The Full Blessing of Pentecost: How it is to be taught - continued 2

The Full Blessing of Pentecost

- The One Thing Needful
By Andrew Murray 

How it is to be taught

(Excerpts - continued 2)

"And it came to pass that Paul came to Ephesus and finding certain disciples,
He said unto them,
Have ye received the Holy Ghost since ye believed?"
ACTS xix. 1-2.

It is the great work of the gospel ministry to lead believers to the Holy Spirit.

Was it not the great aim of the Lord Jesus, after He had educated and trained His disciples for three years by His intercourse with them,
to lead them up to the point of waiting for the promise of the Father and receiving the Holy Spirit sent down from heaven?

Was not this the chief object of Peter on the day of Pentecost,
when, after summoning those who were pricked in their hearts to repent and be baptized for the forgiveness of sins,
he assured them that they should then receive the Holy Spirit?

Was it not this also that Paul aimed at when in his Epistles he asked his fellow-Christians if they did not know that they were each one "a temple of the Holy Spirit," or reminded them that they had to be "filled with the Holy Spirit"?

Yes: the supreme need of the Christian life is to receive the Holy Spirit,
and when we have it, to be conscious of the fact and live in harmony with it.

An evangelical minister must not merely preach about the Holy Spirit from time to time or even often times,
but also direct all his efforts towards teaching his congregation that there can be no true worship save through the indwelling and unceasing operation of the Holy Spirit.

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To lead believers to the Holy Spirit, the great lack in their life must be pointed out to them.

This was manifestly the intention in Paul's question:
"Have ye receive the Holy Spirit since ye believed?"

Just as only those that are thirsty will drink water with eagerness and only those that are sick will desire a physician,
so it is only when believers are prepared to acknowledge the defective and sinful character of their spiritual condition,
that the preaching of the full blessing of Pentecost will find an entrance into their hearts.

So long as Christians imagine that the only thing lacking in their life is more earnestness, or more importunity, or more strength,
and that if they only obtain these benefits they themselves will become all they ought to be,
the preaching of a full salvation will be of little avail.

It is only when the discovery is made that they are not standing in a right attitude towards the Holy Spirit,
that they have only His preparatory operations, but do not yet know and honour Him in His indwelling,
that the way to something higher will ever be open or even be desired.

For this discovery, it is indispensable that the question should be put to each, man by man, as pointedly and as personally as may be:

"Have ye receive the Holy Spirit since ye believed?"

When the answer shall take the shape of a deeply felt and utterly sincere Alas! the time of revival is not far off.