My first "sermons" in 1974 and early 1975 did not have much content. They were basically my testimony of the work of the Spirit of how He made Himself so real to me. In those days I really didn't know too much, and there was so much to learn.
FOLLOWING THE SPIRIT'S VOICE
But during 1975 I heard the unmistakable voice of the Holy Spirit telling me that it was time to begin conducting weekly meetings in Toronto.He said, "Follow me. Hear My voice, and you will lead many to Christ."And so I began. On Monday nights we scheduled a series of services that would continue for the next five years. We started in a high school auditorium, and the crowds became so large we had to move to larger facilities. Hundreds and hundreds of people attended. The services were totally led by the Spirit, and I listened ever so closely to His voice. People were delivered from serious addictions.
Families were reunited. We had" healing lines" and heard testimonies of miracles. But always, always, the services resulted in the salvation of lost souls. Then something happened. People began to receive miracles, deliverance, and healings right in their seats. No lines for "the laying on of hands." God began to do His work all across the auditorium—so freely that there was not time to hear all of the testimonies.The press began to take notice. On the front pages of the Toronto Star, the Toronto Globe and Mail, and other papers across Canada there were stories of the "Miracle Rallies" we were conducting.
In December 1976 the Globe and Mail sent a reporter to one of the services to describe in detail what was happening. He wrote of the healings and testimonies and ended the article by quoting me: "I'm not interested in building up Benny Hinn. I'm not and never will be. Jesus is the one. . . to be built up and exalted. We want to reach souls for the Lord Jesus. I want to see souls, souls, souls, souls, souls. People, do you understand that?"Under the headline, "Does Faith Healing Really Work?" the Toronto Star presented four case studies of people who had been healed in our services.
He told about a shift worker at the GM plant in Oshawa who had cancer of the throat. "This week, following a checkup at the cancer clinic, he was told there is no trace of malignancy."He told the story of a Beaverton trucker: "A non church-goer, who had suffered from congestive heart failure and slight emphysema (a lung disease) for seven years, was persuaded by friends to attend a healing crusade. 'I went to the doctor three days later, and he told me he could find nothing wrong,' he says. 'God must have done it.'"What about their doctors? The reporter quoted one as saying, "Look, there are more things happening in this world than we know about."Television stations began to film documentaries on what God was doing.
The Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC), Global TV, and the huge independent station in Toronto, Channel 9, produced specials. We ran our own weekly television program that was shown in prime time after 60 Minutes for a year and a half. A Yellow Cab in Pittsburgh Leaving the great city of Toronto in 1979 was not easy for me. It was where I had been saved, healed, and touched by the mighty Spirit of God. The press had nothing but good news to report about the ministry. But again, I promised to follow the leading of the Holy Ghost. I knew He wanted me to build a church and establish an international ministry.
He had told me this years earlier, in1977. I remember exactly where it happened. I was back in Pittsburgh, riding in a big Yellow Cab when I had a conversation with the Spirit about it. About the ministry He said, "It will touch the world!"I wondered, "Where will it be? New York? Los Angeles?" But, you know, the Spirit has an amazing way of leading you. In July 1978 I traveled to Orlando, Florida, to speak for Pastor Roy Harthern. He told me about his daughter, Suzanne, who was attending Evangel College in Springfield, Missouri.
Being single, my ears perked up.I invited myself back to spend Christmas with them, and Suzanne was home for the holidays. The first time I saw her, the Lord said, "That's your wife." Just like that! I felt it. And she did too. But I had to be sure so I began to ask God for "signs."I'd put out "fleeces." And every one of them was answered. I thought, "Is this just coincidence? Or does God really want me to marry this young lady?" Then I tried one last sign a rather difficult one.
I was flying back to Orlando from San Jose, California, on January 1, 1979. I made a quick trip there to speak at a New Year's Eve service. On the plane I had a talk with God. I said, "If she really is to be my wife, have her say to me when I get back, 'I've made you a cheesecake.'" That was the toughest test I could think of. Suzanne met me at the Orlando airport, and the first words out of her mouth were, "Benny, I've made you a cheese cake." Then she said, "Don't expect too much.
I've never made a cheesecake before."We were engaged within two weeks and married later that year. As time passed, all signs pointed to Orlando, Florida, asthe place we would begin a worldwide ministry. With just a handful of people, the Orlando Christian Center was started in 1983. Now it touches the lives of thousands of people every week, plus a national television audience. He's Not a Promoter To be honest, I had no idea where the Spirit would lead my life when I began my relationship with Him. All I knew was that He was real and desired my fellowship .
