THE ASCENT OF THE SPIRIT, . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 203
{11}
I
THE AGE-MISSION OF THE SPIRIT
{12}
"It is evident that the present dispensation under which we are is the
dispensation of the Spirit, or of the Third Person of the Holy Trinity.
To him in the Divine economy, has been committed the office of applying
the redemption of the Son to the souls of men by the vocation,
justification, and salvation of the elect. We are therefore under the
personal guidance of the Third Person, as truly as the apostles were
under the guidance of the Second."--_Henry Edward Manning_.
{13}
THE AGE-MISSION OF THE SPIRIT--INTRODUCTORY
In some observations on the doctrine of the Spirit, which lie before us
as we write, an eminent professor of theology remarks on the
disproportionate attention which has been given to the person and work
of the Holy Spirit, as compared with that bestowed on the life and
ministry of Jesus Christ. It is affirmed, moreover, that in many of
the works upon the subject now extant there is a lack of definiteness
of impression which leaves much still to be desired in the treatment of
this subject. These observations lead us to ask: Why not employ the
same method in writing about the Third Person of the Trinity as we use
in considering the Second Person? Scores of excellent lives of Christ
have been written; and we find that in these, almost without exception,
the divine story begins with Bethlehem and ends with Olivet. Though
the Saviour lived before his incarnation, and continues to live after
his ascension, yet it gives a certain definiteness of impression to
limit one's view to his historic career, distinguishing his visible
life lived in time from his invisible life lived in eternity.
{14}
So in considering the Holy Spirit, we believe there is an advantage in
separating his ministry in time from his ministry before and after,
bounding it by Pentecost on the one side, and by Christ's second coming
on the other. We have to confess that in many respects one of the best
treatises on the Spirit which we have found is by a Roman
Catholic--Cardinal Manning. Notwithstanding the papistical errors
which abound in the volume, his general conception of the subject is in
some particulars admirable. His treatise is called "The Temporal
Mission of the Holy Ghost." How much is suggested by this title! Just
as Jesus Christ had a time-ministry which he came into the world to
fulfill, and having accomplished it returned to the Father, so the Holy
Spirit, for the fulfillment of a definite mission, came into the world
at an appointed time; he is now carrying on his ministry on earth, and
in due time he will complete it and ascend to heaven again--this is
what these words suggest, and what, as we believe, the Scriptures
teach. If we thus form a right conception of this present age-ministry
of the Spirit, we have a definite view-point from which to study his
operations in the ages past, and his greater mission, if there be such,
in the ages to come.
Now we conceive that the vagueness and mystery attaching in many minds
to the doctrine of the Spirit, are due largely to a failure to
recognize his {15} time-ministry, distinct from all that went before
and introductory to all that is to come after--a ministry with a
definite beginning and a definite termination. Certainly no one can
read the farewell discourse of our Lord, as recorded by John, without
being impressed with the fact that just as distinctly as his own advent
was foretold by prophets and angels, he now announces the advent into
the world of another, co-equal with himself, his Divine successor, his
other self in the mysterious unity of the Godhead. And moreover, it
seems clear to us that he implied that this coming One was to appear
not only for an appointed work, but for an appointed period: "He shall
give you another Comforter, that he may abide with you forever"--_eis
ton aiõna_. If we translate literally and say "_for the age_," it
harmonizes with a parallel passage. In giving the great commission,
Jesus says: "And lo, I am with you alway, even _unto the end of the
age_." Here his presence by the Holy Ghost is evidently meant. The
perpetuity of that presence is guaranteed, "with you all the days"; and
its bound determined, "_unto the end of the age_." Not that it need be
argued that he shall not be here after this dispensation is finished;
but that there is such a thing as a temporal mission of the Holy Spirit
does seem to be implied. And a full study confirms the view. The
present is the dispensation of {16} the Holy Ghost; the age-work which
he inaugurated on the day of Pentecost is now going on, and it will
continue until the Lord Jesus returns from heaven, when another order
will be ushered in and another dispensational ministry succeed.
In the well-known work of Moberly, on "The Administration of the Holy
Spirit in the Body of Christ," the author divides the course of
redemption thus far accomplished into these three stages: The first
age, God the Father; the second age, God the Son; and the third age,
God the Holy Ghost. This distribution seems to be correct, and so does
his remark upon the inauguration of the last of these periods on the
day of Pentecost. "At that moment," he says, "the third stage of the
development [manifestation] of God for the restoration of the world
finally began, never to come to an end or to be superseded on earth
till the restitution of all things, when the Son of Man shall come
again in the clouds of heaven, in like manner as his disciples saw him
go into heaven." And what shall be the next period, "the age to come,"
whose powers they have already tasted who have been "made partakers of
the Holy Ghost"? This question need not be answered, as we have done
all that is required, defined the age of the Spirit which constitutes
the field in which our entire discussion lies.
{17}
II
THE ADVENT OF THE SPIRIT
{18}
"Therefore the Holy Ghost on this day--Pentecost--descended into the
temple of his apostles, which he had prepared for himself, as a shower of
sanctification, appearing no more as a transient visitor, but as a
perpetual Comforter and as an eternal inhabitant. He came therefore on
this day to his disciples, no longer by the grace of visitation and
operation, but by the very presence of his majesty."--_Augustine_.
{19}
II
THE ADVENT OF THE SPIRIT
"For _the Holy Ghost was not yet_," is the more than surprising saying of
Jesus when speaking of "the Spirit which they that believe on him should
receive." Had not the Spirit been seen descending upon Jesus like a dove
at his baptism, and remaining on him? Had he not been the divine agent
in creation, and in the illumination and inspiration of the patriarchs
and prophets and seers of the old dispensation? How then could Jesus say
that he "was not yet given," as the words read in our Common version?
The answer to this question furnishes our best point of departure for an
intelligent study of the doctrine of the Spirit. Augustine calls the day
of Pentecost the "_dies natalis_" of the Holy Ghost; and for the same
reason that the day when Mary "brought forth her first-born son" we name
"the birthday of Jesus Christ." Yet Jesus had existed before he lay in
the cradle at Bethlehem; he was "in the beginning with God"; he was the
agent in creation. By him all things were. But on the day of his birth
he became incarnate, that in the flesh he might fulfill his great {20}
ministry as the Apostle and High Priest of our confession, manifesting
God to men, and making himself an offering for the sins of the world.
Not until after his birth in Bethlehem was Jesus in the world in his
official capacity, in his divine ministry as mediator between man and
God; and so not till after the day of Pentecost was the Holy Spirit in
the world in his official sphere, as mediator between men and Christ. In
the following senses then is Augustine's saying true, which calls
Pentecost "the birthday of the Spirit":
1. The Holy Spirit, from that time on, took up his residence on earth.
The Christian church throughout all this dispensation is the home of the
Spirit as truly as heaven, during this same period, is the home of Jesus
Christ. This is according to that sublime word of Jesus, called by one
"the highest promise which can be made to man": "If a man love me he will
keep my words: and my Father will love him, and we will come unto him,
_and make our abode with him_" (John 14: 23). This promise was fulfilled
at Pentecost, and the first two Persons of the Godhead now hold residence
in the church through the Third. The Holy Spirit during the present time
is in office on earth; and all spiritual presence and divine communion of
the Trinity with men are through him. In other words, while the Father
and the Son are visibly and personally in heaven, they are invisibly here
in the {21} body of the faithful by the indwelling of the Comforter. So
that though we affirm that on the day of Pentecost the Holy Spirit came
to dwell upon earth for this entire dispensation, we do not imply that he
thereby ceased to be in heaven. Not with God, as with finite man, does
arrival in one place necessitate withdrawal from another. Jesus uttered
a saying concerning himself so mysterious and seemingly contradictory
that many attempts have been made to explain away its literal and obvious
meaning: "And no man hath ascended up to heaven but _he that came down
from heaven, even the Son of man who is in heaven_"--Christ on earth, and
yet in glory; here and there, at the same time, just as a thought which
we embody in speech and send forth from the mind, yet remains in the mind
as really and distinctly as before it was expressed. Why should this
saying concerning our divine Lord seem incredible? And as with the Son,
so with the Spirit. The Holy Ghost is here, abiding perpetually in the
church; and he is likewise there, in communion with the Father and the
Son from whom he proceeds, and from whom, as co-equal partner in the
Godhead, he can never be separated any more than the sunbeam can be
dissociated from the sun in which it has its source.
2. Again: The Holy Spirit, in a mystical but very real sense, became
embodied in the church on the day of Pentecost. Not that we would by any
{22} means put this embodiment on the same plane with the incarnation of
the Second Person of the Trinity. When "the Word was made flesh and
dwelt among us," it was God entering into union with sinless humanity;
here it is the Holy Spirit uniting himself with the church in its
imperfect and militant condition. Nevertheless, it is according to
literal Scripture that the body of the faithful is indwelt by the divine
Spirit. In this fact we have the distinguishing peculiarity of the
present dispensation. "For he dwelleth with you and _shall be in you_!"
said Jesus, speaking anticipatively of the coming of the Comforter; and
so truly was this prediction fulfilled that ever after the day of
Pentecost the Holy Spirit is spoken of as being in the church. "_If so
be that the Spirit of God dwell in you_" is the inspired assumption on
which the deep teaching in Romans eighth proceeds. All the recognition
and deference which the disciples paid to their Lord they now pay to the
Holy Spirit, his true vicar, his invisible self, present in the body of
believers. How artlessly and naturally this comes out in the findings of
the first council at Jerusalem: "It seemed good _to the Holy Ghost and to
us_" runs the record; as though it had been said: "Peter and James and
Barnabas and Saul and the rest were present, and also just as truly was
the Holy Ghost."
And when the first capital sin was committed in the church, in the
conspiracy and falsehood {23} of Ananias and Sapphira, Peter's question
is: "Why hath Satan filled thine heart to lie to the Holy Ghost?" "How
is it that ye have agreed together to tempt the Holy Ghost?" Not only is
the personal presence of the Spirit in the body of believers thus
distinctly recognized, but he is there in authority and supremacy, as the
center of the assembly. "Incarnated in the church!" do we say? We get
this conception by comparing together the inspired characterizations of
Christ and of the church. "This temple" was the name which he gave to
his own divine person, greatly to the scandal and indignation of the
Jews; and the evangelist explains to us that "he spoke of the temple of
his body." A metaphor, a type! do we say? No! He said so because it
was so. "The Word was made flesh and tabernacled among us, and we beheld
his glory" (John 1: 14). This is temple imagery. "Tabernacled"
(_eschênôsen_) is the word used in Scripture for the dwelling of God with
men; and the temple is God's dwelling-place. The "glory" harmonizes with
the same idea. As the Shechinah cloud rested above the mercy-seat, the
symbol and sign of God's presence, so from the Holy of Holies of our
blessed Lord's heart did the glory of God shine forth, "the glory as of
the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth," certifying him
to be the veritable temple of the Most High.
After his ascension and the sending down of the {24} Spirit, the church
takes the name her Lord had borne before; she is the temple of God, and
the only temple which he has on earth during the present dispensation.
