PITTS
THEOLOGY
LIBRARY
EMORY UNIVERSITY
ATLANTA, GEORGIA 30322
THE HOLY SPIRIT
THE HOLY SPIRIT
BY
REV. WILLIAM LOCKE BRADDOCK
BOSTON
RICHARD G. BADGER
THE GORHAM PRESS
Copyright, 1923, by Richard G. Badger
All rights reserved
The Gorham Press, Boston, U.S.A.
INTRODUCTION
Though the subject of this volume is the Holy
Spirit, we have said much concerning the other
two Persons of the Godhead, the Father and the
Son. As the three are indissolubly associated this
was inevitable. It is impossible to consider one
of the Persons in any fulness without saying
something at least about the others. Human
language can not, indeed, express the conception
of the triune God in its complete fulness. It is
not only true that, did any persons know Him
as He knows Himself, they could not convey Him
in His perfection to their fellow-men through any
words known to them. But it is also true that
persons fail to find words in any human vocabu-
lary that will fully express their thoughts of Him
as these exist in their own minds. So great is
the imperfection of human language. This has
been true in all the ages of the Christian Church.
This was true in the fourth and fifth centuries
when the symbols of faith were formulated.
The language employed by Athanasius and the
other eminent scholars of those days in the dis-
cussion of the Trinity and in the embodiment of
the truths concerning the Trinity in the symbols
of faith was the Greek language, the language
that held the supremacy among the languages
of that time. But though they employed this
5
6
Introduction
very superior language in endeavoring to convey
to their fellow-men their thoughts of the triune
God, yet they were not perfectly successful.
Some of their thoughts remained in their own
minds and died with them, and were consequently
lost to the church and the world.
Those were great terms indeed, that were em-
ployed in speaking of God, Generation, Proces-
sion, Incarnation, Tri-personality; but they were
not perfect; they did not convey the truth in that
fulness the authors wished to convey it. What
was true in that period of the history of the
church is true now also in this advanced twen-
tieth century. Human language is yet a very
imperfect medium through which to express
thought. Such is the fact in every department
of knowledge. It is the fact in medicine. It is
the fact in law. It is the fact in politics. It is
the fact in the many sciences, not excluding the
science of theology. Indeed, it is specially true
of that science that has been truly called the
Queen of Sciences. The truths of theology,
being the greatest and deepest in the universe,
are the most difficult to communicate through
the medium of language. It is still true even in
this advanced age that there are no words, that
can adequately convey to men the deep things of
God concerning Himself. We have to use those
Introduction
7
theological terms to convey them that were
chosen in the fourth and fifth centuries.
It is probable, indeed that some day in the
future more expressive theological terms will be
invented to convey them. I say that this will
probably happen in the future history of the
church, as there is every reason to believe that
there will be a mighty advance in every depart-
ment of learning as the world moves forward to
its culmination. But until we discover better
theological terms to express the great realities
concerning God we are bound to continue em-
ploying those that have come down to us from
antiquity. We can not discard them. We can
not treat them as of little importance. It is no
doubt the will of God, that we attach great im-
portance to them. Inadequate as language is to
convey truths, especially deep and great truths,
it can not be dispensed with. It is through words
that the Holy Spirit reveals the truths concerning
Himself and the Father and the Son, even though
the words be far from perfection. Of course,
He is desirous that they should be perfect, and
He is ready to work with the saints on earth to
make them perfect. But until that is effected
He will make the best of the words and work
through them to increase the knowledge of the
saints touching the unity in Trinity and the
8
Introduction
Trinity in Unity. We should never forget that
we are in a progressive world. The world never
stands still. As it grows in years it grows in
knowledge; yea, in all kinds of knowledge. We
are only beginning to find out the deep things
of God. We are only beginning to learn about
the triune God. This is especially true of the
Third Person of the Trinity. Not a few books,
indeed, have been published concerning the
Spirit, especially in the past few years, but not
as many by far as the subject justifies. It re-
mains true notwithstanding the volumes that have
been given to the world on this subject that it has
not been treated as fully as some other subjects
contained in the Bible. More has been discovered
about the Father and the Son as revealed in the
Bible than about the Spirit. The Church is to be
praised for discovering so much about the Father
and the Son. The Church is to be blamed for
her delinquency in presenting to the world the
knowledge about the Spirit. Comparatively
speaking she has presented to the world little
about Him. The New Testament, we know, is
full of Him, Precious realities concerning Him
are thickly scattered through this blessed volume.
And it is required by God of the saints on earth
to search for them. We know that the great and
rich treasures of material nature can not be ob-
Introduction
9
tained unless men by hard toil seek for them.
So it is true of the great and rich realities con-
cerning the Spirit enclosed within the pages of
the New Testament. If the saints of God would
become possessors of these realities they must
see that the faculties of their minds in all their
activity be given to them, given to them not
occasionally but continuously. And they must
never forget that it is absolutely necessary, that
they should thus employ their mental faculties,
not independently of divine assistance, but in
cooperation with God.
In this volume I realize I have not begun to
present to the world the rich treasures of the
Spirit as they exist in the New Testament. In-
deed, I have performed my work so imperfectly
that I feel reluctant to give its outcome to the
pulblic. Still I shall make the venture, with the
prayer that the words I have written may be
blessed to the spiritual welfare of my readers.
I can not close without giving to my readers
an additional thought. I would impress upon
them the great importance of studying the Holy
Spirit for themselves. Do not be satisfied with
what others have said about Him, even though
they be such splendid interpreters of Scripture
as was Bishop Brooks. Do not be content to
read the contributions that others have made
IO
Introduction
concerning His nature and His work. Of course,
learn all you can concerning His nature and His
work from the pen of others, especially from
the pen of the geniuses of the Church who have
explored the Scriptures with great success. But
do not fail to go to the Fountain of knowledge
and draw therefrom for yourselves its living
waters. See that you go to the Bible, especially
the New Testament, and search it thoroughly,
bringing together the many passages of which He
is the subject, and think of them, meditate upon
them, and study them, with all diligence, and
also with earnest prayer for divine assistance,
with prayer to the Holy Spirit, as He is the best
interpreter of His own words; and you will
receive a rich benediction, you will be blessed
with rich conceptions of the Holy Spirit, some of
which you will not, indeed be able to communi-
cate to your fellowmen because you will not be in
possession of words that can express them; but,
though lost to others, they will abide with you
forever. And if you be true to yourselves and
continue to study Him in the pages of the New
Testament, these will continue to increase, giving
you an increase of unspeakable joy, joy of mind,
and joy of soul, and joy of spirit, even until you
exchange your citizenship of earth for citizenship
of heaven.
CONTENTS
Chapter Page
I. The Holy Spirit, a Divine Person 15
II. The Holy Spirit, the Executive of the
Godhead as Revealed in the Old
Testament 26
III. The Holy Spirit, the Executive of
the Godhead as Revealed in the
New Testament 49
IV. The Holy Spirit, the Vicar of Christ 66
V. The Holy Spirit in Cooperation with
the Father and the Son, the Per-
fecter of the Saints Throughout
Eternity 123
VI. Cooperation, a lesson learned from
the work of the Holy Spirit in
Cooperation with the Father and
the Son 130
VII. The Importance of Seeking for
Knowledge Concerning the Holy
Spirit 139
THE HOLY SPIRIT
CHAPTER I
THE HOLY SPIRIT, A DIVINE PERSON
The Holy Spirit in the estimation of some
persons has no personality. Some persons con-
sider the Holy Spirit as nothing more than a mere
influence. But those persons, who wrote and
spoke as they were moved by the Holy Spirit,
do not thus consider the Holy Spirit. According
to their teaching the Holy Spirit is a person.
They ascribe to Him all the attributes of a
person. They can not but ascribe to Him per-
sonal attributes. In His dealings with them they
had a wonderful experience. He worked upon
their minds, imparting to them the deep things of
God. He worked upon their hearts, giving them
unspeakable joys and consolations. They could
not but declare to the world that He is truly a
person; a person, too, wonderful in His opera-
tions, possessing knowledge and power more than
human. Their experience with Him was such
that they learned the great truth that He is a
divine person. The Holy Spirit according to the
declaration of the men who spoke and wrote
under the inspiration of God, is a divine person.
He is the Third Person of the adorable Trinity.
15
i6
The Holy Spirit
The God of the universe is the Triune God.
He is not the God of Mohammed. His is not the
God of Arius. He is not the God of Swedenborg.
But He is the God of Athanasius. He is the
tri-personal God. He is the God in whose God-
head are three divine Persons, of equal power
and honor and glory, the Father, the Son, and
the Holy Spirit; a doctrine, which, though above
reason, is not contrary to reason, but can be
approved and accepted and even unspeakably
enjoyed by reason, if reason be under the con-
stant influence and working of the Spirit of God.
A great deal has been revealed to us concerning
the triune God in the Bible. Not that the Bible
makes us acquainted with Him in the complete-
ness of His nature. There are depths in His
nature, no doubt, which have never been sounded
in the language of mortals on earth. There are
depths in His nature, which no human eye has
ever seen, which no human ear has ever heard,
which no human heart has ever conceived. Still
very much has been revealed to us in the word of
God touching His wonderful nature. God in His
love has revealed Himself to us in as great
fulness as He saw that we could comprehend
and use to our spiritual welfare.
We leam from the Bible, that the First Person
of the Godhead is the fountain of divine life.
The Holy Spirit
17
The revelation that comes to us from its sacred
pages, is that all divine life is derived from Him.
That the Father is the origin of Deity is ever
the declaration that greets us when heaven opens
its secrets to earth. So teach Athanasius and
most of the great expounders of Holy Writ in the
primitive Church. When Athanasius defended
the Deity of the Son of God at the first Ecumeni-
cal Council against the Arians he used language,
which implied that it was derived from the
Father. In the language of the Nicine Creed,
for which we are principally indebted to his in-
telligence and courage, we say, "I believe in one
Lord Jesus Christ the only-begotten Son of God;
Begotten of the Father before all worlds; God
of God, Light of iLght, very God of very God,
Begotten, not made. The Son of God does not
owe His existence to the creative hand of the
Father. He is not a creature as held by Arius
and the followers of Arius. He is divine. He
is God. But though God, He is God of God.
His Deity is derived from the Father, not by ere-
ation, but by generation. He is begotten of the
Father, He is begotten of the Father before all
worlds, that is from everlasting. There never
was a time when He was not begotten. His
generation is stamped with a wonderful unique-
ness. It is an eternal generation. The Deity of
i8
The Holy Spirit
the Third Person of the Trinity is derivitive as
well as the Deity of the Second Person. It is
derived not by generation. It is derived by pro-
cession. The first general Council was convened
to determine the question of the Deity of the Son.
Arius and the followers of Arius had denied His
Deity. They taught that He was a creature, the
highest of creatures, indeed, but only a creature.
The agitation of this question so convulsed the
church, that the church deemed it wise to give her
decision touching this question. So her repre-
sentatives were summoned to meet at Nicea, and
under the leadership and eloquence of Athanasius
the Deacon, condemned the teaching of the
Arians, declaring that the Son of God was of
one substance with the Father and therefore very
God of very God.
Soon after the decision of the Council of Nicea
was given to the world another important truth
of revelation was denied. The Macedonians, the
followers of Macedonius, Bishop of Constan-
tinople, announced their belief, that the Holy
Spirit was a created Being; superior, indeed, to
the very angels of heaven, but still only a created
Being. This heresy was the cause of the con-
vening of the second general council, called the
council of Constantinople, so called because its
sessions were held in the city bearing that name.
The Holy Spirit
19
At the council of Nicea, all that was determined
concerning the Holy Spirit is given in these
words, "and we believe in the Holy Spirit. At
the council of Constantinople are added the fol-
lowing, "The Lord and Giver of Life who pro-
ceedeth from the Father, who with the Father
and the Son together is worshipped and glorified,
who spake by the prophets. As the church at
the council of Nicea declared it was the teaching
of the Bible, that the Son of God was not a
creature but God, so she declared at the council
of Constantinople that the Bible taught that the
Holy Spirit was not a creature but God. He is
called in he symbol of faith that was formulated
by this council, "The Lord, that is God; for the
Lord in that symbol means God in the most abso-
lute sense. He is the author of all created life.
He is pronounced the Life-Giver. All physical
life proceeds from Him. So does all intellectual
life. So does all moral life. So does all spiritual
life. To Him man is indebted for the life he
enjoys in all its various forms. But as the
Second Person of the Godhead derives His Deity
from the First Person, such is also true of the
Third Person. If the Second Person derives His
Deity from the First Person by generation, the
Third Person derives from the First Person His
Deity by procession. And as the generation of
20
The Holy Spirit
the Second Person is an eternal generation, so
the procession of the Third Person is an eternal
procession. If there never was a time when the
One was not begotten, so there never was a time
when the Other did not proceed. Such is the
nature of the triune God. To us it is a great
mystery. It is above our reason, albeit it is not
contrary to our reason. Though the Second and
Third Persons derive their Deity from the First
Person, they are not inferior to the First Person,
but are on equality with Him, receiving equal
worship and glory with Him from angels and
archangels, from Cherubim and Seraphim, and
from all the hosts of heaven and from all the
intelligences of the universe. These are ever
ascribing glory to the triune God in the words,
"Holy, Holy, Holy, Lord God Almighty, which
was and is and is to come.
But the doctrine of the Holy Spirit in the
Church of God did not end with the determina-
tion of the sencond general council. There were
saints in the church of God, who saw that this
council did not in its decision exhaust the truths
concerning the Holy Spirit revealed in the Word
of God. They saw more clearly than the saints
who preceded them—for from the first there were
some saints, who, though they saw dimly, yet
saw a certain great truth concerning the Holy
The Holy Spirit
21
Spirit, of which the second general council did
not take cognizance—they saw more clearly,
indeed, than did their predecessors that great
truth that the Holy Spirit proceeds from the
Son as well as from the Father. It may be said
that the history of the "Filioque is one almost
of mystery. It grew, but its growth for a long
time was so slow that it was imperceptible. Two
centuries elapsed from the meeting of the second
general council before it was adopted in any part
of Christendom. It became a part of the Con-
stantinopolitan or Nicene creed as used in Spain
two hundred years following this council. It was
at least two hundred years more before it was
introduced into the Roman Church. Strange to
say, that, though the Popes vehemently resisted
its introduction into the Roman Church, they
were enthusiastic in endeavoring to impose it
upon the Eastern Church, which resulted in the
great schism in the church Catholic, the Eastern
portion ceasing to hold communion with the
western portion. Whether the addition of the
"Filioque to the Nicene Creed was the principal
cause of the catastrophic division in Christendom
is a mooted question. Some ecclesiastical writers
hold that it was, while others are firm in denying
it. There are those who contend that this addi-
tion to the creed was only a pretext to the
22
The Holy Spirit
division but that the real cause was political and
not theological. The lordly spirit of the world
had taken possession of the Papacy, and the
Papacy endeavored to assert over the Eastern
portion of the Church a supremacy, which it
would not tolerate. Such, I am inclined to be-
lieve, was the chief cause of the unfortunate
schism in the Body of Christ. Had that spirit of
supremacy been kept under control, had the
different parts of the church been bound to-
gether by Christian love, it is probable that the
addition of the "Filioque to the creed would
have been amicably settled. It is reasonable to
believe that it would have been amicably settled.
The difference between the Western and Eastern
Churches in the doctrine of the "Filioque was
a verbal and not a real difference. The theolo-
gians of the Eastern Church as well as the
theologians of the Western could not but see,
that the procession of the Holy Spirit from the
Son was a truth revealed in Holy Scripture. It
is true that the very word, "Procession, does
not occur in giving the relation of the Third
Person to the Second as it does in describing
His relation to the First Person. But that does
not mean that such a relation does not exist.
Why should it be required of us to show that
some passage is contained in Scripture, in which
The Holy Spirit
23
the same word is used in reference to the Son
as is used in reference to the Father? Such
interpretation is not reasonable. It is not broad.
It is not Catholic. The true Catholic way of
interpreting Scripture is by comparing Scripture
with Scripture, bringing together the different
passages of Scripture bearing on the truth in
question and making the proper deduction. So
interpreted the doctrine of the "Filioque is no
doubt taught in Scripture. And it is held not
only by the Divines of the Western Church.
There are Divines of the Eastern Church also,
who believe it. And I do not believe that the
addition of the clause, the "Filioque", to the
Nicene symbol of faith would have produced the
great Schism in the Body of Christ, if love had
reigned supreme and not the spirit of supremacy
Which animated the princes of this world. In
other words, I believe that it was this spirit of
supremacy in the Papacy, and not the addition
of this clause to the creed, which caused this
schism. The procession of the Holy Spirit from
the Son is one of the fundamental truths of
Scripture, so fundamental that were it omitted
from our symbol of faith our conception of the
nature of the triune God would fall below its
great reality. Of course, there is a certain sense,
in which the procession of the Spirit from the
24
The Holy Spirit
Son is to be held. He did not proceed from the Son
in the same sense He proceeded from the Father.
He proceeded from the Father in the primary
sense, and from the Son in the secondary sense.
In other words, He proceeded from the Father
through the Son. Many great divines have left
behind them their view of the procession of the
Holy Spirit from the Son. Perhaps, the view of
none is worded in more lucid language than the
view of Bishop Pearson. Says he, "Though it
is not expressly spoken in the Scripture that the
Holy Spirit proceeded from the Son, yet the
substance of the same truth is virtually contained
there; because those very expressions which are
spoken of the Holy Spirit in relation to the
Father, for that reason because He proceedeth
from the Father, are also spoken of the same
Spirit in relation to the Son; and therefore there
must be the same reason presupposed in reference
to the Son which is expressed in reference to the
Father. The "Filioque has been a part of the
Nicene Creed for eight centuries as used by the
Western Churches. The Western Churches,
which constitute the majority of Christendom
have acknowledged it in public worship for eight
hundred years. And so important do they con-
sider it, that nothing in my estimation would
make them abandon it. When in the providence
The Holy Spirit 25
of God the reunion of the churches is brought
about. I do not believe there will be any change
in the Nicene Creed as now used by the western
branches of the church Catholic. The Western
Churches, no doubt, see the divine hand in the
Nicene Creed in its present form. They feel
sure that it did not thus come down to us through
the ages fortuitously, but that it was the work
of the Holy Spirit. Desirous as they are for
ecclesiastical unity, praying and working as they
do for its accomplishment, they would not see
its realization at the sacrifice of any important
truth. The Holy Spirit is the Spirit of Truth.
