Part 2, Chapter 07
CHAPTER VII. THE WORK OF THE SPIRIT IN SANCTIFICATION. In conversion, as we have seen, according to Scripture and Christian experience, the Holy Spirit effects a radical change in the soul. By working in us faith and repentance, He imparts to us a new principle of life, the principle of godliness or love to God, which is the ruling motive of every genuine Christian. This seems to be what is called in one remarkable passage “ the seed of God” (1 John 3:9), and in another “that which is begotten of the Spirit” (John 3:6); and the possession of this divine principle of life makes an essential difference between those who are born again and even the best of those animated by merely selfish or earthly motives But this does not imply that the child of God is at once perfect in holiness. On the contrary, since the Spirit of God may and often does lay hold of the very lowest and most sinful; the materials, so to speak, on which this work is wrought are often very unlikely; and as it is not done magically, or by mere power, but by the influence of grace, in accordance with the essential constitution of man, and in the way of a vital process, it is only by degrees that the soul is completely renewed. A new principle or ruling motive is imparted by regeneration, and the Christian is no longer under the influence of selfishness as his highest impulse, but is really possessed with love to God and faith in Jesus Christ. This new principle more or less influences the whole nature: the thoughts, the feelings, the desires, the actions, all are affected by it; so that in a true sense it may be said there is an entire renewal. The regenerate has not only a new belief, or a new hope, or a new love, or a new conduct, but all these together; he is a new man, a new creature.
Yet his renewal is not complete in any part. The faith of the Christian, though real and sincere, is not perfect at first, but often mingled and interrupted with distrust; his love, though genuine, may not be strong enough to encounter hardships or temptations: in a word, though he has a germ of spiritual life implanted within him, which in principle is higher than anything of which unrenewed men partake, he is still beset with allurements to sin, and possessed with tendencies or habits of yielding to these allurements. He really loves God and hates sin; that is the ruling principle of his soul: but that does not remove all possibility of sin, it does not make the pleasures of sin less attractive to his senses, or the selfdenial that God requires less painful to flesh and blood: it does not destroy the power of habit which may have been contracted by former acts of self-indulgence; nor does it obviate the possibility of missing the path of duty through mistake or heedlessness.
Such is the state in which the New Testament describes the converts to Christianity as being, with their hearts filled with a new affection, love to God and Christ, yet prone to many sins, sometimes of a gross and shocking nature, and needing to have the most plain moral duties enforced on them. The spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak; nay, the flesh lusteth against the spirit. By these adverse influences the principle of love to God in the heart might be overcome and choked, were it not continually nourished and strengthened by the same power that implanted it at first. If the influence of the Holy Spirit in regeneration were a merely transient impulse, however powerful, the renewal effected by it would not be complete, and might not be lasting. The new impulse of love to God would be continually opposed by the remaining tendencies and temptations to evil, and would be in clanger of either degenerating into a mere sentiment, without influence on practical life, or being entirely extinguished in course of time. In order to escape these dangers, the new life in the soul must be fed and encouraged, so that it may grow and gain strength; and this, Scripture declares, is done by the Holy Spirit in the work of progressive renewal or sanctification. The Holy Spirit is said not only to be given, but to dwell in Christians (Romans 8:9, Romans 8:11; 1 Corinthians 6:19; John 14:17; John 12:27); and this indicates His continual working. As the Spirit of God is in His essence omnipresent, His coming upon any one denotes, not any local movement, but His beginning to work upon such a one in a way He had not done before; and so His abiding upon, or dwelling in men, means His continuing to influence them as He had begun. The Holy Spirit kindled the new life of faith and love in a twofold way, outwardly by presenting the grace and love of God in the gospel, and inwardly by opening the heart to receive that grace and love. In a like twofold manner He continues His work, and thereby nurtures the faith that He implanted at first. By the Holy Spirit the grace of God as revealed in Christ continues to be presented to the soul; and the gospel, as it is the means of our new birth, so also is it the means of our growth in spiritual life. Hence Peter, after reminding Christians that they have been born again of incorruptible seed through the Word of God, exhorts them as new-born babes to “long for the spiritual milk which is without guile, 1 that they may grow thereby unto salvation” (1 Peter 2:2). The spiritual nourishment of our souls is the gospel, or Christ who is presented in the gospel. Christ crucified is, as Augustine said, both milk for babes and meat for men. This spiritual food nourishes the soul as it is received by faith and love; and the gospel presenting Christ to us calls forth these graces into continual and active exercise, and so promotes their growth and the increasing perfection of the Christian character. The revelation
1 This rendering of the Revised Version is more in accordance with the usage of the language than “ the sincere milk of the word; “ but though the reference to ch. 1:23 is thereby effaced, we need not doubt that it is the word of God that is meant. of God that is made in the person, and teaching, and work of Jesus, and in the blessings that flow from these, is most fitted to increase and confirm that faith or trustful reliance on God’s mercy, and that repentance or aversion from evil and turning to God, which form the beginning and principle of Christian life.
