When the Holy Ghost is Come Part 11

"It pleased G.o.d... to reveal His Son in me," wrote Paul (Gal. i.

15, 16); and again, "Christ liveth in me" (Gal. ii. 20); and again, "My little children, of whom I travail in birth again until Christ be formed in you" (Gal. iv. 19); as though Christ is to be spiritually formed in the heart of each believer by the operation of the Holy Spirit, as He was physically formed in the womb of Mary by the same Spirit (Luke i. 35); and again, "The mystery which hath been hid from ages and from generations, but now is made manifest to His saints,... which is Christ in you, the hope of glory" (Col. i. 26, 27); "That Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith" (Eph. iii. 17); "Examine yourselves, whether ye be in the faith; prove your own selves. Know ye not your own selves, how that Jesus Christ is in you, except ye be reprobates" (2 Cor. xiii. 5)?

"At that day," said Jesus, when making His great promise of the Comforter to His disciples, "At that day ye shall know that I am in My Father, and ye in Me, and I in you" (John xiv. 20); and again, in His great prayer, He said: "I have declared unto them Thy name, and will declare it: that the love wherewith Thou hast loved Me may be in them, and I in them."

It is this ever-recurring revelation to penitent, believing hearts, by the agency of the ever-present Holy Spirit, that makes faith in Jesus Christ living and invincible. "I know He is Lord, for He saves my soul from sin, and He saves me now," is an argument that rationalism and unbelief cannot answer nor overthrow, and so long as there are men in the world who can say this, faith in the divinity of Jesus Christ is secure; and this experience and witness come by the Holy Ghost.

"I worship Thee, O Holy Ghost, I love to worship Thee; My risen Lord for aye were lost But for Thy company."

And so it is by the guidance and teaching of the Holy Spirit that all saving truth becomes vital to us.

It is He that makes the Bible a living Book; it is He that convinces the world of judgment (John xvi. 8-11); it is He that makes men certain that there is a Heaven of surpa.s.sing and enduring glory and joy, and a h.e.l.l of endless sorrow and woe for those who sin away their day of grace and die in impenitence.

Who have been the mightiest and most faithful preachers of the gloom and terror and pain of a perpetual h.e.l.l? those who have been the mightiest and most effective preachers of G.o.d's compa.s.sionate love.

In all periods of great revival, when men seemed to live on the borderland, and in the vision of eternity, h.e.l.l has been preached. The leaders in these revivals have been men of prayer and faith and consuming love, but they have been men who knew "the terrors of the Lord," and, therefore, they preached the judgments of G.o.d, and they proved that the law with its penalties is a schoolmaster to bring men to Christ (Gal. iii. 24). Fox, the Quaker; Bunyan, the Baptist; Baxter, the Puritan; Wesley and Fletcher, and Whitefield and Caughey, the Methodists; Finney, the Presbyterian; Edwards and Moody, the Congregationalists; and General Booth, the Salvationist, have preached it, not savagely, but tenderly and faithfully, as a mother might warn her child against some great danger that would surely follow careless and selfish wrong-doing.

What men have loved and laboured and sacrificed as these men?

Their hearts have been a flaming furnace of love and devotion to G.o.d, and an over-flowing fountain of love and compa.s.sion for men; but just in proportion as they have discovered G.o.d's love and pity for the sinner, so have they discovered His wrath against sin and all obstinate wrong-doing; and as they have caught glimpses of Heaven and declared its joys and everlasting glories to men, so they have seen h.e.l.l, with its endless punishment, and with trembling voice and overflowing eyes have they warned men to "flee from the wrath to come."

Were these men, throbbing with spiritual life and consumed with devotion to the Kingdom of G.o.d and the everlasting well-being of their fellowmen, led to this belief by the Spirit of Truth, or were they misled? Is it the prophet, weeping and praying and preaching and fighting for G.o.d and men, to whom the Spirit has always first spoken and revealed the things of G.o.d? Or is it the philosopher, or dry-as-dust theologian, or the popular preacher of smooth things, sitting in his study and among his books, spinning out of his own mind his conceits concerning G.o.d's plan and purpose in the universe?

Does Seneca or the Psalmist, Plato or Paul, Rousseau or Wesley, the idolised, high-salaried, soft-raimented preacher of a wide gate and broad way to life and Heaven, or the veteran soul-winner, General Booth, more clearly make known the mind of G.o.d in matters that are spiritual?

