There are four separate and distinct lines of proof of the Personality
of the Holy Spirit.
1. The first line of proof of the Personality of the Holy Spirit is
that all the distinctive marks or characteristics of personality are
ascribed to the Holy Spirit in the Bible. What are the distinctive
characteristics of personality? Knowledge, feeling and will. Any being
who knows and feels and wills is a person. Oftentimes when you say
that the Holy Spirit is a person, people understand you to mean that
the Holy Spirit has hands and feet and fingers and toes and eyes and
ears and nose and mouth, and so on. But these are not the marks of
personality, these are the marks of corporeity. Any being who knows,
thinks and wills is a person whether he have a body or not. Now all
these characteristics of personality are ascribed to the Holy Spirit in
the Bible.
(1) Turn in your Bibles to 1 Cor. 2:11. +"For what man knoweth the
things of a man, save the spirit of man which is in him? Even so
the things of God knoweth no man, but the Spirit of God."+ _Here
knowledge is ascribed to the Holy Spirit._ The Holy Spirit in other
words, is not a mere illumination that comes to your mind and mine
whereby our minds are cleared and strengthened to see truth that they
would not otherwise discover. The Holy Spirit is a Person who Himself
knows the things of God and reveals to us what He Himself knows.
(2) Now turn to 1 Cor. 12:11: +"But all these worketh that one and
the selfsame Spirit, dividing to every man severally as He will."+
Here _will_ is ascribed to the Holy Spirit. The thought clearly is
that the Holy Spirit is not a divine power that we get hold of and
use according to our will, but that the Holy Spirit is a person who
gets hold of us and uses us according to His will. This is one of the
most fundamental facts in regard to the Holy Spirit that we must bear
in mind if we are to get into right relations to Him. More people are
going astray at this point than almost any other. They are trying to
get hold of some divine power which they can use according to their
will. I do thank God that there is no divine power that I can get hold
of and use according to my will. What could I, in my foolishness and
ignorance, do with a divine power, what evil I might work! But on the
other hand, I am still more glad that while there is no divine power
that I can get hold of and use according to my foolish will, there is
a Divine Person who can get hold of me and use me according to His
infinitely wise and loving will.
(3) Turn now to Rom. 8:27. +"And he that searcheth the hearts knoweth
what is the mind of the Spirit, because he maketh intercession for the
saints according to the will of God."+ What I wish you to notice
here is expression, "_the mind_ of the Spirit." The Greek word here
translated "mind" is a comprehensive word that has in it the ideas of
both thought and purpose. It is the same word which is used in the 7th
verse of the chapter where we read, +"The mind of the flesh is enmity
against God,"+ where the thought is that not merely the thought of
the flesh is against God, but the whole moral and intellectual life of
the flesh is enmity against God.
(4) We now turn to a most remarkable passage—Rom. 15:30. +"Now I
beseech you, brethren, for the Lord Jesus Christ's sake, and for the
love of the Spirit, that ye strive together with me in your prayers to
God for me."+ What I wish you to notice in this verse are the words
"_The love of the Spirit_." It is a wonderful thought. It teaches us
that the Holy Spirit is not a mere blind influence or power, no matter
how beneficent, that comes into our hearts and lives, but that He is
a Divine Person, loving us with the tenderest love. I wonder how many
of us have ever thought much regarding "the love of the Spirit." I
wonder how many of us ministers who are here to-day have ever preached
a sermon on the love of the Spirit. I wonder how many of you have ever
heard a sermon on the love of the Spirit. Every day of your life you
kneel down before God the Father, at least I hope you do, and say,
"Heavenly Father, I thank thee for thy great love that led thee to give
thy Son to come down to this world and die upon the cross of Calvary in
my place." Every day of your life you kneel down and look up into the
face of Jesus Christ the Son and say, "Thou blessed Son of God, I thank
thee for that great love of thine that led thee to come down to this
world in obedience to the Father and die in my place upon the cross of
Calvary." But did you ever kneel down and look up to the Holy Spirit
and say to him, "Holy Spirit, I thank thee for that great love of
thine"? And yet we owe our salvation as truly to the love of the Holy
Spirit as we do to the love of the Father and the love of the Son. If
it had not been for the love of God the Father to me, looking down upon
me in my lost estate, yes, anticipating my fall and ruin and sending
His Son down to this world to die upon the cross, to die in my place,
I would have been in hell to-day. If it had not been for the love of
Jesus Christ, the Son, coming down to this world in obedience to the
Father to lay down His life, a perfect atoning sacrifice on the cross
of Cavalry in my stead, I would have been in hell to-day. But if it had
not been for the love of the Holy Spirit to me, coming down to this
world in obedience to the Father and the Son, seeking me out in my lost
condition, following me day after day, and week after week, and month
after month, and year after year, when I would not listen to Him, when
I deliberately turned my back upon Him, when I insulted Him, following
me into places where it must have been agony for One so holy to go,
following me day after day, week after week, month after month, year
after year, until at last He succeeded in bringing me to my senses and
bringing me to realise my utterly lost condition and revealed the Lord
Jesus to me as just the Saviour I needed and induced me and enabled me
to receive the Lord Jesus as my Saviour and my Lord; if it had not been
for this patient, long-suffering, never-wearying love of the Spirit of
God to me, I would have been in hell to-day.
