The Greatest Faith Ever Known

Roman Catholic authors, a liberal United Methodist minister, and a teen-led prayer meeting were responsible for my involvement in the Pentecostal Movement.
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While reading Fulton and April Oursler’s The Greatest Faith Ever Known, the need for a dramatic confession of faith became inescapable. In the story of Philip and the Ethiopian financier as recounted by the Ourslers, it is clear that to qualify for baptism in water one must believe with all the heart. Deeply moved by the account, I knelt and prayed using the words of the Ethiopian money manager, “I believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God.” [1]
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Not satisfied with a private expression of faith and wanting to emulate the biblical pattern, I approached the minister of our United Methodist Church and requested baptism by immersion. Fresh out of seminary, the Reverend Roberts was unorthodox in his beliefs and practice. He openly admitted to the teens who attended his weekly “rap sessions” that he did not believe in hell and was not too sure about heaven. It was not surprising when he refused the request. To him baptism was an unnecessary ritual.
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When reminded that Methodist catechetical classes taught that immersion was the prerogative of the believer, he insisted it would be too much trouble to borrow a baptistery from another church. Refusing to drop the matter, I began a search for a church that baptized by immersion.
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It was a pleasant surprise to find that the Assemblies of God church in a neighboring town not only observed believer’s baptism by immersion, but also endeavored to restore primitive Christian practices like those described in the Ourslers’ paraphrase of the Book of Acts.
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The teens at First Assembly were serious about their faith and conducted their own prayer meetings. During one of the prayer sessions, a few teens asked if they could pray for me to receive the baptism in the Holy Spirit. I acquiesced even though the terminology and objectives were unclear. The encounter with the Holy Spirit began to transform my life even though I did not speak in tongues on that occasion. Rising from five-hours of prostrate prayer, life suddenly had a new direction.
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The next six months were a flurry of spiritual activities—unrelenting prayer at the altar, discussions with church leaders and consumption of literature on the subject of the Person and Work of the Holy Spirit.
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Finally, on a chilly February night, I methodically placed the various areas of my life “on the altar.” As I reached the place of total surrender, words in a language other than English (my first and only language) came into my mind. By an act of my will, I cooperated with God and spoke as He supplied the words and the ability to pronounce them properly. The more I spoke the larger the “vocabulary” became.
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Since that encounter at the altar, a day has not come when I could not pray or praise in tongues.
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[1] Oursler, Fulton and April Oursler Armstrong. The Greatest Faith Ever Known (Garden City, NY: Doubleday and Company, Inc. 1953), 108. See also Acts 8:36-38.