He is always on the side of truth. He is ever
working for the triumph of truth. As He caused
the "Filioque clause to become a part of the
great symbol of faith of the church of God
notwithstanding so much opposition to it, so He
will so work upon the minds of the saints of all
ages that they will not allow it to be removed
therefrom, but will see that it always occupy a
prominent position in the Liturgy of the Church.
Truth is mighty and will prevail because the
Holy Spirit is on the side of truth.
CHAPTER II
THE HOLY SPIRIT, THE EXECUTIVE OF THE
GODHEAD, AS REVEALED IN THE OLD TESTAMENT
The Holy Spirit is then the Third Person of the
adorable Trinity, proceeding from the Father
and the Son. He is the Lord. He is God, having
all power. He is the Maker of all things. He
in cooperation with the Father and the Son
created the universe. Whether He performed
any special offices in relation to the many worlds
of the universe excepting one we do not know.
Revelation is silent respecting this question. It
is true that we can not believe that His special
operations so blessed, so rich, are confined to
one world amid myriads of worlds and that world
so insignificant in size in comparison with so
many. To believe this I think is unreasonable.
But we are not sure that this belief of ours is
true. We can not prove it. It has not been re-
vealed to us from heaven through men inspired
of God. But it has been revealed to us that the
Holy Spirit has blessed this world, in which we
have been placed to work out our destiny, with
His special operations. We learn from the Bible
a great deal about the Holy Spirit in relation
to this world. No one can read of His operations
in connection with the history of the earth as
given us in the word of God, in the Old Testa-
26
The Holy Spirit
27
ment as well as in the New, without coming to
the conclusion that He is, as He has been well
called, "The Executive of the Godhead. We
are indebted to Him as the Executive of the
Godhead for this world of ours as it has existed
for thousands of years in its great beauty and
glory. We know that it did not always thus
exist. Far back in the distant past it was in
a chaotic state. In the beginning the Sacred
Historian tells us the earth was without form
and void, and darkness was upon the face of the
deep. But it was not the pupose of God that it
should always remain in this state. It was His
will that it should be beautified and made fit to be
the abode of beings created in His own image.
So the Holy Spirit descended and wrought in it
a magnificent change. He "moved upon the face
of the waters is the brief but significant descrip-
tion of the author of the Book of Genesis.
Milton in his great epic, the Holy Spirit working
on his splendid imagination, grasped the signifi-
cance of these words when in invoking the Spirit
that expression came from his pen, "Thou from
the first wast present and with mighty wings
outspread Dove-like sat'st brooding on the vast
abyss and mad'st it pregnant. At His descent
the dark and dead earth became a new earth. It
became a world of light. It became a world of
28
The Holy Spirit
life. He made it pregnant. It was He, who
made the grass to grow upon the mountains. It
was He who caused the trees to spring up and
to bloom and to bear fruit thirty fold, sixty
fold, a hundred fold. It was He, who filled the
rivers and the seas with creatures that sported
amidst the waters. It was He, who created the
birds of the air, that are ever calling to each
other in sweetest melody to praise God for His
goodness. Does any one say, that this world
was brought to the state in which we now have
it and as it has existed for many thousand years
by the law of evolution? Does any one say that
it was not brought to its present state instan-
taneously? Does any one say that it was not
brought to its present state even in six days of
twenty-four hours, as it was held for a long time
in the Christian Church? Does any one say that
it was a slow growth, a growth of millions of
years? Very true. This teaching is not
antagonistic to the teaching of the word of
God. Those who taught that the world was
created in six days of twenty-four hours in dura-
tion did not give the right interpretation to the
word of God. Properly interpreted there is no
conflict between the word of God and science.
The sacred Historian does not tell us that God
created this world as we now see it in six days
The Holy Spirit 29
of twenty-four hours duration. He only says
that God created it in six days. Now, the word
day is used in Scripture in different senses.
Scripture even speaks of the day of the Lord,
that is, the last day, called the day of judgment,
the length of which no mortal knows. Science
informs us that the days of creation were periods
of immense length, which is not contradicted by
the teaching of the Bible. It is true that this
world was not brought to its present state in-
stantaneously, nor even in a short space of time,
but through a very long evolutionary process.
Those who teach that the world we inhabit came
to us through the law of evolution teach the
truth, but not the whole truth. Laws of no kind
have any life in themselves. Of themselves they
have no power. Of themselves they can not
create anything. To create anything there must
be the power of some personal being behind them.
They must be the instrument of some intelligent
being. So was it with the law of evolution in
connection with the history of this planet. It
had no power in itself to bring about the beautiful
and glorious change in our planet. It was be-
cause it was the instrument of a person of great
power, that the blessed change occurred. It was
because behind it was the power of the Holy
Spirit, the Executive of the Godhead. It becomes
3°
The Holy Spirit
us, for whom the great change in this world was
brought about, to bless and adore not the instru-
ment used in bringing it about, but the great
power that made use of the instrument.
This leads me to say, that the Holy Spirit in
beautifying and enriching this planet of ours had
a great purpose in view. That purpose was, that
it should be the habitation of beings created in
the divine image. So when it was brought out of
chaos to a world of order and beauty, as we
now have it, these beings made their appearance.
A magnificent climax of a magnificent work!
Not that the world was not more magnificent
after their appearance than it was prioj- to their
appearance, for its magnificence was surely
greater after they took possession and extended
their rule over it. It was not so much bringing
light out of darkness and order out of confusion
that made it the glorious world that it is. It was
not so much the beauties and charms of nature.
Is was not so much the many wonderful and
attractive forms of life. It was something far
superior. It was the populating this world with
human beings, beings who surpassed all the other
creatures of the world not only in physical and
mental splendor, but in something which none of
them possessed, something far more important
and excellent than anything physical and mental,
The Holy Spirit
3i
no matter how great. It was the populating the
world with human beings, beings who were moral
and spiritual in their nature, beings who were like
God, who could converse with God, who could
consciously worship and adore God, and who
could as time winged its flight become more and
more like God. This world is the great and
glorious world that it is, because human beings
made in the image of God inhabit it and rule it.
It would, indeed, have been a more glorious
world than it is, if these beings had always been
true to the law of their nature, If these beings
had not fallen, if they had never been disobedient
to the voice of God, if they had never forsaken
truth and righteousness, if they had never known
anything of the sins of the flesh and the sins of
the spirit, if the sins of pride and arrogance and
impurity and hatred and violence and injustice
had never been written against them in God's
book of remembrance they would have made this
planet a much more charming and glorious world
than we see it today. But fallen though they are
human beings are great. Disobedient though
they are, they have not lost entirely the divine
image in which they were created. They are still
in some degree like God. In the darkest hour of
their history they have prayed to Him and com-
muned with Him and aspired to be more and
32
The Holy Spirit
more like Him. In the darkest hour of their
history the Holy Spirit did not forsake them.
Though grieved by their sins. He would not
abandon them but continued to dwell with them.
As they increased and multiplied and took
possession of the earth He accompanied them and
worked upon them. We do not say that they
universally yielded to His influence, and strove
with His assistance to work out their salvation.
Though it may be true of all of them that the
potentialities of their nature were such that with
His assistance they could have risen higher and
higher in righteousness and holiness, many of
them, probably the majority of them resisted His
influence. But many of them also, no doubt,
perhaps a goodly minority cooperated with Him
and became more and more like God in His
moral attributes. We could, if we would, cite
the names of not a few, whose light so shone
before their fellow-men that these saw their good
works, and were incited by these works to live
good and holy lives. But we can not but believe
that there have been great multitudes, who, like
the unknown soldier who rests in the cemetery
at Arlington, have not been made known by name
to posterity, but whose deeds in their respective
generations were fragrant with the love of God
and man.
The Holy Spirit
33
There are persons so pessimistic as to the
capability of human nature to rise to good and
noble deeds, that in reading the history of the
human race they fail to see any such deeds.
In reading the history of the human race they
are capable of seeing only the wicked and ignoble
deeds of the human race. Their pessimism pre-
vents them from being good interpreters of
history. Their language to their fellows is,
"Read history. Study the history of Babylon,
of Assyria, of Egypt, of Persia, of Greece, of
Rome. What message does it bring us as to the
moral condition of these peoples? Does it not
bring a sad and heart-rending message? Does
it not tell us that these nations were under the
control of the powers of darkness? Does it not
tell us that their works were continually evil?
The interpretation that these persons put upon
the history of these nations, is superficial. They
see only in part. It is true that many of the
individuals, who composed these nations were
corrupt, but not all. If many were dishonest,
many were also honest. If hatred reigned in
the breasts of many, the hearts of many were
under the power of love. It is no doubt true,
that the Holy Spirit worked upon them as well as
the evil spirit. It is no doubt true, that the Holy
Spirit succeeded in His good influences. If the
34
The Holy Spirit
spirit of evil led captive many, many became also
true servants of the Holy Spirit. As the execu-
tive of the Godhead the Holy Spirit was with
all the nations of antiquity, whether they were
monarchies or republics, whether they were of
high or of low civilization, whether they were
rich or poor, whether they were strong or weak
in numbers. We do not say that anything had
been written about the Holy Spirit by any indi-
viduals that belonged to these nations. We do
not say, that any one among them had taught
anything about the nature and works of the Holy
Spirit. It is no doubt true that none, not even
the most intellectual, knew anything of His na-
ture and His works. It is, no doubt, true that the
people of these nations had never so much as
heard that there was any Holy Spirit. It is no
doubt true, that when the minds and consciences
and hearts of any of the people of these nations
were worked upon, by some invisible power for
their betterment, they were not conscious what
that power was. And when any of them co-
operated with 'the invisible power they did not
know that it was the Holy Spirit with whom
they were co-operating. They were, indeed, co-
workers with Him but unconscious co-workers.
The Holy Spirit was the power, that created in
them good thoughts and enlightened their con-
The Holy Spirit
35
sciences and warmed and purified their affections,
but they were not conscious that that power was
He. It was, no doubt, true that the Holy Spirit
worked among these nations as the executive of
the Godhead, but none were conscious of the fact.
Probably if we knew more, we could fully ex-
plain it, perhaps we could not fully explain it
unless we knew as much as God knows.
But there was one nation of antiquity, among
whom the Holy Spirit worked with more success
than among the others. It was the Hebrew
nation. God blessed that nation as He did no
other nation. It was called the chosen nation.
Is God then, it may be asked, a respecter of
persons? In the strict sense of the word He is
not a respecter of persons, whether considered
in a corporate capacity or from an individual
standpoint. He loves all persons. He would
bless all persons. He would, if He could bless
all persons in an equal degree. But this He can
not do without acting arbitrarily. He made
human beings free agents, and as free agents He
must deal with them if He be the God of justice
and law. As the Hebrew nation became the
chosen nation there was a reason. The reason
was not that God was an arbitrary God punishing
and blessing nations according to whimsical
notions. He blessed the Hebrew nation, indeed,
36
The Holy Spirit
as He did no other nation. He revealed great
and sublime truths to the Hebrew nation as He
did to no other nation, and gave them the great
vision of the great event of the future, the Incar-
nation of the Son of God, through whom that
nation and all the nations of the world down to
the great consummation would be richly blessed.
But why did that nation thus become the chosen
nation. "This is a deep subject, and can not be
fully explained by us. But it is, no doubt, true,
that it was partly because there existed in that
nation human beings who were more like Him
than any in the other nations, and therefore better
fitted as instruments through which He could
work. Such were Abraham, the Founder of the
Hebrew nation, and Moses, the great temporal
deliverer thereof. But be the explanation what
it may it is a fact that the Hebrew nation was the
chosen nation. It is a fact that among all the
nations of antiquity, that nation was the most
richly blessed. That is, it was blessed spiritually
as was no other nation. It is a fact, which no
one can deny, that the Holy Spirit worked among
the Hebrews with a success He worked among
no other peoples of antiquity. The Hebrews
were often conscious of His working. They
knew Him even by name. In their history as
given to us in the Old Testament He is called
The Holy Spirit
37
sometimes the Spirit, sometimes the Spirit of
God, sometimes the Holy Spirit of God. If
we would carefully read these Scriptures, if we
would read them with the special purpose of
ascertaining what is taught concerning the Holy
Spirit, if with the aid of a concordance we would
bring together all the passages that relate to Him,
we would be surprised to find how much is re-
vealed to us about Him. We would learn that
He worked upon the Hebrews physically and
mentally as well as morally and spiritually. He
worked with them in all their temporal affairs.
Was their occupation that of the hands? Did
they work in iron and brass ? Did they till the
soil of the earth? Did they construct highways
and erect buildings? Were they the hewers of
wood and drawers of water? The Holy Spirit
was with them to assist them and to encourage
them. Did they work principally with their in-
tellects? Were they the leaders of armies ? Did
they occupy the position of statesmen? Were
they the architects and artists of the nation?
Were they the poets and the historians? The
Holy Spirit inspired them and guided them and
blessed their efforts and led them to victory.
But His work among them was chiefly of a
moral and spiritual character. If their minds
and bodies were under His guidance and direc-
38
The Holy Spirit
tion, so much more so were their consciences and
souls. Many are the examples among them of
His ethical operations. Among the most notable
example is the example of David. David was a
great genius. Nature had lavished on him many
excellent gifts among which was the attribute of
imagination, that attribute which is the greatest
of all the attributes of the human mind. He
possessed this attribute in a large measure, for
he was a poet of superior order, and no one, we
know, can be a superior poet without a splendid
imagination. Early in life this great genius came
under the guidance and operation of the Holy
Spirit. The Holy Spirit so moved upon his heart
and conscience that he had lofty thoughts, he
had high ideals, he aspired to do noble deeds, and
did indeed do noble deeds. He became a man
after God's own heart, and the people loved him
and adored him. But in an evil hour he fell
from grace, he became a great transgressor, he
committed two notorious sins, he violated two of
the ten moral commandments, "Thou shalt not
kill, and "Thou shalt not commit adultery.
How had the mighty fallen! How low had he
fallen, the exalted King of Israel for whom
nature had done so much, for whom providence
had done so much, for whom the Holy Spirit had
done so much! But no sooner had the angelic
The Holy Spirit
39
pen recorded to his condemnation the violation
of the sixth and seventh commandments of the
Decalogue than the Spirit of God sent a winged
arrow to his conscience through the reproof of
Nathan the prophet, which opened his eyes to
his condition and brought him to his better self.
He repented with tears of deep contrition. He
was converted by the power of the Holy Spirit.
The Holy Spirit, though grieved by his sins,
would not abandon him, but continued to dwell
with him and to strive with him. That the
conversion of David was genuine we can not but
believe if we read with thought that fine metrical
production of his, the fifty-first Psalm—for
though he was not the author of the whole Book
of Psalms in the Hebrew Bible, yet this particular
psalm, as well as many others, came from his pen.
We learn from this psalm that he was a true
penitent, mourning over his fall and turning to
God and determining to walk in the commands
of God to the end of his life. Who can doubt
that his repentance was unto salvation and good
works, who in perusing this psalm hears the
author uttering such words as these, "Have
mercy upon me, O God, after Thy great good-
ness, according unto the multitude of Thy mer-
cies do away mine offences. Wash me thor-
oughly from my wickedness, and cleanse me
40 The Holy Spirit
from my sin. For I acknowledge my faults and
my sin is ever before me. Against Thee only
have I sinned, and done this evil in Thy sight,
that Thou mightest be justified in Thy saying,
and clear when Thou art judged . . . Thou shalt
purge me with hyssop and I shall be clean, Thou
shalt wash me and I shall be whiter than snow.
Thou shalt make me to hear of joy and gladness,
that the bones which Thou hast broken may
rejoice. Turn Thy face from my sins, and put
out all my misdeeds. Make me a clean heart,
O God, and renew a right spirit within me. Cast
me not away from Thy presence, and take not
Thy Holy Spirit from me. O give me the com-
fort of Thy help again, and stablish me with Thy
free spirit. We learn from these words of his
as well as from the words of others that he was
converted by the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit
again co-operated with him to do the works of
God. The Holy Spirit again gave to him the
peace of God that passeth all understanding.
That he was thus blessed by the Holy Spirit to
the end of his earthly existence we have no
reason to doubt, if his history as given us in
the Hebrew Scriptures be fairly interpreted.
There are persons, who do not hold that the
Hebrew nation was the greatest nation of
antiquity. According to their conception of
The Holy Spirit
4i
greatness Greece was a greater nation, Rome was
a greater nation, Egypt was a greater nation.
If their conception of greatness be the true one;
if, as they believe, human knowledge and human
wisdom and human strength constitute real great-
ness, then these nations were greater than the
Hebrew nation. But if greatness in the best
sense of the word is a product of divine know-
ledge and divine wisdom and divine strength—
and I do not think that one of ten educated men
in this twentieth century will doubt it—then the
Hebrew nation eclipsed in greatness all the na-
tions in the ancient world. The Hebrew nation
in its relation to God was unique among all the
nations of the ancient world. It was the chosen
nation. It was the God-fearing nation. God
made Himself known to the Hebrew nation. He
revealed to the people of this nation His will and
purposes and truths. He instituted among them
an order of prophets, an institution which he
vouchsafed to no other nation dwelling on this
planet. From time to time He called from among
them certain individuals and revealed to them
some of His purposes and truths with the com-
mand to proclaim them to their fellowmen. The
Hebrew prophets were inspired messengers of
God. They were inspired in the strict sense of
that word. There is a sense in which all true
42 The Holy Spirit
Christians are inspired, as we learn from the
collect at the beginning of the communion ser-
vice of the Episcopal Church. There is a sense
in which every poetic genius is inspired, in which
Milton and Shakespeare and Dante were inspired.
