I am Pst. Emmanuel John Essien, from Nigeria, 27 years of age and married to my lovely wife, Mrs. Abigail Emmanuel.

I am a Missionary with Nigeria Evangelical Missions Association and Beyond Translation. I train Mother Tongue Speakers to translate the Bible into their Heart Language and so far, we have covered nearly all the books in the New Testament.

I am the Lead Pastor of Great Faith Believers Assembly, Uyo; with the mandate of discipling men into the stature of Christ as they fulfill the Great Commission of taking the gospel to the whole world.

Welcome to 12 Minute Converse with Jesus Believers.

God chose first to have a conversation with us, his creation.

Our prayer is that this listening space brings growth and transforms your life forever.

Praise God for you Pastor Emmanuel.

It's a great pleasure to connect with you.

Please tell us what part of the world are you in today?

So my name is Pastor Emmanuel Essien and I'm connecting from Nigeria.

Out of looking and seeing you at the altar, preaching, teaching, how has it been navigating the power of the Holy Spirit?

It has been a very pleasant experience.

It has its own different kind of feeling.

It produces a certain level of dopamine that no other substance in this world could ever get close to.

And the Holy Spirit actually is one thing that, or the Holy Spirit is what empowers a person.

And without the Holy Spirit, our potentials that lies deep within us, we will never find expression.

So how it has been for me with the Holy Spirit has actually been a moment of rest.

I tend to flow.

It's more like I'm swimming alongside with the tides.

But when life, when I tried to live life outside of the Holy Spirit, before the encounter, it was obviously like I was swimming against the tides.

So I was, you know, struggling, trying to make things right, trying to do things, you know, trying to make things better.

But the more I tried, the harder it became and the more mistakes I made.

So the Holy Spirit has actually been a wonderful blessing and it has been gracious altogether.

Tell me about the encounter.

What was that like?

My baptism was officially on the 4th of June 2016 in the University of Calabar Chapel of Redemption.

But I can tell you for sure that even after the baptism, life was still pretty much normal to me.

There were no strange occurrences.

I didn't feel any quite different, you know, from what I actually was.

Although I had these huge expectations that immediately after the baptism I should feel something.

But the water baptism came and, you know, everything was just normal.

But then later cross life, I realized that I started hearing the voice of God and it became clear to me that God was trying to pull me into something, into a much deeper walk with Him than what I have ever done in my past life.

And even though I tried yielding, it was a very, very difficult thing for me.

Like I mentioned earlier, it was like I was swimming against the tides.

I tried everything, tried to connect, but it wasn't really working.

So how the Holy Ghost helped me was that I became sick.

I was really sick one of those times like that.

And for three good days, I couldn't take in anything into my mouth.

I couldn't take in anything.

I was in my room, lying down on my bed for three days.

And at that point, I knew that I needed something much more than what I had.

So I cried out to God right on my sick bed and I asked Him to please help me, to show me the light, to show me Himself that I needed more of Him.

And strangely, I slept on that night and the next I woke up feeling very different.

That was the beginning of the dealings that I had with God.

One of those mornings, still around that period, after I had made that prayer, I was watching a Jimmy Swaggart broadcast and it was just a worship service.

And I noticed that I began tearing up.

My eyes just began tearing up and I was wondering, why am I tearing up?

Why do I have tears in my eyes?

Like, where is all of this coming from?

I was trying to figure out what was going on.

And then my left knee started shaking.

I was just literally shaking on the chair where I was seated and I felt this overwhelming presence.

I got up and tried walking.

I couldn't.

I just knelt down.

I wept.

I wept and my heart opened up and I realized that that was the baptism of the Holy Spirit that was taking place.

So immediately after that encounter, my hunger for God grew rapidly.

My thirst after righteousness and His kingdom grew rapidly.

I started desiring fasting.

I started desiring to study the scriptures.

I started desiring to pray.

And there are times that, you know, I would just be going through the scriptures and then God would literally speak to me through the scriptures.

Like, I would know that this is God talking to me directly.

And, you know, it actually breathed a whole new experience for me.

So that's my encounter literally opened up the door to much more encounters.

