What Happens After the Baptism of the Holy Spirit?

Hey, welcome to Self Talk. Thank you for listening today. Tonight or this morning, whenever you're listening. Today's show is something that's been on my heart for a while. It's about the baptism of the Holy Spirit and why it is so controversial and what happens when you're baptized with the Holy Spirit. It should not be controversial, it's all over the scripture, especially the Book of Acts and Book of Luke, but it changed my life forever and ever and ever, and we need to talk about it, because there's a huge difference between Christians who are filled with the Spirit and those who are not. So thank you for listening. Please check out my website for this podcast at icmcollege.org/selftalk. There, please subscribe, follow, check out my store, all kinds of good stuff like that. Anyway, thank you so much for listening today, and I just pray this show will be a blessing to you.

[Intro plays]

Participant #1:

Hey, welcome to Self Talk. This is Ray Self. Thank you for listening today. This show is sponsored by the college I'm blessed to be the president of International College of Ministry, a Holy Spirit field online college. Now enrolling at icmcollege.org. icmcollege.org. If you want to answer the call of God on your life, you need to get equipped, and this is the place to do it, an accredited college where you can get associate’s, bachelor's, master's, and doctorate degrees. We give life experience credits, degrees in ministry, theology, Christian counseling, and prophetic ministry. Check us out icmcollege.org. 

Okay, today I want to talk to you about the baptism of the Holy Spirit. I don't understand why it's so controversial, but it is. I tell you what the deal is. People who've never been baptized in the Holy Spirit don't understand the baptism of the Holy Spirit. It's almost like you need the baptism of the Holy Spirit to understand what the baptism of the Holy Spirit is. And so I listen to people like John MacArthur, who continually rip to shreds anybody who's spirit filled. I know it's a bold statement. John McArthur is a brilliant theologian, an excellent speaker, highly respected. But I guarantee you, if you're a Holy Spirit filled minister and you have any reputation at all, he's going to come after you. And I really think one of the reasons is that people who are not filled with the Holy Spirit have an issue with people who are filled with the Holy Spirit. And the sad thing is, you don't understand what it is to be filled with the Holy Spirit until you get filled with the Holy Spirit. So it's kind of a catch-22. 

Let me explain to you what I mean. So I was raised in the Southern Baptist Church, and I was saved at age ten, I was saved. I mean, I was radically saved. I remember I went down and I confessed Christ as my savior, and I was baptized, and my life changed. My life changed. Now, I went kind of crazy when I turned 18 and went into college for some years. That's part of my story, how God pulled me out of that. And I-I never doubted my salvation, though. I mean, I knew God loved me. I knew I was a Christian. I knew that Jesus was my savior, even though sometimes I did not let him be Lord. And, but when my life got very difficult back in the 80s, my life got incredibly difficult, more difficult than you can ever imagine. I have talked about it on some other podcasts, going through a horrible, horrible divorce, a stepson involved and all kinds of awful stuff. It was so bad, I'm not even going to talk about it. Dealing with lawsuits and business issues, the IRS, all kinds of horrible stuff. 

I was in a deep, deep, deep, deep, deep, dark depression. And my mother, I'll never forget this. And my mother came to me one day and she said, “Ray, I have a friend of mine named John, and he prays for people at his home. And I've seen things happen when he prays for people at his home. And a friend of mine, they said she could never have a baby. He prayed for her, and now she's pregnant. I saw somebody else's leg healed.” And something told me now, looking back now, I know it was God. Go see John. Go see this man. So my mother took me to meet her friend named John. I walk into John's house, and I'll never forget this as long as I live. John had a beautiful house in a neighborhood in Memphis and East Memphis. As a matter of fact, he's actually a very well known artist. And I walked into his house and he looked at me and he said, “hey, Ray, have you ever heard of the baptism of the Holy Spirit?” And being a good Southern Baptist, I said, I don't know what you're talking about, because as a Baptist, the teaching is and the belief is, when you're saved, that's all there is. You get it. You get it all. Well, let me tell you something. It is a work of the Holy Spirit to be saved. When you're saved, you are regenerated. You are justified. You are redeemed. You, you begin your sanctification. You, you're adopted as a child of God. You become filled, you, you have a work of the Holy Spirit that changes who you are. You're born again. You become a new creation as the Bible talks about a new creature, creature. You're completely changed.