But the inspiration of the Hebrew prophet was
of a higher kind than the inspiration of poets or
even the inspiration of people who are good and
Godly. It was a unique inspiration. It was an
inspiration that none of the Hebrews, who were
not called to be prophets knew anything of by
experience, no matter how near to God they were
in good thoughts and good works. When the
revelations of God came to them the Holy Spirit
enabled them to deliver by mouth and pen these
without loss of any of the truths therein con-
tained. He so worked upon them, that they
delivered these as perfectly as human language
was capable of delivering them. The Holy Spirit
used them as choice instruments to make them
known to the Hebrew people. He spoke, as it
were, through them. Such has always been the
teaching of the Christian Church, and early in
her history she announced it to the world. In
the year of our Lord 381 through her repre-
sentatives in a general council she made this
announcement. In the council of Constantinople
she added to the Creed as it came from the
The Holy Spirit
43
council of Nicea these words concerning the
person and work of the Holy Spirit, "The Lord
and Giver of Life, who proceedeth from the
Father, who with the Father and the Son together
is worshipped and glorified who spoke by the
prophets. The prophets were themselves
conscious that the Holy Spirit spoke by them,
whenever they communicated any messages or
truths, that had been communicated to them they
generally prefaced their communications with
these words, "Thus saith the Lord. Not that
the prophets were mere machines or amanuenses
in communicating their revelations. The facul-
ties of their minds were not passive when the
Holy Spirit used them as instruments to convey
the divine revelations to the Hebrews and
through the Hebrews to all the people of the
world. On the contrary, they were more active
than they usually were. In the delivery of these
communications there was a co-operation of the
human and the divine. God worked with man
and man worked with God. It has been well
said, "The Holy Spirit possessed and used the
faculties in such a way that without supersession
or mechanical compulsion, but working through
them, the revelation of God was to come to,
through, and for man. The inspiring operations
of the Holy Spirit joined with mental activity
44
The Holy Spirit
of the workers, working through it, determining
it and leading it. During the whole history of
the Hebrew nation there were many prophets,
some of whom were instrumental in delivering
deep and important revelations, which would
affect not only the Hebrew race, but all the races
of the world down to the end of time. The
prophet Isaiah, perhaps, was the most honored
of all these instruments, and will be read and
studied with such interest and joy in all the ages,
with which none others will be read and studied.
Isaiah has well been called the evangelical
prophet. Even in his generation about 800 years
before the Christian era he, it may be truly said,
preached the gospel of good news, anticipating
St. Peter and the rest of the Apostles. He pro-
claimed the Incarnation of the Son of God. The
Holy Spirit, working on and through his imagina-
tion, gave him that blessed vision of that multi-
tude of angels, who came from heaven nineteen
hundred years ago with the charming song,
"Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace,
good will toward men. We are irresistably
drawn to this conclusion when we read those
charming utterances of his, "Unto us a child is
born, unto us a son is given, and the government
shall be upon his shoulders and his name shall be
called, Wonderful, Cousellor, Mighty God, Ever-
The Holy Spirit
45
lasting Father, Prince of Peace. Of the increase
of his government and of peace there shall be
no end, upon the throne of David, and upon his
kingdom to establish it and to uphold it with
judgment and with righteousness from hence-
forth even forever and ever.
We said that during most of the hitsory of the
Hebrews the Holy Spirit spoke to them by the
prophets. He did not speak to them by the
prophets during their entire history. Wonderful
to say that several hundred years before the close
of the Old Testament dispensation the voice of
prophecy was silent. A satisfactory explanation
cannot be given as to this silence. All that we
are sure of is, that God can not be blamed for it.
The blame we think rests upon the Hebrew
people. They did not wish to hear the voice of
the prophet. The prophet had become an un-
welcome messenger to them, and they would not
tolerate his appearance any longer. So God,
though desirous of raising up prophets for them,
ceased to do so, as He will not force His blessings
upon His creatures who stand in relation with
Him as free agents. The disappearance of the
prophet from among them was followed by a
decline in morality and spirituality. They were,
indeed, in a certain sense very religious. They
were no longer exiles in Babylon. They had been
46
The Holy Spirit
restored to their native land, and had rebuilt their
temple, and with rich and gorgious ceremonies
worshipped the God of their fathers. But with
all their rich forms, the power of Godliness was
on the wane. They had degenerated and were
continually degenerating in that which consti-
tuted the substance of religion. They had be-
come mechanical worshippers of God, and were
becoming more and more so. Their degeneration,
no doubt, can be explained by the cessation of the
Holy Spirit speaking to them by the prophets.
It seems to be a law as unalterable as the law of
the Medes and the Persians, that when the voice
of the prophet is silent moral and spiritual decay
begins to set in. So it has been for the last nine-
teen hundred years in the history of the Christian
Church. When in any part of Christendom the
people would not hear the preachers of the word,
who are in a true sense the prophets of God, but
were content in worshipping God with a gorgeous
ritual their worship has become mechanical, they
have ceased to worship God in spirit and in truth.
It was, no doubt, we say, because the Holy Spirit
had ceased to speak to the Hebrew people by
the prophets, that they lost the power of godliness
and were not prepared to receive the Messiah,
whose advent into the world had been foretold
by Isaiah and by others of the prophets. Not
The Holy Spirit 47
that God had abandoned His people altogether.
Not that the Holy Spirit did not work with them
in any way whatsoever. We know from the
history of the Hebrews, as we learn it from the
books of the Apocrypha, that the Holy Spirit
was still at work among them, though not through
the utterances of His prophets. We learn from
these important productions, that were written
two or three hundred years anterior to the Chris-
tian era, that some of the Hebrews were under
the operation of the Holy Spirit and led good
and holy lives. We say important productions;
for though they were not given by the Holy
Spirit speaking by the prophets and were there-
fore not on equality with the thirty-nine books
of the Hebrew Scriptures, yet they contain much
useful knowledge and can be read with much
profit by Christians of all ages. But though some
of the Hebrew people lived near to God through
the working of the Holy Spirit in those degener-
ate days and years, yet, as a nation they were far
from God, knowing experimentally nothing of
real communion with God, and, no doubt, for the
reason that there was no speaking of the Holy
Spirit by the prophets. But will God allow His
great purpose of saving the world through the
Hebrew people to be frustrated by their moral
and spiritual degeneration? That is not con-
48
The Holy Spirit
ceivable. Did the Holy Spirit speaking by the
prophets foretell that a great personage, the very
Son of God, would come into the world as its
Saviour and Redeemer? His word can not come
to naught, it will be accomplished. It will not,
indeed, be accomplished by the use of arbitrary
power, but through law, through some law in the
spiritual world. It will be accomplished through
the working of the Holy Spirit on human beings
without destroying free-agency. It were im-
possible, no doubt, to accomplish this great pur-
pose without a mighty activity of the Holy Spirit.
But a mighty activity of the Holy Spirit would
occur, it would occur that He would prepare
certain individuals by working on their souls and
consciences and spirits, and thus making them
good and receptive instruments through whom
He could work, and then working through them
with mighty energy. So it happened as the Old
Testament dispensation was coming to a close.
CHAPTER III
THE HOLY SPIRIT, THE EXECUTIVE OF THE
GODHEAD, AS REVEALED IN THE NEW TESTAMENT
It is a historic fact that as the Old Testament
dispensation was coming to a close there was a
mighty rustling of the wings of the Holy Spirit
in the moral atmosphere of Palestine. He
worked with a power He had not worked even
in the most glorious days of Hebrew history.
He visited certain of the Hebrews then living
with an energy and fulness that had never been
given to any of their predecessors. Such were
Zachariah and his wife Elizabeth and Mary the
blessed virgin of Nazareth. When the announce-
ment by the angel Gabriel to Zachariah, that he
would be the father of a son, who would be the
great prophet to herald the coming of a greater
personage than he, when this announcement was
verified, and this son was born, and the name of
John was given to him at his circumcision, we
are told that Zachariah was filled with the Holy
Spirit, and prophesied in the language of the
Benedictus that exquisite song, which was
adopted by the Church as one of the anthems in
her public worship. But great as was the opera-
tion of the Holy Spirit upon the mind and soul
49
5°
The Holy Spirit
of Zachariah His operation upon the mind and
soul of the blessed virgin of Nazareth was even
greater. It was not untilthe announcement of
the angel to Zachariah was verified, that Zach-
ariah was so lifted up as to give expression to
that exquisite song of his; whereas it was some
time before the verification of the announcement
made to her, indeed, it was almost as soon as
the words of the announcement were addressed
to her, that her mind and soul became so strong
in faith, and as a consequence, so full of hope
and joy that those charming poetic utterances
fell from her lips, those utterances that form the
magnificat, a hymn which the church has im-
mortalized by making it a part of her daily
service. So also it may be said, that great as was
the power of the Holy Spirit on the mind and
soul of Zachariah, it was greater as exerted on
his Son. The evangelist tells us that John was
filled with the Holy Spirit from his mother's
womb. This language is full of significance. It
seems to mean that his conception was wonderful.
I do not think that any thoughtful person can
read the story of the birth of John without
coming to the conclusion that there was some-
thing supernatural connected with it. As soon
as his existence began, the Holy Spirit dwelt with
him and worked on him and in him from the
The Holy Spirit
5i
embryonic state to conscious childhood, and from
conscious childhood to the day of his official
appearance in the religious world, fashioning him
in his gradual development as an efficient instru-
ment by whom to prepare the world for the
appearance of the Messiah, the Saviour of the
world. Of all the prophets the Hebrew race had
produced John the Baptist, according to the
testimony of the Saviour Himself, was the
greatest. He preached repentance with a power
with which none of his predecessors had ever
preached it. He gave the people a clearer and
fuller idea of the Messiah than had ever been
given them by any of the prophets that went
before him, Isaiah the evangelical prophet not
being an exception. So, too, it may be said, that,
if the operations of the Holy Spirit on the blessed
Virgin of Nazareth were great, His operations
on her Son were greater. She was, indeed a
very holy person. She was adorned with the
graces of the Spirit. She was, no doubt, superior
in spiritual adornment to Zachariah, yea, even
to John the Baptist himself. But there was one
member of the human race, that excelled her
spiritually. Her Son had received a much larger
measure of the Holy Spirit than ever was given
to her. The fact is, the Holy Spirit was given
without measure to the Lord Jesus Christ. The
52
The Holy Spirit
very human existence of the Lord Jesus Christ
was due to Him. The beginning of the human
existence of the Lord Jesus Christ was absolutely
unique in the whole history of the human race.
It can be truly said of Him what cannot be said
of any other human being that ever was born
into the world, that He had not a human "father.
According to the teaching of the Church as given
in the Apostle's Creed, and derived by her from
the Scriptures, He was conceived by the Holy
Spirit. The Church from the beginning has
always put emphasis on the virgin birth. He,
who was in the beginning with God, who was
God, and by whom all things were made, became
flesh in the womb of the blessed virgin of Nazar-
eth by the mighty power of the Holy Spirit.
Eternal praises are due to the Holy Spirit by the
whole Body of Christ for the greatest event that
ever occurred in the history of the human race,
the union of the nature of God with the nature
of man in the person of the Son of God.
But the Lord Jesus Christ possessed without
measure the Holy Spirit not only in the beginning
of His incarnate life, but during the whole of
His incarnate life on the earth. The Holy Spirit
was with Him without measure from His un-
conscious existence in Bethlehem to conscious
childhood in Nazareth and during the whole of
The Holy Spirit 53
His conscious development in Nazareth to His
entrance upon His official work of saving the
world from sin and the consequences of sin.
During His private life in Nazareth He, no doubt,
often had intimations of His future destiny. A
voice within, no doubt, often assured Him that
He was born for the accomplishment of a great
work; and, no doubt, as the time for entering
upon that work drew nearer that voice to Him
became more assuring. And, when in the provi-
dence of God that time arrived, for which He
had waited with so much hope and such great
longing, that voice, which was none other than
the very voice of the Holy Spirit, urged Him
forward with so great impulse, that with stead-
fast and determined step He advanced toward
the waters of the Jordan where His forerunner
was baptizing. He and John probably had never
before looked each other in the face. Bht though
they did not know each other personally, yet they
had knowledge of each other more important
and profound than that that sometimes comes
from personal acquaintance. Studying with deep
meditation the phophecies of the Hebrew Scrip-
tures with the light of the events that had
occurred in their age and generation thrown upon
them, they could not but come to the conclusion
that they themselves were the subjects of some
54 The Holy Spirit
of these prophecies, the Lord Jesus seeing in
John the Baptist His Precursor, who would as
predicted come in the spirit and power of Elijah,
and John the Baptist seeing in Him the Messiah
the Son of the Highest, who would come as the
Lamb of God to take away the sin of the world.
When they met each other they knew each other
because they knew other before they met. As
soon as the Lord Jesus met His precursor without
any hesitancy He desired to be baptized by him.
But His precursor was unwilling to baptise Him,
saying in beautiful humility, "I have need to be
baptized of Thee, and comest Thou to me?
The Lord Jesus said to him in reply in humility
more beautiful still, "Suffice it to be so now;
for it becometh us to fulfil all righteousness.
The Baptism of the Lord Jesus Christ was His
inauguration into the office of the Redeemer of
the world, the grandest inauguration that has
ever occurred on this planet. The whole ineffable
Godhead participated in this inauguration, the
First Person addressing the Second Person in
the words, "Thou art my beloved Son, and the
Third Person descending on the head of the
Second Person in the form of a dove. The
Third Person on this occasion as well as during
the whole of the life of the incarnate Son of God
on the earth acted as the Executive of the God-
The Holy Spirit
55
head. He operated as the Executive of the
Godhead, as we have said, during the whole
history of die Hebrew race. But while the Son
of God was tabernacling in the flesh on the earth
He operated in a larger measure than He had
ever done before. Indeed, to put it as strongly
as human language can put it, He worked on and
in the Son of God without measure.
But before entering upon the work, for which
He came into the world, it was necessary that
He should go through the ordeal of trial and
temptation. So it is said that the Holy Spirit
led Him, or, to use the strong language of St.
Mark "drove Him into the wilderness to be
tempted of 'the devil. Not that He went against
His will. Not that the Holy Spirit for the time
being destroyed His free agency. Literally
speaking, no compulsion was brought to bear
upon Him by the Holy Spirit. St. Mark in his
strong language only means that the Holy Spirit
operated with mighty power on Him. On this
occasion as well as during the whole of His
earthly life the free agency of our Lord was
intact to perfection. He went to that terrible
conflict with Satan the fallen angel without re-
luctance, though under the leadership of the Holy
Spirit, indeed because under the leadership of
the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit guided Him
56 The Holy Spirit
on that occasion, and was with Him and in Him,
assisting Him in His struggles with His foe. In
His struggles He had divine assistance. He did
not, indeed, use His own omnipotent power.
That was what Satan wished Him to do, for in
doing so He would have suffered defeat. He
fought the battle in His own human nature,
but His human nature received assistance from
the Third Person of the Trinity, the Executive
of the Godhead, just as all other human beings
are helped by the Executive of the Godhead, who
ask His assistance by genuine and earnest prayer.
And it was because He willingly co-operated with
the Executive of the Godhead, the Holy Spirit,
that He became the mighty victor that He was
in that awful conflict.
Our Lord's ministry on earth was about three
years in duration. No three years of any other
man's life have ever been filled with such splen-
did activity. No other man in that space of time
has ever given to the world so many rich utter-
ances or performed so many noble and merciful
deeds. Though He spent much time in private
communion with His Father though He often
withdrew from the multitude to the lonely moun-
tain to commune with His Father, though He
often rose up before day and spent many nights
in communing with Him and praying to Him,
The Holy Spirit 57
yet His appearance among the people as a teacher
and a worker of loving deeds had no precedent,
and no one during the nineteen hundred years,
that have followed His exit from the world, can
be considered His equal. As people study the
four Gospels with hard thinking and patient toil
they become amazed that any human being in so
short a space of time could do so much splendid
teaching and perform so many splendid works.
The reason was because He co-operated with the
Holy Spirit. It was because the Holy Spirit
worked with Him and in Him and His giving no
hindrance to the blessed work.
The Lord plainly taught that His wonderful
works were wrought by the power of the Holy
Spirit. The Evangelist tells us that on one occa-
sion a person possessed of a devil, and both blind
and dumb, was brought to Jesus, and that Jesus
immediately healed him, healed him physically,
giving him both sight and power of speech, and
healed him also mentally, for that he was healed
mentally also is the inference to be drawn from
the narrative. The people, who were witnesses
of the healing of this demoniac were amazed at
the power of Jesus. To them it was an exhibi-
tion of miraculous power. The Pharisees even,
the implacable foes of Jesus, acknowledged that
it was a miracle. But their hatred of Jesus was
58
The Holy Spirit
so intense that they could not see that Jesus
wrought the miracle by the power of God, but
attributed it to the power of the evil spirit. They
charged that Jesus was in league with Beelzebub
the prince of the devils, and that it was in co-
operation with the prince of the devils that He
had healed this demoniac. So great is the blind-
ness of hatred. So great is the stupidity of
hatred. But Jesus informed them that He had
performed this miracle of mercy by the power
of the Spirit of God, and that as they had
charged that He had performed it by an unclean
and diabolic spirit, it was equivalent to saying
that the Holy Spirit was an unclean and diabolic
spirit, and that in saying this they were guilty of
the sin against the Holy Spirit, which was the
greatest of all sins, and has no forgiveness in this
world or the world to come. Not that the mere
utterance of these words by the Pharisees con-
stituted the unpardonable sin against the Holy
Spirit. This utterance was a sign, a manifesta-
tion, an evidence of it. The Pharisees during the
ministry of Christ opposed Him and persecuted
Him. Their hearts were full of murderous
thoughts toward Him. They looked upon Him
with hatred and malice. The Holy Spirit in love
to them warned them and entreated them to act
justly and truthfully toward Him. But they
The Holy Spirit
59
would not be warned, they would not be en-
treated, and as a consequence their hatred and
malice toward Him so increased that they could
no longer hear the voice of the Spirit, and then
the Spirit took His everlasting flight. So when
they uttered these words, "He casteth out devils
through Beelzebub the prince of devils, they
were then, and perhaps had been for some time,
enduring the nemesis of the unpardonable sin.
