Sid: I have Corey Russell on the telephone and he prays with the people at IHOP International House of Prayer; he’s in that prayer room some 30 hours a week and he said “All of a sudden when they get into prayer for Israel the level of prayer, the intensity increases.” Why, because we’re in as the Orthodox Rabbi’s say the footsteps of Messiah; I mean He is ready to appear, and everything if you read prophesy centers on the most important country in the world, Israel in the last days. Now it is so mandatory for you to develop you spirit. Corey Russell we were talking about the benefits of praying in tongues, what does Paul mean when he says, “That we edify ourselves when we pray in the spirit?”
Corey: Yeah, I think when he talks about edifying, I know that word edify comes from the Greek word, “edifice,” which means massive, magnificent building. I believe that when I’m praying in the Holy Spirit for those extended periods of time; and I want to note that extended periods of time many of us only speak in tongues when we fall down at the altar, or when we feel the Lord, but I want to give us a vision and begin to step out in it. Even when we don’t feel God, even when it’s dry, when it’s 5:30 in the morning with a cup of coffee or life’s just beginning to build ourselves and beginning to strengthen ourselves because I actually believe that we’re building a house to house the activity, the person and the ministry of the Holy Spirit in us and through us. And that word edify, the way that I picture it is the way that you would charge your battery by a cord, charge your computer into a source, a power source. When I’m praying in the Holy Spirit; when I’m praying in tongues I am plugging my spirit man into the Spirit of God who lives within me and I’m receiving; I am trading my strength for His strength; I’m trading my might, my resources for the resources might and power of the Holy Spirit. He literally comes and supercharges my inner man which thereby changes my thought life; changes my emotional chemistry, changes my desires and changes my body. That I live by the Spirit; I live according to my spirit man who brings revolution to the rest of my life. So that edify, so this is the issue Sid, it says in Luke 1:80 “That John the Baptist went into the wilderness and became strong in Spirit, he became strong in Spirit.” Many of us were in such a fitness craze here in this nation, everybody wants to get physically fit and I love it but many believers are spiritually weak. Many of us live on life support because we haven’t learned to build our spirit man with the same intentionality of building our physical man.
Sid: I believe it’s so critical right now because of the times we’re living in, the footsteps of Messiah. I don’ think, may it was a degree of an options before, I see it as zero option because I find that praying in tongues makes me more sensitive to the Spirit of God. And we’re going to get to this country where we’re going to have to hear from God and our life could be at stake.
Corey: Oh, I totally believe it. I’ve been thinking about the Roman’s 11; the fullness of the Gentiles to the provocation of Israel and this fullness corporately of the Gentiles. I believe that praying in the Holy Spirit is what’s going to build us individually, unto us being built corporately, unto a fullness touching the Gentile Church all over the earth. And so I believe it’s mandatory; it’s not a nice, it’s kind of cool. I believe that it’s utterly mandatory in this hour that we cultivate extended times of praying in the Holy Spirit for the strength as well as many other benefits that are laid out in the Word of God.
Sid: What should we be doing when we’re praying in tongues? Should we just be zoning out? Should we have a focal point? What do you recommend?
Corey: Yeah, I believe because it says in 1 Corinthians 14 that we speak to God. Many of us, and you know, we confess we get easily distracted, I get distracted, you get distracted, everybody gets distracted. What I have found is that I love to have the focal point that I’m speaking straight to God. I feel with my mind’s eye, there’s two focal points that I have whenever I’m praying in tongues, the first one is its Revelation 4 “God setting on the throne.” It says in Revelation 4 “That God is sitting on the throne;” and I’ll close my eyes and I’ll picture myself in my mind’s eye standing on the sea of glass, mingle with fire in Revelation 4. And I will speak from my spirit to God on the throne, and I will just keep that, whenever my mind wonders I’ll always bring it back to that. Many of us stop because we end up beating up ourselves because our minds get distracted and we get off on something else. We’ve got to stop condemning ourselves and then whenever our minds wander we just got to bring it back to its focal point. So I love to think about it like this, God on the throne, and then God in my spirit. Colossians 1:27 says “Christ in you, the hope of glory.” So I love to focus on God on the throne, and then the fire of God living on the inside of my spirit and I gaze on Him within and I speak to Him, I commune with Him, I receive from Him and I find that helps my heart stay focused, and stay longer and bring it back to something when my minds wandering. So that’s a practical tool that I have found helped me and I’ve see it help the weakest of people across the board to connect with God for extended periods of time.
