George Fox, founder of the Society of Friends was born again at the age of eleven. But when he turned twenty-three and after hungering and thirsting for a deeper experience, a new enduement of power came upon him. From that time on he was mightily used of God again and again he described the power of the Lord on him and through him. The Spirit’s power clothed him wherever he went and until his death he was a mighty instrument in the hand of God.
John Bunyan after a tempestuous and sinful youth was converted one evening as the Holy Spirit applied Hebrews 2 :14-15 to his heart . After a joyous walk with the Lord he went through a two-year struggle with Satan. God used the passage in I John 1:7 to him and he entered his “BeulahLand experience.” Though not without trials from then on he was overwhelmed with the sense of God’s grace and power. God mightily used him as during his twelve years of imprisonment he wrote his famous books. Among them the immortal classic “Pilgrim’s Progress.”
William Penn, the famous Quaker who founded Pennsylvania was a great soulwinner. He was born again at the age of twelve and at the age of twenty-two made a full consecration of his all and was filled with the Spirit after hearing a message by a Quaker preacher. He was immediately endued with the power that gave him dominion over wordly conversation and habits.
John Wesley after years as an earnest but only nominal Christian was born again with a clear assurance of salvation on May 24, 1738 in a Moravian service in London. After ten years of struggle he had found peace. Later in the year he began to long for a still deeper experience. On January 1, 1739 John Wesley, his brother Charles, George Whitefield and some sixty others were continuing in prayers. About three o’clock in the morning God poured out His Spirit on them in a mighty way in a tremendous empowering, anointing and infilling of the Holy Spirit that sent the Wesleys and Whitefield to blaze a trail of salvation and revival across the British isles and in the American colonies. The Holy Spirit continued to manifest His power through John Wesley until his triumphant death in 1791.
Oswald Chambers, the author of My Utmost For His Highest was a strong Bible teacher of this experience. He testified, “ Dr. F. B. Meyer came and spoke to us about the Holy Spirit. I determined to have all that was going and went to my room and asked God simply and definitely for his Holy Spirit, whatever that meant. Four years later God spoke to me through His Word. “ Luke 11:13 got hold of me….it was borne in upon me that I had to claim the gift from God on authority of JesusChrist … this I did in dogged committal . I had no vision of heaven nor of angels …..but like a flash something happened inside me …the days that followed have truly been heaven on earth . Glory be to God- the last aching abyss of the human heart is filled to overflowing with the love of God. The power and tyranny of sin is gone and the radiant, unspeakable emancipation of the indwelling Christ has come. “
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