The utterance of these words by the Pharisees
proved that they were in this awful spiritual
condition. But Jesus wrought not only this
work of benignity, the healing of this demoniac
through the Holy Spirit, but by means of
the same Spirit all of the benignant works
of His three years ministry were wrought
to the glory of God and to the blessed-
ness of His fellow-men. What was true of His
mighty works was also true of His rich utter-
ances. It was through the power of the Holy
Spirit, working with Him and in Him, that those
rich utterances of His fell from His lips as
benedictions to the members of the human family.
Early in His ministry, as it was natural, He
visited Nazareth, that town .that had witnessed
the incidents of His entire private life except the
first few months of His earthly existence, and He
went as was His custom into the synagogue on
6o The Holy Spirit
the Sabbath and stood up to read. And it
happened that when the Book or Scroll was hand-
ed to Him His eyes fell upon that portion of
Isaiah, which is now known as the sixty-first
chapter which begins thus, "The Spirit of the
Lord God is upon me; because the Lord hath
anointed me to preach good tidings unto the
meek; he hath sent me to bind up the broken
hearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and
the opening of the prison to them that are bound;
to proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord.
When He finished reading He sat down as was
customary to preach a sermon on that which He
had read. His sermon on that occasion was a
great sermon. No other man had ever delivered
such a great sermon in the synagogue of Nazar-
eth. The appearance of Jesus was magnetic,
riveting all eyes upon Him. His delivery was
charming, His voice conveying His splendid
thoughts in rhythmic and fiery language. The
Nazarenes were electrified. With their minds,
if not with their lips, they spoke the words,
"Never man spake like this man. The words
of Scripture which He read and took as His text,
was of Messianic significance. He under the
inspiration of the Holy Spirit told His hearers
that the prophet, who under the inspiration of
the Holy Spirit spoke these words, predicted that
The Holy Spirit
61
a person would come into the world as the Mes-
siah, the Anointed One, the Saviour of the
Hebrew nation and all the nations of the world
and that that person was He who was then
speaking to them. This is what He meant when
He said, "This day is this Scripture fulfilled in
your ears. He and the teachers of the Church
in His day, we know, were not in accord as to
the character of the Messiah, whose advent into
the world was predicted by the Hebrew prophet,
they holding that He would be the temporal
deliverer of the Hebrew nation, and He that He
would be the Saviour of all people in a spiritual
sense. He taught that, when the prophet uttered
the words He had read he foretold that a Person
would come into the world that would be the
anointed of the Lord to save and to bless with
peace and happiness and the best liberty and the
riches that are riches indeed the whole human
family, the Gentile nations as well as the Hebrew
nation. Such was the interpretation He put upon
the words of the prophet, and with a splendid
courage announced to His fellow-townsmen that
the person whose advent these words foretold
was He. This was a splendid sermon. It was
a splendid exposition of one of the greatest
utterances of Hebrew prophecy. But the
Nazarenes did not appreciate it. Some splendid.
62
The Holy Spirit
sermons have been and are thrown away on some
people. So it was with the sermon of the Saviour
in the synagogue of Nazareth. It charmed the
ears of His hearers, but it did not benefit their
souls. Very soon after listening to Him with
wrapt attention their behaviour toward Him was
coarse and brutal. They made a dastardly
attempt upon His life. How mysterious is the
nature of man! It is capable, indeed, of ascend-
ing to heaven. It often descends to hades. No
doubt the apostle St. John had in mind this inci-
dent in the synagogue of Nazareth when in
writing the Prologue to his Gospel he said, "He
was in the world, and the world was made by
Him, and the world knew Him not. He came
unto His own and His own received Him not.
But though the sayings of the Saviour in the
beginning of His ministry were charming, His
sayings as His ministry was drawing to its close
were more charming. Rich as was His discourse
in Nazareth in thought, richer in thought were
those discourses of His a few hours before His
death as given by St. John in His Gospel. He
delivered the former discourse as well as these
others as a prophet. He was a prophet in the
capacity of an interpreter and also in the capacity
of a revealer. This was true, we know, of the
prophets under the Old Testament dispensation.
The Holy Spirit
63
Sometimes the prophet appeared before the
people as a preacher in the ordinary sense of the
word, urging them to practise the truths which
had already been communicated to them. But
he appeared to them also as a prophet in a higher
sense, as a revealer of truths which they had
never heard, and as a foreteller of events that
lay in the future. The Saviour, like the prophets
who preceded Him, was a prophet in both these
senses. When He preached to the Nazarenes on
that memorable Sabbath day, He preached as an
interpreter of prophecy. When He delivered
these discourses near the end of His ministry He
delivered them as a revealer of truths that had
never been revealed before, and as a foreteller
of future events. These discourses, no doubt,
are richer in truths than any discourses that ever
fell from His lips. They contain truths which
had never before been heard on this planet.
Some oft hese are concerning the Holy Spirit.
He, under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit,
revealed truths concerning the Holy Spirit, which
no man on earth had ever heard of before and
which are of inconceivable importance to the
spiritual welfare of the human race.
Christ informed His disciples before His de-
parture from them to the other world, that He
would come again to them in the person of the
64
The Holy Spirit
Holy Spirit. He said to them that after His
return to the Father He would send to them the
Holy Spirit to take His place. Does any one
say that He taught in these discourses near the
end of His earthly life as well as in other dis-
courses that the Holy Spirit had never been in
this world before, that He had never been with
the Hebrews in the Old Testament dispensation
nor with Jesus during His life on the earth?
These discourses of His do not so teach. Nor
does that saying of St. John, that "the Holy
Spirit was not yet given, for that Jesus was not
yet glorified. These words mean that the Holy
Spirit had not yet been given as the Vicar of
Christ. The Holy Spirit, of course, had never
been in this world in that relation. It was im-
possible for Him to come as the Vicar of Christ
until the Ascension of Christ to the Throne of
God. He had always been in the world as the
Executive of the Godhead, working for man and
in man. But according to the teaching of Christ
He would after His glorification at His Ascension
bear a new relation to the human race. He
would be to the disciples of Christ of all future
ages the one only Vicar of Christ. When Christ
was on the earth He was to His disciples the
Paraclete, the Advocate, the Pleader, the Com-
forter. So the Holy Spirit after the departure
The Holy Spirit
65
of Christ to heaven, would come to the earth,
and be to the disciples of Christ down to the
great consummation the Paraclete, the Advocate,
the Pleader, the Comforter. When Christ taught
this truth concerning the Holy Spirit He taught
a truth of tremendous importance.
CHAPTER IV
THE HOLY SPIRIT, THE VICAR OF CHRIST
The promise of Christ that He would send the
Holy Spirit after His departure to take His pla:e
was fulfilled. It is a historic fact. St. Luke
vouches for it. He so informs us in the Acts of
the Apostles, one of the best and most authentic
historical works in existence. Historic experts
declare that St. Luke is to be classed among the
most reliable historians of the world. It is St.
Luke, the great historian, who informs us that
ten days after the Ascension of Christ the Holy
Spirit descended to earth. On the day of Pente-
cost, which was the first day of the week, there
was an outpouring of the Holy Spirit. On the
first day of the week an event of tremendous im-
portance had occurred, the Resurrection of our
Lord from the grave. The first day of the week
was again honored by the occurence of another
event of tremendous importance, the advent of
the Holy Spirit to earth as the Vicar of Christ.
Ten days succeeding the return of Christ to the
Father the Holy Spirit came down upon the
disciples of Christ is the plenitude of power as
they were assembled in that upper room in Jeru-
salem, the same upper room, no doubt, that had
66
The Holy Spirit
6 7
witnessed the institution of the Lord's Supper.
He came down upon them in the plenitude of
His power. The descent of the Holy Spirit, as
given by St. Luke in the Acts of the Apostles,
is a wonderful story. It is the production of a
man, who was far above his fellows in intellectual
gifts. It is the production of a man, whose fine
intellectual gifts had under the inspiration of the
Holy Spirit been strengthened and refined, a man
who had dreamed dreams and seen visions, a
man who had seen things, which the eye had
not seen and the ear had not heard. St. Luke
in a charming and masterful way tells us some-
thing about the acts of the Holy Spirit. His
work early in the history of the Church was
called the Acts of the Apostles,bu t as it has been
well said, a more appropriate title would be the
Acts of the Holy Spirit. For from the beginning
to the end the Holy Spirit may be called the
hero of his work. There has not been a perfect
agreement among the scholars of the church in
their interpretation of the descent of the Holy
Spirit. Some see in it more wonders and some
less wonders. Some see in it more of the super-
natural, and some less of the supernatural. Some
see in it so much of the supernatural that they
•have come to the conclusion that all is super-
natural. They tell us that in the beginning of
68
The Holy Spirit
his work, and indeed throughout his work, he is
silent respecting the ethical operations of the
Holy Spirit, that we look in vain for His ordinary
gifts, so intent was the writer in giving His
extraordinary gifts. Those persons, who hold
this extreme view, do St. Luke an injustice. He
mentions, no doubt, operations of the Holy Spirit
which were of a supernatural character, but not
to the exclusion of His ethical operations. He
tells us, indeed, that the Holy Spirit bestowed
upon the disciples of our Lord extraordinary
gifts, but he does not say these were the only
gifts bestowed upon them. The Holy Spirit be-
stowed upon them gifts called by the theologians
the ordinary gifts of the Spirit. Not that they
were ordinary in the sense that they were less
important than the extraordinary gifts, for they
were not, but were more important. The extraor-
dinary gifts were bestowed upon a few only, and
were only temporary. The ordinary gifts were
bestowed upon the many, and were such as would
not pass away. Upon some was bestowed the
gift of tongues, upon some the gift of healing,
upon some the gift of prophecy; but they were
the few upon whom these gifts were bestowed,
and we know that these soon ceased in the
church with the exception, perhaps, of the gift
of healing. But all the true disciples received
The Holy Spirit
69
from the Holy Spirit His ordinary gifts. In
them all He worked sincerity and veracity and
patience and humility and faith and love and the
other virtues that make the character beautiful
and lovely. No one can read the Acts of the
Apostles with intelligence and without prejudice
without admitting that all the true disciples of
our Lord were blessed with these ordinary gifts
of the Spirit, and because the ordinary gifts the
most important gifts. Indeed, it is plainly the
teaching of St. Luke that the Holy Spirit came
down from heaven not only for the salvation of
the true followers of our Lord, but also for
those who live exclusively or chiefly for the
things of the world. On the very day of His
descent St. Luke tells us that St. Peter preached
to a great multitude, assuring them that Christ,
who had been crucified, was raised from the
dead, and was exalted to the right hand of God
and that five thousand of his hearers were con-
verted. We do not say that all of these were
truly converted. No doubt some of these were
only professing disciples, disciples who only be-
lieved with their minds in Christ as the risen
Saviour. But most of them were converted
indeed and in truth. The Holy Spirit had spoken
to their souls and consciences and hearts, and
not in vain. Most of them believed with the
7°
The Holy Spirit
heart and day by day experienced the workings
of the Holy Spirit and enjoyed communion with
Christ and God. The period of the world dating
from the ascension of Christ and continuing to
His second personal advent has well been called
the Dispensation of the Spirit.
During this period of the history of the world
the Holy Spirit would operate with more power
and greater fulness than during the periods that
preceded it. Not that He has and will have more
power in Himself during this period than He
had during the preceding periods. He is the
same yesterday, today, and forever. He is God.
His power is almighty. But He does not, per-
haps, He can not bring His omnipotence to bear
upon human beings as He can upon inert matter.
As human beings are free agents He has deemed
it wise to work upon them through the truth, or
better still, through the truths. We say, through
the truths. For truth is manifold. There are
many truths. This is the reason that, though He
was the Executive of the Godhead during the
Old Testament dispensation as well as during
the incarnate life of 'the Son of God on the earth.
He did not work with such power and fulness
during those periods as He has worked since His
descent at Pentecost and will continue to work
throughout 'the dispensation of the Spirit.
The Holy Spirit
71
After His descent at Pentecost He had in His
possession more truths than He had before.
There were added to the truths He possessed as
the Executive of the Godhead the truths He
possessed as the Vicar of Christ. As the Vicar
of Christ He spoke with a power with which
Christ Himself even did not speak. He had in
His possession more truths through which to
speak and work than Christ had. He spoke
through the truths that came from the death and
resurrection and ascension of Christ. These
events had, indeed, been predicted. They had
been predicted long before by the Hebrew
prophets. They had been predicted even more
clearly by the Saviour Himself. He told His
disciples that after His crucifixion He would rise
again and return to the Father. But He did not
declare emphatically that there were truths con-
nected with these events without which they
could not be saved. He did not preach the
doctrine of the atonement as the Apostles did
after His ascension, nor that the justification of
man depended upon a risen Redeemer as they did.
To the many truths the Holy Spirit possessed
as the Executive of the Godhead were added the
very important truths that came into His
possession when He became the Vicar of Christ,
the truths that Christ had died as an atoning
72
The Holy Spirit
sacrifice for the sins of the world, and had risen
again to justify us in the sight of heaven. As
soon as the dispensation of the Spirit commenced
the Apostles laid mighty emphasis upon the
resurrection of Christ. They laid more emphasis
upon the resurrection than upon any other event
or truth, the death of Christ not excepted. They
at the first preached His death as well as His
resurrection, but not with that power with which
they preached His resurrection, as it was natural
if the circumstances are considered. But in
course of time more importance was attached to
the death of Christ. St. Paul attached more
importance to His death than had been given to
it by the original apostles. Not that St. Paul
gave less importance to the resurrection than
they had given to it. But he taught in his preach-
ing and epistles that the death of Christ was
equal in importance to the resurrection of Christ.
The death and resurrection of Christ have always
been held as of great importance by the church
in the best days of Christianity. After His
descent at Pentecost the Holy Spirit pressed upon
the minds and souls and consciences of the
people these truths as they were proclaimed by
the apostles.
He worked with the apostles. To whomsoever
they preached, whether to persons who had be-
The Holy Spirit
73
lieved in Christ as the Redeemer of the world,
or to persons who did not know Christ as such,
He was present and worked through the truths
that were preached to the salvation and sanctifi-
cation of the hearers. Through the truths which
they heard He spoke to their minds. He spoke
to their souls. He spoke to their consciences.
He spoke to their hearts. His wish and aim
were to so work upon them through these truths
that they would know by experience what the
communion of saints meant, that they would
form one heavenly society and would with one
mind and one mouth say in the words of the
psalmist, "Praise the Lord, Oh my soul, and all
that is within me praise His holy name. Praise
the Lord, oh my soul and forget not all His
benefits; who forgiveth all thy sins and healeth
all thine infirmities. That this was the glorious
work of the Holy Spirit in the first years of the
Christian Church is plainly taught in the Acts
of the Apostles as welll as in the Epistles of St.
Paul. St. Paul's Epistles are full of the Holy
Spirit both as to His nature and His function.
St. Paul teaches a Pneumatology which no other
writer of the New Testament teaches in that
fulness he does. He himself was indeed, the
temple of the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit
worked in Him. He learned a great deal about
74 The Holy Spirit
the Holy Spirit from the writings of others, for
he was a hard student, and as thoroughly
acquainted with theology as any man of his day,
perhaps, more so. But he learned a great deal
more about the Holy Spirit from communion
with the Holy Spirit, from his rich experiences
with the Holy Spirit. It was not only because
of his objective knowledge of the Holy Spirit,
but chiefly because of the subjective power of the
Holy Spirit with which he was blessed, that he
gave to the world in his preaching and epistles
so many rich utterances concerning the Holy
Spirit. It was through the new truths concern-
ing the Holy Spirit as taught by St. Paul as well
as through the truths concerning Christ that the
Holy Spirit in the early days of Christianity
worked to bring men to the fountain of salvation
and to make them like God.
The Holy Spirit operated with much greater
power on the minds and souls and consciences
and hearts of the members of the human race
during the first days of the New Testament
dispensation than He had ever done before.
Never before had men in such numbers re-
sponded to His invitations and pleadings. Never
before had He been so successful in quickening
them and sactifying them. Why? It was not
because He had more power in Himself. He
The Holy Spirit
75
had always been the omnipotent God. It was
because He had more truths through which to
work. It was because among the new truths
He possessed were those two, the death of Christ
and the resurrection of Christ. When the
apostles preached that God was in the crucified
Christ reconciling the world unto Himself, and
in the risen Christ imparting to men the life of
God, the Holy Spirit was present and worked
through these two truths and with great success,
converting thousands in the best sense of that
word and bringing them in close touch with God.
Nor has His mighty power been confined to the
first years of the New Testament dispensation.
The New Testament dispensation will be the
dispensation of the Spirit to the consummation
of all things. When He descended from heaven
to earth as the Vicar of Christ it was to remain
on earth until time shall be no more, using all
His power to conquer the world for Christ.
