“THE SAINTS’ STRENGTH, WHERE IT LIES”

By W. Gurnall, A.M.

The Christian’s strength lies in the Lord, not in himself. The strength of an earthly general lies in his troops; he flies, as a great commander once said to his soldiers, upon their wings; if their feathers be clipped, their power broken, he is lost. But in the army of saints, the strength of every saint, yea, of the whole host of saints, lies in the Lord of Hosts. God can overcome His enemies without their hands; but they cannot so much as defend themselves without His arm. 2. It is one of God’s names, “The Strength of Israel” (1 Sam. 15: 29). “Without Me ye can do nothing.” (John 15: 5). Thinking strength is of God: “Not that we are sufficient of ourselves to think anything as of ourselves; but our sufficiency is of God.” (2 Cor. 3: 5). We apostles, we saints have habitual grace; yet this lies like water at the bottom of a well, which will not ascend with all our pumping, till

God pours in His exciting grace, and then it comes. To will is more than to think; to exert our will into action, more than both; these are of God. “It is God that worketh in you both to will and to do of His good pleasure.” (Ph. 2: 13). He makes the heart new; and having made it fit for heavenly motion, setting every wheel (as it were) in its right place, then He winds it up by His actuating grace, and sets it going, the thoughts stirring, and the will moving toward the holy object presented; yet here the chariot is set, and cannot ascend the hill of action till God puts His shoulder to the wheel: “To will is present with me; but how to perform that which is good I find not.” (Rom. 7). God is at the bottom of the ladder, and at the top also, the Author and Finisher; yea, helping and lifting the soul at every round, in his ascent to any holy action. Well, now the Christian is set on work, how long will he keep close to it? Alas, poor soul! no longer than he is held up by the same hand that empowered him at first. He hath soon wrought out the strength received; and therefore to maintain the tenure of a holy course, there must be renewing strength from Heaven every moment; which David knew, and therefore, when his heart was in as holy a frame as ever he felt it, and his people by their free-will offering declared the same, yet even then he prays that God would “keep this for ever in the imagination of the thoughts of the heart” of His people, and establish their hearts to Him. (Chron. 29: 18). The Christian, when fullest of Divine communications, is but a glass without a foot; he cannot stand, or hold what he hath received, any longer than God holds him in His strong hand. Therefore Christ, when bound for Heaven, and ready to take His leave of His children, bespeaks His Father’s care of them in His absence—”Father, keep them.” (John 17). As if He had said, “They must not be left alone; they are poor, helpless children that can neither stand nor go without assistance: they will lose the grace I have given them, and fall into those temptations which I kept them from while I was with them, if they be out of Thine eye or arm but one moment; and therefore, “Father, keep them.”

Again. Consider the Christian as addressing himself to any duty of God’s worship; still his strength is in the Lord. Would he pray? Where will he find matter for his prayer? Alas! he knows not what to pray for as he ought. Let him alone, and he will soon pray himself into some temptation or other, and cry for that which were cruelty in God to give; and therefore God puts words in our mouths: “Take words with you, and say.” (Hos. 14: 2). Well, now He hath put words in his mouth, alas, they will freeze in his very lips, if he hath not some heart-heating

affections to thaw them. And where shall this fire be had? Not a spark to be found on his own hearth; except it be some strange fire of natural desires, which will not serve. Whence then must the fire come to thaw the iciness of the heart, but from Heaven? The Holy Spirit must stretch Himself upon the soul (as the prophet on the child), and then the soul will come to some kindly warmth and heavenly heat in his affections; the Spirit must groan, and then the soul will groan; He helps us to these sighs and groans, which turn the sail of prayer; He dissolves the heart, and then it bursts out of the heart by groans of the lips, by heavenly rhetoric; out of the yes, as from a flood-gate with tears. Yet farther, now the creature is enabled to wrestle with God in prayer, what will he get by all this? Suppose he be weak in grace, is he able to pray himself strong, or corruption weak? No, this is not to be found in prayer, as an act of the creature; this drops from Heaven also: “In the day that I cried, Thou answeredst me, and strengthenedst me with strength in my soul.” (Ps. 138: 3). David received it in duty, but had it not from his duty, but from his God. He did not pray himself strong, but God strengthened him in prayer. Well, cast your eye once more upon the Christian as engaging in another ordinance, of hearing the Word preached. The soul’s strength to hear the Word is from God; He opens the heart to attend. (Acts 16: 14). Yea, He opens the understanding of the saint to receive the Word, so as to conceive what it means . . . Now how becoming this is to both, that saints should have all their ability from God for every step they take in the way to Heaven, will soon appear.