"The things of the Spirit... are spiritually discerned" (I Cor.

ii. 14), says Paul. It is not by searching and philosophising that these things are found out, but by revelation. "Flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee," said Jesus to Peter, "but My Father which is in Heaven" (Matthew xvi. 17). The great teacher of truth is the Spirit of Truth, and the only safe expounders and guardians of sound doctrine are men filled with the Holy Ghost.

Study and research have their place, and an important place; but in spiritual things they will be no avail unless prosecuted by spiritual men. As well might men blind from birth attempt to study the starry heavens, and men born deaf undertake to expound and criticise the harmonies of Bach and Beethoven. Men must see and hear to speak and write intelligently on such subjects. And so men must be spiritually enlightened to understand spiritual truth.

The greatest danger to any religious organisation is that a body of men should arise in its ranks, and hold its positions of trust, who have learned its great fundamental doctrines by rote out of the catechism, but have no experimental knowledge of their truth inwrought by the mighty anointing of the Holy Ghost, and who are dest.i.tute of "an unction from the Holy One," by which, says John, "ye know all things" (1 John ii. 20, 27).

Why do men deny the divinity of Jesus Christ? Because they have never placed themselves in that relation to the Spirit, and met those unchanging conditions that would enable Him to reveal Jesus to them as Saviour and Lord.

Why do men dispute the inspiration of the Scriptures? Because the Holy Ghost, who inspired "holy men of G.o.d" to write the Book (2 Peter i. 21), hides its spiritual sense from unspiritual and unholy men.

Why do men doubt a Day of Judgment, and a state of everlasting doom? Because they have never been bowed and broken and crushed beneath the weight of their sin, and by a sense of guilt and separation from a holy G.o.d that can only be removed by faith in His dying Son.

A sportsman lost his way in a pitiless storm on a black and starless night. Suddenly his horse drew back and refused to take another step. He urged it forward, but it only threw itself back upon its haunches. Just then a vivid flash of lightning revealed a great precipice upon the brink of which he stood. It was but an instant, and then the pitchy blackness hid it again from view.

But he turned his horse and anxiously rode away from the terrible danger.

A distinguished professor of religion said to me some time ago, "I dislike, I abhor, the doctrine of h.e.l.l"; and then after a while added, "But three times in my life I have seen that there was eternal separation from G.o.d and an everlasting h.e.l.l for me, if I walked not in the way G.o.d was calling me to go."

Into the blackness of the sinner's night the Holy Spirit, who is patiently and compa.s.sionately seeking the salvation of all men, flashes a light that gives him a glimpse of eternal things which, heeded, would lead to the sweet peace and security of eternal day. For when the Holy Spirit is heeded and honoured, the night pa.s.ses, the shadows flee away, the day dawns, "the Sun of Righteousness arises with healing in His wings," and, saved and sanctified, men walk in His light in safety and joy. Doctrines which before were repellent to the carnal mind, and but foolishness, or a stumbling-block to the heart of unbelief, now become precious and satisfying to the soul; and truths which before were hid in impenetrable darkness, or seen only as through dense gloom and fog, are now seen clearly as in the light of broad day.

"Hold thou the faith that Christ is Lord, G.o.d over all, who died and rose; And everlasting life bestows On all who hear the living word.

For thee His life-blood He out-poured, His Spirit sets thy spirit free; Hold thou the faith--He dwells in thee, And thou in Him, and Christ is Lord!"

"HAVE YE RECEIVED THE HOLY GHOST SINCE YE BELIEVED?"

XV.

PRAYING IN THE SPIRIT.

"Ye shall receive power after that the Holy Ghost is come upon you."

An important work of the Holy Spirit is to teach us how to pray, instruct us what to pray for, and inspire us to pray earnestly, without ceasing, and in faith, for the things we desire and the things that are dear to the heart of the Lord.

In a familiar verse, the poet Montgomery says:

"Prayer is the burden of a sigh, The falling of a tear, The upward glancing of the eye, When none but G.o.d is near."

And no doubt he is right. Prayer is exceedingly simple. The faintest cry for help, a whisper for mercy, is prayer. But when the Holy Spirit comes and fills the soul with His blessed presence, prayer becomes more than a cry; it ceases to be a feeble request, and often becomes a strife (Romans xv. 30; Col.

iv. 12) for greater things, a conflict, an invincible argument, a wrestling with G.o.d, and through it men enter into the Divine councils and rise into a blessed and responsible fellowship in some important sense with the Father and the Son in the moral government of the world.

It was in this spirit and fellowship that Abraham prayed for Sodom (Genesis xviii. 23-32); that Moses interceded for Israel, and stood between them and G.o.d's hot displeasure (Exodus x.x.xii.

