But he was regenerate, you say. And if so, he was an instance of the Spirit's work, a receiver of the Spirit's presence. It is so; not without the Spirit, working in him, could he "delight in the law of God," and "with his true self serve the law of God." But does this necessarily mean that he, as a conscious agent, was fully using his eternal Guest as his power and victory? We are not merely discussing a literary passage. We are pondering an oracle of God about man. So we turn full upon the reader--and upon ourselves--and ask the question, whether the heart cannot help to expound this hard paragraph. Christian man, by grace,--that is to say, by the Holy Spirit of God,--you have believed, and live. You are a limb of Christ, who is your life. But you are a sinner still; always, actually, in defect, and in tendency; always, potentially, in ways terribly positive. For whatever the presence of the Spirit in you has done, it has not so altered you that, if He should go, you would not _instantly_ "revert to the type" of unholiness. Now, how do you meet temptation from without? How do you deal with the dread fact of guilty imbecility within? Do you, if I may put it so, use regenerate faculty in unregenerate fashion, meeting the enemy _practically_ alone, with only high resolves, and moral scorn of wrong, and assiduous processes of discipline on body or mind? God forbid we should call these things evil. They are good. But they are the accidents, not the essence, of the secret; the wall, not the well, of power and triumph. It is the Lord Himself dwelling in you who is your victory; and that victory is to be realized by a conscious and decisive appeal to Him. "Through Him you shall do valiantly; for He it is that shall tread down your enemies" (Psal. lx. 12). And is not this verified in your experience? When, in your regenerate state, you use the true regenerate way, is there not a better record to be given? When, realizing that the true principle is indeed a Person, you less resolve, less struggle, and more appeal and confide--is not sin's "reign" broken, and is not your foot, even yours, because you are in conscious union with the Conqueror, placed effectually on "all the power of the enemy"? We are aware of the objection ready to be made, and by devout and reverent men. It will be said that the Indwelling Spirit works always through the being in whom He dwells; and that so we are not to think of Him as a separable Ally, but just to _act ourselves_, leaving it to Him to act through us. Well, we are willing to state the matter almost exactly in those last words, as theory. But the subject is too deep--and too practical--for neat logical consistency. He does indeed work in us, and through us. But then--it is HE. And to the hard pressed soul there is an unspeakable reality and power in thinking of Him as a separable, let us say simply a personal, Ally, who is also Commander, Lord, Life-Giver; and in calling Him definitely in.