"Know ye not that ye are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God
dwelleth in you?" asks the apostle. This he speaks to the church in its
corporate capacity. "A holy temple in the Lord, in whom ye also are
_builded together_ for a habitation of God through the Spirit," is the
sublime description in the Epistle to the Ephesians. It is enough that
we now emphasize the fact that the same language is here applied to the
church which Christ applies to himself. As with the Head, so with the
mystical body; each is indwelt by the Holy Spirit, and thus is God in
some sense incarnated in both; and for the same reason. Christ was "the
Image of the Invisible God"; and when he stood before men in the flesh he
could say to them, "He that hath seen me hath seen the Father." Not
otherwise than through the incarnation, so far as we know, could the
unknown God become known, and the unseen God become seen. So, after
Christ had returned to the Father, and the world saw him no more, he sent
the Paraclete to be incarnated in his mystical body, the church. As the
Father revealed himself through the Son, so the Son by the Holy Spirit
now reveals himself through the church; as Christ was the image of the
invisible God, so the church is appointed to be {25} the image of the
invisible Christ; and his members, when they are glorified with him,
shall be the express image of his person.
This then is the mystery and the glory of this dispensation; not less
true because mysterious; not less practical because glorious. In an
admirable work on the Spirit, the distinction between the former and the
present relation of the Spirit is thus stated: "In the old dispensation
the Holy Spirit wrought _upon_ believers, but did not in his person dwell
in believers and abide permanently in them. He appeared unto men; he did
not incarnate himself in man. His action was intermittent; he went and
came like the dove which Noah sent forth from the ark, and which went to
and fro, finding no rest; while in the new dispensation he dwells, he
abides in the heart as the dove, his emblem, which John saw descending
and alighting on the head of Jesus. Affianced of the soul, the Spirit
went oft to see his betrothed, but was not yet one with her; the marriage
was not consummated until the Pentecost, after the glorification of Jesus
Christ."[1]
3. A still more obvious reason why before the day of Pentecost it could
be said that "the Holy Ghost was not yet," is contained in the words,
"_Because that Jesus was not yet glorified_." In the order of the
unfolding ages we see each of the persons of the Godhead in turn
exercising an earthly {26} ministry and dealing with man in the work of
redemption. Under the law, God the Father comes down to earth and speaks
to men from the cloud of Sinai and from the glory above the mercy-seat;
under grace, God the Son is in the world, teaching, suffering, dying, and
rising again; under the dispensation of election and out-gathering now
going on, the Holy Spirit is here carrying on the work of renewing and
sanctifying the church, which is the body of Christ. There is a
necessary succession in these Divine ministries, both in time and in
character. In the days of Moses it might have been said: "Christ is not
yet," because the economy of God-Jehovah was not completed. The law must
first be given, with its sacrifices and types and ceremonies and shadows;
man must be put on trial under the law, till the appointed time of his
schooling should be completed. _Then_ must Christ come to fulfill all
types and terminate all sacrifices in himself; to do for us "what the law
could not do in that it was weak through the flesh," and to become "the
end of the law for righteousness to every one that believeth." When in
turn Christ had completed his redemption-work by dying on the cross for
our sins, and rising again from the dead for our justification, and had
taken his place at God's right hand for perpetual intercession, _then_
the Holy Ghost came down to communicate and realize to the church the
finished work of Christ. {27} In a word, as God the Son fulfills to men
the work of God the Father, so God the Holy Ghost realizes to human
hearts the work of God the Son.
There is a holy deference, if we may so say, between the Persons of the
Trinity in regard to their respective ministries. When Christ was in
office on earth, the Father commends us to him, speaking from heaven and
saying: "This is my beloved Son, hear ye him"; when the Holy Ghost had
entered upon his earthly office, Christ commends us to him, speaking
again from heaven with sevenfold reiteration, saying: "He that hath an
ear, let him hear what _the Spirit_ saith unto the churches."[2] As each
Person refers us to the teaching of the other, so in like manner does
each in turn consummate the ministry of the other. Christ's words and
works were not his own, but his Father's: "The words which I speak unto
you I speak not of myself, but the Father that dwelleth in me he doeth
the works."[3] The Spirit's teaching and communications are not his own,
but Christ's: "Howbeit when he the Spirit of truth is come, he will guide
you into all truth; _for he shall not speak of himself; but whatsoever he
shall hear that shall he speak_; and he will show you things to come."
"_He shall glorify me; for he shall receive of mine and show it unto
you._"
This order in the ministries of the Persons of {28} the Godhead is so
fixed and eternal that we find it distinctly foreshadowed even in the
typical teaching of the Old Testament. Many speak slightingly of the
types, but they are as accurate as mathematics; they fix the sequence of
events in redemption as rigidly as the order of sunrise and noontide is
fixed in the heavens. Nowhere in tabernacle or in temple, shall we ever
find the laver placed before the altar. The altar is Calvary and the
laver is Pentecost; one stands for the sacrificial blood, the other for
the sanctifying Spirit. If any high priest were ignorantly to approach
the brazen laver without first having come to the brazen altar, we might
expect a rebuking voice to be heard from heaven: "Not yet the washing of
water"; and such a saying would signify exactly the same as: "Not yet the
Holy Ghost."
Again, when the leper was to be cleansed, observe that the blood was to
be put upon the tip of his right ear, the thumb of his right hand, and
the great toe of his right foot; and then the oil was to be put upon the
right ear, the right thumb, and the right foot--_the oil upon the blood
of the trespass-offering_ (Lev. 14). Never, we venture to say, in all
the manifold repetitions of this divine ceremony, was this order once
inverted, so that the oil was first applied, and then the blood; which
means, interpreting type into antitype, that it was impossible that
Pentecost could have preceded Calvary, or {29} that the outpouring of the
Spirit should have anticipated the shedding of the blood.
Then let us reflect, that not only the order of these two great events of
redemption was fixed from the beginning, but their dates were marked in
the calendar of typical time. The slaying of the paschal lamb told to
generation after generation, though they knew it not, the day of the year
and week on which Christ our Passover should be sacrificed for us. The
presentation of the wave sheaf before the Lord, "_on the morrow after the
Sabbath_"[1] had for long centuries fixed the time of our Lord's
resurrection on the first day of the week. And the command to "count
from the morrow after the Sabbath, from the day that ye brought the sheaf
of the wave offering, _seven Sabbaths_,"[4] determined the day of
Pentecost as the time of the descent of the Spirit. We sometimes think
of the disciples waiting for an indefinite period in that upper room for
the fulfillment of the promise of the Father; but the time had been fixed
not only with God in eternity, but in the calendar of the Hebrew ritual
upon earth. They tarried in prayer for ten days, simply because after
the forty days of the Lord's sojourn on earth subsequent to his
resurrection, ten days remained of the "seven Sabbaths" period.
To sum up what we are saying: The Spirit of God is the successor of the
Son of God in his {30} official ministry on earth. Until Christ's
earthly work for his church had been finished, the Spirit's work in this
world could not properly begin. The office of the Holy Ghost is to
communicate Christ to us--Christ in his entireness. However perfectly
the photographer's plate has been prepared, there can be no picture until
his subject steps into his place and stands before him. Our Saviour's
redemptive work was not completed when he died on the cross, or when he
rose from the dead, or even when he ascended from the brow of Olivet.
Not until he sat down in his Father's throne, summing up all his ministry
in himself,--"I am he that liveth and was dead, and behold I am alive
forevermore,"--did the full Christ stand ready to be communicated to his
church.[5] By the first Adam's sin, God's communion with man through the
Holy Ghost was broken, and their union ruptured. When the second Adam
came up from his cross and resurrection, and took his place at God's
right hand, there was a restoration of this broken fellowship. Very
beautiful are {31} the words of our risen Lord as bearing on this point:
"I ascend to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God."[6] The
place which the divine Son had won for himself in the Father's heart, he
had won for us also. All of acceptance and standing and privilege which
was now his, was ours too, by redemptive right; and the Holy Ghost is
sent down to confirm and realize to us what he had won for us. Without
the expiatory work of Christ for us, the sanctifying work of the Spirit
in us were impossible; and on the other hand, without the work of the
Spirit within us, the work of Christ for us were without avail.
"_And when the day of Pentecost was fully come._" What these words mean
historically, typically, and doctrinally, we are now prepared to see.
The true wave sheaf had been presented in the temple on high. Christ the
first-fruits, brought from the grave on "the morrow after the Sabbath,"
or the first day of the week, now stands before God accepted on our
behalf; the seven Sabbaths from the resurrection day have been counted,
and Pentecost has come. Then suddenly, to those who were "all of one
accord in one place," "there came a sound from heaven as of a rushing
mighty wind, and it filled all {32} the house where they were sitting,
and there appeared unto them cloven tongues, like as of fire, and sat
upon each of them, and they were all filled with the Holy Ghost." As the
manger of Bethlehem was the cradle of the Son of God, so was the upper
room the cradle of the Spirit of God; as the advent of "the Holy Child"
was a testimony that God had "visited and redeemed his people," so was
the coming of the Holy Ghost. The fact that the Comforter is here, is
proof that the Advocate is there in the presence of the Father. Boldly
Peter and the other apostles now confront the rulers with their
testimony, "Whom ye slew and hanged on a tree . . . Him hath God exalted
with his right hand to be a prince and a Saviour, to give repentance to
Israel and forgiveness of sins; and we are his witnesses of these things;
_and so also is the Holy Ghost, whom God, hath given to them that obey
him_." As the sound of the golden bells upon the high priest's garments
within the Holiest gave evidence that he was alive, so the sound of the
Holy Ghost, proceeding from heaven and heard in that upper chamber, was
an incontestable witness that the great High Priest whom they had just
seen passing through the cloud-curtain, entering within the veil, was
still living for them in the presence of the Father. Thus has the "_dies
natalis_," the birthday of the Holy Spirit, come; and the events of his
earthly mission will now be considered in their order.
[1] "The Work of the Holy Spirit in Man," by Pastor Tophel, p. 32.
[2] See epistles to the seven churches: Rev 2: 11.
[3] John 14: 10.
[4] Lev. 23: 11-16.
[5] "Christ having reached his goal, and not till then, bequeathes to his
followers the graces that invested his earthly course; the ascending
Elijah leaves his mantle behind him. It is only an extension of the same
principle, that the declared office of the Holy Spirit being to complete
the image of Christ in every faithful follower by effecting in this world
a spiritual death and resurrection,--a point attested in every
epistle,--_the image could not be stamped until the reality had been
wholly accomplished; the Divine Artist could not fitly descend to make
the copy before the entire original had been provided_."--_Archer Butler_.
[6] John 20: 17. "Because though he and the Father are one, and the
Father his Father by the propriety of nature, to us God became a Father
through the Son, not by right of nature, but by grace."--_Ambrose_.
