Why is there a need for the believer to ask for the Holy Spirit?

Openline Radio on Nov 5, 2022, hour 1

Listener:

Looking at Luke 11:13, which says that God will give us the Holy Spirit if we ask Him, specifically it says if you then who are evil know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will the Heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask Him? When we are born again, God gives us His Holy Spirit at conversion, can you explain why we should ask for the His Spirit when the Holy Spirit is indwelling in us?

Dr Michael Rydelnik:

Just remember when the Lord Jesus said this, it was before Pentecost, the Lord Jesus in the upper room discourse taught that there is going to be something different with the birth of the Church. In the old testament and even in the days of earthly ministry of the Lord Jesus, the Holy Spirit was not in all believers, only in some believers and that He was not permanently in believers, He could be taken away, which was why David prayed take not your Spirit from me when he repented. The Lord Jesus makes a big point in the upper room discourse that He will send the Helper, the Comforter, different translations for that, the Paraclete, and that that One will be in all of us and He will never leave us and when does that start? It starts with the birth of the Church, at Pentecost, when the Holy Spirit falls in Acts 2. And so the Lord Jesus was speaking to a group of people who were not yet, at that time He was talking in His earthly ministry, when people could still pray for the Holy Spirit and He did not come to them automatically.

Luke 11

13 If you then, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask Him!” -nkjv

13 If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children: how much more shall your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to them that ask him? -kjv

13 So if you, despite being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask Him?” -nasb

13 If you then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him!” -niv