(5) Turn now to a passage in the Old Testament. Neh. 9:20. +"Thou
gavest also thy good Spirit to instruct them, and withheldest not thy
manna from their mouth, and gavest them water for their thirst."+
Here both intelligence and goodness are ascribed to the Holy Spirit.
This passage does not add anything to the thought that we have already
had: I brought it in simply because it is from the Old Testament.
There are those who say that the doctrine of the Personality of the
Holy Spirit is in the New Testament, but is not in the Old Testament;
but here we find it as clearly in the Old Testament as in the New. Of
course, we do not find it as frequently in the Old Testament as in the
New, for this is the dispensation of the Holy Spirit: but the doctrine
of the Personality of the Holy Spirit is there in the Old Testament.
There are many who say that the doctrine of the Trinity is not in the
Old Testament, that while it is in the New, it is not in the Old. But
it is in the Old, in the very first chapter of the Bible. In Gen. 1:26
we read, +"And God said, let us make man in our image, after our
likeness."+ Here the plurality of the persons in the Godhead comes
out clearly. God did not say, "_I_ will" or "Let _me_ make man in
_my_ image." He said, "Let _us_ make man in _our_ image, after _our_
likeness." The three persons of the Trinity are found in the first
three verses of the Bible: +"In the beginning God created the heaven
and the earth."+ There you have God the Father. +"And the earth
was without form and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep.
And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters."+ There you
have the Holy Spirit. +"And God said,"+ there you have the Word,
+"Let there be light: and there was light."+ Here we have the
three persons of the Trinity in the first three verses of the Bible. In
fact the doctrine of the Trinity is found hundreds of times in the Old
Testament. In the Hebrew Bible it occurs in every place where you find
the word God in your English Bible, for the Hebrew word for God is a
plural noun. Literally translated, it would be "Gods" and not God. In
the very passage to which the Unitarians and the Jews, who reject the
Deity of Christ, refer so often as proving conclusively that the Deity
of Christ cannot be true, namely Deut. 6:4, the very doctrine that they
are seeking to disprove is found; for Deut. 6:4 literally translated
would read +"Hear, O Israel: Jehovah our Gods is one Jehovah."+
Why did the Hebrews with their intense monotheism, use a plural name
for God? This was the question that puzzled the Hebrew grammarians and
lexicographers, and the best explanation they could arrive at was that
the plural for God here used was the pluralis majestatis, the plural
of majesty. The explanation is entirely inadequate, to say nothing of
the fact that the pluralis majestatis in the Old Testament is a figure
of very doubtful validity. There is another explanation far nearer at
hand, and far more adequate and satisfactory, and that is that the
Hebrew inspired writers use a plural name for God in spite of their
intense monotheism, because there is a plurality of persons in the one
Godhead.
