WORK OF GOD’S SPIRIT
“Do not err, my beloved brethren; every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and cometh down from the Father of lights.”
This text, I believe more and more every day, is one of the most important ones in the whole Bible; and just at this time it is more important for us than ever, because people have forgotten it more than ever.
And, according as you firmly believe this text, according as you firmly believe that every good gift you have in body and soul comes down from above, from God the Father of lights—according, I say, as you believe this, and live upon that belief, just so far will you be able to do your duty to God and man, worthily of your blessed Saviour’s calling and redemption, and of the high honour which He has given you of being free and christened men, redeemed by His most precious blood, and led by His most noble Spirit.
Now, just because this text is so important, the devil is particularly busy in trying to make people forget it. For what is his plan? Is it not to make us forget God, to put God out of all our thoughts, to make us acknowledge God in none of our ways, to make us look at ourselves and not at God, that so we may become first earthly and sensual, and then devilish, like Satan himself? Therefore he tries to make us disbelieve this text. He puts into our hearts such thoughts as these:—‘Ay, all good gifts may come from God; but that only means all spiritual gifts. All those fine, deep doctrines and wonderful feelings that some very religious people talk of, about conversion, and regeneration, and sanctification, and assurance, and the witness of the indwelling Spirit,—all those gifts come from God, no doubt, but they are quite above us. We are straightforward, simple people, who cannot feel fine fancies; if we can be honest, and industrious, and good-natured, and sober, and strong, and healthy, that is enough for us,—and all that has nothing to do with religion. Those are not gifts which come from God. A man is strong and healthy by birth, and honest and good-natured by nature. Those are very good things; but they are not gifts—they are not graces—they are not spiritual blessings—they have nothing to do with the state of a man’s soul. Ungodly people are honest, and good-tempered, and industrious, and healthy, as well as your saints and your methodists; so what is the use of praying for spiritual gifts to God, when we can have all we want by nature?’
Did such thoughts never come into your head, my friends? Are they not often in your heads, more or less? Perhaps not in these very words, but something like them.
I do not say it to blame you, for I believe that every man, each according to his station, is tempted to such thoughts; I believe that such thoughts are not yours or any man’s; I believe they are the devil’s, who tempts all men, who tempted even the Son of God Himself with thoughts like these at their root. Such thoughts are not yours or mine, though they may come into our heads. They are part of the evil which besets us—which is not us—which has no right or share in us—which we pray God to drive away from us when we say, “Deliver us from evil.” Have you not all had such thoughts? But have you not all had very different thoughts? have you not, every one of you, at times, felt in the bottom of your hearts, after all, ‘This strength and industry, this courage, and honesty, and good-nature of mine, must come from God; I did not get them myself? If I was born honest, and strong, and gentle, and brave, some one must have made me so when I was born, or before? The devil certainly did not make me so, therefore God must? These, too, are His gifts?’
Did you ever think such thoughts as these? If you did not, not much matter, for you have all acted, more or less, in your better moments as if you had them. There are more things in a man’s heart, thank God, than ever come into his head. Many a man does a noble thing by instinct, as we say, without ever thinking whether it is a noble thing or not—without thinking about it at all. Many a man, thank God, is led at times, by God’s Spirit, without ever knowing whose Spirit it is that leads him.
But he ought to know it, for it is willing, reasonable service which God wants of us. He does not care to use us like tools and puppets. And why? He is not merely our Maker, He is our Father, and He wishes us to know and feel that we are His children—to know and feel that we all have come from Him; to acknowledge Him in all our ways, to thank Him for all, to look up lovingly and confidently to Him for more, as His reasonable children, day by day, and hour by hour. Every good gift we have comes from Him; but He will have us know where they all come from.
Let us go through now a few of these good gifts, which we call natural, and see what the Bible says of them, and from whom they come.
First, now, that common gift of strength and courage. Who gives you that?—who gave it David? For He that gives it to one is most likely to be He that gives it to another. David says to God, “Thou teachest my hands to war, and my fingers to fight; by the help of God I can leap over a wall: He makes me strong, that my arms can break even a bow of steel:”—that is plain-spoken enough, I think. Who gave Samson his strength, again? What says the Bible? How Samson met a young lion which roared against him, and he had nothing in his hand, and the Spirit of the Lord came mightily upon him, and he tore the lion as he would have torn a kid. And, again, how when traitors had bound him with two new cords, the Spirit of the Lord came mightily upon him, and the cords which were on his arms became as flax that was burnt with fire, and fell from off his hands. And, for God’s sake, do not give in to that miserable fancy that because these stories are what you call miraculous, therefore they have nothing to do with you—that Samson’s strength came to him miraculously by God’s Spirit, and yet yours comes to you a different way. The Bible is written to tell you how all that happens really happens—what all things really are; God is working among us always, but we do not see Him; and the Bible just lifts up, once and for all, the veil which hides Him from us, and lets us see, in one instance, who it is that does all the wonderful things which go on round us to this day, that when we see any thing like it happen we may know whom to thank for it.
The Great Physician healed the blind and the lame in Judea; and why?—to shew us who heals the blind and the lame now—to shew us that the good gift of medicine and surgery, and the physician’s art, comes down from Him who cured the paralytic and cleansed the lepers in Judea—to whom all power is given in heaven and earth.
So, again, with skill in farming and agriculture. From whom does that come? The very heathens can tell us that, for it is curious, that among the heathen, in all ages and countries, those men who have found out great improvements in tilling the ground have been honoured and often worshipped as divine men—as gods, thereby shewing that the heathen, among all their idolatries, had a true and just notion about man’s practical skill and knowledge—that it could only come from Heaven, that it was by the inspiration and guidance of God above that skill in agriculture arose. What says Isaiah of that to the very same purpose? “Doth the ploughman plow all day to sow? doth he open and break the clods of his ground? When he hath made plain the face thereof, doth he not cast abroad the vetches, and cast in the principal wheat and the appointed barley and the rye in their place? For his God doth instruct him to discretion, and doth teach him. This also,” says Isaiah, “cometh from the Lord of Hosts, who is wonderful in counsel, and excellent in working.” Would to God you would all believe it!
Again; wisdom and prudence, and a clear, powerful mind,—are not they parts of God’s likeness? How is God’s Spirit described in Scripture? It is called the Spirit of wisdom and understanding, the Spirit of prudence and might. Therefore, surely, all wisdom and understanding, all prudence and strength of mind, are, like that Spirit, part of God’s image; and where did we get God’s image? Can we make ourselves like God? If we are like him, He must have formed that likeness; and He alone. The Spirit of God, says the Scripture, giveth us understanding.
Or, again; good-nature and affection, love, generosity, pity,—whose likeness are they? What is God’s name but love? God is
