Part 2, Chapter 08
CHAPTER VII T. THE WORK OF THE SPIRIT AS A WITNESS AND TEACHER. The agency of the Holy Spirit in originating and carrying on the new life of Christian faith and love in the soul may be said to include the whole of what He does in us for our salvation; for it includes the renewal and sanctification of the whole man, and might be traced in detail through the various parts of our nature, the mind, the conscience, the heart, the will. To attempt this, however, would involve us in psychological discussions on which Scripture, as it is written for practical rather than theoretical ends, affords little direct light. There is, however, one special aspect of the Spirit’s work which it is practically important to consider separately, and which has a distinct prominence given it in the New Testament, His work on the mind, as a witness and teacher. It was in this character especially that Jesus promised the Holy Spirit to His disciples (John 14:26; John 15:26); in the character of a witness He is appealed to by the apostles (Acts 5:32; Hebrews 2:4); and His work in teaching and witnessing is described as assuring the faith of believers (Romans 8:16; 1 Corinthians 2:4, 1 Corinthians 2:10-16; 1 John 2:20, 1 John 2:27; 1 John 5:7-11). These and other passages speak so emphatically of a witness or teaching of the Spirit, as to lead us to inquire specially what this means, and how it is realized. They describe the Spirit of God as not merely working in us, but addressing Himself to us, and communicating knowledge and certainty of the truth.
According to the usage of Scripture language, the words, “ teach,” “testify,” and the like, may be used of impersonal things which by their existence or appearance convey knowledge to men. So it is said, “ The heavens declare the glory of God, and the firmament showeth his handiwork. Day unto day uttereth speech, and night unto night teacheth knowledge” (Psalms 19:1); and again, the water and the blood bear witness as well as the Spirit (1 John 5:8). In some of the passages above referred to, the Holy Spirit may be said to testify simply in this way, the fact of Jesus’ disciples being endowed with spiritual gifts being a proof of the divine authority and exaltation of Jesus. But it is impossible fairly to apply this explanation to all those statements; some of them plainly have a different meaning. Where passages from the Old Testament are quoted with the phrase, “the Holy Spirit saith,” “the Holy Spirit beareth witness” (Hebrews 3:7; Hebrews 10:15), the meaning is that the sacred writers having been moved by the Holy Spirit, their teaching is that of the Spirit to us. In the same sense Paul speaks of the Holy Spirit testifying, through the utterances of Christian prophets, that bonds and afflictions awaited him (Acts 20:23). Now when we find such expressions used; we cannot doubt that Jesus’ saying to His disciples, that the Holy Spirit would teach them, and testify along with them (John 15:26; John 16:13-15), meant that He would communicate truth to them, and through them to others. This promise includes the inspiration of the apostles and prophets of the New Testament; while in the light of other sayings we can hardly doubt that it conveys also a promise of the teaching of the Spirit to all who believe in Jesus. For John says to Christians in general, “ Ye have an anointing from the Holy One, and ye know all things,... and his anointing teacheth you concerning all things” (1 John 2:20, 1 John 2:27). This plainly means that this divine anointing, which is the Holy Spirit, teaches us not merely by the fact of the effects which it produces, or by the utterances of inspired men, but by a direct communication to our souls. The same thing is taught by Paul, when he says that “ his speech and his preaching were in demonstration of the Spirit and of power,” that is, his gospel had been proved to them by the Spirit and by power. This cannot refer to any miraculous gifts of the Spirit; for these would have formed a sign, such as the Jews vainly sought: it can only mean, that the Holy Spirit showed to the hearers the truth of the gospel. So also, when he writes to the Thessalonians, that the gospel came to them in power, and in the Holy Spirit, and in much assurance (1 Thessalonians 1:5), he must mean that the Holy Spirit enabled them to see the gospel to be the word of God, and to embrace it as such. This is in the fullest sense a testimony of the Spirit; because the gospel comes to us as the word of God given by His Spirit, and the same Spirit enables us to see that it is so. This latter work is not an objective communication of truth additional to what is contained in the gospel, but a subjective opening of our minds to see it. God gives the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of him, that the eyes of our understanding being enlightened, we may know what is the hope of His calling (Ephesians 1:17-18). When the Holy Spirit thus works in us along with the gospel, we have the testimony of the Spirit in and with the word in our hearts, which gives us absolute certainty that the gospel is the word of God. In the same way the Spirit interprets the word to us, and enables us to understand its true meaning; and this in accordance with the principles that are universally applicable in such matters. In order to understand correctly any writing, we must not only be acquainted with the language in which it is written, and the things of which it treats, but also have something in us of the spirit of the writer. Poetry, for instance, is unintelligible to those who have nothing of the poetic spirit in them, and many exquisite poems are not only unappreciated, but entirely misunderstood, by those who are destitute of imaginative feeling. So also one may read a work of philosophy, understanding the meaning of all the words and sentences, and yet have no real apprehension of the problems that are dealt with, so that the whole treatise may seem to such a one unintelligible