of grace, seek him diligently, but, seek him with a patient, submissive, and childlike spirit. You SHALL as certainly find him, as that he is now exalted upon his throne, "a Prince and a Saviour, to give repentance to Israel, and forgiveness of sins."

A word in conclusion. The Spirit comforts the believer by unfolding to his eye the near prospect of the coming glorg. Heaven is near at hand. It is but a step out of a poor, sinful, sorrow-stricken world, into the ́rest that remaineth for the people of God. It is but a moment, the twinkling of an eye, and we are absent from the body and are present with the Lord. Then will the days of our mourning be ended,—then sin will grieve no more and affliction will wound no more and sorrow will depress no more, and God will hide himself no more. There will be the absence of all evil, and the presence of all good; and they who have come out of great tribulation, and have washed their robes, and made them white in the blood of the Lamb, shall take their stand before the throne of God, and shall "serve him day and night in his temple: and he that sitteth on the throne shall dwell among them. They shall hunger no neither shall the sun

more, neither thirst any more: light on them, nor any heat. For the Lamb which is in the midst of the throne shall feed them, and shall lead them unto living fountains of waters: and God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes." Wherefore, beloved in the Lord, let us comfort one another with these words, and with this prospect.

CHAPTER X.

THE INBEING AND OPERATIONS OF THE SPIRIT IN CHRIST.

"And the Spirit of the Lord shall rest upon him, the spirit of wisdom and understanding; the spirit of counsel and might; the spirit of knowledge and of the fear of the Lord.” — Isa. xi. 2.

To whom but the Lord Jesus can these words refer? He alone is the 'rod' arising out of the stem of Jesse,' the branch growing out of his roots,' the lineal descendant of the royal house of David; yet in the circumstances of his parentage, birth, and subsequent life, poor, mean, and lowly, -as saith the same prophet, a "root out of a dry ground; he hath no form nor comeliness; and when we shall see him, there is no beauty that we should desire him." To this agrees the testimony of Paul in his argument on the Messiahship of Christ addressed to the Jews: "And when he had removed him (Saul) he raised up unto them David to be their king, to whom also he gave testimony, and said, I have found David the son of Jesse, a man after mine own heart, which shall fulfil all my will. Of this man's seed hath God according to his promise raised unto Israel a Saviour, Jesus." Clearly, then, is it a beautiful and striking prophecy of Christ, upon whom the Spirit of the Lord in such plenitude and richness was to rest. ( 280 )

In the preceding pages we have presented to view, in various points of light, the different actings of the Holy Spirit in the believer; tracing them from the first conviction of sin in the soul to its 'sealing unto the day of Jesus Christ.' There is yet another and a deeper unfolding of the Spirit's operation not hitherto, or but indirectly, touched upon; and yet so closely allied to his work in the regenerate as not to be overlooked and disregarded. We allude to the OPERATION OF THE SPIRIT IN CHRIST. In treating this subject, we purpose, in the first place, making a few observations explanatory of the doctrine of the indwelling of the Spirit in our Lord. This will prepare us for considering some of his operations in Christ. We shall then be conducted to the practical instructions which this truth conveys.

The doctrine of the indwelling of the Holy Spirit in the Lord Jesus would seem at first sight to be a most inexplicable one; if not contradictory of other doctrines of the Bible long and fondly cherished by the Christian church. But as we advance step by step in its elucidation, with the same Spirit for our guide, we shall not find it difficult, we trust, to comprehend a truth so clearly one of express revelation, and fraught with such immense

blessing to the believer.

We commence with a broad and emphatic declaration of the absolute Deity of the Son of God. The very nature of which doctrine must exclude all idea of an indwelling of the Spirit in Christ considered as God. The Deity of our Lord could not depend for one moment upon the Spirit. That instant it felt its dependency, it ceased to be divine. It is the glory of God that He is independent and self-existent; deriving neither His being nor His happiness from any others, while all others necessarily

derive both from Him. Thus the indwelling of the Spirit had no reference to the Godhead of our Lord; that standing alone, independent, self-existent, resplendent in its own essential, uncreated glory. Let no man lightly esteem this doctrine. Its rejection involves a virtual rejection of every fundamental doctrine of revealed religion. "He that denieth the Son hath not the Father." Words that should sink down into the ears in tones of awful import and solemnity. In vain we attempt to worship God, while we rob His Son of his essential glory. In vain we profess to serve Him, while in doing so we trample in contempt beneath our feet His 'unspeakable gift.' Will God regard such worship, or accept such service? Never! If we destroy the only 'glass' in which He is perfectly seen, how can we know Him? And if we turn from the only 'door' by which he is approached, how can we come unto him? The Son of God is that glass;' for "no man knoweth the Father but he to whom the Son shall reveal him.” The Son of God is that Door;' for he hath so emphatically declared it,"No man cometh unto the Father but by me." O tremble at entertaining the shadow of a thought derogatory to the essential dignity of the Son of God! He whom you ignorantly worship has issued His command and rolled His tremendous thunder round the universe, "All men shall honour the Son even as they honour the Father."

We proceed now to state in what part of our Lord's twofold or complex nature the Holy Spirit dwelt; and to whose inbeing and operation we are to ascribe so much of the remarkable and the glorious in his wondrous life. The humanity of our Lord was that nature. As man, the "Spirit of the Lord rested upon him, the spirit of

wisdom and understanding, the spirit of counsel and might, the spirit of knowledge and of the fear of the Lord." Now it is of the utmost importance in the further discussion of this subject, that we keep clearly in view the perfect manhood of our Lord, else we shall find it difficult to comprehend many things which can only be predicated of his inferior nature. When the Holy Ghost therefore affirms that the "Word was made flesh" that as the "children are partakers of flesh and blood, he also himself likewise took part of the same;" that he was "bone of our bone, and flesh of our flesh," then we hesitate not to give the fullest credenee to the doctrine which teaches the pure and perfect humanity as part of the mysteriously-constituted person of "God manifest in the flesh." In no sense whatever must the humanity of our Lord be considered as partaking of the substance of that divinity. It was not deified in any degree by its union with the Deity, any more than the Deity was humanized by its union with the humanity. The similarity of our Lord's human nature with ours, runs its parallel to the utmost limit, with the exception, emphatically expressed, and when not expressed, always so understood, of his perfect sinlessness. All the essential properties of our nature he assumed, reason, conscience, will, affections, desires; in a word, all the affinities of which our material humanity is composed, belonged to him. "He took not upon him the nature of angels, but he took upon him the seed of Abraham.”

Now in this perfect and pure humanity the Holy Ghost entered and dwelt. To his influence are we to ascribe those actions which threw such interest and beauty around every step of the Lord's short but eventful life as man. We have thus, as briefly as the importance of the sub