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 THE WAY OF LIFE 
 
 UNTO THE 
 IE INDWELLING 
 
 THREE ESSAYS: 
 J, P. WIDNEY 
 

 
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 UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA. 
 
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Entered according to act of Congress, February 5th, 1900, 
 by J. P. Widney, in the office of the Librarian of Congress, 
 Washington, D. C. 
 
 After the title page had been printed two further essays, 
 
 THE BAPTISM WITH THE HOLY GHOST AND WITH FIRE, 
 THE ENDUEMENT WITH POWER, 
 were added to the book. 
 
THE WAY OF LIFE. 
 
 HOLINESS UNTO THE LORD 
 
 THE INDWELLING SPIRIT. 
 
 THREE ESSAYS. 
 J. P. WIDNEY. 
 
 100 Bnacles, Cal. 
 
 COMMERCIAL PRINTING HOUSE 
 
 1900 
 
A i*' 
 
"Thy word is a lamp unto my feet, and a light unto my 
 path." Psalm CXIX. 105. 
 
 "All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable 
 for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in 
 righteousness; that the man of God may be perfect, throughly 
 furnished unto all good works." II. Timothy III. 16, 17. 
 
 86275 
 
To THE READER: 
 
 For four years, putting aside all 
 
 authorities of man, I have taken the Scriptures with 
 only one thought before me "What has God said ? " 
 In my daily study, and in public ministration, this has 
 been the one authority recognized. The prompting 
 to this course was born of a hunger in my own soul. 
 These e'ssays represent somewhat of the results as 
 they have come to me. 
 
 J. P. WIDNEY. 
 
THE WAY OF LIFE. 
 
 'Sirs, what must I do to be saved?" 
 Acts XVI. 30. 
 
I. 
 
 FROM LIFE INTO DEATH. 
 
 The Bible is a soul history a soul prophecy a soul chart. 
 
 It tells where man originally stood with God. 
 
 It contains the history of man's fall from that position, 
 through transgression of God's law, into a state of sin-. 
 
 It tells of the consequences to man of this fall. 
 
 It gives a hope and a prophecy of the possibility of man's 
 restoration again. 
 
 It contains, also, a chart of a way opened up for man back, 
 out of his sin, to God. 
 
 By a study of the falling away from God, man gains the 
 wisdom which comes of experience. 
 
 By a study of the chart, he receives guidance for his return 
 
 The wisdom gained by the fall would be of no avail with- 
 out the chart for the return. 
 
 The chart, without the bitter wisdom gained, the experience, 
 might never be made use of. 
 
 It takes both to make good an answer to the question, 
 
 ''Sirs, what must I do to be saved?" 
 
 No clear answer to this question can be given without first 
 considering what man is to be saved from ; and how he came 
 to be lost. This takes us back at once to the very beginning, 
 to find where, and how, man first starts into life. What does 
 the Bible record show upon these points? The record shows: 
 
 1 That man is born of God, 
 
 "And God said, Let us make 
 
 man in our image, after our likeness" . . . "So God created 
 man in his own image, in the image of God created he him: 
 male and female created he them." Genesis I.-26, 27. 
 
10 THE WAY OF LIFE. 
 
 How in the Image of God ? in body ? This cannot be; for, 
 "God is a spirit." John IV.-24. In mind ? This cannot be; for, 
 "Even so the things of God knoweth no man, but the Spirit of 
 God." I. Corinth. II.-ll. In spiritual nature? Yes, surely; 
 for there is nothing else left. And the record is explicit upon 
 this point: 
 
 "And [he] breathed into his nostrils the breath of 
 life, and man became a living" sou/." Genesis II.-7. 
 
 It is the description of one made in the spiritual likeness of 
 God, pure in desire, free from sin, his will in harmony with the 
 divine will. This is the first birth. 
 
 2 The record further shows: 
 
 That to this new born man 
 
 a law of soul life was laid down, viz: obedience to God; and 
 a penalty fixed for disobedience: 
 
 "But of the tree of the knowledge 
 
 of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it: for in the day that 
 thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die." Genesis II.-17. 
 
 The wording shows by implication that man is made with 
 freedom of will to choose for himself, whether to obey, or 
 disobey. This was the first probation. 
 
 That spiritual death was meant by this, is shown in 
 paragraph 5. 
 
 3 The record further shows: 
 
 That a testing came to man under this law: 
 
 "And the serpent 
 
 said unto the woman, Ye shall not surely die: for God doth 
 know that in the day ye eat thereof then your eyes shall be 
 opened, and ye shall be as gods, knowing good and evil." 
 Genesis III.-4, 5. 
 
 4 The record further shows: 
 
 That man disbelieved God, 
 and broke the law of soul life: 
 
 "And when the woman saw that 
 
 the tree was good for food, and that it was pleasant to the 
 eyes, and a tree to be desired to make one wise, she took of the 
 fruit thereof, and did eat, and gave also tmto her husband with 
 her; and he did eat." Genesis III.-6, 
 
FROM LIFE INTO DEATH. 11 
 
 5 The record finally shows: 
 
 That the law of life was true: 
 
 and man incurred the penalty of its infraction, arid died to God 
 spiritually. That this is the death meant, is shown by the fact 
 that man did not that day die bodily, but lived, and went out 
 to beget children; and that mental death is not meant, is man- 
 ifest, for man, instead of dying mentally, lived and grew in 
 mental powers: 
 
 "And the Lord God said, Behold the man is 
 become as one of us to know good and evil." Genesis III.-22. 
 
 There is only left, then, to make good the penalty, spiritual 
 death, that is, alienation from God: and that this is meant, is 
 shown by Genesis IIT.-24: 
 
 "So he drove out the man: and he 
 
 placed at the east of the garden of Eden cherubims and a flaming 
 sword which turned every way, to keep the way of the tree of 
 life." This is the first death. 
 
 The figures used in Genesis of the Garden of Eden, and the 
 tree with its fruitage, are probably only allegory. The 
 Scriptures are full of such allegories. Christ makes use of them 
 continually as parables. But back of the allegory, back of the 
 parable, is always the spiritual lesson, which is not allegory or 
 parable. 
 
 The important thing in that old Biblical tale is, that therein 
 is told the soul history 'of man in his first estate: that the 
 human soul in the first birth is born in the spiritual likeness of 
 God, and at one with him: that by its own will it violates the 
 conditions of its spiritual life, and dies to God by the consequent 
 going out from his presence and this is sin, for "Sin is the 
 transgression of the Law," (I. John III. -4) not simply of the 
 Sinaitic law, but of God's law. 
 
 Is soul death annihilation? 
 
 Analogy would seem to prove 
 
 that it cannot be, for in all scientific research in other directions, 
 annihilation, blotting out of existence, whether of matter or 
 force, has never been found. Apparent annihilation has always 
 been ultimately found to be only change of form. That by soul 
 death is not meant annihilation in this case, is definitely proven 
 by the fact that God, as shown in the subsequent Biblical 
 record, does not plan to create a new soul for the man thus 
 
12 THE WAY OF LIFE. 
 
 spiritually dead to his Maker, but does plan to win back, to 
 redeem, to regenerate, the lost soul. 
 
 Why did God thus place man where he would be subject to 
 temptation, and the possibility of spiritual death? 
 
 To look upon 
 
 the testing and the fall, as chance, or as a failure in God's 
 plans, is to question the omniscience, or else the wisdom of 
 God. There must have been a plan and a purpose back of it. 
 The answer to this question is possible only when the full record 
 of God's ways with man, as contained in the Scriptures, has 
 been considered. It will be taken up before the close of this 
 writing. (See note on page 29.) 
 
 Did man gain anything by the fall? 
 
 Yes knowledge: 
 
 "For 
 
 God doth know that in the day ye eat thereof, then your eyes 
 shall be opened, and ye shall be as gods, knowing good and 
 evil." Genesis III.-5. 
 
 "And the Lord God said, Behold, the man is become as one 
 of us, to know good and evil:" Genesis III.-22. 
 
 These facts appear in the record thus far: 
 
 1 Man with an intellect ignorant of sin and its baneful 
 consequences. 
 
 2 A law of soul life and a penalty for its infraction. 
 
 3 A heart desire contrary to the law. 
 
 4 A will to gratify the desire contrary to the law, i. e., a 
 will arrayed in opposition to the will of God. 
 
 5 The gratification of the desire, thus making actual trans- 
 gression. 
 
 Result 
 
 The man that was the son of God, made in his spiritual 
 likeness, has by his own free will act transgressed the law of 
 his soul life, and is become spiritually dead to God. 
 
 Does man thereupon realize that a change has come in his 
 relationship to God? Yes, 
 
 "And the eyes of them both were opened, 
 and they knew that they were naked." Genesis III.-7. 
 
FROM LIFE INTO DEATH. 13 
 
 How naked? 
 
 Again the allegory manifestly. A soul 
 awakened to sin and to the knowledge of the fact that it 
 stands naked in its sin before the eye of God. 
 
 And now, as the voice of God calls to the soul in its newly 
 gained knowledge of evil, how does the soul respond? 
 
 "I heard 
 thy voice in the garden, and I was afraid." Genesis III.-10. 
 
 Why afraid? 
 
 "Because I was naked." Genesis III.-10. 
 
 A soul with its innocency gone, and the stain of transgression 
 upon it. 
 
 Afraid of what? 
 
 Afraid of God, the Father; where before 
 was only love and trust, and no fear. 
 
 And now comes the searching question, "Who told thee that 
 thou wast naked?" Genesis III.-ll. 
 
 Conscience conscience aroused and quivering under the shock 
 of sin, and which is ever as the flaming sword of the angel 
 between man and the paradise of his lost innocency. 
 
 Was it just to thus place man where he could be tempted 
 and fall? 
 
 Justice is justice, whether in God or man: its principles apply 
 alike to all to God upon his throne to man before the throne. 
 Anything less than this would be unworthy of divine power. 
 
 To hold God as ignorant of what is to be the consequences 
 of his acts, is to deny one of the essential attributes of the God- 
 head, omnisicence. Unless we are to radically change and lower 
 our estimate of God's nature, we must believe that he not only 
 foreknew the fall of man under temptation, but also that he 
 purposely puts man where the testing and the fall come to him. 
 Shall we sav, then, that God is unjust to this man whom he 
 has made, in thus placing him subject to temptation? 
 
 In view of the suffering which sin brings, we must be forced 
 to answer, Yes, unless that out of this testing, this fall, is to 
 come the possibility of a greater good for man; that it is only 
 the working out of a broader, far-reaching plan: and thus God 
 be justified in his ways with men. 
 
14 THE WAY OF LIFE. 
 
 What are the facts in the case? 
 
 There is in God's universe 
 
 a far-spread battle'going on between good and evil. It began 
 before the days of man: it involves other beings than 
 man. Man is only one of the parties to a conflict broader than 
 his own life, reaching out beyond the narrow limits of his little 
 world. 
 
 Possibly the veil of the flesh is all that keeps him from seeing. 
 If the prayer of Elisha in the gray morning of that day at 
 Dothan, "Lord, open the"eyes of the young man, that he may 
 see," were answered for man, not simply the mountain-side but 
 the depths of the universe would reveal the arrayed hosts. 
 What suggestions of unspeakable conflict lie in the words, "The 
 man is become as one of us to know good and evil." Genesis 
 III.-22. 
 
 Glimpses of this broader conflict are given in the Scriptures: 
 
 "And the angels which kept not their first estate, but left 
 their own habitation, he hath reserved in everlasting chains, 
 under darkness, unto the judgment of the great day." Jude 6. 
 
 "For if God spared not the angels that sinned, but cast 
 them down to hell, and delivered them into chains of darkness, 
 to be reserved unto judgment:" II. Peter II.-4. 
 
 "And there was war in heayen: Michael and his angels 
 fought against the dragon: and the dragon fought, and his 
 angels." Rev. XII.-7. 
 
 The very temptation which comes to man in the infancy of 
 the race is a picture, not of a new-born impulse in a child 
 heart, but of the assault oi a trained, skilled power of evil, 
 which has already learned how to make evil seem good. It 
 shows the cunning of an experienced master in the art of 
 spiritual warfare. 
 
 Why this broad-spread warfare between good and evil? We 
 must believe, as we believe in the wisdom and power of God, 
 that it is not chance; but that back of it lies a plan, fixed, 
 predestined, far-reaching: and, as we believe in God's goodness, 
 that out of it is to come ultimate good. In this battle man is 
 to take his part. Why? Because out of battling comes strength, 
 out of testing, temptation resisted, comes power to stand. Out 
 of the struggle of youth is developed a stronger, nobler manhood 
 than if the struggle had not been. 
 
 Test this by the worldly life 
 
FROM LIFE INTO DEATH. 15 
 
 of man. It is not a wise parent who keeps back his child from 
 the battle of life. A little kindly counsel, a warning of the 
 danger, a caution, "My son, beware of evil," and he sends him 
 forth to the battle, and the danger, knowing that not to send 
 is to keep him always a child: that to send, means the possibility 
 of a strong, sturdy manhood. Not to send him out is to do a 
 wrong to the child. It is to withhold from him the possibilities 
 of growth. 
 
 There is a strangely curious parallel (Is it more? Is it 
 prophecy?) between the Biblical account of the fall of man, and 
 the life of the individual man. The account of the fall might 
 almost seem to be only an allegory of each human life in its 
 individual aspect, then, now, in the days to come. And, indeed, 
 the name Adam is only the Hebrew word man. Man is born 
 a child, in the purity of the Eden of infancy. Should he die in 
 infancy, there is no score of transgression against him, no con- 
 demnation of inherited evil: for Christ said, as he gathered the 
 little ones up in his arms: "Suffer the little children to come 
 unto me, and forbid them not, for of such is the kingdom of 
 God." Mark X.-14. 
 
 And again: 
 
 "Except ye be converted ( <TTpa<j>f]T. turn) 
 and become as little children, ye shall not enter into the kingdom 
 of heaven." Matth. XVIII.-3. 
 
 And he adds: 
 
 "Take heed that ye despise not one of these 
 little ones: for I say unto you, That in heaven their angels do 
 always behold the face of my Father which is in heaven. For 
 the Son of man came to save that which was lost." Matth. 
 XVIII.-10, 11. 
 
 But, it is only a child. 
 
 Then, as the years go by, in the 
 
 child Eden hang the branches of the tree of knowledge of good 
 and evil, laden with their fruitage; and to the curious, restless 
 heart of youth, as in that old tale, comes the voice of the 
 tempter, saying, "Ye shall not surely die. Eat and be wise." 
 And the sinless child eats, and is sinless no more. It has known 
 evil; and the sinning heart dies to God. 
 
 Out of the testing, the battling, man must come with ulti- 
 mate gain, that God's ways with man may be justified. Justice 
 demands it. 
 
II. 
 
 THE PROMISE OF A NEW LIFE. 
 
 The gateway into life is birth. There is no other. Man 
 thus first entered into spiritual life. To this life he died through 
 sin. Is a second birth possible to this man that has died? a 
 soul birth from death into life. The Biblical record is God's 
 written answer to this question. The record shows that God 
 does not abandon the son he had begotten, even though that 
 son, by his own act, has died to the father. At once begins the 
 working out of a plan to make this newly gained knowledge of 
 good and evil, the knowledge which has cost, as its purchase 
 price, spiritual death, the means of undoing its own harm, and 
 of helping to work out a new life for man. The plan does not 
 unfold itself at once. Only a hope is at first thrown out, that 
 man may not, as Cain, despair utterly. To the first man, in 
 the very day of his fall, comes the first promise. Man is not to 
 remain a contented bondsman to evil. Neither shall evil lord 
 it over the man who has thus fallen under its bondage. It is 
 to be despised by the very man who has become its slave; for 
 the dream of the nobler birth does not die out of the soul that 
 once was born of God. Even in its degradation it does not 
 forget the nobility of its first estate. It has sold its birthright 
 of innocency, but does not forget that it once had it. 
 
 And even in the depths of its degradation the stir of a new life, 
 of battling with sin, begins. God's spirit is striving with man, 
 and will not let him rest, even though by his own act he has 
 departed from his Maker. And the man, even in his death ot 
 sin, is still nobler than his master in evil, for he stands erect, 
 while upon the power of evil the sentence is placed : 
 
 "Upon thy 
 
THE PROMISE OF A NEW LIFE. 17 
 
 belly shall thou go, and dust shalt thou eat all the days of thy 
 life." Genesis III.-14. 
 
 It is a picture of the eternal degradation of evil, not even 
 lifted up by its victory over man. 
 
 Man is not to be a passive captive in the hands of evil. The 
 bondage will be resented: "I will put enmity between thee and 
 the woman, and between thy seed and her seed: it shall bruise 
 thy head" yet, yet, as God looks forward through the ages of 
 human misery born of evil "thou shalt bruise his heel." Genesis 
 III.-15. 
 
 The new knowledge of good and evil, and the freedom of 
 will, which is not lost even in the bondage of evil, are at once 
 appealed to, to help in the working out of a new spiritual life 
 for man. The work is not to be all of God. With man's freedom 
 of will it could not be. Man must use the knowledge of good 
 and evil, and the freedom of will, which he still has, to help in 
 the work. He must do his part. He must will to turn back to 
 God, and then intelligently do to that end. There are conditions 
 requisite to soul restoration as there were to soul life; but now 
 the conditions are no longer all under God's control: 
 
 "And the Lord said unto Cain, Why art thou wroth? And 
 why is thy countenance fallen? If thou doest well, shalt thou 
 not be accepted? And if thou doest not well, sin lieth at the 
 door." Genesis IV.-6, 7. 
 
 Man is to help work out his own salvation. If thou doest 
 (freedom of will) well (using the newly gained knowledge of 
 good and evil), shalt thou not be accepted? And if thou doest 
 not well, (still the freedom of will to choose) sin lieth at the 
 door. Whose door? Thy door> not God's; for your knowledge 
 and your freedom of will make you the chooser. No other basis 
 of restoration is possible, for when God made man with freedom 
 of will he voluntarily parted with all power even to save man, 
 unless man wills to co-operate. Restoration can now only come 
 through : 
 
 Man co-operating with God; 
 
 God co-operating with man. 
 
 Paul saw this great basic truth clearly: 
 
 "Wherefore, my beloved, as ye have always obeyed, not as 
 in my presence only, but now much more in my absence, work 
 out your own salvation in fear and trembling; for it is God 
 
18 THE WAY OF LIFE. 
 
 which worketh in you both to will and to do of his good pleas- 
 ure." Philippians II. -12, 13. 
 
 God's promise to Cain was clear and explicit. The general 
 conditions of salvation were laid down plainly: 
 
 Man must desire to be saved. 
 
 He must will to be saved. 
 
 He must work to be saved. 
 
 And when he has done these "shalt thou not be accepted?" 
 God's manner of redeeming the promise was not as yet revealed. 
 
 God does not let man forget that still he is keeping his hand 
 upon him. He is ever reminded that the Father has not given 
 him up, but is watching over him in all his ways. God has not 
 disowned him. To Noah the reminder comes as a command, 
 and then a covenant. The command is, To enter into the Ark: 
 the covenant 
 
 "and I will establish my covenant with you; 
 neither shall all flesh be cut off any more by the waters of a 
 flood: neither shall there any more be a flood to destroy the 
 earth. 
 
 And the bow shall be in the cloud: and I will look upon it 
 that I may remember the everlasting covenant between God 
 "and every living creature of all flesh that is upon the earth." 
 Genesis IX.-ll and 16. 
 
 It was the evidence of God's continued interest and care. 
 
 To Abram comes the promise of a dawning hope to man, 
 and a vague hinting of the manner of it: 
 
 "In thee shall all families of the earth be blessed." Genesis 
 XII.-3. 
 
 And again the promise is gi-ven to him: 
 
 "and in thy seed 
 shall all the nations of the earth be blessed;" 
 
 and it is because 
 of obedience : 
 
 "because thou hast obeyed my voice." Genesis 
 XXII.-18. 
 
 For the hope is to have a fulfillment on in the years that 
 are to be, and men must not forget, lest they some day despair. 
 
 And the faith of Abraham meets a reward, for it is 
 written : 
 
 "and he believed in the Lord, and he counted it to 
 him for righteousness." Genesis XV.-6. 
 
THE PROMISE OF A NEW LIFE. 19 
 
 And God further gives seal to the covenant that it may stand 
 with the recognized authority of a legal compact. To Abraham 
 (Abram) he says: 
 
 "and I will establish my covenant between 
 
 me and thee, and thy seed after thee in their generations for an 
 everlasting covenant, to be a God unto thee, and to thy seed 
 after thee. 
 
 This is my covenant which ye shall keep, between 
 me and you, and thy seed after thee. Every man child among 
 
 you shall be circumcised and it shall be a token of the 
 
 covenant betwixt me and you." Genesis XVII.-7 and 10, 11. 
 
 And now another step is taken in the carrying out of God's 
 plan. The races of men are to be widely scattered over the 
 earth, and the remembrance of this hope may die out among 
 them, and especially as but few of them have directly heard 
 the promise. 
 
 To the end that this remembrance may not die out, the 
 knowledge that God has a plan for man's restoration, God 
 chooses a people whose especial mission shall be to act as custo- 
 dians of the words of the promise until the fullness of time 
 shall come. It is to this end that the command is given to 
 Abram, 
 
 "Get thee out of thy country, and from thy kindred, 
 and from thy father's house, unto a land that I will show thee : 
 and I will make of thee a great nation, and I will bless thee and 
 make thy name great: and thou shalt be a blessing: and I will 
 bless them that bless thee; and curse them that curse thee," and 
 then follows the promise, the reason for it all, "and in thee shall 
 all families ( Hebrew: '"M/sApacAaA family, tribe, people) of the 
 earth be blessed." Genesis XII.-l, 2, 3. 
 
 Why all this care? Could not God have given at once to 
 man restoration to spiritual life without all this preparation, 
 as of a general for a campaign? 
 
 No. Man's will stands in the way ; and the human heart 
 has not yet learned the full lesson of evil. It is to be a 
 campaign running through the centuries. In Abram God begins 
 to build a race. It is only the means to an end. The end in 
 view is, the building of man. 
 
 Men say, The man dies: the race lives. This is true in the 
 
20 THE WAY OF LIFE. 
 
 history of time. God, in the broader view of the history of 
 eternity says, Races die: man lives. 
 
 The promise is repeated to Isaac (Genesis XXVI.-4), and 
 again to Jacob in almost the identical words : 
 
 "and thy seed 
 
 shall be as the dnst of the earth : and thou shalt spread abroad 
 to the west, and to the east, and to the north, and to the south: 
 and in thee and in thy seed, shall all the families (mishpachah) 
 of the earth be blessed." Genesis XXVIII.-14. 
 
 Then came God's dealings with the chosen people; their 
 increase in numbers; their sojourn in a strange land to isolate 
 them, to make of them a separate people; their slavery and 
 miraculous deliverance, to teach them God's power, as with 
 "outstretched arm, and a mighty hand," he delivered them; the 
 long journeying in the wilderness, to teach them daily depend- 
 ence upon him; the battling for the Promised Land, to train 
 them and weld them together as an army, that their race safety 
 amid the struggles of the nations might be insured. 
 
III. 
 
 THE LAW AND THE SACRIFICE. 
 
 Two separate and distinct things were given to the chosen 
 people: 
 
 The Law man's duty to God and his fellow man. 
 
 The sacrificial offering life given as the price of pardon for 
 transgression. 
 
 About these two, as about the two foci of an ellipse, the 
 whole Jewish race life revolved ; these, and the thoughts which 
 lay back of them a God of justice man a sinner pardon for sin 
 to come somehow through the sacrifice of life offered up upon 
 the altar. 
 
 God sin remission the three words sum up the essence of 
 the old covenant. 
 
 The Hebrews, the people chosen of God for the keeping of 
 the record of that old covenant of God for man, were a rude, 
 hard race. The law became their schoolmaster. Under it they 
 learned to do right ; at first through fear of punishment ; then 
 as a dut3 r , because it is right. After a while to the hard heart 
 of the race, thus trained to the thought of duty, came a higher 
 thought, to do right through love. It is man evoluting from 
 fear to duty, from duty to love. 
 
 It is man growing back toward God. Yet between man and 
 the God toward whom his heart is again turning lies ever as 
 a bar across the pathway the record of transgression. "My 
 sin! my sin! How shall my sin be blotted out?" 
 
 It is the unceasing cry of the old covenant man, ever going 
 up. How for this heart that is again turning to God, shall the 
 dark score of transgression be cancelled ? 
 
 To this end the sacrifice for sin was instituted life paid to 
 ransom from death. 
 
22 THE WAY OF LIFE. 
 
 There is little at first in that old Law, and the sacrificial 
 service, to point beyond the mere blood offering of the animal 
 sacrifice as an atonement for sin. Man had not yet apparently 
 grown spiritually to a conception of the logical insufficiency of 
 this, or the need of more. The true enormity of sin as an 
 offence against his own soul had not yet apparently fully 
 dawned upon him ; neither a true conception of the real condi- 
 tion of the human heart. He was still apparently upon the 
 low plane of the thought of sin as simply an offense against 
 the law, having a market price of compensation through 
 penance, or offering. Yet a truer conception of the nature of sin 
 was slowly dawning upon men; and with it came a realization 
 of the insufficiency of the offering of the life of an animal as an 
 atonement. In the agony of his soul David cries out to God: 
 
 "For thou desirest not sacrifice, else would I give it: thou 
 delightest not in burnt offering. The sacrifices of God are a 
 broken spirit: a broken and a contrite heart, O God, thou wilt 
 not despise." Psalm LI.-16, 17. 
 
 And the cry, as he looks past the overt act of transgression 
 to the heart, swayed by evil desires, which lies back of it, and 
 realizes that pardon for the transgression is not, alone, sufficient, 
 
 "Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit 
 within me." Psalm LI.-10. 
 
 In the Psalms we have a picture of the new heart that is 
 growing up in man, a heart that is longing for something 
 more than the mere wiping out of the score of transgression, a 
 heart that is hungering to get back into communion with God. 
 It is man beginning to long for the lost son-ship again: a 
 heart that begins to speak of "cleansing," of "purity," of 
 "peace in God," of "dwelling in the secret places of the Most 
 High," a heart that is learning that God is something more 
 than a stern Judge, that, "Like as a father pitieth his children, 
 so the Lord pitieth them that fear him," (Psalm CIII.-13); and 
 that, in the joy of the newer hope, begins to cry out, "Bless the 
 Lord, O my soul!" 
 
 The Psalms come midway in the time of the old covenant 
 record, as it were to show what progress man is making back 
 toward God. 
 
 And now God reaches out to meet man, to strengthen him 
 in his purpose. Man must not mistake God's feeling toward 
 
THE LAW AND THE SACRIFICE. 23 
 
 him. He must know that God is more than willing man should 
 turn back from his transgressions and seek life: 
 
 "Say unto them, 
 
 As I live saith the Lord God, I have no pleasure in the death of 
 the wicked : but that the wicked turn from his way and live : 
 turn ye, turn ye from your evil ways; for why will ye die, O 
 house of Israel!" Ezekiel XXXIII.-ll. 
 
 He turns to reason with man about it: 
 
 "Come now, and 
 
 let us reason together, saith the Lord : though your sins be as 
 scarlet, they shall be as white as snow : though they be red like 
 crimson, they shall be as wool." Isaiah I.-18. 
 
 And again : 
 
 "Let the wicked forsake his way, and the 
 unrighteous man his thoughts: and let him return unto the 
 Lord, and he will have mercy upon him : and to our God, for 
 he will abundantly pardon." Isaiah LV.-7. 
 
 And again the assurance is given : 
 
 "But if the wicked will 
 
 turn from all his sins that he hath committed (repentance and 
 reformation), and keep all my statutes, and do that which is 
 lawful and right (lead a new life), he shall surely live, he shall 
 not die." Ezekiel XVIII.-21. 
 
 Texts might be multiplied. They are many and clear under 
 the Old Covenant upon this part of the scheme of restoration. 
 
 Repentance, conversion (turning again) cleansing from sin, 
 leading a new life it is a plain pathway in which no man could 
 have reason or excuse for going astray. How it was to be 
 accomplished was not yet apparent. But men were beginning 
 to see that it must be by means of something more than the 
 blood of the temple sacrifice, and were also beginning to look 
 beyond to a true sacrifice, of which this was only the symbol. 
 Isaiah, with the vision of the seer upon him, looks into the 
 future, past the ritual of the temple, and it is something more 
 than the blood of bulls and of goats that he sees as the true 
 atonement, when he cries out in awe : 
 
 "He, wounded for our 
 
 transgressions: he, bruised for our iniquities: the penalty of 
 (which secures) our peace, upon him: and with his stripes we 
 are healed." Isaiah LIIL 5. 
 
 "He!" Who? One who "is brought as a lamb to the 
 
24 THE WAY OF^LIFE. 
 
 slaughter who "is cut off out of the land of the living" who 
 "for the transgression of my people is stricken" who goes down 
 to the grave he who "poured out his soul unto death," and was 
 "numbered with the transgressors;" yet he "bare the sins of 
 many, and made intercession for the transgressors." Isaiah 
 LIII.-7, 12. 
 
 "The Lord hath laid on him the iniquity of us all." Isaiah 
 LIII.-6. 
 
 He the true sacrifice : when is he to come ? The ages went 
 by, and still only the symbol. Why the long delay ? 
 
 Apparently because man still had need of the school of 
 "good and evil," that school to which he had himself opened 
 the door, and there was a lesson to learn. And he was learning. 
 He was learning that that tree of the Garden was a tree of 
 of good and evil. Its fruitage of evil was good to make wise. 
 The tempter was right. But it was not good to make happy. 
 This he had not told. The fruit that was pleasant to the eye 
 has proven bitter to the heart. He has learned also that God 
 was right, that the law of the soul life may not be broken 
 without mortal harm. He has learned the bitterness of dying 
 to God. 
 
 But with it all was the heart of the world yet ready to 
 obey the voice, and say, "I repent me of my transgression. 
 Forgive?" Not yet. The human will stood across the path- 
 way of return, and the heart had not yet entirely sickened of its 
 desire. And so the ages went on. God was waiting for the 
 "fulness of time." (Galatians IV.-4, 5.) 
 