{33}
III
THE NAMING OF THE SPIRIT
{34}
"The name Paraclete is applied to Christ as well as to the Spirit; and
properly: For it is the common office of each to console and encourage
us and to preserve us by their defense. Christ was their [the
disciples'] patron so long as he lived in the world; he then committed
them to the guidance and protection of the Spirit. If any one asks us
whether we are not under the guidance of Christ, the answer is easy:
Christ is a perpetual guardian, but not visibly. As long as he walked
on the earth he appeared openly as their guardian: now he preserves us
by his Spirit. He calls the Spirit 'another Comforter,' in view of the
distinction which we observe in the blessings proceeding from
each."--_John Calvin_.
{35}
III
THE NAMING OF THE SPIRIT
The Son of God was named by the angel before he was conceived in the
womb: "Thou shalt call his name Jesus, for he shall save his people
from their sins." Thus he came, not to receive a name, but to fulfill
a name already predetermined for him. In like manner was the Holy
Ghost named by our Lord before his advent into the world: "But when the
Paraclete is come, whom I will send unto you from the Father" (John 15:
26). This designation of the Holy Spirit here occurs for the first
time--a new name for the new ministry upon which he is now about to
enter. The reader will find in almost any critical commentary
discussions of the meaning of the word, and of the question of its
right translation, whether by "Comforter," or "Advocate," or "Teacher,"
or "Helper." But the question cannot be fully settled by an appeal to
classical or patristic Greek, for the reason, we believe, that it is a
divinely given name whose real significance must be made manifest in
the actual life and history of the Spirit. The name is the person
himself, and only as we know the person can we interpret his name. Why
{36} attempt then to translate this word any more than we do the name
of Jesus? We might well transfer it into our English version, leaving
the history of the church from the Acts of the Apostles to the
experience of the latest saint to fill into it the great significance
which it was intended to contain. Certain it is that the language of
the Holy Ghost can never be fully understood by an appeal to the
lexicon. The heart of the church is the best dictionary of the Spirit.
While all the before-mentioned synonyms are correct, neither one is
adequate, nor are all together sufficient to bring out the full
significance of this great name, "The Paraclete."
Let us consider, however, how much is suggested by the literal meaning
of this word, "the _Paracletos_" and by all that our Lord says
concerning him in his last discourse. "To call to one's aid," is the
meaning of the verb, _parachaleô_, from which the name is derived.
Very beautiful therefore is the word in its application to the
disciples of Christ at the time when the Spirit was given. They had
lost the visible presence of their Lord. The sorrow of his removal
from them through the cross and the sepulchre had after three days been
turned into joy by his resurrection. But now another separation had
come, in his departure to the Father after the cloud had received him
out of sight. In this last and longer bereavement, what should they
do? Their beloved Master had told them beforehand {37} what to do.
They were to call upon the Father to send them One to fill the vacant
place, and he who should be sent would be the "Paraclete," the "one
called to their help."[1]
But what deep questionings must have arisen in their hearts as they
heard the Saviour's promise: "If I go not away the Paraclete will not
come unto you; but if I depart I will send him unto you." Did they
begin to ask whether the mysterious comer would be a "person"?
Impossible to imagine. For he was to take the place of that greatest
of persons; to do for them even greater things than he had done; and to
lead them into even larger knowledge than he had imparted. The
discussion of the personality of the Holy Ghost is so unnatural in the
light of Christ's last discourse that we studiously avoid it. Let us
treat the question, therefore, from the point of view of Christ's own
words, and try to put ourselves under the impression which they make
upon us. To state the matter as simply and familiarly as possible:
Jesus is about to vacate his office on earth as teacher and prophet;
but before doing so he would introduce us to his successor. As in a
complex problem we seek to determine an unknown quantity by the known,
so in this paschal discourse Jesus {38} aims to make us acquainted with
the mysterious, invisible coming personage whom he names the
"Paraclete" by comparing him with himself, the known and the visible
one. Collating his comparisons we may find in them several groups of
seeming contradictions, and just such contradictions as we should
expect if this comer is indeed a person of the Godhead. Of the coming
Paraclete then we find these intimations.[2]
1. He is another, yet the same: "And I will pray the Father and he
shall give you another Comforter" (John 14: 16). By the use of this
expression "another" our Lord distinguishes the Paraclete from himself,
but he also puts him on the same plane with himself. For there is no
parity or even comparison between a person and an influence. If the
promised visitor were to be only an impersonal emanation from God, it
would seem impossible that our Lord should have so co-ordinated him
with himself as to say: "I go to be an Advocate for you in heaven (1
John 2: 1), and I send another to be an Advocate for you on earth."
{39}
But if Christ thus distinguishes the Comforter from himself, he also
identifies him with himself: "I will not leave you orphans: _I will
come to you_" (John 14: 18). By common consent this promise refers to
the advent of the Spirit, for so the connection plainly indicates. And
yet almost in the same breath he says: "The Comforter whom I will send
unto you" (John 14: 26). Thus our Lord makes the same event to be at
once his coming and his sending; and he speaks of the Spirit now as his
own presence, and now as his substitute during his absence. So what
must we conclude but that the Paraclete is Christ's other self, a third
Person in that blessed Trinity of which he is the second.
2. The Paraclete is subordinate yet superior in his ministry to the
church. "For he shall not speak of himself; but whatsoever he shall
hear that shall he speak. He shall glorify me; for he shall receive of
mine and show it unto you" (John 16: 13).
Well may we mark the holy deference between the persons of the Trinity
which is here pointed out. Each receives from another what he
communicates, and each magnifies another in his praises. As Bengel
concisely states it: "The Son glorifies the Father; the Spirit
glorifies the Son." What then is the office of the Holy Ghost, so far
as we can interpret it, but that of communicating and applying the work
of Christ to human hearts? If he convinces of sin it is by exhibiting
the {40} gracious redemptive work of the Saviour and showing men their
guilt in not believing on him. If he witnesses to the penitent of his
acceptance it is by testifying of the atoning blood of Jesus in which
that acceptance is grounded; if he regenerates and sanctifies the heart
it is by communicating to it the life of the risen Lord. Christ is
"all" in himself, and through the Spirit "in all" those whom the Spirit
renews. This reverent subjection of the earthly Comforter to the
heavenly Christ contains a deep lesson for those who are indwelt by the
Spirit[3] and makes them rejoice evermore to be witnesses rather than
originators.
With this subordination of the Holy Spirit to Christ, how is it yet
true that such a great advantage was to accrue to the church by the
departure of the Saviour and the consequent advent of the Spirit to
take his place? That it would be so is what is plainly affirmed in the
following text: "Nevertheless I tell you the truth. It is expedient
for you that I go away: for if I go not away the Comforter will not
come unto you; but if I depart I will send him unto you" (John 16: 7).
If the Spirit is simply the measure of the Son, his sole work being to
communicate the work of the Son, what gain could there be in the
departure of the one in order to {41} the coming of the other? Would
it not be simply the exchange of Christ for Christ?--his visible
presence for his invisible?
To us the answer of this question is most obvious. It was not the
earthly Christ whom the Holy Ghost was to communicate to the church,
but the heavenly Christ,--the Christ re-invested with his eternal
power, re-clothed with the glory which he had with the Father before
the world was, and re-endowed with the infinite treasures of grace
which he had purchased by his death on the cross. It is as though--to
use a very inadequate illustration--a beloved father were to say to his
family: "My children, I have provided well for your needs; but your
condition is one of poverty compared with what it may become. By the
death of a kinsman in my native country I have become heir to an
immense estate. If you will only submit cheerfully to my leaving you
and crossing the sea, and entering into my inheritance, I will send you
back a thousand times more than you could have by my remaining with
you." Only in the instance we are considering, Christ is the
"testator" as well as the heir. By his death the inheritance becomes
available, and when he had ascended into heaven he sent down the Holy
Spirit to distribute the estate among those who were joint heirs with
him. What this estate is, may be best summarized in two beautiful
expressions of frequent recurrence in the {42} epistles of Paul, "The
riches of his grace" (Eph. 1: 7), and "The riches of his glory" (Eph.
3: 16). On the cross "the riches of his grace" was secured to us in
the forgiveness of sins; on the throne "the riches of his glory" was
secured to us in our being strengthened with all might by his Spirit in
the inner man; in the indwelling of Christ in our hearts by faith, and
in our infilling with all the fullness of God. The divine wealth only
becomes completely available on the death, resurrection, and ascension
of our Lord; so that the Holy Spirit, the divine Conveyancer, had not
the full inheritance to convey till Jesus was glorified.
Observe therefore, in the valedictory discourse of our Lord, the
frequent recurrence of the words: "_Because I go to the Father_," one
of the sayings which greatly perplexed his disciples. In the light of
all which Jesus says in this connection, let us see if its meaning may
not be clear to us. "If ye loved me ye would rejoice because I go unto
the Father; for the Father is greater than I" (John 14: 28), he says in
the same connection. We cannot here enter into the deep question of
the _kenosis_, or self-emptying of the Son of God in his incarnation.
It is enough that we follow the plain teaching of the Scripture, that
though "being in the form of God, he counted it not a thing to be
grasped to be on an equality with God; but emptied himself, taking the
form of a servant" (Phil. 2: {43} 6, 7, R. V.). What now does his
going to the Father signify but a refilling with that of which he had
been emptied, or a resumption of his co-equality with God? The greater
blessing which he could confer upon his church by his departure seems
to lie in the fact of the greater power and glory into which he would
enter by his enthronement at God's right hand. As Luther pointedly
puts it: "Therefore do I go, he saith, where I shall be greater than I
now am, that is, to the Father, and it is better that I shall pass out
of this obscurity and weakness into the power and glory in which the
Father is." In the light of this interpretation the meaning of our
Lord's words above quoted does not seem difficult. The Paraclete was
to communicate Christ to his church,--his life, his power, his riches,
his glory. In his exaltation all these were to be very greatly
increased. "All things that the Father hath are mine" (John 16: 15),
he says. And though he had for a time voluntarily disinherited himself
of his heavenly possessions, he is now to be repossessed of them.
"Therefore said I, that he shall take of mine and shall show it unto
you" (16: 15). Christ at God's right hand will have more to give than
while on earth; therefore the church will have more to receive through
the Paraclete than through the visible Christ. What obvious
significance then do the following sayings from this farewell sermon of
Jesus have: "Verily {44} verily, I say unto you, He that believeth on
me the works that I do shall he do also; greater works than these shall
he do; _because I go unto the Father_" (John 14: 12). The earthly
Christ is equal only to himself thus conditioned; and if the Holy
Spirit shall communicate his power to his disciples, they will do the
same works that he does. But the heavenly Christ is co-equal with the
Father, therefore when he shall ascend to the Father, and the Spirit
shall take of his and communicate to his church, it will do greater
works than these. The stream of life, in other words, will have
greater power because of the higher source from which it proceeds.
Very deep are the mysteries here considered, and we can only speak of
them in the light which we get by comparing Scripture with Scripture.
