The first of these chapters (John 3) closed proper Jewish intercourse, showing that they must be born again to enter into the kingdom of God: and so was every one that was born of the Spirit, the cross, or the lifting up of the Son of man, closing all present earthly associations, and introducing heavenly things as yet unknown. In the second (John 4), the Lord, having thereon left Judea, going into Galilee, passes through Samaria, and there, with one of the most worthless of that reprobate race, spews the gift of God, and the consequence of the humiliation of the Son of God—thereon introducing the Father’s name, and spiritual worship by grace. Thus, the gospel dispensation is introduced by it, and its worship, sonship, and joy. In the third (John 7) we find it flowing forth, from filled affections, to the world, the witness, though not the accomplishment, of that day when Jesus shall appear in the glory witnessed of, and it shall be as life from the dead: —and that, indeed, through his then unbelieving brethren here below. The fourth chapter—that is, the second of those alluded to—is more large and general, as the power of all living communion with God, and thus is specially the saint’s place. It identifies itself more especially with the present prayer of the third of Ephesians, founded on the title, “Father of our Lord Jesus Christ,” though that goes further. The seventh chapter—or the third here alluded to—identifies itself more especially with the former part of the prayer of the first of the Ephesians, the portion of the Church also, it is true, but more its hope than its communion, and founded on the title, “God of our Lord Jesus Christ,” looking at the Lord as the head of the body—the first-born among many brethren, the first-born from the dead, the head of the body the Church, as is plainly seen in the testimony of the Apostle which follows—not in the nearness of the divine nature as Son, but in appointed, though righteous, headship as man, the appointed heir of all things: both indeed hanging on his being the Son, but one connected with his nearness to God, even the Father, which is indeed oneness; the other his manifestation in glory, according to divine counsel, when He takes his place with the Church toward the world; though, of course (and necessarily) the Head of it—she the body, the fullness of Him that filleth all in all.
That I may not omit the intervening chapters of John, but that we may see what a summary of divine theology it is, as a testimony to the person of the Lord Jesus in its height above all dispensation, I would here observe, that the 5th contrasts the entire incompetency of any restorative power connected with the law (because it required strength in the patient, which was just what the disease of sin had destroyed, as well as his righteousness which would not have needed it)—in a word, the entire futility of all remedial processes—with the absolute life-giving power of the Son of God in union with the Father; and shows, in addition, on his rejection (the rejection of his word, for so that power wrought), the judicial power put entirely into his hands as Son of man, to execute judgment on all that rejected Him, that all men might honor the Son, even as they honored the Father.
The 6th chapter shows what was proper to Him—his place and that of his disciples—as rejected. First, it showed Him (who fulfilled that word, Psalms 132:13-15,13For the Lord hath chosen Zion; he hath desired it for his habitation. 14This is my rest for ever: here will I dwell; for I have desired it. 15I will abundantly bless her provision: I will satisfy her poor with bread. (Psalm 132:13‑15) “He shall satisfy her poor with bread” —the Jehovah of Israel’s blessing in the latter days, when Zion shall be his “rest forever”) as Prophet, refusing to be king, and thereon going up to exercise his priesthood of intercession apart on high. In the meanwhile, the disciples were toiling alone on the sea, and the wind contrary, aiming but not attaining. Immediately on Jesus (who could all walk on in the difficulties) rejoining them, they were at the land whither they went. This blessed little picture of the order and circumstances of the dispensation having been given, the humiliation of Jesus, as the portion of the Church during his priesthood, is then shown, as affording its food and strength of life. First, his coming down and incarnation—the manna, the true bread that came down from heaven; next, as sacrificed and giving the life He had thus taken as man—believers thereon eating his flesh and drinking his blood, thus living by Him; then closing by the question, “that and if ye shall see the Son of man ascend up where He was before?” This, as we have seen, is followed by the instruction of the 7th chapter, where the time for the manifestation of the Son of man to the world was not yet come, and the gift of the Holy Ghost as the intermediate witness of his glory as Son of man is spoken of. This point has been spoken of in the former part of these remarks; I revert to it now, merely as spewing the beautiful order of the instruction of the Spirit in the Gospel of St. John.
There is another point connected with the operations of the Spirit of our God, which remains to be touched upon—his corporate operations, or his operations as acting in connection with the body of Christ, both as maintaining, and the very center of, its unity; and also as ministering in the diversity of His gifts; and also the distinction between this and His individual presence in the believer.
