In the power of the spirit

Front matter

In the Ito'

f&f mm

PIRIT.

Contents

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PAGE.

A Prefatory Question, ix

I. The Question Of Fact

S^jjntoROM age to age the Lord has raised up ^fll R men of mark for their spiritual power, by a/c^fUs whom He has glorified Himself. However much these men have differed one from another in native endowment and human culture, in two things they have all been alike — they have been great in faith and full of the Holy Ghost. The wealth of their success has been according to the strength of their faith, and the efficiency of their faith has all been due to the fullness of the power of the Spirit upon them.

THE APOSTOLIC PERIOD

opened with the pentecostal gift of the Spirit received by the hundred and twenty assembled in the upper chamber in Jerusalem, and that instantaneous experience was the beginning of the wonderful power of the Apostles and Evangelists. From that moment commenced the spread of that experience amongst those who had before, like the Apostles themselves, been converted under the preaching of John the Baptist and of Jesus, and those who were subsequently brought into repentance and remission of sins by the ministry of the Apostles, Evangelists, and their fellow disciples. This resulted in an age surpassing by far all ages before or since, for the wonders of God's power wrought amongst men by the hands of His servants in saving the lost.

Along the line of

THE MIDDLE AGES

in the annals of the church there are here and there to be seen lights of magnitude shining out upon the surrounding night. Yet they are few in comparison, and in the testimony of those few it might be impossible to trace the beginning of their superior power to any moment when they came into the power of the Spirit. In truth, the knowledge of the gift of the Spirit as a personal endowment for individual Christians, had been lost. The wily adversary had perverted the doctrine of the Spirit to his own purposes by inducing the church to accept it as the doctrine of a sacerdotal instead of an experimental endowment ; as pertaining to priestly authority and not to individual spiritual efficiency. Yet it is entirely legitimate to conclude that all of every age who have shown by their fruits that they had the Apostolic endowment of spiritual power, came into it by an experimental reception of the Spirit not essentially different from that of the Apostles and Evangelists.

They, in fact, stood upon the same ground with all in every age who, without understanding beforehand that there was for them such an experience, or seeing clearly afterwards that it is the privilege of all true Christians, have been led into it by ways they knew not, and have found it a wealth of power and blessing of which they had never dreamed. To this class belong the great lights of the pre-Christian ages, of whom more anon.

Passing along down through

THE LATER CENTURIES,

the case changes materially. Lights of greater magnitude and clearer ray are seen in increasing numbers. Searching the records for their testimony, we find it in many instances very conclusive, and in some very direct, to the point of an instantaneous experience after their conversion, 2 from which dates the beginning of their lives in the power of the Spirit.

Among these may be named people of different lands and various communions, such as Fenelon and Madame Guyon, French Catholics ; George Fox, founder of the Society of Friends in England ; the Wesley s, founders of Methodism, and their followers Fletcher, Hester Ann Rogers, Mrs. Fletcher, Carvosso and Bramwell, also of England ; Malan and D'Aubigne, Swiss Calvinists ; and James Brainerd Taylor, an American Presbyterian, all of whom together comprise only a few of the brighter stars in - whole galaxy of shining witnesses. These all testify of themselves that at a certain moment during their Christian course they were suddenly lifted up into Christ and filled with the Spirit in an experience which stood at the beginning of a higher plane of Christian life and power.

IN THE PRESENT PERIOD

we are entering upon a course still in advance of the latest past. Never before has the experience been so distinctly taught, and by so many, as the privilege of all, — never since the primitive days of the Christian church. Never has it been sought by such multitudes ; nor ever has there been a time since that day when so many were pressing into it. National camp-meetings expressly for this object ;

union conventions, and a multitude of weekly prayer-meetings for this purpose exclusively ; and a continually increasing number of monthly periodicals and weekly journals, in which it is advocated, show a state of things hitherto unknown. In the emphasis laid upon this matter, and in the distinctness with which the experience is urged as the privilege of all Christians, we are approaching the example of Christ and His Apostles. In clearness, simplicity and comprehensiveness, however, we are far behind the first teachers and exemplars of this Christian endowment, and we have a great deal yet to learn from them. . *>

Perhaps in no other one thing is this shown more than in the difference of names given to the experience. Christ and His Apostles gave it one name only ; we call it by many different names. The name they gave it was all-comprehensive. The names we use are all partial and fragmentary in their significance. They expressed the very thing itself radically, in the name used by them. We express one or other of its branches or fruits only by each of the names we use. The name given it in the New Testament is : " The Baptism of the Holy Ghost." The names by which it is now called in various circles are such as these : " Sanctification," "Holiness," "Perfect Love," "The Rest of Faith," and " The Higher Christian Life."