So it's been a decade since, it's quite literally at the time of the recording, just over 10 years of you being baptized and of course, walking with God, having your experience for the three days, then getting better through the Holy Spirit.

For the person who's listening, who's thinking, okay, that's too far off for me to attain.

What would you say to that person?

It took Jesus three years and a half to get His disciples on His feet.

And His disciples still made some mistakes, even after the trainings and everything.

But after Jesus had told His disciples to tarry and wait until they be endued with the power from on high, the moment they obeyed the instructions, the moment they waited and the Holy Ghost came upon them, they received strength to carry out activities that even the Pharisees and the Sadducees who had been doctors of the law for several decades, couldn't accomplish.

They were able to fulfill it.

And the testimony came by others as they saw them.

They said, these be the men that turn their world upside down.

So I'm saying that time is not a factor when it comes to dealings with the Holy Spirit or what God has to do with a person.

Time is never a factor because God is the one who dwells in eternity.

And He said in His word that a thousand thousand years on earth to Him is like a day and a day like a thousand years.

So when we try to bring in, you know, chronological systems and structures to measure up the possibilities of God, we are going to err.

We are greatly going to err.

Because what God can do in a year is something that He can equally do in a week.

It all just depends on the vessel.

It depends on how yielded the vessel is.

It depends on how permitted the vessel is.

Because if one says, okay, it's going to take 10 years and then the person is inconsistent, at the end of 10 years, he will not meet up.

He will not measure up to the possibilities of a person who has been consistent, you know, for 10 years.

The possibilities will be completely different.

What does life look like daily for you?

Well, life actually for me is pretty much amazing.

I'm a missionary.

So I'm actually a Bible translator teacher.

I teach people to translate the Bible into their local language.

So I interact with the Word of God, spend time with God, apart from the fellowship.

Apart from the fellowship, what life to me daily is, is more of a conscious reminder of how little time we have.

So what we do, or what I do, is I try to always keep it at the back of my mind that whatever it is that I am doing, it must be intentional.

I cannot afford to waste my time on things that will not add value to my growth, things that will not add value to my productivity.

So one of the decisions that I've made is to always learn something new every day.

Whatever it is I'm engaging with, whatever it is I'm engaging in, it must be beneficial to my spiritual health.

It must be beneficial to my academic health.

It must be beneficial even to my social health.

So whatever it is that I'm doing must be productive.

That's what life for me daily is.

How many siblings do you have?

I have four siblings, plus myself, that's five.

We are four boys and one girl.

So the girl is the last, actually.

And I think I should, what's the word to use?

Explain this here.

So I'm from a, what's the word to use?

Okay.

So my mom had myself and my elder brother, and she, while she was really young, and she parted ways with the other person because they were not compatible, you know, they realized they were not compatible.

So she got married to someone else.

She wasn't initially married to the other person.

So, you know, she got married to someone else.

So for this other person, I have three siblings from this person, plus my elder brother.

And then from my dad and his family, I have three siblings as well, two boys and a girl too.

Hmm.

So technically step-sisters, step-brothers.

Yes.

Okay.

Yes.

Did that impact who you are?

Were you always one that felt as though it was important to be intentional with your time and as well be responsible, not just for yourself, but for others around you?

Yes.

Growing up, I always wanted, I always admired the fatherly care, you know, demonstrated by people, experienced by people rather.

So I had made up my mind to be a father of one wife and to always be there for my kids and family.

Imagine five years from today, you're listening to this conversation, you would have been able to identify internally the experiences that we covered in a couple of minutes.

You would have been able to feel the challenges, feel the times that you even didn't feel what you expected after being baptized.

And then today doing the work you're doing, but five years from today, you're listening.

What's a message you'd leave for future you?

Stick to the Holy Spirit.

Hold on to God.

Keep doing what you're doing.

Never let God go.

Let God be at the center of everything that you're doing.

Let him be the center of everything that you're doing.

That's just going to be my advice.

Emmanuel, this is a pleasure, a treasure.

I also feel the Holy Spirit within this conversation.

Thank you for being what has inspired my 12-minute conference.