Published in the Pentecostal Evangel, March 1, 1941.

In Acts 1.8 we read: “But ye shall receive power, after that the Holy Ghost is come upon you.”

Oh, the power of the Holy Ghost! the power that quickens, that reveals, and prevails! I love to think that Jesus wanted all His people to have power, that He wanted all men to be overcomers. Nothing but this power will do it. Power over sin, power over sickness, power over the devil, power over all the powers of the devil!

In order to understand what it means to have power there are two things necessary; one is to have ears to hear and the other is to have hearts to receive. Every born-again saint of God, filled with the Spirit has a real revelation of that truth, “Greater is He that is in you than he that is in the world.” I say this with as much audacity as I please. I know evil spirits are in abundance and in multitudes; Jesus cast them out as legion. The believer because of the Spirit that is in him has the power to cast out the evil spirit. It must be so; God wants us to have this power in us; we must be able to destroy Satan’s power wherever we go.

One day as I came into the house my wife said, “Which way did you come?” I answered that I had come in by the back way. “Oh,” she said, “if you had come in by the front you would have seen a man there in a terrible state. There is a crowd of people around him and he is in terrible straits.” Then the door bell rang and she said, “There he is again. What shall we do?” I said, “Just be still.” I rushed to the door and just as I was opening it the Spirit said, “This is what I baptized you for.” I was very careful then in opening the door, and then I heard the man crying outside, “Oh I have committed the unpardonable sin, I am lost, I am lost.” I asked him to come in and when he got inside he said again in awful distress, “I am lost, I am lost.” Then the Spirit came upon me and I commanded the lying spirit to come out of the man in the name of Jesus. Suddenly he lifted up his arms and said, “I never did it.” The moment the lying spirit was out he was able to speak the truth. I then realized the power in the Baptism of the Holy Spirit. It was the Spirit that said, “This is what I baptized you for,” and I believe we ought to be in the place where we shall always be able to understand the mind of the Spirit amid all the other voices in the world.

After the Holy Ghost has come upon you, you have power. I believe a great mistake is made in these days by people tarrying and tarrying after they have received. After you have received it is, “Go ye.” Not “sit still,” but “go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel.” We shall make serious havoc of the whole thing if we turn back again and crawl into a corner seeking something we already have. I want you to see that God depends on us in these last days. There is no room for anyone to boast and the man who goes about saying, “Look at me for I am somebody,” is of no value whatever. God is done with that man altogether, He will have a people to glorify Him. He is doing what He can with what He has, but we are so unwilling to move in the plan of God that He has to grind us many times to get us where He can use us.

Jesus was so filled with the Holy Ghost that He stood in the place where He was always ready. He was always in the attitude where He brought victory out of every opportunity. The power of the Holy Spirit is within us but it can be manifested only as we go in obedience to the opportunity before us. I believe if you wait until you think you have power after you have received the Holy Ghost you will never know you have it. Don’t you know that the child of God who has the Baptism is inhabited by the Spirit? You will remember one time when they tried to throw Jesus from the brow of the hill, that He pressed through the midst of them and as soon as He got through He healed the man with the blind eyes. Pressing through the crowd which was trying to kill Him, He showed forth His power. Some people might think that Jesus should have run away altogether but He stopped to heal. This thought has comforted me over and over again.

One day as I was waiting for a car I stepped into a shoemaker’s shop. I had not been there long when I saw a man with a green shade over his eyes, crying pitifully and in great agony. It was heart-rending and the shoemaker told me that the inflammation was burning out his eyes. I jumped up and went to the man and said, “You devil, come out of this man in the name of Jesus.” Instantly the man said, “It is all gone, I can see now.” That is the only Scriptural way, to begin to work at once, and preach afterwards. You will find as the days go by that the miracles and healings will be manifested. Because the Master was touched with the feeling of the infirmities of the multitudes they instantly gathered around Him to hear what He had to say concerning the Word of God. However, I would rather see one man saved than ten thousand people healed. If you ask me why, I call to your attention the Word which says, “There was a rich man and he fared sumptuously every day.” Now we don’t hear of this man having any diseases but it says, “In hell he lifted up his eyes.” We also read that there was a poor man, full of sores and “he lifted up his eyes in heaven,” so we see that a man can die practically in good health but be lost, and a man can die in disease and be saved; so it is more important to be saved than anything else.

But Jesus was sent to bear the infirmities and the afflictions of the people and to destroy the works of the devil. He said that the thief (which is the devil) cometh to steal and to kill and to destroy, “but I am come that ye might have life and have it more abundantly.” I maintain that God wishes all His people to have the life more abundant. We have the remedy for all sickness in the Word of God! Jesus paid the full price and the full redemption for every need and where sin abounds, grace can come in and much more abound, and dispel all the sickness.