And so supposedly, that's it. And so what the Baptists believe is, well, that's the baptism of the Holy Spirit. But that's not what the Bible says. Now, excuse me for being a little bold, but it's not what the Bible says. So, I'll just, let me just tell my story, and, and I'll tell you more about Scripture and, and some of you listening to me. Maybe you've been baptized with the Holy Spirit, and if you've been baptized with the Holy spirit. You know exactly what I'm talking about. And this is not controversial for you. 

So, make a long story short, John had me repent of a bunch of things. Have you ever done this, have you ever done that? Have you ever done yoga? Have you ever done Ouiji board? Have you ever been to a psychic? Have you ever practiced astrology? You know the list. Repent, repent, repent, repent. So I repented of all that stuff. My life was miserable. I was a wreck. I was totally, totally depressed, stressed, anxious, you name it. I was in, I was in horrible shape. He put his hand on me and he said a prayer; something like this, like “Lord, I now baptized my brother Ray with the Holy Spirit.” I'll never forget this as long as I live. And excuse me if I tear up a little bit. I uh, I felt this feeling come on me. It felt like something warm, like a warm oil flowing over my body. Like this warm sensation that was just from the top of my head, this, this warmth. I remember thinking it felt like warm oil, but you know of course it wasn't. But it was flowing from the top of my head and just covering my body, this complete sense of incredible peace. Now, here I was, completely stressed, anxious, depressed, nervous, you name it. I had it all going on. And all of a sudden, this feeling of peace and this warm, loving, kind, peaceful, amazing feeling started to flow all over my body. And then for the first time, when I can remember, for the first time in a very long time in my life, I felt completely loved. Like loved and accepted. This incredible sense of love came over me like love like I've never experienced before. And then I remember feeling this power. Power. And I knew it was powerful. This was power. And so I sat there for a long time. I don't know how long. I do not know how long. I do remember my mother at one point going, Ray, Ray, you okay? Are you okay? And I'm thinking, um, “this is good, mom.” You know, I just wanted her not to talk. I couldn't say anything. I was just so caught up in the moment. And everything changed in my life from then. 

I was baptized with the Holy Spirit and my life changed. And I want to talk about that. My life changed, everything changed. It was a whole nother level. It was incredible. Did all my troubles stop? No. But did things change within me? Absolutely, yes. And I really believe that one of the reasons people argue against it is because they base their theology on their lack of experience. And when you base your theology on your lack of experience, you're going to come up with a lot of preconceptions and you're going to take some scriptures out of context to justify your preconceptions. The Baptists love to use uh first Corinthians thirteen “when the perfect comes, tongue shall cease prophecy shall cease” There, that is but that's a scripture out of context. And because the Bible before and after that talks all over about tongues. And people said, well, you're baptized with the Holy Spirit, you immediately start speaking in tongues. I did not, I did not. But I know something had changed. Now, prior to this happening to me, John took me into Scripture and began to show me some things that really piqued my attention. He took me to Acts chapter one. And some of these scriptures are very familiar, but I want to go over this really quick because everything changed. And again, I really think that the reason these people like John MacArthur and the Baptists, and I love my church brothers and I love the Baptists and the Methodists, and the reason they argue against it is because they've never experienced it and, so therefore, they take scriptures out of context to condemn it. But those of you, if you're listening to me, if you've been baptized with the Holy Spirit, you know what I'm talking about. 

But before John laid hands on me, he took me to obviously Acts one. And, you know, when Jesus was talking and he said, um, Acts one five “for John baptized with water, but you'll be baptized with the Holy Spirit not many days from now,” you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit. Then Acts one eight, you shall receive power when the Holy Spirit’s come upon you, and you shall be my witnesses both in Jerusalem and Judea and Samaria, even to the remotest parts of the earth. Well, a lot of people think, well, that's Pentecost you're talking about Pentecost, when the Holy Spirit fell. Well, and, and sometimes some of the evangelicals think, well, the Holy Spirit fell at Pentecost. It's been here ever since but it didn't say the Holy Spirit was a generational thing because what you see is the Holy Spirit did fall at Pentecost, but you see example, of example of example of the Holy Spirit falling again and again and again. So this was maybe the first time the Holy Spirit fell. But then you see an example of what I'm talking about, Acts eight. 

So um, Acts eight, verse five says, “Philip went down to the city of Samaria and began proclaiming Christ to them. Now, this is important, hear me now. The crowds, with one accord, were giving attention to what was said by Philip as they heard and saw the signs which he was performing for in the case many who had unclean spirits that were coming out of them shouting with a loud voice, and many who have been paralyzed and the lame were healed, there was much rejoicing in that city.” And then it goes on to believ- down to Acts eight, verse twelve. “And when they believed Philip preaching the good news about the kingdom of God in the name of Jesus Christ, they were baptized, men and women alike.” 