These when continued in exercise tend to promote that life, by acquiring the strength and persistency of a habit, and gradually weakening or expelling contrary habits and overcoming temptations. This is that walking by the Spirit (Galatians 5:1-26), after the Spirit (Romans 8:4-14), in Christ (Colossians 2:6), repeatedly enjoined on Christians as the work of their life and the means of their growth. It denotes a continual exercise of faith and repentance as at the first, looking ever to Christ and to God, with the same feelings of trust, penitence, and love, as when the gospel first came to the soul with its blessed message of glad tidings. For this end the Word of God must be the constant study of the believer; and it is a means that the Holy Spirit uses for his sanctification. But the Spirit also acts more directly on the soul in this work. The various virtues of the Christian character are described as the fruit of the Spirit (Galatians 5:1-26); by the Spirit God reveals to us His hidden wisdom (1 Corinthians 2:10); by the Spirit we are transformed into the image of the Lord (2 Corinthians 3:18); by the Spirit we mortify the deeds of the body (Romans 8:13); by the Spirit we are strengthened in faith and love (Ephesians 3:16). These and other passages indicate a work of the Spirit that consists not merely in presenting to us the revelation of God in Christ, which is fitted to draw our faith and love into continual exercise; but in opening our minds to perceive and our hearts to feel the grace of God thus revealed, and so actually producing in us the exercise of faith and love. We find from experience, that in the progress as in the beginning of Christian life, we are not entirely dependent on the external presentation of God’s grace. The very same passages of God’s Word or views of its truths, that at one time produced the most deep and salutary effects, enlightening the mind, melting the heart to penitence and love, stimulating and encouraging the soul to resolutions and efforts after holiness, may at another time be read or heard, and understood exactly in the same way, and yet fail to make any such impression These spiritual effects, that are not traceable merely to the mora influence of the truth, and that can as little be accounted for by our own will or by external circumstances, are most reasonably to be ascribed to that direct working of the Holy Spirit on the souls of believers of which Scripture speaks. If in the primitive Church the Spirit of God was recognised as the author of the extraordinary gifts of prophecy, tongues, healing: must we not assign to the same source that spiritual insight by which the truths of God are opened up, that devotional fervour that finds spontaneous utterance in earnest pleading prayer, and that zeal for good works that effects things for the good of men that seemed impossible before? The abiding graces, of faith, hope, and love, are in Paul’s estimate higher and more divine than the best of the supernatural gifts, and they cannot be conceived as less directly due to the agency of the Holy Spirit.
