Five Conditions for the Power of the Holy Spirit

FB Meyer, a friend and contemporary of DL Moody, was a Baptist pastor, evangelist, and inner-city missions worker both in England where he grew up and in America where he often came to preach. Meyer was a frequent speaker at the Keswick Convention and wrote over 40 books throughout his life. A series of sermons he gave addressing missions were compiled in a book entitled The Soul’s Ascent. In it, he answered the question about how to receive the power of the Holy Spirit, which he argues is for everyone – not just “special” Christians. Here are his 5 conditions from the chapter Anointing with the Holy Spirit.

You say to me: “Sir, tell me how I may get this power myself.”

I will. I know a little of it, thank God, and I hope as the years pass that I may know more and more. This truth has revolutionized my life.

Now what are these conditions [for the power of the Holy Spirit]? There are as far as I know five. If you discover another, let me know.

1. You cannot have the power of the Holy Ghost without having the Holy Ghost Himself.

That is, the Holy Ghost must come to you as a person before you can enjoy His attribute. In other words, you must be a holy man before you can wield the power of the Holy Ghost. There are plenty of men who think that if they could only get the power of the Holy Ghost they would be able to fill their churches and sell their books and get themselves name and fame. They want it, but not Him. You cannot have it without having Him. If you want the power of the Holy Ghost, open your heart to-day and be filled with the Holy Ghost, and then you will have His power.

2. You must be cleansed.

Oh, I do want to speak wisely! I do not want needlessly to offend you, or denounce you. But I do feel in my heart that if the Holy Spirit is going to work through you or any body He must have a cleansed vessel. The body must be clean.

Now I know that I might here dilate on many of those indulgences that men and women permit. I would much prefer not to characterize them, because you yourselves know anything in your life which is inconsistent with the perfect majesty and purity of that Spirit who has made your body His temple. But if my body is really the temple, the residence and the throne of the Holy Ghost, I must be as careful of it as I would be if I were the custodian of a temple in the inner part of which the light of God shone. I need not say more than that.

3. You must live for the glory of Christ as your supreme end.

Jesus Christ, came into the world to glorify the Father, and the Holy Ghost came into the world to glorify the Son. If therefore you want the Holy Ghost to work with you, you must agree with the Holy Ghost to glorify Jesus, for the Spirit was not given till Jesus was glorified.

4. Your preaching and teaching must be in harmony with the Word of God.

… Remember that the Holy Spirit is like a locomotive, the Word of God like the steel rails; and you must have the steel rails of the Bible as well as the steam-power of the Holy Ghost. Let the Holy Ghost fill you, but He will work along that Book. And I hold that the fact that the Holy Spirit elects to work through that Book is its most complete vindication against all that modern critics have to say. As long as the Holy Ghost is prepared to stand by it and to work by it, I hold it to be in an incomparable sense the Word of the living God to man. I am well satisfied to accept it all.

5. The Holy Spirit must be received by faith.

Galatians 3:14 is the battle-axe. I would not be without that text for anything: “That we might receive the promise of the Spirit through faith.” All of God’s dealings with men are on the same principle, by faith. By faith you are regenerate, by faith you are justified, by faith you are sanctified, by faith you receive the Holy Ghost, by faith you receive Christ as the power of God into your life. It is all by faith.