1. This way of communicating strength to saints gives a double accent to God’s love and mercy.

First. It distils a sweetness into all that the believer hath or doth when he finds any comfort in his bosom, any enlargement of heart to duty, any support under temptation: to consider whence come all these, what Friend sends them in: “They come not from my own cistern, or any creature’s: O it is in my bosom; my God, that hath been here, and left this sweet perfume of comfort behind Him in my bosom; my God, that hath (unawares to me) filled my sails with the gales of His Spirit, and brought me off the flats of my own deadness, where I lay aground! O it is His sweet Spirit that held my head, stayed my heart in such an affliction and temptation, or else I had gone away in a fainting fit of unbelief!” Can this but endear God to a gracious soul—his succours coming so immediately from Heaven: which would be lost if the Christian had any strength to help himself, though this stock of strength came at first from

God? which, think you, speaks more love and condescension, for a prince to give a pension to a favourite, on which he may live by his own care; or for this prince to take the chief care upon himself, and come from day to day to this man’s house and look into his cupboard, and see what provision he hath, what expense he is at, and so constantly to provide for the man from time to time? Possibly some proud spirit, that likes to be his own man, or loves his means better than his prince, would prefer the former; but one that is ambitious to have the heart and love of his prince, would be ravished with the latter. Thus God doth with His saints;—He comes and looks into their cupboard, sees how they are provided, and sends in accordingly as He finds them. He knows you have need of these things, and you shall have them. He knows you need strength to pray, hear, suffer for Him, and in that very hour it is due.

Secondly. This way of God’s dealing with His saints adds to the fulness and stability of their strength. Were the stock in our own hands, we should soon prove broken merchants. God knows we are but leaking vessels; when fullest, we could not hold it long; and therefore to make all sure, He sets us under the streamings forth of His strength; and a leaking vessel, under a cock, gets what it loseth. Thus we have our leakage supplied continually. This was the provision God made for Israel in the wilderness: He clave the rock, and the rock followed them. They had not only a draught at present, but it ran in a stream after them; so that you hear no more of their complaints for water: this rock was Christ. Every believer hath Christ at his back, following him with strength as he goes, for every condition and trial. One flower with the root, is worth many in a posy, which, though sweet, do not grow, but wither as we wear them in our bosoms. God’s strength, as the root, keeps our grace lively; without which it would die.

1. The second design God hath in His saints’ happiness is that He may so express His mercy and love to them as may rebound to Him in the highest advance of His own glory therein (Eph. 1, 4: 12); which is fully attained in His way of empowering saints by a strength not of their own, but of their God’s sending. Had God given His saints a stock of grace to have set up with, and left them to the improvement of it, He had been magnified indeed, because it was more than He owed the creature; but not as now, when not only the Christian’s first strength to close with Christ is from God, but he is beholden to Him for the exercise of that strength, in every action of his Christian course. As a child that travels in his father’s company, all is paid for, but his father

carries the purse, not himself; so the Christian’s shot is discharged in every condition, but he cannot say, “This I did,” or, “That I suffered,” but, “God wrought all in me, and for me.” The very comb of pride is cut here; no room for any self-exalting thoughts. The Christian cannot say, when his faith is strong, “This is the child of my own care and watchfulness.” Alas, poor Christian! who kept thine eye waking, and stirred up thy care? Was not this the offspring of God, as well as thy faith at first? No saint shall say of Heaven, when he comes there, “This is Heaven which I have built in the power of my might.” No, Jerusalem above is a city whose Builder and Maker is God. Every grace, yea, degree of grace, is a stone in that building, the topstone whereof is laid in glory; where saints shall more plainly see how God was not only Founder, to begin, but Benefactor also to finish the same. The glory of the work shall not be crumbed and piece-mealed out, some to God, and some to the creature; but all entirely paid in to God, and He acknowledged All in all.

