The Inbreathed Spirit

A.T. Pierson shows how the Spirit of Jesus has been breathed into us by the Lord Himself and is our life. This is taken from Keswick's Authentic Voice edited by Herbert F. Stevenson:

"That we are in the presence of Christ is becoming so really and manifestly a matter of consciousness to some of us, that I am not quite sure I ought to speak. In the Ladies Meeting this morning, without any appeal, a spirit of self-sacrifice took possession of those who were in attendance. One sister desired to give the last thing she had to the Lord, and she gave a silver clasp. And others, without any attempt at an appeal for sacrifice, followed, until sixty-eight offerings from personal ornamentation, and over ten pounds in money, were offered to the Lord in that small meeting.

"Personally, I have been on my face before God, wondering whether I ought to speak at all. I am not going to lead you in prayer, I am going to ask you to bow your heads and ask for two definite things—first, that I may be enabled to speak, or to keep silence, just as God will: and, second, that you may hear whatever I speak in His name, or whatever He speaks in my silence. Then, as He may lead, I will say a few words. (After silent prayer Dr. Pierson continued):

"Now let us hear His word. Let me read the 19th and following verses of John 20, 'Then the same day at evening, being the first day of the week, when the doors were shut where the disciples were assembled because of the Jews, came Jesus and stood in the midst, and saith unto them, Peace be unto you. And when He had so said, He showed unto them His hands and His side.' Why? Because upon those wounds were based the peace which He spake to them. 'Then were the disciples glad, when they saw the Lord. Then said Jesus to them again, Peace be unto you: as my Father hath sent me, even so send I you. And when He had said this, He breathed on them . . .' That is not the Greek word: it is not 'breathed on them,' but 'breathed into them.' 'And when He had said this, He inbreathed into them, and saith unto them, Receive ye the Holy Ghost.'

"This is the first message to the assembled disciples after He rose from the dead. Nothing is more wonderful in the New Testament than this message, when you take it in all the surroundings of its utterance. Here is the risen Christ, having risen no more to die, death having no more dominion over Him. He is meeting His disciples now, together in the assembly, for the first time after His resurrection. And He says to them three things. First, 'Peace be unto you'; second, 'As my Father hath sent me, even so send I you'; third, 'Receive ye the Holy Ghost.' The first is a message of peace, the last is a message of power, and the middle one is a commission. Peace founded upon the blood of the cross, a testimony founded upon the salvation that comes by the blood, and power for the testimony to be given. It might truly be said that, beyond this, in the New Testament there is not a new idea: it is all here. And everything that this means may come to you in this tent tonight.

"Look at the word 'receive': it is one of the leading words of John’s Gospel. He tells us in chapter 20 and verse 31: 'These are written that ye might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God; and that believing ye might have life through His name'—eternal life through believing. What is it to believe? Look in the first chapter and verse 12: 'To as many as received Him, to them gave He power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on His name.' Believing is receiving, and receiving is believing; and the simplest act that God enables us to do is the act of receiving. When He says 'Peace be unto you,' all you have to do is to receive it; when He says, 'I send you, as the Father sent me,' all you have to do is to receive the commission; and when He inbreathes the Holy Spirit, all you have to do is to breathe in what He breathes out. It is reception throughout.

"Jesus stands among us in His risen power, and He says, showing His hands and His side, 'Peace be unto you. All you have to do is to receive my peace, on the basis of my death.' And immediately He says to you, as soon as you receive His peace: 'I send you now, as the Father sent me, to tell what you have received; and here is the power to tell it: Receive ye the Holy Ghost.'

"Now, if you look in Acts 2, you will find that the same thought is brought before us there. When they were all with one accord in one place, 'suddenly there came a sound from heaven as of a rushing mighty wind.' No, it is not 'wind,' it is 'breath'—that is the Greek word; 'there came from heaven the sound as of a rushing mighty breath, and it filled all the house where they were sitting . . . And they were all filled with the Holy Ghost' [Acts 2:2]. Here is God breathing, breathing a rushing mighty torrent of breath; and, in that torrent of breath, they are all filled.

"Now, see what this means, and what it involves. The Lord appears before us, tonight, as the same yesterday, and today, and forever. He shows us His pierced hands, He shows us the wounded side, and He says: 'Peace be unto you. Pardon is free; death has brought life—will you have it? Atonement has brought pardon—will you have it?' You can be immediately reconciled to God, through the death of His Son, and you can have the peace of God, now, this moment, if you will receive His peace. Having received His peace, begin at once to tell others what a Savior you have found. Recommend them to come to the same crucified but risen Christ, for the same peace. There is your commission. And where is your power? He inbreathes the Holy Spirit; He says, 'Receive ye the Holy Ghost'; and now you are qualified for your great commission.

"Now, we talk about the profound things of God, and they are very profound; but it is quite as marvelous that they are so simple. There is not a child that is able to understand anything, that cannot understand these three things. Here is a crucified Christ, who has borne your sins in His own body on the tree, and you may go and tell what you have found in Jesus; and here is the Lord saying, 'All you have to do is to receive now the Spirit I impart, and you shall be qualified for your work.'