This last difference will be found to be important, and to flow from, and be connected with, the whole order of the economy of grace, of which the Spirit of God is the great agent in us, and, though not received there, still, in a certain sense in testimony, in the world.
This difference depends on the relative character which Christ stands in: first, with the Father, as Son, and us by adoption made sons with Him: and secondly, with God, as the Head of the body, which is his fullness, the Church. We shall find the scriptures speak definitely of both, and distinctly. In one, the Lord Jesus holds a more properly divine relationship with the Father, and introduces us by adoption into something of the enjoyment of that nearness. In the other, a relationship (though all be divine) yet more connected with his human nature and his offices in that, and therefore God is spoken of as his God. The distinction and reality of these two things is expressed by the blessed Lord Himself going away. Having accomplished the redemption, which enabled Him to present his brethren along with Himself as sons to the Father, in his (the Father’s) house, spotless, and sons by adoption, and to assume his place as the Head of the body, the Church, He did not yet allow Himself to be touched and worshipped as in bodily presence in his earthly kingdom; for He was not yet ascended to his Father, so that He could bring forth the fullness of his glory, and that kingdom should be manifestly of the Father, and have its root and source in that higher glory: but, putting his friends, and that for the first time, into the place of sons and brethren, He says them (thus setting the saints, and Himself for them, in their place), “ Go, tell my brethren, I ascend unto my Father and your Father, to my God and your God;” thus establishing these two relationships, and his disciples along with Himself in them.
Then the Lord ascended up on high for the accomplishment, in power, of what He now spoke of, in the truth and efficacy of the work which He had accomplished, and the value of his presented person before the Father, as well as the blood by which sin was put away.
On this statement in John hangs, in fact, the distinction to which I have alluded, followed up in scripture by many other passages. It is the definite revelation of the characters in which Jesus Christ was going away, and which lie was to sustain in our behalf on high; placing us in fellowship with God and the Father in them. There was another point, however, connected with this, involved, in the position which Christ assumed: He is the, displayer of the divine glory—his Father’s glory— “He that bath seen me hath seen the Father,”—He shall appear in the Father’s glory. He was on earth “God manifest in the flesh,” seen, too, of angels: again, “the brightness of God’s glory, the express image of his person.” His glory too was Sonship, as of the only begotten of the Father, ὡς μονγενοῦς παρὰ πατρὸς: as again, “the only begotten Son who is in the bosom of the Father, He hath declared. Him.” In Him all the fullness was pleased to dwell: and, as afterward stated, in fact, as in good pleasure, “In Him dwelleth all the fullness of the Godhead bodily.” Thus, we see the person of the Lord Jesus, the place in which divine glory is in every sense manifested. But He is now hid in God: that is the position which He has now taken; and thereon the Holy Ghost is sent down into the—world, to maintain the witness and manifestation of his glory (not brought out yet visibly on earth, but personally accomplished on high, “crowned with glory and honor”), and to be the earnest and testimony of his title to the earth. The Church on earth is the place and depository of this: “He shall take of mine and shall show it unto you. All things that the Father bath are mine, therefore said I, that He shall take of mine, and shall show it unto you.”
Now the Holy Ghost, as thus sent down from heaven, is the witness of what Christ is there for us towards the Father; and what his title is as of God towards the world; and specially therein, what the power of the hope of the calling and inheritance of God in the saints is. The enjoyment and testimony of these things may be much blended in the operations of the present Spirit; but they are distinct. As for example—the display of my portion in Christ as the Son before the Father, may fill my heart and make me a witness and a testimony of it, to the blessing and comfort of the Church, if the Lord accompany it with the suitable gift of communication; and the power of it in my soul in joy is intimately blended with the thing to be expressed; because so the Holy Ghost acts in this work. It is therefore said, “Out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water.” Still they are quite distinct: for a man may have these things shown to his soul, and enjoy them, and yet not have the gift to communicate them to others; though they be the deep (possibly, I suppose, the deeper) joy of his own: so that, though connected when both are there, they are distinct things. I suppose that those who have gift of testimony, have often found as much (or more) joy in hearing the blessed things of Christ, as in uttering them; though the sense and joy of the blessed things may have ministered to their capacity of utterance. I would speak then distinctively of these two points, though their blending, if the Lord will, may be noticed.
