the most dreadful maledictions, the hardest and harshest words of denunciation, the most fearful curses that ever fell from human lips, came from this gentle, tender, patient, suffering, loving Christ. Read his words to those false-hearted moralists, the Pharisees; see him when he drove the buyers and sellers from the holy temple; hear him upbraid the cities which repented not at his coming; mark his words to Judas who betrayed him; and from all these examples learn that he who loves as no one ever loved before, can also have enkindled within him a fire of wrath that will burn to the lowest hell. Now Christ asks of those who would be his followers, not a love that equals his, but that which resembles it; not love of the same strength, but of the same kind. A pearl of dew will not hold the sun, but it can hold a spark of its light. A child by the sea trying to catch the crystal spray cannot hold the ocean in its tiny shell, but he can hold a drop of the ocean water. So with true Christian love as compared with Christ's love. It must be a genuine drop from His infinite sea. THE HOLY SPIRIT. "Holy Ghost dispel our blindness, Pierce the clouds of sinful night; HO and what is the Holy Spirit, and what are his offices in the Church and in the world, are questions second in importance to none that can be viewed by a Christian mind. Christ said at one time that unless he should go away (that is go back to the right hand of God above) the Spirit would not descend upon his people, and consequently the work in them and through them which the Spirit has since performed, would never have been accomplished. There will always be more or less of mystery connected with these utterances of our Lord. Why the Holy Spirit could not operate when Christ was personally on earth, and why he did not operate more powerfully during the three years of Christ's personal ministry, are matters that can never be fully understood by us, until we understand all the relations which exist between the three persons that compose the Triune Deity. The simple scriptural facts are, that the Spirit did not operate as powerfully as afterward, until Christ went away and sent him down; and that, after he was sent, the work accomplished by him exceeded all that had been done before. How many disciples Christ himself made when on earth we have no means of definitely ascertaining. Great multitudes followed him, and were healed by him, and fed by him, and a great many believed on him in different parts of the country, but how many were spiritually regenerated, as they have been since the advent of the Spirit, we cannot say. Christ's life and ministry on earth were not a failure by any means, neither did they accomplish all that we would naturally think ought to have been accomplished, considering who the teacher and preacher was that labored. Three things, without doubt, combined to make this difference. Christ had not yet died for our sins, according to the Scriptures. He had not yet risen again for our justification, and ascended up on high as our Intercessor and Advocate. The Holy Spirit had not yet taken his full place in the scheme of redemption. But at Pentecost, the sacrifice had been offered, and the resurrection and ascension were facts testified to by friends and enemies; then, last of all, the keystone of the spiritual arch, that which completed and held together, and made effective all that had been done before, was dropped into its place, when "There came a sound from heaven, as of a rushing, mighty wind, filling the house where the disciples (120 in number) were gathered, and appearing as cloven tongues of fire, sitting upon each of them, and causing them all to be filled with the Holy Ghost, and to speak with other tongues, as the Spirit gave them utterance." And as far as the Scriptures represent, had not this last work been performed, the arch would not have been complete, neither could it have stood firm. The scheme of redemption would have been defective, and the gospel shorn of its sin-subduing and heartconquering power. The Church would not have been born as a propagating agency, and the millions who have believed would never have enjoyed, as they have since, the blessings of spiritual power. Glorious day for man when the communication between heaven and earth was fully established; when an invisible cable-wire extended from every believing heart straight up to the eternal throne on which messages could be dispatched both ways, and by which God's light and love and power and blessing could be received and felt in human hearts and homes. A day hardly inferior to that in which the babe of Bethlehem was born, or that in which the heavens were shrouded in blackness, or that in which the great stone was rolled away from Christ's tomb. A COMFORTER. The word Comforter in the Bible is not an adequate representation of the original term. In fact, there is no one English word that does represent it fully. It is found only five times in the New Testament; four times in two chapters of John's gospel which were spoken by Christ at one time just before his arrest, and once in the first letter of John (ii: 2,) where it is translated Advocate, and applied to Christ himself : "If any man sin we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous." Paracletos signifies primarily a helper, an assistant, a representative, as well as a comforter and an advocate, thus showing how many are the offices which the Holy Spirit performs in the work of salvation and sanctification, and how full of power and blessing he can be made to man's soul. It is significant also that Christ chose this word at a time when he wished to instruct his disciples fully concerning their future life and work, and also to take their minds off from himself and transfer them to this other helper which he was about to send them. While reference is made to the Holy Spirit and his work some 300 times in the New Testament, yet he is called the Paraclete only five times. Why is this? We reply, it is to set forth the relation of the Holy Spirit to the triune Godhead, and also set forth the very important relation which he was henceforth to sustain to Christians and the world. Said Christ in the 14th chapter of John, "If ye love me, keep my commandments, and I will pray the Father and he shall give you another comforter (or helper) that he may abide with you forever." Notice here that Christ places the Holy Spirit on a level with himself, thus making him God. Another comforter, another helper, another representative like myself. And he shall be to you more than I have been. Therefore, "it is expedient for you that I go away, for if I go not away he cannot come." This person whom Christ. was to send was to come from the Father, even as he had come, thus indicating equality of origin and |