Sid: Now you’re at the International House of Prayer, and of course I think of the founder, Mike Bickle. And I didn’t realize he came from a background in which they didn’t believe in tongues, and he had that experience, but he was going around telling people it’s not of God, or don’t do it. It’s hard for me to believe that how did he have the spiritual scales come off of his eyes?
Corey: It’s a fascinating story because he came from a pretty evangelical background, got saved in it. But there was a local revival going on and he went one night and the power of God hit him that night, he falls back, and it just comes right out of him, nobody told him anything about it, he just began to speak in tongues. Well, he went back to his leaders and says “Oh, my goodness this is what God’s doing,” he was taking bus loads of kids to this revival and the leader said, “You know what, you’ve got a hold of a demon, you’ve got a hold of a devil here.” And he goes, “Oh, my goodness, this must be the worst, the worst thing in the whole wide world.” So he got totally on the other side of the boat and began to preach against it, he’s go to campuses, college campuses and different churches and say how tongues is not of God. But the pain that drove him he did this for five years, but the pain that drove him is that he kept looking at 1st Corinthians 14:18 and the Apostle Paul saying “I thank my God I speak in tongues more than you all.” And Mike was saying, “How could the busiest man say such a thing, how could the man that has done more for Christianity make such a statement?” So Mike continued in his private life to keep praying in the Holy Spirit, and he gave himself to it for thirty minutes an hour a day for six months. After that six month season he knew within his heart that this was of God, and this was foundational to all of his lives and he’s been doing it ever since. He had definitely a rocky boat until he came to that conclusion.
Sid: Now you have studied some great men and women of the past, and their experience with being baptized in the Holy Spirit and speaking in tongues. What did you learn from John G. Lake?
Corey: Well, I’ll tell you nobody has rocked my life and impacted my life like John G. Lake. You know the great missionary to South Africa and ended up in Spokane, Washington. And he gave this statement in his sermons. He said that “Tongues was the making of his ministry.” That phrase was like an arrow that went straight from the heart of God into mine.
Sid: I’ve heard that from so many other people that became, I hate to use the word, but superstars because no one else is willing to just pray in tongues for an hour a day. Do that, let me challenge those that are listening, I’m going to tell you something, there is nothing you read in the New Testament, there is nothing you see on Christian TV that you can’t do. Aren’t you tired of being a spectator; Christianity was never designed to be a spectator sport. What would happen Corey if everyone listening to me for thirty days would pray one hour in tongues, what do you think would happen to them?
Corey: I will say it clearly to every one of you, you’re life will be radically changed. I don’t care whether you’re at home with two kids, you’re in a factory, you’re in the business place, you’re on assembly line. No matter what your calling is I promise you that praying for an hour in the Holy Spirit, praying in tongues for an hour a day will revolutionize your life. 1. It will dray you closer to God. 2, the Bible will begin to open up. 3, the realm of dreams and visions will open up, you’ll feel power moving through you with words of knowledge and ministry. You’ll find power over the works of the devil warfare. You’ll find a greater level of holiness and character begin to grow up through your life. I give people this training, everybody’s into the 90 day challenge we got you know P90X and all the kind of workout videos for ninety days. I’d say take thirty days, sixty days, ninety days and take those gaps throughout your day just to do it. Whether it’s folding clothes, or at work and I promise you, that what I found in my life at about the twenty-five to thirty minute mark the atmosphere begins to shift and I move into a different place of communion, authority and faith and I can’t live my life without touching it. And no matter what you’re calling is in this life you’ll experience the same, I promise you that.