 Yet the word of warning did not cease. By mouth of seer 
 and prophet the cry went out year after year, "Repent! 
 Repent!" Repent it is the burden of that old covenant record. 
 
 Yet why should a dead man repent ? What good can it do 
 him? The law was, "In the day that thou eatest thereof, thou 
 shalt surely die." And man ate of the fruitage of the tree of 
 the knowledge of good and evil, and died spiritually to God. 
 
 Repentance of his sin and pardon of the score of transgression 
 does not bring life. The warning cry of that old covenant 
 record, "Repent!", if it stood alone, would be only a mockery 
 to man this man with the soul which has died to God. 
 
IV. 
 
 IS THERE MORE ? 
 
 The whole of the Old Covenant record is instinct with the 
 implied pledge that there is more; that man, spiritually dead to 
 God through sin, may again become alive spiritually in God. 
 Without this thought the record would be purposeless. To 
 God man is still his son, for whom he is planning and caring. 
 It is man who has died to God ; not God who has died to man. 
 Toward man he is still God, the Father. It is oftener in what 
 is implied, than in what is directly said, that the hope of a new 
 life in God for the soul is found, yet there are many passages in 
 which it is clearly taught ; and men did not fail to grasp this 
 truth and take it to themselves. Job in the midst of his 
 darkness cries out: 
 
 "I know that my Redeemer liveth, and that 
 
 he shall stand at the latter day upon the earth : and though 
 alter my skin, worms destroy this body, yet in my flesh shall 
 I see God." Job XIX.-25, 26. 
 
 David, full of trust, exclaims: 
 "Thou wilt show me the path of life." Psalm XVI.-ll. 
 
 And again: 
 
 "As for me, I will behold thy face in righteous- 
 ness: I shall be satisfied when I awake with thy likeness." 
 Psalm XVII-15. 
 
 Awake from what ? from the spiritual death of sin ? 
 
 Isaiah has the promise: 
 
 "Incline your ear and come unto 
 
 me; hear, and your soul shall live: and I will make an ever- 
 lasting covenant with you, even the sure mercies of David." 
 Isaiah LY.-3. 
 
26 THE WAY OF LIFE. 
 
 "And they shall teach no more, every man his neighbor, and 
 every man his brother, saying, Know the Lord ; for they shall 
 all know me, from the least of them unto the greatest of them, 
 saith the Lord : for I will forgive their iniquity, and I will 
 remember their sin no more." Jeremiah XXXI.-34. 
 
 "Again, when the wicked man turneth away from his 
 wickedness that he hath committed, and doeth that which is 
 lawful and right, he shall save his soul alive." Ezekiel XVITI.-27. 
 
 Yet, as before stated, it is to the general scope and spirit of 
 the whole of the old covenant record that we must look, rather 
 than to specific passages, for light upon the question of man's 
 spiritual restoration to God, for we must remember that the 
 record is largely only a hinting and a prophecy of the deeper 
 things of God which were yet to be made plain in the clearer 
 light of the new covenant. 
 
 What is God trying to do with, 
 
 and for his people? Is he simply trying to undo one phase of 
 the harm which came of the fall to secure to man pardon for 
 his deeds of actual transgression ? or is he trying to undo the 
 whole harm of the fall, and fully restore man to his first estate: 
 more to bring out of it yet new phases of good to man over 
 and above his condition before he spiritually died to God in sin? 
 It is by constantly bearing in mind this broader aspect of the 
 question that we shall be prepared to discern in the record 
 evidences of such a plan, should they be therein contained. 
 
 That they who were under the old covenant in some sense 
 saw and understood its teaching of this broader hope, and by 
 faith walked in this light, is testified in Hebrews XI.-13, 16: 
 
 "These all died in faith, not having received the promises 
 (the things promised) but having seen them afar off, and were 
 persuaded of them, and embraced them, and confessed that they 
 were strangers and pilgrims on the earth. For they that say such 
 things declare plainly that they seek a country. And truly if 
 they had been mindful of that country from whence they came 
 out, they might have had opportunity to have returned : but 
 now they desire a better country, that is an heavenly: where- 
 fore God is not ashamed to be called their God : for he hath 
 prepared for them a city." 
 
IS THERE MORE ? 27 
 
 But the burden of that old covenant message is to be f nd, 
 not in the hintings and prophecies of things to come, butm the 
 word "Repent." It is the deep undertone to the Law; it is the 
 last warning before the book of prophecy is closed. Yet, as the 
 gloom of the passing night is tinged with the light of the 
 coming dawn, so the gladness of a prophecy mingles with the 
 warning : 
 
 "The voice of him that crieth in the wilderness, Pre- 
 pare ye the way of the Lord, make straight in the desert a 
 highway for our God. Every valley shall be exalted (Heb. nacah, 
 to lift up), and every mountain and hill shall be made low: and 
 the crooked shall be made straight ; and the rough 
 places plain: and the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, 
 and all flesh shall see it together, for the mouth of the 
 Lord hath spoken it:" .... "He shall feed his flock like a 
 shepherd : he shall gather the lambs with his arm, and carry 
 them in his bosom, and shall gently lead those that are with 
 young." Isaiah XL.-3, 4, 5 and 11. 
 
 Again the voice goes on : 
 
 "Behold my servant whom I 
 
 uphold: mine elect in whom 'my soul delighteth: I have put my 
 spirit upon him: he shall bring forth judgment to the Gentiles. 
 He shall not cry nor lift up, nor cause his voice to be heard 
 in the street. A bruised reed shall he not break, and the smoking 
 flax shall he not quench: he shall bring forth judgment unto 
 truth. He shall not fail nor be discouraged, till he have set 
 judgment in the earth: and the isles shall wait for his law. 
 
 Thus saith God, the Lord, he that created the heavens and 
 stretched them out: he that spread forth the earth, and that 
 which cometh out of it: he that giveth breath unto the people 
 upon it, and spirit to them that walk therein : I the Lord have 
 called thee in righteousness, and will hold thine hand, and will 
 keep thee, and give thee for a covenant of the people, for a 
 light of the Gentiles : to open the blind eyes : to bring out the 
 prisoners from prison, and them that sit in darkness out of the 
 prison house. I am the Lord : that is my name : and my glory 
 will I not give to another, neither my praise to graven images. 
 
 Behold the former things are come to pass, and new things 
 do I declare: before they spring forth I tell you of them." Isaiah 
 XLII.-1-9. 
 
 It is the prophecy of something better than earth has y 
 
28 THE WAY OF LIFE. 
 
 known. It is the gospel of hope, the promise of things to come: 
 and men, the old covenant men, looked up, and were glad. 
 
 Why need the true sacrifice have come before the end ? Why 
 not have let man go on accepting the sacrifice by faith, as told 
 in Hebrews XI.-13, 16, and then, at the last day, when all the 
 numberless millions of earth's centuries are gathered together 
 before Him that sitteth upon the throne, why might not Christ, 
 the true Sacrificial Lamb, have stood forth and said, "I now 
 offer myself, the sacrifice, to make good the promise by paying 
 the penalty lor sin for all those who by faith took hold upon 
 the promises;" and then, once for all, have entered into death? 
 
 There was pardon for transgression through faith, under 
 that old covenant, clearly taught ; open to all men : entered into 
 by many. Why not have gone on in the old way to the end ? 
 
 Was it because the old way was not complete ? because God 
 had yet more in store for man ? something not yet made plain, 
 only hinted at, and for which the heart of the world had not 
 yet grown ready? 
 
 "Strengthen ye the weak hands, and confirm 
 the feeble knees. Say to them that are of a fearful heart, Be 
 strong, fear not." Isaiah XXXV.-3, 4. 
 
 Why ? Because "the former things are come 
 
 to pass, and new things do I declare:" (Isaiah XLII.-9) ; 
 and because of a new covenant that is to come: 
 
 "Behold the days come, saith the 
 
 Lord, that I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel, 
 and with the house of Judah : not according to the covenant 
 that I made with their fathers in the day that I took them 
 by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt : which my 
 covenant they brake, although I was a husband unto them, 
 saith the Lord : but this shall be the covenant that I will make 
 with the house of Israel : After those days, saith the Lord, I 
 will put my law in their inward parts, and write it in their 
 hearts: and will be their God, and they shall be my people. 
 And they shall teach no more every man his neighbor, and 
 every man his brother, saying, Know the Lord : for they shall 
 all know me, from the least of them unto the greatest of them, 
 saith the Lord ; for I will forgive their iniquity, and I will 
 remember their sin no more." Jeremiah XXXI.-31, 34. 
 
 The book of the prophecy of the Old Covenant closed, the 
 covenant of the sacrificial blood, and of repentance unto the 
 
IS THERE MORE? 29 
 
 remission of sin ; and the world waited for the New Covenant 
 with the new things it was to bring forth for man's soul. 
 
 NOTE FROM PAGE 12. 
 
 The fuller discussion of this topic, 
 
 "Why did God thus 
 
 place man where he would be subject to temptations, and the 
 possibility of spiritual death?" 
 
 will be found in Chapter IX., 
 under the question, 
 
 "Why has God thus planned that the "babe 
 
 in Christ" shall come to the "measure of the stature of the fulness 
 of Christ," through struggling and battling?" 
 
V. 
 THE TRUE SACRIFICE. 
 
 In the reign of Tiberius Caesar, a man clad in the garb 
 of one of the old prophets came from the wilds of Judea with a 
 warning cry that startled the Jewish world. The book of 
 prophecy, so long closed, was reopened. John was the last of 
 the old prophets, the first of the new. He is the human link 
 binding together old and new. With one hand he takes hold 
 upon Elijah, with the other upon Christ. He has a double 
 message to proclaim the passing of the Old Covenant to 
 herald the incoming of that which is to supplant, by comple- 
 menting, it. To the Jew he says, "Think not to say within 
 yourselves, We have Abraham to our father: for I say unto you 
 that God is able of these stones to raise up children unto 
 Abraham." (Matthew III.-9). It is the passing also of the 
 Hebrew kingdom of exclusiveness, and of the old covenant of 
 the flesh. It is the coming in of the broader Israel of God, and 
 of the new covenant with the heart that Israel, and that 
 covenant of which Jeremiah wrote (as before quoted) in the 
 closing promise of the old : 
 
 "Behold the days come, saith the 
 
 Lord, that I will make a new covenant with the house of 
 Israel, and with the house of Judah : not according to the cov- 
 enant that I made with their fathers, in the day that I took 
 them by the hand, to bring them out of the land of Egypt (the 
 covenant of the Paschal lamb, and of the blood atonement for 
 transgression): which my covenant they brake, although I was 
 an husband unto them, saith the Lord : but this shall be the 
 covenant that I will make with the house of Israel : After those 
 days, saith the Lord, I will put my law in their inward parts, 
 
THE TRUE SACRIFICE. 31 
 
 and write it in their hearts: and will be their God, and they 
 shall be my people. And they shall teach no more every man 
 his neighbor, and every man his brother, saying, Know the 
 Lord: for they shall all know me, from the least of them unto 
 the greatest of them, saith the Lord : for I will forgive their 
 iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more." Jeremiah 
 XXXI.-31, 34. 
 
 But still John proclaims the old message, "Repent! Repent!" 
 Why repent? Because "the kingdom of heaven is at hand." 
 Therefore, "Prepare ye the way of the Lord" (Matthew III.-l, 
 3) the Lord of the new kingdom upon earth. The Jews, with 
 thought apparently of that prophetic message of Isaiah, "The 
 voice of him that crieth in the wilderness, Prepare ye the way 
 of the Lord; make straight in the desert a highway 
 for our God," and of that last warning of Malachi 
 ere the book of prophecy was closed, "Behold, I will 
 send you Elijah the prophet before the coming of the great and 
 dreadful day of the Lord : and he shall turn the heart of the 
 fathers to the children, and the heart of the children to their 
 fathers, lest I come and smite the earth with a curse," ask him, 
 "Art thou Elijah?" No, he replies, "I am the voice of one crying 
 in the wilderness, "Make straight the way of the Lord, as said 
 the prophet Isaiah." John 1-23. 
 
 The old covenant with its symbolic sacrifice for sin had 
 come, is passing, and now the warning cry goes out, "Prepare 
 ye the way of the Lord, make his paths straight." Matthew 
 III.-3. 
 
 How are they to prepare the way and make straight 
 the path for the Lord ? The words imply something which man 
 can do, and which God cannot do : something which has to do 
 with man's free will. John's message tells. It is summed up in 
 'the one word, Repent. And of his own work, as one who is 
 helping to prepare the way, he says, "I indeed baptize you with 
 water unto repentance:" Matthew III.-ll. 
 
 Mark says, "repentance unto remission of sins." Mark 1-4. 
 
 "Remission of sins." How is it obtained ? 
 The Old Covenant gave the altar service, and the sacrificial 
 offerings of blood for the remission of sin, yet plamly confessed 
 
32 THE WAY OF LIFE. 
 
 they were only symbolic : that the true sacrifice, of which these 
 were only the sign, was yet to be offered. 
 
 And Hebrews, looking backward, says, "For it is not 
 possible that the blood of bulls, and of goats, should take away 
 sins." Heb. X.-4. 
 
 But that day by the river, as John looks upon Jesus, the 
 Christ, he recognizes in him the true sacrifice, and exclaims: 
 
 "Behold the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of 
 the world." John I.-29. 
 
 Christ himself confirms this as, that night'of the last supper, 
 he takes the cup, and says: 
 
 "Drink ye all of it: for this is my 
 
 blood of the new covenant which is shed for many for the 
 remission of sins." Matthew XXVI.-28. 
 
 Calvary, and the cross, and that cry, "It is finished," are 
 the closing of the old covenant, the covenant of pardon for 
 transgression. Henceforth this much at least of the way toward 
 life was established, not to be repeated. Hebrews recognizes 
 this great basic fact of Christianity : 
 
 "So Christ was once offered to 
 bear the sins of many." IX.-28. 
 
 "But this man, after he had offered one sacrifice for sins 
 forever, sat down on the right hand of God." X.-12: 
 
 "Now where remission of these (sins and iniquities) is, there 
 is no more offering for sin." X.-1S. 
 
 Is, then, remission of sins pardon for his transgressions 
 all that Christ's coming brought to man ? 
 
 If so, why does 
 
 Christ himself in his teachings dwell so little upon it ? Take 
 the narrative of the four gospels. They are the record of the 
 Christ-life, and the Christ teachings, and the Christ prophecies. 
 
 He does not say much about repentance. He seems to look 
 upon this as a conceded fact, one upon which jt enough has 
 already been said; one which men will hardly question. It was 
 the burden of the Old Covenant message. That record was full 
 of it transgression, broken law, turning away from God, evil 
 ways, impurity, uncleanness, wickedness; and God's condemna- 
 tion upon it all ; and then the warning cry, "Turn ye, turn ye, 
 for why will ye die!" 
 
THE TRUE SACRIFICE. 33 
 
 And that the repentant sinner might have somewhat to 
 look to by faith, the blood of the sacrifice was poured out 
 unceasingly upon the altar. John, the last of the old prophets, 
 still sounds the warning. It is repentance, confession, baptism, 
 remission of sins. 
 
 Christ himself recognizes the sufficiency of the old covenant 
 for this work, in the parable of the rich man and Lazarus: 
 
 "Abraham saith unto him, They have Moses and the 
 Prophets, let them hear them. And he said, Nay, Father 
 Abraham : but if one went unto them from the dead, they will 
 repent. And he said unto him, If they hear not Moses and the 
 Prophets, neither will they be persuaded though one rose from 
 the dead." Luke XVL-29, 31. 
 
 Though the parable is not of Christ's resurrection, yet the 
 parallel is a startling one. 
 
 The Christ coming brought remission of sins. Was this all 
 that it brought? or did it bring more to man? 
 
VI. 
 NEW-THINGS. 
 
 "Behold the former things are come to pass, and new things 
 do I declare: before they spring forth I tell you of them." 
 Isaiah XLII.-9. 
 
 It is the voice of the Lord, speaking through 
 the prophet Isaiah of the Christ coming, and what it is to 
 bring to earth. The fulfilling of the Old Covenant then was 
 not all. There was to be more. The whole Christ life and the 
 Christ teaching upon earth is clearly based upon this thought. 
 While he does not dwell upon repentance, speaking of it 
 incidentally, as a thing essential, and conceded of all, and not 
 needing apparently further speech from him, he does teach 
 something else, teaches it incessantly. As there was a burden 
 to the message of the old, so there is a burden to the message 
 of the new. It is the thought that there is something more than 
 repentance and the remission of the old score of sin needed 
 before one can again be restored to the lost sonship. 
 
 "For I 
 
 say unto you, That except your righteousness shall exceed the 
 righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees, ye shall in no case 
 enter into the kingdom of heaven." Matt. V.-20. 
 
 This to men living under the old law of repentance unto 
 remission of sins. He speaks of righteousness, of denying self, of 
 giving up all for God, of a pure heart, "Blessed are the pure in 
 heart for they shall see God." Matth. V. 8. 
 
 He is speaking of a life, a life upon a distinctly different 
 plane from the life under the old law. "Ye have heard that it 
 hath been said" "but I say unto you," is the note of emphasis 
 in the Sermon on the Mount. It is something deeper, more 
 heart searching than the old Law. 
 
NEW THINGS. 35 
 
 It is in the scene with Nicodemus in John III. 1, 8, that the 
 advanced plane of the new above the old is clearly announced. 
 It is a distinct and unmistakable setting forth of the great 
 message Christ came to bring. Nicodemus, who by the scenes 
 in which he appears (John III.-VII.-XIX) seems to have been a 
 fair. minded man, walking in the light of the old Covenant, and 
 manifestly, from the disposition he displays, far above the 
 average of the Old Covenant Jew as a just man, comes to 
 Christ apparently for light upon his teachings. Christ, whether 
 answering a spoken question of Nicodemus which has escaped 
 record, or answering the unspoken need of the heart, says: 
 
 "Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born again 
 he cannot see the kingdom of God." 
 
 And then in reply to the 
 
 puzzled inquiry of Nicodemus over the meaning of the answer, 
 Christ replies again, but this time more explicitly: 
 
 "Verily, verily, I say unto thee, except a man be born of 
 water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the Kingdom of 
 God." John III.-3, 5. 
 
 Why "born again?" 
 
 Without the first three chapters of 
 
 Genesis the answer which Christ gave that day would be as 
 meaningless to every human soul as it was, for the moment, to 
 Nicodemus. Birth is the gateway of life. There is no other. 
 Man thus entered into spiritual life that day when God breathed 
 into him the breath of life, and man became a living soul. 
 (Genesis II.-7). But he died to God. And now, through Nico- 
 demus, Christ proclaims to man, man spiritually dead to God 
 in sin, the wonderful thought, Ye may be born again; born 
 out of death into life. And more; to man he says, If you would 
 again become spiritually alive to God, you must be born again. 
 The whole scene is as though Christ had said to him, 
 
 "Nicodemus, man was born once, when God breathed into 
 him the breath of life, and man became a living soul. But he 
 died : died to God in the day of his transgression of the law of 
 soul life. If he would live he must be born again. Only through 
 birth may one enter into life. The breath of life must be breathed 
 into him anew before he can pass from his spiritual death back 
 into life again, life in God. Man may again become the temple 
 
36 THE W Y OF LIFE. 
 
 of the living God, but God cannot dwell in an unclean temple. 
 (I. Corinth. III.-16, 17.) Hence John came crying, "Prepare ye 
 the way. Repent and be baptized to the remission of sins." 
 Then, when you have thus prepared the way, he will come in 
 and ye shall be able to receive him." And then? 
 
 "But as many 
 
 as received nim, to them gave he power to become the sons of 
 God: even to them that believe on his name: which were born, 
 not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, 
 but of God." John I.-12, 13. 
 
 "Lift up your heads, O ye gates; and be ye lift up, ye 
 everlasting doors: and the King of glory shall come in." Psalm 
 XXIV.-7. even into his holy temple, "for ye are the temple of 
 the living God." -II. Corinth. YI.-16. 
 
 And now to the questioning wonder of Nicodemus over the 
 strange mystery, Christ makes reply: 
 
 "The wind bloweth where 
 
 it listeth, and thou nearest the sound thereof, but canst not tell 
 whence it cometh nor whither it goeth: so is every one that is 
 born of the Spirit." John III.-8. 
 
 No man has ever yet solved 
 
 the mystery of animal life. It is the despair of the scientist. 
 Neither has auy man ever yet solved the mystery of soul life. 
 Both are God's mysteries. 
 
VII. 
 THE NEW BIRTH. 
 
 What does Christ mean by the words "born again?" 
 
 He is 
 
 evidently pointing to some radical change in man's spiritual 
 nature. The full verse in John III. 5, reads, 
 
 "Except a man be 
 
 born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the king- 
 dom of God." 
 
 A condition which is laid down by Christ him- 
 self as absolutely essential to salvation should be carefully 
 examined. Let us analyze it: 
 Ye must be born. 
 Ye must be born again. 
 Ye must be born of water and of the Spirit. 
 
 Ye must be born. The very words imply that there is a 
 spiritual condition in which man is not alive to God : is dead 
 spiritually; and that the breath of life must be breathed into 
 the dead soul before it can live. 
 
 "Ye must be born again. 11 
 
 The implication is that this is a 
 
 second birth ; that once before man was a living soul ; that the 
 breath of spiritual life departed from him, and he became dead 
 to God: that the breath of life which once was in the soul, and 
 departed, may and must return, in order that man may again 
 become a living soul alive to God. 
 
 Ye must be born of water and of the Spirit. 
 
 Do these two 
 
38 THE WAY OF LIFE. 
 
 words indicate the same thing? No. John says: 
 
 "I indeed 
 
 baptize you with water unto repentance ("and remission of 
 sins," Mark), but he that cometh after me is mightier than I, 
 whose shoes I am not worthy to bear: he shall baptize you 
 with the Holy Ghost (IIvv/m Spirit) and with fire." Matih. 
 III.-ll. 
 
 "With water" is to repentance and the remission of 
 sins, and is expressly so limited. Baptism with the Holy Ghost 
 (Trv^vfWL Spirit) and with fire is specifically expressed by 
 John as conveying something other, and different from repent- 
 ance and remission of sins, and for which repentance and 
 remission of sins are prerequisites to prepare the way. Water 
 and the Spirit do not therefore mean the same. 
 
 One other point should be settled before going on to discuss 
 what is meant by "Born of the Spirit." Three different phrases 
 occur in the New Covenant record so akin in form that the ques- 
 tion at once arises, Are they the same in meaning, or are they 
 used to express different meanings? 
 
 "Born of the Spirit." 
 
 "Born of God." 
 
 "Begotten of God." 
 
 The words born, begotten, begat, 
 
 occur 108 times in the New Testament. Of these the verb 
 yevraw, in some one of its forms or compounds, and meaning 
 either to beget or to bring forth, is used 102 times. 
 
 TI'KTCO in some of its forms, meaning to beget, or to 
 bring forth, is used 4 times. ATTOKVOO, to beget, or to 
 bring forth, 1 time. "E/cT/aw/Lux, untimely birth, 1 time. 
 While the translation is sometimes born, sometimes begotten, 
 the meaning in all cases is, The giving of life, so that one born 
 of God, or begotten of God, is one receiving life of God. 
 Sometimes the wording is "born of God," sometimes, "born of 
 the Spirit," but with the acceptance of the doctrine of the 
 Trinity the force would be the same in either case. 
 
 The three different phrases, born of the spirit, born of God, 
 begotten of God, mriy, therefore, be accepted as expressing the 
 same fact, namely, that man, spiritually dead to God in sin, 
 becomes by a second spiritual birth alive again to God. 
 
THE NEW BIRTH. 39 
 
 Is this new spiritual birth essential to salvation? 
 
 "Jesus 
 
 answered and said unto him, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, 
 Except a man be born again he cannot see the kingdom of 
 God." John III.-3. 
 
 And again, 
 
 "Jesus answered, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a 
 man be born of water, and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into 
 the Kingdom of God." John III.-5. 
 
 How is a soul "born again?" 
 
 "But as many as received 
 
 him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God, even 
 to them that believe on his name: which were born, not of 
 blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but 
 of God." John I.-12, 13. 
 
 "Whosoever believeth that Jesus is the Christ, is born of 
 God:" I. John V.-I. 
 
 "For ye are all the children of God by faith in Chriit Jesus." 
 Galatians III.-26. 
 
 "For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the 
 sons of God." Romans VIIL-14. 
 
 The statement from Romans makes more explicit, and 
 prevents the inadequate construction which might otherwise be 
 given to the text from John as above. It is the belief which is 
 more than mere intellectual assent, a belief which gives itself up 
 to the spirit for guidance. 
 
 What does this new birth (regeneration) bring to a soul? 
 
 "For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten 
 Son. that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but 
 have everlasting life." John III. 16. 
 
 "He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life." John 
 III.-36. 
 
 "Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that heareth my word, 
 and believeth on him that sent me, hath everlasting life, and 
 shall not come into condemnation: but is passed from death 
 unto life." John V.-24. 
 
 How shall a soul know that it is born again ? 
 
 "The Spirit 
 
40 THE WAY OF LIFE. 
 
 itself beareth witness with our spirit, that we are the children 
 of God." Romans VIII.-16. 
 
 "He that believeth on the Son of God hath the witness in 
 himself." I. John V.-10. 
 
 In what way is this witness made known? 
 
 The Scriptures 
 
 do not say. This is God's dealing with each individual soul; 
 and as no two of God's children are mentally or spiritually 
 alike, the probability is that God speaks to no two in exactly 
 the same manner. 
 
 The only light upon this point will be had by analyzing 
 the statements of those who profess to have received the wit- 
 ness, eliminating as non-essential the points wherein they are 
 unlike, noting the points, or point, in which they are the same. 
 The one point in which they are all found to agree is this a 
 mental conviction that the work of regeneration is done and 
 that they are again the children of God. And this conviction is 
 based upon the knowledge of compliance with the prerequisite 
 conditions as laid down by God, namely: 
 
 1 Repentance unto the remission of sins, through faith in 
 the atoning sacrifice of Christ as the offering for pardon of 
 transgression: and 
 
 2 Believing in Jesus Christ as divine, the Son of God, with 
 all that this involves in the acceptance of the Christ life and the 
 Christ teachings as the pattern for a new life in God. 
 
 When does the New Birth in God come to man? 
 
 While the 
 
 Scriptures do not point to the hour in any human life when 
 this change comes to man, they give reasonable ground for 
 inferring when the time may be. 
 
 (a) Repentance and the remission of sins are the preparing 
 of the way. They are only this. They are the means to an 
 end. Without more, man, though a pardoned criminal, would 
 still be dead to God. With the way prepared, it is not probable 
 that God would withhold, even temporarily, the consummation 
 to which they are directed. 
 
 (b) As the repentant soul is not, by the mere act of repent- 
 ance, alive in God, and thus secure of that eternal life which is 
 the intended and promised end of repentance, it is not probable 
 
THE NEW BIRTH. 41 
 
 that God would delay this seal of safety a moment beyond the 
 time when the way has been prepared by repentance. 
 
 (c) To take any one of the several texts quoted in the pre- 
 vious section, and which all bear more or less directly also upon 
 the question asked in this section, when Christ said, 
 
 "He that heareth my word, and believeth on him that sent 
 me, hath everlasting life, and shall not come into condemnation; 
 but is passed from death unto life," the legitimate, and indeed 
 the inevitable inference is that the the moment of belief and 
 acceptance is the moment also of the new birth. 
 
 Upon this question Christ's parable of the return of the 
 Prodigal Son throws an additional light. The son in his 
 disobedience and sin repents, and turns back to the father for 
 forgiveness: 
 
 "But when he was yet a great way off, his 
 father saw him, and had compassion, and ran and fell on his 
 neck and kissed him. . . . For this, my son, was dead, and 
 is alive again ; he was lost, and is found." Luke XV.- 20 and 24. 
 
 Is it probable, is it possible, that God would do less? Oh, 
 "Like as a father pltieth his children, so the Lord pitieth them 
 that fear him." Psalm CIII.-13. 
 
VIII. 
 BABES IN CHRIST. 
 
 What is now the condition of the reborn soul ? 
 
 That it is 
 
 passed from death unto life, and is now become again a child 
 of God, is manifest from the texts already quoted. But is the 
 battle with sin then over: the danger past; the soul out at last 
 safe in God ? 
 
 If we were to take one writer alone for our authority, 
 and one or two isolated texts for answer, we should say, Yes, 
 the battle is won : and there is to be no more conflict with sin. 
 
 "Whosoever is born of God doth not commit sin: for his 
 (avrov, i. e. God's) seed (the germ of the new life) remaineth 
 in him: and he cannot sin, because he is born of God." I.John 
 III.-9. 
 
 ''We know that whosoever is born of God sinneth not: but 
 he that is begotten of God keepeth himself, and that wicked 
 one toucheth him not." I John V. 18. 
 
 Yet how are we to reconcile these statements with John 
 himself, when he says: 
 
 "I write unto you little children, 
 
 because your sins are forgiven you for his name's sake." I. John 
 II.-12. 
 
 and then: 
 
 "My little children, these things write I 
 
 unto you, that (fva, to the end that) ye sin not. And if any 
 man sin (speaking to them still), we have an Advocate with 
 the Father, Jesus Christ, the righteous: and he is the propitia- 
 tion for our sins: and not for ours only, but also for the sins 
 of the whole world." I. John II.-l, 2. 
 
 And the epistle ends with a last warning, 
 
 "Little children, 
 
BABES IN CHRIST. 43 
 
 keep yourselves from idols." V.-21. 
 
 Are these "little children" whom he is so earnestly address- 
 ing and cautioning, "born again"? 
 
 "Ye are of God, little children." I. John IV.-4. 
 
 And again he puts them upon the same spiritual plane with 
 himself in the second verse after, when he says in speaking to 
 them, "We are of God." 
 
 Again he says of them together with himself: 
 
 "Marvel 
 
 not, my brethren, if the world hate you. We know that we 
 have passed from death unto life, because we love the brethren." 
 I. John III.-13, 14. 
 