Now, listen, these people believed and they were baptized. Now, this is after Pentecost. This is a time period after Pentecost. So they believed and they were baptized. Now, my, my Southern Baptist friends would go, okay, they actually weren't quite saved there or something like that, but they were believing here- but these people were saved. These people believed Philip and were baptized. That's salvation. However, the next verse says, now this is critical to understand what I'm talking about in this show. “Now, when the apostles in Jerusalem heard that Samaria had received the word of God, they sent them Peter and John, who came down and prayed for them that they might receive the Holy Spirit, for he had not yet fallen upon them. They had simply been baptized in the name of Lord Jesus Christ.

 This to me is, is millions of Christians today, traditional Christians, they have been baptized and saved in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, okay? Salvation, it's a wonderful thing. It's the most important thing. But then it says in verse 17, and then, “then they”, that's Peter and John that's uh, that’s Peter and John. “Then they began laying hands on them, and they were receiving the Holy Spirit,” okay? So they laid hands on them that they would receive the Holy Spirit after salvation. So then you go to Acts 19 and you see, listen to these two verses. “And it happened while Paul was at Corinth, Paul passed the upper country, came to Ephesus and found some disciples. And he said to them ‘did you receive the Holy Spirit when you believed?’” Stop right there. “‘Did you receive the Holy Spirit when you believed?’” When, when you believe, you are born again. And they said, no, we have not heard whether there is a Holy Spirit. And so you go on down and it says verse six, “Paul laid his hands on them, the Holy Spirit came on them, and they began speaking in tongues and prophesying”. Again you see an example of people saved and then receiving the baptism of the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit came upon him. That's baptism, the Holy Spirit came upon him. So what I'm saying is, scripture speaks of salvation and the baptism of the Holy Spirit. What's the difference? Salvation is being born again. It's an incredible gift from God. You're born again. Baptism of the Holy Spirit is power. You shall receive power when the Holy Spirit's come upon you. Born again, adopted as a child of God, okay? You get to go to heaven, you're regenerated, redeemed, justified all these incredible good things, healed all these incredible things, but then you shall receive power.

When the disciples were in Jerusalem at the, at the last chapter of Luke, Jesus said, “wait in the city until you receive power from on high.” And these disciples were saved. They had rec- they knew Jesus as Lord and Savior. They actually saw him after he rose from the dead, but they needed the Holy Spirit. So, but if you have not experienced what I'm talking about, you're going to argue against it, and people do, but, and it's sad and they take scriptures out of context and say, well, the tongue shall cease, prophecy shall cease. That stuff was for then, it's not for now. Uh, they'll say, well, those believers in Samaria under Philip, they weren't saved until Peter and John came up and laid hands on them. That's not what the Bible says. It says they believed and they were baptized. And then, later, they received the Holy Spirit. 

That's the baptism of the Holy Spirit. And millions of Christians across the world have received the baptism of the Holy Spirit and are, know exactly what I'm talking about. And millions of Christians around the world are arguing against it, and it's causing division, very sadly, in the body of Christ. And the division comes from the fact that you don't understand it until you have it. You don't understand it. Now, what do I mean by that? Well, John told me something when I was baptized with the Holy Spirit. He, he said, “Ray, things are going to be different from now on.” And I said, “what, what’s going to be different?” He said, “you'll read the Bible and you'll see things in scripture you've never seen before, and you'll begin to understand things in the Bible you've never understood before.”  And I thought, well, that's kind of interesting. Now at this point, I had been saved for 25 years. I thought I knew the Bible pretty well. So that kind of struck me as a very strange thing to say. But what he was talking about was, after you have the filling of the Holy Spirit, there's a revelation that the Holy Spirit will give you of the Word that you didn't have before. I'm just telling you that it just happened for me. And I began to see things in the scripture. I began to notice verses I never noticed before. He also said, “you'll lay hands on the sick, you'll put your hand on people and pray for them, and they'll get healed. And that happened. And he said, “do you have any funny language in your mouth?” And I said, “no, John, there's no funny language in my mouth.” He was trying to determine if I was going to speak in tongues, and I didn't speak in tongues, okay? I didn't. And he said, “well, tongues sounds like gibberish when it comes, but don't let the devil tell you it's gibberish.” I said, “okay, John, if I get any gibberish, I won't let the devil tell me it's gibberish,” you know, however. And so I kind of dismissed that one a little bit and he even said, you know, “the Bible says these signs will follow those who believe my name. They'll lay hands on the sick and they shall recover, and they'll cast out demons.” And he said, “you may, you may cast out demons”, I said “Whoa.” 