When I was traveling from England to Australia I witnessed for Jesus, and it was not long before I had plenty of room to myself. If you want a whole seat to yourself just begin to preach Jesus. However, some people listened and began to be much affected. One of the young men said to me, “I have never heard these truths before. You have so moved me that I must have a good conversation with you.” The young man told me that his wife was a great believer in Christian Science but was very sick now and although she had tried everything she had been unable to get relief, so was having a doctor. But the doctor gave her no hope whatever and in her dilemma and facing the realities of death she asked that she might have an appointment with me.

When I got to her I felt it would be unwise to say anything about Christian Science so I said, “You are in bad shape.” She said, “Yes, they give me no hope.” I said, “I will not speak to you about anything but will just lay my hands upon you in the Name of Jesus and when I do you will be healed.” That woke her up and she began to think seriously. For three days she was lamenting over the things she might have to give up. “Will I have to give up the cigarettes?” “No,” I said. “Will I have to give up the dance?” and again I replied “No.” “Well, we have a little drinking sometimes and then we play cards also. Will I have to give—?” “No,” I said, “you will not have to give up anything. Only let us see Jesus.” And right then she got such a vision of her crucified Saviour and Jesus was made so real to her that she at once told her friends that she could not play cards any more, could not drink or dance any more, and she said she would have to go back to England to preach against this awful thing, Christian Science. Oh, what a revelation Jesus gave her! Now if I had refused to go when called for, saying that I first had to go to my cabin and pray about it, the Lord might have let that opportunity slip by. After you have received the Holy Ghost you have power; you don’t have to wait.

The other day we were going through a very thickly populated part of San Francisco when we noticed a large crowd gathered. I saw it from the window of the car and said I had to get out, which I did. There in the midst was a boy in the agonies of death. As I threw my arms around the boy I asked what the trouble was and he answered that he had cramps. In the name of Jesus I commanded the devils to come out of him and at once he jumped up and not even taking time to thank me, ran off perfectly healed. We are God’s own children, quickened by His Spirit and He has given us power over all the powers of darkness; Christ in us the open evidence of eternal glory, Christ in us the Life, the Truth, and the Way.

We have a wonderful salvation that fits everybody. I believe that a baptized person has no conception of the power God has given him until he uses what he has. I maintain that Peter and John had no idea of the greatness of the power they had but they began to speculate. They said, “Well, as far as money goes, we have none of that, but we do have something; we don’t exactly know what it is, but we shall try it on you, In the Name of Jesus of Nazareth, rise up and walk,” and it worked. In order to make yourself realize what you have in your possession you will have to try it and I can assure you it will work all right.

I said one time to a man that the Acts of the Apostles would never have been written if the Apostles had not acted, and the Holy Spirit is still continuing His acts through us. May God help us to have some acts.

There is nothing like Pentecost, and if you have never been baptized you are making a big mistake by waiting. Don’t you know that the only purpose for which God saved you was that you might be a saviour of others? and for you to think that you have to remain stationary and just get to heaven is a great mistake. The Baptism is to make you a witness for Jesus. The hardest way is the best way; you never hear anything about the person who is always having an easy time. The preachers always tell of how Moses crossed the Red Sea when he was at wits’ end. I cannot find the record of anyone in the Scriptures whom God used who was not first tried. So if you never have any trials it is because you are not worth them.

God wants us to have power. When I was traveling in Sweden at a certain station early in the morning a little lady and her daughter got into the train. I saw at once that the lady was in dreadful agony and asked my interpreter to inquire as to the trouble. With tears running down her face she told how her daughter was taking her to the hospital to have her leg amputated. Everything that was possible had been done for her. I told her Jesus could heal. Just then the train stopped and a crowd of people entered until there was hardly standing room, but friends, we never get into a place that is too awkward for God, though it seemed to me that the devil had sent these people in at that time to hinder. However, when the train began to move along I got down, although it was terribly crowded, and putting my hands upon the woman’s leg I prayed for her in the name of Jesus. At once she said to her daughter, “I am healed. It is all different now; I felt the power go down my leg,” and she began to walk about. Then the train stopped at the next station and this woman got out and walked up and down the platform, saying, “I am healed. I am healed.”

Jesus was the first fruits and God has chosen us in Christ and has revealed His Son in us that we might manifest Him in power. God gives us power over the devil and when we say the devil we mean everything that is not of God. Some people say we can afford to do without the Baptism with the Spirit but I say we cannot. I believe any person who thinks there is a stop between Calvary and the glory has made a big mistake.

