Receiving the Spirit is a gentle, honest, and sensitively written account of a Congregationalist minister who found the Holy Spirit in the Catholic Charismatic Movement and who then preached his deepened faith in mainline churches across the country.
The book focuses specifically on the Colonial Church of Edina in Minnesota, where Arthur Rouner Jr. was senior minister for thirty-two years and where many members of the congregation of 3,800 also ""received the spirit."" The church grew significantly during the term of Rouner's pastorate, reaching out into the surrounding community with social ministries and biblical studies programs.

The author, Arthur A. Rouner, is a graduate of Harvard College, Union Theological Seminary, and Luther Theological Seminary. He served as a Congregational minister for
forty-plus years. He has written twenty-five books, including How to Love, Healing Your Hurts, Being Present, and Forgiveness: The Road to Reconciliation. Following parish ministry, he founded The Pilgrim Center for Reconciliation, an international ministry dedicated to helping church and government leaders recover from the traumas of genocide, war, and conflict.
It is his hope that this book may be an encouragement to others who are looking for a word to say that will tell the Lord what they are feeling in critical moments of their lives.