7-14); and that Elijah prevailed to shut up the heavens for three years and six months, and then again prevailed in his prayer for rain.

G.o.d would have us come to Him not only as a foolish and ignorant child comes, but as an amba.s.sador to his home government; as a full-grown son who has become of age and entered into partnership with his father; as a bride who is one in all interests and affections with the bridegroom.

He would have us "come boldly to the throne of grace" with a well-reasoned and Scriptural understanding of what we desire, and with a purpose to "ask," "seek," and "knock" till we get the thing we wish, being a.s.sured that it is according to His will; and this boldness is not inconsistent with the profoundest humility and a sense of utter dependence; indeed, it is always accompanied by self-distrust and humble reliance upon the merits of Jesus, else it is but presumption and unsanctified conceit.

This union of a.s.surance and humility, of boldness and dependence, can be secured only by the baptism with the Holy Spirit, and only so can one be prepared and fitted for such prayer.

Three great obstacles hinder mighty prayer:

1. selfishness; 2, unbelief; 3, the darkness of ignorance and foolishness. The baptism with the Spirit sweeps away these obstacles and brings in the three great essentials to prayer--1, faith; 2, love, Divine love; 3, the light of heavenly knowledge and wisdom.

1. Selfishness must be cast out by the incoming of love. The amba.s.sador must not be seeking personal ends, but the interests of his government and the people he represents; the son must not be seeking private gain, but the common prosperity of the partnership in which he will fully and lawfully share; the bride must not forget him to whom she belongs, and seek separate ends, but in all ways identify herself with her husband and his interests.

So the child of G.o.d must come in prayer, unselfishly.

It is the work of the Holy Spirit, with our co-operation and glad consent, to search and destroy selfishness out of our hearts, and fill them with pure love to G.o.d and man. And when this is done we shall not then be asking for things amiss to consume them upon our l.u.s.ts, to gratify our appet.i.tes, or pride, or ambition, or ease, or vain-glory. We shall seek only the glory of our Lord and the common good of our fellow-men, in which, as co-workers and partners, we shall have a common share. If we ask for success, it is not that we may be exalted, but that G.o.d may be glorified; that Jesus may secure the purchase of His blood; that men may be saved, and the Kingdom of Heaven be established upon earth.

If we ask for daily bread, it is not that we may be full, but that we may be fitted for daily duty. If we ask for health, it is not alone that we may be free from pain and filled with physical comfort, but that we may be spent "in publishing the sinner's Friend," in fulfilling the work for which G.o.d has placed us here.

2. Unbelief must be destroyed. Doubt paralyzes prayer. Unbelief quenches the spirit of intercession. Only as the eye of faith sees our Father G.o.d upon the Throne guaranteeing to us rights and privileges by the blood of His Son, and inviting us to come without fear, and make our wants known, does prayer rise from the commonplace to the sublime; does it cease to be a feeble, timid cry, and become a mighty spiritual force, moving G.o.d Himself in the interests which it seeks.

Men, wise with the wisdom of this world, but poor and naked and blind and foolish in matters of faith, ask: "Will G.o.d change His plans at the request of man?" And we answer, "Yes," since many of G.o.d's plans are made contingent upon the prayers of His people, and He has ordered that prayer offered in faith, according to His will, revealed in His word, shall be one of the controlling factors in His government of men.

Is it G.o.d's will that the tides of the Atlantic and Pacific should sweep across the Isthmus of Panama? That men should run under the Alps? That thoughts and words should be winged across the ocean without any visible or tangible medium? Yes; it is His will, if men will it, and work to these ends in harmony with His great physical laws. So in the spiritual world there are wonders wrought by prayer, and G.o.d wills the will of His people when they come to Him in faith and love.

What else is meant by such promises and a.s.surances as these: "Therefore I say unto you, What things soever ye desire, when ye pray, believe that ye receive them, and ye shall have them" (Mark xi. 24); "The supplication of a righteous man availeth much in its working. Elijah was a man of like pa.s.sions with us, and he prayed fervently that it might not rain; and it rained not on the earth for three years and six months. And he prayed again, and the heavens gave rain and the earth brought forth her fruit"

(James v. 16-18. American Revision).

The Holy Spirit dwelling within the heart helps us to understand the things we may pray for, and the heart that is full of love and loyalty to G.o.d only wants what is lawful. This is mystery to people who are under the dominion of selfishness and the darkness of unbelief, but it is a soul-thrilling fact to those who are filled with the Holy Ghost.