or foolish, In like manner the expressions of religious feelings and experiences by men like Augustine, Luther, Cromwell, or Bunyan, have often seemed insane ravings or hypocritical pretences to critics, acute enough in the judgment of worldly matters, but strangers to such deep spiritual experience. The only way in which this want of understanding can be remedied is the personal contact of soul with soul. If we not merely read or hear the words of poetry or philosophy, but have direct intercourse with a living man in whom is the poetic or philosophic spirit, we may come to have a feeling and insight into the meaning of these studies, such as we had not before; and many can look back to a time when the understanding of poetry or of philosophy was first opened to them in some such way. Only in all such cases what is done is to awaken or call into exercise a faculty that already exists in the soul; in the revelation of spiritual truths there is needed a power that can revive the faculty of spiritual discernment from a state in which it is practically impotent. Hence, however useful and helpful human aid may be, it must be the work of the Spirit of God to enable us really to know the things that are freely given to us by God. This work of the Spirit is the foundation of the certainty of our faith, as resting not merely on the testimony of men but on that of God. Under His teaching we may have, not only a probable opinion, but a full assurance in regard to the things that concern our spiritual life and comfort. These are, the fact that God has spoken and does speak to us, the meaning of the message He addresses to us, and our personal interest in His promises. For none of these do we need to depend either on the authority of men, or on the inferences of reason, when we have the testimony of the Spirit of God; though both the experience of other men, and the rational powers of our own minds, are useful as auxiliaries and confirmations of our faith. The Holy Spirit gives us infallible assurance that God has spoken at sundry times and in divers manners by the prophets, and in the last days by His Son; and how great a thing is it to be assured of that, so that we are not left to feel after Him in the dark by the indirect discovery of His works, but have His voice speaking personally to us! His voice indeed carries its own evidence with it; for it is worthy of Himself, divine, so that He challenges comparison with all counterfeits: “ What is the chaff to the wheat? saith the Lord. Is not my word like as a fire, and like a hammer that breaketh the rock in pieces?” (Jeremiah 23:28-29). But unless the Spirit, through whom the word is given, open our ears to hear it, we cannot perceive this; when He does so, then we recognise the voice of God, and the saying of Jesus about Himself as the true shepherd is fulfilled, “ The sheep follow him, for they know his voice, and a stranger they will not follow, for they know not the voice of strangers.” The majesty, and holiness, and truthfulness, and tenderness, and grace, that shine in the word of God, the power with which it awakens the conscience and melts the heart, are demonstrations of its divine origin to those who are enabled by the Holy Spirit to perceive them; and thus by the witness of the Spirit they are assured that God does really speak to them. But men have understood this word in so many different ways, that it seems difficult or impossible to be sure about its meaning.
Hence we need a guide in the interpretation of it. Yet that is not to be sought for outside, in the teaching of the learned, or of the Church, but in the Holy Spirit enabling us to receive God’s word in meekness of wisdom, and understand its plain meaning in its own light. Jesus promised that the Comforter would take of His and show it to His disciples, and the apostles pray that their converts may be enlightened by the Spirit to understand the truth.
There are indeed many things in the Bible about the meaning of which competent and candid scholars doubt or differ, and probably will always do so; but these are matters of subordinate importance; and when there are differences about the main drift of its teaching, these arise from carelessness, or prejudice, or presumption: and when the Holy Spirit frees the mind from the warping influence of these, and enables us to read the word with simplicity, docility, and diligence, its meaning, as to the great essentials, is plain and certain to us. But further, the believer receives the word of God as a personal message of God to him, and testimony of God’s goodwill to him in Christ; and in this aspect of it also the Holy Spirit gives us assurance of its truth. The gospel is not indeed addressed to each individual by name, as God’s words have sometimes been to the prophets; but it is addressed to men in general, and testifies to each one God’s earnest desire that he should be saved from sin, and the certainty of his being saved if he will but trust in Jesus. Now if this were all, we should have a divine testimony to the general truth of the gospel, but not to our personal interest in it; that we could only learn from our own reflection or examination of ourselves. That can give us some knowledge, but it can never be absolutely certain. But along with the call of the gospel, the Holy Spirit works in our hearts, moving and enabling us to receive it in faith, and to enter into the enjoyment and appreciation of its blessings. When He thus enables us personally to return to our God, and receive His free forgiveness and reconciling love, even as the prodigal son returned to his father; when He leads us to know the peace and joy that come with such faith; when He gives us boldness to cry to God, “ Our Father in heaven,” can we have any doubt that God is gracious to us, and that we are reconciled to Him? Have we not a witness of this in our hearts, the witness not merely of our own consciousness or conscience, but of the Spirit of God dwelling and working in us?
