THE CHURCH THAT WAS AND SHOULD BE.
By Arthur G. Daniells
WHEN Christ began His public ministry, He gathered a little band of humble men about Him. He taught these men the truths concerning the kingdom of heaven, ordained them for service, and sent them forth to minister to their fellow men. He made them the nucleus of His church. At the close of His earthly ministry, when about to leave this world, Jesus told His disciples that another Helper was to be sent to take His place. This successor would not only be with them, but would be in them, to comfort, teach, guide, and empower them for the service to which they were chosen. This promised helper was the Holy Spirit. Christ "rejoiced because of the abundant help he had provided for His church. The Holy Spirit was the highest of all gifts that He could solicit from His Father for the exaltation of His people. This promised blessing, claimed by faith, brings all other blessings in its train." As the representative of Christ, the Holy Spirit is clothed with all the authority and power required to accomplish the purpose of God in the great plan of redemption, and is now to make actual in the hearts of men the salvation that the death of Christ on the cross made possible. It is the Holy Spirit that convicts of sin, produces true repentance, leads to the surrender of self, transforms the life, fills the heart with God's love, brings the thoughts and desires into obedience to Christ, imparts divine life and attributes to the soul, and endues with power for effectual work in soul-winning. This is the mighty work the Spirit of God has been sent to do in sinful flesh. And it is in and through the church that the Holy Spirit is to be manifested to the world. The True Church of Christ
is not confined to any particular race, denomination, sect, or organization. It represents and embraces all who are united to Christ by regeneration. The church is Christ's body; and men and women become members of that body, not by heredity, nor by confirmation, nor by subscribing to a creed, but by union with Christ through faith, repentance, and the forgiveness of sin. The church is Christ's only visible representative on earth. And in order that he might be rightly represented among men, the Saviour prayed His Father to fill His church with the Holy Spirit. By no other means can she correctly represent her Lord. A Spirit-filled church is a church baptized and overflowing with the Spirit of God. What a mighty, moulding, saving influence such a church would have over perishing humanity! It would then indeed be the "light of the world," "fair as the moon, clear as the sun, and terrible as an army with banners;" it would be a "crown of glory in the hand of the Lord, and a royal diadem in the hand of thy God." Christ's promise to send the Holy Spirit to take His place in the church was fulfilled on the Day of Pentecost. The book of Acts is a record of the glorious administration of this Spirit in the apostolic church. Then it was that the church was "baptized with the Holy Ghost." And it was not only baptized, enveloped, overshadowed, but filled with the Holy Spirit. That was indeed a Spirit-filled church, and the record shows what the church was and did when thus filled. And what the church was and did then, it should have continued to be and do until the end of time. But a great, sad change came with the close of that apostolic, Spirit-filled church. The Spirit being denied supreme control in the church, took its departure, and terrible results followed. At no time since then has the Spirit been given its true place in the church, and at no time since then has the church been what it was in apostolic days. Here and there down through the centuries devout believers have given the Spirit its rightful place in their hearts, and their experience has shown what the whole church might have experienced. But a Spirit-filled church is still possible. Yea, more, it is called for, and apostolic compliance now with the conditions upon which the Spirit is promised, will produce a Spirit-filled church now, as of old.