Did the risen Christ breathe on his disciples and say to them: "Receive
ye the Holy Ghost"?[4] "It is enough, Lord, that we have received the
Spirit from thee," they might well have said. Yet it was not enough
for him to give; for looking on to the day of his enthronement, he
says: "But when the Paraclete is come, whom I will send unto you from
the Father, even the Spirit of truth which proceedeth from the Father,
he shall testify of me" (John 15: 26). When Jesus hath ascended "on
high," then can the {45} Holy Ghost communicate "the power from on
high." Therefore it is expedient that he go away.
As with the power which Christ was to impart to his church through the
Paraclete, so with the righteousness which he was both to impute and to
impart; its highest source must be found in heaven: "And when he, the
Comforter, is come, he will convince the world of righteousness; . . .
of righteousness _because I go to my father_, and ye see me no more"
(John 16: 8-10). We may say truly that the righteousness of Christ was
not completely finished and authenticated till he sat down at the right
hand of the majesty on high. By his death he perfectly satisfied the
claims of a violated law, but this fact was not attested until the
grave gave back the certificate of discharge in his released and risen
body. By his resurrection he was "declared to be the Son of God in
power, according to the Spirit of holiness" (Rom. 1: 4). But the fact
was not fully verified till God had "set him at his own right hand in
the heavenly places, far above all principality, and power, and might,
and dominion, and every name that is named" (Eph. 1: 20, 2l). Now in
his consummated glory he is prepared to be "made wisdom, and
righteousness, and sanctification, and redemption" to his people. He
who had been "manifest in the flesh" that he might be made sin for us,
was now "justified in the Spirit" and "received up into glory," that he
might be made {46} righteousness to us, and that "we might be made the
righteousness of God in him." Christ's coronation, in a word, is the
indispensable condition to our justification. Till he who was made a
curse for us is crowned with glory and honor we cannot be assured of
our acceptance with the Father.[5] How deep the current of thought
which flows through this narrow channel--"Because I go to the Father."
3. The Paraclete teaches only the things of Christ; yet teaches more
than Christ taught: "I have yet many things to say unto you, but ye
cannot bear them now. Howbeit when he the Spirit of truth is come, he
will guide you into all the truth" (John 16: 12, 13). It is as though
he had said: "I have brought you a little way in the knowledge of my
doctrine; he shall bring you all the way." One reason for this saying
seems plain: The teaching of Jesus during his earthly ministry waited
to be illumined by a light not risen--the light of the cross, the light
of the sepulchre, the light of the ascension. Therefore until these
events had come to pass, Christian doctrine was undeveloped, and could
not be fully communicated to the disciples of Christ. But this is not
all. The "because I go to the Father" still gives the key to our
Lord's meaning. "But what things {47} soever he shall hear, these
shall he speak, and he shall declare unto you things to come" (John 16:
13, R. V.). Very wonderful is this hint of the mutual converse of the
Godhead, so that the Paraclete is described as listening while he
leads, as having an ear in heaven attentive to the converse of the
Father and the glorified Son, while he extends an unseen guidance to
the flock on earth, communicating to them what he has heard from the
Father and the Son. And we may reverently ask, Has not the glorified
Christ more of knowledge and revelation to communicate than he had in
the days of his humiliation? Of "the things to come" has he not
secrets to impart which hitherto may have been hidden in the counsels
of the Father? To take a single illustration from the words of Christ.
Speaking of his second advent, he says: "But of that day or that hour
knoweth no one, not even the angels in heaven, neither the Son, but the
Father" (Mark 13: 32[6]). It is best that we should interpret these
words frankly, and instead of saying, with some, that he did not know
in the sense that he was not permitted to disclose, admit it possible
that while in his humiliation and under the veil of his incarnation,
this secret was hidden from his eyes.
But is it not presumptuous for us to reason, that {48} therefore he
does not now know the day of his coming? How constantly is that text
quoted as a decisive and final prohibition of all inquiry into the
proximate time of our Lord's return in glory. But they who so use this
saying simply remand us to the childhood of the church, to the
spiritual nonage of the ante-Pentecostal days. Have we forgotten that
since our Lord ascended to the Father he has given us a further
revelation, that wondrous book of the Apocalypse, which opens and
closes with a beatitude upon those who read and faithfully keep the
words of this prophecy? And one characteristic feature of this book is
its chronological predictions concerning the time of the end, its
mystical dates, which have led many sober searchers of the word of God
to inquire diligently "what and what manner of time" the Spirit did
signify in giving us these way-marks in the wilderness. This being so,
we may ask: If we are not irreverent in concluding with many devout
expositors that our Saviour meant what he said in declaring that he did
"not yet" know the time of his advent, are we presumptuous in taking
literally the opening words of the Apocalypse?: "The Revelation of
Jesus Christ, which God gave unto him, to show unto his servants the
things which must shortly come to pass." It was because of his going
unto the Father that greater works and greater riches were to attend
the church after Pentecost. Why may we not assign to the same {49}
cause also the fuller revelation of the future and the leading into
completer truth concerning the blessed hope of the church? In other
words, if we may think of Christ as entering into larger revelation as
he returns to the glory which he had with the Father must we not think
of larger communications of truth by the blessed Paraclete?
Have we not learned something of the nature and offices of the Spirit
by this study of his new name, and of all that the departing Lord says
in the wondrous discourse wherein he introduces him to his disciples?
At least the study should enable us to distinguish two inspired terms
which have been needlessly confounded by not a few writers, viz.: the
words "_Paraclete_," and "_Parousia_." The latter word, which
constantly occurs in Scripture as describing our Lord's second coming,
has been applied in several learned works to the advent of the Holy
Spirit; and since Christ came in the person of the Spirit, it has been
argued that the Redeemer's promised advent in glory has already taken
place. But this is to confuse terms whose use in Scripture marks them
as clearly distinct. Observe their difference: In the Paraclete,
Christ comes spiritually and invisibly; in the Parousia, he comes
bodily and gloriously. The advent of the Paraclete is really
conditioned on the Saviour's personal departure from his people: "If I
go not away the Paraclete will not come to you" (John 16: 7). {50} The
Parousia, on the other hand, is only realized in his personal return to
his people: "For what is our hope or joy or crown of rejoicing? Are
not even ye in the _presence_ of our Lord Jesus Christ _at his
coming_?" (1 Thess. 2: 19.) The Paraclete attends the church in the
days of her humiliation; the Parousia introduces the church into the
day of her glory. In the Paraclete, Christ came to dwell with the
church on earth: "I will not leave you orphans; I will come to you"
(John 14: 18). In the Parousia, Christ comes to take the church to
dwell with himself in glory: "I will come again and receive you unto
myself; that where I am there ye may be also" (John 14: 3). Christ
prayed on behalf of his bereaved church for the coming of this
Paraclete: "And I will pray the Father and he shall give you another
Paraclete." The Holy Spirit now prays with the pilgrim-church for the
hastening of the Parousia. "And the Spirit and the bride say, Come"
(Rev. 22: 17). These two can only be understood in their mutual
relations. Christ, who gave the new name to the Holy Spirit, can best
interpret that name to us by making us acquainted with himself. May
that name be for us so real a symbol of personal presence that while
strangers and pilgrims in the earth we may walk evermore "in the
_paraclesis_ of the Holy Ghost" (Acts 9:31).
[1] The word _paraklêtôr_ is used in the Septuagint (Job 16:2) with the
meaning of "_Comforter_," and the term _paraklêtos_ occurs in the
Talmud, signifying "_Interpreter_."
[2] The most obvious reason for concluding that the Holy Spirit is a
person is that he performs actions and stands in relations which belong
only to a person, e. g.: _He speaks_ (Acts 1: 16); _he works miracles_
(Acts 2: 4; 8: 39); _he sets ministers over churches_ (Acts 20: 28);
_he commands and forbids_ (Acts 8: 29; 11: 12; 13: 2; 16: 6, 7); _he
prays for us_ (Rom. 8: 26); _he witnesses_ (Rom. 8: 16); _he can be
grieved_ (Eph. 4: 30); _he can be blasphemed_ (Mark 3: 29); _he can be
resisted_ (Acts 7: 51, etc).
[3] If the Holy Spirit may not speak of himself as preacher, how canst
thou draw thy preaching out of thyself--out of thine head or even out
of thine heart.--_Pastor Gossner_.
[4] Let it be observed that in this communication of the risen Christ
it is not said, "Receive ye _the_ Holy Ghost"--the article being
significantly omitted--_Labete Pneuma agion_ (John 20: 22).
[5] How righteous must he be, who will go to the Father from the cross
and the grave! Thus will the Holy Spirit convince the world that he is
a righteous man, and truly righteous for man.--_Roos_.
[6] "Neither the Son": "It is more than _neither_; it is _not yet the
Son_," says Morrison the commentator.
{51}
IV
THE EMBODYING OF THE SPIRIT
{52}
"But now the Holy Ghost is given more perfectly, for he is no longer
present by his operation as of old, but is present with us so to speak,
and converses with us in a substantial manner. For it was fitting
that, as the Son had conversed with us in the body, the spirit should
also come among us in a bodily manner."--_Gregory Nazianzen_.
{53}
IV
THE EMBODYING OF THE SPIRIT
"The church, which is his body," began its history and development at
Pentecost. Believers had been saved, and the influences of the Spirit
had been manifested to men in all previous dispensations from Adam to
Christ. But now an _ecclesia_, an outgathering, was to be made to
constitute the mystical body of Christ, incorporated into him the Head
and indwelt by him through the Holy Ghost. The definition which we
sometimes hear, that a church is "a voluntary association of believers,
united together for the purposes of worship and edification" is most
inadequate, not to say incorrect. It is no more true than that hands
and feet and eyes and ears are voluntarily united in the human body for
the purposes of locomotion and work. The church is formed from within;
Christ present by the Holy Ghost, regenerating men by the sovereign
action of the Spirit, and organizing them into himself as the living
center. The Head and the body are therefore one, and predestined to
the same history of humiliation and glory. And as they are one in
fact, so are they one in name. He whom God anointed and filled with
the Holy Ghost {54} is called "the Christ," and the church, which is
his body and fullness, is also called "the Christ." "For as the body
is one, and hath many members, and all the members of that one body,
being many, are one body, _so also is the Christ_" (1 Cor. 12: 12).
Here plainly and with wondrous honor the church is named _o Christos_,
commenting upon which fact Bishop Andrews beautifully says: "Christ is
both in heaven and on earth; as he is called the Head of his church, he
is in heaven; but in respect of his body which is called Christ, he is
on earth."
