unfigurative, and efficacious, between the Head and the limb, between the branch and the Root. He effects an influx into the regenerate man of the blessed virtues of the nature of the Second Adam, an infusion of the exalted life of Jesus Christ, through an open duct, living, and divine, into the man who is born again into Him the incarnate and glorified Son of God. I see on the one hand the blessed Spirit poured without measure upon the Head. I see Him on the other hand, not independently of that Head but in deepest relation to Him and union with Him, pouring Himself richly into the member. I see Him the divine Factor in the becoming and being of the Manhood of the Second Adam. I see Him equally the divine Factor in the new creation of the sinner into a true child of God, a true regenerate member of the new race. And all this combines to remind me that the blessed process all the while has Jesus Christ for its inmost Secret. What does the Holy Life-Giver impart, infuse, develop? What is my Life Eternal in the last analysis? Not Himself, the blessed Worker and Conveyer, but my incarnate, sacrificed, and CHRIST OUR LIFE, BY THE SPIRIT. 4I The Spirit glorified Redeemer and Head. pours into me HIM, to be my Eternal Life for deliverance, for victory, for peace, for service, as truly as He the same Saviour is my pardon and righteousness in His once-wrought propitiation. The Life-Giver is the Giver of Christ who is our Life. "Deep through the springs of mind and soul Thy sovereign thoughts our thoughts control, We live in a time when every fundamental of the old and blessed Gospel is too often denied, or disparaged, or minimized, even by commissioned ministers of the Word, in favour of something alleged to be more large, and loving and living. Let us not be moved. Let us not "drift away" with the stream. Let Heb. ii. 1. us not, for lack of taking heed, for lack, above all, of taking heed in secret for ourselves, go away with the multitude. John vi. 66, 67. But meanwhile let our steadfastness and persistence manifest itself never in mere negatives of rebuke or caution, but more and more in the presentation of our glorious positive. In the tranquil power of the Giver of light and life let us evermore bring into our faith and into our teaching that blessed fulness of the truth as it is in Jesus which is nowhere found more certainly than when we view in their harmony, and use them as we view them, those twin treasures of the old unique Gospel -the saving work of Him who is the one Life, and the saving work of Him who is the one Life-Giver. CHAPTER III. HUS far we have dealt almost exclusively THU with the revealed truth of the Blessed Spirit's personality and divine glory, only turning aside to remember that most sacred and wonderful of all His works, His action in the Incarnation of the Lord Jesus Christ and in the Human Life of the Incarnate One. I do not attempt to retrace any of these steps in the present chapter. Only let me again claim for that last aspect of the doctrine of the Spirit the most earnest, reverent, loving attention of the believer, as he "lives by faith in the Son of God." A great wealth of spiritual blessing surely lies ready for use, for the Christian who will recollect it and use it, in the truth of the Spirit's work for, on, and in, the Incarnate Lord. That work, that unspeakably deep and precious connexion of the Spirit Gal, ii. 20. with the Redeemer in the work of redemption, is meant to throw the full light of life eternal upon our connexion by the Spirit with Christ Jesus, esus, who is our Life. We shall recur often to this side of truth in later pages; but let it be kept always in view. We, every one of us who believe on the name of the Son of 1 Cor. vi. 17. God, are "joined unto Him, one Spirit." Our contact, our union, our embodiment, is such as to be rightly described in the holy Word by that surprising phrase. And is not light thrown upon the phrase by the remembrance that the Spirit who has given us our Life, who has imparted to us Christ, is indeed the Spirit of Christ, not only in the inner relations of Deity, but in the blessed Incarnation of our glorious Head? He who is Himself thus doubly united to Christ-if I may express it so-can He not indeed with richest and holiest fulness pour into us Christ's members the power and virtues of our Head? Indeed He can. And we therefore, the favoured members, will bear that fact in wondering and loving memory. We will cherish it in our heart of hearts. We will use it in our hourly |