Why Do Some People Struggle to Receive the Holy Spirit? by David K. Bernard Podcast recording (no venue stated in the delivered transcript) Kind: teaching Scripture: Acts 2:38, Acts 10, John 7:37-39, Acts 8, Acts 19 Source: https://acts238.life/repository/sermons/david-k-bernard--why-do-some-people-struggle-to-receive-the-holy-spirit Published by Acts 2:38 Life from the sermon transcript on that page. Free to copy and share with attribution. ------------------------------------------------------------ well to answer this question let's start with the basics uh God does want everyone to receive the Holy Spirit and there are only two conditions in the scripture for receiving the spirit first of all faith and second of all repentance acts 238 the classic statement of New Testament salvation says repent and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for remission of sins and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost now we do know uh from the example of Cornelius in Acts 10 that even before you're baptized if you repent open your heart in faith you can receive the holy spirit so baptism is not an absolute precondition but repentance is a precondition for both water baptism and spirit Baptist and of course faith is a precondition for everything and specifically Jesus said regarding the Holy Spirit in John 7 37-39 he that believeth on me as the scripture has said out of his belly shall flow rivers of Living Water and John explained this spake he of the spirit which they that believed on him should receive but the Holy Ghost was not yet given because Jesus was not yet glorified well of course Jesus has been glorified so that qualification is long longer necessary but both Jesus and John uh assured us that when you believe on Jesus Jesus you receive the holy spirit so I teach and I think part of the answer goes in all of our preaching teaching and counseling and praying with Seekers we should explain simply everyone can receive the Holy Spirit if they open their heart in faith and repent of all their sins that means if someone hasn't received the Holy Spirit the two things we look for a repentance and Faith so let's say that I'm praying with someone for a time and they haven't received the Holy Spirit I will usually stop them and talk to them and I'll explain repentance especially if they're brand new and I say repentance means you surrender to God uh you confess your sins to God you don't have to remember every single sin but there has to be an attitude in your heart and of course a new person may not even know what all is sin you you don't have to make sure that they get rid of every sin that you know is in the Bible but it it's it's an attitude of heart that I Surrender I confess that I am a sinner I make no excuses I don't justify myself I've done wrong I I want to change my life I want to live a new life please forgive me of my sins when they have that genuine attitude of repentance then that's what's required so many times people don't receive the spirit because they're holding something back in their mind they're not willing to surrender um and many times they may know what it is they may be harboring a grudge or hatred or bitterness or something a sinful lifestyle that they know is is wrong and while they do want relief in some way they want to continue during their sins they they want to get rid of the feeling of guilt and they want to feel like they're not going to face the Judgment but they really would like to keep sinning if they could um and so that attitude doesn't work um 2 Corinthians um talks about Godly sorrow Works repentance so there has to be a genuine sorrow for the sin not just sorry you got caught so maybe you got arrested so now you come to church crying you're not really sorry for your lifestyle you just wish God would made make wave a magic wand and take away the consequence of you're suffering right now um so that's not repentance so for some it's understanding uh repentance but then the next element is Faith so after I've led someone repentance I say if you have truly confessed your sins to God surrendered your life you really want to live for him you've ask God to forgive you then once you've done all that you're going to feel the weight of sin begin to lift you're going to feel a relief because God is accepting you and forgiving you and of course they they would then need to be baptized but at that point I say you'll feel the change and sometimes people quit right there because they feel hey that's they may have been taught that that salvation or they may just feel a change and they're good with that yes and so I say but that's the opportunity don't quit but start praising God so you'll never receive the Holy Spirit while you're begging or while you're pleading or while you're feeling guilty for your sins you have to transition to accepting the offer of Salvation and forgiveness and thanking God so you must worship and praise and and forget about yourself and focus on the Lord so it has to be an attitude of faith and not just generically you know I believe Jesus is the savior but I believe God will fill me with his Spirit right now and so I think many people do have faith to a point but it's not actualized that yes I I think I could receive this certain now and when I've talk to some people that struggle while they believe in Jesus they believe the preaching they don't really think God's going to do it for him that God might do it for somebody else but I'm a bad person or I'm this or I'm that and so some somehow they have to cross that hurdle now how do you do that that's where when people pray with the person and there's an atmosphere praise everybody's worshiping together then many times it clicks the person makes that mental spiritual transition of forgetting about themselves and their Hang-Ups and their problems and their fears and their doubts and they're lost in worship and they just receive the Holy Spirit begin speaking in tongues now there is a Biblical plan as well and that's the laying on of hands then and I I think we need to understand this more than we do because sometimes there's indiscriminate laying on of hands sometimes there we don't lay on hands so in the Bible the laying on of hands doesn't automatically give you something there's no power in the person but it is symbolic and it's shows that when someone in Spiritual Authority lays hands on you God is going to honor that and he is going to touch you and it becomes a focal point of Faith so if the issue is well I have faith in general I've responded to the message I repented I have faith in Jesus as my savior but I'm not I don't have faith that today right now this minute God's going to fill me with the Holy Spirit well how do you makeSign howin do you break through that that's when the laying on of hands could come into Focus so here's what I would I do with the Seeker so I will tell them about repentance and I say once you genuinely repented I want you to begin worshiping God raise your hands speak out thank you Jesus thank thank you for what I feel I Love You Lord thank you for the promise and when you're sincerely praying I will lay hands on you as the Bible tells me to do when I lay hands on you at that moment I want you to