(6) Now turn to Eph. 4:30. +"And grieve not the Holy Spirit of God,
whereby ye are sealed unto the day of redemption."+ Here grief is
ascribed to the Holy Spirit. In other words, the Holy Spirit is not a
mere blind impersonal influence or power that comes to dwell in your
heart and mine, but a person, a person who loves us, a person who is
holy and intensely sensitive against sin, a person who recoils from sin
in what we call its slightest forms as the holiest woman of earth never
recoiled from sin in its grossest and most repulsive forms. And He sees
whatever we do, He hears whatever we say, He sees our very thoughts,
not a vagrant fancy is allowed a moment's lodgment in our mind but what
He sees it. And if there is anything impure, unholy, immodest, untrue,
false, censorious, or unChristlike in any way, He is grieved beyond
expression. This is a wonderful thought and it is to me the mightiest
incentive that I know to a Christian walk. How many a young man is kept
back from doing things that he would otherwise do, by the thought that,
if he did do that, his mother might hear of it and it would grieve her
beyond expression. How many a young man has come to the great city
and in some hour of temptation has been about to go into a place that
no self-respecting man ought ever to enter, but just as his hand is on
the doorknob and he is about to open the door, the thought comes to
him, "If I should enter there mother might hear of it, and if she did,
it would nearly kill her," and he has turned away without entering;
but there is One holier than the holiest mother that any of us ever
knew, One who loves us with a tenderer love than our own mother loves
us, and Who sees everything we do, not only in the daylight but under
the cover of night; Who hears every word we utter, every careless word
that escapes our lips; Who sees every thought we entertain, yes, Who
sees every fleeting fancy that we allow a moment's lodgment in our
mind; and if there is anything unholy, impure, immodest, indecorous,
unkind, harsh, censorious or unchristlike in any way in act or word or
thought, He sees it and is grieved beyond expression. Oh, how often
there has come into my mind some thought or imagination, I know not
from what source, but that I ought not to entertain, and just as I was
about to give it lodgment, the thought has come, "The Holy Spirit sees
that and will be grieved by it," and the thought has gone. Bearing
this thought of the Holy Spirit in our mind will help us to solve all
the questions that perplex the young believer to-day. For example, the
question, "Ought I as a Christian go to the theatre or the movies?"
Well, if you go the Holy Spirit will go; for He dwells in the heart of
every believer and goes wherever the believer goes. Were you ever at
a theatre or at a moving picture show in your life where you thought
the atmosphere of the place would be congenial to the _Holy_ Spirit?
If not, don't go. Ought I as a Christian go to the dance? Well, here
again, if you go, the Holy Spirit will surely go. Were you ever at a
dance in your life where you believed the atmosphere of the place would
be congenial to the Holy Spirit? Shall I as a Christian play cards?
Were you ever at a card party in all your life, even the most select
little neighbourhood gathering, or even a home gathering to play cards,
where you thought the atmosphere of the place would be congenial to the
Holy Spirit? If not, don't play. So with all the questions that come up
and that some of us find so hard to settle, this thought of the Holy
Spirit will help you to settle them all, and to settle them right, if
you really desire to settle them right and not merely to do the thing
that pleases yourself.
2. The second line of proof of the personality of the Holy Spirit is
that, many actions are ascribed to the Holy Spirit that only a person
can perform. There are many illustrations of this in the Bible; but I
will limit our consideration this morning to three instances.
(1) Turn again to the 2nd chapter of 1 Corinthians. In the 10th verse,
we read, +"But unto us, God revealed them through the Spirit: for
the Spirit searcheth all things, yea, the deep things of God."+ Here
the Holy Spirit is represented as searching the deep things of God. In
other words, as we said under our previous heading, the Holy Spirit is
not a mere illumination whereby our minds are made clear and strong to
apprehend truth that they would not otherwise discover, but the Holy
Spirit is a person Who Himself searches into the deep things of God and
reveals to us the things which He discovers. Such words could only be
spoken of a person.