In the earlier passages in John, and the remarks which were made upon them, the Holy Ghost, who is sent, was spoken of as the power of life; the power of communion; the power of communication. In the latter part of John and other places, the sending of the Spirit is specially spoken of, because the absence and going away of Christ was brought before their minds as a present fact; and hence the Spirit is shown as the sustainer of the relationships induced by the mystery of Christ being thus hid in God, and another Comforter sent. Life-communion with God the Father and the Son, communications concerning the glory of the Son of man, were all distinct and blessed things; but they were not the revelation of the dispensation in which they were ordered, nor the display of the relationships which those dispensations brought to light, though to the instructed soul they might imply them. This is taken up first in the close of John’s gospel. We shall also find it brought out on other ground later in the close of Luke.
It is introduced in John by the statement made to his disciples, “As I said unto the Jews, so now I say unto you, Whither I go, ye cannot come.” In the earlier part of the subsequent chapter, the Lord introduces their comfort: that He was to be the object of faith as God was; that He was not going to be alone in blessedness, and leave them here to themselves in misery, but going to prepare a place for them; and that He would come again and receive them to Himself; that where He was they might be—a far better thing than his being with them in the condition they were in. But meanwhile they knew where He was going, and the way. This resulted, as He explained to them, from their knowing the Father (to whom He was going), in knowing Him; for He was in the Father and the Father in Him. Thus, the great scene into which they were brought, in the knowledge of the person of the Lord Jesus, and his oneness with the Father—He in the Father and the Father in him was introduced: the scene of associated blessedness, into which the disciples were brought by the living knowledge which they had of Jesus, was declared: but the power in which it was known and enjoyed was not yet. But the knowledge of the Father, through the Son, as the object of faith, was now declared, and the subsequent display of his glory in the world, by reason of the exaltation of the Lord Jesus, spoken of. The Lord, then, urging obedience to Him as the way of receiving blessing, takes the place of Mediator to obtain the Comforter for then, —another Comforter, who should not leave them as He was doing, but was to abide with them forever. This it was that was the power of their association with that of which they had heard before—the fellowship of the Father and the Son: first, of the Father with the Son, and the Son with the Father, and then of them with both, in that it was by the Holy Ghost dwelling in them—the Comforter now sent. Thus, though they could not come there, they saw Jesus, and He came to them, and with the Father made his mansion with them, till He came and took them into the mansions of his Father’s house.
This 14th chapter, then, gives us the blessedness—the knowledge of the Father and the Son, by the Son; the order of it, obedience to the Son; the power of it, the presence of the Comforter obtained through the mediation of Christ: but thereon (consequent on this presence) their knowledge that He was in the Father, they in Him and He in them—a blessing far beyond mere mediation, but consequent on the presence of the Spirit obtained, by mediation. This also is added as a consequence that the Father and the Son would come and make their abode with them. Still, in this chapter, whatever the effect of the mediation in their knowledge was, Christ does not go beyond the place of Mediator here, and therefore He tells them that the Father will send the Spirit in His name, and He (the Spirit) would recall all the Lord’s words and instruction to them.
This chapter settles the ground of our present blessing on its basis, as to the place of the great objects of it—Father, Son, and Holy Ghost.
It is quite distinct front the subsequent chapters. The person of the Lord as the object of faith, and his mediation, are spoken of in it. In the 15th chapter we see that, even here below, Israel was not the true vine, but Christ. Of his life below, they were to be the personal witnesses, for they had seen it: of his exaltation as Head on high, the Holy Ghost, sent down, thereon, by Him.
Hence, in this passage, it is not the Father who is spoken of as sending the Holy Ghost in the Mediator’s name, but the Lord Jesus who sends the Comforter from the Father, in connection with his glory, to testify of his glory, proceeding from the Father. It is to be remarked here, that, while much of this latter part connects itself very closely in detail with the operations of the Holy Ghost, given in connection with the Lord Jesus, as calling God his God as well as ours; as the man who, through grace, places Himself in association with us in need as in glory, yet He never, in this part of Scripture, puts Himself out of the place of Son paramount to all dispensation. Though He may take the lowest place in service and obedience, still, it is on a principle paramount to all dispensation; or, though the acts alluded to may have their place in connection with dispensed power (as the testimony of the Spirit will be found to have), yet still, Christ holds the place here, in which He sends Him for that purpose, as paramount to the associations revealed by the Spirit, so sent, in those acts. He testifies that all that the Father has are his, as Son (though the acts by which He may do it may be the witness and consequence of a union with Christ), putting, by grace, ourselves and Him, not merely as SONS’ before THE FATHER individually, but as a body with its head before GOD.
This distinction will be found to be important; because the exercise of the dispensed power may depend on the condition of the body through which it is dispensed—the testimony of the sent Spirit to the glory of the Head, who sent it, never can.
