"Real" Holy Ghost?

[Sam]

I have a DVD which I purchased from the Pentecostal Publishing House a while back. It contains the Pentecostal Herald from December, 1945 (first issue, but with a few pages missing) through December of 2004. They are pdf (portable document format) files. It's been interesting looking at some of those old issues. I used to get the Herald at Church. They were available at both the UPC and ALJC churches where I went.

This is not anything new but goes back quite a few years to the time when folks from different denominations were receiving an experience that they called "the Holy Ghost Baptism" or "the release of the Spirit" or "receiving their prayer language" or "the Baptism in the Holy Spirit." I remember looking down my self-righteous nose at these reports and thinking, "This can't be genuine because they didn't come to us to receive this experience." I guess at that time I thought we had an exclusive franchise on the Spirit of God. Later, my attitude changed.

This article is just presented for information and maybe for some discussion.

This is from page 20 of the January 1962 Pentecostal Herald.

EPISCOPALIANS RECEIVE THE HOLY GHOST

God has promised that in the last days He would pour out of His Spirit upon all flesh. Stirring reports are coming in to us of how large numbers in nominal churches are receiving the baptism of the Holy Ghost.

Recently an Episcopalian minster named Bennet, pastor of St. Mark's Church of the Holy Spirit in Van Nuys, California, was scheduled to speak at a convention in Moody Memorial Church. As he could not be present, Mrs. Gene Stone, a member of his church, addressed the convention. This young woman is not a minister. In a pleasing manner, interjecting praises to the Lord, she told of how the Lord was doing a new thing in our day. (It is new to them, of course.)

Mrs. Stone told of an Anglican priest in Canada receiving the Holy Ghost. (Episcopalians in Canada are called Anglicans.) She also stated that 1300 Episcopalian priests and lay people in the Los Angeles area had received the Holy Ghost, speaking in other tongues. The experience is changing their lives. They have no time now for dances an cocktail parties. They spend their lives witnessing for the Lord.

Mrs. Stone was invited to lunch with seven Episcopalians. While sitting at the table, a message was given in tongues, and interpreted. The waitress, a Baptist, trembling with coffee cups in her hand said, "That's what I want: I've always wanted something more." She received the Holy Ghost right there in the restaurant.

Later at a motel the manager, a woman, knocked at Mrs. Stone's door, saying, "May I speak with you?" But she seemed speechless. Soon Mrs. Stone asked, "Did you want to speak about the Holy Ghost?" The woman answered, "Yes." Soon she was speaking with other tongues.

All this proves that we indeed are living in the last days.