 This whole epistle of John, while it contains the texts 
 already given, which state that one born of God, ."doth not 
 sin," "cannot sin," is yet a constant cry of warning to those 
 whom he recognizes as born of God, to beware of sin; to be 
 watchful that they "abide" in God: and yet that if they should 
 fall into sin to remember that we have still an "Advocate with 
 the Father," who is also the "propitiation for our sins." 
 
 How are we to reconcile this conflict? If one born of God 
 cannot sin, why this constant warning to those whom he recog- 
 nizes as born of God, to beware of sin, and to be on their 
 guard against it? 
 
 Before seeking an answer to the question, let us take other 
 testimony upon this point of the possibility of transgression in 
 those "born of God." 
 
 Test John by Paul. Paul, the 
 
 apostle, who saw God that day upon the Damascus road; who 
 is preaching the Word, having given up all for Christ; of whom 
 God says, "He is a chosen vessel unto me (Acts IX.-15); to 
 whom Ananias says: 
 
 "Brother Saul, the Lord, even Jesus, that appeared unto 
 thee in the way as thou earnest, hath sent me that thou 
 mightest receive thy sight, and be filled with the Holy Ghost." 
 (Acts IX.-17); this "Saul (who is also called Paul) filled with 
 the Holy Ghost" (Acts XIII.-9); this Paul who goes out as a 
 flaming fire brand to preach Christ, his ministry attested by 
 power to work miracles; by the laying on of whose hands the 
 Holy Ghost is giyen (Acts XIX.-6); this Paul, as he looks into 
 his own soul, says this of himself: 
 
 "For the good that I would, I do not: but the evil which I 
 
44 THE WAY OF LIFE. 
 
 would not, that I do. Now if I do that I would not, it is no 
 more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me. 1 find then a 
 law, that when I would do good, evil is present with me. 
 For I delight in the law of God after the inward man: but I 
 see another law in my members, warring against the law of my 
 mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is 
 in my members." Romans VII.-19, 23. 
 
 Again he says of himself: 
 
 "But I keep under my body, 
 
 and bring it into subjection ; lest that by any means when I 
 have preached to others, I myself should be a castaway." 
 I. Corinth. IX.-27. 
 
 To the Ephesians he writes: 
 
 "And grieve not the Holy 
 
 Spirit of God, whereby ye are sealed unto the day of redemp- 
 tion," Ephesians IV. 30. 
 
 To Timothy he writes: 
 
 "Now the Spirit speaketh expressly, 
 
 that in the latter times some shall depart from the faith, giving 
 heed to seducing spirits, and doctrines of devils." I. Timothy 
 IV.-l. 
 
 As the warning cry of that old covenant record to the soul 
 dead in sin is ever, Repent! Repent! so the warning cry 
 of the new covenant record to those who are born 
 again is ever, Beware of sin! watch! fight! "Let him 
 that thinketh he standeth take heed lest he fall." I. Corinth. 
 X.-12. Every epistle that goes out to the infant church is filled 
 with the warning. 
 
 How, then, are we to reconcile this apparent conflict of John 
 with the other writers ? this apparent conflict of John 
 with himself? for John, as already stated, has said that the 
 soul born of God "cannot sin," yet goes on in the same epistle to 
 warn those whom he recognizes as "born of God" to beware of 
 the danger of falling into sin, and if they should so fall, to 
 remember that "we have an Advocate with God, who is also 
 the propitiation for our sins;" and Paul's clear testimony of him. 
 self, after he has been born of God, that a war is still going on in 
 himself with sin, and he is in fear lest he fall. There must be 
 an explanation, for the Scriptures as God's Word must be con- 
 sistent with themselves. 
 
 Does the explanation lie in the words 
 
BABES IN CHRIST. 45 
 
 and TraiSta, (little children) with which John so 
 tenderly addresses them? When John writes, "Whosoever is 
 born of God doth not commit sin: for his (God's) seed remain- 
 eth in him and he cannot sin, because he is "born of God," does 
 he have in view a different person from the "little children" of 
 God whom he is urging to beware of sin ? Is John, in the one 
 set of texts, thinking of "babes in Christ," born of God, yet only 
 new born babes, weak, ill established, apt to stumble and fall, 
 yet withal truly born of God : in the other texts is he, with 
 that prophetic spiritual insight which was so marked in John, 
 looking past the babe to the matured man in Christ, able to 
 stand? 
 
 What light do the other apostolic writers throw upon this 
 point? Do they make such a distinction? 
 
 Paul writes: 
 
 "And I, brethren, could not speak unto you 
 
 as unto spiritual but as unto carnal, even as unto babes in 
 Christ. I have fed you with milk, and not with meat: for 
 hitherto ye were not able to bear it, neither yet now are ye 
 able. For ye are yet carnal : for whereas there is among you 
 envyings, and strife, and divisions, are ye not carnal and walk 
 as men?" I. Corinth. III. 1, 2, 3. 
 
 Are they then not God's children? Yes: for Paul goes on, 
 still addressing them: 
 
 "Know ye not that ye are the temple 
 of God, and that the Spirit of God dwelleth in you? III.-16. 
 
 And of them he has just said, "But of him are ye in Christ 
 Jesus." I. Corinth. I.-30. 
 
 And more, for he is still addressing them: "and ye are 
 Christ's." III.-23. 
 
 Born of God but babes. 
 
 Is any one ever born otherwise? 
 
 It is babes that are born; not full grown men. It is the law of 
 the natural world holding good in the spiritual world. God's 
 laws are general, not special. 
 Peter writes: 
 
 "Wherefore, laying aside all malice, and all 
 
46 THE WAY OF LIFE. 
 
 guile, and hypocrisies, and envies, and all evil speaking, as new 
 burn babes, desire the sincere milk of the Word that ye may 
 grow thereby." I. Peter, II. -1, 2. 
 
 The third verse preceding, to which the "wherefore" refers, 
 makes the meaning explicit: 
 
 "Being born again, not of corruptible seed, but of incor- 
 ruptible, by the word of God, which liveth and abideth 
 forever." I. Peter L-23. 
 
 Born again: born of God. Is the battling then over? No; 
 only just again beginning. It is the old battle of Eden over a 
 human soul, to be waged as never before. For this babe in 
 Christ, this babe in spiritual things and spiritual strength, is no 
 longer a babe in mind. He has eaten of the fruit of the tree of 
 the knowledge of good and evil, and has grown wise thereby, 
 but the wisdom brought no spiritual strength death instead. 
 And now about this new born soul is to be fought a battle such 
 as the Adam of the first innocency never knew: for it is now a 
 soul with the mars and the weaknesses of sin upon it: the stain 
 gone, the guilt pardoned, but the scars and the weaknesses 
 remaining, and with the strength of a man's passions upon it. 
 
 But in the contest will not the same result follow as in 
 man's first battle with sin? Will he not fall again? 
 
 Not necessarily: for man is not now what he was then. He 
 has changed. For, as just said, he has eaten of the fruit of the 
 tree of the knowledge of good and evil, and has grown wise 
 thereby, and now he knows the consequences of sin, not merely 
 by hearsay, but by bitter personal experience. He bears the 
 scars of the first battle ever upon him as a warning in the hour 
 of peril. 
 
 "Born of God," "babes in Christ." But is the babe to 
 continue a babe, with the "envyings and strife, and divisions" 
 (I. Corinth. III.-3) not yet freed from the power of "malice, and 
 all guile, and hypocrisies, and envies, and all evil speaking" 
 (I. Peter II.-l)? How then shall he come to that point of 
 which John speaks when he says he "doth not commit sin." (I. 
 John III.-9.) 
 
 Paul, in the fourth chapter of Ephesians, gives the explana- 
 tion : 
 
 "I therefore, the prisoner of the Lord, beseech you that 
 
BABES IN CHRIST. 47 
 
 ye walk worthy of the vocation wherewith ye are called, with 
 all lowliness and meekness, with long-suffering, forbearing one 
 another in love; endeavoring to keep the unity of the spirit in 
 the bond of peace. . . . And he gave some to be Apostles ; 
 and some prophets; and some evangelists; and some pastors 
 and teachers; for the perfecting of the saints, for the work of 
 the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ : till we all 
 come in the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of 
 God, unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the 
 fullness of Christ : that we henceforth be no more children, tossed 
 to and fro, and carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the 
 sleight of men, and cunning craftiness, whereby they lie in wait 
 to deceive; but speaking the truth in love, may grow up into 
 him in all things, which is the head, even Christ: Ephesians 
 IV.-l, 3 and 11, 15. 
 
 Turn to Peter again: 
 
 "Wherefore, laying aside all malice, 
 
 and all guile, and hypocrisies, and envies, and all evil speaking, 
 as new born babes desire the sincere milk of the word, that ye 
 may grow thereby." I. Peter II.-l, 2, 
 
IX. 
 A CHILD NO LONGER. 
 
 "Born of God" "babes in Christ": "A perfect man" "the 
 measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ." 
 
 Between these 
 
 two lies the whole difference between the Adam of Eden who 
 was unable to resist the power of evil, and the regenerated 
 Adam who "doth not sin." And between the two lies whatever 
 it is that converts the "babe in Christ," "tossed to and fro," 
 unable to stand, into the "perfect man," who is able to stand 
 fast, and not fall. 
 
 It is the experience of those who have thus 
 been born again to God, babes in Christ, that with regenera- 
 tion comes a season of rest. The bitterness of the struggle of 
 the soul in sin is over, and as a new born babe the soul is con- 
 tent to rest as in the arms of the Father. It is the rest of one 
 who has gone through a struggle. Yet the testimony of these 
 is also that this season of rest is not lasting. A new struggle 
 is now upon the soul. The old struggle to escape from sin now 
 becomes a struggle to avoid sin, to keep free from the power of 
 evil. For evil has not given up the battle. And God does not 
 leave man in ignorance of this. He forewarns him, that he may 
 not fall into the danger of a false security, and be taken 
 unawares. The Scriptures leave man no excuse for heedlessness 
 or mistake upon this point. 
 
 It is one constant warning, one unceasing cry, The 
 battle is now upon you: "Watch ye, stand fast in the faith, 
 quit you like men, be strong." I. Corinth. XVI.-13. 
 
 "Be sober, be vigilant; because your adversary the devil, as 
 a roaring lion, walketh about seeking whom he may devour 
 whom resist, steadfast in the faith." I. Peter V.-8. 
 
A CHILD NO LONGER. 49 
 
 And this battling is not spoken of as a thing to be deplored, 
 ,or mourned over, a misfortune; rather is it spoken of as a 
 thing to rejoice over: 
 
 "My brethren," cries James, with gladness in his voice, 
 "count it all joy when ye fall into divers temptations, 
 (7retpao"/xois, testings): knowing this, that the trying of 
 your faith worketh patience. But let patience have her perfect 
 work, that ye may be perfect and entire, wanting nothing 
 (ev w&tvl Aeoro/xevoi, lacking in nothing.) James I.-2, 3, 4. 
 
 Why has God thus planned that the "babe in Christ" shall 
 come to the "measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ, 
 through struggling and battling? 
 
 The question has a companion 
 
 question side by side with it, a question which has already been 
 briefly considered (Page 12.): 
 
 Why did God first place man where he would be subject to 
 spiritual struggle and battling? And the answer is the same 
 to both, namely, that some ultimate good may come of it which 
 could not be so well attained in any other way possibly could 
 only be attained by this way. It brings up the whole question 
 of God's dealings with man. 
 
 Wherein, then is the man, with his transgressions pardoned, 
 his soul regenerated, better off than man before his first trans- 
 gression? If he is no better off, then why did God permit him 
 to go through a testing that is purposeless ? To assume that 
 out of it all he emerges no better off than before, would be to 
 assume that God has not been wise or kind in his dealings with 
 men. No earthly parent would so deal with his child. Out of 
 the testing, the battling, man must come a gainer, or else we 
 must assume that somehow God made a mistake in first making 
 man subject to temptation, and that the whole scheme of 
 redemption is simply an attempt to repair the wrong. Man, 
 who in his first contest with evil was vanquished, must come 
 out of the second contest with a distinct increase in his power 
 of resisting evil, or else he has gained nothing to compensate 
 him for the battle. Battles are not fought without purpose. 
 Every battle is to the end that the one side or the other may 
 gain something. 
 
 The one evident purpose which can be seen to this contest 
 is, That man should no longer be in danger of bondage to 
 
50 THE WAY OF LIFE. 
 
 sin. John says that this man who is come "unto the perfect 
 stature of the fulness of Christ," is therewith to reach the point 
 where "he cannot sin: 11 where he is no longer in danger of 
 again falling under the power of evil. 
 
 This then is the end, that man, out of the testing, the 
 struggle, the battle, shall come to a point spiritually where he 
 shall be able to resist evil, and stand forever freed from its 
 power. 
 
 Could not God have guarded man originally against the 
 possibility of temptation ? 
 
 Unquestionably, yes. Did he? No for 
 
 he made man a free agent, and then placed him where he would 
 be subject to temptation. 
 
 Could not God in regeneration have made man so that he 
 could not sin ? 
 
 To this also the answer must be, No. The law 
 of freedom of will, under which he made man, stands between. 
 Freedom of will carries with it now, as at first, the power to 
 sin if man wills, and must carry it through all the eternities to 
 come. 
 
 Could not God then, in regeneration, have given to man the 
 power to resist all evil, given it at once, as a free gift, and so 
 have freed man from all further battling ? 
 
 Whether he could 
 
 have done so consistently with the scheme of man's soul 
 growth, as set forth in the Scriptures, may be questioned. That 
 he did not do so, is authoritatively stated by the Scriptures in 
 the quotations which have already been given. The final 
 resistance to evil under that scheme must come from man him- 
 self, for he has freedom of will. 
 
X. 
 
 A TEACHER AND GUIDE PROVIDED FOR THE 
 BABE IN CHRIST. 
 
 Yet God does not leave man without instruction and guid- 
 ance in this conflict which is upon him. He does not leave man 
 to make his battle in ignorance or in darkness. He gives light 
 and teaching that the way may be plain. 
 
 It is never to be forgotten that Christ himself came as a 
 teacher before he offered himself up as the sacrifice for trans- 
 gression. 
 
 The Christ life and the Christ teachings are as much a part 
 of the scheme of salvation as the Christ death on Calvary. In 
 the dramatic power of the one, we are apt to lose sight of the 
 less dramatic, yet no less essential power of the other. 
 
 The blood shed on Calvary was simply and solely the Old 
 Covenant offering for transgression. There is no promise, no 
 hinting even, that it is more. Through it comes pardon for 
 transgression no more; not even regeneration, although it is a 
 prerequisite to regeneration. But how is this man, thus pardoned 
 of his transgression, to be kept from sinning again ? There is 
 nowhere in the Scriptures any assurance that it is to be through 
 the blood of the atonement. The very word atonement 
 (Hebrew: kaphar primitive root, meaning, to cover, and 
 derivatively to expiate) excludes the idea. 
 
 It is a word that looks backward. The work that looks 
 forward, the keeping from transgression, must come in another 
 way. Yet this is as much a part of the plan as the mere par- 
 don of the deed done. 
 
 Take the Christ life, the Christ teaching. It is a constant 
 
52 THE WAY OF LIFE. 
 
 training to quicken the spiritual understanding of men that 
 they may rightly discern between good and evil, and an unceas- 
 ing warning to avoid the evil. 
 
 We are too apt in looking with devout eyes upon Christ, 
 the Lamb of God, to overlook the Christ, the Teacher of God. 
 Yet the whole record of the Gospels is instinct with the thought 
 of Christ the Teacher. The very wording used will not allow 
 it to be lost sight of. The Greek word SiSacrKaA.os, teacher, 
 (generally translated, but defectively, simply as Master, yet 
 originally with the idea, not of the English word master, but 
 of the Vulgate Magister, teacher, from which we take the word 
 in the King James translation) is applied to Christ forty-five 
 times in the four Gospels. It is the designation commonly 
 used. It is made use of in addressing him, by the Scribes and 
 Pharisees, by the Sadducees, by his disciples, by seekers after 
 eternal life, and is made use of by Christ himself eight times out 
 of the few cases where he speaks of himself. The verb SiScurKco 
 teach is made use of forty-nine times in describing the char- 
 acter of his work. It is as a teacher that he goes about for 
 the three years of his public ministry. 
 
 Teaching what? Exam- 
 ine the Christ teaching. Not much about his death; only 
 sufficient that men should remember and understand when they 
 came to look back: but much of the nature of sin, and how 
 to avoid it: teaching how to discern between good and evil, 
 and warning to beware of evil. 
 
 The whole framework of Christian doctrine rests upon the 
 words spoken during those three short years by Christ in his 
 capacity as a divine teacher all the epistles all the theologies 
 all the books of devotion and of creeds of all the ages. 
 Christ's work as a teacher is the foundation of it all. 
 
 Yet Christ 
 
 was not to remain upon earth. So long as he lived the sacrifice 
 for transgression of that old covenant was not yet offered up, 
 and the covenant unfulfilled. 
 
 Then, too, Christ, hampered by the flesh in the bodily form 
 which was assumed as a necessary part of the scheme of atone- 
 ment, could, as a teacher, personally reach only a few of earth's 
 millions. How are they, the millions yet unborn, to have eyes 
 enlightened to discern the spiritual truth of Christ's teachings? 
 for: 
 
A TEACHER AND GUIDE PROVIDED FOR THE BABE IN CHRIST. 53 
 
 "The natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit 
 of God : for they are foolishness unto him : neither can he 
 know them, because they are spiritually discerned." I. Cor. 
 II.-14. 
 
 But the Christ life and the Christ death were not the last 
 step in God's plan for man. Christ, who came as the true sacri- 
 fice to complete the old covenant, and who came as teacher 
 to announce the possibility and the way of the new birth, 
 came also as prophet to foretell the coming, and the office, 
 of the Holy Spirit. It is of the Holy Spirit that Christ says: 
 
 "And I will pray the Father, and he shall give you another 
 Comforter, that he may abide with you forever: even the 
 Spirit of truth ; whom the world cannot receive, because it 
 seeth him not, neither knoweth him: but ye know him: for 
 he dwelleth with you, and shall be in you." John XIV.-16, 17. 
 
 Of the office of the Holy Spirit which is thus to be in 
 the regenerated soul, he says: 
 
 "But the Comforter, 
 
 which is the Holy Ghost, whom the Father will send 
 in my name, he shall teach you all things, and bring all things 
 to your remembrance whatsoever I have said unto you." 
 John XIV.-26. 
 
 And again he says: 
 
 "Howbeit, when he, the Spirit of 
 
 truth, is come, he will guide you into all truth ; for he shall 
 not speak of himself ( d<' eavrov, from himself ) ; but 
 whatsoever he shall hear, that shall he speak; and he will 
 show you things to come." John XVI.-13. 
 
 It is the keeping of the promise given in Psalm XXXII. 
 -8, "I will instruct thee and teach thee in the way which 
 thou shalt go: I will guide thee with mine eye." 
 
XI. 
 
 THE LAW OF GROWTH. 
 
 In it all, one fact we may reasonably assume, that God 
 saw better things for man, a more satisfying spiritual man- 
 hood, by the slower process of growth, than by the direct 
 and quick avenue of gift. 
 
 Growth is the universal law of being which he has estab- 
 lished. In the body it is growth from the child to the man. 
 Why the years of comparatively helpless waiting? Could not 
 God have made man at once of full stature without this 
 intervening stage of growth to maturity? Yes, undoubtedly. 
 But he did not. 
 
 Growth in mind from childhood, pleased with a toy, 
 struggling to remember his a, b, c, to the man weighing the 
 planets, and reaching out to the farthest star. Why the years 
 of protracted mental toil, the years of apparent waste in 
 school, in college, the burning of the midnight oil ? Could 
 not God have made man at once in the full mental stature 
 of the trained thinker? Yes, unquestionably. But he did not. 
 
 If he did not, there must be a reason for it. And if he 
 did not for body, for intellect, are we to suppose that the 
 man spiritual is an exception to the law of man's being in 
 all other ways, and that spiritual manhood will be gained by 
 a sudden leap from childhood, the "babe in Christ," to that 
 spiritual manhood where one stands in the ''measure of the 
 stature of the. fulness of Christ," a "perfect man?" 
 
 That the law of growth is to hold good in the spiritual 
 world also, is shown in the Scriptures when Paul says: 
 
 "And he gave some to be apostles: and some prophets: 
 and some evangelists: and some pastors and teachers: for the 
 perfecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the 
 
THE LAW OF GROWTH. 55 
 
 edifying of the body of Christ: till we all come in the unity 
 of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, unto a 
 perfect man, unto the measure of the statufe of the fulness 
 of Christ: that we be no more children, tossed to and fro, 
 and carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the sleight 
 of men and cunning craftiness, whereby they lie in wait to 
 deceive: but speaking the truth in love, may grow up into 
 him in all things, which is the head, even Christ:" Ephesians 
 IV.-ll, 15. 
 
 Peter also says: 
 
 "Wherefore, laying aside all malice, 
 
 and all guile, and hypocricies, and envies, and all evil speak- 
 ings, as new born babes, desire the sincere milk of the word, 
 that ye may grow thereby." I. Peter II.-l, 2. 
 
 This thought of spiritual growth is so widely found in 
 the new covenant record that specific texts are scarcely neces- 
 sary, however. The whole record is instinct with it. 
 
 If God is, as we claim, and as the Scriptures constantly 
 affirm, a wise and loving father, there must be a good and 
 sufficient reason for this season of growth which thus inter- 
 venes between childhood and maturity, not only in the man 
 physical, and the man mental, but also in the man spiritual. 
 Test by the dealings of an earthly father with his child. A 
 wise and kind earthly father only does for his child the 
 things which the child cannot do for itself. It is thus that he 
 trains the child to a man, knowing that the very struggle to 
 do for itself will develop a stronger, better man. An unwise 
 father does too much, and thus spoils the man that might 
 be. He misses the struggle, and never grows to the true 
 strength of manhood. 
 
 How does God deal with his children spiritually? He par- 
 dons man's transgression: this, man could not do for him- 
 self. He breathes again into the soul, that is dead to God in 
 sin, the breath of spiritual life: this man could not do for 
 himself. Then to this new born child, this "babe in Christ," 
 he sends the Holy Spirit as teacher and guide, as school- 
 master; and now, having thus done for man the things which 
 man could not do for himself, he leaves this babe in Christ 
 to develop "unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature 
 of the fulness of Christ," under the working of the law of 
 spiritual growth. 
 
56 THE WAY OF LIFE. 
 
 This is the picture the new covenant record gives of God's 
 ways with man: and it places the man spiritual under the 
 same general law of development as the man intellectual and 
 the man physical. It makes God consistent with himself in 
 the working out of his laws. 
 
 Yet in it all God does not remain passive. He has not, 
 as a stern, hard father, said to this son, "My son, I have 
 given you life, I have started you upon the way of spiritual 
 growth; now you must take care of yourself. After the years 
 you may come back and tell me how it has fared with you." 
 Not this; for "Like as a father pitieth his children, so the 
 Lord pitieth them that fear him. For he knoweth our frame: 
 he remembereth that we are dust." Psalm CHI. 13, 14. 
 
 As a wisely kind father he says, "My son, the conflict of 
 spiritual life is before you. It is better for you that you should 
 battle and grow strong. Yet I am always with you. My 
 love is ever about you. In the hour" of weakness I will give 
 help:" 
 
 "He shall call upon me and I will answer him: I 
 will be with him in trouble: I will deliver him and honor him." 
 Psalm XCI.-15. 
 
 "And it shall come to pass, that before they call, I will 
 answer: and while they are yet speaking, I will hear," Isaiah 
 LXV.-24. 
 
 "The eternal God is thy refuge, and underneath are the 
 everlasting arms." Deut. XXXIII.-27. 
 
 But would it be a wise God, a kind God, that would take 
 the burdens away from man in his spiritual struggle even 
 though man should ask it? It certainly would not be a wise, 
 or a kind earthly father who would do this for his child in 
 worldly matters. He would reply, "My child, I will help you 
 when your strength gives out; but bear the burden; it is better 
 for you. I could easily lift it: but it is for your good that I 
 do not." 
 
 "For this thing, says Paul, "I besought the Lord thrice 
 that it might depart from me." 
 
 What was God's answer? 
 
 I "And he said unto me, My grace 
 is sufficient for thee." II. Corinth. XII.-8, 9. 
 
 And Paul, old, 
 
THE LAW OF GROWTH. 
 
 waiting, as he looks back over the years of the thorn in the 
 flesh, of toiling, and battling, and enduring, cries out in a 
 mighty gladness: 
 
 "I have fought a good fight; I have 
 
 finished my course ; I have kept the faith : henceforth there is 
 laid up for me a crown of righteousness which the Lord, the 
 righteous judge, shall give me at that day:" II. Timothy IV.- 
 7, 8. 
 
 Would Paul, that day in the Roman prison, old, broken 
 with the burden, but with the crown in sight would he, as he 
 looks backward with the deeper wisdom of the years: would he 
 now have had the prayer answered ? or would he choose 
 rather the pain and the grace? 
 
XII. 
 THE THINGS THAT ABIDE, 
 
 Man has learned some things in, and through, the long bat- 
 tle with evil. 
 
 He has learned to be less confident in his own judgment, 
 and to be more willing to accept God's guidance, 
 
 He has learned the danger of looking away from God, the 
 peril that comes from questioning God's word. When that day 
 the tempter said, "In the day thou eatest thereof thou shalt not 
 surely die," man had God's word, "In the day thou eatest thereof 
 thou shalt surely die." Man doubted God; and found death. 
 
 He has learned when tempted to diverge from the plain 
 pathway of God's laws to a by-way, however pleasant it may 
 appear, and however free from apparent harm, however to be 
 desired to make one wise even he has learned that, THIS WAY 
 
 DANGER LIES. 
 
 He has learned to ask God in the hour of doubt: and to 
 believe God. 
 
 Yet this implies that man, this man born again, and 
 grown "unto the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ, 
 a perfect man," may yet sin. How. then, are we to understand 
 John when he says that the soul born of God "cannot sin"? We 
 can only understand it in the sense, not of a power taken 
 away, but of a" power which the soul refuses to exercise. There 
 is no hint in all the Scriptures that freedom of will is ever taken 
 from man, and freedom of will carries with it, by its very 
 nature, the power to sin, if one wills. 
 
 To deprive man of 
 
 freedom of will would be a confession upon God's part that he 
 had made a mistake in first endowing man with it. Indeed, it 
 
THINGS THAT ABIDE. 59 
 
 may even be questioned whether God did not put the possibility 
 of recalling it out of his own power under the law wherein he 
 made man. 
 
 We can only understand that man still uses his freedom of 
 will, but now with an enlightened understanding and the fruits 
 of experience to help him; and now he wills not to sin. 
 
 The power of an enlightened conscience, with God helping 
 him (helping at man's request God cannot, consistently with 
 man's freedom of will, help otherwise) will not now let him fall 
 into sin. This man, made perfect, even as God is perfect, 
 (Matth. V.-48) cannot sin, even as God cannot sin, because his 
 whole understanding now comprehends it, and his whole nature 
 now abhors it. In this sense, and in this sense only, may the 
 words of John, "cannot sin" be understood. 
 
 One thing more man has learned. He has learned to know 
 the great, kind, loving, wise heart of the Father as the child- 
 man never could haye known him. And he has learned to lore 
 the Father with the love of a man. The love of the child is 
 sweet and tender, but what is it to the strong, abiding love of 
 the man, with 'his whole nature deepened, and heart made ten- 
 der, by the years of toil and struggle, and mellowed by the 
 harrowing of pain. This man, grown of the years of battling 
 with evil, is a man such as the heart of the child could not 
 have even conceived of: the God he has learned to know and 
 to love, a God such as the child-man never could have compre- 
 hended. This strong man has learned God's patient love. With 
 eyes made wise through suffering he has seen into the depths of 
 the Father's heart. 
 
XIII. 
 WALKING AGAIN WITH GOD. 
 
 Walking again with God. No longer the Adam of the Gar- 
 den, a child with the years before him, simple hearted, never 
 having known evil, but man who has known the sting of sin; 
 man with the years behind him: man, no longer proud, defiant, 
 but with eyes that have blinded to the bitterness of tears, and 
 with a chastened, humble heart. He has eaten of the fruit of 
 the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. 
 
 Was it all a mistake that placing of man where temptation 
 might come? and has God through all the weary ages been only 
 trying to repair the wrong, to correct the error? 
 
 I cannot think so. I do not understand, I may never 
 understand, the mystery of it all; yet this, it seems to me, I 
 see: That through it has been made possible a nobler, grander 
 man than he who that day walked in the Garden, ignorant of 
 evil: that out of the trial, the testing, has come strength; for 
 temptation is testing: and that through the ceaseless roll of the 
 eternities the man whom God has made, the man whom he suf- 
 fered to be tested, the man who has gone down into the Valley 
 of the Shadow, this man with whom God walked the weary 
 by-ways of earth, sharing the burden that he might win him 
 back; crying, O my son, I will dieforthee! this man will know 
 the great loving heart of the Father, as the Adam of the Garden 
 never could: this man, with heart that has vibrated to the 
 quiver of pain, can love God with a love such as the child 
 heart of Adam never could have known, for love has won him 
 back. And this man with the scars of the battling with sin 
 upon him, has, of his own free will, come back to God. In this 
 fact lies the vindication of God's ways with man. 
 
WALKING AGAIN WITH GOD. 61 
 
 Possibly the greatest, the noblest act of God is, not the cre- 
 ation of the Universe, not the giving of life to the angelic hosts, 
 but the making of a free-willed creature that may defy him: 
 and then making that creature an independent judge, 
 to pass judgment upon the works of his Maker. Of the days of 
 creation it is written that as God looked upon his own work he 
 said, "It is good." But who else is to pass judgment upon 
 God's works and ways? To man, the man whom God has 
 made, he gives to pass judgment. And man, after tasting of 
 good and evil, turns back from his evil ways to God again, say- 
 ing, "I have seen God's works, I have tested his ways, I have 
 tried his judgments, and lo, they are altogether right and good." 
 