He wanted to be my teacher and guide. But here is what I have come to know. The Holy Ghost will never promote Himself; He'll promote Jesus. He will never create the place of greatness just for Himself; He'll give the honor to the Lord . I've also learned that the Spirit is not the source of God's gifts. He is the one who helps you receive from the giver, who is God the Father. He's also the one who helps you receive God the Son as Savior and Lord. He gives you the power to speak.
In fact, it's useless to attempt to proclaim God's Word without the Holy Ghost upon you. "Help Me! "When you say, "Holy Spirit, help me to know Jesus, "He will not disappoint you. He is always willing to help. Listen to what the psalmist says: "Do not cast me away from Your presence, and do not take Your Holy Spirit from me" (Ps. 51:11). Then, in the very next breath, he says, "Restore to me the joy of Your salvation; / And uphold me with Your generous Spirit" (v. 12).
The Holy Ghost is willing. Anytime you say, "Help me," He says, "I will. "When you say, "Teach me," He says, "I'm ready."And when you say, "Help me to pray," He says, "Let's begin."He is right there, giving you the desire to pray. He is the urging behind the hunger to talk to the Father and to the Son. Paul wrote these powerful words: "Therefore I make known to you that no one speaking by the Spirit of God calls Jesus accursed, and no one can say that Jesus is Lord except by the Holy Spirit" (1 Cor. 12:3). When you sing "He is Lord" and mean it from your heart, it's proof that the Holy Ghost is within you. He's using you to proclaim that Jesus Christ is Lord to the whole world! The moment you confess the death, burial, and resurrection of Christ you have passed the test of the Spirit.
Scripture says, "By this you know the Spirit of God: Every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the fleshis of God, and every Spirit that does not confess that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is not from God" (1 John4:2-3). He says, "By this we know the Spirit of truth and the spirit of error" (v. 6).Your salvation is at the very heart of the work of the Holy Spirit. In fact, it is He that actually adopts you into God's family.
Paul writes, "For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, these are sons of God. For you did not receive the spirit of bondage again to fear, but you received the Spirit of adoption" (Rom. 8:14-15). And here is how you express it. By him "we cry out,' Abba, Father.' The Spirit Himself bears witness, with our spirit that we are children of God, and if children, then heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ, if indeed we suffer with Him, that we may also be glorified together" (vv. 15-17). Up for Adoption The Spirit looked at you and saw an orphan. He said, "I will adopt you." He's your Father. Why? Because He is the Spirit of the Father.
Do you remember Dottie Rambo's song, "Holy Spirit, You Are Welcome in This Place"? She was inspired to write, "Omnipotent Father of mercy and grace." That's what the Spirit is. Without Him it is impossible to approach the Father. Paul tells you, "For through Him we both have access by one Spirit to the Father" (Eph. 2:18). Through whom? Through Jesus, both Jew and Gentile can approach God bythe Holy Ghost. But here's the most exciting part of all.
The Bible says that the Holy Ghost has been given to you as a guarantee of eternal life. "Having believed, you were sealed with the Holy Spirit of promise, who is the guarantee of inherit ance until the redemption of the purchased possession, to the praise of His glory" (Eph. 1:13-14).There's no doubt about it. The Holy Spirit is preparing you for heaven. If you're convinced He's living inside, then you must never question whether you are born again. You must never question whether your home is heaven. And you must never question whether you will have eternal life. Let me put it this way.
If tomorrow morning you walk into a store and pick out some clothes and a pair of shoes but don't have all the money, you walk over to "layaway" and make a down payment toward the purchase. You say,"I'll pick it up next week." Your name is on the bill, and you take the receipt home. Then next week you pick up the purchased possession. That's exactly what Jesus did when He came and gave you the Holy Ghost. The only difference is that He paid the entire price on Calvary.
But here's what He says: "I paid for your life, but I'm also giving a down payment that guarantees it's mine." He sent the Holy Spirit. And if you have Him, you are on your way to glory. When Christ returns, He's going to pick you up and take you home. It's worth shouting about. You are a purchased possession of the Lord. That's why you can tell Satan to his ugly face, "Don't touch me. I'm a possession of Christ!"And don't be afraid to speak the Word. Kick him out, and He will flee from you.