"What do you do in the act of breathing? Two things—you create a vacuum, and you fill the vacuum. You could not breathe in if you did not breathe out; the lungs must be emptied of air, before you can take in air. If you want the Holy Spirit, abandon every other dependence, and then appropriate the sufficiency. Now, what are the effects of breathing? The effects of breathing are very simple: they are comprehended in this—what is in the air outside comes into the lungs inside; and the same life giving properties that are in the atmosphere are in you. You received the Holy Spirit; and here is the stupendous effect—the life which is in God becomes the life that is in you. You put the iron in the fire, and presently the fire is in the iron. The effect of putting the iron in the fire is, that that which is peculiar to the fire becomes peculiar to the iron. And the result of your receiving the Holy Spirit is briefly comprehended in this—that that which is peculiar to the Spirit becomes peculiar to your own spirit.

"Take this thought and trace it through the New Testament. Take the Acts of the Apostles. There the atmosphere that enveloped them was the holy atmosphere of God; they breathed it, they were filled with it, they were qualified by it for all their activities. Go into the Epistle to the Romans, and there, in chapter 8 and verse 2, 'The law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death.' This breath of God that comes into you is, first of all, the breath of life; and if you read Romans 8 through, you will find that in the thirty-nine verses there are twenty-nine references to the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit is there represented as the Spirit of life, teaching you, like a little babe, to walk with God; teaching you, like a little babe, to talk with God. For what is 'Abba'? It is the Arabic [sic, actually Aramaic] word for 'Papa.' And what is 'Papa'? It is the first infant prattle, which can only deal with consonants and vowels that do not need teeth for their pronunciation. 'Abba' is 'Papa'; it is the Holy Spirit taking the child into which He has breathed life, and turning the child’s attention to God; He hears the child say 'Papa', and the little one has learned the dialect of heaven. As the Spirit teaches us to walk and to talk, He directs our spiritual intelligence to the right objects. That is spiritual-mindedness; and then the mind is fixed upon divine things, just as an affectionate mother turns the growing intelligence of the child to the things that are best calculated to awaken and nourish the finest order of thought and affection.

"Now, if you turn to I Corinthians 6:17, you read, 'He that is joined unto the Lord is one spirit.' When you take in the breath from the Lord Jesus Christ, His life passes into you, His Spirit weds your spirit; and now you are bound to participate in His nature—His Spirit is His nature. This, the wedlock of the divine Spirit with the human spirit, is one of the most stupendous conceptions presented to us in the Word of God. If you read the Epistles to the Corinthians carefully you will see that the Spirit, entering into us and wedding our spirit, is there treated as molding and shaping our whole spiritual life. So that we can, in our measure, reflect the attributes of God—His wisdom in our knowledge, His righteousness in our morality, His order in our obedience to Him, His unselfishness in our service and love, His sanctity in our holiness. It is all there in the two Epistles.

"Now, when you go to the Epistle to the Galatians, what do you find? That this Holy Spirit, which has become the Spirit of life to you, as in Romans, and the Spirit of unity with God, as in Corinthians, is the Spirit who fosters in you such holy desires that the desires of the flesh are overcome. There is a remarkable passage in chapter 5:

'The flesh lusteth against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh; and these are contrary the one to the other, so that ye may not do the things . . .' under the Spirit’s influence, which you would incline to do under the influence of the flesh—which I take to be the idea. Isn’t it stupendous that lust should be ascribed to the Spirit? 'The flesh lusteth against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh.' Why, has the Spirit lusts? Certainly. What are lusts but overmastering desires? The lusts of the flesh come up from the lower realm and drag the man down; the lusts of the Spirit come down from the higher realm, and draw the man up—that is the difference. What are the lusts of the Spirit?

"Love, joy, peace—Godward; gentleness, goodness, longsuffering—manward; fidelity, meekness, humility—selfward. Love puts hate down, joy puts gloom down, peace puts discontentment down. These virtues are the Spirit’s lusts, to quell the lower lusts. That is the way the Spirit masters the lower by the higher. So it is a wonderful revelation. You have the love of God in you, and you are one with God by the Spirit wedding your spirit; and now that Spirit frames in you desires like God’s, these desires quell and expel the lower desires. And that is the secret of a holy walk with God.

"Then you come to the Epistle to the Ephesians, and oh, stupendous mystery! we are there taught that the Spirit of God, received unto us, lifts us to God’s level in the heavenlies. It is the climax of all revelations in the New Testament, about the fact of the Spirit taking possession. Look at it for a moment. You breathe the breath of the Holy Spirit imparted by Christ, and the life that God lives you live. You come to Corinthians, and see what God sees; in Galatians you love what God loves; in Ephesians you live on the level of God: and what is the effect? Why, you sway the scepter that God sways, for, in the Epistle to the Ephesians, you have the grandest revelation of the power of a child of God. Look in chapter 6: 'We wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places.' And yet over these consummate foes by which we are encompassed, with Satan at the head—probably the grandest being God ever created, without exception—against all of these we clothe ourselves in the armor of God, and simply stand and defy them all. It is a remarkable conception—the life of God in me, so that I live as He lives; the wisdom of God in me, so that I see as He sees; the love of God in me, so that I desire what He desires; the victory of God in me, so that I win as He wins—that is the effect of the reception of the Holy Spirit.