(2) Now turn to Rom. 8:26 +"And in like manner the Spirit also
helpeth our infirmity: for we know not how to pray as we ought but the
spirit himself maketh intercession for us with groanings that cannot be
uttered."+ Here the Holy Spirit is represented as doing what only a
person can do, praying. The Holy Spirit is not a mere influence that
comes to impel us to prayer, and not a mere guidance to us in offering
our prayers. _He is a person who Himself prays._ Every believer in
Christ has two Divine Persons praying for Him. First, the Son, our
Advocate with the Father, who ever liveth to make intercession for us
up yonder at the right hand of God in the place of power (John 2:1 and
Heb. 7:25). Second, the Holy Spirit who prays through us down here. Oh,
what a wonderful thought, that we have these two divine persons praying
for us every day. What a sense it gives us of our security.
(3) Now turn to two other closely related passages. John 14:26. +"But
the comforter, even the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my
name, he shall teach you all things, and bring to your remembrance all
that I have said unto you."+ Here the Holy Spirit is represented as
doing what only a person could do, namely, teaching. We have the same
thought in John 16:12-14. +"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 shall guide you into all the truth: for He shall not speak
from Himself; but what things soever He shall hear, these shall He
speak: and He shall declare unto you the things that are to come. He
shall glorify me; for He shall take of mine, and shall declare it
unto you."+ Here again the Holy Spirit is represented as a living
personal teacher. It is our privilege to have the Holy Spirit as a
living person to-day as our teacher. Every time we study our Bibles, it
is possible for us to have this Divine Person the author of the Book,
to interpret it to us and to teach us its meaning. It is a precious
thought. How many of us have often thought when we heard some great
human teacher whom God has especially blessed to us, "Oh, if I could
only hear that man every day, then I might make some progress in my
Christian life," but we can have a teacher more competent by far than
the greatest human teacher that ever spoke for our teacher every day,
the Holy Spirit.
3. The third line of proof of the personality of the Holy Spirit is
that _an office is predicated of the Holy Spirit that could only be
predicated of a person_. Look for example at John 14:16, 17. Here we
read, +"And I will pray the Father, and He shall give you another
Comforter, that He may abide with you forever, even the Spirit of
truth: whom the world cannot receive; for it seeth him not. Neither
knoweth him: ye know him; for He abideth with you, and shall be in
you."+ Here the Holy Spirit is represented as _another Comforter_
who is coming to take the place of our Lord Jesus. Up to this time our
Lord Jesus had been the friend always at hand to help them in every
emergency that arose. But now He was going and their hearts were filled
with consternation, and He tells them that while He is going, another
is coming to take His place. Can you imagine our Lord Jesus saying this
if the other that was coming to take His place was a mere impersonal
influence or power? Can you imagine our Lord Jesus saying what He says
in John 16:7, +"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 go, I will send him unto you,"+ if that
which was coming to take His place was not another person but a mere
influence or power. In that case, is it for a moment conceivable that
our Lord could say that it was expedient for Him, a Divine Person,
to go and a mere influence or power, no matter how divine, come to
take His place? No! No! What our Lord said was that He, one Divine
Person, was going, but that another Person, just as Divine, was coming
to take His place. This promise is to me one of the most precious
promises in the whole Word of God for this present dispensation, the
thought that during the absence of my Lord, until that glad day when
He shall come back again, another Person, just as divine as He, is by
my side, yes, dwells in my heart every moment to commune with me and
to help me in every emergency that can possibly arise. I suppose you
know that the Greek word translated Comforter in these verses means
more than Comforter. It means Comforter plus a whole lot beside. The
Greek word so translated is _parakletos_. This word is a compound word,
compounded of the word _para_ which means alongside, and _kletos_,
one called, "One called to stand alongside another" to take his part
and help him in every emergency that arises. It is the same word that
is translated "advocate" in 1 John 2:1, +"If any man sin, we have
an advocate+ (_parakleton_) +with the Father, Jesus Christ the
righteous."+ But the word "Advocate" does not give the full force of
the word. Etymologically it means about the same. Advocate is a Latin
word transliterated into the English. The word is compounded of two
words, _ad_, meaning to, and _vocatus_, one called, that is to say, one
called to another to take his part, or to help him. But in our English
usage it has obtained a restricted sense. The Greek word, as already
said, means "one called alongside another," and the thought is of a
helper always at hand with his counsel and his strength and any form
of help needed. Up to this time the Lord Jesus Himself had been their
Paraclete, or friend always at hand to help. Whenever they got into
any trouble they simply turned to Him. For example, on one occasion
they were perplexed on the subject of prayer and they said to the
Lord, "Lord teach us to pray." And He taught them to pray. On another
occasion when Jesus was coming to them walking on the water, when their
first fear was over and He had said, "It is I, be not afraid," then
Peter said to Him, "Lord, if it be thou, bid me come unto thee upon the
water." And the Lord said, "Come." Then Peter clambered over the side
of the fishing smack and commenced to go to Jesus walking on the water.