Unquestionably each one of these names expresses some one phase of the blessed experience into which the Christian comes by receiving the Baptism of the Holy Ghost, and therefore each name has peculiar expressiveness, yet no one of them is all-inclusive. In the experience the Christian comes to apprehend God's method of sanctification as by faith and not of works, nor of mingled works and faith. By faith, because it is purely the work of the Spirit, and the Spirit is purely the gift of God, and faith is the Christian's hand which takes the gift from God. Therefore there is beauty as well as truth in the saying that the great work now rising into prominence is the grand " second step in the Protestant Reformation," because, as the first step was marked by the development of justification by faith, so is this to be by the unfolding of sanctification by faith. " Holiness," by which is meant holiness to the Lord continuously in heart and life, expresses sanctification in perpetuity. tl Sanctification," as used in the Bible, expresses the act of setting one's self apart to the Lord, or the condition of being set apart to the Lord, (comprehensively, separation to the Lord,) as Holiness does the active, endless living in devotion to the Lord.

But these are only parts of the one great whole enjoyed by the Christian who has really accepted the Gift of the Holy Spirit, and has Him ever more abiding in him. "Perfect Love," using the term in the same sense as that in which the beloved, loving, lovely Apostle John used it, expresses another and most glorious reality enjoyed by all who receive the Spirit and have Him in His power abiding in them.

u The Rest of Faith " expresses another of these great and sweet realities.

"The Higher Christian Life," as expressive of the Christ-life — Christ in us our life ; the life more abundant, as Christ Himself puts it in His sayings : " I am the Life, 5 ' and " I am come that they might have life, and have it more abundantly ," indicate another wonderful and precious reality of this experience.

Yet taken all together they do not express the whole. "Power" would be as appropriate as any of the names in use, and as Scriptural, too. " Ye shall receive power when the Holy Ghost is come upon you," said our blessed Saviour to His disciples as He was about to leave them and make w r ay for His spiritual presence by His bodily absence. And power is one of the grand characteristics of this wonderful endowment, not expressed in any of the names now in use for its designation.

Abiding union w 7 ith Christ, is another grand reality not conveyed in any of them.

Abundant fruitage is another.

Now at last, however, — just now for the first, — we are coming to the apprehension that the experience taught under such various names is the very same as that taught by John the Baptist and our Saviour, and exemplified and urged by the Apostles, Evangelists, and their fellow disciples, under the name of the Baptism of the Holy Ghost.

This question settled, settles forever the question of fact concerning the experience as a personal endowment for all Christians who will receive it upon the immutable foundation of

NEW TESTAMENT TEACHING.

The first clarion note of the herald of Christ is : " Repent ye ! " and the next is " Ye shall be baptized with the Holy Ghost ! "

When John stood among the multitudes by the Jordan and proclaimed Christ in these words : " I indeed baptize you with water unto repentance, (change of mind,) but there standeth One among you, the latchet of whose shoes I am not worthy to unloose ; He shall baptize you with the Holy Ghost and with fire ! " — his words must have fallen on them like a bugle blast from the skies. " What ! who ! where ! which is He ? What is this new baptism that He will bestow upon us ? " Plow such exclamations and questions must have passed from lip to lip !

This proclamation by John was confirmed by our Lord. He, through all His ministry, prepared the way by His teachings, and finally toward the end reiterated the promise to His disciples as from the Father, and unfolded its significance as fully as they were able to receive it, and then at the moment of His ascension He reaffirmed the words of John saying : " John indeed baptized you with water, but ye shall be baptized with the Holy Ghost not many days hence."

The fulfillment of this promise, first in the upper chamber, and then in the temple on the day of pentecost, and afterwards in the case of the Samaritan converts, Apollos and the twelve disciples at Ephesus, fills up the measure of this New Testament teaching, and places the matter as an indisputable fact recorded by divine authority.

Add to this the words of Peter to those who so earnestly cried out on the day of pentecost : " Men, brethren, what shall we do ? " " Repent and be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus of Nazareth, for the remission of sins, and ye shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost, for the promise is unto you and to your children, and unto all that are afar off, even as many as the Lord our God shall call.' 9 These words place the universality of this great Christian privilege beyond question.

