The Spirit and the Word: A Treatise on the Holy Spirit in the Light of a Rational Interpretation of the Word of TruthSweeney, Z. T. (Zachary Taylor)
Religion
The Spirit and the Word: A Treatise on the Holy Spirit in the Light of a Rational Interpretation of the Word of Truth
Sweeney, Z. T. (Zachary Taylor)
Holy Spirit
Paul tells Timothy: "The things thou hast heard of me among many
witnesses, the same commit thou to faithful men who shall be able to
teach others also." Was that not an impertinence in Paul if Timothy had
the same divine leading as he? Was it not impertinence in Jude to say
that the faith was "once for all delivered to the saints," if there were
deliverances being constantly made? What need to preach the gospel to
the heathen world if God is directly leading men into the truth? What
need for a New Testament if all men possess this Paraclete? How can one
man deny the claims of another whom he admits to be divinely guided into
all truth?
Some have thought that Christ bestowed the Paraclete upon the apostles
when he breathed upon them and said: "Receive ye the Holy Spirit." At
best that was a prophetic and not an actual bestowal, for after that
onbreathing we find Peter (Acts I) calling upon the assembly of brethren
to _take a vote_ as to who should succeed Judas in the apostolic
college. If he had possessed the Paraclete at that time, he would not
have been compelled to resort to the judgment of his brethren to
determine such a question. Moreover, Christ indicated when the Paraclete
would come, by stating the work that would follow his coming: "_When he
is come_ he shall convict the world [age] of sin, of righteousness and
of judgment." How did he do this?
1. His first act at his coming was to baptize the apostles in the Spirit
and endow them with the Paraclete. "Ye shall be baptized in the Holy
Spirit not many days hence" (Acts 1:5).
2. When the Spirit baptized these apostles with divine guidance he began
his work of convicting the world through them.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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