Seemingly he turned around, took his eyes off the Lord and looked at
the fishing smack to see if the other disciples, John and James, and
the rest, were noticing how well he was getting on, but no sooner had
he got his eyes off the Lord than he began to sink, and he cried out
saying, "Lord, save me," and Jesus reached out His hand and held him
up. Just so, when they got into any other emergency they turned to the
Lord and He delivered them. But now He was going, and consternation
filled their hearts, and the Lord said to them, "Yes, I am going but
another just as divine, just as able to help, is coming to take my
place," and this other Paraclete is with us wherever we go, every hour
of the day or night. He is always by our side. If this thought gets
into your heart and stays there, you will never have another moment of
fear no matter how long you live. How can we fear in any circumstances,
if He is by our side? You may be surrounded by a howling mob. But what
of it if He walks between you and the mob? That thought will banish all
fear. I had a striking illustration of this in my own experience some
years ago. I was speaking at a Bible Conference on Lake Kenka in New
York State. I had a cousin who had a cottage four miles up the lake and
I went up there and spent my rest day with him. The next day he brought
me down in his steam launch to the pier where the Conference was held.
As I stepped off the launch onto the pier he said to me, "Come back
again to-night and spend the night with us," and I promised him that
I would; but I did not realise what I was promising. That night, when
the address was over as I went out of the hotel and started on my walk,
I found that I had undertaken a large contract. The cottage was four
miles away, but a four mile walk or an eight mile walk was nothing
under ordinary circumstances, but a storm was coming up, the whole
heaven was overcast. The path led along a bluff bordering the lake, the
path was near the edge of the bluff. Sometimes the lake was perhaps
not more than ten or twelve feet below, at other times some thirty or
forty feet below. I had never gone over the path before and as there
was no starlight, I couldn't see the path at all. Furthermore, there
had already been a storm that had gulleyed out deep ditches across
the path into which one might fall and break his leg. I couldn't see
these ditches except when there would be a sudden flash of lightning,
and then I would see one and then it would be darker and I blinder
than ever. As I walked along this path, so near the edge of the bluff
with all the furrows cut through it, I felt it was perilous to take
the walk and thought of going back; and then the thought came to me,
"You promised that you would come to-night and they may be sitting up
waiting for you." So I felt that I must go on. But it seemed creepy
and uncanny to walk along the edge of that bluff on such an uncertain
path that I couldn't see, and could only hear the sobbing and wailing
and the moaning of the lake at the foot of the bluff as it rose in the
fast approaching storm. Then the thought came to me, what was it you
told the people there at the conference about the Holy Spirit being
a Person always by our side? And I at once realised that the Holy
Spirit walked between me and the edge of the bluff; and that four miles
through the dark was four miles without a fear, a gladsome instead of a
fearsome walk. I once threw this thought out in the Royal Albert Hall
in London, one dark dismal February afternoon. There was a young lady
in the audience who was very much afraid of the dark. It simply seemed
impossible for her to go into a dark room alone. After the meeting was
over she hurried home and rushed in to the room where her mother was
sitting and cried, "O mother, I have heard the most wonderful address
this afternoon about the Holy Spirit always being by our side as our
ever-present helper and protector. I shall never be afraid of the dark
again." Her mother was a practical English woman and said to her,
"Well, let us see how real that is. Now go upstairs to the top floor,
into the dark room, and shut the door and stay in there alone in the
dark." The daughter went bounding up the stairs, went into the dark
room, closed the door and it was pitch dark, and "Oh," she wrote me
the next day, "it was dark, utterly dark, but that room was bright and
glorious with the presence of the Holy Spirit."