You have the Holy Spirit. A "deposit" on your inheritance! Why was He given as a down payment? Paul says, "Christ has redeemed us from the curse of the law, having become a curse for us (for it is written, 'Cursed is every one who hangs on a tree')" (Gal. 3:13). And then he wrote this marvelous truth: He redeemed us in order "that the blessing of Abraham might come upon the Gentiles in Christ Jesus, that we might receive the promise of the Spirit through faith" (v. 14).Because Christ became a curse, the Spirit was given as promised. You Need Some Help From the moment you accept Jesus as Savior, it is the Spirit that gives you the will, the strength, and the desire too bey God and live the Christian life.
Without Him it is im possible. The apostle Peter tells you, "Since you have purified your souls in obeying the truth through the Spirit in sincere love of the brethren, love one another fervently with a pure heart" (1 Peter 1:22). The reason people even Christians fail is that they depend on their own strength. You can't obey God by saying, "I'm going to do it by myself." How many times have you said, "I'm going to pray," but you didn't. Or "I'llread the Word," but you forgot. Why? Because you weredepending on your mind. You depended on the flesh, and itwill fail you continually.
He'll give you strength and life, but the Spirit will give you something else just as important. He'll give you rest. Isaiah said, As a beast goes down into the valley, And the Spirit of the LORD causes him to rest, So You lead Your people, To make Yourself a glorious name. (Isa. 63:14)Just after I began to preach the gospel, I met David Du Plessis. He was known as "Mr. Pentecost" as a result ofhis presentations of the Holy Spirit to world religious leaders.
He was a charismatic before anyone knew what the word meant. I was walking down the same hallway with this anointed man at a conference in Brockville, Ontario, when I summoned the courage to stop him and ask a question. I nervously asked him, "Dr. DuPlessis, how can I truly please God?"The old man, who is now with Jesus, stopped, put his brief case down, pointed his finger in my chest and pushed me against the wall. I certainly didn't expect that from afrail preacher. All I had said was, "How can I please God?"and he nailed me to the wall. Then he said two words that I have never forgotten.
He said: "Don't try!" He picked up his little case and walked on down the hall.I caught up with him and said, "Dr. DuPlessis, I don't understand."He calmly turned around and said, "Young man, it's not your ability. It's His ability in you." Then he said, "Goodnight," and walked into his room. As I walked into my room, I was still puzzled. I lay down on my bed and thought about those words. "It's notyour ability.
It's His ability in you."In that moment I hardly knew what to pray, but the Spirit began to unlock the truth of those words to me. How can I please God? By yielding! By not even trying. It was just as Mr. Pentecost said. The Holy Spirit will do the work. It's not my strength; it's His. Otherwise I would boast of my own accomplishments. God's Touch When you see Jesus face to face, you won't say, "Lord, look what I did." You'll say, "Lord, look what you did withthis wretched man." Start practicing it.
Open your arms wide and say, "Spirit of the living God, I want to live forJesus today. I give You my mind, my emotion, my will, my intellect, my lips, my mouth, my ears, and my eyes use them for the glory of God." When I wake up and pray that kind of prayer, the anointing floods me like an ocean at high tide. In the moment I totally surrender, God begins to flow through my ministry. Nothing less will do .
I have often wondered why, in my own meetings, the Spirit directs me so often to pray for healing. And I have wondered why my ministry has been accompanied by people who fall under the power of the Holy Spirit. But when I look at the results of the meetings, I see that every manifestation of the Spirit is for one purpose: to bring people to Christ. It is a demonstration that God is alive, that He is still "moving" in the lives of people.
I have seen thousands of people literally fall under the power of the Spirit, and I believe that just a small touch of God's power is all they felt. But it demonstrates the awesome strength of the Almighty, and it draws people to the Savior. Being healed or even being "slain in the Spirit" is not a prerequisite for heaven. There is only one door Christ the Lord. Never take your attention from the purpose of the Spirit on earth.
He is the Spirit of the Father and the Spirit of the Son, leading people to confess that Christ is Lord. As I began my ministry I never ceased to be amazed at the power of the Holy Spirit. He's gentle, but He's powerful. The grass withers, the flower fades, Because the breath of the LORD blows upon it. Surely the people are grass. (Isa. 40:7)The Holy Ghost is not a weak personality. As both a young Christian and a new minister I often stood back and watched the Lord at work. I knew it wasn't me that was touching lives.
