"Then the devil took Him into the Holy city; and he stood Him on the pinnacle of the temple, and said to Him, ‘If You are the Son of God throw Yourself down; for it is written, "He will give His angels charge concerning You; and on their hands they will bear you up, lest you strike your foot against a stone."’

Jesus’ reply back to Satan was,

"On the other hand, it is written, ‘You shall not put to the test the Lord your God.’" (Luke 4)

Christianity is not a blind leap of faith. It is faith based on the objective Word of Jesus. When you received Christ into your life, you believed and knew it was for you. You were not testing Jesus. You were acting upon what your heart testified as truth based on the Bible and the witness of history.

If you are coming to Jesus with this kind of attitude, a testing of truth attitude, I guarantee you, you probably will not receive it at that moment. Our faith is an intelligent faith and our actions and decisions in Jesus must be based on the Word and the Spirit for it to be valid and if we are to expect to have what we are asking for.

The Apostle John says that only what we ask Jesus for that is according to His will, will we receive.¹⁹ If you are not convinced it is according to His will at present, that is you have doubt, as was shared earlier, James says you cannot receive anything from Jesus if you have any doubt.²⁰ "For let not that man expect that he will receive anything from the Lord, being two-souled, unstable in all his ways." (James 1:7-8)

If you are not able to receive the Baptism of the Holy Spirit, and if after seeking Jesus as to why, He shows you that it centers in a lack of faith, that is a lack of conviction of knowing Jesus has it for you, then ask Jesus by faith to intelligently Biblically give you answers to any present remaining doubts and bring you to a place of faith believing. It is not something you can conjure up. Faith is a gift from Jesus, so ask Jesus to give you this gift so you can in faith release your faith to believe Him for what you need to be effective for Him in ministry outreach and release: The Baptism of the Holy Spirit.

Pride basically centers here in the fear of man. Jesus said in the Gospel of John, "How can you believe, when you receive glory from one another, and you do not seek the glory that is from the one and only God?" (John 5:44). Many people are unable to receive the Baptism of the Holy Spirit because they are more concerned about what people think about them, than standing up for what is right and true and best for all. I think possibly this is the main reason people are not able to receive the Baptism of the Holy Spirit. It is because of wrong past teaching and association with brothers and sisters who are negative toward the experience. They are afraid of being rejected by these brothers and sisters if they allow Jesus to bring them into this anointing of the Holy Spirit.

God speaking through Isaiah said,

"‘For My thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways My ways,’ declares Yehovah. ‘For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are My ways higher than your ways, and My thoughts than your thoughts.’" (Is 55:8-9).

Jesus’ ways are best, not ours. We are loving Jesus and our brother when we submit to and uphold Jesus’ ways. The Apostle John wrote,

"By this we know that we love the children of God, when we love God and observe His commandments. For this is the love of God, that we keep His commandments; and His commandments are not burdensome." (1 John 5:2-3).

If, after seeking Jesus, Jesus shows you this is what is keeping you from receiving the Baptism of the Holy Spirit, the fear of man, then Jesus’ word to you is Matthew 11:12, "And from the days of John the Baptist until now the kingdom of heaven suffers violence, and violent men take it by force." You may have to do violence to your flesh and ego, literally getting down on your knees and praying it through.

If this is your problem, ask Jesus in faith, as only He knows how, to deal with your heart and free you from the fear of man. The writer of Proverbs states, "The fear of man gives a snare, but he who trusts in Yehovah will be exalted." (Prov 29:25). Once you are freed from the fear of man concerning this aspect of your Christian faith, then in Jesus’ time and way you will be able to receive the Baptism of the Holy Spirit. If you are unable to free yourself of this fear, pray and ask Jesus to free you from the fear of man and to give you a pure love for Him and Your brother. David wrote, "I sought Yehovah, and He answered me, and delivered me from all my fears." (Ps 34:4)

When one receives the Baptism of the Holy Spirit with speaking in tongues, the presence and reality of Jesus is manifested. We cannot hide anything from Jesus.²¹ When we become aware of His presence and power, we become aware of His holiness, thus we become aware of our short comings and sin. This causes us to want to draw nearer to Jesus and have our hearts cleansed.