In this thought is also the cure for insomnia. Did any of you ever
have insomnia? I did. For two dark, awful years. Night after night,
I would go to bed, almost dead, as it seemed to me, for sleep, and I
thought I would certainly sleep as I could scarcely keep awake; but
scarcely had my head touched the pillow when I knew I wouldn't sleep
and I would hear the clock strike twelve, one, two, three, four, five,
six, and then it was time to get up. It seemed as though I didn't sleep
at all, though I have no doubt I did: for I believe that people who
suffer from insomnia sleep more than they think they do, else we would
die: but it seemed as if I didn't sleep at all, and this went on for
two whole years, until I thought that if I couldn't get sleep I would
lose my mind. And then I got deliverance. For years I would retire
and fall asleep about as soon as my head touched the pillow. But one
night I went to bed in the Bible Institute in Chicago where I was then
stopping. I expected to fall asleep almost immediately, as had become
my custom, but scarcely had my head touched the pillow when I knew I
was not going to sleep. Insomnia was back. If you have ever had him
you will always recognise him. It seemed as if Insomnia was sitting
on the footboard looking like an imp, grinning at me and saying "I am
back for two more years." "Oh," I thought, "two more years of this
awful insomnia." But that very morning I had been teaching the students
in the lecture room on the floor below on the Personality of the Holy
Spirit, and the thought came to me almost immediately, "What was that
you were telling the students down stairs this morning about the Holy
Spirit being always with us?" And I said, "Why don't you practice what
you preach?" And I looked up and said, "O thou blessed Holy Spirit of
God, thou art here, if thou hast anything to say to me, I will listen."
And He opened to me some of the sweet and precious things about Jesus
Christ, filling my soul with calm and peace and joy, and the next thing
I knew I was asleep and the next thing I knew it was to-morrow morning;
and whenever Insomnia has come around since and sat on my footboard, I
have done the same thing and it has never failed.
In this thought also is a cure for all loneliness. If the thought of
the Holy Spirit as an Ever-present Friend always at hand, once enters
your heart and stays there, you will never have another lonely moment
as long as you live. My life for the larger part of the last sixteen
years has been a lonely life. I have often been separated from all my
family for months at a time. I have not seen my wife sometimes for two
or three months at a time and for eighteen months I did not see any
member of my family but my wife. One night I was walking the deck of
a steamer in the South Seas between New Zealand and Tasmania. It was
a stormy night. Most of the other passengers were below sick, none of
the officers nor sailors could walk with me for they had their hands
full looking after the boat. I had to walk the deck alone. Four of the
five other members of my family were on the other side of the globe,
seventeen thousand miles away by the nearest route that I could get to
them, and the one member of my family who was nearer was not with me
that night. As I walked the deck alone I got to thinking of the four
children seventeen thousand miles away and was about to get lonesome,
when the thought came to me of the Holy Spirit by my side, and that
as I walked He took every step with me, and all loneliness was gone.
I gave expression to this thought some years ago in the city of St.
Paul, and at the close of the address a physician came to me and said,
"I wish to thank you for that thought. I am often called at night to go
out alone through darkness and storm far into the country, and I have
been very lonely, but I will never be lonely again, for I will know
that every step of the way the Holy Spirit is beside me in my doctor's
gig."