So soon as the Holy Ghost was sent down from heaven this great work of
his embodying began, and it is to continue until the number of the
elect shall be accomplished, or unto the end of the present
dispensation. Christ, if we may say it reverently, became mystically a
babe again on the day of Pentecost, and the hundred and twenty were his
infantile body, as once more through the Holy Ghost he incarnated
himself in his flesh. Now he is growing and increasing in his members,
and so will he continue to do "till we all come in the unity of the
faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God unto a perfect man, unto
the measure of the stature of fullness of Christ." Then the Christ on
earth will be taken up into visible union with the Christ in heaven,
and the Head and the body be glorified together. Observe how the
history of the church's formation, as recorded in the Acts, harmonizes
with {55} the conception given above. The story of Pentecost
culminates in the words, "and the same day there were added about three
thousand souls" (Acts 2: 41). Added to whom? we naturally ask. And
the King James translators have answered our question by inserting in
italics "to them." But not so speaks the Holy Ghost. And when, a few
verses further on in the same chapter, we read: "And the Lord added to
the church daily such as should be saved," we need to be reminded that
the words "to the church" are spurious. All such glosses and
interpolations have only tended to mar the sublime teaching of this
first chapter of the Holy Spirit's history. "And believers were the
more added _to the Lord_" (Acts 5: 14.) "And much people were added
_unto the Lord_" (Acts 11: 24.) This is the language of
inspiration--Not the mutual union of believers, but their divine
co-uniting with Christ; not voluntary association of Christians, but
their sovereign incorporation into the Head and this incorporation
effected by the Head through the Holy Ghost.
If we ask concerning the way of admission into this divine _ecclesia_,
the teaching of Scripture is explicit: "For in one Spirit were we all
baptized into one body" (1 Cor. 12: 13). The baptism in water marks
the formal introduction of the believer into the church; but this is
the symbol, not the substance. For observe the identity of form
between the ritual {56} and the spiritual. "I indeed baptize you in
water," . . . said John, "but he that cometh after me . . . shall
baptize you in the Holy Ghost and in fire" (Matt. 3: 11). As in the
one instance the disciple was submerged in the element of water, so in
the other he was to be submerged in the element of the Spirit. And
thus it was in actual historic fact. The upper room became the
Spirit's baptistery, if we may use the figure. His presence "filled
all the house where they were sitting," and "they were all filled with
the Holy Ghost." The baptistery would never need to be re-filled, for
Pentecost was once and for all, and the Spirit then came to abide in
the church perpetually. But each believer throughout the age would
need to be infilled with that Spirit which dwells in the body of
Christ. In other words, it seems clear that the baptism of the Spirit
was given once for the whole church, extending from Pentecost to
Parousia. "There is one Lord, one faith, one baptism" (Eph. 4: 5). As
there is one body reaching through the entire dispensation, so there is
"one baptism" for that body given on the day of Pentecost. Thus if we
rightly understand the meaning of Scripture it is true, both as to time
and as to fact, that "in one Spirit we were all baptized into one body,
whether Jews or Greeks, whether bond or free."
The typical foreshadowing, as seen in the church in the wilderness, is
very suggestive at this point: "Moreover, brethren, I would not that ye
should be {57} ignorant, how that all our fathers were under the cloud
and all passed through the sea; and were all baptized unto Moses in the
cloud and in the sea" (1 Cor. 10: 1). Baptized _into_ Moses by their
passage through the sea, identified with him as their leader, and
committed to him in corporate fellowship; even so were they also
baptized into Jehovah, who in the cloud of glory now took his place in
the midst of the camp and tabernacled henceforth with them. The type
is perfect as all inspired types are. The antitype first appears in
Christ our Lord, baptized in water at the Jordan, and then baptized in
the Holy Ghost which "descended from heaven like a dove and abode upon
him." Then it recurred again in the waiting disciples, who besides the
baptism of water, which had doubtless already been received, now were
baptized "in the Holy Ghost and in fire." Henceforth they were in the
divine element, as their fathers had been in the wilderness, "not in
the flesh but _in the Spirit_" (Rom. 8: 9); called "to live according
to God _in the Spirit_" (1 Peter 4: 6); to "walk _in the Spirit_" (Gal.
5: 25); "praying always with all prayer and supplication _in the
Spirit_" (Eph. 6: 18). In a word, on the day of Pentecost the entire
body of Christ was baptized into the element and presence of the Holy
Ghost as a permanent condition. And though one might object that the
body as a whole was not yet in existence, we reply that neither was the
complete church in {58} existence when Christ died on Calvary, yet all
believers are repeatedly said to have died with him.
To change the figure of baptism for a moment to another which is used
synonymously, that of the anointing of the Spirit, we have in Exodus a
beautiful typical illustration of our thought. At Aaron's consecration
the precious ointment was not only poured upon his head, but ran down
in rich profusion upon his body and upon his priestly garments. This
fact is taken up by the psalmist when he sings: "Behold how good and
pleasant it is for brethren to dwell together in unity. It is like the
precious ointment upon the head that ran down upon the beard, even
Aaron's beard, that went down to the skirts of his garments" (Ps. 133:
1, 2). Of our great High Priest we read: "How God anointed Jesus of
Nazareth with the Holy Ghost and with power" (Acts 10: 38). But it was
not for himself alone but also for his brethren that he obtained this
holy unction. He received that he might communicate. "Upon whom thou
shalt see the Spirit descending and remaining on him, the same is he
that baptizeth in the Holy Ghost" (John 1: 33). And now we behold our
Aaron, our great High Priest, who has passed through the heavens, Jesus
the Son of God, standing in the holiest in heaven. "Thou didst love
righteousness and didst hate iniquity," is the divine encomium now
passed upon him, "therefore God, thy God, anointed thee with the oil of
gladness {59} above thy fellows" (Heb. 1: 9). He, the _Christos_, the
Anointed, stands above and for the _Christoi_, his anointed brethren,
and from him the Head, the unction of the Holy Ghost descended on the
day of Pentecost. It was poured in rich profusion upon his mystical
body. It has been flowing down ever since, and will continue to do so
till the last member shall have been incorporated with himself, and so
anointed by the one Spirit into the one body, which is the church.
It is true that in one instance subsequent to Pentecost the baptism in
the Holy Ghost is spoken of. When the Spirit fell on the house of
Cornelius, Peter is reminded of the word of the Lord, how that he said:
"John indeed baptized in water, but ye shall be baptized in the Holy
Ghost" (Acts 11: 16). This was a great crisis in the history of the
church, the opening of the door of faith to the Gentiles, and it would
seem that these new subjects of grace now came into participation of an
already present Spirit. Yet Pentecost still appears to have been the
age-baptism of the church. As Calvary was once for all, so was the
visitation of the upper room.
Consider now that, as through the Holy Ghost we become incorporated
into the body of Christ, we are in the same way assimilated to the Head
of that body, which is Christ. An unsanctified church dishonors the
Lord, especially by its incongruity. A noble head, lofty-browed and
intellectual, upon a {60} deformed and stunted body, is a pitiable
sight. What, to the angels and principalities who gaze evermore upon
the face of Jesus, must be the sight of an unholy and misshapen church
on earth, standing in that place of honor called "his body."
Photographing in a sentence the _ecclesia_ of the earliest centuries,
Professor Harnack says: "_Originally the church was the heavenly bride
of Christ, and the abiding place of the Holy Spirit_." Let the reader
consider how much is involved in this definition. The first and most
sacred relation of the body is to the head. Watching for the return of
the Bridegroom induces holiness of life and conduct in the bride; and
the supreme work of the Spirit is directed to this end, that "He may
establish our hearts unblamable in holiness before God our Father, at
the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ with all his saints" (1 Thess. 3:
13). In accomplishing this end he effects all other and subordinate
ends. The glorified Christ manifests himself to man through his body.
If there is a perfect correspondence between himself and his members,
then there will be a true manifestation of himself to the world.[1]
Therefore does the Spirit abide in the body, that the body may be
"inChristed," to {61} use an old phrase of the mystics; that is,
indwelt by Christ and transfigured into the likeness of Christ. Only
thus, as "a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a
peculiar people," can it "shew forth the virtues of him who has called
us out of darkness into his marvelous light." And who is the Christ
that is thus to be manifested? From the throne he gives us his name:
"I am he that liveth and was dead, and behold I am alive for evermore"
(Rev. 1: 18). Christ in glory is not simply what he is, but what he
was and what he is to be. As a tree gathers up into itself all the
growths of former years, and contains them in its trunk, so Jesus on
the throne is all that he was and is and is to be. In other words, his
death is a perpetual fact as well as his life.
And his church is predestined to be like him in this respect, since it
not only heads up in him, as saith the apostle, that ye "may grow up
into him in all things which is the Head, even Christ," but also bodies
itself forth from him, "from whom the whole body, fitly joined together
and compacted by that which every joint supplieth, . . . maketh
increase of the body" . . . (Eph. 4: 16). If the church will literally
manifest Christ, then she must be both a living and a dying church. To
this she is committed in the divinely given form of her baptism. "Know
ye not that so many of us as were baptized into Jesus Christ were
baptized into his {62} death; therefore we were buried with him by
baptism into death, that like as Christ was raised up from the dead by
the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of
life" (Rom. 6: 3, 4). And the baptism of the Holy Ghost into which we
have been brought is designed to accomplish inwardly and spiritually
what the baptism of water foreshadows outwardly and typically, viz., to
reproduce in us the living and the dying of our Lord.
First, the living. "For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus
hath made me free from the law of sin and death" (Rom. 8: 2). That is,
that which has been hitherto the actuating principle within us, viz.,
sin and death, is now to be met and mastered by another principle, the
law of life, of which the Holy Spirit of God is the author and
sustainer. As by our natural spirit we are connected with the first
Adam, and made partakers of his fallen nature, so by the Holy Spirit we
are now united with the second Adam, and made partakers of his
glorified nature. To vivify the body of Christ by maintaining its
identity with the risen Head is, in a word, the unceasing work of the
Holy Ghost.
Secondly, the dying of our Lord in his members is to be constantly
effected by the indwelling Spirit. The church, which is the fullness
of him that "filleth all in all," completes in the world his {63}
crucifixion as well as his resurrection. This is certainly Paul's
profound thought, when he speaks of filling up "that which is behind of
the afflictions of Christ in my flesh, for his body's sake, which is
the church" (Col. 1: 24). In other words, the church, as the
complement of her Lord, must have a life experience and a death
experience running parallel.
It is remarkable how exact is this figure of the body, which is
employed to symbolize the church. In the human system life and death
are constantly working together. A certain amount of tissue must die
every day and be cast out and buried, and a certain amount of new
tissue must also be created and nourished daily in the same body.
Arrest the death-process, and it is just as certain to produce disorder
as though you were to arrest the life-process. Literally is this true
of the corporate body also. The church must die daily in fulfillment
of the crucified life of her Head, as well as live daily in the
manifestation of his glorified life. This italicised sentence, which
we take from a recent book, is worthy to be made a golden text for
Christians: "_The Church is Christian no more than as it is the organ
of the continuous passion of Christ_." To sympathize, in the literal
sense of suffering with our sinning and lost humanity, is not only the
duty of the church, but the absolutely essential condition to her true
manifestation of her Lord. A {64} self-indulgent church disfigures
Christ; an avaricious church bears false witness against Christ; a
worldly church betrays Christ, and gives him over once more to be
mocked and reviled by his enemies.
