Six Characteristics of One Who Has Received the Gift of the Holy Ghost

Admittedly, this was very hard for me to grasp when I first learned about the Baptism of Fire and the variance from LDS culture and tradition. Like many parts of this study guide it may require you to unlearn some things and allow the Lord to teach you as if you are at that very place in time that the Savior was teaching it to the people (e.g. 3 Nephi 11-27) or as if you are at His feet just soaking up His words for the first time. There are a few things to keep in mind here:

• The power of the Holy Ghost is different from the Gift of the Holy Ghost. Yes, you may think you know that, and that may be true, but keep in mind that the words uttered by a priesthood holder at the time of confirmation (after the baptism of water) may not be what you think it is. Therefore, you may realize after “feasting” upon the words of Christ in this study guide that you may need to ask yourself whether you have, in reality, received the Gift of the Holy Ghost. A person may need to deal with some pride in this section in order to fully grasp what the Lord intended for a person as it relates to the event Baptism of Fire and Gift of the Holy Ghost. I know I did.
• Being familiar with these six characteristics and how they were exemplified in the scriptures is really important. You should not consider the people in the scriptures as special so much so that you dismiss these characteristics as being part of your experience. In other words, it’s not like these really cool experiences only happened in the scriptures. If you have received this event and gift then you too should experience something similar.
• If you have in fact received your baptism of fire and Gift of the Holy Ghost, you may not fully have been fully aware of all these characteristics. For example, It is not uncommon for one to have had this event experience and not been fully aware of the visual fire through spiritual eyes). However, all one has to do is ask the Lord to reveal whether that event has taken place and whether that characteristic was present even though you were not fully aware at the time. You could also simply ask the Lord to reveal that characteristic to you again.

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