believe God is going to lay his hand upon you and I want you to open your heart to receive so when you give people instructions to focus their faith on that moment many times and I wait till they're worshiping and they're genuinely worshiping so as far as I can until in discussion and observation they've truly repented and then they're truly worshiping praising and they have an atmosphere attitude of reception well then when I lay hands on them then many times that is the focal point of Faith they'll receive the Holy Spirit another way that happens is you lead them to repentance and then you know there there's an end they don't receive the Holy Ghost immediately so then you explain water baptism in the name of Jesus Christ because that is the second step after repentance you lead them to baptism but you explain now when you come up out of the water according to acts 238 you repent you're baptized in Jesus name and then the next thing you'll receive the Holy Spirit and I actually say when I say I baptize you in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ for the washing away of your sins and you shall receive the gift of the holy spirit so when they come out of the water I say I want you to worship God you're going to feel cleansing but don't just get up and leave start praising God and then I will lay hands on you and so many times people receive the Holy Ghost when they come up out of the Waters of baptism so if you teach people many times they'll receive the Holy Spirit when they come up out of the Waters of baptism or when hands are laid upon them after they repented and so I gear my uh appeals after my message to that expectation and typically I wouldn't pray for people in extended time I'd pray a few minutes and if they didn't receive I'd stop them I'd go through those two steps and and we'd try again but rarely would we go on and on and on because there seems to be something blocking them and many times a very new people they're unfamiliar with the ways of God and and after they would pray I would encourage them say you're learning how to yield to God and it's very easy you can receive the Holy Spirit anytime it could be at home tonight when you kneel by your bedside but you're just having to learn how to open up your heart to God Rel lease uhu for many people they they have mental emotional Hang-Ups uh because of past experiences because of their past Church relationships or relationship with people in authority and and so they don't know how to Just Surrender and so I explained to them in the process of prayer God is leading you God is ready to fill you at any time but you're the one that has to let go and open up now there are so I will just tell you over the years I was raised in Korea my parents were missionaries and this is what they taught and many times if they had a series of meetings the first night or two they would preach mostly on repentance and then the last few nights they would preach on on the holy spirit so they'd get the audience prepared and then people would receive so we found very few situations uh where people would tar for the Holy Ghost a long time or come day after day or month after month I think the way you teach and pre preach and pray and counsel you can lead the vast majority of people to receive the Holy Spirit and it is a matter of focusing the faith to receive at that moment however there are a few cases that seem to be challenging uh I'll give you a couple examples one is where maybe a person is so uh because of their life experien suffering depression been been abused been been victimized they just can't bring thems to believe it's really true and all I can say there is you just keep praying keep believing keep encouraging uh if they don't receive the Holy Spirit don't let them feel discouraged like I'm no good just say no you made progress you've done well and I just advise them keep coming keep praying keep believing it's going to happen it's it's going to happen it's a matter of time uh and the other time sometimes people actually do receive the Holy Spirit speaking tongues but because of their expectations what they've been told you they're waiting for a bolt of lightning or they again they can't believe it's happening to them and so I've had those cases where everybody around them said I I heard them speak in tongues and they no I don't think I did and so again you keep encourage them and and I I never try to convince someone they receive the Holy Spirit but I will tell them look you know other people are telling me this so I want you to lay aside your fears and just worship and when they do start speaking in tongues I try encourage them and then when they finish to say did you hear yourself and so so for some it's a matter of again trying to talk them through to realize set aside all your preconceived ideas and just focus on the lord it's very simple you're making it too complex God wants to do this for you and it's going to happen and I I think I've been as a pastor uh we were you know successful in almost every case and to to give you a little bit of encouragement even the Bible you do see there is a process it's not intended to be a long process in the in the book of Acts repentance water baptism and the Holy Ghost are all meant to occur simultaneously or near simultaneously in Rapid succession someone repents you immediately baptize them and they receive the Holy Spirit or repent and they immediately receive the Holy Spirit and then when they finish praying you baptize them but let's take the example in Acts 8 the Samaritans they repented they believ they were about baptized but they didn't receive the Holy Ghost and so the word was sent to Peter and John in Jerusalem so it it was about at least a two days journey from Samaria to Jerusalem and back so there had to be four days and then when Peter and John came prayed for them laid hands then they received the spirit at least four days um the Apostle Paul his uh repentance on the road to Damascus but 3 Days Later ananas prayed for him to receive the Holy Spirit uh Cornelius I believe repent was already repentant but God gave him a vision to send for Peter it was 4 days later while Peter was preaching that Cornelius received the Holy Spirit in Acts 19 the Disciples of John and Ephesus they had been baptized into John we don't know but it's probably days weeks months could could have been years so they truly repented but they hadn't heard about the Holy Spirit and that could be one reason that people have never really heard that the holy spirit is available and so they don't seek it or maybe they've heard a little bit but they haven't focused their faith to receive so in the book of Acts you do see a process so I try to encourage someone if they have repented then they need to be baptized in Jesus name if they have done both then it's just a matter of time a short time but there is a process and even in the book of Acts we s we see examples of that process but I think if we preach it teach it and encourage people we will see it happen as in the book of Acts and just one final Point uh if you want resources on the theology uh see my book the new birth and for a chapter on praying with Seekers see my book spiritual leadership in the 21st century