The resurrection of our Lord is prolonged in his body, as we all see
plainly. Every regeneration is a pulse-beat of his throne-life. But
too little do we recognize the fact that his crucifixion must be
prolonged side by side with his resurrection. "If any man will come
after me let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow
me." The church is called to live a glorified life in communion with
her Head, and a crucified life in her contact with the world. And the
Holy Spirit dwells evermore in the church to effect this twofold
manifestation of Christ. "But God be thanked, that ye have obeyed from
the heart that pattern of doctrine to which ye were delivered," writes
the apostle (Rom. 6: 17). The pattern, as the context shows, is Christ
dead and risen. If the church truly lives in the Spirit, he will keep
her so plastic that she will obey this divine mold as the metal
conforms to the die in which it is struck. If she yields to the sway
of "the spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience," she
will be stereotyped according to the fashion of the world, and they
that look upon her will fail to see Christ in her.
[1] "The Holy Spirit not only dwells in the church as his habitation,
but also uses her as the living organism whereby he moves and walks
forth in the world, and speaks to the world and acts upon the world.
He is the soul of the church which is Christ's body."--_Bishop Webb,
The Presence and Office of the Spirit_, p. 47.
{65}
V
THE ENDUEMENT OF THE SPIRIT
{66}
"To the disciples, the baptism of the Spirit was very distinctly not
his first bestowal for regeneration, but the definite communication of
his presence in power of their glorified Lord. Just as there was a
two-fold operation of the one Spirit in the Old and New Testaments, of
which the state of the disciples before and after Pentecost was the
striking illustration, so there may be, and in the great majority of
Christians is, a corresponding difference of experience. . . When once
the distinct recognition of what the indwelling of the Spirit was meant
to bring is brought home to the soul, and it is ready to give up all to
be made partaker of it, the believer may ask and expect what may be
termed a baptism of the Spirit. Praying to the Father in accordance to
the two prayers in Ephesians, and coming to Jesus in the renewed
surrender of faith and obedience, he may receive such an inflow of the
Holy Spirit as shall consciously lift him to a different level from the
one on which he has hitherto lived."--_Rev. Andrew Murray_.
{67}
V
THE ENDUEMENT OF THE SPIRIT
We have maintained in the previous chapter that the baptism in the Holy
Ghost was given once for all on the day of Pentecost, when the
Paraclete came in person to make his abode in the church. It does not
follow therefore that every believer has received this baptism. God's
gift is one thing; our appropriation of that gift is quite another
thing. Our relation to the second and to the third persons of the
Godhead is exactly parallel in this respect. "God so loved the world
that he _gave_ his only begotten Son" (John 3: 16). "But as many as
_received him_ to them gave he the right to become the children of God,
even to them that believe on his name" (John 1: 12). Here are the two
sides of salvation, the divine and the human, which are absolutely
co-essential.
There is a doctrine somewhat in vogue, not inappropriately denominated
redemption by incarnation, which maintains that since God gave his Son
to the world, all the world has the Son, consciously or unconsciously,
and that therefore all the world will be saved. It need not be said
that a true evangelical teaching must reject this theory as utterly
{68} untenable, since it ignores the necessity of individual faith in
Christ. But some orthodox writers have urged an almost identical view
with respect to the Holy Ghost. They have contended that the enduement
of the Spirit is "not any special or more advanced experience, but
simply the condition of every one who is a child of God"; that
"believers converted after Pentecost, and living in other localities,
are just as really endowed with the indwelling Spirit as those who
actually partook of the Pentecostal blessing at Jerusalem."[1]
On the contrary, it seems clear from the Scriptures that it is still
the duty and privilege of believers to receive the Holy Spirit by a
conscious, definite act of appropriating faith, just as they received
Jesus Christ. We base this conclusion on several grounds. Presumably
if the Paraclete is a person, coming down at a certain definite time to
make his abode in the church, for guiding, teaching, and sanctifying
the body of Christ, there is the same reason for our accepting him for
his special ministry as for accepting the Lord Jesus for his special
ministry. To say that in receiving Christ we necessarily received in
the same act the gift of the Spirit, seems to confound what the
Scriptures make distinct.[2] For it is as sinners that we accept {69}
Christ for our justification, but it is as sons that we accept the
Spirit for our sanctification: "And because ye are sons, God hath sent
forth the Spirit of his Son into your hearts, crying Abba, Father"
(Gal. 4: 6). Thus, when Peter preached his first sermon to the
multitude after the Spirit had been given, he said: "Repent and be
baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ, for the
remission of sins, and ye shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost"
(Acts 2: 38).
This passage shows that logically and chronologically the gift of the
Spirit is subsequent to repentance. Whether it follows as a necessary
and inseparable consequence, as might seem, we shall consider later.
Suffice that this point is clear, so clear that one of the most
conservative as well as ablest writers on this subject, in commenting
on this text in Acts, says: "Therefore it is evident that the reception
of the Holy Ghost, as here spoken of, has nothing whatever to do with
bringing men to believe and repent. It is a subsequent operation; it
is an additional and {70} separate blessing; it is a privilege founded
on faith already actively working in the heart. . . I do not mean to
deny that the gift of the Holy Ghost may be practically on the same
occasion, but never in the same moment. The reason is quite simple
too. The gift of the Holy Ghost _is grounded on the fact that we are
sons by faith in Christ, believers resting on redemption in him_.
Plainly, therefore, it appears that the Spirit of God has already
regenerated us."[3]
Now, as we examine the Scriptures on this point, we shall see that we
are required to appropriate the Spirit as sons, in the same way that we
appropriated Christ as sinners. "As many as received him, even to them
that believe on his name," is the condition of becoming sons, as we
have already seen, receiving and believing being used as equivalent
terms. In a kind of foretaste of Pentecost, the risen Christ, standing
in the midst of his disciples, "breathed on them and said, Receive ye
the Holy Ghost." The verb is not passive, as our English version might
lead us to suppose, but has here as generally an active signification,
just as in the familiar passage in Revelation: "Whosoever will, let him
_take_ the water of life freely." Twice in the Epistle to the
Galatians the possession of the Holy Ghost is put on the same grounds
of active {71} appropriation through faith: "Received ye the Spirit by
the works of the law or by the hearing of faith?" (3: 2). "That ye
might receive the promise of the Spirit through faith" (3: 14). These
texts seem to imply that just as there is a "faith toward our Lord
Jesus Christ" for salvation, there is a faith toward the Holy Ghost for
power and consecration.
If we turn from New Testament teaching to New Testament example we are
strongly confirmed in this impression. We begin with that striking
incident in the nineteenth chapter of Acts. Paul, having found certain
disciples at Ephesus, said unto them: "Did ye receive the Holy Ghost
when ye believed? And they said unto him, Nay; we did not so much as
hear whether there is a Holy Ghost." This passage seems decisive as
showing that one may be a disciple without having entered into
possession of the Spirit as God's gift to believers. Some admit this,
who yet deny any possible application of the incident to our own times,
alleging that it is the miraculous gifts of the Spirit which are here
under consideration, since, after recording that when Paul had laid his
hands upon them and "the Holy Ghost came upon them," it is added that
"they spake with tongues and prophesied." All that need be said upon
this point is simply that these Ephesian disciples, by the reception of
the Spirit, came into the same condition with the upper-room disciples
who {72} received him some twenty years before, and of whom it is
written that "they were all filled with the Holy Ghost and began to
speak with other tongues as the Spirit gave them utterance." In other
words, these Ephesian disciples on receiving the Holy Ghost exhibited
the traits of the Spirit common to the other disciples of the apostolic
age.
Whether those traits--the speaking of tongues and the working of
miracles--were intended to be perpetual or not we do not here discuss.
But that the presence of the personal Holy Spirit in the church was
intended to be perpetual there can be no question. And whatsoever
relations believers held to that Spirit in the beginning they have a
right to claim to-day. We must withhold our consent from the
inconsistent exegesis which would make the water baptism of the
apostolic times still rigidly binding, but would relegate the baptism
in the Spirit to a bygone dispensation. We hold indeed, that Pentecost
was once for all, but equally that the appropriation of the Spirit by
believers is always for all, and that the shutting up of certain great
blessings of the Holy Ghost within that ideal realm called "the
apostolic age," however convenient it may be as an escape from fancied
difficulties, may be the means of robbing believers of some of their
most precious covenant rights.[4] Let us {73} transfer this incident
of the Ephesian Christians to our own times. We need not bring forward
an imaginary case, for by the testimony of many experienced witnesses
the same condition is constantly encountered. Not only individual
Christians, but whole communities of disciples are found who have been
so imperfectly instructed that they have never known that there is a
Holy Spirit, except as an influence, an impersonal something to be
vaguely recognized. Of the Holy Ghost as a Divine Person, dwelling in
the church, to be honored and invoked and obeyed and implicitly
trusted, they know nothing. Is it conceivable that there could be any
deep spiritual life or any real sanctified energy for service in a
community like this? And what should a well-instructed teacher or
evangelist do, on discovering a church or an individual Christian in
such a condition? Let us turn to another passage of the Acts for an
answer: "Now when the apostles which were at Jerusalem heard that
Samaria had received the word of God they sent unto them Peter and
John, who when they were come down prayed for them that they might
receive the Holy Ghost; for as yet he had fallen upon none of them;
only they were baptized in the name {74} of the Lord Jesus. Then laid
they their hands on them and they received the Holy Ghost" (Acts 8:
14-17).
Here were believers who had been baptized in water. But this was not
enough. The baptism in the Spirit, already bestowed at Pentecost, must
be appropriated. Hear the prayer of the apostles "that they might
receive the Holy Ghost." Such prayer we deem eminently proper for
those who today may be ignorant of the Comforter. And yet such prayer
should be followed by an act of believing acceptance on the part of the
willing disciple: "O Holy Spirit, I yield to thee now in humble
surrender. I receive thee as my Teacher, my Comforter, my Sanctifier,
and my Guide." Do not testimonies abound on every hand of new lives
resulting from such an act of consecration as this, lives full of peace
and power and victory among those who before had received the
forgiveness of sins but not the enduement of power?
We conceive that the great end for which the enduement of the Spirit is
bestowed is our qualification for the highest and most effective
service in the church of Christ. Other effects will certainly attend
the blessing, a fixed assurance of our acceptance in Christ, and a holy
separateness from the world; but these results will be conducive to the
greatest and supreme end, our consecrated usefulness.
{75}
Let us observe that Christ, who is our example in this as in all
things, did not enter upon his ministry till he had received the Holy
Ghost. Not only so, but we see that all his service from his baptism
to his ascension was wrought in the Spirit. Ask concerning his
miracles, and we hear him saying: "I by the Spirit of God cast out
devils" (Matt. 12: 28). Ask concerning that decease which he
accomplished at Jerusalem, and we read "that he through the eternal
Spirit offered himself without spot unto God" (Heb. 9: 14). Ask
concerning the giving of the great commission, and we read that he was
received up "after that he through the Holy Ghost had given
commandments unto the apostles" (Acts 1: 2). Thus, though he was the
Son of God, he acted ever in supreme reliance upon him who has been
called the "Executive of the Godhead."
