CHRIST'S PRAYER ANSWERED.
GOD LISTENS.
When Christ opens His mouth, God bows down His ear. "I know that thou
hearest me always." The disciples did not wait long until they were
baptized with the Holy Ghost. Christ's prayer found audience and the
answer was not long delayed.
HEART CLEANSING.
The baptism with the Spirit which was administered to the one hundred
and twenty effected their sanctification. The cleansing of their hearts
was one of the effects of the out-pouring of the Spirit. Sanctification
and the baptism with the Spirit are therefore coetaneous--they take
place at the same time.
PETER'S PROOF.
This is proven by an inspired statement made by Peter. Referring to the
Gentiles he says that God "put no difference between them" and us Jews
who were sanctified at Pentecost, "purifying their hearts by faith."
THE MANNER OF CLEANSING.
There need be no confusion as to the manner of cleansing. Jesus prayed,
"Sanctify them THROUGH THY TRUTH." It is by means of the truth preached
of and read, that we first hear of a full deliverance from all sin. It
is "through the truth" that we learn of God's willingness as well as
His power to sanctify. If it had not been for THE BLOOD, Jesus could
never have guaranteed the coming of the Comforter; the blood is "the
procuring cause" of all the blessings which we receive. Everything
comes through the atonement. FAITH is the human condition necessary for
the cleansing of the soul; so that, in a very important sense, we are
sanctified by faith. THE DIVINE OMNIPOTENT HOLY GHOST is the immediate
agency of heart-cleansing. He is the baptizing element administered by
Christ the Divine Baptizer: "He shall baptize you with the Holy Ghost."
FIRE!
It would be well for us to notice some of the characteristics of the
Pentecostal anointing. John the Baptist, minister of the gospel and
preacher of genuine regeneration, said of Jesus that "he should baptize
with the Holy Ghost and fire," thus using a most powerful symbol to
characterize the nature of the work of the Holy Ghost. Everyone is
familiar with the action of fire; it burns everything combustible with
which it comes in contact.
CONSEALED SERPENTS.
We submit that no one can tell just how much there is in the heart that
needs to be consumed. There are things dormant in the unsanctified
heart of which the man never dreams. There are serpents coiled in
balls, and vipers spitting poison, and centipedes, and fat blinking
toads, and vampires, and lizards, and tarantulas, that we never suspect
of being in the soul. But they are there.
THE EMBRYOS OF CRIME.
It is God's mercy that says, "Be ye holy," for He knows that unless we
get cleaned out and purified the inner reptiles will poison us to
death. Every unsanctified man carries in his bosom the seeds of all
possible crimes, the embryos of all black actions. There are times when
we half believe that something of the kind is true. Did you ever stand
by the cage of a lion and watch his restless pace and feel that you had
something in you kindred to him? Many a man has gazed into the green
eyes of a wild beast and trembled, feeling a similarity of nature.
Every son of Adam feels the beast stir in him at times, until Pentecost
eradicates the bestial principle.
SMOULDERING EMBERS.
The embers from which hell-fire is kindled smoulder in the unsanctified
heart. It is dangerous to attempt to build a Christian character over a
latent volcano. A once active volcano becomes inactive. The lava cools,
the ashes settle, and the smoke drifts away. An enterprising farmer
covers a considerable space of the once fiery volcanic field with fresh
earth carted from a fertile valley. All goes well for a year or two.
The garden prospers, the vegetables are most encouraging, and the
produce is abundant. But one morning the farmer notices that smoke is
issuing from the crater at the summit of the mountain. The sky blackens
and red flames flash amid the clouds of smoke. The land is shaken with
earthquakes. Suddenly, right in the middle of his verdant field, a
great red-lipped chasm opens and blue flames leap upwards and surge
toward the sky. His crops are blasted with the "fierce heat of the
flame," and the work of years is wrecked in a moment.
BLUE FLAMES OF GEHENNA
No permanent Christian life can be built upon the foundation of an
unsanctified heart. For a time the graces of the Spirit may seem to
grow, but in some sad hour the surface will split open and the man will
leap back aghast at the blue flames of Gehenna, which singe his brows
and blacken his cheeks.
THE PROPHET AND PRINCE.
An old white-haired prophet and a gay young prince are in conversation.
The aged man bows his head upon his staff and weeps.
"For what are you weeping, old man?"
"Ah, I am thinking of the black and dastardly crimes you will commit
when you have once become king."
"Is thy servant a dog, a ruthless town whelp, that he should do such
things?"
PROPHECY FULFILLED
But years roll on and the young man is king, and his hands are stained
with crime, and the old man's predictions come true. God had given the
aged saint a view of the boy's breast, and he saw the embryonic seeds
of sin which, if allowed to remain, would sprout and produce a fruitage
of evil deeds.
THE BROKEN FLOWER
The secret of the downfall of many a brilliant character is a bosom
sinfulness little expected to be in existence. No man saw the black and
ugly thing but it was there. A lady had a tall and graceful plant. The
flowers were white and beautiful and all the town said, "What a fine
flower!" One day a storm swept across the garden. One plant was
injured; it was the one which people had admired and praised. Filled
with grief, the lady stooped to examine the stem, and found that it had
been pierced by a worm-hole. The insect had worked silently and
secretly. No one saw him cutting into the heart of the tall and
magnificent flower, but in a storm, under a test severe and protracted,
the stem snapped and the choice beauty of the garden was a thing of the
past.
THE WORM IN THE HEART.
It is the worm in the heart with his relentless and resistless tooth,
which weakens the character. Under severe and protracted temptation the
will snaps and yields, and the beautiful life is a wreck and fit only
for the dump of the Universe.
STUMPS AND ROOTS.
There are many roots, hidden roots, which bury themselves deep in the
soil of the heart. They extend far below clear cerebration, twisting
and twining themselves in "the fringe of consciousness." It takes the
fire of the Holy Ghost to follow them deep into the ground and destroy
them. It used to be a pastime of the boys in eastern Ohio to pile great
heaps of brush upon huge stumps in newly-cleared land. All the long
October day they would toil, raising a stack of dry limbs upon the
stump which needed to be removed. In the evening when twilight came and
the stars shone out, they would light the brush and watch the flames
greedily devour the pile. In the morning when the lads returned to the
scene of the fire, no sign of the stump was to be seen. Looking closely
they saw great holes as large at the top of the ground as a man's body,
and tapering to a small point as they went deep into the earth. The
fire had found the huge roots, and had tracked them into their retreats
and consumed them.
FIRE OF PENTECOST.
We pile the brush of time and talents and money and name and self upon
the altar, and the fire of Pentecost, which God sends as He sent to
Mount Carmel of old, will destroy not only the brush, but the roots of
sin, one and all.