Author and minister Max Lucado grew up in a church that does not teach the baptism of the Holy Spirit, but he is now revealing that praying in tongues has become an important part of his prayer life. It all started with a great personal awakening to the power of the Holy Spirit.
Lucado has written several books that are beloved by Christians of many denominations, characterized by his insightful ability to explain the words of God. and his latest book, Help Is Here: Finding New Power and Purpose in the Power of the Holy SpiritIts purpose is to point out the unique role of the Holy Spirit and the empowerment He provides to believers.
The award-winning, best-selling author says she was raised with a very limited understanding of the Holy Spirit. Then, for two decades he pastored the Oak Hills Church in San Antonio, Texas, which was loosely affiliated with the Church of Christ. But later in life, God did something he was not expecting.
The 68-year-old preacher told Ed Statzer and co-host Daniel Yang on The Statzer Church Leaders podcast, “For me, my recent fascination with the Holy Spirit or my search for an understanding of the Holy Spirit comes out of frustration. Look around, and like you said I’ve been in ministry since 1979, and I found myself really tired the last 5 or 6 years of the way churches were struggling to connect with society.”
He says that the man-made methods of setting up churches to make an impact aren’t cutting it anymore. Then they realized that the answer was found in the Bible where Jesus told his disciples to go and wait for the Holy Spirit until they were filled with power from above.
“I don’t want another program or church or idea or trend, but I hunger—I hunger for a drop of the Holy Spirit raining upon the church,” he explains. “The Holy Spirit can do in a moment our best pastors and preachers can do in a lifetime. All we need is a great awakening. We need that supernatural visitation of the Holy Spirit to come upon us.”
The amazing thing is that Lucado said those words five months ago, long before the Asbury Awakening began. Now others are talking and praying about a nationwide wave of awakening.
Lucado says he goes back to the biblical passage in John 20:22 where Jesus Christ rose from the dead, appeared to the disciples, breathed upon them and said, “Receive the Holy Spirit.” It was a moment of salvation in which the disciples met the risen Lord and were the first to be filled with the Holy Spirit.
“I believe I received the Holy Spirit when I gave my heart to Christ as a young man. I didn’t know how to follow Him and how to respond to Him,” he explains.
He says that he has recently learned to breathe and breathe in the Spirit of God. “The Holy Spirit is very willing to give if we will only request to receive. So I think my main job as a Christian is to receive the Holy Spirit and then trust that He will speak through me as I I go about my day,” he explained.
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It’s a big change for Lucado because he says he comes out of a church background of a “Holy Spirit sheriff” who judges in God’s supernatural ways and is “cautious, hesitant and resistant”.
Over the years, he mostly had a gradual awakening to his need for the Holy Spirit. But he also had several “very supernatural” encounters “in which I received an additional gift, perhaps, of the Holy Spirit.”
One such moment in his own life came about four years ago. “It will surprise a lot of onlookers, it has already certainly surprised our church,” he said.
“When I was 64 on a July morning, while I was praying, I started praying in tongues,” Lucado told the Statzer Podcast. “I had done nothing different, except that I came to the passage where the Apostle Paul said, ‘eagerly desiring spiritual gifts’ … I prayed that every morning for two or three weeks. And then one morning Early in the morning, I began to pray in a heavenly language.”
“Back then I was taught that those languages were closed,” he says. “But I would say it’s just a tender moment every morning.”
He has even come to believe in a version of what the Bible refers to as the “baptism in the Holy Spirit”.
“When people ask me if I think there is a post-conversion experience of the Holy Spirit, my answer is I think there is, but not just one. I think there is almost daily,” he said. Said.
At the end of the day, Lucado says the goal is to reach the world with the gospel of Jesus Christ. He believes that secularism has ruined the lives of many, many people, causing a mental health crisis in America, and that Christians need the Holy Spirit to heal hearts and transform lives. It’s time for a supernatural force to intervene desperately.
Below: You can watch the ‘Church Leaders’ interview with Max Lucado
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