From the ascension of Christ down to the present
time He has been working in the minds and souls
of men through all the truths revealed to men,
and will continue to so work down to the end of
the world. Down to the present time He has
been working for the salvation of the world with
all earnestness and power, and we contend that,
when circumstances are considered, He has
76 The Holy Spirit
worked with great success, certainly with more
success by far than He did before the New
Testament dispensation began. We do not say,
that the advance has been rapid. It has not
been by any means as rapid as the first disciples
of Christ expected it would be. Most of the
disciples of the Apostolic Church expected the
work of the Holy Spirit would be accomplished
in a very short time. Most of them looked for
the return of the Lord Jesus in their day in His
personal glory as judge of the quick and the
dead. It was not, indeed, the belief of all that
He would come again in person to the earth so
soon. Some did not so believe, among whom
was St. Paul. St. Paul did not hold the belief
of the majority touching the return of the Lord.
He told them that they erred in holding that the
reurn of the Lord would occur in their day. But
though he did not hold as they did that the
return of the Lord would be so soon, yet it was
his belief, no doubt, that it would be much sooner
than we know now that it will be. It was, no
doubt, his conviction that the dispensation of the
Spirit would cover a shorter period than it will
cover, indeed than it has covered. It would haye
been a surprise to him, had it been intimated
to him what we know concerning the length of
the period of the history of the human race,
The Holy Spirit
77
called the dispensation of the Spirit. But had
St. Paul possessed the knowledge we do in this
twentieth century, he would not have held this
private belief he did. I say private belief, for
he had no belief as a prophet of God concerning
the time of the second personal coming of our
Lord.
St. Paul had, indeed, a great intellect, and was
one of the most learned men of his day. But
concerning a great many things the thinkers of
this century have more knowledge than he had.
They have more knowledge of human psychology
than he had. We know, indeed, that the Holy
Spirit will not use force to convince us that the
Lord Jesus Christ is the Saviour of the world
and to constrain us to accept Him as our Saviour
and to lead such lives as He delights in. So did
St. Paul know. We know that the Holy Spirit
deals with us as free agents, able with divine
assistance to work out our salvation and having
the power to reject the assistance of God and go
forward on the road to destruction. So did St.
Paul know. We know that the Holy Spirit,
without destroying our free agency, can so work
upon our minds and souls and consciences and
hearts through the truths that have been revealed
to us, that we can willingly accept them and obey
them and live to the glory of God. So did St.
78
The Holy Spirit
Paul know. Indeed, we are chiefly indebted to
St. Paul for these facts. These facts are taught
in other parts of the New Testament, but they
are to be gathered principally from his works.
But St. Paul did not understand human psy-
chology as well as the thinkers of the twentieth
century do. He was not as well acquainted with
human nature as they are. He did not know
that the minds of men were so hard to convince,
he did not know that the wills of men were so
hard to move, he did not know that the hearts of
men were so hard to incline. The history of the
human race during the many years since the days
of St. Paul reveals to us much concerning man
that was not known before. It reveals to us the
fact that sin has affected the whole nature of
man, body, soul, and spirit in a degree that was
hitherto unknown. Of course, St. Paul was not
ignorant of the fact that the nature of man was
very evil. This we know, ihe teaches in his many
letters to the churches. This is indeed, the
teaching of the whole Bible, the Old Testament
as well as the New Testament. But the last
nineteen hundred years of the existence of man
on this planet have disclosed the sinfulness of
his nature in a degree, of which people were
ignorant, who lived anterior to this period. This
is especially true of the age in which our lot is
The Holy Spirit
79
cast. We understand human psychology as our
forefathers did not. We understand the biblical
phrase, "The exceeding sinfulness of sin, in
respect to the nature of man with a thoroughness
that our forefathers did not. We do not mean
to say, that human nature in this twentieth
century is more corrupt than it was nineteen
hundred years ago. We do not mean to say that
the men who now populate this earth are worse
morally and spiritually than the men who
lived in the primitive days of Christianity.
This we do not believe. On the contrary
we believe that the human race has im-
proved morally and spiritually as well as in-
tellectually. We believe that people who are now
living on this planet are nearer to God and more
like God in His moral attributes than were those
who lived at the beginning of the dispensation of
the Spirit. But this is also our belief; that we,
who now inhabit this planet understand the nature
of man better than did those, who inhabited it in
the first century of the Christian era. We believe
that we can see the wickedness of the nature of
man, as it really exists, with clearer and more
discerning eyes than they did; and for this rea-
son, because we have more light with which to
scrutinize it. What is true in the physical world,
is also true in the moral world. In the physical
8o
The Holy Spirit
world whatsoever doth make manifest is light.
So too whatsoever doth make manifest in the
moral world is light. The greater the light that
is thrown upon the nature of man the more
apparent does its corruption become to us.
History is a good interpreter of many of the
truths of the Bible, among which is the corrup-
tion of human nature. It reveals man as a
creature capable of so much wickedness, capable
not only of thinking and imagining and planning
such great wickedness, but also capable of putting
his inventions and plans into such cruel and even
diabolic deeds, that it is not surprising that we
can see what the primitive Christians could not
see, that the work of the Holy Spirit in saving
and sanctifying the human race and thus con-
quering the world for Christ is necessarily not
a rapid work, but a work rather slow as men
compute time.
But sin as it exists in man is not the only
obstacle to the work of the Holy Spirit in con-
quering the world for Christ. There is, we be-
lieve, a tremendous power of evil objective to
man with which He has to contend. We believe
that there is a personal devil. We believe that
Satan, who is called in Scripture the adversary
of God and man, is a being with personal attri-
butes. I know that there are scientists who
The Holy Spirit
81
ridicule this idea, who consider people, if not
almost insane, yet certainly very foolish, who
entertain it. But there are no scientists, who can
disprove it. Of the many sciences there is not
one that reveals anything on the subject.
Whether there is a personal devil it is not within
the province of science to determine. Science
can not answer affirmatively or negatively. As
it must remain profoundly silent respecting such
questions as the existence of heaven and hell,
so it must remain profoundly silent respecting
the question of the personality of the devil.
These are questions that can be answered only
with the assistance of revelation. What say the
men, who wrote under the inspiration of the
Holy Spirit? What is the teaching of the Bible?
We believe that, if a fair interpretation be put
upon the sayings of the Saviour, He taught that
there is a personal devil. Not to mention other
places in the Gospels the temptation in the wil-
derness reveals Him as teaching it. The substance
at least of the account of the temptation is
derived from Christ Himself, for He only knew
anything about it. The writer, we are sure, did
not put the words addressed to the devil into the
mouth of the Saviour, but he took the words out
of the mouth of the Saviour. They are no doubt,
the words of the Saviour Himself, and they
82
The Holy Spirit
presuppose the personality of the devil. So has
the Church interpreted it. The Church has
always held the devil to be a creature with a
mind and a will. So universal in the Christian
world has been this tradition of belief, that it is
to be found in the best literature, Shakespeare
in one of his immortal dramas alluding to him
as an angel who fell by the sin of ambition from
heaven, and Milton in his great epic making him
almost its hero, ascribing to him a glory and
power much more than human. When we take
into consideration that the superhuman power of
satan, the adversary of God and man, was
brought to bear upon the corrupt nature of man
and worked through that nature. We should
not be surprised that the work of the Holy Spirit
to convert the world to Christ and righteousness
has been so slow. But though slow, it has been
sure. It has been attended with success. The
conflict between good and evil in the last nine-
teen hundred years has been tremendous. Evil
at times has seemingly been triumphant. The
destruction of good has appeared inevitable.
The prediction of the extermination of the
Church has been looked forward to with cer-
tainty by her enemies and by some pessimistic
Christians. But God was in the midst of her,
therefore she fell not; the Holy Spirit was for
The Holy Spirit
83
her and with her, therefore she survived, yea,
won. The Apostle, writing to individual Chris-
tians, said, "He that is in you is greater than he
that is in the world. So He that was with and
in Christians eorporately was greater than he
that was in the world. The Holy Spirit, that
dwells in the Body of Christ, is stronger than
the evil spirit who is called the god of this world.
The Holy Spirit has won in the awful
conflict though slowly, because He has worked
with all earnestness. He has worked with all
the disciples of the Lord in all earnestness both
individually and eorporately.
He has worked in all earnestness with all the
disciples of the Lord eorporately. He has been
with the Church from the day of Pentecost when
•her existence began on earth down to the present
time. He was with her in the thousand years
that saw no impairment of her unity. The
Church, we know, existed for at least ten cen-
turies as an undivided body. As an undivided
body her representatives met together from time
to time in councils and synods to consult con-
cerning her welfare and to legislate for her wel-
fare, and through her the welfare of the world.
And all the time the Holy Spirit was with her.
He was with her in her general councils and in
her more numerous provincial councils. In these
84
The Holy Spirit
many councils He Himself presided. Not that
a human being did not in some sense preside
over them. But He presided also, and in a
sensei n which no man was capable of presiding.
It was not only in the council of the blessed
apostles convened in the city of Jerusalem that
He presided, but in all the councils of the Church
that were, subsequently convened for ten con-
secutive centuries. And He had a great deal to
do with their deliberations and enactments. It
is true that in these councils there were human
blunders and errors and ignorances, and even
weaknesses and sins, such as pride and ambition
and prejudices; but not withstanding these
warring elements, these elements through which
the great adversary of God and men, no doubt,
worked, He the Spirit of God, the Spirit of truth,
also worked; He worked through the truths that
were mixed with the errors, and succeeded in
making these councils, especially the general
councils, blessings to the Church and through the
Church to the world. We say, especially
the general councils. For in the general councils
there was more learning as well as, no doubt,
more godliness than in the provincial councils.
The best men of the Church represented her in
the general councils. This was, especially true
of the general councils convened in the fourth
The Holy Spirit
85
and fifth centuries, named the council of Nicea,
the council of Constantinople the council of
Ephesus, and the council of Chalcedon. It was
in these four councils that we, if we have eyes
to see, can see the Holy Spirit presiding and
working with great success. When we remember
the history of the council of Nicea is it not plain
to us that God was there? Is it not plain that
the Holy Spirit was with and in that great genius
and saint, Athanasius the Deacon, and inspired
him in declaring and proving out of the Scrip-
tures the divinity of Christ, the Deity of the Son
of God? And is it not very apparent that the
Holy Spirit it was, who presided at the council
of Constantinople, and that it is to Him that we
must render praise and thanks for those funda-
mental truths of Revelation, or rather to the
embodying in the creed of the Church those
fundamental truths, the Personality and Divinity
of the Holy Spirit? But when the Church, after
a millennial existence as the one body of Christ
grieved the Holy Spirit, as no doubt she did by
rending the blessed unity, He did not cease to
work with her. History informs us as we know,
that about a thousand years following the day
of Pentecost that portion of Christendom em-
bracing the Christian nations of the East separ-
ated from that portion that constituted the Chris-
86
The Holy Spirit
tian nations of the West, both no doubt being
guilty of the schism, the latter perhaps being
more to be blamed than the former. Sad to say,
the deplorable schism has never been healed. On
the contrary the divisions have increased and
multiplied. In this twentieth century the separ-
ate bodies of Christians number more than in
the sixteenth or in any previous century. But
the Holy Spirit, though grieved at the increase,
does not withhold His presence from any of them.
He dwells with the smallest as well as with the
largest. He dwells with those who can not claim
apostolic succession, as well as with those who
are thus blessed.
Some of the Christian denominations, we
know, have the historic episcopate. Some of
them can trace their origin back to the days of
the apostles. Such is true of the Anglican
Church, and of the Roman Church, and of the
Greek Church. Through these apostolic
churches, no doubt, the Holy Spirit works.
Through them He has been, though slowly, yet
surely conquering the world for Christ. But He
has by no means limited His work to the
churches of apostolic succession. Those
churches that do not claim apostolic succession,
or, if they do, can not prove it, are also blessed
with His presence. He is no respector of persons
The Holy Spirit
8 7
whether considered individually or corporately.
We do not mean to say that His blessings fall
with equal richness on Christian bodies, who do
not possess equally the great truths of revelation,
and are not equally faithful in teaching and
reducing to practise the truths they know. If
this were true, then we could not say that He
is no respecter of persons. If this were true,
then it would follow that in blessing the. churches
He acts arbitrarily and does not always work
through the truth or the truths. But He never
does work arbitrarily. He always works though
the truth. And it must necessarily follow, that
those churches that possess the truth that
approximates nearest to perfection, and that co-
operate the most faithfully with the Holy Spirit
in His work of benediction, will partake the most
abundantly of His work of benediction and will
be the most instrumental in conquering the world
for Christ. If the churches of apostolic sue-
cession have more of the great truths of revela-
tion than the churches that can not trace their
ministry back to the first century and are more
faithful in making these truths known to the
world than these are, then they will be more
blessed by die Holy Spirit; otherwise they will
not, but the reverse will be true. But some
persons will say that those Christian bodies which
88 The Holy Spirit
we call churches, are not churches in the true
sense of the word, if they do not come from the
days of the apostles; and if they are not churches
we have no right to say that the Holy Spirit
works through them with the same success as
He does through those Christian bodies which
we know for a certainty are churches. As to
whether the Christian bodies, which are not of
apostolic succession are true churches, we shall
not discuss in this volume. But this we will
affirm, that though some learned and holy men
hold that they are not true churches, there are
other men just as learned and holy who hold
that they are true churches. There are learned
and holy men in the Anglican Church, which is
no doubt apostolic in origin, who teach that they
are true churches. This is the teaching of the
great Hooker in his immortal work, "The Eccle-
siastical Polity. Those who follow him in his
teaching, declare that though Episcopacy is
necessary to the well being of a church, it is not
necessary to the being of a church.
But we do not think that we are called upon
to determine this question in this volume. For
we do not hesitate to assert that whether we con-
sider these Christian bodies, that are not of
apostolic origin, true churches, or do not so
consider them, if they hold the great truths of
The Holy Spirit 89
revelation in that fulness and with that tenacity
that the apostolic churches do, and are as earnest
and as active in preaching these truths, then the
Spirit of truth and holiness will not make any
difference between them, but will work through
them all with the same success. The question
is, do these bodies of Christians teach the funda-
mental doctrines? To mention a few of the
largest of these bodies. No person void of
prejudice caii intelligently read the history of the
Methodist and Baptist and Presbyterian and
Lutheran denominations without conceding that
they are sound in the faith as to fundamental
truths of the Bible, and that they are exerting
themselves to spread abroad these truths. No
person can deny that they have had much success.
Their success is too apparent for such denial.
Indeed, in good works, in the betterment of
mankind, in bringing men to repentance and to
Christ, do they not seem to be equal to the
churches of apostolic succession? It is as certain
that the Son of righteousness gives His spiritual
light by the Spirit through them to the human
race as that the material sun gives his light to the
material world. By their fruits we know people
what they are whether individually or collec-
tively. So taught the Saviour of the world. By
their works we must conclude if we are fair,
9°
The Holy Spirit
that these great Christian bodies have the
presence of the Holy Spirit, and that with them
and through them the Holy Spirit has been
actively working. Their example has been such,
their example is such, that the churches of
apostolic succession can not afford to disregard
it. Indeed the churches of apostolic succession,
if they are wise, will be quick to imitate it.
These Christian bodies we have mentioned, have
met with the success, that history accords them,
because they have held with great tenacity the
great truths of revelation, and they have thus
held these truths because they have honored the
Book, that contains them by constantly reading
it and studying it. The Holy Spirit, being the
Being that He is, can not but bless these bodies
of Christians, who thus honor Holy Scripture.
And here I can not refrain from giving a tribute
of praise to the Anglican Church or communion.
But I do not give it to the disparagement of
other churches. The Anglican Church is apos-
tolic not only as to her origin . She is apostolic
as to her doctrines. She is apostolic as to her
love of Scripture. Were the apostles ever citing
Scripture in their preaching and exhorting and
advising the people to read it and to search it?
So has she honored it. She requires her clergy
to proclaim to the people the truths it contains.
The Holy Spirit
9i
She has put it into the hands of the laity as the
chief book of devotion. It was the Anglican
Church that gave to England and through Eng-
land to the whole English-speaking world that
version of the Bible known as the version of
King James; a version that has been chiefly in-
strumental in making the Anglo-Saxon peoples
the morally as well as the intellectually pro-
gressive peoples that they are. That version,
considering the age in which it was given was
a very accurate rendering of the original. But
in addition to the faithful rendering of the
Hebrew and Greek, its diction is beautiful and
charming, which we know has done so much to
attach the many generations to it, and to send
home to their consciences and hearts the truths
it declares; for it is a psychological fact, that
when truth is clothed so beautifully and sweetly,
as it is in this version of Scripture it appeals
with much more power to both the heart and
intellect than it does when it is embodied in
language that lacks rhythm and beauty. We
believe that the Anglican Church has been
honored by the Holy Spirit, as she, no doubt,
has been, for the reason that she has done so
much to honor Holy Scripture.
But the Holy Spirit has worked upon persons
and with persons not only collectively, but indi-
92 The Holy Spirit
vidually. Ever since the day of Pentecost He
has in person dwelt with and in the disciples of
our Lord, comforting them, inspiring them,
sanctifying them, and through them saving the
world from the destructive powers of sin and
the devil. Whether in high positions in the earth
or in places of obscurity He has made His abode
with them and in them. He was with and in
St. Paul, in the sufferings and persecutions,
which he received at the hands of the enemies of
the cross of Christ, and made them work together
for his good. He was with and in St. John in
his awful solitude in the Isle of Patmos as well
as in many other dark days of his life, turning
his darkness into light and his grief into joy.
He was with and in St. Athanasius when for the
confession of the true faith, the faith of the
One in Three and the Three in One, he was
forced to abandon the work of the Church and
to be a wanderer in the world. He was with
him and in him during his enforced inactivity,
and gave him strength to finish his course with
joy. So was He with and in St. Chrysostom
and St. Augustine and St. Patrick. He was
with and in Wickliffe and Huss and Luther and
Cranmer and Latimer and Ridley. He was with
and in Wesley and Wilberforce and Bp. Brooks
and Gen. Lee. He was with and in Joan of Arc
The Holy Spirit 93
and Florence Nightingale and Queen Victoria.
