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TH E K I N G ’ S B U S I N E S S
September, 1941
I drink, I take the gift of the fullness of the Holy Spirit, and thank Thee for it.” That was on Monday. On Wednesday she followed me to Interlaken to hive an afternoon of Bible study and prayer. She said to me, “Oh, do you know that on Monday a longing of ten years was satisfied in ten minutes?” A new ex pression was in her face. The wistful ness had gone because the heart had been satisfied. That was in 1931. I wish I could tell of the rivers of living water that have been flowing out of her life ever since. It is a great thing to hear something like that from Europe in these days. One year recently in four cities in Switzer land she had four thousand people in her Bible classes. In 1935, she planned and carried out an international Bible conference. On faith she took a big hotel, promising to pay fifteen hundred francs for it. She did not know until within a few days before the conference opened how many people would be there. She took the whole hotel with two hundred beds, depending solely up on God to meet every financial need. There were seventeen European coun tries and three mission lands represent ed at that conference. In August of 1939, with the war ready to break out, she went on planning for another inter national conference. Thirty countries were represented. The delegates came, not knowing whether thay would be able to get home. They had a youth con ference with something like five hundred young people there, and in August of 1940 they had a conference in Switzerland with eight hundred people in attendance! Word came to this woman that the British and Foreign Bible Society had to close its doors in Berlin and that the Society had a new edition of 25,000 copies of the German Bible which would be confiscated if some one did not buy them immediately. The Lord laid this on her heart, and she felt that if there was ever a time when the Gefmans jjeeded Bibles, it was now. She tried to form a Swiss Bible Society to take over these Bibles, but was unsuccessful. The cost of the 25,000 Bibles was 40,- 000 francs. So she took them. Rivers of living water flowing! And I have not finished telling you what God is doing through that woman. She now has a Bible school and a rest home where any who wish may come and rest. If they can pay anything, all right; if they cannot pay anything, they are likewise welcome. She says God will supply the needed money— and He does! She has had to move five times into larger quarters, not for fail ure to pay her rent, but because of the growth of the work. And it all came about because one day that thirsty soul came to the well and took Him at His Word and drank until she was filled. “Be filled with the Spirit.”
drink.” He does not even say “pray” ; He says “drink.” I believe there is a difference. I believe that in this illustra tion, drinking is a definite act of faith. It is an act of the will. Oh! receive that marvelous gift that God offers. Christians Whom the Holy Spirit Filled The last time I was in Southern California in a meeting where we wqre thinking of this great theme, a dear woman came after one of the meetings and took my hand and with a wistful look in her face said, “Miss Paxson, oh! I thirst.” I knew she did. There was every evidence of genuineness in what she said. But I almost put my hand up to my ear to get the rest of that verse. She did not say it. She went away with the same wistfulness in her face, but she came back to the next meeting. We went further into this great truth, and as she went out again, she said, “I thirst and I drink!” Later I had a letter from her in which she wrote, “I just keep on thirsting and drinking, and He keeps on satisfying.” How does a person become filled with the Holy Spirit? By drinking. How does he keep filled? By keeping on drink ing! It is just as simple as that! In 1931, I was in Europe convalescing from an illness. God took me up into the beautiful Swiss Alps to a Christian hotel for a week. There I met a wonder ful German woman who was a conse crated Christian. She has one of the most brilliant minds I have ever met. She has her degree from one of the great German universities. She has also one of the simplest, purest spirits I have ever known. She was the secretary of a well-known student organization for several years. One time she gave a message on the new birth and was asked to resign. Next she went to a Bible school as a teacher. I had studied her face several days, and I saw a great wistfulness in her eyes. The last morning I was there she came to me and said, “Could I ask you one question? How long does one have to wait to be filled with the Holy Spirit?” “Do you truly thirst? Do you truly long for the infilling of the Holy Spirit?” I asked. “ Oh!” she said, “yes, for so long I have longed for it!” I answered, “How long must you wait? Just long enough to drink; by one appropriating act of faith to take that blessed, glorious gift of the infill ing of the Holy Spirit.” "Do you mean it is as simple as that?” she inquired. “That is what God says in His Word,” was my reply. Then we went to a-little side room where we knelt down and she offered one of the simplest, sweet est prayers I have ever heard in my life. It was something like this: “Lord, I thirst. Lord, I come unto Thee. Lord,
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v n r r TO a n y e v a n g e l ic a l I n u l l CHRISTIAN MINISTER Sunday School or Missionary Superintend ent» one copy o f “ God’s Loving Money Rule for _Your Financial Prosperity’* for each fam ily in his congregation providing he w ill agree to give a talk on Tithing before distribution! W rite stating denom ination and number o f leaflets desired to TITHER, 721K Title Insurance Bldg., Los Angeles, Calif* to be conscious of His presence. I know He is always with me, but there is a need of renewed and , deepened reality of things spiritual.” That is thirst. The realization of a conscious need of Him, wanting to find Him in the Word, wanting to make Him real to others, wanting an experimental knowledge of Him—that is thirst! Do you have it? It is the realization of a deep, inward need, a soul need that must be met; an acknowledgment of emptiness, dryness, and barrenness; and a determination that that thirst shall be quenched. Then what is the next thing? ‘‘Come unto me.” Yes, Christ says, “Come unto me.” He is the only One who can give this gift. He is the One who offers it. We must receive it from Him. Thirdly, He says, “Come unto me, and
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