10 IN THE POWER OF THE SPIRIT.

Allusion has been made to the great lights of

THE PRE-CHRISTIAN AGES.

No one can doubt, without violence to common sense, that such men as Enoch, who walked with God , Moses, who talked with Him ; Abraham, the friend of God ; Elijah, who called down fire upon the altar, and went up in a chariot of fire ; Isaiah^ who was purified by fire and all ablaze with it, — had received the baptism of the Holy Ghost and of fire, whether they knew it as a distinct experience and general privilege or not.

That these men should not have so known it, is more than probable, because then as yet, God had not revealed Himself as Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. Jesus had not yet come in the flesh, and the time had not come for the distinctiveness which now obtains in the teaching of the gift of the Holy Ghost in contradistinction from the experience of the new birth.

That they could receive this glorious endowment without knowing about it, as the Apostles did, as a distinct experience, is quite clear, because even now there are similar instances. A single example of this kind will serve as the representative of a class of whom there have been some in every age. With this, these statements concerning the question of fact will end.

AN ACCOMPLISHED PHYSICIAN

came one day into a meeting, where the higher Christian life was the subject of conversation. He was a man of unusual strength and culture, and of manly bearing. He listened and kept his seat as long as he could, then rose and said :

" This is very wonderful ! I have never been in a meeting of this kind before. I have never heard or read a word on this subject until this hour. Yet now I hear things from you, which are as familiar to me as if I had been hearing and reading about them all my days. In telling your experience, you tell mine. Your feelings are mine. Your Saviour as an ever-present Saviour, is mine. I never dreamed that this experience was the privilege of all Christians. I thought it was peculiar to me, and that 1 had been led into it by my own peculiar condition of bodily health. The fact is, that although I appear strong and well, I am a very great sufferer, and my life hangs upon a thread which may snap at any moment without the warning of so much as a tick of the clock. In my agony and peril I was driven to cast myself as I was, on Christ. I had long been a Christian, but felt that I was far from being purified from sin and filled with Christ. It was plain to me that I could not purify myself, or even make any great effort to do so. Therefore I just abandoned myself to

Jesus to do what He pleased with me, and there left my case and was at rest.

" Very soon after that, without any effort on my part, I began to be filled with the fullness of God, and have been so ever since. It is amazing to me to think how the Saviour manifests Himself to me ; not only w 7 hen I am in prayer or reading the Bible, or in the house of God, or amongst fellow Christians, but when walking the streets, or in a crowded hotel, or railway car, or reading a newspaper, Jesus, who is never absent from me, unfolds Himself to me in some new relation, or in some old one renewed, and so fills me with joy that, Episcopalian as I am, I can hardly restrain myself from praising Him aloud."

II. Distinct From The New Birth

STORY OF THE FREE-BONDMAN.

^S£?EARS ago there came to the lead mines on the Iowa side of the Mississippi river, a man whose story is one of many, — stranger than fiction, — connected with the by-gone American enormity, African slavery.

He was a slave, intrusted by his master with himself, to go where he pleased and do what he liked ; to earn money and pay first for himself and then for his wife and children, at certain stipulated prices.

Mining there was a venture. The average shaft was eighty feet deep, three-fourths in the rock. Some shafts produced nothing ; others paid well.

Henry, — that was his name, — found a partner and commenced work. They sunk a shaft to the average depth, and found no paying deposit of ore. This brought them to the bottom of their purse and to the end of the partner's endurance. Henry

14 IN TEE POWER OF TEE SPIRIT.

resolved to go on down alone with his shaft. He could manage to live and keep his tools in repair, by doing now and then a cash job for somebodyelse, and he changed work with other miners to get help on what he could not do alone in Lis own shaft.

For awhile he went on cheerfully. By-and-by hope began to fail. Finally, he made up his mind to drill one more hole as deep in the rock as he could, without putting in another blast, and then, if he did not come to an opening, abandon the shaft. As he was lifting and dropping his drill for the last time, suddenly it disappeared and was gone. Then he knew that the long-sought opening was found.

A few eager hours served to open an orifice, through which he let himself down by a rope until his feet rested on the rock below. A moment more was taken in striking a light, when, to his unspeakable delight, he w r as fairly dazzled by the brilliance of the crystalline ore above, below, and around. He stood amidst the illuminated price of himself, and was glad.