More particularly, the Holy Spirit works in the process of sanctification by producing in the soul those special virtues which may be lacking in particular persons, or needed on particular occasions. One Christian, for example, may be constitutionally defective in courage, another in meekness, another in patience, and so on. These special qualities the Spirit of God can and does bestow; as Paul reminds Timothy, who seems to have been naturally of a timid and shrinking disposition, “ God gave us not a spirit of fearfulness, but of power, and of love, and of discipline “ (2 Timothy 1:7); or as the fiery spirit of the son of thunder was chastened and refined, so that he became the Apostle of love. There are special aspects of God’s revelation in Christ fitted to draw forth special virtues, and to discourage and check the faults opposed to them; and these the Holy Spirit uses for these ends; as we may see how Paul’s second letter to Timothy sets forth those views of Christian truth and experience that are most likely to encourage and strengthen a timid disciple; and Jesus, when He had occasion to rebuke the intolerant zeal of James and John, showed them in word and deed the grace and love of His mission. 1 The dealings of Providence too, more especially the trials and afflictions of life, are made the means of promoting and perfecting in believers special virtues in which they may be defective, such as meekness, patience, hope. At the same time, there is also a direct agency of the Holy Spirit here; for all these virtues are described as the fruit of the Spirit; they are all developments in various directions of the right state of heart towards God, expressed in faith and repentance, which is wrought and maintained by the Spirit of God in the heart. The new life of Christianity is a unity; and though, on account of the imperfect and abnormal condition of most Christians, it does not show itself with perfect symmetry; yet it tends towards moral excellence and perfection in every direction, and the more vigorous the central principle of religious life is, the more will particular virtues be developed and increased. The Spirit’s work of sanctification is thus the continuance and development of regeneration; and is related to it as preservation is to creation in the natural world. But just as preservation differs from creation in this, that in it God works by means, and with the co-operation of the creatures; so in the Spirit’s work of sanctification there is a co-operation of the human will, such as cannot be admitted in regeneration. In implanting the new life at first, the Holy Spirit has to deal with a soul, that is indeed essentially active^ but in regard to spiritual religion insensible or opposed to the call of God. Hence this work is entirely due
1 Luke 9:54-56. The words, “ Ye know not what manner of spirit ye are of: for the Son of man came not to destroy men’s lives, but to save them,” are indeed of doubtful authenticity; but they are thoroughly in the Spirit of Christ, and more likely to have been omitted than added in the time of the oldest MSS. Anyhow we may be sure that it was what he saw and felt of the love of Christ, that softened the natural character of John. to the divine power; we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works. But in the preservation and development of the new life, the Spirit has to deal with a soul that is now spiritually alive, that is able and inclined to work in the same direction as His work. Hence in this process of sanctification we are called to be fellow-workers with God; we are to work out our own salvation with fear and trembling, because it is God that worketh in us to will and to do. Such exhortations continually occur in the Epistles, in close connection with statements of the work of God by His Spirit in our sanctification. The knowledge we have of the reality of that work ought not to lead us to be less earnest and diligent in our own efforts, but rather more so: for it assures us that our efforts shall not be in vain, as we might fear they would be, if we had only them to look to for success. Nor does the sanctifying work of the Holy Spirit render our co-operation needless; for though the Spirit’s power is indeed divine, and therefore all-sufficient, yet it is exercised in a way suited to our nature, not only as men, but as now having spiritual life, and able to know, desire, and seek for spiritual blessings. The fear and trembling, with which Paul says Christians ought to engage in the work, are not due to uncertainty or want of hope as to the issue, but are the emotions that ought naturally to arise from the knowledge that we are so closely associated with God in the work. If we have any right apprehension of the greatness, the glory, the holiness of God, we must feel that it is a solemn and awful thing to be fellowworkers with the high and lofty One who inhabiteth eternity, whose name is holy. With what reverence should we engage in the work of purifying ourselves, how careful should we be that our hearts are right with God, and our ends and aims in harmony with His, how fearful lest by heedlessness or self-seeking we provoke His holy anger! In Scripture there are warnings not only to unbelievers that they resist not the Holy Spirit, but also to Christians that they do not grieve that blessed Agent (Ephesians 4:30); and it is indicated that the Spirit is grieved when we indulge in anger, bitterness, or malice, or anything opposed to God’s holy law. If we rebel and grieve His Holy Spirit, God may turn to be our enemy and fight against us (Isaiah 63:10); and whenever we fall into any grievous sin, we have reason to pray with the Psalmist, “Take not thy holy spirit from me” (Psa. 11:11). If it is the holy God who thus works in us by His Spirit, well may we be filled with fear and trembling as we work out our own salvation.
Yet we have the assurance that God our Saviour is able to keep us from falling, and to present us blameless before the presence of His glory with exceeding joy (Jude 1:24); that saints are kept by the power of God through faith unto salvation (1 Peter 1:5); and that He who hath begun a good work in us will perfect it until the day of Christ (Php 1:6). So we may give ourselves to this work in the confidence and hope that such promises are fitted to inspire, and be strong in the Lord who sanctifies us, and who has said, “ I will never leave thee nor forsake thee.”