Have You Received the Holy Spirit?

Paul had barely arrived in Ephesus when he asked a question that should stop every believer in their tracks. He found a small band of disciples — about twelve men — and before he taught them anything, before he settled in, he wanted to know one thing.

And finding some disciples he said to them, “Did you receive the Holy Spirit when you believed?” So they said to him, “We have not so much as heard whether there is a Holy Spirit.”

Acts 19:1–2 (NKJV)

Read that answer again. “We have not so much as heard whether there is a Holy Spirit.” That was the heart of their problem. And if I am honest with you, it is close to the heart of ours.

In our day we have heard of the Holy Spirit. But there is so much confusion about who He is, what He does, and how He works, that we might as well be saying the same thing. We have reduced the Holy Spirit to a phenomenon — something we cannot really explain but recognize by its effects. We feel an anointing, we shake, we dance, and we conclude, “Yes, that is the Spirit moving.”

When the Spirit works, those things may happen. But hear me: some of the greatest works of the Spirit have happened in dead silence. The Holy Spirit is far more than a feeling you experience.

The question behind the question

For days I wrestled with why Paul, meeting a church of only twelve, would lead with that particular question. So I asked the Holy Spirit, and He told me to read the rest of the chapter. Then it exploded in front of me. Paul asked because there was no evidence in the whole city that Spirit-filled believers were in their midst. None.

Look at what happened after they received the Spirit. Paul reasoned in the synagogue and then daily in the school of Tyrannus, and Luke tells us the result.

And this continued for two years, so that all who dwelt in Asia heard the word of the Lord Jesus, both Jews and Greeks.

Acts 19:10 (NKJV)

These disciples had been sitting under “John’s baptism” for more than twenty years. Yet within two years of receiving the Spirit, all of Asia heard the word of the Lord. God worked unusual miracles. People who had practiced magic dragged out their expensive books and burned them in public. The whole city was thrown into an uproar over Jesus.

So let the question land on your own life. How is it that a church can stand in a city for ten, twenty, forty years, and the neighborhood around it has still not truly heard about Jesus? How is it that if some churches closed their doors, no one nearby would notice or miss them? Did you receive the Holy Spirit when you believed?

How is it that you have been a believer for twenty-five years — a deacon, a worker, a leader — and the people watching your life have not come confessing their sins and turning from them because they saw God in you? When you take on great responsibility, great power becomes available. That was Paul’s whole point.

He is God, not a force

Paul did not scold those disciples. He taught them. And there are two truths about the Holy Spirit you cannot skip if you want Him to transform your life.

The first is this: the Holy Spirit is God. He is not the power of God, the fire of God, the wind of God, or the dove of God. He is God. Every time you read in the Old Testament that God did something or said something, remember — that is the Holy Spirit. Scripture constantly interchanges the Spirit of God with God, just as it interchanges the Word of God, the Son, with God.

Ananias, why has Satan filled your heart to lie to the Holy Spirit… You have not lied to men but to God.

Acts 5:3–4 (NKJV)

Peter says Ananias lied to the Holy Spirit, then in the same breath says he lied to God. They are one and the same. The three great attributes of God are ascribed to the Spirit as well — He is everywhere present, He is all-powerful, and He is all-knowing.

Grasp this, and Paul’s question changes shape. “Have you received the Holy Spirit since you believed?” is really asking, “Have you received God since you believed?” There is no way a human being receives God into their life and stays ordinary. And it is a lie of the enemy to imagine that receiving God simply means you speak in tongues. That makes no sense.

Now the Lord is the Spirit; and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty. But we all, with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as by the Spirit of the Lord.

2 Corinthians 3:17–18 (NKJV)

He is a Person you can know

The second truth is that the Holy Spirit is a Person, not an impersonal influence like wind or smoke. He has a will. He knows things. He speaks. He has feelings that can be grieved. You can have fellowship with Him the way you would with any person. In fact, the name Jesus gave Him was “another Helper” — another Comforter, just like me.

Which means when you have the Holy Spirit, you have all of Him. He is not like water, where you hold a little and then get more. The moment He walks into your life, all of Him is available to you. So the real question is not how much of the Spirit you have. The question is how much of you the Spirit has.

That is why Paul did not ask, “Did the Spirit come upon you?” He asked, “Did you receive Him?” Those twelve already had the Spirit — they could not have been saved without Him. But their ignorance of who He was had capped how much they had actually received. When we cry “Come, Holy Spirit,” we are not calling Him from absence into presence. We are asking to move from one level of His presence into a deeper one.

What happens when you receive Him

So what should you expect when the Spirit is poured out? Joel saw it centuries in advance.

Then, after doing all those things, I will pour out my Spirit upon all people. Your sons and daughters will prophesy. Your old men will dream dreams, and your young men will see visions.

Joel 2:28 (NLT)

From that promise come at least three marks of the Spirit poured out on a believer.

• Dreams and visions — a sharp increase in revelation and insight into God’s word. The Spirit authored the Scriptures, so He illuminates them, interprets them, and brings the things of Christ alive to you (John 14:26).
• Prophecy and tongues — God gives the utterance and you give the voice. Every time the Spirit came upon people in the Bible, it was marked by speaking in tongues, prophecy, or both.
• Signs and wonders — power to do what is impossible for us: healing the sick, casting out demons, mending broken hearts, so that God alone gets the glory.

God comes upon us to make the impossible possible. If everything we did could be done on our own strength, we would not need Him at all.

How to receive

Three things need to happen for you to receive this baptism, and none of them are complicated.

First, know who qualifies. This is for all believers — anyone who has trusted the finished work of Jesus. You do not have to wait, clean up your life, or become more holy first. The hundred and twenty in the upper room received it. The Samaritans received it. Cornelius and his household received it. Saul the persecutor received it just days after his conversion. The promise, Peter said, is “to you and to your children, and to all who are afar off.”

Second, understand how God releases His power. The power of God is released through an act of faith on your part — not faith alone, and not the power alone, but the two together. When the woman with the issue of blood reached out and touched Jesus’ garment, the healing power that was already present was released. When Peter stepped out of the boat, God held him up on the waves — but God would not step out of the boat for him. That was Peter’s part, and it was the only part he could play.

Tongues work the same way. The miracle is not that you speak; it is what you speak. Opening your mouth is the natural act, like Peter’s walking. As you begin to speak out in praise, the Spirit supplies the words and the syllables. Many believers wait for God to do it all, never open their mouths, and so never speak. Do your part, and what starts as a trickle grows into a river.

Third, come in faith and ask. The Spirit is the promise of the Father, and God will not force Him on anyone, just as He does not force salvation on anyone. He put the thirst in you — that longing is probably why you are reading this. Asking simply says, “God, I want you. I want all of you.”

If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children: how much more shall your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to them that ask him?

Luke 11:13 (KJV)

So the question that met twelve men in Ephesus now meets you. Have you received the Holy Spirit — have you received God — since you believed? If there is a thirst in you as you read this, do not talk yourself out of it. Ask your Father for His Spirit, open your mouth, and begin. He has promised that the one who asks receives.