So then he said, “Now, Ray, I need to send you to another church that's going to help you with your gifting.” And he told me about this church called the Vineyard, hahaha, which did help me. I mean, it was a whole strange experience when I went to- that's a whole funny story, you know, walking into that church, people wearing blue jeans, no suits, no ties, where were the hymnals? No hymnals. Singing contemporary songs I've never heard before, and singing song after song after song, people raising their hands. A strange new world. But I began to really like it and understand that there was, there was a difference in these Christians. And I'm not criticizing the church I came out of, the traditional church, because they were wonderful, beautiful, incredible people. But there was another level. There was another level. And then, the famous prophetic word that God gave me, you know, God knows how to talk to me sometimes. And he said, “Ray, you've been eating chocolate cake without the icing. Now you have chocolate cake with the icing.” I know it's a silly example, but the Holy Spirit, after I was baptized with the Holy Spirit, everything changed. I began to flow in the gifts of the Spirit. I began to get words of knowledge. One- first corinthians twelve came alive. I began to get words of knowledge, words of wisdom, prophecy, and I lay hands on, on- multiple times I put my hand on people and would lay hands on them and they would get healed right in front of me. And it's a whole nother long story, but I actually did do quite a few, uh, expelling demons. You know, and that's another wild tale we can talk about. 

But you see, the controversy, I think, arises because without understanding of the baptism of the Holy Spirit, without a hunger for it, and sometimes without having the baptism of the Holy Spirit, you're going to find ways to criticize it and say, “well, that's just emotionalism, that's just something that was for then and not for now. It was something that validated the New Testament Church, uh, it stopped with the last apostles, it stopped with the canonization of scripture.” All these arguments which really don't line up with scripture in context. Scripture in context clearly speaks of the baptism of the Holy Spirit. And millions of Christians will testify of the change, dramatic change in their life after the baptism of the Holy Spirit. The word comes alive. Your passion and zeal for God reaches a level you never thought of. And, there, there's- your ability to hear God, it’s like all of a sudden the, you know, your ears are unclogged. The ability to hear God flow into gifts, it's just an amazing whole nother level. And it causes controversy because people criticize what they don't understand, they don't know, and they look for ways to explain it away. 

And traditionally these churches, the Baptist, the Methodist, the Presbyterians for instance, and I love them and God loves these churches, but they have theology designed to explain it away. But if you read the Bible carefully, let the Bible speak for itself and not your religious tradition, you'll see that the baptism of the Holy Spirit is real. And if you've ever experienced that you know what I'm talking about. I had a dramatic life change. Huge life change. Everything in my life changed. I ended up answering the call of God all my life, going to bible college, graduating bible college, ended up becoming president of the bible college, began preaching, teaching, prophesying, founded International College of Ministry. And the story goes on and on and on from there. I, it's, it’s, next to salvation, it's the most important experience with God I've ever had. It changed my life forever. If you've never been baptized with the Holy Spirit, seek out a spirit filled pastor or elder. Say “I want to be baptized with the Holy Spirit.” 

Another thing, oh, about tongues, for some reason, tongues always comes up. People love to talk about tongues and blah, blah, blah. Well, I didn't speak in tongues until I got baptized in the Holy Spirit, until I was driving home from John's house, and all of a sudden, I started speaking in tongues, hahaha. Just a few phrases, and it grew and grew and grew. Tongues is, is mentioned in scripture multiple times. Paul said, “covet to prophesy”, first Corinthians 14, verse 39, “and do not forbid speaking in tongues.” Okay? But he did say, hey, if you're speaking in tongues to a church, uh, if you don't have an interpreter to be quiet because nobody will know what you're talking about, that's just common sense. But he said, “do not forbid speaking in tongues,” okay? The only time he forbid speaking in tongues, apparently the people in Corinth were just getting up and shouting in tongues all over the place. Nobody knew what they were saying. They were causing a bunch of confusion. Tongues, to me is a spiritual language. It's your spirit pouring out to God, and countless people will tell you, when you speak in a tongue, it edifies. See, when you speak in a tongue in Corinthians, it says that “he who speaks in a tongue edifies himself. He prophesies edifies the church.” But when you speak in a tongue, it does edify you. It builds you up. And also it's a commun- it’s its a communication with God. And you can speak in a tongue and get still, and you will hear God speak back. You will hear God's voice. Praying in tongues is a very, very powerful thing. Is it the only sign of the baptism- is it the primary evidence of the Baptist, the Holy Spirit? A lot of the Pentecostals teach that, uh, that is the evidence of the baptism of the Holy Spirit.