And this is what is peculiar in the state of the Church. Its standing in Christ is above all dispensation; it is as sons along with Him with the Father. Its manifestation in time may be by dispensed service; and here it partakes of all the responsibility of a dispensation on earth, as of deeds done in the body. Thus, this gospel begins anterior to Genesis, which recounts the creation of the scene on which dispensations have been displayed: there, “In the beginning God created;” here, “In the beginning was the Word,” by whom all things were created. And the Church derives its existence and heavenly fullness from this sovereign source: the purpose of it being effectuated consequent on the rejection of the Son of man, who would have been the righteous crown of all natural dispensation; but who, as risen, associates the redeemed Church with Himself, in a position paramount to it all—even his own association of Sonship with the Father, in the privilege of the same love: and the Holy Ghost is here sent down of Him, the witness and power of this, and therefore in his own action paramount to all dispensation, but this only in the fact of his testimony to Him as so exalted; and this is the point John here takes up. Now the manifestation of his (Christ’s) corporate Headship to the Church, in which He says, in our behalf, “My God,” as He had said so in blessed title of righteousness when the Pattern of our place below, depends (and hence the present manifestation of the Church’s glory as united to Him) on the obedience of the Church, and its suitableness to be made an instrument of display here; quite a distinct thing from the certainty of its union to and the known and infallible glory of its Head on high. This is a permanent revelation; not a responsible manifestation Which partakes of the nature of a dispensation on earth, though the glory testified to in it may be above all mere dispensation, for its head and for itself. The joy, moreover, and sense of glory, may also depend on obedience and consistency, not the permanent fact that the Spirit testifies of his glory, in the Church. Thus, in John 15 it is written, “If ye keep my commandments, ye shall abide in my love, as I have kept my Father’s commandments and abide in his love.” There could clearly be no doubt of the Son’s continuing in the Father’s love, but the dispensation of this on earth hung on the obedience on earth, in Him infallibly perfect, and therefore so its consequences; in us continual failure and its consequences also.
We have seen that the testimony of the Spirit is to the glory of Jesus Christ. Sent by the Father in the Son’s name, He is the power of union and communion with both; associating the disciples in the fullness of blessing with both, and the presence of both manifested thereby to the believer. Sent by the Son—the exalted man—from the Father, He is the witness of his glory, and that all that the Father has, is that Holy, but rejected, One’s also.
From the remarks I have already made, it will be seen that in the 16th chapter of John, the Spirit and his testimony, as there presented to us, are the indefeasible portion of the saints, the necessary testimony of the glory of Christ. It forms and sustains the Church, instead of depending on the Church’s obedience, although the extent of the Church’s enjoyment of the blessing may hang upon that obedience. He is the witness of the acceptance by the Father of the obedience of Christ, the perfect Son of God, and of the glory of his person: thus, establishing our present standing with God, and our Father, and the place of the Church, owning this by his operation through grace, in contrast with the world, who rejected Jesus as the Son of God.
Hence, although the obedient disciples of the Lord Jesus were the instruments of the testimony, yet these are dropped as regards the testimony in the first instance; and the subject spoken of is, the Comforter’s testimony in a conviction of the world. He is present as the witness of the glory of Christ; that is, as the abiding power of the dispensation, the necessary character of the testimony of his very presence in the world was this—that He was come in condemnation of the whole world before God; for it had rejected the Son whom the Father had sent in love to it. He had said, “I have yet one Son,” and they had cast Him out—not merely Jews were in question, the world had done it—man had done it: “He was despised and rejected of men.” Every grace of God, every righteousness of man, had been shown in the Son of God; they had seen no beauty in Him that they should desire Him. Nay more, as the Lord had distinctly shown of the world, they had both seen and hated both Him and the Father—hated Him, blessed and perfect in his ways, without a cause!
It is on this solemn ground the Lord appeals to his Father, in the 17th chapter. For the children, He had called for the Holy Father’s care. As to the world, He appeals to his righteous Father’s judgment.
