Church of Christ Studies

The Holy Spirit and His Work

I want to speak to you at this time, my friends, regarding the work of the Holy Spirit, especially as it relates to the apostles in their respective work. As a text this morning, 1 John 5: 7 will answer, in which John says: "There are three that bear record in heaven, the Father, the Word, and the Holy Ghost: and these three are one."

 

I think, perhaps, that there is not anything connected with the plan of salvation considered more mysterious, perhaps less understood, than is the Holy Spirit and his work in the accomplishment of the purpose in view. Permit me just to suggest to this audience that the Holy Spirit is a person, such as is God, the Father, and Christ, the Son, and that these three make up what we call the "Godhead," or the "Trinity," and the Bible says they are one. So that settles that point. They are one in nature, each of them being infinite, eternal. They are one in design and one in purpose. The object ultimately to be attained is the same with each of them.

 

Now, there seem to be people upon the earth who cannot appreciate how these may have their own personality and yet be one. In the marriage relationship the husband and wife are one when thus their lives are blended and together they agree to travel in the onward journey. Now, that does not rob them of their individuality nor of their personality; neither does it deny the fact that they are one. Well, how one? One with reference to their purpose, one with reference to their aim in life and to the object to be accomplished. While that is true, there is a special field of operation for each of them.

 

It is the business and the place of the husband to look after outside matters, business concerns, and solve the problems of support and a livelihood along the pathway of life; and it is the place of the wife to look after the home, assume the responsibilities that naturally come upon her. But in each of these fields both are equally interested and are one in their purpose, intent, and objective.

 

Now, can we view this Trinity after that fashion? Can we understand that God and the Lord and the Holy Spirit are one, looking ultimately to the salvation of the souls of men and the adornment of the Father's house with souls redeemed from the earth? While that is true with respect to them and in that sense they are one, let me submit to you that there is a special realm and field of operation for each of these. For instance, when man had wandered sway, having transgressed God's law and forfeited his right to the tree of life and the prospects which he had a right and reason to expect, God and the Lord and the Holy Spirit all were interested in his ultimate redemption, in his rescue, in his final salvation; but in the accomplishment of that ultimate objective there are numbers of things to intervene.

 

Necessarily first of all is the drafting or planning of a great scheme of redemption whereby God could be just and save mankind. After the plan is suggested, the next step necessarily following is that the plan must be carried out and executed. That having been done, the world must know respecting it and get acquainted with all things connected therewith.

 

Now, don't you think that such would cover the ground? Taking man as he was in his fallen state and the ultimate object on the part of these three to be his rescue and final reinstatement into God's paradise, there are three things of magnificent character to be accomplished. First, the getting up of a plan by which he may be saved; second, the execution of that plan; and, third, the revelation of that plan. Now, neither of these could exist with profit to man without the other; and so, in the very simplest way of thinking, let me submit to you that it was God's special part in this great working out of man's redemption and restoration to originate the plan, draft the scheme, outline the policy, and furnish, if you please, blue prints, together with certain specifications as to how the matter should be finally executed upon the earth.

 

In the infinite purpose of Jehovah the plan was formed, the scheme was drafted, and the specifications were outlined. For forty centuries God led and tutored humanity until in the fullness of time Christ came, and to him as the great master mechanic were delivered the plan and the specifications, with the express understanding that not his will, but the Father's, should be done. it was his to execute what Jehovah had drafted and to carry into effect heaven's will.

 

A third of a century was spent by our Lord in preparation and execution of his work. Scorn, ridicule, and contempt were heaped upon him. Death on the tree of the cross, the opening of his side, and the pouring forth of the last drop of blood in his body constituted a part of the coat. His last expression was: "it is finished." What is finished? "My special part in the great scheme of redemption. I have walked in obedience to the declarations of the Father; I have followed the draft and the scheme to a dot; and now it's all over, it's finished; and hence I commend my spirit back unto God Almighty."

 

That having been done, God's purpose, together with that of Christ and the Holy Spirit, was for you and me to learn the way of life and the path of duty. Hence, the Holy Spirit's special function and special work was to take up just where the Lord had left oil and make known to all the sons and daughters of men what God had planned and Christ had executed. When the Spirit thus guided the apostles into all truth and the will of God was made known, there was a perfect, a complete, and a replete system of salvation. The responsibility was shifted from God and from Christ and the Spirit and placed upon human beings. Jehovah-jireh, the Lord, has provided, the Christ has executed, the Spirit has revealed; and hence throughout the two thousand years since the proposition has been for us to accept what has been provided and be saved or reject it and be damned.

 

Now, I want to ask this splendid audience: What do you think about the completion and the perfection of each of these respective parts? When God Almighty in the morning of time had hashed before him the whole outline and possibilities of man's redemption and had finished it, I wonder if there is anybody that thinks that it was not a matter complete. Have you faith enough in God to believe that his scheme is adapted, that it is adequate, that it is complete? If you have not, of course what you need is faith in God Almighty to begin with. Now, in the second place, are you satisfied to-day with what Christ did in his particular field and relationship with the scheme of redemption? When he lived for thirty-three years on the earth, suffered, sorrowed, sighed, bled, and died on the tree of the cross, are you content with that? Or do you think something else ought to occur? Do you have faith to say: "Lord, I accept the provisions and the wonderful sacrifice that thus was made as adequate to my salvation and to my ultimate redemption ?"

 

Now, third, do you believe this morning that when the Holy Spirit guided the apostles unto the proclamation of the truth and they finally penned all of that Bible before us— do you believe the Holy Spirit finished his work with reference to the plan of salvation?