POINTS FROM THEOLOGY

No. 12—The Personality of the Holy Spirit

It has generally always been recognised by all professing the Christian name that the Holy Spirit is at least a divine influence, but it has not always been acknowledged that He is a Divine Person within the God-head. There is a great danger at the present time in the fact that, although much is said about the Holy Spirit, many deny His personality.

Professor Smeaton puts the position very clearly in his book on The Holy Spirit:—

“The Scriptures distinctly recognise the Spirit as a Person. We have only to recall the language used in reference to THE COMFORTER to be convinced of this. To compensate for the loss incurred by the departure of the Lord Jesus to the Father, He promised that He would send another Comforter, who should take His place as their immediate Teacher, Helper and Protector, and thus supply the want of His own presence, the anticipated loss of which filled them with trouble and dismay. When we look at the Persons referred to in that promise, it would be a perversion of language to suppose that a mere quality or influence is meant in any of the personal allusions. The sender is certainly different from the person who is sent: for we do not speak of sending a quality on an errand. Nor does ANYONE SEND HIMSELF FROM HIMSELF, as the Sabellian must put it when he interprets the words: “When THE COMFORTER is come,

whom I WILL send to you from the Father” (John xv. 26). Whether we accept one rendering or another of the word Comforter, whether we make it TEACHER with Ernesti, or HELPER, or ADVOCATE, or PATRON with others, it is obvious to every mind that He who was to compensate the disciples and the Church, of which they were the first-fruits, for the loss of Christ’s visible presence, was certainly a Person. The refusal to accept the Spirit’s personality in that text compels the interpreter, if consistent with himself, to DENY THE PERSONALITY OF CHRIST in whose room He came. That is the alternative before him which no ingenuity can evade. And the absurdity is not less obvious of identifying the title Comforter or Paraclete with the impersonal gifts which the apostles subsequently received. That such a comment is untenable, is clear from the explicit announcements that the Spirit should teach them all things (John xix. 26); guide them into all truth (xvi. 13); bring all things to their remembrance (xiv. 26); glorify Christ by receiving of His, and showing it to His disciples (xvi. 14). It is not possible more explicitly to distinguish a person from the works which he performs. Nor ought we to omit a noteworthy peculiarity in the THREE passages which refer to the Comforter. A change of gender in the use of the masculine demonstrative pronoun (‘ekeinos) forestalls the possibility of putting any other sense than a personal reference upon the words. Thus it is said: “The Comforter, the Holy Ghost, whom the Father will send in my name, He (‘ekeinos) shall teach you all things” (John xiv. 26); “When the Comforter is come, whom I will send unto you from the Father, the Spirit of truth who proceedeth from the Father, He (‘ekeinos) shall testify of me”; “Howbeit, when He (‘ekeinos), the Spirit of truth, is come, He will guide you into all truth: For He shall not speak of (better: from) Himself; but whatsoever He shall hear, that shall He speak, and He will show you things to come. He (‘ekeinos) shall glorify me” (xvi. 13: 14).

The unbiased sense of unlettered men, who are beyond the influence of the theological currents, is alive to the fact that the meaning of many passages is lost, unless we think of the Holy Ghost as a Person, and not a mere influence or energy. To lie to the Holy Ghost (Acts v. 3), to grieve the Holy Spirit of God (Eph. iv. 30), are expressions which, as every reflecting mind perceives, imply a Person who is pleased or displeased; and they cannot, with any propriety or fitness, be referred to what is impersonal.