 And will man at last stand? Yes, for he has tasted of the 
 fruitage of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, and of 
 his own free will he has turned back from evil and chosen 
 good. It is not only the vindication of God's ways with man 
 but it is the vindication also of free will. Man has learned to 
 know good and evil: has learned to know through all the long 
 ages of misery and pain. The mystery of sin is a mystery to 
 him no more. The mystery was death. He has passed through 
 the valley of the shadow. He will not trayel that road again. 
 For, wise in the wisdom gained of the bitter fruit, he has made 
 his choice, and WILLS NOT TO SIN. 
 
 But do all men, do even most men, clearly see, and under- 
 standingly follow, the successive steps of this pathway back to 
 God? No: nor have we reason to suppose it is essential that 
 they should. Men are little skilled to analyze and give name to 
 their own spiritual processes. They only know that somehow 
 they grew sorry for the wrong in their lives: that a great hun- 
 gering came to be at peace with God, and they resolved to lead 
 a new life. And then, as a cry went up from their hearts to 
 God for help, and they bowed to his will, peace came to their 
 souls, and the burden was gone. And as the years have gone 
 by, in the midst of testing and battling, they have been kept, 
 and have grown near to God. 
 
 And then, men start from such 
 different standpoints. One, like Saul, "breathing out threaten- 
 
62 THE WAY OF LIFE. 
 
 ings and slaughter," is stricken down by the power of God in a 
 moment, and through all the years is able to point back to the 
 hour, and the milestone on the Damascus road, where his whole 
 ife was changed. 
 
 Another only knows that an agony came upon his soul until 
 he beat upon his breast and cried, "God be merciful to me a 
 sinner;" and somehow the load was gone, and he went to his 
 house justified. 
 
 Another is like Timothy, of whom Paul says, "When I call 
 to remembrance the unfeigned faith that is in thee, which dwelt 
 first in thy grandmother Lois, and thy mother Eunice; and I am 
 persuaded in thee also." (II. Timothy I.-5.) And this one born 
 and reared in the household of faith, trained in right ways from 
 his mother's knee, hardly knows what it is ever to have been 
 other than a child of God. 
 
 Yet Saul of the Damascus road, and the poor publican from 
 without the temple gate, and Timothy from his mother's knee, 
 shall together stand before the throne, and, in a gladness that 
 is deeper than speech, their hearts shall say, "Master, by ways 
 that we knew not of, thou didst lead us." 
 
 BLESS THE LORD, O MY SOUL 
 
HOLINESS UNTO THE LORD. 
 
"Wherefore girding up the loins of your mind, be sober, and 
 set your hope perfectly on the grace that is to be brought unto 
 you at the revelation of Jesus Christ: as children of obedience, 
 not fashioning yourselves according to your tormer lusts in the 
 time of your ignorance: but like as he which called you is holy, 
 be ye yourselves also holy in all manner of living: because it is 
 written, Ye shall be holy: for I am holy." I. Peter L-13, 16. 
 
In order to avoid too much repetition some things are 
 omitted in the essay upon Holiness unto the Lord which are 
 given in the previous essay on The Way of Life, The essay 
 upon The Way of Life gives the broad outlines: the essay upon 
 Holiness unto the Lord takes up more in detail what is a 
 special feature of the other. To a full understanding of the 
 thought of each, they'should be read in the order in which they 
 are given, namely, 
 
 I. The Way of Life. 
 
 II. Holiness unto the Lord. 
 
I. 
 
 THE BORDER LAND. 
 
 Between the soul "born again," yet a "babe in Christ," 
 still in the ignorance and weakness of spiritual infancy, with 
 the testings, the trials, the falling into sin and the repenting 
 again, as described by Paul and . other New Testament 
 writers, still before it, between this babe in Christ and the 
 "perfect man" come "unto the measure of the stature Df the 
 fulness of Christ, (Ephesians IV.-13),who "cannot sin" (I.John 
 III. 9), lies a border land. In the man physical, the man men- 
 tal, the corresponding stage is the interval of youth, where- 
 in comes growth, the growth which transforms the weakling 
 infant into the man, strong, able to stand. This transition 
 period between spiritual infancy and spiritual manhood has 
 been the source of much difference of opinion and discussion 
 The controversies have pivoted around the words, Holiness, 
 Sanctification, Christian Perfection, the Higher Life. The gist 
 of the controversy may be summed up in the question, "How 
 does the "babe in Christ" attain to spiritual manhood?" The 
 views advanced in the discussions have been so divergent that it 
 is difficult to see how they can all be legitimately based upon 
 the Scriptures; for the way must be a plain, simple way, which 
 the most ignorant, or unlearned person may readily, understand 
 When the Scripture says of God, "just and righ 
 is he," (Deut. XXXII.-4), and when God calls him 
 self "a just God and a Savior" (Isaiah XLV.-21), thi 
 condition of utter plainness and simplicity as essential to an y 
 plan of salvation becomes imperative. To hold a soul morally 
 responsible for conditions beyond its comprehension, would not 
 be just. 1 have often been struck with this thought as I have 
 watched the puzzled, anxious, discouraged faces of earnest 
 
68 HOLINESS UNTO THE LORD. 
 
 seekers, as they have vainly tried to comprehend some abstruse, 
 mystical exposition of some doctrine which yet was insisted 
 upon as an absolute condition of salvation. 
 
 Isaiah recognized the obligation that the way must be plain 
 and easily understood, when he said: 
 
 "And an highway 
 
 shall be there, and a way, and it shall be called the way of 
 holiness: the unclean shall not pass over it; but it shall be for 
 those: the -wayfaring men, though fools, shall not err therein." 
 Isaiah XXXV. 8. 
 
 Does this difference of opinion come from a failure to search 
 the whole Scriptures in the investigation? 
 
 The question is a 
 
 natural one, for surely God's word, which is to be the guide 
 of men from death unto life, must, in fairness to seeking souls, 
 be clear and plain. If "Thy word is a lamp unto my path," 
 (Psalm CXIX.-105) surely it is not unfair to expect it to shine 
 with a clearness which shall not lead men astray. 
 
 The object of this essay is to inquire more fully than was 
 done in the essay, THE WAY OF LIFE, what the Scriptures teach 
 upon this question, namely, How does the "Babe in Christ," 
 weak, easily falling into sin, come "unto the measure of the 
 stature of the fulness of Christ," the "perfect man" who "can- 
 not sin;" for there can be no better definition of "Holiness unto 
 the Lord," than the New Covenant words just quoted. 
 
 Some precautions to be observed in the search. 
 
 1. To discriminate carefully between human and divine 
 authority. Whatever devout men may think, their opinion, 
 unless based upon absolute Scriptural authority, cannot be 
 taken into account. "Thus saith the Lord," must be the only 
 proper authority and foundation, and this must be final. 
 
 2. Claims to special revelations, or enlightenment by the 
 Spirit, cannot be accepted as authority, because we have no 
 commonly recognised means of testing such claims, to know 
 whether they be more than the fancy of the one making them. 
 The one common and recognized authority among Christians is 
 the "Thus saith the Lord," of the revealed word, as found in 
 the Holy Scriptures. This is the sole court of appeal. We have 
 no other. 
 
THE BORDER LAND. 69 
 
 3. In searching the Scriptures themselves, care must be 
 taken, in all cases of dispute or doubt, to make sure of the 
 exact meaning of the riginal tongue. Our versions of the Old 
 Testament Hebrew, and the New Testament Greek, especially 
 the King James translation, are not always strictly accurate in 
 the shading of meaning. 
 
 4. The Scriptures can only in fairness be taken in their 
 plain, direct meaning. The moment we begin to read into the 
 word mystical and special meanings there remains no common 
 ground for discussion, and a door has been opened into a 
 region ol shadowy uncertainty and great possible error. 
 
 5. Texts must not be wrested from their natural surround- 
 ings, but must be taken with the context, which is often abso- 
 lutely essential to a proper understanding of their true mean- 
 ing, and to a due estimate of their relative importance, and 
 will often serve to correct erroneous, because hastily drawn, 
 conclusions. 
 
 6. Caution must be had with regard to basing important 
 doctrines upon a single text, and especially if this text, when 
 taken alone, and in the manner in which it is used, shows any 
 conflict with other portions of the Scriptures, or any lack of 
 harmony with the general scope and tenor of the Scriptures as 
 a whole. 
 
 7 In all statements and discussions, words must be used 
 in their commonly accepted dictionary meaning, as they would 
 be used in a court of law. And a word once used in a certain 
 sense must continue to be used in exactly the same sense when- 
 ever employed. Failure to observe this simple precaution lies 
 back of much of the theological disputation of the world . 
 
 What is the specific question under consideration in this 
 essay ? 
 
 It is this: What is the character, and time, and man- 
 ner of action, of the change which comes to man spiritually 
 between regeneration (born again), and the one who has reached 
 the point described by John in the words, "he cannot sin"? 
 
 We have here two distinct, sharply defined, fixed points; one, 
 the beginning of the Christian experience; the other, its 
 culmination. They represent the extremes of the Christian life. 
 They are far apart. Between them lie great and important 
 
70 HOLINESS UNTO THE LORD. 
 
 changes. There is a long journey to be passed over before a 
 soul starting from the one, has reached the other. And as they 
 are the beginning and the end, any other work must lie some- 
 where between, and must, in the very nature of the case, be 
 preliminary to that stage wherein one "cannot sin." 
 
II. 
 
 THE OLD COVENANT RECORD, AND ITS 
 
 TEACHINGS UPON THE SUBJECT OF 
 
 HOLINESS UNTO THE LORD. 
 
 What light does the Scripture record of the Old Covenant 
 throw upon this subject? Not what may be read into the 
 record; but what does the record contain? Not, how may 
 words be twisted or forced beyond their legitimate meaning; or 
 what meaning may be injected into them when severed from the 
 context; but what meaning do the words fairly and legitimately 
 bear. And it should be born in mind that no greater harm can 
 come to a cause than through claiming too much, or through 
 trying to force proof and support for a doctrine where the rec- 
 ord will not fairly justify it. 
 
 Two lines of investigation are 
 
 requisite to settle the question specific words or texts the gen- 
 eral scope and spirit of the record. 
 
 1. Specific words or texts. 
 
 Much stress has been placed, in 
 
 discussions upon this topic, upon the words sanctify, holi- 
 ness, purify, cleanse, as found so frequently occuring in the Old 
 Covenant record. We are not justified, however, in at once 
 assuming that these words, as made use of in that record, are 
 necessarily always, or even generally, used in the specific spirit- 
 ual sense in which they are used in the so-called holiness discus- 
 sions, that is, as descriptive ol a second work of spiritual 
 change in the human heart. 
 
 The verb sanctify (sanctus facio, to make holy; Hebrew: 
 qadash, primary meaning, to cleanse) with its derivatives, is 
 made use of 110 times in the Old Covenant record. It is used 
 
72 HOLINESS UNTO THE LORD. 
 
 of times, of places, of buildings, of fields, of utensils, in the sense 
 of set apart, dedicate, cleanse; it is used of men in the sense of 
 bodily cleansing: it is used of God in the sense of hallow. 
 After careful examination of these texts in detail, it seems 
 doubtful whether other than a forced construction could in any 
 case hold the words as descriptive of a further work of grace 
 in the human heart. The noun sanctification does not occur 
 in the Old Covenant record. 
 
 The word holy, with its derivative, holiness, occurs 451 
 times in the Old Testament. In all but four cases the Hebrew 
 word is built up from the same primitive root as the qadash of 
 sanctify. In the four exceptions the word used is the Chaldaeic 
 chaciyd, pious, godly. In few of the 451 cases also can any fair 
 use of the text be made to indicate a further work of grace in 
 the heart. But again we find the texts applying to times, 
 places, things, Israel as a people rather than to individual 
 work or change. 
 
 The word cleanse, with its derivatives, occurs 183 times, 
 ten different Hebrew words, some of them derivatives from a 
 common root, being thus translated. 
 
 These words also are used of places, of things, of the people 
 at large, as a work done through the sacrifices for actual trans- 
 gression: only inferentially, and in a few places, as in the Psalms 
 of David, are they made use of as descriptive of a heart work, 
 e. g., Psalms LI.-10 and LXXIIL 1, and notably also in 
 Ezekiel XXXVI.-25, 29. 
 
 The word purify, with its derivatives, occurs 116 times in 
 that record. Eleven different Hebrew words, some of them 
 allied, are thus translated. These words also are used almost 
 exclusively of things; or when of persons, in the sense of freeing 
 from transgression. In Psalm XXIV.-4, the word pure is used 
 of the heart, apparently as the Greek Ko.Qa.poi is employed in 
 Matthew V.-8, in the sense of cleansed. 
 
 These tests of single words show that a word taken alone 
 is not a safe or sufficient foundation upon which to base a 
 Scriptural doctrine: on the contrary, is a most insufficient and 
 unsafe basis. They show the necessity for a careful weighing of 
 the context in all cases. 
 
 Is there then to be found in the Old Covenant record any 
 reasonable basis, for the doctrine of a work in the human soul 
 
THE OLD COVENANT RECORD UPON THE SUBJECT. 73 
 
 whereby it shall be freed from the power of evil, not simply 
 the transgression pardoned, the soul born again into spiritual 
 life, but, over and beyond this, an ability to stand, the power 
 of evil permanently broken? 
 
 To this the answer must be, Yes. 
 
 An answer based not so much upon specific words or texts, as 
 upon the general scope and spirit of the record. It must be felt 
 rather than seen, for that whole covenant is incomplete and only 
 prophetic, often only dimly prophetic, of better things to come. 
 Take the LI. Psalm, the cry of David's heart after an awful 
 backsliding. It is the despairing cry of a human heart, not 
 simply for pardon for transgression, but for emancipation from 
 the power of evil. It is such a cry as comes from one in the 
 relentless grip of the undertow. Analyze the Psalm. It con- 
 tains: 
 
 A recognition of actual transgression: "I acknowledge my 
 transgressions." 
 
 Conviction: "My sin is ever before me." 
 Confession to God: "Against thee, thee only, have I 
 sinned, and done this evil in thy sight." 
 
 A plea for pardon: "Cleanse me from my sin." 
 But there is more: A recognition of evil back of, and 
 deeper seated than personal transgression, the evil of a heart 
 prone to transgression with a proneness which comes of hered- 
 ity:- 
 
 "Behold I was shapen in iniquity; and in sin did my mother 
 conceive me." 
 
 A recognition also of the fact that God requires the chang- 
 ing of this evil nature: "Behold thou desirest truth in the 
 inward parts." 
 
 A cry for this inner change, and a deeper work of grace: 
 "Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right 
 spirit within me." 
 
 A recognition of the need of something more than the sacri- 
 fice of blood in order to the doing of this work : "For thou 
 desirest not sacrifice, else would I give it : thou delightest 
 not in burnt offering. The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit: 
 a broken and a contrite heart, O God, thou wilt not despise." 
 
 A recognition of God's ability to thus radically cleanse the 
 heart: "Wash (thou) me, and I shall be whiter than snow." 
 Is it conceivable that God has provided no relief for this 
 
74 HOLINESS UNTO THE LORD. 
 
 longing of the human heart to be freed from the power of evil? 
 and must the cry go unanswered? 
 
 Ezekiel seems clearly to 
 
 point to an answer to the cry, and to show that there is a way 
 to be provided, whereby the power of evil over a human soul 
 shall be permanently broken, when, as spokesman of the Lord, 
 he gives utterance to the divine message: 
 
 "Then will I sprinkle 
 
 clean water upon you, and ye shall be clean: from all your 
 filthiness, and from all your idols, will I cleanse you." 
 
 But there is more: 
 
 "A new heart also will I give you, 
 
 and a new spirit will I put within you: and I will take away 
 the stony heart out of your flesh, and I will put my spirit 
 within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes, and ye shall 
 keep my judgments, and do them." Ezekiel XXXVI.-25, 27. 
 
 Isaiah has a vision of the coming of a time when this shall 
 no longer be only dimly seen, as afar off, a thing which men 
 shall grasp only by faith, but as a present, glorious possibility. 
 As the spirit of prophecy rests upon him he looks across the 
 ages, and cries: 
 
 "And a highway shall be there, and a way, 
 and it shall be called The way of holiness: the unclean shall not 
 pass over it: but it shall be for those (see verses 3 to 6): the 
 wayfaring men, though fools, shall not err therein. No lion 
 shall be there, nor any ravenous beast shall go up thereon, it 
 shall not be found there: but the redeemed shall walk there. 
 And the ransomed of the Lord shall return, and come to Zion 
 with songs and everlasting joy upon their heads: they shall 
 obtain joy and gladness, and sorrow and sighing shall flee 
 away." Isaiah XXXV.-8, 10. 
 
 What do these words of Isaiah mean? Take the context. 
 It may help to give answer to the inquiry. The whole chapter 
 is injected into the general subject of Isaiah's discourse as a sep- 
 arate and distinct matter. 
 
 The prophet has been denouncing man's uncleanness, and 
 God's wrath thereon, and the coming woes, when suddenly, as 
 one who, walking the desert alone, has a vision of a far-off 
 oasis with its restful palms, he pauses and tells of the vision. 
 The concensus of opinions is that it refers to the coming of 
 Christ's Kingdom. It is a prophecy apparently of something 
 
THE OLD COVENANT RECORD UPON THE SUBJECT. 75 
 
 better yet in store for man. In the thought of what it is to 
 be to men he cries: 
 
 "Strengthen ye the weak hands, and confirm 
 the feeble knees. Say to them that are of a fearful heart, Be 
 strong, fear not." 
 
 Why? Because your God "will come and save you." 
 
 Then what? "Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened, 
 and the ears of the deaf shall be unstopped: then shall the lame 
 man leap as an hart, and the tongue of the dumb sing: for in 
 the wilderness shall waters break out, and streams in the des- 
 ert." Why? It is because of that "Way of Holiness." 
 
 And how about the feeble and fearful ? The answer is in 
 verse 10: 
 
 "And the ransomed of the Lord shall return, and 
 come to Zion with songs, and everlasting joy upon their heads: 
 and they shall obtain joy and gladness, and sorrow and sigh- 
 ing shall flee away." 
 
 "The whole chapter is apparently a pro- 
 phecy to God's people of the coming of something better than 
 they have yet found, and the fulfillment lies along the way of 
 Holiness unto the Lord, a holiness beyond such as they had 
 found under the blood sacrifice for transgression. 
 
 Back of the imagery is seen the coming of a time when the 
 redeemed shall walk safely, emancipated from the power of 
 evil. "No lion shall be there" that lion of which Peter sounds 
 the warning: 
 
 "Be sober, be vigilant: because your adversary 
 the devil, as a roaring lion, walketh about, seeking whom he 
 may devour." I. Peter V.-8. 
 
 It is thus to the general scope and spirit of the whole of 
 the Old Covenant record that we must look, rather than to 
 isolated words or specific passages: for we must remember that 
 that record is largely only a hinting and a prophecy of the deep 
 things of God which were to be made plain in the clearer light 
 of the New Covenant. 
 
 And I doubt whether any one can carefully and prayerfully 
 study that old record without discerning therein the spirit of 
 prophetic longing, and the growing assurance of a deeper work 
 in the human soul than conies of the pardon of transgression 
 alone. It is the bird song in the night darkness that tells of 
 the coming of the morning. It takes this note of hope which 
 
76 HOLINESS UNTO THE LORD. 
 
 ever runs in and through the writing, to relieve what would 
 otherwise be the gloom of an unutterable sadness resting upon 
 that Old Covenant record. And by faith they who were under 
 the covenant heard, and took hold of the promises, and walked 
 thereby, and were glad. See Hebrews XI. 
 
III. 
 
 THE NEW COVENANT RECORD, AND ITS TEACH- 
 INGS UPON THE SUBJECT OF HOLINESS 
 UNTO THE LORD. 
 
 It is only by keeping the great Scriptural landmarks clearly 
 and constantly in view that the possibility of reaching satisfac- 
 tory conclusions upon any moot point of doctrine may be 
 assured. For the Scriptures are not an aggregation of discon- 
 nected, fragmentary writings, but a continuous, self-consistent 
 record of the working out of a plan which from beginning to 
 end never loses sight of one purpose. This general scope of the 
 Scriptures must never be overlooked, nor the fact that each 
 separate writing must strictly accord and harmonize with the 
 end in view. Let us briefly review a few of these landmarks. 
 
 What did the coming of Christ upon earth bring to man? 
 
 It brought: 
 
 1 The fulfilling of the Old Covenant in the offering of the 
 true sacrifice for transgression. Calvary was the final altar 
 sacrifice for sin: 
 
 "For it is not possible that the blood of 
 bulls and goats should take away sin." , Hebrews X.-4. 
 
 "The next day John seeth Jesus coming unto him, and saith, 
 Behold the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the 
 world." John I.-29. 
 
 And beyond this sacrifice there is no other: 
 
 "But this 
 
 man, after he had offered one sacrifice for sins forever, sat down 
 on the right hand of God." Hebrews X.-12. 
 
78 HOLINESS UNTO THE LORD. 
 
 2 It brought the doctrine of the new birth : 
 
 "Jesus answered 
 
 and said unto him, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, except a 
 man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God." John 
 III.-3. 
 
 3 It made of the doctrine a completed fact, not simply a 
 prophecy: 
 
 "But as many as received him, to them gave he 
 power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on 
 his name: which were born not of blood, nor of the will of the 
 flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God." John I. 12, 13. 
 
 "Beloved, now are we the sons of God:" I. John III.-2. 
 
 4 It brought the doctrine of the indwelling Christ: 
 
 "He that eateth my flesh and drinketh my blood, dwelleth 
 in me, and I in him." John VP-56. 
 
 And this is life, for: 
 
 "Whoso eateth my flesh, and drink- 
 eth my blood, hath eternal life." John VI.-54. 
 
 5 It brought the prophecy and promise of the coming of 
 the Holy Spirit: 
 
 "And T will pray the Father, and he shall 
 
 give you another Comforter, that he may abide with you for- 
 ever: even the Spirit (Trvev/xa) of truth : whom the world can- 
 not receive, because it seeth him not, neither knoweth him : 
 but ye know him for he dwelleth with you, and shall be in 
 you." John XIV.-16, 17. 
 
 But not yet come: 
 
 "It is expedient for you that I go 
 
 away: for if I go not away, the Comforter will not come unto 
 you: but if I depart I will send him unto you." John XVI-7. 
 
 6 It brought a foretelling of the office of the Holy Spirit: 
 
 "But the Comforter, which is the Holy Ghost, (Ilj/cv/xa) 
 whom the Father will send in my name, he shall teach you all 
 things, and bring all things to your remembrance, whatsoever 
 I have said unto you." John XIV.-26. 
 
 "Howbeit when he, the Spirit (Ilvev/xa) of truth is come* 
 he will guide you into all truth: for he shall not speak of him" 
 self: (d<* eavrov from himself) but whatsoever he shall hear 
 that s hall he speak; and he will show you things to come." 
 John XVI. 13. 
 
THE NEW COVENANT RECORD UPON THE SUBJECT. 79 
 
 The foregoing are all clear, sharply defined steps in the line 
 of development of soul life, clearly set forth in the Scriptures, 
 and about which Christians have little controversy. Now, how- 
 ever, diversity of opinions and of theories begins. It starts from 
 the dividing line of the new birth (regeneration.) 
 
 John speaks of one "born again" as one who "doth not 
 commit sin," and as one who "cannot sin, because he is born 
 of God" (I. John III. -9), yet, as has been shown in the essay 
 upon THE WAY OF LIFE, in the same epistle he recognizes the 
 possibility of sin in those born of God, and warns against it. 
 
 Paul speaks of one born of God as a "babe in Christ" full 
 of imperfections, and weaknesses, and frequently falling into sin: 
 "And I, brethern, could not speak unto you as unto spiritual, 
 but as unto carnal, even as uuto babes in Christ. I have fed 
 you with milk, and not with meat: for hitherto ye were not 
 able to bear it, neither yet now are ye able. For ye are yet 
 carnal: for whereas there is among you envying, and strife, and 
 divisions, are ye not carnal, and walk as men?" I. Corinth. 
 III.-l, 3. 
 
 Yet Paul also speaks of one born again who after a while, 
 through a perfecting work, comes "unto a perfect man, unto 
 the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ," "no more 
 a child, tossed to and fro," swayed and let astray as a child, 
 but one able to stand as a man. (Ephesians IV.-13, 14.) 
 
 Thus both of these writers recognize clearly two distinct 
 stages in the soul life of the one "born of God," childhood- 
 manhood: a work begun a work completed. John recognizes 
 it by implication: Paul recognizes it by direct statement. 
 
IV. 
 SPIRITUAL CHILDHOOD SPIRITUAL MANHOOD. 
 
 How does this "babe in Christ" become a man in Christ? 
 
 This one question covers the whole field of the so-called 
 Holiness controversy, and a satisfactory answer to it would be 
 a solution to the whole matter. 
 
 That there remains a further work to be done in the believer 
 after regeneration, Christ himself recognizes in that last prayer 
 with his disciples when he prays for them, saying: 
 
 "Sanctify them in the (cv rrj) truth." John XVII.-17. 
 
 That this was not a part of the work to be done by the 
 Christ coming, is shown by his words in the beginning of the 
 same prayer, when he says, "I have finished the work which 
 thou gavest me to do." John XVII.-4. 
 
 Christ's specific work ends with remission of transgression 
 in the sacrifice of Calvary (John I.-29), and regeneration (John 
 VI.-54). And if one regenerated falls into sin (d/xa/m'a, trans- 
 gression) John says, We have an advocate with the 
 Father who is the propitiation for our sins. (I. John II. 2.), 
 And again the sin may be pardoned. 
 
 But the further work for 
 
 this "babe in Christ" is, by Christ's own statement, to be the 
 work, not of himself, for "I have finished the work which thou 
 gavest me to do," (John XVII.-4), but is to be the work of 
 the Holy Spirit as instructor, "Howbeit when he, the Spirit 
 of truth, is come, he will guide you into all truth." (John 
 XVI.-13.) 
 
 It would seem to be the office, then, of the Holy 
 Spirit to take this new born babe in Christ, and guide him 
 nto all truth. The Holy Spirit is thus described as the School- 
 
SPIRITUAL CHILDHOOD SPIRITUAL MANHOOD. 81 
 
 master who is to train this "babe in Christ" unto a perfect 
 man, unto the measure of the statare of the fulness of Christ." 
 
 That this work is not one limited to the little band of disci- 
 ples present that night, but is a work to be done in all of Christ's 
 followers, is shown by the added words in the same prayer 
 when he says, "Neither pray I for these alone, but for them 
 also which shall believe on me through their word." John 
 XVII.-20. 
 
 And that this is to be the man completely at one again 
 with God, is shown by his words in the following verse, as he 
 says, "That they all may be one, as thou Father art in me, 
 and I in thee, that they also may be one in us." 
 
 How does this "babe in Christ" become a man? 
 
 An essential 
 
 preliminary to an answer is the consideration of the further 
 question, What is the mental and spiritual condition of the 
 newly regenerated one, this "babe in Christ"? 
 
 Is it a babe, pure, clean from all transgression? or is it one 
 haying still what has been termed a residuum of sin, from 
 which it has not yet been cleansed? 
 
 And again, before the inquiry can be prosecuted, another 
 preliminary must be settled, namely, What is meant by the 
 word sin. Much of the perplexity which has arisen upon this 
 point has come from ambiguity in the use of the word sin. It 
 has come from confusing, and treating as one and the same, an 
 act and the inherited proneness to the act. This word sin 
 occurs 107 times in the New Covenant record. In every case it 
 is a translation of the Greek d/xapna (verb d/oux/oTavo>) , or one of 
 its derivatives. The word a/xa/cma means primarily the missing 
 of a mark, as of one throwing a spear. The secondary meaning 
 is, an evil deed committed, a transgression. It does not mean 
 heredity in evil tendency. John defines the word when he says, 
 "Sin is the transgression of the Law." I. John III.-4. Christ, 
 in the keen, heart-searching analysis of the Sermon on the 
 Mount, makes this more explicit by showing that transgres- 
 sion may be of desire, or intent: as well as of overt act. 
 
 Heredity cannot be sin. If it were, no child dying in infancy 
 could be saved, because it could have no chance to repent of its 
 sin and turn to God, and thus prepare the way for regen- 
 eration. Neither has it power to believe on Christ that it 
 
82 HOLINESS UNTO THE LORD. 
 
 may have eternal life. Yet, "of such is the kingdom of heaven" 
 says Christ of the little ones. Could he say it of those who 
 possess inherited sin even? Such (as the little ones) was Adam: 
 he transgressed. Such is the child: it may transgress. With the 
 inherited tendency and proneness to evil, it will transgress, and 
 will need the atonement for transgression, but not for inherited 
 transgression. Sin, then, is not heredity, but actual transgres- 
 sion. 
 
 And now to come back to the question of a residuum of sin 
 after justification. 
 
 Is not the one justified a man cleansed from all transgres- 
 sion? Has the work^of pardon been only partial ? Is there'still 
 a residuum left uncleansed? Such a supposition would involve 
 one of two things: 
 
 1 That the sinner has repented of only a part of his sins: 
 as though he came to God saying, "I repent me of my immor- 
 alities, and ask pardon therefor, but do not repent me of 
 my hatreds." Would God pardon anything to such an applica- 
 tion? 
 
 2 That to one repenting of all, God replies, "I will pardon 
 your immoralities, but not your hatreds." Would God do this 
 to a soul sincerely repenting? 
 
 A partial justification would be an absurdity upon the very 
 face of it. 
 
 And so with regard to regeneration. A child is born or it 
 is not born. Christ does not say to Nicodemus: "Nicodemus, 
 you must be partly born again ; and after a while you may be 
 entirely born." The very figure made use of by Christ forbids 
 such a supposition as an absurdity. 
 
 The "babe in Christ" is not then, a babe with the stain of 
 a partially cleansed sin yet upon him. He is not one who is 
 only partly justified, but one as a new born babe, cleansed 
 through the atonement of Christ, and alive spiritually in God, 
 through the indwelling Christ, yet, Paul says, still a babe. 
 
 In what sense is justified and regenerated man still a babe? 
 
 To find answer to this question we must begin back at the 
 starting point of man's existence man as first made by God- 
 man before the the first death to God in transgression the man 
 pictured in the first three chapters of Genesis. It is a picture 
 
SPIRITUAL CHILDHOOD SPIRITUAL MANHOOD. 83 
 
 of a new born infant, a babe in the knowledge of good and 
 evil, a babe in desire, a babe in will. It is the parallel of the 
 infant as born daily into the world. 
 