This was his first discovery, and a grand one — it paid for himself, and he was free. This was a joy and a glory. But his wife and children were still in bondage, and his cavern in the rock was stripped of its wealth.

DISTINCT FROM TEE NEW BIRTH. 15

What should he do ? Two ways were presented : He could " drift " along the crevice upon the same level with his first discovery, or he could go down deeper for a second store of mineral wealth. Which way should he take ? The old miners advised him to "drift." His own heart said "go down/' and down he did go ; not far before he " struck " another opening, much larger and richer than the first. This time his hopes were abundantly surpassed. His wife and children were emancipated, a fine farm was purchased and stocked, a good house erected and furnished, out of his second discovery, and an ample cash capital was left over to him for business.

The story of this free-bondman is that of many a soul.

God has prepared for us a store of grace and truth in Christ Jesus, ample both to redeem us from bondage and to endow us for service and glory. These stores of grace are hidden in Christ, and must be discovered to be possessed and enjoyed. They are freely provided and freely bestowed, and are ours the moment we accept and discover them. They have to be searched for as for hid treasure, or they will not be found. We seek for them only when pressed by a sense of our need. Our necessities are two-fold, and the discoveries to meet them are made one at a time. The first great felt want that arises in the soul is that of deliverance from condemnation and death. When we discover the grace of God in Christ Jesus, by which this want is met, it is glorious indeed. Like Miriam and Moses, we sing the song of triumph on the hither bank of the Red Sea, and rejoice with unspeakable joy in redeeming love.

The second great necessity, as it arises, is that of endowment. Liberty does not suffice, — power is needed as well. Like Israel delivered from bondage, we find ourselves in a wilderness, often hungry and thirsty ; and when we come up to the borders of the land with its flowing abundance, we start back from going in to possess it, because its high walls and giants appal us. Then comes the question, What shall we do to obtain the needed endowment? Shall we " drift" on the level of our past discovery, in the hope of gradual gain, or shall we strike down for a deeper and richer store of grace and truth ?

Alas for us ! too many of us try the wrong way first, and some continue it to the end, and so fail of the grand discovery they might otherwise make. Forever in the first principles — sinning and repenting, — they never get beyond the plane of their first experience.

Those who do strike for a new discovery, are usually not very long in finding it, and when it is found every want of their souls is met. Redeemed before, they are now endowed ; bought already with a price, and clothed with garments of salvation, they are now filled with the Spirit — brought into abiding union with Jesus and made temples of the Holy Ghost.

By the first experience we are born into the family of God, and receive the spirit of adoption ; by the second we come to manhood, and enter upon our inheritance as heirs of God.

The deeper experience was realized by the patriarch Job when the Lord manifested Himself to him in the rolling, involving cloud, and doubled over to him all he had ever before possessed and enjoyed. The prophet Isaiah came into it when he was cleansed from sin by the fire from the altar laid on his lips. Patriarch and prophet alike received the baptism of the Spirit, (the Rhua) the wind, the fire.

The second grand discovery was symbolized in the Old Testament as distinct from the first, by the Feast of Pentecost, which came after that of the Passover. For as the Passover signified atonement for sin, and immunity from judgment, so the Pentecost represented endowment with resurrection-life and power in Jesus by the baptism of the Holy Ghost.

In the New Testament, John the Baptist proclaims the distinction by declaring that he preaches the> first experience, and that upon those who come into that, Jesus will also bestow the second.

Jesus emphasizes this proclamation of John by repeating it, and speaking to His disciples as already in the first experience, and soon to come into the second. And He also unfolds at length the nature and benefits of the later and deeper experience, as that in which He bestows the Comforter upon His disciples, to dwell in them forever, and in which He comes to them Himself with His Father, to abide forever with them, so to bring them into abiding and full union with Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

The Apostles and their fellow-disciples exemplify the distinction by the fact that on the day of Pentecost they receive the promised Comforter after having been true disciples of Christ, as recognized by the Saviour Himself, during the years of His presence with them in the body.

Peter and John act upon the fact of this distinction when they go down to Samaria and at once pray for the happy Samaritans already converted under the preaching of Philip, that they may receive the Spirit.

Paul acts upon it when he meets the twelve disciples at Ephesus, raid asks them whether they have received the Spirit since they believed.

Apollos further illustrates it by accepting the deeper experience under the teaching of Aquila and Priscilla, after having become already a true Christian, zealous for Christ, eloquent in the gospel, and mighty in the Scriptures.

