The Person and Work of The Holy SpiritTorrey, R. A. (Reuben Archer)
Religion
The Person and Work of The Holy Spirit
Torrey, R. A. (Reuben Archer)
Holy Spirit
In the first place _the baptism with the Holy Spirit is a definite
experience of which one may and ought to know __ whether he has received
it or not_. This is evident from our Lord’s command to His disciples in
Luke xxiv. 49 and in Acts i. 4, that they should not depart from Jerusalem
to undertake the work which He had commissioned them to do until they had
received this promise of the Father. It is also evident from the eighth
chapter of Acts, fifteenth and sixteenth verses, where we are distinctly
told, “_the Holy Spirit had not as yet fallen upon any of them_.” It is
evident also from the nineteenth chapter of the Acts of the Apostles, the
second verse, R. V., where Paul put to the little group of disciples at
Ephesus the definite question, “Did ye receive the Holy Ghost when ye
believed?” It is evident that the receiving of the Holy Ghost was an
experience so definite that one could answer yes or no to the question
whether they had received the Holy Spirit. In this case the disciples
definitely answered, “No,” that they did not so much as hear whether the
Holy Ghost was given. They did not say what our Authorized Version makes
them say, that they did not so much as hear whether there was any Holy
Ghost. They knew that there was a Holy Ghost; they knew furthermore that
there was a definite promise of the baptism with the Holy Ghost, but they
had not heard that that promise had been as yet fulfilled. Paul told them
that it had and took steps whereby they were definitely baptized with the
Holy Spirit before that meeting closed. It is equally evident from Gal.
iii. 2 that the baptism with the Holy Spirit is a definite experience of
which one may know whether he has received it or not. In this passage Paul
says to the believers in Galatia, “This only would I learn of you,
Received ye the Spirit by the works of the law, or by the hearing of
faith?” Their receiving the Spirit had been so definite as a matter of
personal consciousness, that Paul could appeal to it as a ground for his
argument. In our day there is much talk about the baptism with the Holy
Spirit and prayer for the baptism with the Spirit that is altogether vague
and indefinite. Men arise in meeting and pray that they may be baptized
with the Holy Spirit, and if you should go afterwards to the one who
offered the prayer and put to him the question, “Did you receive what you
asked? Were you baptized with the Holy Spirit?” it is quite likely that he
would hesitate and falter and say, “I hope so”; but there is none of this
indefiniteness in the Bible. The Bible is clear as day on this, as on
every other point. It sets forth an experience so definite and so real,
that one may know whether or not he has received the baptism with the Holy
Spirit, and can answer yes or no to the question, “Have you received the
Holy Ghost?”
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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