 Did he remain a babe? 
 
 Not in the knowledge of good and evil: 
 
 "For God doth 
 
 know that in the day ye eat thereof, then your eyes shall be 
 opened: and ye shall be as gods, knowing good and evil." 
 Genesis III. 5. 
 
 "And the Lord God said, Behold the man is become as one 
 of us, to know go6d and evil:" Genesis III.-22. 
 
 "As one of us" this babe in Christ is no longer a babe in 
 the knowledge of good and evil. He has eaten of the fruit of 
 the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, and verily the 
 tempter was right, it was a tree to make one wise, but it is 
 not a wisdom that leadeth unto life. The babe of innocency is 
 no longer a babe in innocency, but a man, wise in that knowl- 
 edge of sin, the ending whereof is spiritual death. 
 
 "As one of us" If no longer then a babe in intellect, is it 
 in desire and will power? 
 
 Is it the spiritual nature that is born again as a babe in 
 Christ? What light does the New Covenant record throw upon 
 this point? 
 
 "And I, brethren, could not speak unto you as unto 
 spiritual, but as unto carnal, even as unto babes in Christ: I 
 have fed you with milk, and not with meat; for hitherto ye 
 were not able to bear it, neither yet now are ye able. For ye 
 are yet carnal: for whereas there is among you envying and 
 strife, and divisions, are ye not carnal, and walk as men?" I. 
 Corinthians III.-l, 3. 
 
 "And grieve not the Holy Spirit of God whereby ye are 
 sealed unto the day of redemption. Let alt bitterness, and 
 wrath, and anger, and clamor, and evil speaking, be put away 
 from you, with all malice; and be ye kind one to another, ten- 
 der-hearted, forgiving one another, even as God for Christ's sake 
 hath forgiven you. Be ye therefore followers (/JLL^TOL imitators) 
 of God, as dear children. * J* * * * "Let no man deceive 
 you with vain words: for because of these things cometh the 
 wrath of God upon the child rea of disobedience. Be not ye 
 therefore partakers with them," Ephesians IV.-30, 32 and V. 
 1, 6, 7. 
 
84 HOLINESS UNTO THE LORD. 
 
 "That we henceforth be no more children, tossed to and fro, 
 and carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the sleight of 
 men, and cunning craftiness, whereby they lie in wait to 
 deceive : but speaking the trnth in love, may grow up into him 
 in all things, which is the head, even Christ." Ephesians IV.- 
 14, 15. 
 
 "Wherefore laying aside all malice, and all guile, and all 
 hypocricies, and all envies, and all evil speaking, as new born 
 babes, desire the sincere milk. of the word, that ye may grow 
 thereby." I. Peter II,-1. 2. 
 
 These texts give a picture of one who is*a child in wayward 
 desire a child in inability to restrain passion, a child in the 
 ease with which it may be led astray, a child in ignorance of 
 spiritual things, a child with a will uncertain and easily swayed 
 from the right. It is a new born babe, prone to evil, needing 
 constantly an instructor, a guide, one who is yet a child, not 
 yet a man, in God. 
 
 And now for this new born soul a standard is set up, for it 
 is not to remain a "babe in Christ." It is that Old Covenant 
 standard of "Holiness unto the Lord." 
 
 "Be ye holy," is the command to this babe yet feeble 
 against unholy desires. Why? "for I (the Lord) am holy." I. 
 Peter I.-16. 
 
 The lost image of God (Genesis I. -27) is to be regained. 
 
 "Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in 
 heaven is perfect." Matth, V.-48. 
 
 Again the lost image as a standard. 
 
 Father, "sanctify them" (sanctus facio 'Ayiacrov, make holy). 
 It is Christ's cry over the Apostles, and over "all them who 
 shall believe on me through their word." John XVII.-17 and 20. 
 
 "And the very God of peace sanctify you wholly." I. Thesso. 
 V. 23. 
 
 "For I long to see you that I may impart unto you some 
 spiritual gift, to the end ye may be established." Romans I.- 
 II. And this to the "beloved of God in Rome, called to be 
 saints" (dyibis holy), but not yet strong to stand. 
 
 It never ceases, this holding up of the standard, the warn- 
 ing, the exhortation, the prayer. And this not to the unregen- 
 erate, those dead in sin, but, as the context in the various cases 
 shows, to the regenerate, those born again. It never ceases, 
 for the battle is again on, and on in this regenerated soul. Not 
 
SPIRITUAL CHILDHOOD SPIRITUAL MANHOOD. 85 
 
 such a battle as the first man, fresh from the hands of his 
 Maker had to fight, but a battle of man with the ages of her- 
 edity upon him. For "The fathers have eaten sour grapes, and 
 the children's teeth are set on edge." Ezekiel XVIII.-2. 
 
 It is the child with the baleful fires of the ages of wrong- 
 doing of the fathers burning in his blood. It is a battle such 
 as the Adam of man's innocency could not even have been con- 
 ceived of. It is the curse of the centuries of murder and violence 
 and rapine and wrong. It is the taint of the slum, of the 
 brothel, of the wine cup. The battle that was upon that first 
 man in the pure-blooded innocency of the race was a parade 
 day skirmish to the fierce grapple that comes to his children as 
 earth has grown old and hoary in sin. Is it any wonder the 
 warning cry never ceases in the pages of the sacred record? 
 Would God have been just to man if he had not sounded the 
 alarm? It is the long roll to the new made camp. Double the 
 guards! Strengthen the outposts! Keep watch and ward 
 against the powers of sin. Do not dream you are safe and 
 secure. It was only a lull in the battle. 
 
 There is something more needed than the pardon of trans- 
 gression and the birth again into spiritual life. Be holy ! Be 
 perfect! Be established! It is the price of safety. Not until the 
 "babe in Christ" has grown "unto the measure of the stature 
 of the fulness of Christ," has become holy, perfect, established, 
 is the victory final; for this man who "is become as one of us 
 to know good and evil" (Genesis III. -22.) must "become as one 
 of us" in holiness also, that he may stand. 
 
 And now again the question may be asked, and this time 
 with the preliminaries cleared, 
 
 How is this "babe in Christ" to come "unto a perfect man, 
 unto the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ"? 
 that one of whom John says, "he doth not commit sin." 
 
 1 He is to be instructed in spiritual truth. 
 
 When man that day ate of the fruit of the tree of the 
 knowledge of good and evil, and became as "one of us, to know 
 good and evil," (Hebrew, Yada literally to ascertain by seeing, 
 i. e., to gain knowledge of by testing, to make acquaintance 
 with), it does not necessarily follow that with this power now 
 his, he made use of it all. His spiritual education began that 
 day. That he did proceed to know ?vil the sad history of man 
 
86 HOLINESS UNTO THE LORD. 
 
 only too surely proves. That he preceded also to know good, 
 that history as surely disproves. And as one who develops by 
 training only one side of his powers, he became a man in the 
 knowledge of evil: but remained a child in his knowledge of 
 good: and further, it is as this child, undeveloped in the knowl- 
 edge of good, that he is "born again." 
 
 And now this babe in the knowledge of spiritual things is 
 to be instructed, taught, developed along the neglected, the 
 dwarfed side, of his spiritual nature. 
 
 It is to this end, manifestly, that Christ says: 
 
 "Howbeit 
 
 when he, the Spirit of truth, is come, he will guide you into all 
 truth; for he shall not speak of himself (<' eavrov, from him- 
 self); but whatsoever he shall hear, that shall he speak; and he 
 will show you things to come." John XVI.-13. 
 
 2 His heart must be freed from its proneness to evil. 
 
 This 
 
 is the cry that David sends up when he prays, "Create in me a 
 clean heart, God: and renew a right spirit within me." Psalm 
 LI.-10. 
 
 And this is the promise: 
 
 "A new heart also will I give 
 
 you, and a new spirit will I put within you:" Ezekiel XXXVI. 
 -26. 
 
 3 The feeble, vacillating will must be strengthened, that 
 when evil presents itself he may will to do right, with a 
 strength of will that shall yield to no solicitation, no tempta- 
 tion. 
 
 It is of this feeble will that Paul says in dismay, 
 
 "For the 
 
 good that I would I do not; but the evil which I would not, 
 that I do." Romans VII.-19. 
 
 Yet it is to the latent possibilities of that will that the clos- 
 ing invitation of the New Covenant record is addressed when 
 it says, as a final invitation: 
 
 "And whosoever will, let him 
 take the water of life freely." Rev. XXII.-17. 
 
 Neither of these three alone is sufficient. Neither any two 
 of them. An understanding enlightened to discern between good 
 and evil, without a desire to choose good, and a will to follow 
 
SPIRITUAL CHILDHOOD SPIRITUAL MANHOOD. 87 
 
 it rather than evil, will not ayail unto "Holiness unto the 
 Lord." 
 
 A heart freed from its proneness to evil, without an [under- 
 standing enlightened to discern which is the good, and which 
 the evil, and a will strong to decide between the two will not 
 avail; for how shall one follow the right who does not know 
 what the right is, and has no strength of will to resist evil and 
 choose the good. Probably no error more dangerous in its 
 practical results to human souls can be taught than that Holi- 
 ness unto the Lord is summed up in a heart work alone. 
 
 A strengthened will alone is not enough, for of what avail 
 will it be to will to do good without an understanding of what 
 good is and with a heart prone to evil. 
 
 That one may become "Holy unto the Lord," all three of 
 these conditions are essential; for it is the whole man that is to 
 be made holy unto the Lord; and it is to be a man, not a babe. 
 
V. 
 
 DOES "HOLINESS UNTO THE LORD" 
 
 COME TO MAN THROUGH PROCESS OF SPIRITUAL 
 
 GROWTH? OR IS IT THE DIRECT GIFT OF 
 
 GOD? OR DO BOTH GOD AND MAN 
 
 HAVE PART IN THE WORK? 
 
 But how is this change to be brought about? for still the 
 question remains unanswered, How is this "babe in Christ" to 
 come "unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of 
 the fulness of Christ," the one who "doth not commit sin"? 
 
 Is it as in the man physical, the man mental, from within, 
 aud by the slower process of growth? or is the law, which 
 elsewhere holds good in man's being, here set aside, and is it 
 from God at once, and by gift from God? 
 
 Analogy would point to the process of 
 
 growth rather than to sudden gift from without, for God's 
 laws, as we find them elsewhere, are general rather than special 
 in character and action. 
 
 Yet in the face of the many miracles of direct intervention 
 recorded in the history of God's spiritual dealings with men, we 
 cannot assume that this is the case; and we have seen that in 
 the pardon of transgression, and in regeneration, while man has 
 by his own voluntary act complied with the requirements laid 
 down by God, yet the pardon, the regeneration, have been 
 God's sole act. and, inferential/y, sudden in consummation. 
 
 What light does the New Covenant record throw upon this 
 question? 
 
 Paul says: 
 
 "And he gave some to be apostles; and some, 
 prophets: and some, evangelists: and some, pastors, and teach- 
 
HOW DOES HOLINESS UNTO THE LORD COME TO MAN? 89 
 
 ers: for the perfecting- of the saints, unto the work of ministering, 
 unto the building up of the body of Christ: till we all attain unto 
 the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, 
 unto a full grown man, unto the measure of the stature of the 
 fulness of Christ: that we may be no longer children, tossed to 
 and fro and carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the 
 sleight of men, in craftiness, after the wiles of error, but speak- 
 ing truth ( oArjOevovres dealing truly) in love, may grow up in all 
 things into him, which is the head, even Christ." Ephesians 
 IV 11, 15. 
 
 Peter gives the same thought: 
 
 "Putting away therefore 
 
 all wickedness, and all guile, and hypocricies, and envies, and all 
 evil speakings, as new born babes, long for the spiritual milk, 
 which is without guile, that ye may grow thereby unto salva- 
 tion. I. Peter II.-l, 2. 
 Yet Peter also says: 
 
 "And the God of all grace who hath 
 
 called you (v/xas) unto his eternal glory in Christ, after that 
 ye have suffered a little while shall himself perfect, stablish, 
 strengthen you." I. Peter V.-10. 
 And Paul, also, says: 
 
 "But the Lord is faithful, who 
 
 shall stablish you, and keep you from evil." II. Thessalon. 
 III.-3. 
 
 In Hebrews we find: 
 
 "Wherefore, let us cease to speak of 
 
 the first principles of Christ, and press on unto perfection 
 (reXetOT^Ta R. V. marg. full growth); not laying again a foun- 
 dation of repentance from dead works, and of faith toward God, 
 of the teaching of baptism, and of laying on of hands, and 
 of resurrection of the dead, and of eternal judgment. And this 
 will we do, if God permit." Hebrews VI.-l, 3. 
 Yet we also find in Hebrews: 
 
 "Now the God of peace, 
 
 that brought again from the dead our Lord Jesus, that 
 great shepherd of the sheep, through the blood of the everlast- 
 ing covenant, make you perfect in every good thing to do his 
 will, working in you that which is well pleasing in his sight, 
 through Jesus Christ, to whom be glory for ever and ever." 
 Hebrews XIII.-20, 21. 
 
90 HOLINESS UNTO THE LORD. 
 
 These specimen texts show an apparent conflict running: 
 through the New Covenant record upon the question of the 
 manner and source of this further change, a change of which the 
 Old Covenant record dimly hints, and which Christ in his prayer 
 foretells for the regenerated, and whereby the "babe in Christ", 
 comes unto a "perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of 
 the fulness of Christ." 
 
 The conflict hinges around the question, Whether it is again, 
 like justification and regeneration, a direct and sudden work of 
 God, done for man? or whether the further work is of man him- 
 self, under a law of development and growth? or is there some 
 third solution to the question? 
 
 Paul throws a flood of light upon the subject in one of those 
 texts which stand like a guide post at the parting of ways: 
 
 "Wherefore, my beloved, as ye have always obeyed, 
 not as in my presence only, but now much more in my absence, 
 Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling, for it is 
 God which worketh in you both to will and to do of his good 
 pleasure." Philipp. II.-12, 13. 
 
 And this is addressed, not to the unregenerate, but "to all 
 the saints in Christ Jesus which are at Philippi, with the bish- 
 ops and deacons:" .... "Being confident of this very thing, 
 that he which hath begun a good .wark in you, will perform it 
 until the day of Jesus Christ." Philipp. I.-l and 6. 
 
 It is thus not man alone: not God alone. It is God work- 
 ing together with man: man working together with God. And 
 as the days, the years, go by, the spiritual apprehension 
 grows clearer, under the tutelage of the Holy Spirit, to discern 
 between good and evil, and to know God's will: the troubled 
 heart, torn by conflicting desires, learns to desire good rather 
 than evil, and desires to do God's will: the will, weak, vacillat- 
 ing between good and evil, grows strong to will to do good 
 and not evil: and learns to say to God, Thy will and not mine 
 be done: the result, "Holiness unto the Lord." The "babe in 
 Christ" is "come unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the 
 stature of the fulness of Christ," and "doth not commit sin." 
 
VI. 
 
 WHAT PART DOES GOD HAVE WHAT PART 
 DOES MAN HAVE IN THE WORK? 
 
 What share does each have in this work? How much is 
 man's growth tinder the law of deTelopment? how much is 
 God's work by direct act of intervention? 
 
 The Scriptures do not say. 
 
 Have we anything from which we may reason to an 
 answer? 
 
 Yes! The Scriptures refer constantly to the earthly 
 parent as an illustration of God's ways with his children. Apply 
 the test here. How does an earthly parent do in the rearing 
 and training of his children from infancy to adult life? The wise 
 father does for the child only what it cannot do for itself. His 
 object is to make a man of the child, a man who may be 
 strong to stand in the hour of testing, To do for the child that 
 which it is able to do for itself is to defeat the very end had in 
 view, and is to do a great wrong to the child. It is to deprive 
 it of the chance to grow and become strong, for strength comes 
 of the struggling. Yet the wise father does not let the child 
 become discouraged. He is ever watching over it. If the hour 
 comes when the child's strength is not sufficient for the burden, 
 his hand is stretched out to help. 
 
 The father works together with his child to the building up 
 of a man. 
 
 "Does God do so with his children? 
 
 "And lest I should 
 
 be exalted above measure, through the abundance of the revel- 
 ations, there was given me a thorn in the flesh, a messenger of 
 
92 HOLINESS UNTO THE LORD. 
 
 Satan to buffet me lest I should be exalted above measure. 
 For this thing I besought the Lord thrice that it might depart 
 from me. And he said unto me, My grace is sufficient for 
 thee." II. Corinth. XII.-.7, 8, 9. 
 
 "The steps of a good man are ordered by the Lord: and he 
 delighteth in his way. Though he fall he shall not be utterly 
 cast down: for the Lord upholdeth him with his hand." Psalm 
 XXXVII.-23, 24. 
 
 How is man, then, to do his part that he, "a babe in 
 Christ," may come "unto a perfect man, unto the measure of 
 the stature of the fulness of Christ," and thus be "HOLY UNTO 
 THE LORD? for as has been shown, there is a part which man 
 must do. God is only one of two workers to this end. The 
 other is man himself. 
 
 As has been shown, three things are necessary to this change 
 in man. It may be well for the sake of clearness to restate 
 them. 
 
 1 He is to be instructed in spiritual things, that he may 
 rightly discern what is good and what is evil. 
 
 2 His heart must be released from its proneness to evil. 
 3 His will must be strengthened that he may be able to 
 will to do good rather than evil. 
 
 How much of this can man do for himself? Can he 
 instruct himself in spiritual things to clearly discern between 
 good and evil ? The answer must be, Yes, and No. 
 
 He may diligently make use of the means which God has 
 placed before him to educate himself upon this point, using to 
 this end all the intellectual power God gave him when he was 
 fashioned by his Maker. God's reyealed and written word was 
 given for this purpose, and is open to all. 
 
 "Thy word is a lamp unto my feet, and a light unto my 
 path." Psalm CXIX.-105. 
 
 "All Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profit- 
 able for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in 
 righteousness: that the man of God may be perfect, throughly 
 furnished unto all good works." II. Timothy, III.-16, 17. 
 
 Not only may man thus diligently make use of the means of 
 instruction God has placed before him, to educate himself in 
 spiritual things, that he may be able to discern between good 
 and evil, but God lays it upon man as an obligation, a duty to 
 
THE PART GOD HAS THE PART MAN HAS IN THE WORK. 93 
 
 do this for himself. It is the end to which the Scriptures are 
 given. No human soul can safely neglect this duty. He does it 
 at his own peril. And God has nowhere even intimated any 
 purpose of supplanting this source of spiritual enlightenment by 
 any other revelation of divme truth. Yet God has supplemented 
 (not supplanted) the written word by a promise to give to 
 man a guide into spiritual truth, that he may not go astray: 
 
 "Howbeit, when he, the Spirit of truth, is come, he will 
 guide you into all truth." John XVI.-13. 
 
 Thus, while man cannot, in one sense, instruct himself in 
 spiritual things, to discern between good and evil, yet in the 
 sense of making use of the means which God puts into his 
 hands, the revealed and written word, and by availing himself 
 of the promised guidance of the Holy Spirit he may do so. 
 And the Scriptures show no other way in which this power to 
 discern between good and evil may be gained. Under this double 
 training the spiritual eyes grew keen to see, and the conscience 
 tender to feel, and man becomes skilled to discern between good 
 and evil. 
 
 Can man free his own heart from its proneness to evil? 
 
 David's pleading cry to God after his backsliding, voices the 
 common experience of men that this work man cannot do for 
 himself. 
 
 "Create (thou) in me a clean heart, O God, and renew thou 
 a right (Hebrew kuwn, primitive root, to be erect, to be 
 fixed, established) spirit within me," (Psalm LI.-10), is the 
 prayer he offers up for himself. 
 
 And God has promised to do 
 this for man : 
 
 "A new heart also will I give you, and a new 
 spirit will I put within you: and I will take away the stony 
 heart out of your flesh, and I will give you an heart of flesh. 
 And I will put my Spirit within you, and cause you to walk in 
 my statutes, and ye shall keep my judgments, and do them." 
 Ezekiel XXXVI.-26, 27. 
 
 Yet, man must ask God to do this. It is the condition 
 which comes of man's free agency. When God gave to man free 
 will, by the very act itself he placed a bar across his own power 
 to interfere with that free will, even to help. Man must first 
 ask. 
 
94 HOLINESS UNTO THE LORD. 
 
 But there is something for man to do after the asking, and 
 after God has made good his promise to renew a right spirit 
 within that heart. Somewhere out of the bitter depths of his 
 spiritual experience, David's son had learned this lesson, when 
 he wrote the warning words: 
 
 "Keep thy heart with all diligence; 
 
 for out of it are the issues of life." Proverbs IY.-23. 
 Man must stand guard over his own heart." 
 And Christ enforces the caution when, at Gethsemane, he 
 makes of the bodily weariness of his disciples a spiritual object 
 lesson, and says, "Watch and pray that ye enter not into 
 temptation: the spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is 
 weak." Matthew XXVI.-41. 
 
 Can man do anything to strengthen his own will, that he 
 may be strong to will to do right rather than wrong? 
 
 Man can will to do: he can will not to do: and, as has 
 been before stated, God cannot, under the conditions of freedom 
 of will which he has himself laid down, interfere, unless at man's 
 request. 
 
 This absolute freedom of man's will in the matter of his 
 personal relationship to God, is recognized in the last words of 
 Christ before the book of the New Covenant record is closed: 
 
 "And whosoever will, let him take the water of life freely," 
 Rev. XXII.-17. 
 
 And every man knows that his will is his own. As, then, 
 in his will he is thus independent of God, it is here that the 
 great battle with evil must be fought by man: and he must 
 fight it. And the battle is all the more far-reaching from the 
 fact that man's will in a measure dominates his heart and his 
 understanding. 
 
 It was the will that first took man away from God. Man's 
 will had it in its power that day of the first temptation to say 
 No, to the heart desire. It did not; and man by his own will 
 turned from good to evil. And as man in his freedom of will 
 willed to turn from God, so man must, in that same freedom of 
 will, will to come back to God. Every man recognizes this fact 
 in himself. It needs no proof. And the whole scheme of God's 
 dealings with man is based upon it as a foundation fact. God 
 does not command, but implores man to turn back from evil to 
 good: 
 
THE PART GOD HAS THE PART MAN HAS IN THE WORK. 95 
 
 "As I live, saith the Lord God, I have no pleasure in the 
 death of the wicked: but that the wicked turn from his way and 
 live: turn ye, turn ye, from your evil ways, for why will ye die, 
 O house of Israel?" Ezekiel XXXIII.-ll. 
 
 It is God's yearning cry over a wilful and wayward son. 
 
 "O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, thou that killest the prophets, and 
 stonest them which are sent unto thee, how oft would I have 
 gathered thy children together, even as a hen gathereth her 
 chickens under her wings, and ye would not!' 1 Matthew XXIII. 
 -37. 
 
 It is a wail as of a broken-hearted father over a lost child. 
 
 A heart cleansed from transgression and freed from its prone- 
 ness to evil, is a good thing: yet there is no security until back 
 of it, as arbiter and master, stand an enlightened spiritual 
 understanding, and a will strong to say No, in the hour when 
 evil shall present Itself. 
 
 Can man, then, of himself, strengthen this spiritual will 
 power for good, rather than evil? 
 
 There is no reason to suppose 
 
 that he cannot: there is much reason to suppose that he can. 
 No fact in psychology is better established than this, that will 
 power may be cultivated the same as memory, or any other 
 faculty of the mind. The man who in his business is weak to 
 say No, and who by his weak complaisance embarrasses himself in 
 his finances, learns after a while to say No, and to be firm. 
 The man who finds himself in danger from a growing appetite, 
 and who, even without any pretense to religion as a motive 
 force, begins to say No, to the craving, learns, as the days go 
 by, that his power to say No, is increasing. His will power -is 
 now growing stronger by resisting, just as it was before grow- 
 ing weaker by yielding. Is there any reason to suppose that 
 the law of growth which holds good in all other uses of the will 
 power, fails to hold good in spiritual matters? 
 
 The inquiry brings us again to the fact that God's laws are 
 general in character, rather than special. 
 
 Yet there are cases where the will power has become weak- 
 ened, or where temptation is so overpowering, that the will 
 stands helpless, paralyzed in the presence of evil. 
 
 And with the ages of heredity in yielding to sin, it may be 
 questioned whether any human will, unaided, is strong enough 
 for the battle with evil: for that heredity does thus affect the 
 
HOLINESS UNTO THE LORD. 96 
 
 spiritual will power is shown in the difference of resisting force 
 displayed by persons of different moral ancestry. Is there help 
 for man in this weakness? 
 
 "Fear thou not: for I am with thee: 
 
 be not dismayed: for I am thy God: I will strengthen thee: 
 yea, I will help thee: yea, I will uphold thee with the right hand 
 of my righteousness." Isaiah XLI.-10. 
 
 Yet, man must will to ask, for God cannot step over the line 
 of that freedom of will, even to help in the hour of peril, unless 
 man requests it. He must respect his own law. 
 
 Does God give the same help to all? 
 
 The Scriptures do not 
 
 say. But again, what does the earthly father do? Does each 
 child receive the same care, the same watchfulness, the same help? 
 Does he not rather give to each according to its needs: for no 
 two of his children are alike in natural ability, in acquirements, 
 in the need of help. To the strong child he gives little help; a 
 word here and there: the hand sometimes stretched out. For 
 the weaker one he does more. And the poor, deformed cripple, 
 the sorrow of the household over him he watches with a care 
 that never lets a burden settle down without the father's out- 
 stretched hand to help: even carries him in his arms. 
 
 How would God, as a kind Father naturally do with his 
 spiritual children? for, "Like as a father pitieth his children, so 
 the Lord pitieth them that fear him. For he knoweth our frame: 
 he rernembereth that we are dust." Psalm CIII.-13. 14. 
 
 Children of God some spiritually strong by heredity and 
 surroundings; some weak, Oh, so weak: some as the crip- 
 pled, halting, feeble one to whom the father's hand is ever 
 stretched out in help. Is God less thoughtful, less considerate 
 of these little ones? Oh, "like as a father pitieth his child- 
 ren!" 
 
VII. 
 
 ROADMARKS ALONG THE "WAY OF HOLINESS. 
 
 Do the Scriptures give any waymarks by which a soul 
 may judge of its own growth in this life of Holiness unto 
 the Lord? 
 
 Yes: "Sanctify them in (<f v ) the truth." John 
 XVII.-17. 
 
 "And I will pray the Father, and he shall give you another 
 Comforter, that he may abide with you forever: even the 
 Spirit of truth." John XIV.-16, 17. 
 
 "Howbeit, when he, the Spirit of truth is come, he will guide 
 you into all truth." John XVI.-13. 
 
 But the fruit of the Spirit (the Spirit of the foregoing 
 texts) is love, joy, peace, long suffering, gentleness, goodness, 
 faith, meekness, temperance: against such there is no law." 
 Galatians V.-22, 23. 
 
 The soul which recognizes the growth of these fruits in 
 itself may thank God, and take courage. The soul which fails 
 to find them in^itself may well mistrust that somehow it has 
 mistaken the way. For Christ laid down the general law, 
 "Even so every good tree bringeth forth good fruit; but a corrupt 
 ( (raTrpov bad ) tree bringeth forth evil fruit. A good tree can- 
 not bring forth evil fruit, neither can a corrupt (bad) tree bring 
 forth good fruit," Matthew VII.-17, 18. 
 
 And he adds the general caution, "Wherefore by their 
 fruits ye shall know them." Verse 20. 
 
 Do the Scriptures set up any absolute standard by which 
 
98 HOLINESS UNTO THE LORD. 
 
 one person may judge another in this life of "Holiness unto 
 the Lord"? 
 
 I fail to find any such standard anywhere set forth by 
 the Scriptures, or any authority for the setting up of a stand- 
 ard. It would seem rather to be as a land in which each soul 
 must walk alone with God. And if that soul can say, "It is 
 peace between me and my God," I fail to find any warrant in 
 the Scriptures for another to question or deny. We may only 
 infer as we see evidence of the fruits of the Spirit in the life. 
 
 "So then, every one of us shall give account of himself to 
 God. Let us not therefore judge one another any more; but 
 judge this rather, that no man put a stumbling block, or an 
 occasion to fall, in his brother's way." Romans XIV.-12, 13. 
 
 Have the Scriptures given any test by which one may know 
 absolutely that he has passed the point where the power of 
 evil is at last forever broken, and he stands free and beyond 
 peril of fall? 
 
 I fail to find any such standard, anywhere given in the 
 Scriptures. They simply do not say. But I find Christ's injunc- 
 tion to his disciples, "Watch and pray, lest ye enter into 
 temptation," repeated as a warning cry everywhere through 
 the epistles to the churches. And the injunction and promise: 
 
 "He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith 
 unto the churches: He that overcometh shall not be hurt of 
 the second death." Rev. II.--11. 
 
 WATCH AND PRAY. 
 
ROADMARKS ALONG THE "WAY OF HOLINESS." 99 
 
 SUMMING UP. 
 
 That a time comes in the life of a redeemed soul when the 
 last sin has been committed, when the soul at last walks 
 with God, fully emancipated from the power of evil, the vie" 
 tory won, walks at last in the fulness of "the liberty where- 
 with Christ has made us free," we must believe, as we believe 
 in the completeness of the scheme of redemption. 
 
 That this state is to come suddenly, or as the direct and 
 unconditional gift of God, without effort or adequate struggle 
 upon man's part, I find no warrant in the Scriptures for 
 believing. 
 
 That it is to come through a season of testing and battling, 
 wherein man works together with God for the final victory 
 the New Covenant record teaches clearly and continually. 
 
 That, of the time when this work may be finally completed 
 in any particular soul, the Scriptures give no human warrant 
 for judging: and in the absence of such warrant I can only con- 
 clude that God has withheld authority to so judge. It is meet, 
 therefore, that I should leave this point to be passed upon by 
 God alone, I having no authority or right to say to another, 
 "The work is now finished, and you are freed from the power, 
 of sin:" or to say of another, so claiming, and whose life is not 
 inconsistent with the claim, that he is mistaken or self-deceived. 
 These questions must be settled by each human soul for itself 
 alone with God. 
 