In this same precious truth there is a cure for a broken heart. Oh, how
many broken-hearted people there are in the world to-day, especially in
these days of war and bloodshed and death! Many of us here have lost
loved ones. Many more of us in all probability will during the months
that are just ahead of us. But we need not have a moment's heartache
if we only know the communion of the Holy Ghost. There is perhaps
here to-day some woman who a year ago, or a few months ago, or a few
weeks ago, or a few days ago, had by her side a man whom she dearly
loved, a man so strong and wise that she was freed from all sense
of responsibility and care; for all the burdens were upon him, and
how bright and happy life was in his companionship! But the dark day
came when that loved one was taken away, and how lonely and empty and
barren, and full of burden and care, life is to-day! Listen! There is
One who walks right by your side, wiser and stronger and more loving
than the wisest and strongest and most loving husband that ever lived,
ready to bear all the burdens and responsibilities of life, yes, ready
to do far more: to come in and dwell in your heart and fill every nook
and corner of your empty, aching heart, and thus banish all loneliness
and heartache forever. I said this one afternoon in Saint Andrews Hall
in Glasgow. At the close of the address, when I passed out into the
reception room, a lady who had hurried along to meet me, approached
me. She wore a widow's bonnet, her face bore the marks of deep sorrow,
but now there was a happy look in her face. She hurried to me and
said, "Doctor Torrey, this is the anniversary of my dear husband's
death" (her husband was one of the most highly esteemed Christian men
in Glasgow) "and I came to Saint Andrews Hall to-day saying to myself,
'Doctor Torrey will have something to say that will help me.' Oh," she
continued, "you have said just the right word! I will never be lonesome
again, never have a heartache again. I will let the Holy Spirit come
in and fill every aching corner of my heart." Eighteen months passed;
I was in Scotland again, taking a short vacation on the lochs of the
Clyde on the private yacht of a friend. One day we stopped off a point,
a little boat put off from the point and came alongside the steam
yacht. The first one who clambered up the side of the yacht and onto
the deck was this widow. Seeing me standing on the deck, she hurried
across and took my hand in both of hers and with a radiant smile on her
face she said, "Oh, Doctor Torrey, the thought you gave me in Saint
Andrews Hall that afternoon stays with me still and I have not had a
lonely or sad hour from that day to this."
But it is in our Christian work that the thought comes to us with
greatest power and helpfulness. Take my own experience. I became a
minister simply because I had to, or be forever lost. I do not mean
that I am saved by preaching the Gospel; I am saved simply on the
ground of Christ's atoning blood and that alone; but my becoming a
Christian and accepting Him as my Saviour turned upon my preaching the
Gospel. For six years I refused to come out as a Christian because I
was unwilling to preach, and I felt that if I became a Christian I must
preach. The night that I was converted I did not say, "I will accept
Christ" or "I will give up my sins"; I said, "I will preach." But if
there was ever a man who by natural temperament was unfitted to preach,
it was I. I was one of these abnormally bashful boys. A stranger could
scarcely speak to me without my blushing to the roots of my hair. Of
all the tortures I endured at school there was none so great as that of
reciting a piece. To stand up on the platform and have all the scholars
looking at me, I could scarcely endure it, and when I had to recite and
my own mother and father asked me to recite the piece before I went to
school, I simply could not recite it before my own father and mother.
Think of a man like that going into the ministry. Even after I was in
Yale College, when I would go home on a vacation and my mother would
have callers and send for me to come in and meet them, I couldn't say
a word. After they were gone my mother would say to me, "Archie, why
didn't you say something to Mrs. S. or Mrs. D.?" and I would say, "Why,
mother, I did!" and she would reply, "You didn't utter a sound." I
thought I did, but it would come no further than my throat and there be
smothered. I was so bashful that I never even spoke in a church prayer
meeting until after I entered the theological seminary. Then I thought,
if I was to be a preacher I must at least be able to speak in my own
church prayer meeting. I made up my mind I would. I learned a piece by
heart. I remember some of it now. I think I forgot some of it when I
got up to speak that night. As soon as the meeting was thrown open I
grasped the back of the settee in front of me and pulled myself up to
my feet and held on to it lest I should fall. One Niagara went rushing
up one side and another down the other, and I tremblingly repeated
as much of my little piece as I could remember and then dropped back
into the seat. At the close of the meeting a dear old maid, a lovely
Christian woman, came to me and cheeringly said, "Oh, Mr. Torrey, I
want to thank you for what you said to-night. It did me so much good.