Thousands of other prominent persons might be
mentioned, with whom and in whom He dwelt
to cheer and inspire and to make heroes in die
cause of truth, whose names are written not only
on the pages of the history of this planet, but
also in the great Book of the Lamb of God,
which will be opened to the eyes of the whole
universe on the great day of the Lord.
And if it be true—and it is true beyond a
peradventure—that He has been with and in
thousands of prominent men and women, teach-
ing them and guiding them and making them
victors in the Kingdom of God, it is doubtless
true also, that He has been with and in ten
thousands of the less fortunate in the good things
of this world, some of whom were so poor in the
comforts of the world, that it could have been
said of them as it was said of the Saviour when
He was on earth, "The foxes have holes and the
birds of the air have nests, but the Son of man
has not where to lay His head, and some of
whom have been so chained down by their en-
vironmenit from the beginning, that it has been
impossible for them to improve the mental gifts
bestowed on them by nature. He has been with
and in ten thousands of the less fortunate and
the least fortunate and those who did not seem
94
The Holy Spirit
to be fortunate at all in those things that are
regarded as the good things of earth. He has
been with and in them to cheer and to comfort
and to inspire. He has with and in them, and
though poor and ignorant in the things of the
world, He has taught them to say, "Though I
have nothing, yet possess I all things. All things
are mine, things present and things to come.
Most of these ten thousands of the less fortunate
and the least fortunate and the unfortunate have
not been honored by the men who have
written the history of this planet, but their names,
the names of all, will appear in the Book of Life,
the great Book of the Lamb of God.
But though it is true that the names of most
of them have perished so far as this world is
concerned, blessed be God, the names of a few
have been preserved for the ednfication of their
successors and for the glory of God. Susan
Allibone, though dead, will always speak.
Though not among those of the least fortunate
in the good things of this world, she was not
among those of the most fortunate. She was
among those of the less fortunate. She was an
inhabitant of the City of brotherly love. And if
this American City, which in the Greek form
bears the same name as another city, whose
church was numbered among the seven churches
The Holy Spirit
95
in Asia, if this American city was as loyal to the
teaching and commands of the Son of God as
was that ancient Asian city, whose church was
honored with a message from His mediatorial
throne through the instrumentality of His servant
when a lonely exile on Patmos—and we can not
but believe that it was as loyal—then Miss
-Allibone was a worthy citizen of that city.
Brotherly love was indelibly engraved on her
heart. She was a true follower of Him, who
loved the whole world. For an interesting and
splendid memoir of her we are indebted to the
pen of Bp. Lee, the first prelate elected by the
Episcopal diocese of Delaware to guide the
members thereof in the pastoral functions under
the chief and great Shepherd of the sheep. She
illustrates the precious truth, that no matter what
our sufferings and afflictions, God will give us
strength to bear them and make them work to-
gether for our everlasting good. So too will the
dairyman's daughter and the young cottager
always speak to the children of men as long as
the human race survives on this planet. They
have not only a prominent place in the Lamb's
Book of Life, but they have been made immortal
in the world's records of the good and the blessed.
Perhaps the most valuable piece of work ever
achieved by that good and godly man, the Rev.
96
The Holy Spirit
Leigh Richmond was the brief though charming
accounts of the lives of these two females in the
lower walks of life. No one can read the brief
lives of these two female followers of our Lord
without confessing that God is a social God,
that He is an immanent God, that He loves to
dwell with the human soul, no matter how poor
and lowly, yea, because poor and lowly, and to
teach it, and to comfort it, and to cheer it, and
to exalt it, and to give it the true riches and a
heavenly vision before which all earthly glory
vanishes into nothingness.
As it has been in the past history of the human
race, so will it be in its history of the future.
It has been said that history repeats itself. It
does, no doubt, repeat itself so far as the ex-
periences of the saints of God are concerned.
Could the thousands and millions of saints, who
have finished their course with joy, now speak
to us, they would declare that the greatness of
God in His dealings with them on the earth con-
sisted not so much in His transcendence as in
His immanence, they would declare that in His
humility He took up His abode in their souls and
hearts as their advocate and teacher and guide
and comforter. So too the thousands and
millions of saints, that will hence forth live on
this planet as time wings its flight to the great
The Holy Spirit
97
day when death will be swallowed up in victory,
will have a similar experience, and with thanks-
giving and adoration will publish it to the
universe when God will be all and in all.
From what has been said concerning the work
of the Holy Spirit with and upon the disciples
of our Lord considered as individuals the infer-
ence to be drawn is that He works upon them
both directly and indirectly. Some persons lay
almost entire emphasis upon His indirect working
on individuals, scarcely ever saying anything
about His direct working. They never grow
weary in reminding their fellow-Christians, that
He works mightily through the sacraments and
ordinances of the church, but very seldom allude
to His working in the absence of these media.
Other persons there are, who do not attach much
importance to His indirect working, who, indeed,
attach so little importance to it, that they treat
with indifference those sacraments and ordin-
ances which have been provided by the church;
but they are ever ready to confess that He works
powerfully on the minds and souls of individuals
at all times if they cooperate with Him, when
alone in their closets, or engaged in their re-
spective occupations, or enjoying their innocent
amusements. But the New Testament gives
much importance to the working of the Holy
98 The Holy Spirit
Spirit both directly and indirectly. The men who
wrote as they were moved by the Holy Spirit,
teach that the Holy Spirit is ever ready to work
through the sacraments and ordinances of the
church with power on individual souls to their
comfort and holiness and salvation; but not only
through these, but also without these. They
teach that He is ever ready without these to
work with richest benedictions on all persons who
will work with Him, whether in their closets
where no eye can see them but the eye of God,
or when attending to their duties under the eye
of the world. The disciples of the Lord in the
primitive church so interpreted the teaching of
the apostles, as we learn from the writer of the
Acts of the Apotsles. They believed that the
sacraments and the ordinances were given for a
great purpose even for the purpose of regenerat-
ing and sanctifying an dsaving creatures made in
God's image. So they were diligent in making
use of them. They were ever ready to obey the
command to be baptized. They were ever ready
to submit to the laying on of the hands of the
Apostles. And as to the Holy Communion, the
Lord's Supper, we know from the early history
of the church that they laid strong emphasis on
this sacrament. When the disciples of the Lord
in the primitive church came together on the
The Holy Spirit
99
first day of the week, they were always faithful
in partaking of this sacrament. The first day
of the week was to them the great day of the
week, and they called it the Lord's day because
their Lord rose again from the dead on that
day. They always regarded it as the great day
of the week, and were strict in observing it by
assembling in the attitude of worshippers of God,
and making the principal feature of the worship
the partaking of the Lord's Supper. The Lords'
Supper was to them not only a memorial feast.
It was, indeed, that to them, but it was a great
deal more. It was to them a sacrament in the
strict sense of the word. It was to them an
outward and visible sign of an inward and
spiritual grace. Whenever they partook of it,
it reminded them of two great events, the death
of Christ and the resurrection of Christ. In
this sacrament the death and resurrection of
Christ were indissolubly linked together, and the
truths they taught were indissolubly linked to-
gether, that Christ died for our sins and rose
again for our justification. In partaking of this
sacrament the Holy Spirit worked on their minds
and souls through these truths to their comfort
and sanctification and to their moral and spiritual
strength. If we learn from the New Testament
that the Holy Spirit worked with power on the
IOO
The Holy Spirit
minds and souls of men and women indirectly,
so too do we learn that He worked on them
directly. He worked not only through sacra-
ments and ordinances, but at times and in places
when these were absent. When the Apostles
were imprisoned for preaching Jesus crucified
and risen the Holy Spirit was with them in
prison and filled them with joy, which no chains
could take from them. When after their miracu-
lous deliverance they were ordered not to preach
again in the name of Jesus they rejoiced that
they were counted worthy to suffer for His sake,
and ceased not to proclaim daily to the people
that He was the Christ. They experienced the
joy that they did and proclaimed Jesus as they
did because the Holy Spirit was with them and
worked mightily in them. So too it has ever
been. He has delighted to work upon human
beings not only through sacraments and ordin-
ances, but also in the absence of these. We learn
from the memoir of Susan A'llibone that she
became the good and holy woman that she was
in spite of her physical sufferings and afflictions
because of the frequency of her private devo-
tions. And in reading the accounts of the lives
of the dairyman's daughter and the young
cottager we can not but concluded that it was
because of their continuous private communion
The Holy Spirit
101
with God that they became rich in the good things
of God, though they possessed none of the good
things of this world.
Our conviction then is, that during the past
nineteen hundred years the Holy Spirit has been
conquering the world for Christ. We have, no
doubt, that He has so worked upon human beings
both collectively and individually, but especially
individually, that He has brought nearer in the
history of earth the day when the kingdoms of
the world will become the kingdoms of our
incarnate Lord. We say, especially individually,
for we believe that He works through them as
individuals with more success than He works
through them as a corporate body. There is, no
doubt, that the church as the Body of Christ has
done much to make the world better morally and
spiritually. Through her representatives in coun-
cils and synods she has so placed before the eyes
of the people of the world the truths of Scripture
that many through these truths have been con-
verted and saved. But it is our belief that more
have been converted and saved through the in-
fluences and example of individual members of
the church. The chief cause, that the people who
love the world and the things of the world change
their course and acknowledge Christ as their
Saviour, is that they observe that the individual
102
The Holy Spirit
members of the church in their daily walk and
conversation are under the influence and control
of an invisible force superior to any the world
knows of, producing blessings such as no earthly
power is capable of producing. They have taken
knowledge of these members of the church that
they have been with Jesus and that the Spirit of
Jesus dwells with them and in them. But be that
as it may, we are convinced that since the day of
Pentecost the Holy Spirit has worked success-
fully with and upon the human race both
corporately and individually. By His twofold
working with and through the followers of
Christ He has made this a better world, a more
moral world, a more merciful world, a world
that is opening its eyes to the fact that God is
love. Those persons are superficial in the inter-
pretation of history, who say that the church of
Christ has failed in her mission to regenerate
the human race. Do they point to the decline
and fall of the Roman Empire as an illustration
of what they say? Do they call our attention to
the late world war as another and more con-
vincing proof ? Our answer is, that if they would
look below the surface of history, they would see
that neither of these events proves their assertion.
As to the decline and fall of the Roman Empire
it began to decline before die Church of Christ
The Holy Spirit
103
was established and was corrupt to the heart,
and was fast hastening to its fall before any
missionaries of the church took the Gospel to
Rome. The missionaries did not, indeed, prevent
the Roman Empire from being broken into frag-
ments, but this they did, or rather this the Holy
Spirit did through the truths they preached and
taught. He made of the fragments thereof
nations, that were better morally and spiritually
than the old Empire; nations whose citizens loved
truth and righteousness and justice more than its
citizens, especially the citizens that ruled it. Great
were the evils that accompanied the destruction of
this mighty Empire, but the Holy Spirit brought
good out of them. In some mysterious way, we do
not mean in some miraculous way in the strict
sense of that word, but in some mysterious way
He made these evils work together for the better-
ment of the human race. It is a historic fact that
the Holy Spirit worked with success even during
that awful catastrophe, the breaking into pieces
of the mighty Empire of Rome.
As to the late world war, that is no argument
that the Christian Church, or, as some prefer to
say, the Christian Religion has been a failure in
making this world better. Paradoxical, as it may
sound, the people of the world were more moral
and spiritual when the war began and during the
io4
The Holy Spirit
years it raged than the people of the world had
ever been in any previous age. The large
majority of the nations, especially the Christian
nations, did not wish that war, and strove hard
through their representatives to prevent it.
History puts the blame on one nation, probably
on two. As it is in the natural world, so in the
rational world; a spark will sometimes produce
a conflagration. A few individuals or a few
nations can sometimes set the world on fire. The
solidarity of the human race is such that the
many have often to suffer because of the few.
One or two of the nations dragged the others
into the conflict. The many had to go into the
conflict in order to protect themselves, and to
save civilization from extermination. The allied
nations, which composed by far the majority of
the people of the world conducted the war more
humanely than any war of any proportion had
ever been conducted before. The Holy Spirit
had worked on the minds and consciences of the
rulers of these nations with more success than
He had ever worked before on the rulers of the
nations, and, no doubt, He operated with and in
the individual soldiers that composed the fighting
forces ethically and spiritually as He had never
done in any previous conflict. In that awful
conflict when the very foundations seemed to be
The Holy Spirit 105
shaken and men's hearts were failing them for
fear of a universal upheaval, the Lord God
Omnipotent was reigning, heaven looked on with
grave interest, yea, participated in the struggle,
the Holy Spirit, the Third Person of the blessed
Trinity was present, not only beholding, but also
working, working mightily, working on the side
of the Allies because the Allies were on the side
of truth and righteousness. He worked on the
side of the Allies, silently indeed, but powerfully
because silently, bringing mighty things to pass.
At the time, no doubt, few if any could penetrate
His mysterious working and see Him at work.
But we, who can look back on it, and see it with
the light of history thrown on it, can penetrate it,
though not far, yet far enough to declare with
thankful hearts in the language of the poet,
"God moves in a mysterious way
His wonders to perform,
He plants His footsteps in the sea,
And rides upon the storm.
The Holy Spirit it was, who was the great victor
in the world war. The historians, of course,
give most if not all the praise to human beings
for the victory. Most of them see only the
human element in the victory. A few perhaps,
see the divine element, but very dimly. They
seem to forget that the Lord God omnipotent
io6
The Holy Spirit
reigneth. They ascribe the glory of the victory
to weak mortals. The English Historians give
most of the glory to the English forces, the
French historians give most of the glory to the
French forces, and the American historians give
most of the glory to the American forces, so
strong is prejudice in the minds of weak mortals.
But the divine element was greater by far than
the human element in that victory. The arm that
triumphed was the arm of the Lord. If the
historian St. Luke were now on the earth he
would inform the readers of the world that songs
of triumph are due to God the Holy Spirit.
If St. Paul were among us, he would say now
substantially what he said nineteen hundred years
ago. He said then, that he indeed planted and
Apostles watered, but it was God who gave the
increase. So would he say in this twentieth
century, if he were in our midst, the allied forces
fought and agonized, but the Holy Spirit it was,
who gave them the victory.
But in saying that the Holy Spirit fought with
the Allies, we do not mean to say, that He
approves of war. He does not. He did not
wish that late war. He had nothing t odo with
originating it. The wickedness and ignorance
of men are responsible for it. When the Allies
tried to prevent it, the Holy Spirit was with
The Holy Spirit
107
them, and assisted them in their splendid attempt.
And (though His assistance did not make their
splendid attempt a success, that did not mean that
in the future He would let the wicked have their
way in making the earth a veritable hell. The
Holy Spirit does not always succeed in contend-
ing with the powers of evil. The history of this
planet is, that the powers of evil often obtain
temporary victory over the spirit of righteousness
and peace. Such undoubtedly is the history of
this planet, explain the mystery as men will.
But it is also the history of this planet that truth
crushed to the earth will rise again. Though the
Spirit of God may fail again and again because
of the sin and ignorance of man to accomplish
some great purpose for the human race. He
does not fail to accomplish it in the end. So
since the termination of the great war He has
not ceased working to prevent wars in the future.
No sooner did victory crown the arms of the
allied nations than they resumed their efforts
through their representatives to eliminate war
from human affairs. To this end the Peace Con-
ference was convened at Versailles. To this
end the Conference for the Limitation of Arma-
ments was convened at Washington. Both con-
ferences have contributed much toward perpetual
peace on this planet. Never before have such
io8
The Holy Spirit
great efforts been made to accomplish this pur-
pose. Never before has such success followed
the efforts toward its accomplishment. Much
praise is due to the representatives of the nations.
More praise is due to the people of the nations,
who were behind these representatives urging
them on. But praise beyond comparison is due
to the Holy Spirit, who was behind both people
and their representatives inspiring them and in-
citing them. The Holy Spirit it was, we may
say, who convened these conferences and pre-
sided over them. The work that has been lately
accomplished to terminate war in the future is
prophetic of the day when according to the
prophetic teaching of Scripture the nations will
learn war no more.
As the Holy Spirit has worked with success
during the past nineteen hundred years in con-
quering the world for Christ, so in the future will
He continue to work until the conquest is com-
pleted. To conquer the world for Christ does
not mean simply to make people nominally the
disciples of Christ, as we have intimated. It
means a great deal more. It means to make
people disciples of Christ indeed and in truth,
disciples, who have the Spirit of Christ Himself,
the spirit to think and to do the things that are
right. Suppose that the missionaries were soon
The Holy Spirit 109
to succeed by their preaching in moving the
people in every part of the inhabited world to
acknowledge Christ as their Saviour publicly by
being baptized in the name of the triune God and
to submit to the laying on of hands in Confirma-
tion; suppose that through their teaching all the
people everywhere should habitually present
themselves at the administration of the Holy
Communion, and thus commemorate the love of
their Lord in dying for them and rising again;
would such external loyalty alone to their Lord
prove that the world had ben conquered for
Christ? By no means. If the sacraments and
ordinances of the Church were not to them the
power of God unto salvation, if they were not to
them means of grace, but only empty signs, if
they still continued in their sins, if they con-
tinued to live principally for the pleasures of the
world or for the accumulation of the riches of
the world or for the attainment of the honors
of the world, then would that grand prophecy
still remain unfulfilled, "The kingdom of this
world shall become the kingdom of the Lord
Jesus Christ. Not until the majority at least
of the people of this world become in addition to
their nominal loyalty to their Lord by making use
of the Christian sacraments and ordinances loyal
also to His teaching, which demands the new-
no
The Holy Spirit
birth, birth from above, birth by the Holy Spirit,
which means following after righteousness and
holiness all their days, even to the end of life;
not until this happens in the history of this world
will this prophecy, can this prophecy, see its real
fulfillment. It is in this high sense, that the
Holy Spirit in the past nineteen hundred years
has partly conquered the world for Christ. It
is in this high sense that He is now working and
will continue to work to conquer the world for
Christ until the conquest is complete. We have
no doubt whatsoever that He will succeed in com-
pleting the conquest. Men, who spoke and wrote
under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, pre-
dieted it. Not only so. It is one of those pre-
dictions whose fulfilment is guaranteed by the
eternal predestination of God.