The Book of Acts, specially prepared, as we have seen, to exhibit historically the Spirit’s operations in the Church after the Lord’s ascension, contains allusions to the personal leading of the Spirit on the mind of all Christ’s servants, and in the formation of the various Churches. Thus He said to Philip, who had been directed to the way along which the chamberlain of the Ethiopian Queen was returning home: “Go near and join thyself to this chariot” (viii. 29); and after that mission was successfully accomplished, the Spirit of the Lord caught away Philip (viii. 39). To Peter, when the deputation for Cornelius arrived at Joppa, the Spirit said: “Behold, three men seek thee” (x. 19). When Saul of Tarsus was set apart to his great Gentile commission, which made him in a peculiar sense the apostle of the Gentiles, the Holy Ghost said to the prophets and teachers who were ministering to the Lord in the Church at Antioch: “Separate to me Barnabas and Saul for the work whereunto I have called them” (xiii. 2). When Paul and Timothy attempted to go into Bithynia, the Spirit suffered them not (xvi. 7). When the members constituting the council at Jerusalem gave forth the result of their deliberations for the guidance of the Churches in reference to the observance of the Jewish rites, they said: “It seemed good to the Holy Ghost and to us” (xv. 28)—language which could not have been used if the Holy Spirit were nothing but an influence. When He commissioned the apostles, and either directed or forbade them to do this or that according to His will, the language attests a free and sovereign agent, unless we are prepared to abandon the literal sense of words and the style of historic narrative. Fritzsche, in his learned treatise on the Spirit, correctly maintains—though the treatise is unsatisfactory as a statement of ecclesiastical doctrine—that it is clear as noonday that Scripture speaks of a Person or subsistence, not of a divine influence or energy; and the Christian Church from the beginning, notwithstanding the defections of individuals, may be said to have asserted the Spirit’s personality, and to have based it on the Scriptures. Collecting the evidence supplied by the survey of Scripture, we may put the arguments for the personality of the Spirit under the six following heads:—

1. The personal actions ascribed to Him abundantly prove it. (John xiv. 26; 1 Cor. xii. 11).

2. His distinction from the Father and the Son, and His mission from both, prove it. (John xv. 26).

3. The co-ordinate rank and power which belong to Him equally with the Father and the Son prove it. (Matt. xxviii. 19; 2 Cor. xiii. 14).

4. His appearance under a visible form at the baptism of Christ and on the day of Pentecost proves it.

5. The sin against the Holy Ghost implying a Person proves it.

6. The way in which He is distinguished from His gifts proves it. (1 Cor. xii. 11).

The glorification of the Holy Ghost in connection with the Church is still future. Passage after passage might be adduced to show that He occupies a co-ordinate rank with the other Persons. But the completion of the Church opens a vista into the future. The appearance of Christ among men ushered in a full historical revelation of the Son in word and deed; and the abasement to which He stooped was followed by an equally conspicuous exaltation. With the Holy Ghost it is not so yet. He dwells in redeemed hearts bought with a price. He occupies a co-ordinate rank. But His work is still unseen. The personality and Deity of the Spirit are, however, one day to be displayed in conspicuous glory in connection with His work upon the Church, when He shall have completed the marvellous transformation. The final issue in the glory reflected from every redeemed and perfected saint, and from the entire body of Christ now scattered over every country, and visited from hour to hour with new communications of wisdom, grace, and power, but then seen to be united to their glorious Head, will be worthy of the divine workman who is carrying on His transforming work, and raising up a temple in which the Godhead shall dwell forever. At present the divine personality of the Spirit is less perceptible, because it is not beheld in connection with the accomplished work. The redeemed are not yet perfect; the Church is not yet complete. There is still another stage of revelation, when the Spirit shall be glorified in connection with the work which He shall have finished and brought to its destined completeness.”

Note.—The aforesaid article is the last of a series of twelve sent in by Rev. D. MacLean, Glasgow. Thanks is due to Mr MacLean.—Editor.