 

Is it not strange, friends, that people will be inconsistent and illogical in their reasoning and in their attitude? Now, I am going to say plainly what I have in mind. I have nothing to conceal. Friends, I want you to hear it. There is just as much sense in my falling upon my knees at this hour and asking God Almighty to get up, to design, and to draft another scheme of redemption as there is for me to ask Christ to come to earth again, suffer, and die. Either one of those would smack of infidelity and skepticism. But, further, friends, there is just as much sense, just as much reason, and just as much Bible in my praying to God to get up a new scheme of redemption, and that Christ suffer, sorrow, and die again, as there is for me to ask the Holy Spirit to perform his work a second time or to send some other means to do that which already the Holy Spirit has done. I do not care who it is, the man to-day who is not content with God's plan and with Christ's execution and the Holy Spirit's revelations needs faith in his heart and trust in God Almighty. Hence, the great petitions and the pitiful pleadings of God's Spirit, in some special manner, in some new and untried means, to do something wholly different from that which is revealed, portrays a lack of faith and smacks of skepticism.

 

Friends, I am glad to announce to you that I accept at one hundred per cent the entire plan. I have perfect confidence that it is adequate for the purpose intended, that there is not one single thing lacking, that it needs no supplement or subsidiary support or new orders in this the twentieth century for the accomplishment of the end in view.

 

I believe that God provided for all the race, that Christ tasted death for every man, and that in the Bible, through the Holy Spirit, there is a perfect revelation. I accept the responsibility to believe and obey the gospel and be saved or to reject it and be damned. The gospel is to me a savor of life unto life or of death unto death.

 

In addition to enabling them to perform miracles, let me suggest that the relationship of the Holy Spirit to the apostles was threefold in nature. First, the Holy Spirit was promised them (John 14: 23) for the express purpose of bringing to their remembrance all things whatsoever that the Savior had taught them. Be it remembered that for about three years they had been students under the tutorage and teaching of the Lord Jesus Christ. During that time they had forgotten many of the lessons taught. These things were too important and too serious and there was too much at stake for God to rely upon the frailties and imperfections of humanity's memory; and so the promise was that when the Spirit, which was the Holy Ghost, shall come upon you, which shall proceed from the Father, he will bring to your remembrance all things whatsoever I have commanded you. He will go back to the past, to the very beginning, and review it and keep it ever present before you as an open book so that you will not make a mistake. Hence, the past was provided for by the coming of the Holy Spirit unto the twelve.

 

Now, second, for the present, God said the Holy Spirit will guide you unto all truth. The apostles were standing there with the way before them never having been gone over, the vast wilderness, the vast territory stretching out​ in the great future, and they are to carry out and to blaze the path in which all the rest of the gospel preachers are destined to follow.

 

Now, the Spirit says: "My relation to you as apostles shall not be simply to remind you of the past; but I will guide you unto all truth, and hence see that no mistake is made. For the future I will draw aside the curtain that intervenes and show you things to come."

 

Now, I stop to ask: Do you believe, friends, honestly and candidly, that when the Spirit thus appeared to the apostles and guided them, he did a complete work, or was there something lacking on his side of the great gospel plan of salvation? I am glad to-day to say that I believe confidently and thoroughly that the Holy Spirit went back into the teachings the Savior had given and gathered them up and turned them over to the apostles, and thus they were endued with his power, were enabled to draw upon the great storehouse of information that the Christ had taught them for the three and one-half years; and when they started out from Jerusalem with the old sword in hand to blaze the saplings along the path, I have perfect confidence in the all sufficiency, in the absolute perfection, of that guiding; so that there is not a single, solitary thing God would have you and me to do to-day but that the Spirit guided those apostles unto the proclamation of that truth. The man who feels otherwise needs to bow down to God and say: "Lord, increase my faith in the Jerusalem gospel and in the provisions of the Holy Spirit."

 

I used to drive oxen back on the farm, and many times hauled from the woods and the bottoms timbers round about. Sometimes workmen would go out and make rails, split posts, or cut our winter's wood where there was no road. I did not know the way, and the first trip—mark you, the first trip—one of the workmen who knew it had to come and go with me; and as we drove along, he, in front, with ax in hand, peeled a sapling here and skinned a beech yonder. Thus a path was blazed all the way. I want to ask: Do you think that workman had to go with me the next load? it would be a reflection on me if I could not go there the second time. There were the wagon tracks, there was the bark knocked off, and all I needed to do was to just follow the same road. I could have hauled fifty loads thereafter unaccompanied by the workman direct.

 

Do you know, that is what the Holy Spirit did. He said to these apostles:"I will go with you down the old Jerusalem path." So he started out, blazing the pathway of human redemption; and upon the pages of God's word the bark is peeled off of a sapling here and a blazed tree over there, and another is marked on down the line; and when the whole territory had all been traversed and all the plan revealed and made known, God simply says to you and me to-day: "Follow the blazes, for the Holy Spirit in his miraculous power will not accompany preachers of this age; but follow the PATHS, the old tracks, and the old lines. If you will do that, the same results will follow, as certain as the night follows the day."

 

But the Spirit guided them unto all the truth, and they taught sinners to believe the gospel with all their hearts, repent genuinely of their sine, and publicly confess the Christ, the Son oh God, and to be buried with him in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, and arise to walk in newness of life, and then walk out in that path until by and by Heaven sees fit to claim them as his own. That Is the truth, friends, unto which the Holy Spirit guided the apostles.

 

I bid you now, while together we shall stand and sing the hymn, to walk in wisdom's way.