Some Christians do not want to get any closer to Jesus than they already are, because it would mean a change in their life-style. When a man sees his grandmother healed, he is hit with the reality of God and is led to repentance or the other extreme, to try and destroy the truth.

If after seeking Jesus, He shows you that your lack of desire for holiness in your life is the problem, then His words to you are the following,

"He who is not with Me is against Me; and he who does not gather with Me scatters." (Matt 12:30, notice its context).

"I know your deeds, that you are neither cold nor hot; I would that you were cold or hot. So because you are lukewarm, and neither hot nor cold, I will spit you out of My mouth. Because you say, ‘I am rich, and have become wealthy, and have need of nothing,’ and you do not know that you are wretched and miserable and poor and blind and naked. I advise you to buy from Me gold refined by fire, that you may become rich, and white garments, that you may clothe yourself, and that the shame of your nakedness may not be revealed, and eye salve to anoint your eyes, that you may see. Those whom I love, I reprove and discipline; be zealous therefore, and repent." (Rev 3:15-19).

Pray and ask Jesus to free you of your selfishness and give you a heart to surrender to all His will so that Jesus can be glorified through your life. The Apostle Paul wrote,

"For many walk, of whom I often told you, and now tell you even weeping, that they are enemies of the cross of Christ, whose end is destruction, whose god is their belly, and whose glory is in their shame, who set their minds on earthly things." (Phil 3:18-19).

Nothing is wrong with emotion. The Bible tells us that we are to rejoice in Jesus’ presence and leap for joy.²² But this is a decision of the heart first, not a feeling. As we obey Jesus in our approach to Him through worship and praise and in Spirit and truth, feelings will be the reward of our obedience.²³ However, the purpose of the Baptism of the Holy Spirit is not to have an emotional experience; its purpose, as was shared in Section 5, is to free us of taking the initiative ourselves so we will wait for the Holy Spirit’s initiative and prompting with power before moving out for effective ministry outreach and release.

When you see people saved and healed through the release of power that comes with the Baptism of the Holy Spirit I hope you will get excited and experience some emotion over the salvation of the recipient, but not as a basis for receiving the Baptism of the Holy Spirit. The motive should be first, Jesus’ power to free us of ourselves so that His presence and power can be released in our lives properly and in control for the benefit of others who do not know Him yet and need His healing touch.

If, after seeking Jesus, He shows you this is why you have not been able to receive the Baptism of the Holy Spirit, because your motives are wrong, ask Jesus to bring your heart to a place where its motives are right. Then trust Jesus to bring you into this anointing in His time and way.

Some people are just plain scared of the reality of the presence of Jesus in this form. These people are afraid that surrendering to such an anointing would mean to go into a trance and lose all self-control, especially as it relates to speaking in tongues. Paul writes, though, about our spirit in union with the Holy Spirit, "and the spirits of prophets are subject to prophets." (1 Cor 14:32). This simply means the Holy Spirit will never make us do anything and can do nothing through our lives without our conscious willful cooperation first, whether Holy Spirit Baptized or not.

Paul writes in second Timothy, "For God has not given us a spirit of timidity, but of power and love and a sound-mind." (2 Tim 1:7). If you have been in meetings where people were shouting at the top of their lunges and doing things which were not in order in the name of the Holy Spirit, and it left you in confusion; whether you saw the gifts in operation or not, what you encountered was not the Holy Spirit, but rather the wills and personalities of the people through whom the gifts of the Holy Spirit were being manifested. The gifts of tongues and interpretations, prophecy and healings, discernment of spirits and deliverance were from the Holy Spirit; but the way they were being ministered and used was not the Holy Spirit, but was the manifestation of the individuals whose presence you were in. The Holy Spirit is subject to us and our wills. However, we are responsible for how we represent Jesus and His holy Spirit.