“ The love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Spirit which is given to us.” “ The Spirit itself beareth witness with our spirits that we are the children of God.” “ He that believeth on the Son of God hath the witness in him,... and the witness is this, that God gave unto us eternal life, and this life is in his Son” (Romans 5:1-21;Romans 8:16; 1 John 5:16).
It is to be observed that this function of the Holy Spirit as our teacher and witness is not a thing distinct and apart from His general work in renewing and sanctifying our souls. He enables us to see the Scriptures to be the Word of God, to understand their true meaning, and to be assured of God’s goodwill to us, and of our interest in His promises, no otherwise than by bringing our minds and hearts into sympathy and harmony with God’s mind and heart as declared in His word: and that is just the work wherein our sanctification consists. To revert to the analogy before noticed, just as we come to understand and appreciate poetry or philosophy more deeply and truly, the more we grow in the poetic or philosophic spirit; so it is in proportion as we advance in Christian life in general, that we learn to perceive more easily, more correctly, and more fully, the mind of God in His word. Hence we find that enlightenment is promised in Scripture to various spiritual graces. “ To him that ordereth his way aright will I show the salvation of God” (Ps. 1. 23). “ Unto the upright there ariseth light in the darkness “ (Psalms 112:4).
“ If any man willeth to do his will, he shall know of the teaching” (John 7:17). “Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God” (Matthew 5:8). “Every one that loveth knoweth God” (1 John 4:7). This is what secures this great truth of the testimony of the Holy Spirit from the danger of being perverted into an encouragement to fanaticism, by men mistaking the suggestions of their own fancy, or interest, or wishes, for the teaching of the Holy Spirit. If it is ever borne in mind, on the one hand that the Spirit’s testimony is in and with the Word, and on the other hand that it is just a special aspect of the work of sanctification as a whole; these abuses of this doctrine may be avoided, and it may be seen to be consistent with truth and soberness, and in harmony with well-ascertained facts of our experience. Of the way in which the Holy Spirit as a teacher is a guide to believers, in the details of practical life, and the steps they should take in various circumstances, we have a remarkable illustration in Paul’s Epistles to the Corinthians, both in the advice he gives to them, and in what he says about his own plans and proceedings.
They had asked his opinion on several questions of practical conduct, about marriage, about meats offered to idols, about the conduct of religious meetings, and the exercise of spiritual gifts; and he gives answers to these inquiries in successive sections of his first epistle to them. In them all he carries the question of detail in the first place up to some general principle, on which the Word of God gives a clear and authoritative decision; then he indicates how the application of this may be modified by circumstances, and how in some cases other principles come to bear upon the question, so as to define the path of duty one way or another; then he refers to various alternative suppositions, as to what might occur in actual life, and shows how the general principles of Scripture determine the right course variously in various circumstances. In each of these discussions we see lofty and comprehensive principles laid down; but then these are not left in their generality, but at the same time are so explained and applied to actual cases, that we have not mere vague commonplaces, but distinct directions capable of being applied and acted upon in practice. Now what has enabled Paul thus to combine lofty principles with precise application, is his ample acquaintance with Scripture, his clear apprehension of its real meaning, and his thorough sympathy with its spirit, and honest resolution to apply it fearlessly to varying circumstances. But these are qualities that may be possessed by ordinary Christians, without Paul’s supernatural inspiration or rare intellectual gifts.
If the Word of God dwell in us richly, so that we can readily perceive, when any practical question arises, what general principle Scripture has given which covers it; if we have a clear and right apprehension of the meaning of that principle, and if we are free from the tendency to apply it in a one-sided way, and are resolved honestly to decide and act upon it, then we may see how it plainly directs our path of duty: the Word of God is a lamp to our feet and a light to our path; but it is the Holy Spirit, quickening and nourishing Christian life in us, that enables us to use it as such.
Still more strikingly do we see this guidance of the Spirit in Paul’s own conduct, as it comes out in these epistles. When he wrote his first epistle, he had already given up a former intention of going at once to them, from Ephesus, before the visit he had to pay to the churches in Macedonia. He made this change because he desired to make a longer stay with them (1 Corinthians 16:5-6); and also, as he assures them in his later letter, to spare them and give them time to reform the abuses for which he had blamed them, so that he might not have to come to them with the sorrowful duty of exercising discipline (
We seem to see in this how he was guided by the Spirit in his Christian walk; and so, when he was accused of duplicity or indecision in his proceedings, he asserts his disinterestedness and straightforwardness, and declares that he has been enabled in this to imitate the stedfastness of Christ Himself, because God has anointed and sealed him and given the earnest of the Spirit (2 Corinthians 1:19-22); while at the same time he indicates that this is not a privilege peculiar to him, but a blessing in which they and all believers may share. “ He who establisheth us with you unto Christ is God.”