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"Rejoice always - Pray without ceasing - In everything give thanks, for this is God's will for you in Christ Jesus - Do not quench the Spirit - Do not despise prophetic utterances - But examine everything carefully; hold fast to what is good - Abstain from every form of evil". (I Thessalonians 5: 16-22)

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It was in the very early 1970's, and Jackie's aunt Eva took a bus to South Bend, Indiana, to visit her mother-in-law. On her way back she noticed that someone had left a book on the bus seat that she had chosen, called "Catholic Pentecostals", written by Kevin and Dorothy Ranahan, early leaders of the Catholic Charismatic movement. She brought it home and gave it to Jackie's dad, thinking that he might be interested in it. And indeed, Harry got so interested that he attended a Charismatic prayer meeting held at an abbey in Three Rivers, a city about a half hour away. Harry began to get a strong desire to receive the Baptism of the Holy Spirit, as well as the desire to receive the gift of speaking in tongues. Not knowing how to go about it, he lay in bed and repeated the name, Jesus, throughout the night. The next morning when he got out of bed he was not tired, and so he went to the machine shop that he owned with a brother-in-law, working all that day with the machines. That night Harry again stayed awake, repeating his prayer of "Jesus, Jesus, JESUS", all night long. And again that next morning he got up, not tired, and worked all day. The third night, still determined to receive the Baptism of the Holy Spirit, he lay down on his bed, and immediately after the first "Jesus", his words switched over to a new language, and Harry spent the entire night in worship and prayer to God using the tongues that the Holy Spirit had given him.

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My experience was different. I had been an atheist for over 4 years by the time I married Jackie. She remembers always believing that Jesus was her Lord and Savior, and shortly after her dad's experience, the summer before we got married, he prayed with his children that they would open their hearts to the moving of the Holy Spirit, and Jackie eagerly asked for and received the gift of speaking in tongues. So we began our married life as a mixed couple, something that now I would not recommend. We went through pre-marriage consoling with Jackie's priest, Father Fitzgerald, and even though he knew I was an atheist, he still allowed us to get married in the church during a mass at St. Joe's.

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Several months later came the big after-dinner-with-the-whole-family-blow up-on abortion and religion, and that began an amazing 2 month period leading to my conversion and Baptism in the Spirit. I'll share one story from that period. I was working as a traveling salesman for our family furniture business. In October I went to the Fall furniture show in North Carolina that lasted 10 days, and at night I had time to read some books that Harry had given me. Although the books helped me understand for the first time things such as - Jesus death on the cross was intended for me personally - I still could not even begin to comprehend God. The one thing I knew was that I didn't know God, nor how God could be. And so I tried to pray. But the only thing I could think of each night, while laying on my bed down there in North Carolina, was to say the Our Father. And I did that each night. Unlike Harry, I didn't spend very long each night praying, but I was knocking on the door, and seeing that, Jesus was preparing me for the time when He would open it.

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The scripture verse that finally cut deep to my heart applies well to both of the stories above. One day, during my time of seeking, I thought; "Oh, I could speak funny words like Jackie does when she speaks in tongues", and I began to try to talk funny, when a strange word came out. I immediately stoopped because the thought in my mind was; "I don't know if there is a God, and I don't know if there is a devil, but if there is a devil then I certainly don't want anything that comes from him". It was a few weeks later, while I was reading a book by a Dr. Robert Frost, that I got excited about the possibility of knowing God. I put down the book and asked God (this was the 3rd time I had done so) to reveal Himself to me. Unlike the other times, when nothing happened I was extremely disappointed. Letting out an audible sigh, I picked up the book again and read a passage which Dr. Frost quoted from Luke 11, where Jesus says;

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"Ask, and it shall be given to you; seek, and you shall find; knock, and it shall be opened to you. For everyone who asks, receives, and he who seeks, finds, and to him who knocks, it shall be opened. Now suppose one of you fathers is asked by his son for a fish; he will not give him a snake instead of a fish, will he? Or if he is asked for an egg, he will not give him a scorpion, will he? If you then, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more shall your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask Him?".

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I had been seeking. I had been asking. I didn't know Him but now I desperately wanted Him. Through that passage He told me that I could trust Him to be a loving Lord, and a Precious Savior, and that whatever he had for me was good. And so I knelt down, and examined my conscious, and confessed my rebellion, and asked Jesus to come into my heart and to fill me with His Holy Spirit. As a step of faith I opened my mouth to speak forth in a new tongue. And in the instant before I spoke, as I began to give it breath, I came to know Jesus as a person.

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We live in a microwave, fast food, instant gratification, super high speed Internet world. Our TVs have 200 channels, or ipods have 2000 songs, our cell phones have 2000 minutes a month. We give God a few hours a week of our time, but if we have a need we want to be able to access Him right now by double clicking on His icon. And yet, God is not a program running somewhere out there, ready to dispense the right stuff if only we know the correct pathways. He has revealed Himself to us as a person, and He wants to be in everything we do. His Holy Spirit will call us to come to know Jesus, and through Him the Father, but we must respond. And if we seek Him, He will be found, and will come into our hearts to bring a new birth to our spirits. The Holy Spirit has spiritual gifts for our benefit and for the benefit of our community. But we need to seek after them, and learn to grow in them. We get frustrated when we don't see immediate answers to prayers. But God wants us to trust Him, and to have joy in the journey. Sometimes trust means that we need to surrender more of our time to seek after, and to wait for, what He has for us. And trust means that when He shows us what we need to do, we respond, even if the evidence or logic is not immediately apparent. When we allow Him to be in every part of our lives, asking Him to move in our areas of concern, we will truly be able to give Him thanks in everything, rejoicing always.