 That to the end of emancipation from the power of evil a 
 heart change alone is not enough, but that in addition to this, 
 there must be an understanding enlightened in spiritual matters 
 to rightly discern between good and evil, and a will strength- 
 ened to will to do good and not evil. That is, the whole man, 
 not simply a part, must be sanctified. 
 
 That to this end God works together with man: man works 
 together with God. And the end is, the power of evil at last 
 broken, and a soul that is Holy unto the Lord. 
 
 But the question may here also be asked, as it was of the 
 WAY OF LIFE, Will all men, will most men even, clearly see, 
 
100 HOLINESS UNTO THE LORD. 
 
 and understandingly follow, the successive steps of this way of 
 Holiness unto the Lord. 1 * And i again" the answer must be, No. 
 Nor, again, have we reason to suppose it to be essential that, 
 they should. For, as there said, men are little skilled to 
 analyze, and give name to, the successive stages of their own 
 spiritual experience. They only knowjthat as the years went 
 by after they had given themselves to God, a deeper longing 
 grew up within them for a nearness to God, and for a power 
 to withstand evil, such as they had not yet found. And they 
 struggled on, watching, praying, loving, trusting. And then 
 some glad day, as one who has toiled up the' mountain side, 
 they looked back; and lo, the world was beneath their feet; 
 and above, around, only God's pure skies; and at last it was 
 peace, that peace of God which passeth understanding. And at 
 last they walked with God, to go out from his presence again 
 no more. 
 
 BEYOND. 
 
 "After this I beheld, and, lo, a great multitude, which no 
 man could number, of all nations, and_kindreds, and peoples, 
 and tongues, stood before the throne, and before the Lamb, 
 clothed with white robes, and palms in their hands; and cried 
 with a loud voice, saying, Salvation to our God which sitteth 
 upon the throne, and unto the Lamb." 
 
 "And one of the elders 
 
 answered, saying unto me, What are these which are arrayed 
 in white robes? and whence came they?" 
 
 "And Ijsaid unto him, 
 
 Sir, thou knowest. And he said unto me, These are they which 
 came out of great tribulation, and have washed their robes, 
 and made them white in the blood of the Lamb. Therefore are 
 they before the throne of God, and serve^him day and night in 
 his temple: and he that sitteth on the throne shall dwell among 
 them. They shall hunger no more, neither thirst any 
 more: neither shall the sun light on them, nor any heat. For 
 the Lamb which is in the midst of the throne shall feed them, 
 and shall lead them unto living fountains of waters: and God 
 shall wipe away all tears from their eyes." Rev. VII.-9, 17. 
 
 AMEN. 
 
THE INDWELLING SPIRIT. 
 
"Know ye not that ye are the temple of God, and that the 
 Spirit of God dwelleth in you?" I. Corinth. III. 16. 
 
I. 
 
 THE HOLY SPIRIT WHAT IS MEANT BY THE 
 TERM. 
 
 When Christ's disciples were gathered about him that night 
 of the last supper, with hearts heavy over the coming separa- 
 tion, he said to them, 
 
 "I will pray the Father, and he shall 
 
 give you another Comforter, that he may abide with you for- 
 ever, even the Spirit of truth: whom the world cannot receive, 
 because it seth him not, neither knoweth him: but ye know 
 him, for he dwelleth with you, and shall be in you." John 
 XIV.-16, 17. 
 
 And of this Comforter he says by way of identification, 
 
 "But the Comforter, which is the Holy Ghost, whom the 
 Father will send in my name, he shall teach you all things, and 
 bring all things to your remembrance, whatsoever I have said 
 unto you." John XIV.-26. 
 
 What is the Holy Ghost? This which is spoken of by Christ 
 as an entity, a personality, and which is to have to do with 
 man as comforter and teacher and guide? 
 
 It is well 
 
 first to analyze and define the name itself. The English word 
 ghost is a word which, like many other words in the language 
 has, in the years, drifted and narrowed from its original mean- 
 ing. It is the Old English gast, the German geist, and means 
 simply spirit. The corresponding word in the Vulgate, from 
 which the King James translation was essentially made, is the 
 Latin spiritus, from which we have our word spirit. The Greek 
 is Trveiyxa (TTI/CW, to blow, breathe), which as the Latin spiritus 
 (spiro, to breathe, blow) has as a primary substantive meaning 
 
104 THE INDWELLING SPIRIT. 
 
 the air. In its secondary meaning it was applied to that intan- 
 gible part of man which, in contradistinction to the more 
 knowable body we call spirit. In like manner it came to be 
 applied to incorporeal beings not cognizable to man's bodily 
 senses. Through the changing which is ever going on in lan- 
 guage the word has come in popular usage, to mean an 
 apparition. 
 
 Because of this drifting and narrowing of the word 
 ghost, the American translators of the Revised Version very 
 properly preferred to substitute the word spirit for the word 
 ghost in the whole New Testament. The conservatism of the 
 English members of the board of revisers overruled this, how- 
 ever, and in many of the the places where the word occurs 
 insisted upon the retention of the word ghost. 
 
 In this essay it is to be remembered, then, that the term 
 Holy Ghost simply means Holy Spirit. It is also to be borne 
 in mind that the terms, "the Comforter," "the Holy Ghost," 
 "the Spirit of truth," as shown in the two texts from John as 
 already quoted, are simply different names for the same entity, 
 and that whatever attributes may pertain to the one pertain 
 equally to all. 
 
 What is the position of the Holy Spirit in the divinity? 
 
 That it is a position of importance is shown in the fact 
 that the Spirit is to come to man as Christ's successor: 
 
 "And 
 
 I will pray the Father, and he shall give you another Com- 
 forter: that he may abide with you forever." John XIV.-16. 
 
 "But the Comforter, which is the Holy Ghost, whom the 
 Father will send in my name." John XIV.-26. 
 
 "But when the Comforter is come, whom I will send unto 
 you from the Father." John XV.-26. 
 
 Christ still further recognizes the intimate relationship of 
 the Holy Spirit to Father and Son in the commission to the 
 disciples: 
 
 "Go ye, therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing 
 them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the 
 Holy Ghost." Matth. XXVIII.-I9. 
 
 I. John V-7, would, if authentic, be sufficient alone upon 
 the point of the position of the Holy Spirit in the divinity, but 
 
THE HOLY SPIRIT WHAT IS MEANT BY THE TERM. 105 
 
 this verse, although given in the Vulgate, and inserted in 
 brackets in the Codex Vaticanus, and coming to the King James 
 translation from the Vulgate, is so universally lacking in the 
 older Greek manuscripts that it is very properly omitted from 
 the Revised Version. Yet the existence of the Holy Spirit as an 
 entity, and as an admitted and integral part of the divinity, is 
 shown by the texts already quoted, and by many others as 
 found throughout the New Testament record. And the only 
 legitimate inference which can be drawn from the commission 
 to baptize "in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of 
 the Holy Ghost," is that the_relationship is one of union in the 
 Godhead. 
 
II. 
 
 THE HOLY SPIRIT UNDER THE OLD 
 DISPENSATION. 
 
 WAS THE HOLY SPIRIT KNOWN TO "MAN UNDER THE OLD COVENANT 
 
 DISPENSATION, AND BEFORE THAT, DURING THE 
 
 PATRIARCHAL ERA? 
 
 The Old Testament record has in it 36 clearly expressed 
 passages which speak of the "Spirit of God." Sometimes the 
 wording is, "The Spirit of God," sometimes, "The Spirit of the 
 Lord;" sometimes the wording is "My Spirit," but with the 
 context showing that the pronoun "my" refers to God. The 
 work of this spirit is varied In some of the cases it is God's 
 Spirit striving with man. See Genesis VI.-3. In some, it*is the 
 Spirit coming upon man for some specific purpose, as upon 
 Balaam. Numbers XXIV.-2: or upon Othniel, Judges III.-10: 
 or upon David. 1. Samuel XVI.-13. In I. Samuel XVI.-14, it is 
 the Spirit of the Lord abandoning Saul. In Ezekiel incomes as 
 a Spirit of prophecy. 
 
 In Isaiah LXI.-l, it is foretold prophetically of the~coming 
 of the Spirit of the Lord God upon the Christ for his commis- 
 sion as preacher of good tidings. 
 
 In Ezekiel XXXVI.-27, it is'promised to men as that'which 
 is to be put within them in the new'dispensation. In Joel II.- 
 28, it is foretold as that which is to be poured out^upon all 
 flesh. 
 
 But is "the Spirit of God," "the Spirit of the Lord," "My 
 Spirit," as thus spoken of in the Old Testament record, the same 
 as the "Holy Spirit," the "Holy Ghost," as spoken of in the 
 New Testament record? 
 
 The point might be assumed as true, 
 and probably few, if any, would dispute it. We can hardly 
 
THE HOLY SPIRIT UNDER THE OLD DISPENSATION. 107 
 
 conceive of two "Spirits of God" in the divinity. It would be 
 to set aside all of our recognized Biblical teachings upon the 
 nature of the Godhead. Yet that there may be no possibility of 
 caviling, it may be well to take the testimony of the Scriptures 
 upon this point also. 
 
 The Greek translation of the Hebrew 
 
 Old Testament, which was made among the Alexandrian Jews 
 in the third century before Christ, for their own use, as the 
 Hebrew had become to them a dead language, and which 
 because of the popular fable that it had been made by a com- 
 mission of seventy-two Jewish scholars, appointed by Ptolemy 
 II. became known as the Septuagint, is a connecting link 
 between old and new in the bibliology of the Scriptures. 
 
 Like the Latin of the early Italic texts wh/ch grew up in 
 the 2d century after Christ, and of the Vulgate of Jerome of the 
 4th century, it has scarcely received the attention to which it is 
 entitled in Biblical study, especially as both the Latin and the 
 Septuagint Greek long antedate any of the existing copies of the 
 Hebrew or of the Apostolic Greek. 
 
 The great value of the Septuagint 
 
 in Biblical research lies, not simply in the fact that it gives a 
 side light, from Jewish sources, as early as the 3d century before 
 Christ, upon their own Scriptures, but in the more important 
 fact that it is the copy of the Old Testament Scriptures which 
 was commonly in use among the New Testament writers, and 
 that their quotations from the Old Testament record are largely, 
 if not entirely from it rather than from the Hebrew text: and 
 in the additional and exceedingly important fact that it supplied 
 to them ready made, much of the sacred phraseology used by 
 them. 
 
 Now apply these facts to the topic under discussion. It 
 gives us a ready means of tracing the historical development oi 
 the nomenclature of the Holy Spirit from the Old Testament 
 record to the New, and is a valuable means of identification. 
 
 In the 36 cases, as already instanced, in which "The Spirit 
 of God," as dealing with men, is mentioned in the Old Testa- 
 ment record, the Hebrew word in every case is Ruwach, with 
 a verbal primitive meaning, to blow, to breath, and with a 
 substantive meaning of wind, breath, and a secondary mean- 
 ing of spirit. In this respect it stands side by side 
 with the Latin spiritus and the Greek Trvev/xa as already 
 
108 THE INDWELLING SPIRIT. 
 
 given. In every single one of the 36 cases just mentioned the 
 Hebrew Ruwach is translated in the Septuagint by the Greek 
 word TrvevfJM'- and this same Trvev/xa is the one,^and^the only 
 word used in the New Testament Greek of the Gospels, of Acts, 
 and of the Epistles to designate the Holy Spirit, the ayios 
 (holy) being added to it adjectively. Verbal proof could hardly 
 be stronger as to the identity, in the minds of the sacred writ- 
 ers, of the Old Testament "Spirit of God" and the New Testa- 
 ment "Holy Spirit." 
 
 Yet we are not left to this method of 
 
 identification alone. Peter definitely confirms this identity of 
 the two in Acts II.-1G, 17, 18, when he says, 
 
 "But this is that 
 
 which was spoken by the prophet Joel, And it shall come to 
 pass in the last days, saith God, I will pour out of my Spirit upon 
 all flesh: and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, 
 and your young men shall see visions, and your old^men shall 
 dream dreams: and on my servants and on my handmaidens I 
 will pour out in those days of my Spirit;" 
 
 And this he is say- 
 ing of the scene described in Acts II.-4, where it is stated, 
 
 "And 
 
 they were all filled with the Holy Ghost, and began to speak 
 with other tongues, as the Spirit gave them utteranqe." 
 
 And 
 
 Peter still further identifies the New with the Old in verses 38 
 and 39 of the same chapter, when to the people who had 
 gathered about in amazement at the strange scene, he says, 
 
 "Repent and be baptized every one of you in the name of 
 Jesus Christ for the remission of sins, and ye shall receive the 
 gift of the Holy Ghost. For the promise (Joel II.-28), is unto 
 you and your children, and to all that are afar off, even as 
 many as^the Lord our God shall call." 
 
 (See also for the promise, Isaiah XLIV. 3: Ezekiel XXXVI. 
 -27: and Acts XXVIII-25 for Paul's confirmation of the identity 
 of the two. 
 
 Was the Holy Spirit known to, and actively present among 
 men after the Christ coming, and before that night of the last 
 supper when Christ gives the promise of his coming? 
 
 Yes. In Luke 
 
THE HOLY SPIRIT UNDER THE OLD DISPENSATION. 109 
 
 I. 15, the angel tells Zacharias that John, the son that is to be 
 born to him, shall "be filled with the Holy Ghost." In verse 
 41, Elizabeth is "filled with the Holy Ghost," and prophesies. 
 In verse 67 it is said, "Zacharias was filled with the Holy Ghost 
 and prophesied." In Luke II.-25, 26, 27,"it*is*said of Simeon, 
 "And the Holy Ghost was upon him. And it was'revealed unto 
 him by the Holy Ghost,^that he should not see"death before he 
 had seen the Lord's Christ (Xptcrros anointed). And'he came 
 by the Spirit into the temple." 
 
III. 
 
 THE HOLY SPIRIT UNDER THE NEW 
 DISPENSATION. 
 
 If, then, the Holy Spirit was known to men, and worked 
 among them under the Old Covenant dispensation, and if it was 
 also known and active among men at the time of Christ's 
 birth, and during his life time, How does Christ that night of 
 the last supper promise to his disciples the coming of the Holy 
 Spirit as though it were a new thing- among men? For he 
 says: 
 
 "I will pray the Father, and he shall give you another 
 Comforter, that he may abide with you forever, even the Spirit 
 of truth." JohnXIV.-16, 17. 
 
 And again, "But when the Comforter is come, whom I will 
 send unto you from the Father, even the Spirit of truth." 
 John XV.-26. 
 
 And again: 
 
 It is expedient for you that I go away: for if 
 I go not away, the Comforter will not come unto you: but if I 
 depart, I will send him unto you." John XVI. -7. 
 
 How are these apparently conflicting facts and statements 
 to be reconciled with each other? for the Scriptures must be 
 consistent with themselves. 
 
 The only possible explanation 
 
 which can be given would be that this new coming of the Holy 
 Spirit, of which Christ speaks, is a coming simply in a new 
 capacity or relationship, or both, and not as a new entity. 
 
 Do the Scriptures contain any authority for such an explan- 
 ation? In answer we have a text which like Paul's famous 
 words, quoted in the essay, "THE WAY OF LIFE," stands as a 
 great basic fact in our knowledge of the relationship of the 
 Holy Spirit to man; but this time the words are from Christ 
 
THE HOLY SPIRIT UNDER THE NEW DISPENSATION. Ill 
 
 himself. It is in John XIV.-17. Christ has just given to his 
 disciples the promise contained in verse 16, "I will pray the 
 Father, and he shall give you another Comforter, that he may 
 abide (/x,ei/r/ remain) with you forever: even the Spirit of truth, 
 whom the' world cannot receive, because it seeth him not: 
 neither knoweth him," and then he adds, "but ye know him: 
 for he dwelleth with (nap vfuv} you and shall be in (cv fytTv) 
 row." 
 
 Analyze the text, "Ye know him." How could they know 
 him if he was not yet come? The inference is that he is already 
 come; and this the Scriptures, as before shown, confirm. 
 
 "He dwelleth with (nap v/uv) you." He is already about 
 you, and with you, even as one dwelling with another: but, 
 "He shall be in ( ej / vfuv} you." 
 
 "Dwelleth with" 'shall be in" Are we to suppose that 
 Christ's words are a mere tautology, a needless repetition of 
 the same thought in different forms? 
 
 This cannot be, for not only was Christ not wont to speak 
 thus needlessly and redundantly, but the wording of the two 
 expressions conveys two separate and distinct meanings which, 
 with evident purpose, are here placed in contrast. The two 
 Greek prepositions made use of are radically and totally unlike 
 in meaning Trap' i. e. napd, with: ev, in. A change in the char, 
 acter of the relationship of the Holy Spirit to man is here clearly 
 set forth: so clearly that no man can doubt, or fail to see, who 
 takes Christ to mean what he says. 
 
 "Dwelleth with' 1 "shall be in." The Spirit of God which 
 has been striving with man, which has been as a warning voice 
 to him in his sins, which has been crying "Repent, Repent," by 
 voice of prophet, of inspired word, of accusing conscience, and 
 which, if the man heeded not, would not always striye with 
 him (Genesis VI. 3), but which, when he showed that he was bent 
 upon evil ways, would depart from him (I. Samuel XVL 14), 
 and which, when he joined himself to idols, would "let him 
 alone," (Hosea IV.-17), this Spirit which has dwelt with man 
 is now promised to God's regenerated people as an ever present, 
 /^dwelling guide, and teacher, and Comforter, which shall not 
 depart, but is to remain (//.el/to) with them forever. 
 
 But why does Christ, as he speaks of this coming of the 
 
112 THE INDWELLING SPIRIT. 
 
 Holy Spirit to the more intimate relationship of indwelling in 
 man, say: 
 
 "It is expedient for you that I go away; for if 
 I go not away, the comforter will not come unto you: but if 
 I depart, I will send him unto you." John XVI 7. 
 
 The word "for" in the text shows that the coming of the 
 Holy Spirit is conditioned upon the antecedent going away of 
 Christ: yet no adequate reason is apparent in the text as it 
 stands. The question at once arises, Does the English transla- 
 tion give the full meaning of the Greek? The Greek verb for the 
 two wordings "go away" and "depart" in the text is in each 
 case dWA^o). It has been translated differently for the sake of 
 euphony, simply to vary the expression. 
 
 It is a compound word meaning literally and primarily, as 
 translated, "to go away," "to depart" but it means more 
 than this. A secondary meaning is to die. (See Liddell and 
 Scott's Greek lexicon.) 
 
 We have the same idiom in English, as when we speak of 
 those dead as "the departed." 
 
 Now read the text again: 
 
 "It is expedient for you that I 
 
 die (direA.0ci>): for if I die (aTre'A&o) not the Comforter will not 
 come unto you: but if I go (Greek, 7ropev$o> metaphorically to 
 depart from life; see Thayer's lexicon, "7ro/oevo>, b,") I will send 
 him unto you." 
 
 With the full meaning of the Greek, it becomes 
 now apparent that the coming of the Holy Spirit to dwell in 
 man is conditioned, not upon the mere departure of Christ as 
 an antecedent, but because of that which is implied in the 
 going, namely, his death. And again the question arises, Why? 
 
 Why could the Holy Spirit dwell with man before Christ's 
 death, but can only dwell in man after, and because of, his 
 death? 
 
 The explanation lies manifestly along the line of the thought 
 that the scheme of salvation is an orderly one, and each succes- 
 sive step must come in its logical consecutive place; neither 
 before nor afttr. The way had to be prepared for the Christ 
 coming; hence John's mission, and his warning cry, "Prepare ye 
 the way of the Lord-" not simply for his coming but, "Make 
 his paths straight," the pathway of his work after he comes. 
 How? By "repentance unto ( ts to the end of) remission of 
 
THE HOLY SPIRIT UNDER THE NEW DISPENSATION. 113 
 
 sins." Mark I. -4. In like manner must the way be prepared 
 for the indwelling of the Holy Spirit. Paul says to the church 
 at Corinth, "Know ye not that ye are the temple of God, and 
 that the Spirit of God dwelleth in you?" I. Corinth. Ill 16. 
 
 But could the Spirit of God dwell in an unclean temple? 
 
 Paul answers this thought in the next verse when he says, 
 "for the temple of God is holy, which temple ye are," and pref- 
 aces this by the statement that "If any man defile the temple 
 of God, him shall God destroy." I. Corinth. III.-17. 
 
 How has thisjtemple been redeemed from the uncleanness of 
 sin? 
 
 John answered this when he wrote, "the blood of Jesus 
 Christ, his^Sonfcleanseth us from all sin" (djoapTcixs, transgres- 
 sion). It is all a picture of the Holy Spirit of God coming to 
 dwell in a tempU which has been cleansed for his indwelling, 
 cleansed by the blood of that sacrifice on Calvary. For God 
 cannot dwell in an unclean temple. The Old Law is full of this 
 thought. The house wherein God is to dwell must be free from 
 all uncleanness, puie, holy. And so of the temple in man for 
 the indwelling of the Holy Spirit of God, The law is not ful- 
 filled, and sin is not legally washed away, until the'offering up 
 of Christ, the true sacrifice, upon Calvary. Hence Christ says, 
 "It is expedient'for you that I go away ( a,7re'A.0w die), for 
 if I go not away ( obreA^w ) the Comforter will not come 
 unto you." John XYL 7: for his coming is to be an indwell- 
 ing, and the temple is not yet cleansed for his presence. 
 V 
 \ 
 
 A 
 
IV. 
 THE OFFICE OF THE HOLY SPIRIT. 
 
 WHAT IS TO BE THE ESPECIAL CHARACTER OF THE NEW OFFICE OF 
 THE HOLY SPIRIT AS THUS INDWELLING IN MAN? 
 
 All the information we haye upon this subject comes from 
 Christ himself, and is found in his words to :he twelve disciples 
 the night of the Last Supper, as recorded br John in Chapters 
 XIV., XV. and XVI. As complementary to this we have the 
 record of the subsequent working of the Holy Spirit in the 
 hearts of men, as given in Acts, and the various Epistles. 
 
 In John XIV. 
 
 -16, Christ speaks of the Holy Spirit as the "Comforter," 
 (TrapdKXrjTos helper, intercessor, comforter : from TrapaKaXfw, 
 primarily to call to the aid of: secondary meaning, to console, 
 to comfort). This intercessor, helper, comforter, is to take the 
 place of Christ to them, not as sacrifice, but as counsellor, 
 helper, ever-present friend, when Christ shall have gone from 
 them. It is in accordance with this phase of the Holy Spirit's 
 work that Paul says: 
 
 "Likewise the Spirit also helpeth our 
 
 infirmities;" and again, in the same verse, "The Spirit itself 
 maketh intercession for us." Romans VIII.-26. 
 
 In Acts IX.-31, it is said: 
 
 "Then had the churches rest 
 
 throughout all Judea and Galilee and Samaria, and were edified: 
 and walking in the fear of the Lord, and in the comfort of the 
 Holy Ghost, were multiplied." 
 
 In John XIV.-17, Christ speaks of the Holy Ghost as "The 
 Spirit of truth," and further says in XVI 13, as descriptive of 
 its work, 
 
 "Howbeit, when he, the Spirit of truth, is come he 
 
THE OFFICE OF THE HOLY SPIRIT. 115 
 
 will guide you into all truth: lor he shall not speak of himself 
 (d<' eavTov from himself): but whatsoever he shall hear, that 
 shall he speak: and he will show you things to come." 
 
 It is 
 
 in the thought of this office of the Holy Spirit manifestly, that 
 Paul says (I. Corinth. II.-9 to 14) as he looks back to the days 
 before the coming of the Holy Spirit as guide into all truth, 
 
 "But as it is written (Isaiah LXIV.4), Eye hath not seen, 
 nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man the 
 things which God hath prepared for them that, love him." 
 
 "But," Paul cries in exultation, as the thought of the 
 contrast between the old days when men walked without the 
 guidance of the Holy Spirit and the newer days of his presence 
 with them comes over him "But unto us God hath revealed 
 (ctTreKaAv^e made known, manifested) them by his Spirit: for 
 the Spirit searcheth all things, yea, the|deep things of God." 
 
 And he goes on to say: 
 
 "Now we have received not 
 
 the spirit of the world, but the Spirit which is of God, that we 
 might know the things that are freely given to us of God." 
 
 -Why the necessity of this giving of the Holy Spirit as guide 
 into all truth, and as revealer of the things which were to 
 come? The 14th verse*gives the explanation: 
 
 "But the natural 
 
 man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God, for they are 
 foolishness unto him: neither can he know them, because they 
 are spiritually discerned." 
 
 It is to this natural man, who in his 
 
 soul blindness is unable to perceive and take in spiritual truth, 
 that the Holy Spirit comes as illuminator and guide into the 
 deep truths of God; and he walks in darkness no longer. 
 In John XIV.-26, Christ says: 
 
 "But the Comforter, which 
 
 is the Holy Ghost, whom the Father will send in my name, he 
 shall teach (Si8aei 8i8a<7KO) ; to instruct in, to explain to) you 
 all things and bringjall^things to your remembrance, whatso- 
 ever I have said~unto*you." 
 
 The promise would, upon its face, 
 
 apparently, be more immediately to the little band of disciples 
 which was that night gathered about him, and who were 
 shortly to go out as his messengers and spokesmen, after he 
 
116 THE^INDWELLING SPIRIT. 
 
 shall have been taken from them, and would seem to refer to 
 their fitting for the work: yet that it had a wider scope, and 
 was intended for his followers in general, would seem to be 
 probable from I. John II. 20 and 27. The epistle is a general 
 one, presumably to the churches at large. In it John says to 
 them: 
 
 "But ye have an unction (^pur/itf, anointing) from 
 the Holy One, and ye know all things. . . . But the anoint- 
 ing which ye have received of him abideth in you, and ye need 
 not that any man teach you: but as the same anointing teach- 
 eth you of all things, and is truth and is no lie: and even as it 
 hath taught you, ye shall abide in him." 
 
 "The same thought is 
 
 contained in the verses already quoted from Paul, I. Corinth. 
 II.-12, 13. It is that the Holy Spirit will bring back to the 
 mind of man, and quicken in his heart, the words of Christ, as 
 the words of a mother come up, one hardly knows how, and 
 the eyes soften, after all the long years of wandering and sin. 
 
 The Holy Spirit is also to testify of Christ. Christ says in 
 John XV.-26: 
 
 "But when the Comforter is come, whom I 
 will send unto you from the Father, even the Spirit of truth, 
 which proceedeth from the Father, he shall testify of me" 
 (lJMpTvprj<ri TTCpl C/AOV bear witness concerning me). Christ has 
 just been speaking to the twelve of his rejection by the world, 
 which refused to accept his works and teachings as evidence of 
 his divine mission, when he goes on to say as in the text 
 nevertheless "the Spirit shall bear witness concerning me." In 
 the hearts of men, is probably the thought intended. It is 
 manifestly in accordance with this that Peter says, speaking of 
 Christ to the Jews: 
 
 "Him hath God exalted with his right 
 
 hand to be a prince, and a Savior, for to give repentance to 
 Israel, and forgiveness of sins. And we are his witnesses of 
 these things; and so is also the Holy Ghost, whom God hath 
 given to them that obey him." Acts V.-31, 32. 
 
 John also, in the same line of thought, speaking of Christ, 
 says: 
 
 "This is he that came by water and blood, even 
 Jesus Christ, not by water only, but by water and blood : 
 
THE OFFICE OF THE HOLY SPIRIT. 117 
 
 and it is the Spirit that bcarcth witness, because the Spirit is 
 truth." I. John V.-6. 
 
 Paul, likewise, says: 
 
 "Wherefore I give you to under- 
 stand that no man, speaking by the Spirit of God calleth 
 Jesus accursed (anathema}, and that no man can say that 
 Jesus is the Lord but by (d ^ l v if not in) the Holy Ghost." 
 I. Corinth. XII.-3. 
 
 Back of it all lies the thought that no man who weighs 
 the evidence^candidly, who takes the works and teachings of 
 Christ fairly, will be left in doubt as to the divine mission 
 of Christ, but that the Holy Spirit will testify to his heart 
 that Jesus of Nazareth is the Christ, the Son of God. 
 
 The Holy Spirit is to quicken the conscience of the world. 
 Christ says: 
 
 "And when he is come, he will reprove (eAey^ci 
 convict) the world of (-Trepi concerning) sin, and of ( Trepi) 
 righteousness and of (Trepi) judgment." John XVI. 8. 
 
 "Of sin" that there is such a thing as sin: and of its 
 exceeding sinfulness: and that through it somehow comes soul 
 peril to man. It is the quickened conscience of man arousing 
 him to a sense oi peril. It is this that makes Felix tremble 
 when Paul reasons with him of righteousness, temperance and 
 judgment to come. (Acts XXIV.-25.) It is witnessed in that 
 scene in the prison when, with no word of exhortation spoken, 
 the keeper cries out, "Sirs, What must I do to be saved?" 
 Acts XVI.-30. It is this that gives power to Peter's word, 
 and that makes the message of the Apostles a flame of fire 
 in the hearts of men. 
 
 "Of righteousness" (Tightness) that there is a right way, 
 and man should walk therein. 
 
 "Of judgment" that sin must have a judgment, and that 
 sinful men must face the penalty of their sins: 
 
 "For he cometh 
 
 to judge the earth: with righteousness shall he judge the 
 world, and the people with equity." Psalm XCVIII.-9. 
 
 The Holy Spirit is to glorify Christ. (John XVI.-14.) 
 
 Out of it all the world shall come to know him, to esteem, to 
 honor him. He is not always to be stricken and despised of 
 
118 THE INDWELLING SPIRIT. 
 
 men. (Isaiah LIU.) And this is even now fulfilling, for never 
 has Jesus, the Christ, stood higher before the world than now. 
 The world is putting aside its scoffing: is learning to know 
 and to glorify the Christ. 
 
 Is the coming of the Holy Spirit in this office of "teacher 
 and guide into all truth" to supercede or add to the previous 
 revelations and teachings of divine truth by the bringing of 
 new revelations and new teachings ? or is it only to bring 
 to remembrance, and illumine, and make clear, what has 
 already been revealed and taught? 
 