He and the world now were entirely contrary the one to the other: “O righteous Father, the world hath not known thee: but I have known thee, and these have known that thou hast sent me.” The presence of the Holy Ghost, sent down on the departure of the blessed Son of God, proved the world to be in irreparable sin in not having believed on Him. Nothing else was seen in the world. It lay in wickedness. Righteousness there was none. The only righteous One had been rejected, and cast out and slain. God had not interfered to prevent it, nor Jesus resisted it; for deeper purposes were in accomplishment. But the evidence of sin was complete, irrefutable, and in itself in the world irreparable, in the accomplishment of its highest act—an act showing hatred to the gracious presence of the Lord, as well as contradictory of the righteousness of man before Him. Righteousness thereon was not looked for on earth in man; for sin had been proved. It was found only in the reception of the righteous man—the Son of God, on the throne of God on high, and the condemnation of the world in seeing Him no more as so come. This also was testified by the presence of the Holy Ghost, sent down as a consequence of Jesus being there. The judgment (not now executed) was proved as against the world; because he who, in leading them against Christ, had been now demonstrated by the world to be its prince, was judged: the rest would follow in its day. Thus, the presence of the Holy Ghost, convicting the world in these things, formed the testimony to Christ’s glory there his witness against the rejecting world.
To the disciples He was in blessing: in leading them into all truth, truth which they were unable to bear till He came, truth connected with Christ’s glory, and the consequent breaking down of all they then knew and clung to; and not only leading Ahem into all actual truth, but showing them things to come; the portion of the Church—their portion and God’s future dealings with the world too. In this He would glorify Christ, taking of his and spewing it to them; and all that the Father had was his. This then the Holy Ghost did, as against the world and with the disciples, in the testimony of Christ’s glory. If by grace a man received the testimony as against the world, and was subdued by it, and gave up the world and followed Christ with his disciples, he became the happy subject of that further service of the Holy Ghost; guiding, showing, glorifying Christ as the possessor of all the Father’s. This is the office and service of the ever-abiding Comforter (in whatever degree enjoyed), for the need of Christ’s glory, till the Church be caught up to enjoy it there, and the world be actually judged; so that there shall be no need of testimony to either on these points, though the Holy Ghost may be to the Church the perpetual power of enjoyment in them, and God’s glory by them.
The presence of the Holy Ghost implies and involves this—the need, before God, of Christ’s glory. In this He acts as a Servant, as it were, not speaking of Himself, but what He hears, that speaking. Whatever the means instrumentally used, this is the subject and the power. The Holy Ghost is faithful in this service. He must be so; for Christ is to be glorified. And this secures the witness of Christ’s glory, in whatever measure, according to its faithfulness; this is the Church’s delight.
In all this, the Holy Ghost is spoken of as being on earth, and being sent in lieu of Christ, who is gone on high, in distinctness of person: and the glory of the person of Christ, the great subject of the gospel, is still treated of in its aspect to the world who rejected Him, and the disciples who by grace received Him.
It appears to me, that the communication of the Holy Ghost, as noticed in the 20th chapter of this gospel, is as to the place it holds there of the character already spoken of. The whole of that chapter is a sort of picture of the dispensation in brief. It is not the Head and the body, but Christ in his personal title to send, as the Father sent Him; and giving them, in His risen power, capacity to execute the mission, the abiding essential service of those now called to it, whatever measure of power it might be executed in. But Christ has not only gone to the Father, and been seated in the glory which he had with him before the world was, and sent the Comforter, the witness of that glory, and the assurance to the saints of their sonship and fellowship with him in it—his Father and their Father—but lie takes a Place as head of the body (is its Lord indeed and source of supply, but also its head), and to receive for it that which he sends forth and ministers to it. Christ has a double character in this—Lord, and head of his body united to himself: But the Holy Ghost—is, in all operations, from creation downwards, the proper and immediate agent.
As head of the body, the Lord Jesus displays the Church with himself in a common glory; but in all this he is spoken of as the subject of God’s power. (See Ephesians 1:19-2319And what is the exceeding greatness of his power to us-ward who believe, according to the working of his mighty power, 20Which he wrought in Christ, when he raised him from the dead, and set him at his own right hand in the heavenly places, 21Far above all principality, and power, and might, and dominion, and every name that is named, not only in this world, but also in that which is to come: 22And hath put all things under his feet, and gave him to be the head over all things to the church, 23Which is his body, the fulness of him that filleth all in all. (Ephesians 1:19‑23).) And even where spoken of as Lord, still as a recipient and as made so: though while this is true, because he humbled himself and became a man, so that God also bath highly exalted him, that he should have a name which is above every name, every believer finds the very basis of his faith in that he is the true God and eternal life.