It was the sovereignty of God and the operation of the Spirit. I just watched in amazement. But I don't think I've been as frightened in my life as that Sunday night in April 1975. There I was on the platform of a small pentecostal church on the west side of Toronto when my parents Costandi and Clemence walked in the door. My heart almost stopped, and I could feel the perspiration on my forehead.
My worst nightmare could not have matched this. I was petrified—too startled to laugh and too shocked to cry. What Must They Be Thinking? I had been preaching for five months, but my parents had no idea. The tension in our house over the Lord was bad enough without my breaking that news. But they saw an ad the pastor placed in the newspaper and walked into that little church.
I couldn't even glance in their direction. But the moment I opened my mouth to preach, the anointing of the Holy Spirit filled that building. It was so strong. Words began flowing out of me like a river. I found myself factually "listening" to what the Spirit directed me to say. As I was finishing my message, I felt led to begin ministering to people who needed healing. I thought, "What must my mom and dad be thinking of all this?"
Then they stood up and walked out the back door."Jim," I said after the service, "you've got to pray!" Jim Poynter was with me on the plat form that night and knew the seriousness of the situation. I even thought of spending the night at his home to avoid the inevitable confrontation. Instead, I got into my car and began to drive the streets of Toronto. I thought, "If I get home in the middle of the night, my folks will be sleeping." It was just after two o'clock in the morning when I quietly parked in front of the house and turned off the ignition. I tiptoed up the steps and slowly unlocked the front door. I opened it and was startled by what I saw.
There in front of me, seated on the couch, were my mom and dad. I had been panic-stricken when I saw them walk into that church, but this was even worse. My knees began to tremble, and I looked for a place to sit down. My father was the first to speak and I listened in disbelief."Son," he softly said, "how can we become like you?"Was I hearing what I thought I was hearing? Was this the same man that had been so offended by my conversion? The father that had absolutely forbidden the name of "Jesus" to be spoken in our home?"We really want to know," he said.
"Tell us how we can have what you have."I looked at my dear mother and saw tears begin to fall down her beautiful cheeks. I couldn't contain my joy at that moment. I began to weep. And for the next hour of that unforgettable night I opened the Scripture and led my parents to the saving knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ. My daddy said, "Benny, do you know what convinced me?" He told me that when I began preaching, he turned to my mother and said, "That's not your son. Your son can't talk! His God must be real." He didn't know that I had been totally healed of stuttering. The marvelous conversion of my parents allowed the Lord to literally sweep through the rest of the family.
Henry showed up and got saved. My little brother Mike was born again. Then it happened to Chris. If you've ever heard about" household salvation," this was it! The Hinn home was transformed into "heaven on earth!" And the change was not temporary. It was apermanent work of the Spirit. Today Chris, Willie, Henry,Sammy, and Mike are totally involved in ministry. Mary and Rose are committed Christians and living for the Lord.And Benny? Well, you know what has happened to him. First Things First Just as the Holy Spirit touched my life and drew my parents to Christ, He wants the same for you.
The greatest work of the Spirit is not to lead you into some heavenly ecstasy on earth. That may happen, but His purpose is to convict of sin and lead people to Jesus. As you have been reading this book you may have said, "That's for me! I want to have an exciting personal relationship with the Holy Spirit!" But are you ready for it? What happened to me the night the Spirit entered my bedroom was not the first step. It began much earlier. You've got to put first things first and touch every step on your spiritual ladder. My friend, if you have never asked Christ to come into your heart, now is the time. It's the most important step you will ever take. Right now, say: "Jesus, I confess that I am a sinner.
I believe that You are the Son of God and that You shed your precious blood on the cross for me. Forgive meof my sin. Cleanse my heart from all unrighteousness. I thank You for saving me now. Amen. "If you have spoken that prayer from your heart, you are ready to begin a new life in the Spirit. And every day as you pray, read God's Word, and tell others of His love, you will sense God's exciting direction.
I have come to the conclusion that I am totally dependent on the Holy Spirit. He's all I have. He's all you have. Jesus promised Him and God sent Him that you may have knowledge, power, communion, and fellowship. He will anoint you, help you, breathe on you, comfort you, give you rest, lead and guide you, help you pray, and so much more. He is waiting to begin a relationship with you that will change your life forever. But it's up to you to extend the invitation. When the sun comes up tomorrow, He will be longing to hear you say,
"Good morning, Holy Spirit."
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