p. 116 | THE HOLY GHOST

Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Michigan · Feb 19, 1901

THE HOLY GHOST

The King's Messenger

THIS is an age when people dislike the workings and movings of the Holy Ghost. If you don't believe it, watch the spirit of disapproval among fashionable preachers and church-members when some real saint gets burdened for souls, or shouts aloud for joy. Let a repenting sinner become desperately in earnest and begin to scream for mercy, and the baptized worldlings will be completely confounded to know how to relieve him.

During Jesus Christ's dispensation the Jews were continually referring to the dispensation which had just closed. They were living behind the times, and it is just the same to-day. How seldom is to be heard a sermon in one of the fashionable churches on the office and power of the Holy Ghost. They preach about Christ, and all that is said is historical. The reason men do not preach more about the third person in the Godhead is that they do not live in the realm and dispensation of His mighty, supernatural power. Since Holy Writ does not record much about the Holy Ghost, what we positively know about Him must be obtained largely through personal contact in communion with Him.

But even among those who profess to know Him, there seems to be a lack of knowledge of His workings. This accounts for the many errors in doctrine so prevalent everywhere. For instance, some teach that one does not receive the Holy Ghost until he enters upon the “higher life.” They report meetings like this: “There were twenty-five professions to conversion, and thirty professed to receive the Holy Ghost.” This is unscriptural; for when a soul is regenerated, he then receives the Holy Ghost, which is the Spirit of God. Jesus breathed upon the disciples previously to the day of Pentecost, and said, “Receive ye the Holy Ghost.” Afterward they said: “We are His witnesses of these things; and so is also the Holy Ghost, whom God hath given to them that obey Him.”