The 2nd chapter of Philippians is the full statement of this great truth—this blessed truth (having all its value from his being truly and essentially God), that he humbled himself, that, as a man for our sakes, and as obedient to death, he might, as man, be exalted to the place of Lord, due to him in glory. As my subject is the presence of the Holy Ghost, I do not remark further on this passage, than that it seems to me a special contrast with the first Adam, who, being man, sought to exalt himself, and became disobedient unto death, or under death by disobedience; whereas the history of the second Adam is, that he made himself of no reputation in becoming a man, and death to him was the highest, fullest act of obedience and confidence, then, as man, in his Father: and therefore God highly exalted him such as sinful man was by his disobedience cast down, who sought to exalt himself and to be as Elohim. In this, then, we have the great doctrine of the exaltation of Jesus as the new man, the second Adam, the head of a new race—the depositary of power; in whom man was, according to the 8th Psalm, “set over all things.”
The divine power in which he could sustain it, and the title of Sonship in which he held it—for, indeed, he was the Creator—is not now my immediate subject. This point may be seen in Colossians 1, and the double headship, resting on it, of creation and of the Church. At present, it is the connection of this with the gift of the Holy Ghost that we have to speak of. It is not, perhaps I need hardly say, as if there were two Holy Ghosts, or the Holy Ghost given were not so given at once, whatever the results: but that the place and power of the Spirit, so given, are distinct. In the one, he is the pledge and power of Sonship with the Father: in the other, the effectuator of the Lordship of Christ, and the animating energy of every member according to the measure of the gift of Christ, and the power of unity to the whole body. We do, however, see that Christ risen, but not yet glorified, could communicate the Holy Spirit to them; though, till glorified, he could not send it down as witness of his Lordship. We have seen, that while (as individually blessing us) he fits the soul for the exercise of whatever gift is bestowed, he may bless in fullness of communion when no gift is in exercise—so that they are distinct; the former point, its connection with the apprehensions and enjoyment of the soul, being the difference of habitual Christian gift from the previous workings of the Holy Ghost: that, before it was put: “ thus saith the Lord,” and individually the prophet might find he ministered to another. In the exercise of it by a real Christian, though he might minister it without actually realizing it in communion at the moment—he ministers the things which were his own, and known as such through the earnest of the Holy Ghost sent down from heaven.
I would now trace some of the scriptures connected with this point. In this the Holy Ghost is a Spirit of power, not a Spirit of Sonship; though, it may be, the sons, having the Holy Ghost, have the power, according to his will, by his presence working in them. This presence of the Holy Ghost is withal corporate presence, that is, his operation, though, as the body, it works by individuals, of course, but by them properly as members of the body, working in power, not in communion. Consequently we see, if the gift was not available for the body (where the edification of the body was the intent of the gift), it was to be suppressed in its exercise, even though confessedly the gift of the Holy Ghost: for the particular gift of the Spirit was to be subjected to the title and rule of the Holy Ghost in the whole, as the member to the mind of the whole body, for the glory of Christ (though power was entrusted to the individual for that use of the whole body, for that glory), and the glory of the body with him; for no power was rightly used out of the objects of the grace that gave it.
This train I have been led into by the first scripture I would refer to, Luke 24 There Christ is looked at as exalted in glory, and the world and all flesh alike here below. It is not there, “Go, disciple the Gentiles,” as in Matthew; but repentance and remission of sins to all nations, beginning at Jerusalem, merely the first place here below amongst them. This commission Peter was accomplishing in his early sermons in Acts, though Paul carried out farther, as regards the Gentiles, not beginning, however, at Jerusalem. The word of the Lord in Luke was first, “Ye are witnesses of these things;” then, “And, behold, I send the promise of my Father upon you; but tarry ye in Jerusalem, till ye be endued with power from on high;” and afterward he was parted from them and carried up into heaven.
In the first sermon of Peter, we have precisely this “This Jesus hath God raised up, whereof we all are witnesses. 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.” He then quotes the testimony of the 110th Psalm, and says, “Therefore, let all the house of Israel know assuredly that God hath made that same Jesus, whom ye have crucified, both Lord and Christ.” The rejection of this testimony set aside the form of the commission in Matthew, in which Jerusalem was made the formal center of organized evangelization, according to her ancient standing, the Gentiles being treated as Gentiles.
But the Character in which the gift of the Spirit is here presented, as given to believers and forming the Church, is very distinct. Jesus sends the promise of the Father. It is the same great common truth. But in what character is it sent? It is to endue with power from on high. It displays itself in exhibition in the first instance—to the world, not in communion of sons with the Father—though, of course, the very same and only Holy Ghost which was the power of this. Its primary testimony is to the Lordship of Christ.
We have seen the identity of the expressions in Luke 24 and Acts 2, let us observe the terms in which the Spirit, by the apostle, bears witness to Jesus.