Plainly we see how Christ was our pattern and exemplar in his relation
to the Holy Spirit. He had been begotten of the Holy Ghost in the womb
of the virgin, and had lived that holy and obedient life which this
divine nativity would imply. But when he would enter upon his public
ministry, he waited for the Spirit to come upon him, as he had hitherto
been in him. For this anointing we find him praying: "Jesus also being
baptized and praying, the heaven was opened, and the Holy Ghost
descended in a bodily shape like a {76} dove upon him" (Luke 3: 22).
Had he any "promise of the Father" to plead, as he now asked the
anointing of the Spirit, if as we may believe this was the subject of
his prayer? Yes; it had been written in the prophets concerning the
rod out of the stem of Jesse: "And the Spirit of the Lord shall rest
upon him; the spirit of wisdom and understanding, the spirit of counsel
and might, the spirit of knowledge and of the fear of the Lord" (Isa.
11: 2). "The promise of the seven-fold Spirit," the Jewish
commentators call it. Certainly it was literally fulfilled upon the
Son of God at the Jordan, when God gave him the Spirit without measure.
For he who was now baptized was in turn to be baptizer. "Upon whom
thou shalt see the Spirit descending, and remaining on him, the same is
he which baptizeth with the Holy Ghost" (John 1: 33). "I indeed
baptize you in water unto repentance: but he that cometh after me is
mightier than I . . . he shall baptize you in the Holy Ghost and in
fire" (Matt. 3: 11, R. V.). And now being at the right hand exalted,
and having "the seven spirits of God" (Rev. 3: 3), the fullness of the
Holy Ghost, he will shed forth his power upon those who pray for it,
even as the Father shed it forth upon himself.
Let us observe now the symbols and descriptions of the enduement of the
Spirit which are applied equally to Christ and to the disciples of
Christ.
{77}
1. _The Sealing of the Spirit_. We hear Jesus saying to the multitude
that sought him for the loaves and fishes, "Labor not for the meat
which perisheth, but for that meat which endureth unto eternal life,
which the Son of man shall give unto you, _for him hath God the Father
sealed_" (John 6: 27). This sealing must evidently refer back to his
reception of the Spirit at the Jordan. One of the most instructive
writers on the Hebrew worship and ritual tells us that it was the
custom for the priest to whom the service pertained, having selected a
lamb from the flock, to inspect it with the most minute scrutiny, in
order to discover if it was without physical defect, and then to seal
it with the temple seal, thus certifying that it was fit for sacrifice
and for food. Behold the Lamb of God presenting himself for inspection
at the Jordan! Under the Father's omniscient scrutiny he is found to
be "a lamb without blemish and without spot." From the opening heaven
God gives witness to the fact in the words: "This is my beloved Son in
whom I am well pleased," and then he puts the Holy Ghost upon him, the
testimony to his sonship, the seal of his separation unto sacrifice and
service.
The disciple is as his Lord in this experience. "In whom having also
believed ye were sealed with the Holy Spirit of promise" (Eph. 1: 13).
As always in the statements of Scripture, this {78} transaction is
represented as subsequent to faith. It is not conversion, but
something done upon a converted soul, a kind of crown of consecration
put upon his faith. Indeed the two events stand in marked contrast.
In conversion the believer receives the testimony of God and "sets his
seal to that God is true" (John 3: 33). In consecration God sets his
seal upon the believer that he is true. The last is God's "Amen" to
the Christian, verifying the Christian's "Amen" to God. "Now he, which
establisheth us with you in Christ, and anointed us, is God; _who also
sealed us_ and gave us the earnest of the Spirit in our hearts" (2 Cor.
1: 21, 22).
If we ask to what we are committed and separated by this divine
transaction, we may learn by studying the church's monograph, if such
we may name what is brought out in a mysterious passage in one of the
pastoral epistles. In spite of the defection and unbelief of some, the
apostle says: "Nevertheless the foundation of God standeth sure, having
this seal." Then he gives us the two inscriptions on the seal: "The
Lord knoweth them that are his"; and, "Let every one that nameth the
name of the Lord depart from unrighteousness" (2 Tim. 2: 19)--Ownership
and holiness. When we receive the gift of the Holy Spirit it is that
we may count ourselves henceforth and altogether Christ's. If any
shrink from this devotement, how can he {79} have the fullness of the
Spirit? God cannot put his signature upon what is not his. Hence, if
under the sway of a worldly spirit we withhold ourselves from God and
insist on self-ownership, we need not count it strange if God withholds
himself from us and denies us the seal of divine ownership. God is
very jealous of his divine signet. He graciously bestows it upon those
who are ready to devote themselves utterly and irrevocably to his
service, but he strenuously withholds it from those who, while
professing his name, are yet "serving divers lusts and pleasures."
There is a suggestive passage in the Gospel of John which, translated
so as to bring out the antitheses which it contains, reads thus: "Many
trusted in his name, beholding the signs which he did; but Jesus did
not trust himself to them" (John 2: 23, 24). Here is the great
essential to our having the seal of the Spirit. Can the Lord trust us?
Nay; the question is more serious. Can he trust himself to us? The
Holy Spirit, which is his signet ring, can he commit it to our use for
signing our prayers and for certifying ourselves, and his honor not be
compromised?
The other inscription on the seal is: "Let every one that nameth the
name of the Lord depart from unrighteousness."[5] The possession of
the Spirit {80} commits us irrevocably to separation from sin. For
what is holiness but an emanation of the Spirit of holiness who dwells
within us? A sanctified life is therefore the print or impression of
his seal: "He can never own us without his mark, the stamp of holiness.
The devil's stamp is none of God's badge. Our spiritual extraction
from him is but pretended unless we do things worthy of so illustrious
birth and becoming the honor of so great a Father." The great office
of the Spirit in the present economy is to communicate Christ to his
church which is his body. And what is so truly essential of Christ as
holiness? "In him is no sin; whosoever abideth in him sinneth not."
The body can only be sinless by uninterrupted communion with the Head;
the Head will not maintain communion with the body except it be holy.
The idea of ownership, just considered, comes out still further in the
words of the apostle: "And grieve not the Spirit of God in whom ye were
sealed unto the day of redemption" (Eph. 4: 30). The day of redemption
is at the advent of our Lord in glory, when he shall raise the dead and
translate the living. Now his own are in the world, but the world
knows them not. But he has put his mark and secret sign upon them, by
which he shall recognize them at his coming. In that great quickening,
at the Redeemer's advent, the Holy Spirit will be the seal by which the
saints will be recognized, {81} and the power through which they will
be drawn up to God. "If the Spirit that raised up Jesus dwell in you"
(Rom. 11: 9), is the great condition of final quickening. As the
magnet attracts the particles of iron and attaches them to itself by
first imparting its own magnetism to them, so Christ, having given his
Spirit to his own, will draw them to himself through the Spirit. We
are not questioning now that all who have eternal life dwelling in them
will share in the redemption of the body; we are simply entering into
the apostle's exhortation against grieving the Spirit. We must fear
lest we mar the seal by which we were stamped, lest we deface or
obscure the signature by which we are to be recognized in the day of
redemption.[6]
In a word the sealing is the Spirit himself, now received by faith and
resting upon the believer, with all the results in assurance, in joy,
and in {82} empowering for service, which must follow his unhindered
sway in the soul. Dr. John Owen, who has written more intelligently
and more exhaustively on this subject than any with whom we are
acquainted, thus sums up the subject: "If we can learn aright how
Christ was sealed, we shall learn how we are sealed. The sealing of
Christ by the Father is the communication of the Holy Spirit in
fullness to him, authorizing him unto and acting his divine power in
all the acts and duties of his office, so as to evidence the presence
of God with him and approbation of him. God's sealing of believers
then is his gracious communication of the Holy Spirit unto them so to
act his divine power in them as to enable them unto all the duties of
their holy calling, evidencing them to be accepted with him both for
themselves and others, and asserting their preservation unto eternal
life."[7]
2. _The Fullness of the Spirit_. Immediately upon his baptism we
read: "And Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan and
was led by the Spirit into the wilderness" (Luke 4: 1). The same
record is made concerning the upper-room, disciples, immediately after
the descent of the Spirit: "And they were all filled with the Holy
Spirit" (Acts 2: 4). What is here spoken of seems nothing different
from what in other Scriptures is {83} called the reception of the
Spirit. It is a transaction that may be repeated, and will be if we
are living in the Spirit. But it is clearly an experience belonging to
one who has already been converged. This comes out very plainly in the
life of Paul. If according to the opinion quoted in the early part of
this chapter, the reception of the Spirit is associated always and
inseparably with conversion, one will reasonably ask, why a conversion
so marked and so radical as that of the apostle to the Gentiles need be
followed by such an experience as that named in Acts 9: 17: "And
Ananias departed and entered into the house, and laying his hands on
him, said Brother Saul, the Lord, even Jesus who appeared unto thee in
the way which thou earnest, hath sent me that thou mightest receive thy
sight and be filled with the Holy Ghost." We seem to have a clear
allusion here to that which so constantly appears in Scripture, both in
doctrine and in life, a divine something distinct from conversion and
subsequent to it, which we have called the reception of the Spirit.
"The enduement of power" we may well name it; for observe how
constantly throughout the book of Acts mighty works and mighty
utterances are connected with this qualification. "Then Peter, _filled
with the Holy Ghost_, said unto them" (Acts 4: 8), is the preface to
one of the apostle's most powerful sermons. "And they were _all filled
with the Holy Ghost_, and they spake the {84} word with boldness" (Acts
4: 31), is a similar record. And they chose Stephen, a man _full_ of
faith and _of the Holy Ghost_, the narrative runs, regarding the choice
of deacons in Acts 6: 5. "And he, being _full of the Holy Ghost_," is
the keynote to his great martyr-sermon. This infilling of the Spirit
marks a decisive and most important crisis in the Christian life,
judging from the story of the apostle's conversion, to which we have
just referred.
But, as we have intimated, we are far from maintaining that this is an
experience once for all, as the sealing seems to be. As the words
"regeneration" and "renewal" used in Scripture mark respectively the
impartation of the divine life as a perpetual possession and its
increase by repeated communications, so in our sealing there is a
reception of the Spirit once for all, which reception may be followed
by repeated fillings. It is reasonable to conclude this since our
capacity is ever increasing and our need constantly recurring,
according to the beautiful saying of Godet: "Man is a vessel destined
to receive God, a vessel which must be enlarged in proportion as it is
filled and filled in proportion as it is enlarged."
And yet we confess here to a degree of uncertainty as to the use of
terms, and as to whether the two now under consideration are identical.
We may well pause therefore and lift a prayer, that since "we have
received not the spirit of {85} the world but the Spirit which is of
God, that we might know the things which are freely given to us of
God," this blessed Revelator and Interpreter may not only reveal to us
our privilege and inheritance in the Holy Ghost, but teach us to name
and distinguish the terms by which it is conveyed.
While the fact of which we are speaking seems undoubted, the exposition
of it is far from being easy. Therefore we should attach no little
value to a consensus of opinion on this subject from those who have
thought most carefully and searched most prayerfully concerning it
This is our apology for the multiplied quotations which we are
introducing into this chapter, believing that the Holy Spirit is most
likely to interpret himself through those who most honor him in seeking
his guidance and illumination.