You spoke with so much feeling." Feeling! The only feeling I had was
that I was scared nearly to death. Think of a man like that going into
the ministry. My first years in the ministry were torture. I preached
three times a day. I committed my sermons to memory and then I stood up
and twisted the top button of my coat until I had twisted the sermon
out and then when the third sermon was preached and finished, I dropped
back into the haircloth settee back of the pulpit with a great sense of
relief that that was over for another week. And then the thought would
take possession of me, Well you have to begin to-morrow morning to get
ready for next Sunday! But a glad day came when the thought I am trying
to teach you this morning took possession of me, viz., that when I
stood up to preach, that, though people saw me, that there was Another
who stood by my side whom they did not see, but upon whom was all the
responsibility for the meeting, and all that I had to do was to get as
far back out of sight as possible and let Him do the preaching. From
that day preaching has been the joy of my life. I would rather preach
than eat. Sometimes when I rise to preach, before I have uttered a
word, the thought of Him, standing beside me, able and willing to take
charge of the whole meeting and do whatever needs to be done, has so
filled my heart with exultant joy that I have felt like shouting. Just
so in your Sunday School teaching. Some of you worry about your Sunday
School classes for fear that you will say something that ought not to
be said, or leave unsaid something that ought to be said, and the
thought of the burden and responsibility almost crushes you. Listen!
Always remember this as you sit there teaching your class: there is One
right beside you Who knows just what ought to be said and just what
ought to be done. Instead of carrying the responsibility of the class,
let Him carry it, let Him do the teaching. One Monday morning I met
one of the most faithful laymen I ever knew and a very gifted Bible
teacher. He was deep in the blues, over his failure with his class the
day before—at least, what he regarded as failure. He unburdened his
heart to me. I said to him, "Mr. Dyer, did you not ask God to give you
wisdom as you went before that class?" He said, "I did." I said, "Did
you not expect Him to give it?" He said, "I did." Then I said, "What
right have you to doubt that He did?" He replied, "I never thought
of that before. I will never worry about my class again." Just so in
personal work. When I or some one else urges you at the close of the
meeting to go and speak to some one else, oh, how many of you want to
go, but you don't stir. You think to yourself, "I might say the wrong
thing." You will, if you say it. You will certainly say the wrong
thing; but trust the Holy Spirit, He will say the right thing. Let Him
have your lips to speak through. It may not appear the right thing at
the time, but some time you will find out that it was just the right
thing. One night in Launceston, Tasmania, as Mrs. Torrey and I came
away from the meeting, my wife said to me, "Archie, I wasted my whole
evening. I have been talking to the most frivolous girl. I don't think
that she has a serious thought in her head." I replied, "Clara, how do
you know? Did you not trust God to guide you?" "Yes." "Well, leave it
with Him." The very next night at the close of the meeting the same
seemingly utterly frivolous young woman came up to Mrs. Torrey, leading
her mother by the hand, and said, "Mrs. Torrey, won't you speak to my
mother? You led me to Christ last night, now please lead my mother to
Christ."
4. But I must close. There is another line of proof of the personality
of the Holy Spirit, but we have no time to dwell upon it. This line of
proof is that a treatment is predicated of the Holy Spirit that could
only be predicated of a person. In Isa. 63:10 we are taught that the
Holy Spirit is rebelled against and grieved. You cannot rebel against
or grieve a mere influence or power. Only a person can be rebelled
against and grieved. In Heb. 10:29 we are taught that the Holy Spirit
is "done despite unto," or "treated with contumely," insulted. You
cannot treat an influence or power with contumely; only a person. In
Acts 5:3 we are taught that the Holy Spirit is lied to. You can only
lie to a person. In Matt. 12:31 we are taught that the Holy Spirit is
blasphemed against. We are told that the blasphemy against the Holy
Ghost is more serious than the blasphemy against the Lord Jesus, and
this certainly could only be said of a person and a Divine Person.
To sum it all up, the Holy Spirit is a Person. Theoretically we
probably all believed this before, but do we in our real thought of
Him, in our practical attitude toward Him, treat Him as a person? Do we
really regard Him as real a person as Jesus Christ is, as loving, as
wise, as strong, as worthy of our confidence and love, and surrender
as He? A Divine Person always by our side? The Holy Spirit came
into this world to be to the disciples of our Lord after our Lord's
own departure, and to be to us, what Jesus Christ had been to them
during the days of His personal companionship with them. Is He that
to you to-day? Do you know the "communion of the Holy Spirit?" the
companionship of the Holy Spirit, the partnership of the Holy Spirit,
the fellowship of the Holy Spirit, the comradeship of the Holy Spirit?
To put it into a single word, the whole object of this address this
morning, I say it reverently, is to introduce you to my Friend, the
Holy Spirit.