Predestination is to some persons an unwel-
come word, a word that creates in their minds
an unpleasant impression, a word that recalls
those controversies in the past, in which the
goodness and justice of God were impugned.
It is a word, that has no doubt been abused.
But it is a great word if properly defined. It is
a word full of inspiration and comfort. It is,
we know, a scriptural expression. It is one of
the favorite expressions of St. Paul. As used by
him we see some of the greatness of God, and
The Holy Spirit
hi
because the greatness of God, the love of God.
I think it can be defined thus, "It is the deter-
mined purpose of God from all eternity to bestow
upon His rational creatures some of His rich
blessings. This is a limited definition, no doubt,
but so far as it goes it is a true definition. The
eternal predestination of God is always a predes-
tination to life and blessedness, never to death
and destruction. When He decreed in the eternal
counsels the occurrence of events in the history
of the universe they were events that were
fraught with rich benignity to His rational crea-
tures. Some events have happened on this planet,
that have brought misery to the human race, but
these were not predestined by God; for instance,
the transgression of the divine law by man. Man
and not God is responsible for this. It is
grievious to God. But there are some events,
that have occurred on this planet, that were con-
ceived and purposed in the divine intellect, such
as the Incarnation of the Son of God. It was
the purpose of the great Jehovah before the
morning stars sang together and the Sons of God
shouted for joy that God should become man in
the manger in Bethlehem to elevate man to the
throne of God. There are also some events that
will occur in the future, that never were decreed
in the counsels of eternity. If eternal punish-
112
The Holy Spirit
ment be visited upon the ungodly, who will not
be moved to repentance by the love of God, it
will not be because it was purposed by their
Creator. Such events as this take place contrary
to the will of God. But there are events, we are
sure, that will take place in the future history of
this world, that are according to His will. One
of these will be the complete conquest of this
world by the Holy Spirit for our Incarnate Lord.
This event is guaranteed by the everlasting pre-
destination of God. It will happen. It can not
but happen. It has been determined. The word
has gone forth, and the word of our God abideth
forever. Said the inspired Hebrew prophet long
years ago, "The grass withereth, the flower
fadeth, but the word of our God shall stand
forever. That great purpose, as well as all the
great purposes that were conceived in the mind
of God before the beginning of time, will become
effectual by the operation of the Holy Spirit.
As we have said, He began nineteen hundred
years ago to make it an accomplished fact and
no doubt has been successful, especially during
the last one hundred years. During this period
of the history of the human race we see plainly,
unless we have eyes that can not see, that the
human race has progressed morally and spir-
itually, and because morally and spiritually,
The Holy Spirit
ii3
therefore intellectually and even physically.
During this period slavery has been abolished
everywhere in the Christian world, duelling has
become a thing of the past, prize-fighting has
almost disappeared, being regarded by the best
people as coarse and degrading, war has become
odious in the estimation of the majority of the
people of the Christian nations, who through
their representatives are struggling hard to pre-
vent it, and the liquor question has been taken
in hand by one of the great nations of the world,
perhaps, the most progressive of all the nations,
which by legislation is making a mighty effort
to stop the flooding of this country with the
pernicious intoxicating beverages. Thus has the
executive of the Godhead been at work to make
effectual the eternal predestination of God and
to hasten the time when the kingdoms of this
world will become the kingdom of God and His
Christ.
A magnificent destiny is awaiting the human
race on this planet, a destiny more magnificent
even than that Mr. Wells pictures in his work
entitled "The Outline of History. In the con-
eluding pages of this work Mr. Wells appears
in the role of a prophet. He gives us a glorious
vision of the future destiny of the human race
on this planet. To him the day will surely come
114
The Holy Spirit
in the history of this planet when God will bestow
upon the creatures made in His image His bless-
ings with a richness which will far eclipse His
blessings in any previous ages. Among the many
factors, that will bring about this great improve-
ment the main factors will be education and
religion. So he declares. And in saying thus, no
doubt, he speaks as a true prophet. We believe
that education and religion, but especially religion
will be the chief instruments, through which God
will work toward this great improvement of His
rational creatures. But there is one declaration
in his prophecy, to which we can not give our
assent. He tells us that the religion that will help
so much to produce the great improvement will
not be any religion now known to the world.
It will not be Mohammedanism. It will not be
Buddhism. It will not be even Christianity. But
it will be a religion superior to any of these.
Holding the view he does about the Founder of
the Christian religion, of course it is natural that
he would hold the view he does about His
religion. Mr. Wells does not believe in the
Divinity of Christ. He regards Christ as a very
great man, the greatest man the world has ever
known, but still only a man. He can not say,
"I believe in the Deity of the Son of God.
Holding this belief, he can not say, if he be a
The Holy Spirit
"5
man of good logical powers, that the religion of
Christ is such that it will be a mighty factor in
achieving the glorious destiny that awaits the
human race/ No religion founded by a mere
man can suit the human race in all stages of its
development. The knowledge of man is too
limited for that. The wisdom of man is too
imperfect for that. Only a being, who has the
wisdom and omniscience of God could found
such a religion. But the Founder of the Chris-
tian religion is such a being. He is more than
man. He is God as well as man. He is the
Second Person of the adorable Trinity, having
all power and knowledge and wisdom in heaven
and earth. The presumption therefore is, that
the religion He left behind Him when He ascend-
ed to heaven nineteen hundred years ago was
such as would abide forever. And the presump-
tion becomes to us a certainty when we open the
New Testament and read the utterances of those
disciples of His, who spoke and wrote under the
inspiration of the Holy Spirit. If Mr. Wells had
a glorious vision of the future destiny of the
human race, St. Paul and St. John had a more
glorious vision. Through these inspired disciples
of our Lord the Holy Spirit revealed to the world
the truth, that the day would come when the
knowledge of the Lord would cover the earth
ii6
The Holy Spirit
as the waters cover the sea, and that men every-
where would be blessed with a civilization richer
by far than any ever conceived by the unassisted
intellect of man. And through them He revealed
the fact that the great factor in that civilization
would be the religion of Christ as He left it at
His glorious ascension, supplemented, of course,
by the words and acts of the Vicar of Christ
from the day of Pentecost to the completion of
the New Testament Scriptures.
The truths of the religion of Christ, as we
gather them out of the New Testament, will
never become obsolete. They will always be
living truths. The more they are fathomed
greater will be their richness, greater will be their
power. They will ever be an inexhaustible foun-
tain, supplying the needs of the human race down
to the great consummation. Through them the
Holy Spirit will constantly work to make real
that glorious vision of St. Paul and St. John of
the future destiny of the creatures made in the
image of God. Through them the Holy Spirit
will produce a civilization sometime in the future,
which will far eclipse any that men have dreamed
of, who have not grasped the religion of Christ
in its spirit. We may say, that the civilization
that even the great men have dreamed of, who
have not thus grasped the Christian religion, is
The Holy Spirit
ii 7
composed of the three elements, the physical,
the intellectual, and the moral. It is possible for
such a civilization to be great. Suppose that in
the future the intellect of man should make many
more useful discoveries and inventions far more
useful than any that have ever yet been made
—and no doubt that is possible—and suppose
that the morals of men generally should be much
superior to the morals of men now; suppose that
the commandments, "Thou shalt not murder,
"Thou shalt not commit adultery, "Thou shalt
not steal, "Thou shalt not bear false witness,
as well as the rest of the moral law, should be
strictly observed by men generally, would not
that be a blessed civilization; would not that be
a great benediction to the human race? No one
can but answer this question in the affirmative.
But the civilization, that the New Testament
Prophets saw in their vision will be composed
of four elements. In addition to the three just
mentioned will be the spiritual element. That
means necessarily a civilization of much greater
superiority. Persons, who are spiritual, who
have been regenerated by the Spirit, who walk
in the Spirit, who pray in the Spirit, who com-
mune with God the Spirit, who under the inspir-
ation of the Spirit dream dreams and see visions,
are much more blessed and much more exalted
n8 The Holy Spirit
in the estimation of God than are those who
know nothing of the working of the spirit, no
matter how much they may be blessed physically,
intellectually, and even morally. Such blessed
civilization then, the civilization in which these
four elements are united will some day be the
possession of the human race. When that will
arrive we do not know. It may arrive a hundred
years hence. It may not arrive for thousands of
years. It matters not, it will certainly arrive.
It was predicted by men, who were taught by
the Spirit, and their prediction is guaranteed by
the eternal predestination of God.
When the Holy Spirit succeeds in blessing the
human race with such a civilization and thus
conquering the world for Christ, then will Christ
return from heaven and become King of Kings
and Lord of Lords. In certain senses, indeed,
Christ has returned to earth since His ascension
from Olivet. He returned spiritually on the day
of Pentecost. He returned providentially at the
destruction of Jerusalem. He returned both
spiritually and providentially at the great Refor-
rnation in the sixteenth century. But at the great
consummation He will return in another sense.
He will return in person. He will return in
visible form as He left the earth from Olivet.
Nineteen hundred years ago He ascended to
The Holy Spirit
119
heaven as the God-man. So at the end of this
dispensation He will come again to this world
as the God-man. He will come to reign with
His saints on the earth as the God-man. He
will then address to them such blessed words as
these, "Come ye blessed of my Father, inherit
the kingdom prepared for you from the founda-
tion of the world. From their hearts full of
gratitude and love will arise the hymn of triumph,
"Thou art worthy to receive dominion and power
and glory. We praise Thee, O God, we acknow-
ledge Thee to be the Lord. Thou art the King of
Glory, O Christ. Thou are the everlasting Son
of the Father. Crown Him, crown Him, Lord
of all.
That will be a great day in the history of this
planet when Christ comes again in the glory of
heaven. It will be a day that will proclaim to
the universe that God loves righteousness and
hates iniquity. It will be a day that will proclaim
to the universe, that the earth was made for the
righteous. It will be a day that will proclaim to
the universe the truth that Christ taught in the
sermon on the mount—long years ago when He
said, "Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit
the earth. The saints will then come in
possession of what was originally made for them.
In a certain sense this world will be theirs. As
120
The Holy Spirit
it will belong to Christ, it will, therefore, also
belong to them. What will be Christ's will also
be theirs. His glory will be in a certain sense
their glory. They will share, we are taught, in
His glory. In that day they will be like Christ,
for they will see Him as He is. The reward,
that will be awarded them, will be the possession
of the earth, not, indeed, in their natural bodies,
but in bodies that will be spiritual. For Scripture
assures us that when Christ returns to the earth
in person at the end of the world, that all His
saints that will then be alive on the earth will
undergo a mighty bodily change, their bodies
becoming like His own glorious body. They will
reign with Christ. They will be very near to
Christ. They will be like Him. They will be
like Him spiritually. They will be like Him
bodily. As His body is immortal, so will their
bodies be immortal. They will never die. They
will never suffer. They will be immune to sick-
ness and disease. They will be pneumatic
bodies. Yes, verily, our old earth is marching
on to a glorious goal. She is old in years, but
not in vigor and vitality. She is ever renewing
her powers of rejuvenation. Even from a
material standpoint she is progressing and will
continue to progress. That was the meaning of
the prophet when he wrote in that beautiful
The Holy Spirit 121
poetic language, "The wilderness and the solitary
place shall be glad for them, and the desert shall
rejoice and blossom as the rose. That is what
the apostle St. Paul taught when he uttered those
rich and charming words, "For I reckon that the
sufferings of this present time are not worthy to
be compared with the glory which shall be re-
vealed to us-ward. For the earnest expectation of
the creation waiteth for the revealing of the
sons of God. For the creation was subjected
to vanity, not of its own will but by reason of
him who subjected it, in hope that the creation
itself also shall be delivered from the bondage of
corruption into the liberty of the glory of the
children of God. There will be no doubt a great
mterialistic improvement in the earth before the
close of this dispensation. It will be effected
through the exertions of the saints of God.
When the Holy Spirit succeeds in conquering the
world for Christ and He shall appear in person
in the glory of heaven, then the material creation
will sympathetically, as it were, unite with the
saints of God in rejoicing over die victory, and
praising and magnifying His name; the saints
of God, we say; we mean all the saints of God;
not only those who will be changed as to their
bodies then living, but also all those, who have
died from the beginning and shall die to that
122
The Holy Spirit
hour, for we are assured by St. Paul that at that
day all those who are in their graves will hear the
voice of the Son of God and will be clothed then
with new bodies, though the same bodies, the
same in identity, but new in every other respect.
At that great day can we not imagine that
innumerable company of the saints of God,
knowing, as they will, that the material earth was
benefitted by the victory of Christ as well as
they, will call upon it to rejoice with them in
blessing the Lord? Can we not in imagination
hear them saying in language similar to the
language of our Benedicite, though more rhyth-
mical, "O all ye works of the Lord, bless ye the
Lord; praise Him and magnify Him forever;
O let the earth bless the Lord; yea, let it praise
Him and magnify Him forever.
CHAPTER V
THE HOLY SPIRIT, IN COOPERATION WITH THE
FATHER AND THE SON, THE PERFECTER OF
THE SAINTS THROUGHOUT ETERNITY
The question naturally presents itself to us,
will the Holy Spirit continue to work with and
in the saints after the great change that will be
effected at the personal coming of the Lord Jesus
Christ ? The answer to be returned to this ques-
tion according to the teaching of the New Testa-
ment is, we believe, that He will continue to so
work. To those who say that He will not con-
tinue thus to work, because the saints will then
be perfect and will not need, therefore, His
assistance, we would remind them that the saints
will not be absolutely perfect after that great
change. They will, indeed, be relatively perfect,
but they will not be perfect in an absolute sense.
They will not be perfect as their Father in heaven
is perfect. Compared to their condition before
the coming of Christ from heaven they will be
perfect. They will be more like God then than
they were before, they will be more holy, indeed
they will be without sin in any form which will
not be true of them previously to the return of
their Lord from heaven. They will continue to
grow in grace as well as in knowledge after the
123
124
The Holy Spirit
resurrection. Indeed, throughout eternity they
will learn more and more about God, they will
understand better His attributes in their won-
derful manifestations and operations, indeed
their conceptions of His very mysterious nature
will be enlarged. So too throughout eternity they
will progress in their ethical relations to Him,
they will approximate nearer to His perfect
holiness, they will become more and more like
Him in His unspeakable love. But it will be
impossible for them to improve intellectually and
ethically in their own strength and activity.
They will need a more potent dynamic than they
possess in their own nature. They will need the
Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit, no doubt, will
work with and in them throughout eternity.
He will not stand to them in the relation of
Vicar of Christ throughout eternity. He will
necessarily resign that office when Christ returns
to earth in the glory of heaven. But after that
event He will stand to them in the relation of
the executive of the Godhead. Such seems to
be the teaching of the New Testament. As the
executive of the Godhead He worked upon them
and with them when they lived on the earth.
When they were citizens of earth He was to
them as revealer of God. He revealed to them
the truths of God, and through these truths He
The Holy Spirit 125
worked upon their souls and spirits, purifying
them and sanctifying them and drawing them
nearer to the divine heart. So when they become
citizens of heaven, He will continue to be a
Revealer to them. He will enlighten their minds
more and more with new verities concerning the
Godhead and through these will operate on their
souls and spirits, making them more and more
holy and lovely and consequently more and more
blissful. When they were on the earth in the
flesh, we know, their bodies were the temples
of the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit after re-
generating them made His abode in their bodies,
though these were not perfectly free from sin
and the stains of sin. Sinful though these were,
He was content to dwell in them to cleanse them
and to sanctify them, and thus make them fit
instruments through which He could work on
their souls and spirits. It is the teaching of St.
Paul, that the saints of God on the earth are
in their triune nature under the constant influence
and power of the Holy Spirit. It was the prayer
of St. Paul that his fellow Christians would
remain blameless and would improve in body and
soul and spirit until the coming of the Lord and
Saviour Jesus Christ. If the bodies of the
saints are the temples of the Holy Spirit, though
stained with sin, for they are never void of sin
126 The Holy Spirit
while on the earth, is it not reasonable to believe
that after they become spiritual bodies and are
entirely without sin or any of its stains He will
continue to dwell with them and make them
befitting receptacles of their ever improving
souls and spirits throughout eternity? We can
not positively affirm that the Holy Spirit will
dwell with and in the saints as the executive of
the Godhead throughout eternity, but we know
for a certainty that He will dwell with and in
them. He will dwell with and in them as the
Third Person of the adorable Trinity. There are
persons who would not thus express themselves.
They would not hesitate to say, indeed, that God
would dwell in them and work upon them, if
they believe that they would continue to improve
all the days of their existence, for they would
need His assistance, as they would be powerless
of themselves to help themselves. But they
would not admit that the Third Person of the
Trinity would perform that blessed work for
them and in them. They would say, that they
do not believe there are three divine Persons in
the Godhead. They would say, that their doc-
trine is that there is but one divine Person in
the Godhead. These persons would simply con-
fess, therefore, that God will continue to abide
with the saints after the return of Christ from
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127
heaven and assist them in their never-ending
improvement. It will be God, of course, who
will abide with them and work toward their
improvement. But the Holy Spirit, the Third
Person of the Trinity is God, and there is but
one God.
