It is the idea of some that the old Methodist standard of personal
experience is a mere individualistic viewpoint, and that it is inadequate
because it sounds no social note. They feel that the visitation of the
Divine Spirit will do well enough for the man, but that it has no
provision for the group. It will do for a personal experience but not for
a mass movement, they say. This is one of the mistakes that has led to
the present lack of emphasis on the person and work of the Holy Spirit.
That it is a mistake is easy to see on second thought.
The salvation of the group can only be accomplished by the salvation of
the individuals who compose it. One by one we must come to the throne of
grace. One by one we must confess our sins and seek pardon. One by one we
must have our hearts transformed. One by one we must go back to the ways
of existence and live anew. A righteous community, state, or nation is
only a group of individuals wearing, each for himself, the clean,
white garments of right living.
However, the Holy Spirit can possess the mind of the group as well as that
of the individual. It was so on the Day of Pentecost. Those present
entered into that great spiritual experience as one person. They were
gathered with one accord in one place. These are the two conditions to any
such manifestation of divine power. They felt the experience more keenly
and profited from it more largely because their minds were fused into a
common consciousness.
The social gospel needs the Holy Spirit element in it just as much as the
individualistic gospel ever did. As we once tried to have the Holy Spirit
transform hearts, and still must, so too we must now endeavor to have the
Holy Spirit cleanse and exalt social relationships. What it once did for
the man, and still does, we must also seek that it shall do for the mass.