Labels: 1941, Pentecostal Evangel

Published in Confidence, July/September 1920.

The Baptism of the Holy Ghost is a great beginning. I think the best word we can say is, “Lord, what wilt Thou have me to do?” The greatest difficulty today with us is to be held in the place where it shall be God only—it is so easy to get our own mind to work. The working of the Holy Ghost is so different. I believe there is a mind of Christ, and we may be so immersed in the Spirit that we are all the day asking, “What wilt Thou have me to do?”

This has been a day in the Holy Ghost. The last three months have been the greatest days of my life. I used to think if I could see such and such things worked I should be satisfied; but I have seen greater things than I ever expected to see, and I am more hungry to see greater things yet. The great thing at conventions is to get us so immersed in God that we may see signs and wonders in the name of the Lord Jesus; a place where death has taken place and we are not, for God has taken us. If God has taken hold of us we will be changed by His power and might. You can depend on it. The Ethiopian will be changed. I find God has a plan to turn the world upside down, when we are not.

When I have been at my wits’ end, and have seen God open the door, I have felt I should never doubt God again. I have been taken to another place that is worse still. There is no p!ace for us, and yet a place where God is, where the Holy Ghost is just showing forth and displaying His graces; a place where we will never come out, where we are always immersed in the Spirit, the glory of God being seen upon us. It is wonderful!

There is a power behind the scenes that moves things. God can work in such a marvelous way. Our Brother Poiman was held up by a strike and couldn’t get to Switzerland. Then they sent to Brother Wigglesworth, and I couldn’t go; and then they sent again, and that time I couldn’t go, but I could say I would go in two months.

I believe we have yet to learn what it would be with a Pentecostal Church in England that understood truly the work of intercession. I believe God the Holy Ghost wants to teach us that it is not only the people on the p!alform who can move things by prayer. You people, the Lord can move things through you. We have to learn the power of the breath of the Holy Ghost. If I am filled with the Holy Ghost, He will formulate the word that will come into your hearts. The sound of my voice is only by the breath that goes through it. When I was in a little room at Bern waiting for my passport, I found a lot of people, but I couldn’t speak to them, so I got hold of three men and pulled them unto me. They stared, but I got them on their knees. Then we prayed, and the revival began. I couldn’t talk to them, but I could show them the way to talk to Someone else.

God will move upon the people to make them see the glory of God just as it was when Jesus walked in this world, and I believe the Holy Ghost will do special wonders and miracles in these last days. I was taken to see a young woman who was very ill. The young man who showed me the way said, “I am afraid we shall not be able to do much here, because of her mother, and the doctors are coming.” I said, “This is what God has brought me here for,” and when I prayed the young woman was instantly healed by the power of God. God the Holy Ghost says in our hearts today that it is only He who can do it. After that we got crowds, and I ministered to the sick among them for two hours.

The secret for the future is living and moving in the power of the Holy Ghost. One thing I rejoice in is that there need not be an hour or a moment when I do not know the Holy Ghost is upon me. Oh, this glorious life in God is beyond expression; it is God manifest in the flesh. Oh, this glorious unction of the Holy Ghost—that we move by the Spirit. He should be our continual life. The Holy Ghost has the last thoughts of anything that God wants to give. Glory to God for the Holy Ghost! We must see that we live in the place where we say, “What wilt Thou have me to do?” and are in the place where He can work in us to will and to do of His good pleasure.

Labels: 1920, Confidence

Notes taken from the Bradford Convention by Florence Vipan.
Presented April 6, 1920.
Published in Confidence, April-June 1920.

Luke 10:19-22.

It is more important our unity with Jesus than anything else. When our hearts are in perfect tune then we can have confidence before God. It is more important than casting out evil spirits, but it brings the casting-out of evil spirits. Greater is He that is in you than the power of Satan. Jesus said, “I will give you power,” etc. That is the fact we have to deal with this afternoon. Only in the authority of the Name of Jesus. The authority of the name of Jesus is in fellowship and co-operation with Him. “If we know that He heareth us,” etc. God would have us in the place continually, where we know He heareth us. “I will give you power to cast out the evil spirits.” I was asked to visit a man in an asylum, a slave to intemperance and nicotine. The evil power would not allow an introduction to this man. God gave authority over the power of evil, a broken spirit was given, and he was crying out for salvation. In three days he was out of that place. In the Name: of Jesus we dealt with the two evil powers—the hardest thing in life was to do without tobacco—the mighty power of God came over him.