 Christ says of the Holy Spirit, "he will show you 
 things to come." (ra e^o/xeva) John XVI.-13. The phrase 
 "TO,, epxo/xeva," literally "the (things) coming," would 
 seem to refer to events yet to come to pass rather than 
 to new revelations of divine truth. Ta, the neuter 
 of the definite article is used in this sense. If it were truths, 
 new truths, to be revealed, to which the reference is made, 
 the article should be the feminine ras to correspond with the 
 word a\rjOLa<s (truths), made use of, however, in the singular 
 only in the previous sentence. That the reference is not thus 
 to new revelations of spiritual truth, the gender of the article 
 clearly shows. 
 
 The first chapter of Revelation throws a flood of light 
 upon this point. John says, "I was in the Spirit on the 
 Lord's day." (Rev. I.-10); and the command to him is, 
 "Write the things (a, relative, elliptical for T a a) which thou 
 hast seen, and the things (a for ra a) which are, and the 
 things (again the neuter a for T a a) which shall be hereafter." 
 (/zero, Tavra after these.) I.-19. 
 
 Who is it that makes the revela- 
 tion to John of these things which are to be? The answer 
 is in chapter II. 7, and in the six repetitions of that sentence 
 which are found in the second and third chapters of Revela- 
 tion: 
 
 "He that hath ears to hear, let him hear what ( T i, 
 neuter the thing which) the Spirit saith to the churches," 
 and the book of Revelation is a revelation of events, not of 
 new doctrines. 
 
 There is no assurance in the Scriptures, no hinting even, 
 
THE OFFICE OF THE HOLY SPIRIT. 119 
 
 that the old teachings, God's word in the Old Covenant rec- 
 ord, Christ's words in the new, are to be set aside or super- 
 ceded, or added to: only brought to remembrance, illumined, 
 and made clear: no hintings of new revelations of divine truth. 
 In accordance with this thought it will be noted that the 
 apostles in their writings (the various epistles) are only com- 
 mentators upon what has already been revealed, not them- 
 selves revealers of new spiritual truths, The Revelation of John 
 is, as just said, of things, events, (TO, ep^o/Aera), glimpses of the 
 hereafter not new teachings. The chart for man back to God 
 has been written. It is not to be added to, for it is sufficient. 
 
V. 
 THE REDEEMING OF THE PROMISE. 
 
 When was the promise of Christ, with respect to the coming 
 of the Holy Spirit to man, formally redeemed? 
 
 Christ had 
 
 promised to his disciples that the Holy Spirit should come to 
 them to abide. He had said, "I will pray the Father, and he 
 shall give 3 r ou another Comforter, that he may abide with you 
 forever, even the Spirit of truth:" (John XIV.-16, 17: he had 
 also said, "But the Comforter, which is the Holy Ghost, whom 
 the Father will send in my name," John XIY.-26: he had 
 likewise said, "It is expedient for you that I go away (o/Tre'A.&o 
 die), for if I go not away (aTre'A&o), the Comforter will not 
 come unto you: but if I depart (TropevOa) depart, i. e., from 
 life, die), I will send him unto you." John XVI.-7. When 
 was this promise formally made good? 
 
 The account is given 
 
 in John XX.-19 to 22. It is after the sacrifice upon Calvary: 
 the evening of the very day of the resurrection from the dead. 
 Christ, for the first time after the fulfillment of his statement 
 that he must first die, meets with the disciples assembled 
 together. The account is given by John as follows: 
 
 "Then 
 
 the same day at evening, being the first day of the week, when 
 the doors were shut where the disciples were assembled for 
 fear of the Jews, came Jesus, and stood in the midst, and saith 
 unto them, Peace be unto you. And when he had so said, 
 he showed unto them his hands and his side. Then were the 
 disciples glad when they saw the Lord. Then said Jesus unto 
 them again, Peace be unto you: as my Father hath sent me, 
 even so send I you. And when he had said this, he breathed 
 on them, and saith unto them, Receive ye the Holy Ghost." 
 
THE REDEEMING OF THE PROMISE. 121 
 
 What are the evidences of the indwelling of the Holy Spirit 
 in man? 
 
 The question is naturally and properly asked by every 
 devout soul, "How shall I know that the promise is fulfilled 
 in me, and that the Holy Spirit dwelleth within me? 
 
 By what means shall I perceive and know the presence 
 within me of this intangible being? My physical senses cannot 
 grasp it. My mind cannot seize upon it. Will God leave me 
 in ignorance upon a point which the Scriptures dwell upon as 
 one of so vital importance?" The question is not only a natural 
 one: it is also a reasonable one. Man does not pass beyond 
 the bounds of equity in asking it; and upon a point so import- 
 ant he is, in equity, entitled to an answer. Is an answer given 
 in the Holy Scriptures? The reply must be, Unquestionably 
 Yes. A clear, plain answer is therein contained; and no man 
 who applies the test as thus given need remain in doubt. 
 
 Back of the test lies a general law laid down by Christ 
 himself in the Sermon on the Mount. It is contained in verses 
 15 to 20 of Matthew, Chapter VII. He is speaking o.f false 
 prophets, and of evidences as to the nature of the spirit 
 dwelling within them. The law is, "By their fruits ye shall 
 know them:" and back of the spiritual'law is the natural law 
 that a tree is known by its fruits; a good tree bringing forth 
 good fruits; an evil tree bringing forth evil fruits the summing 
 up, "Wherefore, by their fruits ye shall know." 
 
 Now turn to Galatians V.-22, 23. Paul is giving to the 
 people of the church the marks by which they may distinguish 
 those who are under the dominion of the flesh from those who are 
 led by the Spirit. He appeals to Christ's law, "The tree known 
 by its fruits," as the decisive test. After enumerating the 
 fruits of the flesh he goes on to give the fruits of the Spirit in 
 man: 
 
 "But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, long 
 suffering, gentleness, (^p-^a-ror^ kindness) goodness, faith, 
 meekness, temperance: against such there is no law." 
 
 It is the 
 
 old primal law of creation, the tree yielding fruit after its kind 
 (Genesis I.-ll), carried into the spiritual world. 
 
 Fruit when? Not all at once, for fruit grows. Again the 
 general law carried into the spiritual world. For, "So is the 
 kingdom of God, as if a man should cast seed into the ground; 
 
122 THE INDWELLING SPIRIT. 
 
 and should sleep and rise, night and day, and the seed should 
 spring and grow up, he knoweth not how. For the earth 
 bringeth forth fruit of herself: first the blade, then the ear, after 
 that the full corn in the ear." Mark IY.-26-28. 
 
 It is Christ 
 
 that speaks. Who am I that I should question the words of 
 the Master? 
 
 "By their fruits ye shall know." The soul which sees within 
 itself the growing up of the kindly fruits of the Spirit, instead 
 of the bitter fruits of the flesh, has Christ's assurance that the 
 tree is there. The test is conclusive: and I find no other given 
 in the Scriptures. 
 
 The soul which recognizes this in itself may rest in the 
 assurance of the indwelling Spirit, though no eye hath seen him, 
 no hand touched him, no ear, save the ear of the soul, hath 
 heard his voice. And the soul which does not find this fruitage 
 within itself, which, as the years go by, is not growing patient, 
 and ge,ntle, and tender and kind, whatever the profession of 
 godliness, may well call a halt, and with bitter tears ask what 
 is wrong. 
 
 "And grieve* not the Holy Spirit of God, whereby 
 ye are sealed unto the day of redemption. Let all bitterness, 
 and wrath, and anger, and clamor, and evil speaking be put 
 away from you, with all malice: and be ye kind one to another, 
 tender-hearted, forgiving one another, eyen as God for Christ's 
 sake hath forgiven you." Ephesians IV.-30, 32. 
 
THE BAPTISM WITH THE HOLY GHOST 
 AND WITH FIRE: 
 
 AND 
 
 THE ENDUEMENT WITH POWER. 
 
"And behold I send the promise of my Father upon you: 
 but tarry ye in the city of Jerusalem, until ye be endued with 
 power from on high." Luke XXIV -49. 
 
I. 
 
 THE BAPTISM WITH THE HOLY GHOST AND 
 WITH FIRE. 
 
 When John the Baptist stood that day by the river Jordan 
 preaching to the multitude, he said to them, 
 
 "I indeed baptize 
 
 you with water unto repentance: but he that cometh after me is 
 mightier than I, whose shoes I am not worthy to bear: he 
 shall baptize you with the Holy Ghost, and with fire." Matth. 
 III.-ll. 
 
 Mark, in recording the same scene, quotes John as saying, 
 
 "I indeed have baptized you with water; but he shall bap- 
 tize you with the Holy Ghost." Mark I. -8: omitting the words 
 "and with fire." 
 
 Luke says: 
 
 "John answered, saying unto them all, I 
 
 indeed baptize you with water; but one mightier than I com- 
 eth, the latchet of whose shoes I am not worthy to unloose: he 
 shall baptize you with the Holy Ghost and with fire." Luke 
 III. -16. 
 
 John further identifies these predictions with Christ when he 
 says: 
 
 "The next day John (the Baptist) seeth Jesus coming 
 unto him, and saith, Behold the Lamb of God, which taketh 
 away the sin of the world! This is he of whom 
 I said, after me cometh a man which is pre- 
 ferred before me, for he was before me. And I knew 
 him not: but that he should be made manifest to Israel, there- 
 fore am I come baptizing with water. And John bare record, 
 saying, I saw the Spirit descending from heaven like a dove, 
 and it abode upon him. And I knew him not, but he that sent 
 me to baptize with water, the same said unto me, Upon whom 
 thou shalt see the spirit descending, and remaining on him, the 
 
126 THE BAPTISM WITH THE HOLY GHOST 
 
 same is he which baptizeth with the Holy Ghost." John I.-29,33 
 
 Of Christ, then, the prediction is made, that he is to baptize 
 with the Holy Ghost and with fire. Yet Christ lived his life 
 upon earth, did his work, taught his doctrines, died upon Cal- 
 vary, rose from the dead, abode yet a few days longer upon 
 earth with the disciples, and then ascended to heaven, and in it 
 all no appearance of the fulfilment of John's prophecy. Nor is 
 the prophecy even alluded to again in either ot the Gospels, and 
 there is no record or hinting of its fulfilment. The indwelling 
 of the Holy Spirit, of which Christ foretells before his death, 
 and which is realized the evening of the day in which he arose 
 from the tomb, when he said to the disciples, "Receive ye the 
 Holy Ghost," cannot be considered a fulfilment; for this was, in 
 no sense of the word, a baptism. The very meaning of the 
 word (/3a7rTio> to bathe, wash, cleanse) is limited to things 
 external, and does not apply to that which is within. It was 
 thus that John baptized his disciples. It was thus that Christ 
 was baptized by John. 
 
 However, the words of Christ himself are explicit upon this 
 point, for forty day after he has given to the disciples the in- 
 dwelling Spirit and in his last interview before his final ascen- 
 sion, and manifestly referring to that scene, and John's prophecy 
 by the banks of the Jordan, he says: 
 
 "For John truly bap- 
 tized with water; but ye shall be baptized with the Holy Ghost 
 not many days hence." Acts I. 5. 
 
 The indwelling Spirit had thus already come: the baptism 
 with the Holy Ghost was yet to come. 
 
 As the fulfilment of the prophecy is not to be found before 
 Christ's ascension, we are forced to search for it later after he 
 had finally parted from his disciples. Is there anything to be 
 found in that after history, as given in Acts (for the consecutive 
 church history ceases with Acts) which may satisfactorily be 
 taken as a fulfilment? 
 
 Let us take the events following after the giving of the "in- 
 dwelling Spirit" in their chronological order. 
 
 After the giving of the Spirit, and just before he parts from 
 the disciples for the last time, Christ commissions them to go 
 out as his messengers to preach the Gospel to all nations. The 
 words of the commission are: 
 
 "Go ye therefore, and teach all 
 
THE BAPTISM WITH THE HOLY GHOST 127 
 
 nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the 
 Son, and of the Holy Ghost: teaching them to observe all things 
 whatsoever I have commanded you." Matth. XXVIII.-19, 20. 
 Luke alludes, but less in detail, to the same commission, 
 but then goes on to give these further words from Christ to 
 the disciples: 
 
 "And, behold, I send the promise of my Father 
 upon you: but tarry ye in the city of Jerusalem until ye be 
 endued with power from on high." Luke XXIV.-49. 
 
 Luke again, in Acts I.-l to 8, refers to these words of 
 Christ. It is an additional light, and the account is somewhat 
 more explicit: 
 
 "The former treatise have I made, O Theophi- 
 lus, of all that Jesus began both to do and teach, until the day 
 in which he was taken up, after that he through the Holy 
 Ghost had given commandment unto the Apostles whom he had 
 chosen: to whom also he showed himself alive after his passion 
 by many infallible proofs, being seen of them forty days, and 
 speaking of the things pertaining to the kingdom of God: and 
 being, assembled together with them, commanded them that 
 they should not'depart from Jerusalem, but wait for the prom- 
 ise of the Father, which, saith he, ye have heard of me. For 
 John truly baptized with water: but ye shall be baptized with 
 the Holy Ghost not many days hence. When they therefore were 
 come together they asked of him, saying, Lord, wilt thou at 
 this time restore again the kingdom to Israel? And he said 
 unto them, It is not for you to know the times or the seasons, 
 which the Father hath, put in his own power (eov<na author- 
 ity). But ye shall receive power (8wa/xtv power to do) after 
 that'the Holy^Ghost is come upon you ^^ iyx.as), and ye shall 
 be witnesses unto me, both in Jerusalem, and in Judea, and in 
 Samaria, and unto the uttermost part of the earth. And when 
 he_had spoken these things, while they beheld, he was taken up 
 and a cloud received him out of their sight." 
 
 Two separate 
 
 things"" are here" spoken of the sending of the promise of the 
 Father the enduement with power from on high. That they 
 are not the" same, is clear from the wording of the passage, for 
 they are spoken "of[separately, and as distinct the one from the 
 other, not only apparently in character, but also as having a rela- 
 tionship of sequence the one to the other. Yet that there is 
 
128 THE BAPTSIM WITH THE HOLY GHOST 
 
 some relationship between them, is to be inferred from the 
 manner in which they are linked together, and spoken of, in the 
 same sentence. For the sake of clearness, however, it is better 
 to examine them separately : 
 
 "And behold I send the promise 
 
 (rrjv 7rayyr)\iav the thing promised) of my Father (ro9 Trar/ods 
 the Father) upon you." Luke XXIV.-49. 
 
 What was "the 
 
 promise of the Father"? That the words do not refer to the 
 promise of the "indwelling Spirit" is manifest, for that promise 
 was given, not by the Father, but by Christ himself, Christ 
 had said, "I will pray the Father, and he shall give you another 
 Comforter." John XIV.-16. And the Comforter was to be 
 sent, not in the name of the Father, but in Christ's name: 
 
 "But the Comforter, which is the Holy Ghost, whom the 
 Father will send in my name." John XIV.-26. 
 
 And again Christ says of this coming: 
 
 "But when the 
 
 Comforter is come, whom / will send unto you from the Father." 
 John XV.-26. 
 
 It will be seen from these passages that the 
 promise of the indwelling Spirit is distinctively a promise of 
 Christ and not of the Father. Then, too, the relationship of 
 the Holy Spirit to man, spoken of in the two statements, is 
 entirely different. The Comforter, the Holy Spirit whom Christ 
 promised was to be in man "for he dwelleth with you, and 
 shall be in you: (ev vfuv) John XIV.-17: while the promise of 
 the Father spoken of in Luke XXIV.-49, is to be upon you 
 (e<' fTrl {yxas.) And further, if "the promise of the Father" 
 referred to the "indwelling Spirit," how could Christ speak of it 
 as a thing yet to be sent ("behold I send the promise"), when, 
 as a matter of fact, the Holy Spirit, as indwelling in man, had 
 already been given by Christ the day of his resurrection? See 
 John XX-22. 
 
 The conclusion is unavoidable from the foregoing facts that 
 "the promise of the Father" cannot refer to the abiding of 
 the Holy Spirit as an indwelling presence in man, as 
 promised by Christ and already given, but to something else 
 which would seem, from the wording of the verse in question, 
 Luke XXIV.-49, to be connected with the enduement with 
 power. To what, then, does it refer? Peter answers the ques- 
 
THE BAPTISM WITH THE HOLY GHOST 129 
 
 tion in Acts. The disciples were assembled in that upper cham- 
 ber in Jerusalem, waiting, as Christ had directed, for the 
 enduement with power, when a wonderful thing came upon 
 them. The scene is best described in the words of the Scripture 
 itself: 
 
 "And when the day of Pentecost was fully come, they 
 were all with one accord in one place. And suddenly there came 
 a sound from heaven as of a rushing mighty wind, and it filled 
 all the house where they were sitting. And there appeared unto 
 them cloven tongues, like as of fire, and it sat upon each of 
 them. And they were all filled with the Holy Ghost, and began 
 to speak with other tongues as the Spirit gave them utterance.'' 
 Acts II.-l, 4. 
 
 The bystanders, amazed at the scene, could give no other 
 explanation than that, "These men are full of new wine." 
 
 "But Peter, standing up with the eleven, lifted up his voice 
 and said unto them, Ye men of Judea, and all ye that dwell at 
 Jerusalem, be this known unto you, and hearken to my words: 
 for these are not drunken, as ye suppose, seeing it is but the 
 third hour of the day. But this is that which was spoken 
 by the prophet Joel, And it shall come to pass in the last days, 
 saith God, I will pour out of my Spirit upon(eVi) all flesh: and 
 your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, and your young 
 men shall see visions, and your old men shall dream dreams: 
 and on (ITTI) my servants and on my handmaidens I will pour 
 out in those days of my Spirit, and they shall prophesy.'' 
 Acts II.-14, 18. 
 
 Again it is the same Greek preposition, eVt (upon). It is a 
 sudden and mighty outpouring of God's Spirit upon the disci- 
 ples, a baptism of the Holy Spirit which has supervened upon 
 the indwelling of the Holy Spirit. 
 
 That this outpouring of the Holy Spirit upon the disciples 
 was the baptism with the Holy Ghost which had been prom- 
 ised, is confirmed by Peter when he says: 
 
 "Therefore being 
 
 by the right hand of God exalted, and having received of the 
 Father the promise of the Holy Ghost, he hath shed forth this, 
 which ye now see and hear." Acts II.-33. 
 
 And again when he says: 
 
 "And as I began to speak, the 
 
130 THE BAPTISM WITH THE HOLY GHOST 
 
 Holy Ghost fell on them, as on us at the beginning. Then 
 remembered I the word of the Lord, how that he said, John 
 indeed baptized with water, but ye shall be baptized with the 
 Holy Ghost. Forasmuch then as God gave them the like gift as 
 he did unto us, who believed on the Lord Jesus Christ, what 
 was I, that I could withstand God?" Acts XL-IS, 17. 
 
 What is the purpose of this baptism? for that it could be 
 thus foretold, and waited for, and sent, and yet be without a 
 definite purpose, would not seem reasonable, nor would it be in 
 keeping with that manifest working to a fixed plan which is 
 everywhere so marked a feature of God's ways with man, as 
 narrated in the Scriptures. 
 
 Was the purpose to add to, or make more complete, the 
 scheme of salvation for man? 
 
 To assume this would be to 
 
 assume that the plan of redemption from transgression, and of 
 a new life for man in God, was not complete in the work of 
 Christ himself. It would be to assume that Christ returned to 
 heaven leaving an incompleted work for man's salvation, and 
 that to finish the work it was necessary to go back to an old 
 prophecy and promise of the Father. Yet what do the Scrip- 
 tures show as the steps in the plan of salvation of man? They 
 show: 
 
 1 Man's sin remitted through the blood of Christ, shed as 
 the sacrificial atonement : 
 
 "Behold the Lamb of God which 
 
 taketh away the sin (d/Aaprtav transgression) of the world." 
 John L-29. 
 
 " . . . . the blood of Jesus Christ, his Son, cleanseth us 
 from all sin (d/xa/m'as transgression)." I. John I.-7. 
 
 2 Man born again from spiritual death in sin to life in 
 God through faith in Jesus Christ: 
 
 "Jesus answered and said 
 
 unto him, Verily, verily, I say unto thee. Except a man be born 
 again, he cannot see the kingdom of God." John III.-3. 
 
 "Whosoever belie veth that Jesus is the Christ is born of 
 God." I. John V.-l. 
 
 "Ear ye are all the children of God by faith in Christ 
 Jesus." Galatians III.-26. 
 
 "That whosoever believeth in him (Christ) should not perish, 
 but have eternal life." John III.-15. 
 
THE BAPTISM WITH THE HOLY GHOST 131 
 
 - 
 
 3 Man thus pardoned, and again a child of God and heir 
 to eternal life, now provided with a teacher and guide in the 
 person of the indwelling Spirit whose work is not transient or 
 temporary, neither only a partial work, but who is to be guide 
 to man into all truth, and is to abide with him forever: 
 
 "And 
 
 I will pray the Father, and he shall give you another Com- 
 forter, that he may abide with you forever: even the Spirit of 
 truth." John XIV.-16, 17. 
 
 "But the Comforter, which is the Holy Ghost, whom the 
 Father will send in my name, he shall teach you all things, and 
 bring all things to your remembrance whatsoever I have said 
 unto you." John XIY.-26. 
 
 "Howbeit when he, the Spirit of truth is come, he will guide 
 you into all truth." John XYI.-13. 
 
 4? Man to become holy unto the Lord in the trujth into 
 which the Holy Spirit is to act as teacher and guide: 
 
 "Sanctify 
 
 (sanctus facio dyiaorov make holy) them through thy truth 
 (ev ry dAr?0et'a in the truth): thy word is truth." John XVII. 
 17. 
 
 "Neither pray I for these alone: but for them also which 
 shall believe on me through their word." John XVII.-20. 
 
 If then, as thus shown, man is already, before, and without 
 this baptism of the Holy Spirit, pardoned of his transgressions, 
 born again to God, heir to eternal life, and provision made for 
 his becoming Holy unto the Lord (sanctified) what else remains 
 to make the work of oneness with God complete? The answer 
 must be that nothing more remains to be provided for: the 
 scheme for man in his individual relationship to God is complete. 
 
 It is manifestly in the thought of this completeness of the 
 the work, as already provided for, that Christ goes on in the 
 same prayer to add these words: 
 
 "Neither pray I for these 
 
 alone, but for them also which shall believe on me through 
 their word: that they all may be one: as thou, Father, art in 
 me, and I in thee, that they also may be one in us: that the 
 world may believe that thou hast sent me. And the glory 
 which thou gavest me I have given them: that they may be one 
 even as we are one: I in them, and thou in me, that they may 
 be made perfect in one." John XVII.-20, 23. 
 
132 THE BAPTISM WITH THE HOLY GHOST 
 
 If, then, the baptism with the Holy Ghost and with tire had 
 not to do with the work of man's individual salvation, nor 
 with his becoming holy unto the Lord, what was its purpose? for 
 that it must have had some specific purpose the whole tenor of 
 God's ways with man would indicate, for that God ever does 
 purposeless work is controverted by the whole record of the 
 Scriptures; neither could we conceive of it as a possibility con- 
 sistent with his nature. The most reasonable method of seek- 
 ing for an answer to the inquiry is to make a careful study of 
 the text and context of the passages in the Scriptures in which 
 the baptism with the Holy Ghost and with fire is spoken of, 
 and then to find what yet remained to be done in the working 
 out of God's ways with men. 
 
 The promise of this baptism is found in only one of the 
 Gospels. Luke says (XXIV.-45, 51): 
 
 "Then opened he their 
 
 understanding, that they might understand the Scriptures, and 
 said unto them, Thus it is written, and thus it behoved Christ to 
 suffer, and to rise from the dead the third day: and that repent- 
 ance and remission of sins should be preached in his name among 
 all nations, beginning at Jerusalem. And ye are witnesses of 
 these things. And behold I send the promise of my Father upon 
 (eVt) you: but tarry ye in the city of Jerusalem until ye be 
 endued (IvBvarja-Oe eVSvw, to put on, to clothe as with a gar- 
 ment) with power (Swa/x,u/ power to do) from on high. And 
 he led them out as far as Bethany, and he lifted up his hands 
 and blessed them. And it came to pass, while he blessed them, 
 he was parted from them, and carried up into heaven." 
 
 What are the circumstances under which this command is 
 given? 
 
 Christ, as has just been shown, had finished the work 
 of providing for man's redemption and sanctification. He has 
 just commissioned his disciples to go out as his messengers to 
 carry the glad tidings to all men. To the end of a better fitting 
 for the work which lies before them he has just "opened their 
 understanding that they might understand the Scriptures" with 
 regard to the prophecies of his coming to men, and the purpose 
 of it, and now, with the work done in their own souls, and 
 their understanding enlightened to the message, they are to go 
 out by his command to preach this gospel of hope to men: and 
 
THE BAPTISM WITH THE HOLY GHOST 133 
 
 they are to be his witnesses (fjidpTvpes fjunprvped) to bear tes- 
 timony) of these things. 
 
 But who and what are they? and 
 
 what is the task before them? A little band of eleven against 
 the world. Unknown, yet to attack entrenched heathenism. So 
 fearful that when the Christ whom they are to preach was led 
 to Calvary, they all abandoned him and fled. With no proof as 
 yet to their own minds that the power which he had to touch 
 men's hearts will go with them. With no proof to the world 
 that they are commissioned to be his successors. 
 
 The undertaking would seem to be hopeless: the attempt 
 madness. How are these fearful hearts to have courage? the 
 doubting world to be convinced? 
 
 This is the problem which lay before them, the question as 
 yet unanswered. For it the Christ life, the Christ death, the 
 indwelling Spirit, have given no solution. Has God left this 
 part of the plan unprovided for, or is "the promise of the 
 Father," for which they are bidden to wait, that which is to 
 complete and make effective the plan for the reclamation of a 
 world lost in sin? 
 
 Before passing on for an answer it is well to examine again 
 and upon the line of this inquiry, the second account of the 
 scene when the command was given to "wait for the promise 
 of the Father," for there is a second account but not in the 
 gospels. It is in the first chapter of Acts where a retrospective 
 view is given of the one scene in Christ's life which is to become 
 the connecting link again between old and new. The account, 
 which has been before quoted, but which it is well to consider 
 again, is also from Luke: 
 
 "The former treatise (Luke's gos- 
 pel) have I made, O Theophilus, of all that Jesus began both to 
 do and to teach, until the day in which he was taken up, after 
 that he, through the Holy Ghost, had given commandment 
 unto the apostles whom he had chosen: to whom he showed 
 himself alive after his passion (7ra$etv Trao-^cu to suffer) by 
 many infallible proofs, being seen of them forty days, and 
 speaking of the things pertaining to the kingdom of God: and 
 being assembled together with them, commanded them that they 
 should not depart from Jerusalem, but wait for the promise of 
 the Father, which, saith he, ye have heard of me (ov R V. 
 
134 THE BAPTISM WITH THE HOLY GHOST 
 
 from me): for John truly baptized with water, but ye shall be 
 baptized with the Holy Ghost not many days hence. When 
 they therefore were come together, they asked of him saying, 
 Lord, wilt thou at this time restore again the kingdom to 
 srael? And he said unto them, It is not for you to know the 
 times or the seasons, which the Father hath put in his own 
 power (eov<ria authority) But ye shall receive power (8wayu.iv 
 power|to do) after that the Holy Ghost is come upon you, 
 and ye shall be witnesses unto me, both in Jerusalem, and in all 
 Judea, and in Samaria, and unto the uttermost part of the 
 earth. And when he had spoken these things, while they beheld 
 he was taken up, and a cloud received him out of their sight." 
 Acts I.-l, 9. 
 
 It will be noted in this account that the apostles are: 
 
 1 To wait in Jerusalem for the "promise (the thing prom- 
 ised) of the Father." Verse 4. 
 
 2 That the promise is "the baptism with the Holy Ghost" 
 shown by the word "for." Verse 5. 
 
 3 That following the baptism with the Holy Ghost is to 
 be given to them power to do, that is to perform things. 
 Verse 8. 
 
 4 That thereupon they are to go out to be Christ's wit- 
 nesses (pdpTvpes those who bear testimony) to all the earth. 
 Verse 8. 
 
 What do the apostles do? 
 
 1 they return to Jerusalem as commanded. Verse 12. 
 
 2 They await the fulfilling of the promise. Verses 13, 14. 
 
 What came to them? 
 
 "And when the day of Pentecost was 
 
 fully come, they were all with one accord in one place. And 
 suddenly there came a sound from heaven, as of a rushing, 
 mighty wind, and it filled all the house where they were sitting. 
 And there appeared unto them cloven tongues like as of fire, and 
 it sat upon each of them. And they were all filled with the 
 Holy Ghost, and began to speak with other tongues, as the 
 Spirit gave them utterance." Acts II.-l, 4. 
 
 Are we to understand this as the fulfillment of "the promise 
 of the Father"? 
 
 No other conclusion is possible, for there is no 
 record of anything else coming to the disciples, and they 
 immediately thereafter go out to the work to which Christ has 
 
THE BAPTISM WITH THE HOLY GHOST 135 
 
 appointed them, thus showing that they themselves thus under- 
 stood, and recognized it as such. 
 
 And that they themselves so understood and accepted is 
 further confirmed by the words of Peter when, in explanation of 
 the scene which accompanies the baptism, he says to the won- 
 dering bystanders: 
 
 "This is that which was spoken by the 
 
 prophet Joel; And it shall come to pass in the last days, saith 
 God, I will pour out of my Spirit upon all flesh: and your sons 
 and your daughters shall prophesy, and your young men shall 
 see visions and your old men shall dream dreams: and on my 
 servants, and on my handmaidens I will pour out in those days 
 of my Spirit: and they shall prophesy." Acts II.-16, 18. 
 
 And further says: 
 
 "This Jesus hath God raised up, whereof 
 
 we are witnesses. Therefore being by the right hand of God 
 CA-alted, and having received of the Father the promise of the 
 Holy Ghost, he (Jesus) hath shed forth this, which ye now see 
 and hear." Acts II.-33. 
 
