Before being filled with the Holy Spirit, I spent many blessed hours in prayer and communion with the Lord. I often prayed throughout the night. But even though I spent hours in God’s presence, somehow, I would leave that place of prayer with a sense of dissatisfaction. It always seemed like I hadn’t expressed what I wanted to say to the Lord. I used every descriptive adjective at my disposal to tell the Lord how wonderful He is, but I always left my prayer time feeling like my heart hadn’t truly spoken.

However, when I was filled with the Holy Spirit and began praying in tongues, my prayer life changed dramatically. Finally, my spirit could express itself, and I would leave my prayer time with a sense of spiritual satisfaction. Of course, I had already received the Holy Spirit to some extent through the new birth (John 3:3-8). He had borne witness to my spirit that I was a child of God (Romans 8:16). When I was a teenager lying on a sickbed with two serious organic heart problems and an incurable blood disease, the Holy Spirit spoke to my heart, trying to guide me to the subject of divine healing in the Word.

I desperately needed the Word and the Holy Spirit to guide me to healing because all I had heard preached was the message of salvation. I had attended Sunday school and church all my life, never missed a service until I became paralyzed, but I had never received any training on how to listen to the Holy Spirit and follow Him.

But when I was 16 years old and on a sickbed, I began to hear an inner voice as the Holy Spirit spoke to my spirit. No one told me to listen, but I ended up saying to myself, “Well, I can’t be any worse off by listening than I am now. After all, the doctor says I’m going to die and there’s nothing more they can do! So, I guess I’ll start listening here, inside of me.”

And as I listened to the Holy Spirit, whom I knew to some extent through the new birth, He led me straight to divine healing! The day came when the Holy Spirit spoke to my heart, saying, “Now, you believe you’re well.” “Of course, I do!” I said.

The Holy Spirit said, “Then get up.” “People should be up by ten in the morning.”

In the room alone, I struggled to sit up and leaned my body over the bed to be able to push my feet onto the floor. I then grabbed the bedpost and stood up. Holding onto the bedpost, I declared, “I want to announce in the presence of the Almighty God, the holy angels, the Holy Spirit, the devil, and all his cohorts that, according to the Word of God, I am healed, and I believe it! Suddenly, I felt a warm glow of God’s healing presence descend on me like warm honey, I straightened up, and I began walking around the room, healed!

How did I come to this moment of healing after being paralyzed on a sickbed with a terminal heart disease for 16 months? I listened to the Holy Spirit I had become acquainted with in the new birth. Later, I listened to the same voice of the Holy Spirit, and He led me to the baptism of the Holy Spirit (Acts 1:5)!

Let’s go back to the analogy of drinking water. When I was born again on that sickbed, I drank a glass of water, the experience of the new birth. But the same Holy Spirit who made me a new creature in Christ also led me to divine healing. I then received the Holy Spirit and drank to fullness. From that moment on, His ministry to me and through me, as well as His relationship with me, multiplied infinitely!

This text is an excerpt from the book “The Power of Speaking in Tongues: Everything you want to know about Speaking in Tongues” written by Kenneth Erwin Hagin.

We invite you to read the following article “Maintaining the “greatest measure” of the Spirit“.