1. Introduction

This eBooklet is very personal for me. My life has been transformed through the use of this wonderful gift from the Holy Spirit and I want to share what I have learned with others.

For those interested, I did not grow up in a "pentecostal" or "charismatic" church. I was instead raised as a mainstream conservative evangelical. Most of the people I knew believed that God "could" manifest the supernatural gifts of Holy Spirit in us, but did not feel that it was our place to reach out for them. I did find out later, though, that  many more folks than I had realized were complete cessationists (those who believe that the supernatural gifts ceased with the deaths of Jesus' original apostles).

I lived with this "I believe it but don't really expect to experience it" mentality toward the gifts for many years, but was rocked in 2010. I had been growing in hunger for more spiritual food, but the church I was going to was not giving me what I needed. They had right doctrine and were on top of all the latest church fads, but that was not what I needed. So I left that church and began looking for more.

My siblings had attended that year a radical conference called Power and Love and since I was hungry for more of the Spirit, I begged them to come visit me after it was over. They came and we talked for hours about Holy Spirit, about healing and growing into mountain-moving faith. That started me on the journey that has led me to today.

As I began listening to teachers like John Wimber, Dan Mohler, and Bill Johnson, my horizons began to exapand and I became hungry for more and more of the Spirit. In short, I wanted to experience what the early church had.

Breakthrough began for me when I heard a message from a woman named Robia LaMorte on the gift of tongues. But it was not until months after that, that I actually began praying in tongues.

What follows is a summary of what I have learned in my process from the time I first heard that message until now where I commune daily with God in tongues. What you will read is intensely personal for me, but it flows from the truth found in the Bible. The best you can do is ask Holy Spirit to guide you into the truth as you read through these pages. But do not be surprised if you hear Him cheering as we continue on this journey.

<Table of Contents                             2. What Are Tongues?>