 The promise of the Father, this special baptism with the 
 Holy Ghost, would seem then from the Scripture record to have 
 to do, as purpose and end, rather with a special fitting for the 
 work of spreading the gospel of salvation, than with any fur- 
 ther work of salvation to the individual soul of man. That in 
 this work of special fitting a great spiritual exaltation came to 
 the souls of the messengers themselves the record also as plainly 
 sho\vs. 
 
 But why do they need this special pouring out of the Holy 
 Spirit upon them as a fitting for the work? In what way will 
 it better prepare them for what lies before? 
 
 The explanation 
 
 would seem to lie along the line of confidence-r-courage to face 
 the world. That a remarkable change came to them in this 
 respect immediately thereupon, is clearly shown by the record. 
 These men who fled panic stricken when their master was 
 seized (Matth. XXYI.-56), and Peter, who denied him (Matth. 
 XXVI.-70, 72, 74), and who, when they meet together after- 
 ward, gather within a room with shut doors for "fear of the 
 Jews" (John XX.-19), and who, so unstable is their faith, will 
 not believe that his word was true and that he is indeed risen 
 from the dead (Mark XVI.-13), and who are even affrighted 
 
136 THE BAPTISM WITH THE HOLY GHOST 
 
 when he does appear unto them, and deem that they have only 
 seen a spirit these men, after the baptism with the Holy 
 Ghost seem immediately to lose all mistrust, all fear, and go 
 out to proclaim to a hostile world the risen Christ with a 
 boldness, a defiance of danger, which shows a complete trans- 
 formation. Of them it is said, immediately after this baptism 
 with the Holy Ghost, when they are arrested and brought to 
 trial for preaching Christ: 
 
 "Now when they saw the bold- 
 ness of Peter and John, and perceived that they were unlearned 
 and ignorant men, they marveled: and they took knowledge of 
 them that they had been with Jesus." Acts IV.-13. 
 
 And when 
 
 they are commanded not to preach Christ, these men who but 
 a few days before had been afraid to own him, now boldly 
 reply to the very men who had been instrumental in securing 
 the death of their Master, and with his fate as a possibility 
 before them: 
 
 " Whether it be right in the sight of God to 
 hearken unto you more than unto God, judge ye. For we can- 
 not but speak the things which we have seen and heard." 
 Acts IV.-19, 20. 
 
 And when they are again seized and brought to trial for 
 persisting in publicly preaching Christ, and are brought before 
 the council, and the high priest says to them: 
 
 "Did not we 
 
 straitly command you, that ye should not teach in this name? 
 and behold, ye have filled Jerusalem with your doctrines, and 
 intend to bring this man's blood upon us;" 
 
 it is said, "Then 
 
 Peter and the other apostles answered and said, We ought to 
 obey God rather than men." And boldly preaching Christ cru- 
 cified to the council itself, they add, "And we are his witnesses 
 of these things." 
 
 The account goes on to say, "And when they 
 had called the apostles, and beaten them, they commanded 
 that they should not speak in the name of Jesus, and let them 
 *o." 
 
 Does the old fear again come upon them; and do they obey? 
 
 "And they departed from the presence of the council, 
 rejoicing that they were counted worthy to suffer shame for 
 
THE BAPTISM WITH THE HOLY GHOST 137 
 
 his name. And daily in the temple and in every house, they 
 ceased not to teach and preach Jesus Christ." Acts V.-27 to 42. 
 
 Again, after the martyrdom of Stephen, it is said: 
 
 "As for 
 
 Saul, he made havoc of the church, entering into every house, 
 and haling men and women, committed them to prison. There- 
 fore they that were scattered abroad went everywhere preach- 
 ing the word." Acts VIII.-3, 4. 
 
 It is all a vivid picture of a new born boldness come upon 
 men who before were fearful and discouraged. And it does not 
 cease. The whole history of the church of Christ is a history of 
 timid men, of shrinking women, transformed by some miraculous 
 power until they shrink from no danger, are checked by no 
 peril, in witnessing for Him of Calvary. The Roman arena, 
 and the lion's den, and the martyr's stake, and the rack of the 
 inquisition, testify to the coming upon man of some power, 
 some exaltation, some great uplifting out of self, which 
 is more than human. Whence came it? The record of 
 the Scriptures shows that it came with that baptism of the 
 Holy Ghost which fell upon the little band of disciples that day 
 in the upper chamber in Jerusalem, and which at various times 
 has fallen upon Christ's church in the ages since. 
 
II. 
 
 "AND WITH FIRE.'' 
 
 The prophecy was: 
 
 "He shall baptize you with the Holy 
 Ghost, and with fire" Matth. III.-ll. 
 
 "With the Holy Ghost and with fire" the two are linked 
 together in the prophecy in such manner that the fulfillment 
 would also reasonably be looked for as linked together in like 
 manner, And so we find it, for the account reads: 
 
 "And when 
 
 the day of Pentecost was fully come, they were all with one 
 accord in one place. And suddenly there came a sound from 
 heaven, as of a rushing, mighty wind, and it filled all the house 
 where they were sitting. And there appeared unto them cloven 
 tongues like as of fire, and it sat upon each of them. And they 
 were all filled with the Holy Ghost, and began to speak with 
 other tongues, as the Spirit gave them utterance." Acts II.- 
 1,4. 
 
 That this was what was meant by the phrase, "and with 
 fire," it is reasonable to suppose, for there is no further mention 
 in the New Covenant record of the subject, neither anything 
 which could be construed as a mention of it. 
 
 What was the purpose of this visible baptism with fire/ 
 The Scriptures do not say. Neither is there further mention 
 of the subject in the subsequent narrative. We are only left to 
 infer. Yet if we consider the circumstances under which it was 
 given, the purpose would seem to be so plainly and clearly 
 manifest that we can scarcely remain in doubt. It would seem 
 
AND WITH FIRE 139 
 
 to have come simply as the visible sign of the divine presence 
 in that outpouring which was termed "the baptism with the 
 Holy Spirit." 
 
 I find no scriptural authority, neither any just reason for 
 attaching any mystical meaning to the tongues of fire which 
 sat upon the disciples that day. Fire was to the Jews the rec- 
 ognized sign of the diyine presence: hence the appropriateness of 
 it as a symbol of the presence of the invisible spirit in this case. 
 It was the burning lamp, and the fire of the furnace which 
 marked the coming of God to Abraham the night of the cove- 
 nant. It was in the burning bush that God was manifest to 
 Moses at Horeb. It was the pillar of fire by night which told 
 of the divine presence in the tabernacle. It was in fire that 
 Jehovah descended upon Sinai. It was to the fire from heaven 
 that Elijah appealed as the deciding test of the true God: and 
 it is a chariot of fire that comes from God for Elijah by the 
 waters of Jordan. 
 
 The tongues of fire which that day sat upon 
 the disciples were, therefore, a symbol whose significance was 
 recognized by the Jews. It was to their minds the confirma- 
 tion, by a well known sign, of the presence of the Spirit of God 
 with these men. It was to them the visible proof that the 
 divine power of Christ had passed on to his disciples. And this 
 was necessary to the success of their work. They now go out 
 having been divinely accredited by the visible sign of God's 
 presence with them. There is, as has been before said, no 
 reason, or authority, to attach to it any significance beyond this. 
 To attach to it, as is sometimes done, other, and mystical 
 meanings, is without warrant from the Scriptures. 
 
 Matthew III.-ll, 12, and Luke III.-16, 17, might, upon a 
 superficial reading, seem from mere contiguity of statements, to 
 imply some further work of personal spiritual cleansing. The 
 readings, which are essentially the same, are as follows: 
 
 "I indeed baptize you 
 
 with water unto repentance: but he that cometh after me is 
 mightier than I, whose shoes I am not worthy to bear: he 
 shall baptize you with the Holy Ghost and with fire: whose fan 
 is in his band, and he will thoroughly purge his floor, and 
 gather his wheat into the garner: but he will burn up the chaff 
 with unquenchable fire." Matth. III.-ll, 12. 
 
140 THE BAPTISM WITH THE HOLY GHOST 
 
 The objections to the construction that verse 12 refers to 
 any further work of purification in believers would be: 
 
 1 The Scriptures expressly provide for the cleansing from 
 all sin through the sacrificial blood of Christ. I. John 1-7. 
 
 2 The texts themselves clearly refer, not to any spiritual 
 work in Christ's followers but to a separation between them 
 and the wicked. 
 
 3 Unquenchable fire is the well recognized Scriptural desig- 
 nation for the fire of eternal punishment, not of a cleansing fire 
 in believers. See Rev. XIV.-ll., and Mark IX.-43, 48. 
 
 Was this baptism with fire intended for the apostles alone, 
 or is it for all o Christ's followers, in all ages? 
 
 The Scriptures do 
 
 not say. Yet there is no record of its recurrence at any time 
 afterward in the infant church, and it is not probable that so 
 striking a phenomenon would be left without mention had it 
 again occurred. 
 
 The outpouring of the Holy Spirit in a special manner is 
 spoken of several times afterward in the record (see Acts IV.- 
 31; VIII.-17; X-- 44, 47) but not the baptism with fire. 
 
 And with the view that this baptism with fire was simply 
 a token to both disciples and believers of the passing on of a 
 supernatural power from Christ to those whom he left as his 
 representatives, there would seem to be no need of a further 
 manifestation of such kind. 
 
 So far as the Scriptures, then, are 
 
 to be taken as a final authority we must rest in these conclu- 
 sions: 
 
 I That the promise of the baptism with fire was to the first 
 band of apostles alone. 
 
 2 That there is no evidence of its coming to even their 
 immediate successors. 
 
 3 That there is no evidence that it was, received in subse- 
 quent ages. 
 
 4 That there is no evidence of any purpose -beyond the set- 
 ting of a seal upon the authority of the disciples. 
 
 5 That all mystical interpretations and theories as to its 
 coming as an after power of cleansing, or purifying, or of burn- 
 ing out of a residuum of sin in believers, are without warrant 
 from the Scriptuies, and are in direct conflict with the whole 
 
AND WITH FIRE 141 
 
 Scriptural teaching of the adequacy and sufficiency of the cleans- 
 ing power of the sacrificial blood of Christ. Such theories, in 
 their very nature, deny the sufficiency of the atonement by 
 Christ, and repudiate the written -word, which says: 
 
 "The 
 
 blood of Jesus Christ his Son, cleanseth us from all sin." I. 
 John I.-7. 
 
THE ENDUEMENT WITH POWER. 
 
 Christ said to his disciples after his resurrection, and just 
 before his ascension: 
 
 "And behold I send the promise of my 
 
 Father upon you, but tarry ye in the city of Jerusalem until ye 
 be endued with power from on high. 11 Luke XXIV.-49. 
 
 "What is meant by the word power in this text? The Greek 
 word is Swa/xis. In contradistinction to eov<ru& (the power 
 of authority) 8vva/us * s power to do, ability to bring things to 
 pass. 
 
 This passage in Luke, and the passage in Acts I.-8, which 
 is simply a retelling of the same scene, are the only places in 
 the Scriptures in which the enduement with power is specifically 
 mentioned. 
 
 That there must have been some special purpose in this 
 enduement with power, would seem only to be a reasonable 
 supposition, judging from the evidences of definite plan every- 
 where manifest in God's dealings with men, as shown in the 
 Scriptures: neither would a purposeless act seem to be worthy 
 of the divine wisdom, and especially at so important a time as 
 the last interview of Christ with his disciples, when he is about 
 to leave them alone upon earth. 
 
 What, then, was the purpose of this enduement with 
 power? 
 
 The Scriptures do not specifically say. 
 
 Have we, then, any means of judging of the purpose? 
 
 The 
 
 most reasonable plan of seeking an answer is to examine into 
 the circumstances under which the command was given, supple- 
 
THE ENDUEMENT WITH POWER 143 
 
 menting this by the history of the events which follow. 
 
 The account of the giving of the command is found in Luke 
 XXIV.-44 to 49 inclusive. Christ, as has just been said, is 
 about to part from the disciples whom, for three years, he has 
 been teaching and training to go out as his successors and 
 messengers to the world to preach his gospel. In verse 44 he 
 reminds them of the prophecies concerning himself and his work 
 for man. In verse 45 he opens their understanding, that these 
 prophecies as fulfilled in himself may be clear to them. In 46 
 he reminds them that his suffering of death and the subsequent 
 rising from the dead, are a part of the plan. Then in verse 
 47 he shows the purpose of it all "that repentance and remis- 
 sion of sins should be preached in his name (that is as coming 
 through him) among all nations, beginning at Jerusalem. 
 
 And now he says to them (verse 48): 
 
 "And ye are wit- 
 nesses (/jLaprvpes /xapTvpeo), to bear witness, to testify to) of 
 these things." 
 
 The wording of purpose in Acts I.-8, which gives the same 
 scene, is even more explicit as to intent. 
 
 It there says: 
 
 "And ye shall be my witnesses both in 
 
 Jerusalem, and in all Judea, and in Samaria, and unto the 
 uttermost parts of the earth." 
 
 And now he adds, Luke'XXIV.-49: 
 
 "And behold I send 
 
 the promise of my Father upon you (the baptism with the Holy 
 Ghost): but tarry ye in the city of Jerusalem, until ye be 
 endued with power (Svm/uv power to do) from on high." 
 
 From this analysis of the circumstances attending the com- 
 mand the only conclusion which can be drawn is that the 
 power spoken of, and for which they are to wait, is the power 
 which will be needed in order to the accomplishment of the 
 work which lies before them, namely, to spread the gospel of 
 Christ to the world. 
 
 Why should they need this special power? 
 
 A survey, how- 
 ever brief, of the situation quickly shows. The divine commis- 
 sion of Christ, the Master, had been authenticated by well 
 known and widely recognized manifestations of supernatural 
 power. He himself cites these as proof of his divine commission. 
 
144 THE EftDUEMENT WITH POWER 
 
 When the messengers of John come asking, "Art thou he that 
 should come, or do we look for another?" Christ replies: 
 
 "Go 
 
 and show John again those things which ye do hear and seer 
 the blind receive their sight, and the lame walk, the lepers are 
 cleansed, and the deaf hear, the dead are raised up, and the 
 poor have the gospel preached to them." Matth. XI.-4, 5. 
 
 Peter appeals to the same proofs of the divine commission 
 of Christ, when he says upon the day of Pentecost: 
 
 "Ye men 
 
 of Israel, hear these words: Jesus of Nazareth, a man approved 
 (d-TroSeSeiy/AeVov aTroSeiKvvfu to set forth, to attest, to prove 
 to) of God among you by miracles and wonders and signs, which 
 God did by him in the midst of you, as ye yourselves also 
 know." Acts II.-22. 
 
 But now the Master, thus attested to the world by these 
 exhibitions of a supernatural power, is to leave them, and they 
 are to go out as his representatives to continue the work which 
 he has begun. 
 
 But how shall the world be convinced of the genuineness of 
 their commission? It may refuse, probably will refuse, to accept 
 their word without proof. How shall the world know? When 
 a king in those days would accredit a messenger upon a mission 
 of especial importance, he gave to him his signet ring, the ring 
 with which he officially stamped, and thus authenticated, his 
 proclamations. 
 
 What signet ring shall this uncrowned king of man, he who 
 has neither gold nor precious stones, give to his messengers, 
 that they may be accredited of men? 
 
 Christ, the king, gave to them his own signet, that which 
 had been recognized among men as the proof of his own divine 
 commission: 
 
 Ye are to go out as my messengers, "but tarry 
 ye in Jerusalem until ye be endued with power from on high." 
 Luke XXIV.-49. 
 
 Does the history of the events which followed the enduc- 
 ment with power confirm this view of its purpose as an accred- 
 iting credential upon the part of the apostles from Christ to the 
 world? a sign of the passing on to them of the divine commis- 
 sion? 
 
 The Scriptures give the best answer to the question: "And 
 
THE ENDUEMENT WITH POWER 145 
 
 when they had set them in the midst they asked, By what 
 power, or by what name, have ye done this? Then Peter, filled 
 with the Holy Ghost, said unto them, Ye rulers of the people, 
 and elders of Israel, if we this day be examined of the good 
 deed done to this impotent man, by what means he is made 
 whole, be it known unto you all, and to all the people of 
 Israel, that by the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, whom ye 
 crucified, whom God raised from the dead, even by him doth 
 this man stand here before you whole." 
 
 "Neither is there sal- 
 vation in any other, for there is none other name under heaven 
 given among men whereby we must be saved." Acts IY.-7, 10, 
 and 12. 
 
 "And by the hands of the apostles were many signs and 
 wonders wrought among the people." Acts V.-12. 
 
 "Then Philip went down to the city of Samaria, and 
 preached Christ unto them. And the people with one accord 
 gave heed unto those things which Philip spake, hearing and 
 seeing the miracles which he did." Acts VIIL-5, 7. 
 
 \ 
 
 Was the enduement with power intended to continue as a 
 gift in the church through after ages? or was it intended to be 
 limited to those who first went out as Christ's messengers? 
 
 Again the Scriptures do not say. And again we can only 
 judge by the after history of the church. 
 
 And now there comes in as legitimate testimony, not simply 
 the record of the early church as given in Acts, and the allu- 
 sions in the Epistles, but also the record of the church of God 
 as found in contemporaneous history down through the centu- 
 ries. Before pursuing this investigation, however, a more care- 
 ful analysis of the scope of the phrase "enduement with power" 
 should be made. 
 
 Awa/us "power to do." Power to do what? The texts 
 given in the preceding section, and others, of which these are 
 only selections, show that power to work miracles, the power 
 to temporarily suspend or reverse, for a specific end, the normal 
 working of some one of the laws of the natural world, was one 
 of the phases of power intended. 
 
 That this power was made use of frequently during the ear- 
 lier days of the apostolic mission, the record clearly shows. 
 
146 THE ENDUEMENT WITH POWER 
 
 But the record also as clearly shows that even while the years of 
 the apostolic ministry still continued the exercise of this power 
 became less frequent as time passed by, in this respect resemb- 
 ling the latter years of Christ's ministry: for while his 
 earlier years were marked by frequent miracles, these became 
 less frequent in the latter years when his authority came 
 to be more generally recognized. If, as the texts already 
 quoted would indicate, the working of miracles was intended 
 simply as a sign or seal to the disciples and to the world, of 
 the passing on of the divine authority of Christ to his mes- 
 sengers, a credential of the genuineness of their claim to be his 
 spokesmen, it is evident that when once the world had received 
 proper evidence upon this point the necessity for the proof would 
 cease, and the exercise of the power would no longer be called 
 for, neither is it probable that God would continue this grant 
 to men of a power so extraordinary as to, at will, suspend or 
 reverse the normal working of natural laws, when once the 
 special purpose for which the grant had been^made was accom- 
 plished, and the need no longer existed. The rule in the work- 
 ing of the universe is law; the miracle, evidently the exception. 
 
 That this cessation of the exercise of the miracle working 
 power could have been due to any failure of spirituality, or any 
 degeneracy of the early church, is not probable, for the cessa- 
 tion, as shown by the record, began while the first disciples, 
 those who had been specially chosen and trained, and commis- 
 sioned by Christ himself, were yet living, and actively in charge 
 of the work. 
 
 But side by side with the exercise of the power to thus work 
 miracles we find evident and repeated allusions to another 
 power the power to so present the word that hearers shall be 
 convinced, and sinners turned from their ways. Without this 
 power the message would fall dead upon human ears. This 
 power is to be distinguished from the work of the Holy Spirit 
 in convincing the world of sin, and thus preparing the way 
 for the message was to be giyen through human agency. 
 
 And this power, unlike the miracle working power, would, 
 in order to make the word effective, have to be continued so 
 long as the message has to be delivered to a world still in sin: 
 would have to be continued on through the ages. What do 
 the Biblical record, and the after history of God's church, show 
 upon this point? 
 
THE ENDUEMENT WITH POWER 14-7 
 
 Of Christ himself the officers had said: 
 
 "Never man spake like this man." John VII. -46. 
 
 Of the apostles it is said: 
 
 "And with great power (Svra/m) 
 
 gave the apostles witness of the resurrection of the Lord Jesus." 
 Acts IV.-33. 
 
 Paul says of his own message: 
 
 "And my speech and my 
 
 preaching was not with enticing words of man's wisdom, but 
 in demonstration of the Spirit and of power." (<Wa//,etos) 
 I. Corinth. II.-4. 
 
 Again he says: "For our gospel came not unto you in 
 word only: but also in power, (Swa^tet) and in the Holy 
 Ghost." I. Thessalon. I.-5. 
 
 What were the results of this power? 
 
 When Peter preaches 
 
 for the first time after the enduement with power, the .record 
 says of the multitude: 
 
 "Now when they heard this they were 
 
 pricked in their heart, and, and said unto Peter, and to the rest 
 of the the apostles, Men and brethren, What shall we do?" 
 Acts II. 37. 
 
 And the record goes on to say: 
 
 "And the same day there 
 were added unto them about three thousand souls." Acts II .-41. 
 
 It was this enduement with power, power in the spoken word, 
 which gave to the infant church its rapid spread, and sent the 
 apostles out as a flaming fire to the great heathen world about 
 the east shores of the Mediterranean. The after history of the 
 church, while it does not clearly show the exercise of the endue- 
 ment with power to the working of miracles, does show in its 
 early and rapid spread, and in the great reformations and 
 revivals of the 16th and the 18th centuries, and in the power 
 of turning men to God, which has characterized not only the 
 world-famed evangelists, but also the patient, little known 
 workers in all lands, that there is an enduement with power in 
 the spoken word which abides with God's messengers in all 
 lands, and times, and among all peoples. 
 
 But why was the enduement with power conditioned upon 
 
148 THE ENDUEMENT WITH POWER 
 
 the antecedent baptism with the Holy Ghost? 
 
 The words of 
 
 Christ were, "But ye shall receive power after that the Holy 
 Ghost is come upon you: and ye shall be witnesses unto me 
 both in Jerusalem, and in all Judea, and in Samaria, and unto 
 the uttermost part of the earth." Acts I.-8. 
 
 Again the Scrip- 
 tures give no direct explanation. We are left to infer from the 
 context, and from the circumstances of the case. Yet a satis- 
 factory answer to the question is plain. In the closing section 
 of chapter I. of this essay the change which came to the disci- 
 ples through the baptism with the Holy Ghost is shown a 
 change from fear to courage, from despair to hope, from timid- 
 ity to boldness, Without this antecedent gain of courage, of 
 hope, of boldness, of what avail would the gift of power have 
 been? Power without fitness or capacity to use it, would be fruit- 
 less. Hence the antecedent baptism with the Holy Ghost, with 
 all that it implied. Now when power is given, it is not given 
 into the hands of men afraid or unable to make use of it, but 
 to men prepared to go out and wield it for the cause of Christ, 
 the Master. 
 
 Is power given equally to all ? 
 
 Paul answers the question in 
 
 the XII. chapter of I. Corinthians, and again in Ephesians IV. 
 11, when he writes: "And he gave some to be apostles, and 
 some prophets, and some evangelists, and some pastors and 
 teachers." to each according to his capacity and fitness: and 
 to all according to the needs of the work. 
 
 And Lydia of Thyatira, and Eunice, at whose knee the 
 youthful Timothy is reared in the mother's faith, and Dorcas, 
 Dorcas with the gift of seamstress, and her bundle of garments 
 for the poor are not these also "endued with power from on, 
 high" for the work of the Master ? and is not their work also 
 of infinite worth? 
 
 The tears of the widows came up before the throne; and 
 God, the God of the Paul who goes to the executioner's block 
 unrescued, the God of the ages, harkens to the pitiful cry, and 
 turns back the law of death: and the stilled hand of Dorcas 
 feels again the thrill of life, and goes back to its work among 
 the poor. 
 
 Oh, "Like as a father pitieth his children !" 
 
RECAPITULATION 
 
 1 Man not the one central figure of sentient creation ; but 
 only one of the factors in a broader creation which reaches out 
 beyond the bounds of his little world. 
 
 2 God breathed into his nostrils the breath of life and man 
 became a living soul. It was a birth into spiritual life in God 
 the first birth. 
 
 3 Man is created as a child spiritually, in accordance with 
 a general plan of development by the law of growth as a fun- 
 damental law of being. 
 
 4 To the end of this growth, he, in accordance with a gen- 
 eral law, is placed under conditions of testing and struggle, and 
 as an essential condition to a true testing, is created with free- 
 dom of will. This is man's first probation. 
 
 5 In order that he may clearly understand the nature of 
 this testing, a law of spiritual life is laid down to him, and 
 also its converse, the law of spiritual death. 
 
 Life spiritual communion with God: its condition, obedience 
 to his laws. 
 
 Death spiritual alienation from God: its cause, disobedience 
 to his laws. 
 
 Sin the breaking of this law of life. 
 
 The struggle of free will between these two is the essence of 
 the warring between good and evil. 
 
 6 Man makes use of this freedom of will to disobey the law 
 of life in God, endures the penalty, is banished by his own act 
 from spiritual presence with God, and thus dies to God. This is 
 the first death. 
 
150 RECAPITULATION 
 
 7 This testing, and the falling into sin upon the part of 
 man, not an anomaly, not a mischance, not a failure in God's 
 plans, but only a part of the .working out of a broad, far-reach- 
 ing, probably a universal, plan of testing to all sentient crea- 
 tion throughout the universe, and of which we have hintings in 
 the Scripture record, and where-through man assuredly, angels 
 presumably, may have held out to them the possibility of ulti- 
 mately attaining to a plane of spiritual being far in advance of 
 that possible without the testing, and which could only be 
 attained through, and because of, the battling and testing. 
 
 8 God does not abandon the man whom he has created 
 and thus placed under testing, for the possibility of this diso- 
 bedience was necessarily foreseen as within the scope of the 
 plan, and it came while man was as yet practically ignorant of 
 the full consequences of his act, having had no actual experience 
 of what the penalty fully involved. 
 
 9 Man thus spiritually dead to God in transgression, has 
 no power to pardon his own sin, or to again enter^into life in 
 God. 
 
 10 God's plan, however, involves a way for the pardon of 
 man's transgression of the law of spiritual being, and his restor- 
 ation to life in God. Yet this possibility of restoration is still 
 dependent upon man's freedom of will, for man who willed to 
 disobey, may refuse, if he will, to avail himself of the possibili- 
 ties opened up to him by God's plan of restoration, and may 
 elect to remain in his sin, and dead to God. 
 
 But to the end that he may not so elect, God's Spirit, which 
 at the first was breathed into man when he became a living 
 soul, and whi.h now no longer dwells within the man spiritu- 
 ally dead to God, as a life-giving principle, is yet ever about 
 him, striving with him, warning him, pleading with him, and 
 entreating him, now that he has seen the consequences of his 
 disobedience, to turn back from his ways; and to the end that 
 he may have inducement to heed, God holds out to him a prom- 
 ise of pardon and restoration to life. 
 
 11 To the end of pardon Christ dies upon Calvary for 
 man's transgression. In what way God makes this sacrifice a 
 
RECAPITULATION 151 
 
 sufficient and satisfying atonement for man's transgression, the 
 Scriptures do not explain. The fact is stated the explanation 
 of the manner is withheld. This is God's secret. 
 
 12 To the man who by his own will turns in repentance 
 and submission to God, the merit of this sacrifice is applied, 
 and he stands cleared from his transgression before his Maker. 
 
 13 The man, thus cleansed of his sin, is accepted of God, 
 and through a second entering in of the Spirit is "born again" 
 into life in God. 
 
 14 This man, grown wise in sin, is yet a babe in spirit- 
 ual things, this side of his being having remained dwarfed 
 through non-use; and it is as an infant in the knowledge and 
 discernment of spiritual truth that he is born again. 
 
 15 For this spiritual babe in Christ, a teacher and guide 
 is provided, in the person of the "indwelling Spirit," who is to 
 teach him, and guide him into all truth. 
 
 16 The conflict of testing is now again upon this child in 
 spiritual truth, but this time it comes to one who has learned 
 by actual and sore test the power and the penalty of evil. This 
 is man's second probation. 
 
 17 Through this testing, and because of it, the "babe in 
 Christ" is to come "unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the 
 stature of the fulness of Christ," one who will not sin because 
 of his own free and enlightened will he now wills not to sin. 
 He is become "Holy unto the Lord, a sanctified soul." 
 
 Yet man may again, if he will, turn away from God, and 
 again and finally choose evil rather than good, and thus again 
 die to God: but this time it will be with an understanding 
 enlightened by actual personal experience as to the full conse- 
 quences of his act. This is the second spiritual death. It is of 
 this final deliberate free will rejection of God's law of spiritual 
 life that it is said: 
 
 "For it is impossible for those who were 
 once enlightened, and have tasted of the heavenly gift, and were 
 
152 RECAPITULATION 
 
 made partakers of the Holy Ghost, and have tasted the good 
 word of God, and the powers of the world to come: if they 
 shall fall away (Tra/oaTreo-di/Tas-TrapaTrtTTTto to fall away, not 
 simply in the sense of falling, but a falling away, in the sense 
 of abandoning, rejecting) to renew them again unto repentance: 
 seeing they crucify to themselves the Son of God afresh, and 
 put him to an open shame." Hebrews VI.-4, 6. 
 
 18 God equips the reclaimed soul that he may send~it out 
 as a messenger to bear the message of a gospel of salvation 
 from sin and spiritual death to those who are yet dead to God 
 in transgression. To this end he pours out upon him a special 
 baptism of the Holy Spirit, and endues him with power to do 
 in the work which lies before him. 
 
 19 And again it may be said all this is not chance, not 
 an after thought upon God's part to correct a miscarriage in 
 the original scheme of creation, but a thing foreseen, and 
 planned, and provided for in immeasurable love and supreme 
 wisdom before the world was. 
 
 "Domine refugium factus es nobis a generatione in genera- 
 tionem. 
 
 Prinsquam monies fierent, aut formaretur terra, et orbis, a 
 saeculo et usque in saeculum tu es Deus. Ne avertas hominem 
 in humilitatem: et dixisti, Convertimini nlii hominum" Psalm 
 XC.l, 2, 3. 
 
 AMEN. 
 
YB 12896