rit of God;" but God is a Spirit; and therefore the Spirit of God, though he may be personally, cannot be essentially different from God himself. Having thus evinced the distinct Personality and absolute Divinity of the Holy Ghost, we now proceed, with increased reverence, to consider the Office he vouchsafes to sustain in the work of our salvation. Much confusion has arisen in men's minds, from a want of due circumspection and mutual understanding in the use of the terms, by which the different branches of that Office have been designated. The learned and judicious Bishop Pearson, in his Exposition of the Creed, includes the whole under the general term Sanctification, which he subdivides into general Revelation, individual Illumination, Regeneration, Assistance and Direction, Union with Christ, Assurance of Adoption, and Ministerial Ordination. The chief confusion has been occasioned by a want of uniformity in the meaning attached to the word Regeneration, which is sometimes used to denote the commencement, and sometimes the maturity of Christian Sanctification. Similar ambigui 3 Rom. viii. 9. ties of speech are of frequent occurrence, and are, perhaps, unavoidable consequences of the imperfection of human language; (F) particularly when employed upon spiritual subjects, for the clear representation of which it is altogether inadequate, and can only convey an obscure idea of many most interesting truths through the complicated medium of allegorical figures. The sources of these figures, again, are circumscribed and confined within very narrow bounds, by the puny capacity of us to whom they are addressed; so that, from the limited means of representation, and the boundless extent of the subjects to be represented, a very minute change in the former frequently indicates a great difference in the latter. Thus, in the case before us, the pardon of original sin, and admission into covenant with God by Baptism, which is now, generally speaking, the first operation of the Spirit in the sanctification of an individual, is called by our Lord, in his conversation with Nicodemus, " being born again." And the reception of the "spirit of Adoption, whereby we cry Abba, Father;"4 that is, whereby we are assured that we are at that moment, and, if we be 4. Rom. viii. 15. true to ourselves, may continue to all eternity, "the children of God," inasmuch as we feel ourselves "led by the Spirit of God” to yield a willing obedience to his holy commandments-this happy state, which comprises the greatest maturity of sanctification attainable here below, is called by St John "being born of God." Thus the commencement and achievement of all that the Spirit does for an individual in this life, are represented by figures very minutely differing from each other; and by not attending to the difference that does exist in the signs, too many have lost sight of the important difference in the things signified. They include both figures under the common name of Regeneration, or New Birth; and then, arguing from analogy, and from those passages of Scripture which refer to our being " born again," that the new birth is the commencement, and from those which refer to our being "born of God," that it is the perfection of human sanctification here on earth, they insist that there is no interval between the beginning and the completion of our sanctification; that the Spirit does his whole work at once; that the transition from absolute darkness to the clear 5 Rom. viii. 14. est light, from gross carnal-mindedness and depravity to the highest state of Christian perfection, is instantaneous; and that, therefore, whoever have not "the earnest of the Spirit," and "the love of God shed abroad in their hearts by the Holy Ghost," are "without Christ, aliens from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers from the covenants of promise, having no hope, and without God in the world."8 Would men, however, come to the study of the Scriptures with more humble and teachable minds; would they more industriously employ the reason which God has given them, and place it more meekly under the guidance of the Spirit of Truth, they might easily discover that it is not thus the Spirit helpeth our infirmities; but that, feeding us first with milk, and then with stronger meat, he, as an affectionate parent, gradually brings us up from infancy to maturity, from babes in Christ "to perfect men, to the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ." The very figures employed by our Saviour and by St John, nearly as they resemble each other, may, if attentively considered, be perceived to be sufficiently different, to mark 6 2 Cor. v. 5. 7 Rom. v. 5. 8 Ephes. ii. 12. the difference of the things they represent. The expression born again, clearly refers to a previous birth, namely, the natural, by which we are "born in sin, and the children of wrath." It is therefore, with peculiar propriety, employed by our Lord to denote that operation of the Spirit in baptism, by which we are delivered from the guilt of original sin, and "made the children of grace;" being made capable of attaining to true faith and obedience, and thus obtaining "power to become the sons of God." The expression born of God has, on the other hand, no reference to any previous birth, but merely to a state in which we were not the children of God. Baptism, though it makes us children of grace, does not necessarily make us at the same time, in this peculiar sense, children of God.(&) This is a higher degree, to which we do not attain till, by duly availing ourselves of the grace and power conferred by baptism, we become possessed of a genuine and lively faith in Christ Jesus, a willing heart to obey his commandments, and a meek and quiet spirit, entirely given up to the guidance of the Spirit of God. Then, and not till then, we know that we are the children of God, for "as many as are led 9 John, i. 12. |