CHRIST'S PLACE IN THE SPIRIT'S WORK. 35

strengthen our "faith in the operation of God," to impart a growing definite- Col. ii. 12. ness of view, and a fuller peace in the heart, and a more humble adoration, as we ponder our own transition, by the power of the Spirit, from death unto life," and onwards always to "life more abundant."

John v. 24;

X. 10.

For in this recollection of the truth of the Spirit's work on and in the Manhood of our blessed Head we are brought directly to a fuller recollection also of the PLACE OF CHRIST

(if I may express myself so) in the Holy Spirit's saving work for us. Let us take this up as our closing topic for this chapter.

We who believe indeed in the Lord Jesus Christ know on the evidence of God's Word that we owe our saving faith to the Lord the Spirit, "the "the Spirit of faith." We 2 Cor. iv. 13. who were once "dead in trespasses Eph. ii. 1. and sins," and who now live, know on the same evidence that we were, in "abundant mercy," "born of the Spirit," and that every step which we take in we take "by the Spirit." Is the

John iii. 8.

that life

Gal. v. 25.

sound" of regenerate vitality and action

"heard," in however small a whisper yet audibly, in our souls and in the outward life which manifests their condition? It is the blessed Spirit's presence in special grace. It is the evidence, the one evidence, of our real new birth, new creation, by Him. I say, it is the one evidence of this. For let us remember that across all the problems of sacramental operation we must read always those words of our Lord about the mystic Wind. Wherever that Wind is, yes, wherever it is, by its very nature as wind it moves; it is not merely latent; it is heard: "Thou hearest the sound thereof; so is every one that is born of the Spirit." But on this I do not linger now.1 Our concern now is with the experiences of the life of grace in Christ, and their connexion with the personal working of the Spirit. AccordI Pet. i. 2. ingly, "in the sanctification of the Spirit," that is to say in His whole work of our separation to God, we were by Him at John xvi. 8. first brought through conviction I Pet. i. 2. "unto obedience to, and bloodsprinkling of, Jesus Christ." And when the

1 See further below, p. 74.

OUR NEW LIFE ALL BY THE SPIRIT.

37

last step of the blessed process shall come, and we shall rise transfigured from the grave, possessing" the adoption, to wit Rom. viii. 23. the redemption of our body," it will still and for ever be "because of the Spirit Rom. viii. 11. who dwelleth in us." Between this Alpha and this Omega of our personal salvation all is of "the same Spirit." Does the peaceful power of grace pervade our regenerate being, and claim effectually for our Lord all we are and all we have, and bring spirit, soul, and body into a delightful captivity and bondservice to our Head and Possessor? It is Eph. v. 18. "the fulness of the Spirit." Do we day by day "mortify the deeds of the body"? It is "by the Spirit." Do we in truth Rom. viii. 13. breathe "the Abba, that prayer of faith alone"? It is the Spirit, the Spirit of adoption, the Spirit of God's Son in our hearts. Do we pray in truth the prayer of

Rom. viii. 15, 17.
Gal. iv. 6.

Jude 20.

holy faith and love, the prayer that asks according to His will? It is "in the Holy Ghost" it is "the Spirit making intercession for us with groanings that Rom. viii. 26. cannot be uttered." Do " we wait by faith for

Gal. v. 5.

the hope of righteousness," the glory reserved for the justified? It is "by the Spirit." Does "Christ dwell in our hearts by faith?" It is because the Spirit has "strengthEph. iii. 16. ened us with might in our inner man.

Am I needlessly dwelling upon truths which are, thanks be to God, our most familiar friends among the treasures of the Gospel? It is not wholly for argument that I do so. To me there seems to lie in the very recitation of our creed of the Hidden Life a charm and power which the Spirit Himself can wonderfully employ to revive or to develop in the soul the realization and the use of the precious things which are in some respects so familiar.

But I come now to what was my main reason for this review of some of the blessings given us by the Lord the Life-Giver. I come to say something of the Place of Christ in the Spirit's work.

And here for the present I will speak not only briefly but in one direction alone. I will not dwell upon the all-beloved truth of the propitiating Cross, and upon the Spirit's witness to it in our awakened hearts. I will not dwel

THE SPIRIT UNITES US TO CHRIST.

39

at all indeed upon the Spirit's witness to the Lord Jesus. I look at present in the direction only of our UNION with Jesus Christ in new birth and life by the Spirit.

John xi. 25;

xiv. 6.

The Spirit, as our Communion Creed confesses, is the Life-Giver, the Maker-alive.1 But what is the LIFE which He gives, with which He works? I listen, and I hear another Voice, which is yet as if also His; and it says, "I am the Life." "The Life Eternal is in the Son;" "He that hath the Son hath the Life." I John v. 12. I read these great, these blessed words in the light of what we have recollected now of the Holy Spirit's work on and in the Holy Son of Man; and I thus see in them a remembrance that what the Spirit does in His free and allpowerful work in the soul which He quickens into second life is, above all things, to bring it into contact with the Son. He roots it, He grafts it, He embodies it, into the Son. He deals so with it that there is a continuity wholly spiritual indeed but none the less most real,

1 Τὸ Ζωοποιόν.