In speaking of the Father, Son, and Holy
Spirit as Persons we must bear in mind that they
are not persons in the sense human beings are
persons. They are not persons in the sense that
James, John, and Peter are persons. James,
John, and Peter are three separate, three different
beings. If we were to speak of the Father, the
Son, and the Holy Spirit as persons in the same
sense we speak of these individuals as persons we
would make three separate beings in the God-
head, that would amount to T ritheism, we would
be virtually acknowledging that there were three
Gods. Though we can not, if we would be
orthodox, use the word person in this sense in
speaking of die Father, and the Son, and the
Holy Spirit, yet in some sense it is permissible
to speak of them as persons. It is the best word
we know of that will give us some idea of the
distinctions in the Godhead. We are compelled
to use some word in calling attention to these
distinctions, and this word will better express
them than any word with which we are
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The Holy Spirit
acquainted. There are, we know, distinctions in
the Godhead. So teaches the whole New Testa-
ment. God is referred to in the New Testament
somtimes as Father, sometimes as Son, sometimes
as Holy Spirit, and in such a way that the con-
elusion is inevitable that there are real and deep
distinctions in the Godhead. Some persons have
tried to explain those passages, which teach that
the Father is God, that the Son is God, that the
Holy Spirit is God as meaning that the one God
merely manifests Himself in three ways. So
explained the real distinctions in the Godhead
would be destroyed, and the Christian religion
as it existed in the first century would not be the
true religion of Christ. Without doubt the
teachers of the church in primitive days believed
that there were real and fundamental distinctions
in the Godhead, and they used the best word
that could be found in human vocabulary to
express them. They selected the word "person.
That word has stood the test of time. No other
word has ever been substituted by the church.
It is the best word that can be found in human
vocabulary of this twentieth century. The time
may come when a more suitable word will be
evolved; and, no doubt, as soon as that happens,
that word will be substituted by the church.
There is but one God. That is one of the funda-
The Holy Spirit
129
mental truths of the Bible. But there are real
and eternal distinctions in the Godhead. That
is also a fundamental truth. These distinctions
are three, neither more nor less. Early in the
history of the church they were designated as
persons. Therefore we may say without being
guilty of heterodoxy, that the Father is God, the
Son is God, the Holy Spirit is God, yet there are
not three Gods but one God; so the Father is
almighty, the Son is almighty, the Holy Spirit is
almighty, yet there are not three almighties but
one almighty. So too, we think, it is permissible
to say, that the Father created us, the Son created
us, the Holy Spirit created us, yet there are not
three creators but one Creator, and that the Son
redeemed us, the Father redeemed us, the Holy
Spirit redeemed us, yet there are not three re-
deemers but one Redeemer; and that the Holy
Spirit sanctifies us, the Father sanctifies us, the
Son sanctifies us, yet there are not three sancti-
tiers but one Sanctifier. ' We believe also that
it is according to the teaching of Scripture to
affirm that the Triune God will work with and in
the saints of God throughout eternity toward
their improvement. There will be a blessed
cooperation of the three divine Persons in mak-
ing the saints more like Christ in body, soul, and
spirit as aeon succeeds aeon.
CHAPTER VI
COOPERATION, A LESSON LEARNED FROM THE WORK
OF THE HOLY SPIRIT IN COOPERATION WITH
THE FATHER AND THE SON
This leads me to say that the doctrine of the
Trinity is a practical doctrine. The doctrine of
the Trinity was revealed not only for the intellect
of man, but also for his moral nature. It was,
no doubt, revealed for his intellect. It is the
will of God that man should study it and ponder
it as much as he can, and learn all he can
concerning it. Indeed, God would have him use
his mental faculties on all the truths contained
in the Scriptures. Indeed, it is the divine com-
mand that he should read and search all Holy
Scriptures. The Scriptures, we are assured,
were written for our learning. St. Paul com-
mended the Bereans for searching them daily.
They contain many precious truths, which God
would have us make our own by diligent study.
We should seek the truth no matter what the
truth may be and where it may be found. We
should endeavor to get possession of knowledge,
no matter what the nature of that knowledge may
be. We know that hundreds of years ago a great
many men, not only ignorant men, but well
educated men, believed that it was not according
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The Holy Spirit
to the will of God, that men should search for
knowledge in all domains. We know that hun-
dreds of years ago the majority of the most
learned men were opposed to scientific research,
and the few, who made scientific discoveries,
were persecuted and made to recant. And even
today, though no one is permitted to be prevented
by punishment for endeavoring to wrest from
nature her secrets, yet not a few frown upon the
attempt to do so, and call those who make the
attempt, foolish dreamers and visionaries. But we
do not believe that it is against the divine will
for man to search for truth and knowledge
wherever they may be found, whether in the
book of nature or in that divine book called the
Bible. On the contrary, we have no doubt that
it is according to the divine will that men search
for truth and knowledge in both of these books,
but especially in the divine book. The truths
contained in the Bible were written for our
learning. They were written for the improve-
ment of our minds. This is true even of that
truth that is so full of mystery, the truth of the
Trinity. Perhaps, we may say, that this is
especially true of the truth of the Trinity. The
doctrine of the Trinity, as we said, is full of
mystery. It will always be full of mystery.
The intellect of man will never thoroughly under-
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The Holy Spirit
stand it. The deep nature of God will ever be
beyond the comprehension of man. Still man
can learn a great deal about the Trinity. Many
of the truths involved in the Trinity are written
in the Scriptures for our learning. Men have
found out a great deal about the Trinity by
studying the Scriptures, and will, no doubt, find
out more as time bears the world on to the great
consummation. We in this twentieth century
are better acquainted with the Trinity than were
even the great thinkers of the church in the
fourth and fifth centuries, who gave to the world
the symbols of faith. Those, who follow us
will be more advanced in the study of this
mystery. The doctrine of the Trinity was re-
vealed for the intellect of man. But it was also
revealed for the moral nature of man. It was
revealed especially for the moral nature of man.
It was revealed to make man not only wiser, but
better, more moral and useful, more merciful,
more loving. It is a veiy practical doctrine. It
is practical in many ways.
Men can learn from it the great lesson of
cooperation. In the Godhead, there is no such
thing as competition. Competition has never ex-
isted in the Godhead. It never will exist, it never
can exist, in the Godhead. That were an im-
possibility. That is inconceivable. Before that
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133
could be possible it would be necessary for a
change to take place in the nature of the triune
God. It has been said by some good thinkers,
that there is such a thing as holy rivalry among
the saints of God. Whether that be true, we
will not say, but we will say that there is no holy
rivalry in the blessed Godhead. The blessed
Godhead is too holy for any rivalry no matter
how holy. But we may say, it is my belief, that
there is a blessed cooperation in the Godhead.
I know that there are some good persons, who
will not admit it, but lift up holy hands in denying
it. But notwithstanding I make bold to affirm
that it is not heterodoxy to use such language in
connection with the Godhead. Deep down in
the nature of the triune God there is a great
reality, which no word of which we are
acquainted can express as well as this word
"cooperation. That word does not by any
means adequately express the reality, but it gives
us a better conceptio nof it than any other word
in our vocabulary will. It is with this word as
with the word person. As we have said, early in
the history of the Christian religion the church
found it necessary to give expression to the
distinctions in the Godhead which are revealed
in the New Testament Scriptures, and the word
she selected for that purpose was "person, the
134
The Holy Spirit
most adequate of all the words in the vocabulary
of man. It was not, indeed, a perfectly adequate
word, but a word more adequate than any other
known word, and gave some conception of these
distinctions in the Godhead. The same may be
said to be true of the word "cooperation. The
operation of the triune God for the welfare of
the human race dates from the beginning in the
form of predestination. It has been going on
ever since in some form or another. If the God
of the New Testament were the God of Arius, or
of any man, who like Arius denies the Divinity
of the Son and the Holy Spirit then this word
would be unsuitable to use. But as He is not the
God of the Unitarian, no matter in what form his
unitarianism is held, but is the God of the
Trinitarian, this word is surely permissible.
It is permissible to use it in speaking of the
triune God, the God in whose Godhead there
are three eternal and fundamental distinctions,
the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. It is
permissible to say, that the three divine Persons,
the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit planned
and cooperated in working for the salvation and
the glorification of the human race. So that the
doctrine of the Trinity is a very practical
doctrine.
We learn from it the important lesson of
The Holy Spirit 135
cooperation. As there was cooperation in the
Godhead in redeeming man, as there is coopera-
tion in the Godhead in sanctifying man, so it
is the will of the triune God that men should
cooperate in assisting one another in attaining
unto salvation and in conquernig the world for
Christ. Sad to say, that from time immemorial
competition has reigned in the world. As far
back as history can take us we find the human
race under control of competition. And
generally the competition has been of a very
undesirable kind, such as comes under the con-
demnation of God, such as is forbidden by the
eighth commandment, if that commandment is
interpreted in that comprehensive way that the
Saviour in the sermon on the mount interpreted
several of the ten sayings. From the earliest
times men in competing with one another have
been guilty of dishonesty, trying in every way
possible to take advantage of one another. The
rich in competing with the rich have taken ad-
vantage of one another in order to add to their
treasures on earth, though they knew that these
treasures might take to themselves wings and fly
away, or that surely time on its rapid wing would
soon separate them from these forever. The
poor in competing with the poor have taken
advantage of one another, that they might make
136 The Holy Spirit
a livelihood, or that they might rise higher in
the world, though they ought to have known that
in thus endeavoring to elevate themselves they
were debasing themselves. Indeed, in every de-
partment of life ever since the human race began
its career on earth dishonest competition has
prevailed. It has existed in the legal profession.
It has existed in the medical profession. It 'has
manifested itself in the scientific world. It has
been clearly visible in the political world; yea,
so clearly visible, that a man, though a fool could
not help seeing it. It has not been absent from
the theological world. Men in every walk of life
from time immemorial have in competing with
one another injured one another. In competing
with one another they have deprived one another
of money or lands, or houses or goods or the
opportunity of rising in the world or their repu-
tation or their good name, using that popular
expression, but an expression upon which heaven
does not smile, "Every man for himself, but God
for us all. But competition as it has existed
among human beings has not always been dis-
honest. It has also been honest. In every age
of the world there have been persons, who have
competed with their fellowmen sincerely and
fairly. This has been especially true since the
birth of Christ. Since the dawn of Christianity
The Holy Spirit
13 7
men in increasing numbers have dealt justly and
charitably with one another, obeying the com-
mand of the Master, "Whatsoever ye would that
men should do to you, do ye even so to them.
The human race has been much benefitted by
honest competition. God does not frown upon
it. It is, we believe, according to His will. But
there is a more excellent way of benefitting the
human race. It is the way of cooperation.
This is the divine way. This is the way the
Saviour taught when He was on the earth. This
is the way the apostles proclaimed after His
ascension into glory. That is the meaning of the
very existence of the Christian Church. But
the Christian centuries have been slow in seeing
it, or, if they have clearly seen it, they surely
have been tardy in reducing their knowledge to
practise. Christians in no great numbers in any
of the epochs of the Christian Church have
sincerely and lovingly cooperated in conquering
the world for their master and in saving and
exalting the human race. And until they do
thus cooperate the conquest of the world for
Christ can not be effected. Until God's way of
converting and blessing the world is adopted,
Satan will rule the world in the sense that the
majority of the human race will be under his
influence and guidance, war, the greatest of all
138 The Holy Spirit
the evils that afflict mankind, will do its devilish
and destructive work, and, of course, the many
evils that inevitably proceed from war will con-
tinue with their demoralizing and debasing
effects. But we are glad to say that the Chris-
tians of this epoch, in which our lot is cast, have
grasped the idea of cooperation as those of no
previous epoch have grasped it. In the last two
or three decades the people of the Christian
nations have been working together to exter-
minate war, as well as some other evils that afflict
mankind, with a sincerity and an earnestness and
an intelligence, which far eclipse the efforts of
Christians of any previous days. So that all
persons, who possess the gift of reading the
times, cannot but be optimistic and prophesy in
the language of Scripture that some day there
will be war no more, and from the rising of the
sun unto the going down of the same, cooperation
will do its divine and predestined work and Christ
will reign on the earth the King of Kings and the
Lord of Lords.
CHAPTER VII
THE IMPORTANCE OF SEEKING FOR KNOWLEDGE
CONCERNING THE HOLY SPIRIT
In conclusion I would urge upon my readers
to consider well the Holy Spirit. Give to Him
your best thoughts. Give to Him your deepest
study. Study His nature and functions with the
whole of your mental strength. It is true of the
large majority of Christians of this age, that
their knowledge of the Holy Spirit is very
limited. Of course, it can not be said of them
what was said of some of the disciples of our
Lord in the first century, that they had not so
much as heard whether there be any Holy Spirit.
They have often heard of Him,, and have con-
fessed Him and have prayed to Him and have
adored Him. But their confession has been lip-
confession, their prayer lip-prayer, their adora-
tion lip-adoration. A very little intelligence and
spirit have been put into their confession and
prayer and adoration. They know very little
about the Holy Spirit. They know a great deal
more about some other facts and truths of Scrip-
ture, which can not be compared in importance
to knowledge about Him. It has been so for
all these nineteen hundred years. The teachers
139
140
The Holy Spirit
of the church have not done their duty in their
teaching concerning Him. They have in their
teaching and discussions emphasized some other
facts and truths more than the truths concerning
Him, for instance Baptism, Confirmation, the
Christian Ministry, and the Holy Communion,
although the New Testament attaches a great
deal more importance to the truths concerning
Him than to these facts and truths. The New
Testament is full of the Holy Spirit. He engages
much more of its space than these do. This is
true of the four Gospels. This is true of die
Acts of the Apostles. This is true of the many
Epistles. The doctrine of the Holy Spirit has
been very much neglected by the teachers of the
Church. Her doctors of divinity have not given
sufficient time and attention to the stody of His
nature and work. But this will not always be
the case. This can not always be the case, if
the Christianity of the New Testament is the
religion of Christ. If the religion of the New
Testament is the religion of Christ, then, no
doubt, the Holy Spirit will be the great truth
under consideration in the future history of the
church. I would ask my readers to remember
this and strive to anticipate that glorious day by
giving their best mental strength to the study of
the Holy Spirit. You may not be on earth when
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141
that day arrives to rejoice with them who will
then rejoice. But if you will not then be mem-
bers of the church militant, you will be among
those disciples of our Lord, whose knowledge of
the Holy Spirit will be more advanced than the
knowledge of any of the members of the church
militant in any future age of the history of that
church. The more you learn about the Holy
Spirit in the church militant the better prepared
you will be to take your place when you are
transferred to the church triumphant. Let this
exquisite hymn daily arise from your hearts as
time bears you on to your great change.
Come Holy Spirit, eternal God,
Proceeding from above,
Both from the Father and the Son,
The God of peace and love;
Visit our minds, into our hearts
Thy heavenly grace inspire;
That truth and godliness we may
Pursue with full desire.
Thou art the very Comforter
In grief and all distress,
The heavenly gift of God most High,
No tongue can it express;
142 The Holy Spirit
The fountain and the living spring
Of joy celestial;
The fire so bright, the love so sweet,
The unction spiritual.
Thou in Thy gifts art manifold
By them Christ's Church doth stand;
In faithful hearts thou writ'st thy law,
The finger of God's hand.
O Holy Ghost, into our minds
Send down thy heavenly light;
Kindle our hearts with fervent zeal,
To serve God day and night.
Grant us the grace that we may know
The Father of all might,
That we of his beloved son
May gain the blissful sight;
And that we may with perfect faith
Ever acknowledge Thee,
The Spirit of Father and of Son,
One God in Persons Three.
This leads me to say, that if you would learn
all about the Holy Spirit that your mental facul-
ties are capable of discovering, it is necessary
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143
that you should study Him in connection with
the other persons of the Godhead, the Father
and the Son. The three Persons are indissolubly
associated. They are never separated from one
another. They are One in such a true and such
a mysterious sense, that we can not study one
to the best advantage without studying the others.
Let us consider well then the triune God. Let
us give our best thought and deepest meditation
to the Three in One and the One in Three. He
is the perennial Fountain of rich and inex-
haustible truth. The angels consider no employ-
ment so honorable and profitable as studying
Him in His nature and His functions. Let that
mind be in us that is in the angels. But if we
would become possessors of the deep things of
God in that degree that we are capable by the
gifts of nature of possessing, we must be sure
that the illuminating light from above fill our
minds and souls. And as it is only possible by
communion with God, by prayer to Him and
adoration of Him that we can possess this
illuminating light, we should be diligent in com-
muning with Him, in praying to Him and in
adoring Him. This we should do not now and
then, but daily and regularly and often, surely
not less than three times a day. And as thought
and desire and longing naturally assume the
144
The Holy Spirit
shape of words, we should see that we employ
the best and the most rhythmical language in
our devotions; for language has a great deal to
do in inspiring us and lifting up our minds and
souls to God. And I would suggest that, in our
private devotions in the morning and at noon
and in the evening and at all other times we may
withdraw from the world to our closets to
worship God, we use that beautiful and inspir-
ing and sublime chant that has come down to
us through the ages, "The Gloria Pratri. Let
us see that we use it, not mechanically, but
always with the understanding and the spirit.
Then we shall be surprised how much of the deep
things of God as contained in Scripture will be
unfolded to us. Then we shall see God in the
richness and complexity of His nature in a degree
we had never before dreamed of. As in our
private devotions, so in our devotions in the
sanctuary. Let us take with us in the sanctuary
the deep things of God, and ask Him by His
illuminating light to make them to us more visible
and more understandable. If in the churches
we attend the Gloria Patri occurs in the services,
then whenever it occurs let us see that we bow
our heads; but let us be sure that the bowing of
the head is a visible sign of an inward and
spiritual grace. Let us be sure that the bowing
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145
of the head proceeds from the bowing of the
heart. Let us never forget, that if we would
grasp the deep things of God as He would have
us grasp them, we must ask His assistance
through prayer. It is only through communion
with God that we can become acquainted with
God in His rich and complex nature.