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not see a proof of coëquality, especially as in the first passage God is represented as "even our Father." But read the 11th and 12th, as well as the 13th, ver. of 1 Thess. iii. "Now God Himself, and our Father, and our Lord Jesus Christ, direct our way unto you, and the Lord (evidently the Lord Jesus just referred to) make you to increase and abound in love one toward another, and toward all men, even as we do toward you; to the end he may stablish your hearts unblameable in holiness before God, even our Father, at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, with all his saints." "The Lord direct your hearts into the love of God, and into the patient waiting for Christ." Here the Apostle "prays God to guide their hearts into the love of God, and the imitation of the patience of Christ in waiting for his appearing" (Jowett). Compare 1 Thess. i. 10, "Ye turn from idols to serve the living and true God, and to wait for His Son from Heaven, whom He raised from the dead."

The last "sealing testimony" alleged is from the Book of Revelation. It is asked what place the Spirit had on that wondrous occasion when the Lamb received the Book from Him that sat on the throne? And this, in substance, is Mr. Bickersteth's answer: The Lamb had seven horns and seven eyes, which are the seven spirits of God sent forth into all the earth; it is argued that the seven spirits are the Holy Spirit; therefore, the Holy Spirit partakes of the homage addressed to the Lamb. But if, as it seems to me, the homage the Lamb received in this sublime imagery be not inconsistent with Christ's own plain words, "the true worshippers are they who worship the

Father," the Holy Spirit's share of homage as the seven horns and the seven eyes, even supposing the assumed interpretation to be the true one, will still leave the supreme glory, dominion, and majesty to the Father alone. (Vide p. 126.)

I beg the reader to consider the foregoing evidence, and ask himself whether, in kind or amount, it be such as we might expect if in our Psalms, and Prayers, and Litanies, we are to worship the Holy Spirit in parity with the Father? To my Trinitarian brother, I would say, think of the calls we have to worship Him who was, and is, and is to come-think of their nature as well as their multitude, their unmistakeable simplicity, and the distinct manner in which they confine the highest worship to Him, and then, at least, you will understand, and I hope feel charitably towards those who pray to the Father through Jesus Christ, instead of joining you in your worship of a triune God. Where is there any passage in the Old or New Testament of this kind, When ye pray, say, O God the Holy Spirit, or, The true worshippers are they who worship the Spirit, or, Worship the Holy Ghost in parity with the Father and the Son? If the Holy Spirit were an object of worship, we might suppose it would be addressed as Comforter by the Apostle Paul in any time of particular distress in the churches over which he watched, but in reality we find him looking for comfort to the "Lord Jesus Christ himself, and to God, even our Father, who hath loved us, and hath given us everlasting consolation and good hope through grace," 2 Thess. ii. 16.* Mr. Bickersteth,

* Origen enters into the question whether prayer is to be

indeed, seems conscious of the weakness of the evidence he has advanced, and says "the glories of his person are only rarely disclosed in full view, his worship is comparatively withdrawn from observation ;" but I cannot help feeling that much more is implied in the absence of all clear argument, and in the following facts:

(1) In the New Testament there is no distinct instance of prayer to the Holy Spirit, no ascription of praise, no doxology.

(2) When, in the fourth century, the doctrine of the Trinity was adopted in nearly its present form, there was no Scriptural doxology that suited it, and a new one had to be made, though the New Testament abounds in doxologies.

(3) The original form of the Gloria Patri appears to have been, "To the Father, through the Son, in the Holy Spirit," or, "in the Son and Holy Spirit," not and the Son, and the Holy Ghost.

(4) The original Nicene Creed (A.D. 325) contains, on this head, simply, "we believe also in the Holy Spirit." But in 381, the Council of Constantinople added, "the Lord and Giver of life, who proceedeth from the Father, who with the Father and Son together is worshipped and glorified." In the ninth century another addition was made, viz., to the clause "proceeding from the Father," was added "and the Son."

offered to the Son as well as to the Father; but Hagenbach observes, "It is remarkable that no mention is made of the Holy Spirit. If Origen had held the doctrine of the trinity, he would have spoken not of two, but of three, to whom prayers are to be addressed."

(5) Gieseler, in his Church History (vol. i. p. 164, Clarke's ed.), gives the following account of early opinion respecting the Spirit. "Most difficult were the questions as to the essence of the Logos in relation to the Father, and his agency in relation to that of the Holy Spirit. With regard to the former point, there were several who did not assume a personal distinction of the Logos from the Father. But the view was more generally adopted that he was a divine person, less than the Father, and produced out of His essence according to the will of the latter. Agreeably to both views, the Logos was the God working all in the finite, so that no room appeared to be left for the agency of the Holy Spirit. Accordingly, the doctrine of the Holy Spirit still remained entirely undeveloped."*

(6) The earliest charge against the philosophizing Christians was that of introducing a second God.

One practical remark. In the doctrine of the personality of the Spirit, as God with a distinct function from that of the Father, I cannot but feel that from the Father is taken His most loved and

*For when all others who held our doctrines were divided into three classes, the faith of many being unsound respecting the Son, that of still more concerning the Holy Spirit (on which subject, to be least impious was thought to be piety), and a small number being sound in both respects, he (Athanasius) first and alone, or with a very few, had the courage to profess in writing, clearly and explicitly, the true doctrine of the one Godhead, and nature of the three persons. Thus that truth, a knowledge of which, as far as regards the Son, had been vouchsafed to most of the fathers before, he was finally inspired to maintain in respect to the Holy Spirit." Gregory Nazienzen (Norton's

Statement of Reasons, p. 5).

158 THE PERSONALITY OF THE HOLY SPIRIT.

loving work, viz., the care of the spirits of His children. Assuredly it is not the Father's chief and peculiar office merely to superintend the material universe and the order of events, leaving to others the redemption, sanctification, and nurture of souls. In all that Christ does for us, we feel that the Father is working in him, and every operation of the Spirit within us is a silent and secret communion with the Father. Mr. Bickersteth says, "Suppose in a volume of history you met with the following passage, 'The prince having left this province thought good that his Majesty's power should occupy his room;"" the power is then represented as having personal qualities, and we are asked whether we could doubt for a moment that it was a personal intelligent agent. The prince having left this province! This is a very significant passage, and makes me feel deeply how Trinitarianism removes the Father to a distance, and separates Him from our hearts. If our heavenly Father had gone away, we should indeed need a person in His stead, but as He Himself is never far from any one of us, surely we can trace His Holy Spirit to no other such divine and blessed source as the bosom of His owu love.

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