“Jesus of Nazareth, a man approved of God among you by miracles, and wonders, and signs, which God did by him. This Jesus bath God raised up, whereof we all are witnesses. 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.... Therefore, let all the house of Israel know assuredly, that God hath made this same Jesus, whom ye have crucified, both Lord and Christ.”
Now, in the whole of this passage, it is clear that our blessed and adorable Lord, who had humbled himself to become so, as we have seen from Philippians, is spoken of as man: As man he is made Lord and Christ. This we shall see to be directly connected with consequent operation and power of the Spirit, but yet not the whole of the principles connected with it. The corporate character of the scene of its operations was not yet developed. We have already, then, this first point distinctly brought out the testimony, through the medium of the disciples, as the Spirit gave them utterance, to the Lordship of Christ as man, before the world. But whatever the rumor occasioned by the facts, the word of preaching to the Jews is all of which the effect is related. They were to be baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus for the remission of sins, and they would receive the gift of the Holy Ghost; for the promise was to them and their children, and to all afar off, even as many as the Lord their God should call. Whoever, then, received the word gladly, was baptized, and there were added about three thousand souls.
The assembly of God was now formed, and the Lord added to it daily such as should be saved.
The testimony had been given to the world—beginning at Jerusalem, by these witnesses, chosen of God, to the Lordship of the man Christ Jesus. The Church had been formed by it, and then the Lord added to the Church such as should be saved—the remnant of Israel.
In this we see the operation of the Spirit, founded on the exaltation and Lordship of Christ, by chosen witnesses; but antecedent to the Church, and forming it. Of this character is all preaching.
When the assembly is gathered, then the Lord adds to it daily such as should be saved. The highest privileges of the believer are then known, in the revealed portion of the believer brought home to his new man, by the Spirit of adoption—the Holy Ghost given to him, the seal of the faith wrought in his heart by God.
The work of the Holy Ghost is then pursued in abundant testimony of Christ’s power, proposing (Acts 3) the return of Jesus, and the times of refreshing on the repentance of Israel, the opposition and rejection of the testimony by the rulers, the disciples confidence—his power, and blessing, and judgment within the Church—the determined opposition and rejection of the resurrection and exaltation of Jesus, and constant testimony thereto of the apostles as his witnesses: as is also, say they, the Holy Ghost which is given to them that obey him. We have, then, (Acts 6) the exhibition of the energy of the Holy Ghost providing for the circumstances even of partial failure in the Church. Then, on the renewed testimony, in his own prerogative power in Stephen, “full of the Holy Ghost,” the judgment of, the Jews’ rejection, nationally, of the Spirit is pronounced, and the Jewish history closed with that which introduced the Church, as so witnessing, into heaven, on its rejection, as full of the Spirit, in Jerusalem the center of God’s earthly system; and actually the spirit of the saint in the intermediate state there. “They stoned Stephen, calling upon. God, and saying, Lord Jesus, receive my spirit;” and with intercession for the unhappy people, as Jesus on his rejection, “Lord, lay not this sin to their charge.” Thus the Spirit, so acting, recognized the Lord Jesus; as Jesus, as the Son had commended himself—his Spirit—on his rejection, to the Father.
This broke up, as has been frequently observed by those familiar with these truths, the earthly scheme and center of the Church. Matthew’s commission, as has been remarked, in its original form dropped; for the Jewish people, by their rulers, having nationally rejected the testimony by the Spirit to the exaltation of Christ, as they had rejected the Son of God in his humiliation come amongst them as Messiah, Jerusalem ceased to be the center from which the gathering power thereto was to flow.
Thereupon accordingly, the Church was scattered, except the Apostles. I would remark, in passing, on the very distinct manner in which the personal presence of the Holy Ghost is presented to it in all this history. Ananias lies to the Holy Ghost—tempts the Spirit. The Apostles were witnesses of the resurrection and exaltation of Christ, and so also was the Holy Ghost which was given to them that obey him. “Filled with the Holy Ghost,” as the Lord had promised, was the power and source of their speech, as we see on every occasion. Thus, the Holy Ghost as that other Comforter, present with them personally, was clearly before their minds. As the Son had been with them once, so, according to promise, the Holy Ghost was with them now. The Son had brought the love of the Father (now indeed yet more clearly apprehended by the holy Ghost as the Spirit of adoption), and the Spirit now fully revealed to them the Lordship of the man, Jesus; who had been slain land rejected by the world.
But another great frame-work and form of the dispensation was now to be introduced.
