap-
tism with the Holy Spirit has just been told. We
have a right when we have met the conditions and have
definitely asked for the baptism with the Holy Spirit to
cc It is mine," and to get up and go on in our work
say,
leaving the matter of experience to God's time and
place. We get assurance that we have received the
baptism with the Holy Spirit in precisely the same
way that we get assurance of our salvation. When an
inquirer comes to you, whom you have reason to be-
lieve really has received Jesus but who lacks assurance, what do you do with him ? Do you tell him to kneel down and pray until he gets assurance ? NoJ: if you know how to deal with a soul. You know that true
assurance comes through the Word of God, that it is
through what is " written " that we are to know that we
have eternal life (i John v. 13). So you take the in-
quirer to the written Word. For example, you take
him to John iii. 36. You tell him to read it. He
reads, " He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting
life." You ask him, " Who has everlasting life ? "
He reolies from the oassa2:e before him, u He that be-
238 The Person and Work of the Holy Spirit
lieveth on the Son." " How many who believe on the Son have everlasting life ? " " Every one that believes on the Son." " Do you know this to be true ? " " Yes." " Why ? " " Because God says so." "What does God say ? " " God says,
c He that be-
lieveth on the Son hath everlasting life/ " " Do you believe on the Son?" "Yes." "What have you then ? " He ought to say, " Everlasting life," but quite
likely he will not. He may say, " I wish I had ever-
lasting life." You point him again to the verse and
by questions bring out what it says, and you hold him
to it until he sees that he has everlasting life ; sees
that he has everlasting life simply because God says so
After he has assurance on the ground of the Word, he
will have assurance by personal experience, by the
testimony of the Spirit in his heart. Now you should
deal with yourself in precisely the same way about the
baptism with the Holy Spirit. <f*Hold yourself to the word found in i John v. 14, 15, and know that you have the baptism with the Spirit simply because God
says so in His Word, whether you feel it or not.
Afterwards you will know it by experience. God's
: first, His Word ; second, belief in His Word 5 third, experience, or feeling.l We desire to
order is always
change God's order, and have first, His Word, then
feeling, then we will believe. But God demands that we believe on His naked Word, ct Abraham believed God and it was accounted to him for righteousness
(Gal. iii. 6 ; cf. Gen. xv. 6). Abraham had as yet no
feeling in his body of new life and power. He just be-
lieved God and feeling came afterwards. God demands