Praying Yorkshire folk. We have people in Bradford that can carry you right through into heaven. and it is due to their prayers that before I got to Switzerland the Revival was on the spring. Oh, the preciousness of my Lord and the adaptability the Holy Spirit gives to a child of God. I saw hundreds healed by the power of God, and I give testimony in the face of Jesus. We go away from these meetings to act in the power of the Holy Ghost. A woman in Paris suffered from epileptic fits for 23 years and could not go out alone. She was healed and can now go out alone. The mother, too, was healed because of the testimony of her daughter.

Romans 10:5. We know the Baptism in the Holy Ghost gives all we need. A young man, 27 years of age, was dumb. He came to a meeting sneering and laughing, and got so near to see what was going on. I thought he was seeking, and put my hands on him. The power of God went through him. I said to him, “Shout, shout, shout!” and the people called out to him in his language, “Shout!” and for the first time in his life he began to shout. God gave him his speech.

Police in Switzerland. There were more people night after night seeking healing than there are attending this Convention. We were working until midnight. So many people were healed that two policemen were sent to apprehend me. They said I was doing it without credentials. The police wanted to see a wicked woman who had been healed of a rupture, and was the means of bringing others to be healed. When they heard this they said they wished all preachers did the same.

Scores of awful sinners were healed. A whole family (all wicked) was saved through being healed. Jesus is glorious. Surely He is the most lovely of all. Truly He was manifested to destroy the works of the devil. That Name manifests life as truly as ever it did. There was a woman with an awful face (nose). I felt an awful sensation, as I do when I see cancer. I rebuked the disease in the Name of Jesus. The next night I forgot about the woman. She came to the meeting and when I saw her I said, “Oh, God! Oh, God!” The same nose shone like glass, and all the skin was new. Our God is a God of love. Who can describe His majesty and glory. Well might the poet say, “Crown Him with many crowns.” We must do it. We must do it. There was a man with an incurable disease. The moment hands were laid on him he was perfectly healed, after 34 years of suffering from the work of Satan. When Peter’s wife’s mother was sick with the fever, Jesus rebuked the fever. The fever could hear. All fevers are evil spirits. Jesus was manifested to destroy them. Where is Jesus? When we are born again we are born of the Word of God—Christ in you. Resist the devil and he will flee. Rebuke him in the Name of Jesus.

Healed and saved. The presence of God was so manifested there. A man on the railway was healed of a disease of 22 years standing. There was a wicked man healed. He was so broken in spirit that we had to break up the meeting till he got saved. He was going to tell everybody how he was saved. I tell you, there is something in healing. Like the man at the beautiful gate, when the people saw him leaping and praising God 5,000 were saved. God forbid we shouid glory in anything less than putting Him before anyone. I was taken to a place to see a girl whose bowels, the doctor said,. were completely done. No one couid do anything for her. She felt an inward power. Immediately hands were laid upon her.

At one meeting there were 1,000 people so anxious to hear the Word of God and of healing. God only knows how I have longed to see people saved, and God showed me in spirit He would save. People put up their hands all over the place, as they wanted to be saved. Oh, to see how they flocked out. God is the same God. When the love of God came they were neither Swiss nor English. When I toid tbem about the needs of China they asked if they couldn’t give money. At the first collection they gave £100. This is what the German-Swiss did for England to send our missionaries. The work is enlarging. I brought £300 to England for foreign missions—£200 given to the P.M.U., and £100 to the Congo.

A woman came to be healed of a cancer. How it did smell—but God healed. The husband got saved and the whole family. I believe there is a crown, but it will have to be fought for. There was a young woman vomiting blood. God awakened me in the middle of the night, and in the Name of Jesus commanded the demon power to come out, and she was immediately healed. It is the precious name of Jesus.

At Zurich. At Zurich it was just the same. God worked special miracles and wonders. The Holy Ghost is different to everyone else. “The anointing ye have received abideth.” There was a man with a disease you could not look at. I praise God for what Jesus does. In ten minutes he was made whole. The man sat up in bed and said, “I know I am healed.” The doctor was announced. He was amazed, and said to the man’s wife, “Your husband is whole. Whatever has happened? I shall come no more.” He had been attending his patient three times a day.

A little boy four years of age was very ill. The doctor who had been attending him for several days said there was something amiss with his brain. The Lord showed me the mischief was in the stomach, so I laid hands on the child’s stomach. A few hours later a worm, fifteen inches long, came out of his mouth, and the boy was whole. Does God know? Hebrews 4:12-13. The discernment of God goes to every part of you—neither is there any creature not manifest in His sight.

In Ireland a woman had her thigh broken in two places. She lay in bed and could just reach the mantel-piece. When I laid hands on her she said, “It’s going right down.” “What is going right down?” “The power of God.” And in His strength she arose.

Labels: 1920, Confidence