In a recent work upon this subject, in which careful scholarship and
spiritual insight seem to be well united, the author thus states his
conclusions: "It seems to me beyond question, as a matter of experience
both of Christians in the present day and of the early church, as
recorded by inspiration, that in addition to the gift of the Spirit
received at conversion, there is another blessing corresponding in its
signs and effects to the blessing received by the apostles at
Pentecost--a blessing to be asked for and expected by Christians still,
and to be described in language similar to that employed {86} in the
book of the Acts. Whatever that blessing may be, it is in immediate
connection with the Holy Ghost; and one of the terms by which we may
designate it is 'to be filled with the Spirit.' As with the early
Christians so with us now, the filling comes when there is special need
for it. . . And there is an occasion when that blessing comes to a man
for the first time. That first time is a spiritual crisis from which
his future spiritual life must be dated. There may be a question as to
what it is to be called, or at least by what name in Scripture we are
authorized to call it. . . Whether consciously or not, it is to the
fact of the Holy Spirit's coming in new power to the soul that all new
life is due; and the more that this is consciously understood the more
is the Holy Ghost in his due place in our hearts. It is only when he
is consciously accepted in all his power that we can be said to be
either 'baptized' or 'filled' with the Holy Ghost. I should like to
add that it is possible to maintain that God from the first offered to
his own people a higher position in this matter than they have
generally been able to occupy, in that the fullness of the Spirit was
and is offered to each soul at conversion; and that it is only from
want of faith that subsequent outpourings of the Holy Ghost become
needful."[8]
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That the filling of the Spirit belongs to us as a covenant privilege
seems to be clear from the exhortation in the Epistle to the Ephesians,
which is confessedly of universal application: "Be not drunken with
wine, wherein is excess, but be filled with the Spirit" (Eph. 5: 18).
The passive verb employed here is suggestive. The surrendered will,
the yielded body, the emptied heart, are the great requisites to his
incoming. And when he has come and filled the believer, the result is
a kind of passive activity, as of one wrought upon and controlled
rather than of one directing his own efforts. Under the influence of
strong drink there is an outpouring of all that the evil spirit
inspires--frivolity, profanity, and riotous conduct. "Be
God-intoxicated men," the apostle would seem to say; "let the Spirit of
God so control you that you shall pour yourself out in psalms and hymns
and spiritual songs." If such divine enthusiasm has its perils, we
believe that they are less to be dreaded than that "moderatism" which
makes the servants of God satisfied with the letter of Scripture if
only that letter be skillfully and scientifically handled, rather than
giving the supreme place to the Spirit as the inspirer and motor of all
Christian service.
3. _The Anointing of the Spirit_. After the baptism and temptation we
find our Lord appropriating to himself the words of the prophet, as he
read them in the synagogue of Nazareth: {88} "The Spirit of the Lord is
upon me, because he hath anointed me to preach good tidings to the
poor" (Luke 4: 18). Twice in the Acts there is a reference to this
important event in similar terms: "Thy holy servant Jesus, whom thou
didst anoint" (Acts 4: 27, R. V.). "Jesus of Nazareth, how that God
anointed him with the Holy Ghost and with power" (Acts 10: 38). And as
with the Lord so with his disciples: "Now he that establisheth us with
you in Christ, and anointed us, is God" (2 Cor. 1: 21, R. V.).
A student of the Scriptures need not be told how closely the ceremony
of anointing was related to all important offices and ministries of the
servants of Jehovah under the old covenant. The priest was anointed
that he might be holy unto the Lord (Lev. 8: 12). The king was
anointed that the Spirit of the Lord might rest upon him in power (1
Sam. 16: 15). The prophet was anointed that he might be the oracle of
God to the people (1 Kings 19: 16). No servant of Jehovah was deemed
qualified for his ministry without this holy sanctifying touch laid
upon him. Even in the cleansing of the leper this ceremony was not
wanting. The priest was required to dip his right finger in the oil
that was in his left hand and to put it upon the tip of the right ear,
upon the thumb of the right hand, and upon the great toe of the right
foot of him that was to be cleansed, the oil "_upon {89} the blood of
the trespass-offering_" (Lev. 14: 17). Thus with divine accuracy did
even the types foretell the two-fold provision for the Christian life,
cleansing by the blood and hallowing by the oil--justification in
Christ, sanctification in the Spirit.
If we ask now what this anointing is, the reply is obviously the Holy
Spirit himself. As before he was the seal attesting us, so now he is
the oil sanctifying us--the same gift described by different symbols.
And as it was the Aaron who had been the first anointed who was
qualified to anoint others, so with our great High Priest. It is he
within the veil who gives the Spirit unto his own, that he may qualify
them to be "an elect race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people
for God's own possession" (1 Peter 2: 9, R. V.). "But ye have an
anointing from the Holy One, and ye know all things" (1 John 2: 20).
Christ in the New Testament is constantly called "the Holy One." And
because the Spirit was sent to communicate him to the people, they are
made partakers of his knowledge as well as of his holiness. If it
should be said that this unction of which John speaks is miraculous,
the divine illumination of evangelists and prophets who were
commissioned to be the vehicles of inspired Scripture, we must call
attention to other passages which connect the knowledge of God with the
Holy Ghost. "For who among men knoweth the things of a man save the
spirit of a man which {90} is in him; even so the things of God none
knoweth save the Spirit of God" (1 Cor. 2: 11, R. V.). The horse and
his rider may see the same magnificent piece of statuary in the park;
the one may be delighted with it as a work of human genius, but upon
the dull eye of the other it makes no impression, and for the reason
that it takes a human mind to appreciate the work of the human mind.
Likewise only the Spirit of God can know and make known the thoughts
and teachings and revelations of God. This seems to be the meaning of
John in his discourse concerning the divine unction: "But the anointing
which ye have received of him abideth in you, and ye need not that any
man teach you; but as the same anointing teacheth you of all things" (1
John 2: 27).
In nothing does the enduement of the Spirit more distinctly manifest
itself than in the fine discernment of revealed truth which it imparts.
As in service, the contrast between working in the power of the Spirit
and in the energy of the flesh is easily discernible, even more clearly
in knowledge and teaching is the contrast between the tuition of
learning and the intuition of the Spirit. While we should not
undervalue the former, it is striking to note how the Bible puts the
weightier emphasis on the latter; so that really the unspiritual hearer
is to be accounted less blameworthy for not discerning the truth than
the intellectual preacher is for {91} expecting him to do so. When,
for example, one attempts with the utmost learning to convince an
unbeliever of the deity of Christ and fails, the word of Scripture to
him is: "No man is able to say 'Lord Jesus' save in the Holy Ghost" (1
Cor. 12: 3).
The Spirit of Jesus can alone reveal to men the lordship of Jesus, and
this key of knowledge the Holy Ghost will never put into the hand of
any man however learned. As it is written that Christ is the "raying
forth" of the Father's glory, and "the express image of his person"
(Heb. 1: 3), thus by a beautiful figure reminding us that as we can
only see the sun in the rays of the sun, so we can only know God in
Jesus Christ, who is the manifestation of God. It is so likewise
between the second and third Persons of the Trinity. Christ is the
image of the invisible God; the Holy Ghost is the invisible image of
Christ. As Jesus manifested the Father outwardly, the Spirit manifests
Jesus inwardly, forming him within us as the hidden man of the heart,
imaging him to the spirit by an interior impression which no
intellectual instruction, however diligent, can effect.
In his profound discourse concerning the "unction" and accompanying
illumination, John was only expounding by the Spirit what Jesus had
said before his departure: "Howbeit, when he the Spirit of truth is
come, he will guide you into all {92} truth; he shall glorify me; for
he shall receive of mine and shall show it unto you" (John 16: 13).
"The Spirit of truth"--How much instruction and suggestion is conveyed
by this term! As he is called "the Spirit of Christ," as revealing
Christ in his suffering and glory, so he is called "the Spirit of
truth," as manifesting the truth in all its depths and heights. As
impossible as it is that we should know the person of Christ without
the Spirit of Christ who reveals him, so impossible it is that we
should know the truth as it is in Jesus without the Spirit of truth who
is appointed to convey it. "The Spirit of truth whom the world cannot
receive" (John 14: 17)--We must come to Christ before the Spirit can
come to us. "The Spirit of truth which proceedeth from the Father"
(John 15: 26)--He can only teach us in intelligent sonship to cry
"Abba, Father." "The Spirit of truth . . . shall guide you into all
truth" (John 16: 13). Divine knowledge is all and altogether in his
power to communicate, and without his illumination it must be hidden
from our understanding.
Thus we have had the enduement of the Spirit presented to us under
three aspects--sealing, filling, and anointing--all of which terms, so
far as we can understand, signify the same thing--the gift of the Holy
Ghost appropriated through faith. Each of these terms is connected
with some special {93} Divine endowment--the seal with assurance and
consecration; the filling with power; and the anointing with knowledge.
All these gifts are wrapt up in the one gift in which they are
included, and without whom we are excluded from their possession.
While thus we conclude that it is a Christian's privilege and duty to
claim a distinct anointing of the Spirit to qualify him for his work,
we would be careful not to prescribe any stereotyped exercises through
which one must necessarily pass in order to possess it. It is easy to
cite cases of decisive, vivid, and clearly marked experience of the
Spirit's enduement, as in the lives of Dr. Finney, James Brainard
Taylor, and many others. And instead of discrediting these
experiences--so definite as to time and so distinct as to accompanying
credentials--we would ask the reader to study them, and observe the
remarkable effects which followed in the ministry of those who enjoyed
them. The lives of many of the co-laborers with Wesley and Whitefield
give a striking confirmation of the doctrine which we are defending.
Years of barren ministry, in which the gospel was preached with
orthodox correctness and literary finish, followed, after the Holy
Spirit had been recognized and appropriated, by evangelistic pastorates
of the most fervent type, such is the history of not a few of these
mighty men of God.
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Let not this great subject be embarrassed by too minute theological
definitions on the one hand, nor by the too exacting demand for
striking spiritual exercises on the other, lest we put upon simple
souls a burden greater than they can bear. Nevertheless we cannot
emphasize too strongly the divine crisis in the soul which a full
reception of the Holy Ghost may bring. "My little children, of whom I
travail in birth again until Christ be formed in you" (Gal. 4: 19),
writes the apostle to those who had already believed on the Son of God.
Whatever he may have meant in this fervent saying, we doubt not that
the deepest yearning of the Spirit is for the informing of Christ in
the heart, in order to that outward conformity to Christ which is the
supreme end of Christian nurture. If we conceive of the Christian life
as only a gradual growth in grace, is there not danger that we come to
regard this growth as both invisible and inevitable, and so take little
responsibility for its accomplishment? Let the believer receive the
Holy Ghost by a definite act of faith for his consecration, as he
received Christ by faith for his justification, and may he not be sure
that he is in a safe and scriptural way of acting? We know of no
plainer form of stating the matter than to speak of it as a simple
acceptance by faith, the faith which is
An affirmation and an act,
Which bids eternal truth be present fact.
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