Many, in our own day, who have been born again and have clearly apprehended their justification by faith, seek and find the later and deeper experience under one or other of various names, such as " Sanctification," " The Rest of Faith," " Perfect Love," and " The Higher Christian Life."

Besides these, there is another class of Christians who come into it without ever having heard of it at all as a distinct experience. Pressed by their great heart-hunger for something more than they have found in their conversion, they go anew to the Lord, give themselves up completely into His hands, and He gives them in fact the Holy Spirit to dwell in them and lead them into all the fullness of God.

What could show more clearly the distinctness of the later experience from the new birth ? Taught and exemplified abundantly as distinct in the Scriptures, sought and found under other names by many who have not recognized it under the Scripture name — Baptism of the Holy Ghost — and actually found by those who have not sought it or

heard of it so as to conceive of it as a distinct 3 experience, either from the Word of God or the teachings of their fellow Christians ; — if these things do not show it, what could ?

A single instance from the many of the last named class will sufficiently illustrate the fact stated concerning them : —

THE LOST INEBRIATE SAVED.

He had been a prosperous man, a banker^ with a loving and lovely wife and a large circle of reputable friends. Insidiously, the habit of wine drinking had grown into that of a craving appetite for something stronger, and this into an alarming frequency and constancy in the use of intoxicants, until at last it became a cancerous vice, striking its deadly roots into the vitals of his character, prosperity and prospects. He began to neglect his affairs. He did things that were foolish, yea fearful, for a business man to do. Confidence in him gradually ceased, friends dropped off, business diminished, and finally he was compelled to change his line for one of lower grade.

Meanwhile he became alarmed for himself, and sought to reform. He tried gradualism, and the grade was downward ever into deeper depths. He tried total abstinence by resolutions which snapped in the hour of temptation. He added the force of public sentiment by the public pledge, but respect for his word before men proved as ineffectual as his private resolutions had done. Neither selfrespect, or respect for his wife, or for public opinion, could hold him back from intoxication.

One resource remained, and this he felt sure would answer the purpose — the church — religion. His wife was a member of the church, and he made up his mind to cast in his lot with her and be a true Christian. He took his stand publicly, entered the Sabbath school, talked in prayer meetings, and offered himself as a member of the church; and was indignant that they did not call a special meeting to receive him. All this while he was using tobacco as a substitute for stronger stimulants, and often hastening home from church or Sabbath school to his pipe. This, of course, could end only in failure, and this time his failure was an awful one. Like the Prodigal, he deliberately took everything he could scrape together, and literally went away into a far country and wasted all in riotous living. With a high hand he kept it up for many weeks, until his money was all gone. At last he came so far to himself as to return deeply humbled to his home.

Before going away he had heard Dr. John Hall, and been impressed with his sincerity, and after his return he again sought his ministry. The Lord so ordered it that the subject of discourse this time was the love of God, and it fell upon the prodigal returned, like the welcoming arms of a father ; his heart was deeply touched and he sought an interview, and said frankly, st I have come to see you about my soul." Dr. Hall said many things true and kind — one thing went home to the depths of his visitor's heart. He asked him if he knew the plan of salvation. The answer was, " O yes, I understand it very well." u You know, then, that you need to have imputed to you the righteousness of Christ, do you? " " No, sir, I do not; what does that mean ? " The Doctor explained. " The righteousness of Christ ? " thought he, " the righteousness of Christ ; no, I have been trying to mend my own ways, so as to make them right in my own eyes and commendable to God. Oh ! I must have the righteousness of Christ."

Heartily thanking the Doctor, he went out, sought his own place, locked himself in, and that very night before he had been long prostrate in the presence of the Lord, he had his eyes opened to see the miserable patch- work of his own righteousness, mended up as best he had been able to do it, as all and only filthy ?*ags, while the perfect righteousness of Christ came out before him in its spotless beauty and shining glory as all his own by simple faith. Instantly, his mourning was turned to joy, and his garments of heaviness to praise.

From that blessed hour he was in a new life, in a new world. His motives were new, his feelings were new, his chains fell off. The old appetite left him ; tobacco, like alcohol, ceased to be a temptation to him. He was a free man, a true man, a true child of God. Yet, although free, he was not full. He was, indeed, at times very joyous ; but then again he was in unrest. From the day of his conversion he gave himself up to earnest and active service as a Christian, but he found the impulsion too often to be only a sense of duty, when it should have been love. He worked faithfully, but longed more and more for a deeper spiritual endowment.