Saul, through the instrumentality of a simple disciple, Ananias, receives the Holy Ghost on his conversion, and begins to testify of Christ in Damascus.
The Gentiles then receive the Holy Ghost, and are admitted through the instrumentality of Peter. The reading of the 11Th, 12Th, and 13th chapters of Acts will distinctly spew what prominence this presence and power of the Holy Ghost held. There is, in addition, the service of angels, in the Apostle of the circumcision; but the gift of the Holy Ghost is just the sign of acceptance.
But in the calling and conversion of Saul a new and blessed principle was presented, as identified with that, to his mind: “Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou me?” In a word, the unity and identity of the Church with Christ, of which the apostle thus called—irregularly called, as one born out of due time—became the eminent witness and teacher. Indeed, though there may be kindred truths in the other epistolary writings, we never definitively read of “his body, the Church,” save in those of Paul. He seems specially to call it his gospel. In this (the power, in whatever form, of the glory of Christ, the knowledge of or unity with him) the Holy Ghost is found to operate and unfold itself. Not, clearly, quitting the ground of the Lordship of Christ, but withal working as the power of unity in the whole body and diversity of operation in the particular members. In each, at the same time (for this highest and most blessed character of it, I need hardly say, was not lost), “ the Spirit of adoption crying, Abba, Father;” but this was a distinct individual operation, though of the same Spirit; a joy true to the individual saint, were there but one, though enhanced doubtless by communion, and which contemplated our joy with the Father, as sons along with the blessed Son of God, Jesus the first-born among many brethren.
The corporate witness of his Lordship and glory, and of the union of the Church with him as Head over all things, is a distinct subject. The ground of this, in union, as well as the Church’s blessing and portion by virtue of that union, is specially found in the Ephesians, and is there therefore looked at as regards the blessing and profit of the Church. Its administration, and, therefore, the general order of it in its principles and exhibition before the world, is found in Corinthians, the epistle which affords the apostolic directions for the management of the Church in its internal economy here below.
But before I enter on the formal economy of the Spirit, as presented in these chapters, I would turn to the doctrine of the word relating to it, as the ordinary portion of the Church in general, as there are one or two passages of Scripture which speak definitely of it in this light. The resurrection had marked out Jesus to be the Son of God, according to the Spirit of holiness. He might be of the seed of David according to the flesh, but he was the Son of ‘God according to entirely another life, spirit, and energy. Of this his resurrection was at once the proof and the glorious character; for it was triumph over death, of which, according to that life and holiness which was in him, it was not possible (though he might imputatively take sin) that he could be holden. In this resurrection and power of accomplished and triumphant liberty—liberty of perfectness and sanctification of man to God in a new state of life, in which man had never been he became the Head of a new family, the first-born from the dead, the Head of the body, the Church, having in all things the preeminence, and the Son, taking his place now, as such, in resurrection, Thus our justification became, in fact, identified with our position as sons, and as risen (i.e., with holiness, according to its character in resurrection) before God as children. Therefore it was that, if the apostle had known Christ Jesus after the flesh, henceforth he knew him no more; for he now knew him in this character in resurrection, the Head of the new creation—the new family of God—the Second Adam, and so to us the quickening Spirit, when our living souls had spiritually died in the first Adam in sin—the head of a new family of men, with whom, in the close, the tabernacle of God should be.
The justification of the Church having been first reasoned out by the Spirit, the apostle turns to this; first as regards death and resurrection, in the 6th of Romans; then, as regards the law, in the 7th; i.e., first, “ nature” or “ the flesh,” in se: then the operation of the law on the question into which spiritual understanding and a new will brought the conscience:—and in the 8th he takes up the presence of the Spirit in moral operation and witness. Having stated the source of this mighty change and holy liberty, in “ the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus” (the breath of life to our souls being the very same power in which Christ was raised from the dead, and our partaking in all the consequences of that resurrection; God having done what the law could not do, i.e., condemned sin in the flesh, and that in atonement, in grace to us), the apostle proceeds to instruct us what the power and the character of the Spirit in this new nature is.
It is the Spirit of God, as contrasted with man in the flesh. It is the Spirit of Christ, in respect of the form and character of this new man. It is the Spirit of Him that raised up Christ from the dead, according to the power and energy in which it works full deliveran6e in result. Thus, its moral character and operation were unfolded, as a Spirit of power, and deliverance, and character IN us; in answer to the question, who shall deliver us from the body of this death?
(Continued from p. 178.)
(To be continued.)