 In Scripture. You see times when people spoke in tongues after the baptism of the Holy Spirit. You see times when they spoke in tongues and they prophesied after the Baptist and Holy Spirit. You also see a time around Acts ten that doesn't say what they did. So to me, I think if you're baptized in the Holy Spirit, you will see fruit. You'll definitely see fruit. I think you'll see gifting flow, and I think you'll know that something has changed in you. Now, does everything get twisted and perverted by our flesh and by our traditions and by crazy, wacky, perverted people, because we're all, you know, we’re all learning, we're all growing? Yes, sure, things get twisted, and sure things get counterfeited, and sure, things get, you know, kind of crazy. So does it happen in all church because we're human beings? But don't- you know, I'm from the south, never throw the baby out with the bathwater. Which means just because somebody perverts a gift doesn't mean the gift is not true. Just because something is counterfeit, counterfeited doesn't mean it's not real. As a matter of fact, the devil will only counterfeit what is valuable. So, yeah, you'll see, counterfeit tongues, counterfeit prophecies, counterfeit spiritual gifts, counterfeit all kinds of stuff, that's just what, that’s just the devil at work. You know, he's just doing his job. 

Anyway, I hope this makes sense to you. Let me just pray for you. Heavenly Father, thank you for everyone listening to this podcast, and Lord, and for someone listening here who's hungry for the baptism of the Holy Spirit. You shall receive power when the Holy Spirit’s come upon you. I pray right now that the Holy Spirit would just fall on them. Holy Spirit, according to your will, the name of Jesus Christ. Baptize those listening with me right now, with the Holy Spirit fall on them right now, fill them from the top of their head all the way to the soles of their feet. In the name of Jesus Christ, by faith, I declare and decree a baptism of the Holy Spirit. Each one listening, who's ready and willing and wants to receive it. Holy Spirit, touch them now, come upon them now. Baptize my brothers and sisters. Baptize my brothers and sisters. And Father you said that we should be continually filled with the Holy Spirit. So Lord, fill us even more. Fill us even more. Touch us now. Baptize us with your Holy Spirit, fresh and anew. And if it for the first time, people, Lord, just come on them now, come on them with your power. Come, Holy Spirit. Come, Holy Spirit. Come, Holy Spirit. Baptize my brothers and sisters; now, in Jesus name. Thank you, Father. Thank you, Jesus. Amen. Thank you for listening. This is Dr. Ray Self. And you've been listening to Self Talk.

[Outro plays]

Hey, guys, thank you for listening to today's show. I pray that the Holy Spirit touched you, came upon you, maybe even baptized you. I believe he did if you want Him to. So please uh, do a couple of things for me. It's very important to keep this show going. If you’ll consider donating, that would be terrific; icmcollege.org/donate. A really important thing for you, for your life is to answer the call of God on your life and get equipped and get trained for it and maybe finish up that college degree you never finished. Go to icmcollege.org/enroll. icmcollege.org/enroll. 

You know, also, there's free stuff on my website icmcollege.org. We have free lessons. There's counseling lessons, spiritual warfare lessons. There's lessons on pro-, on prophetic, on the School of the Prophets. You know, check out the free lessons. It's a free sample. Also, another thing That’s free is you can get a free evaluation. You say, well you know, I might be interested in getting my college degree, but I don't know what it would take or how much it would cost, or how many credits I can get. Go to the website, click Free Evaluation, it's right on the top right, and I'll send you that, no charge. Then you'll know for sure what it would take and you can pray about it if it's something you want to do. 

Now, on my Podpage website, icmcollege.org/selftalk there's all kinds of cool stuff that's where you can like, subscribe, rate me, give me a review, that really helps the show. Also, there's a store there. There are some courses you can purchase. All, whole, all six weeks, $225 courses, you can purchase for $35. So, you know, School of the Prophets, Foundations of Spiritual Warfare, uh, Counseling Victims to Freedom. So anyway, that's really cool stuff. The main thing is I'm grateful for you. Thank you for everyone listening to me. It means a lot. Send me an email if you'd like some more- anything I can do for you. Dr. Ray Self. Drrayself@gmail.com. Anyway, God bless you. Thanks for listening.