"We could follow it all through the New Testament, and show that there is not an Epistle which does not manifest to us some new and glorious revelation of what it is to have the Spirit possess us and control us. The life that is impossible to you in the natural man and the carnal man, becomes possible in the spiritual man. 'The things which are impossible with man are possible with God,' and 'all things are possible to him that believeth.' Do you know what the power of these spiritual lusts is, to control and subdue the lower?

"I remember, as I stand here—it is twenty-seven years ago—that once, in Michigan, I and my three children were in the water over half an hour, in instant peril of drowning. One of those children with me in the water was the beloved one who fell asleep in India a year ago last November. She was a little child; and when she came out of the water and went home to her dear mother, who knew nothing about the peril until it was all over, she took pen and paper and with trembling hand, wrote: 'God having saved me today from drowning, I give myself henceforth to Him.' When, in India, she had almost died two days before she actually departed, a companion said to her, 'Louise, you almost left us yesterday. If God had called you, would you have been glad?' 'Oh! wouldn’t I,' she replied. The Spirit had awakened such desires after God, that when He called she leaped like a tired child into her Father’s arms. The thought of her, and of that escape from imminent drowning twenty-seven years ago, almost overpowers me as I stand here. I cannot but feel that, as to you, my friends, I have risen from the dead. I have been spared twenty-seven years to make this address in Keswick tonight. I might have died then. (The whole gathering here broke into the singing of 'Songs of praises I will ever give to Thee.' Dr. Pierson continued):

"Now, I want to make a practical application of the things that I have said to you, with trembling voice. I want you to realise what is means when Jesus stands among us, stretches forth His pierced hands, shows us His wounded side, and says, 'Peace be unto you.'

"Do you know how abundantly God pardons? You remember how, a few years ago, when Adolf Beck was in prison because he was confounded with another man; you remember how, when his innocence was confirmed, the Government tried to make some amends for the disgrace and shame that had come to him and his family. I put it down as one of the most remarkable human illustrations of which I have ever read, of what God’s forgiveness is. Mr. Beck received from His Majesty a free pardon, the effect of which is much greater than can be conveyed by the word 'pardon' in its ordinary sense. This comes from the Home Secretary; and what does he say? Hear his words: 'A free pardon issued by the King not only forgives crime, but wipes out the whole conviction, and obliterates every stain which the law had ever attached to the alleged offence.' That is what God says to you now, as he offers you a free pardon—not only forgiveness, but something more: all that appertains to the past wiped out, every stain of guilt obliterated. Are you a sinner here tonight unforgiven? Jesus stands among us, in His risen power; and He says, Here is a free pardon for you, wiping out conviction, abolishing penalty and judgment, and obliterating every stain. What does the Lord say to us tonight about power? My beloved friends, if you will receive the Holy Ghost, power is yours. I do not care at all about your feelings; it is a fact, irrespective of your feelings.

"In the days of what was called 'the underground railway' in America, we used to get the poor fellows from the South away from slavery by secret means, hiding them in cellars and garrets, and conveying them at midnight across the land, from one hospitable house to another. A poor fellow had found his way to Canada. Blessed be God, when he stepped on English soil he became a free man. As the train moved on into Toronto, Harriet Tubman, herself an emancipated slave, who had helped hundreds of others to freedom, went in and saw the poor fellow crouching down in a corner, mortally afraid that some slave owner or slave catcher might be after him. 'Joe, you fool,' she said, 'what are you cowering there for? You have shaken off the lion’s paw; you are a free man on free soil. Praise the Lord, Joe!' And when we see some sinner who has accepted Jesus Christ, and has had this free pardon, crouching down and cowering as though he were in the power of the world, the flesh, and the devil, we feel like saying, 'You fool, you have shaken off the lion’s paw; you are a free man. Praise the Lord!' I want you, if you have accepted Jesus Christ, to cast your doubts away, to cast away all your fears, all your hesitation, and just to believe in your freedom, and to publish to the world your declaration of emancipation. Yes, beloved, Jesus is the same yesterday, and today, and forever.

"Did you hear the beautiful anecdote of my friend J.F. Stuart, President of the Christian Commission established to help soldiers in hospital or on the battlefield dying of their wounds, to find Jesus? He had permission to go within the lines. Once, at midnight, he appeared on the outskirts of the Union Army. The sentinel challenged him to give the password. 'Washington,' he replied. 'Not correct, and my orders are to shoot every man who does not give the password.' 'Then let me go to headquarters and get the password; for I must have been misinformed.' He was allowed to go, and came back: 'Give the countersign,' said the sentry. 'Potomac.' 'Right, enter the lines.' 'And now,' said Mr. Stuart to the sentry, 'now that I have given you the right password, may I ask whether you have the right password to heaven?' 'Oh yes, Mr. Stuart; it is, "Jesus Christ, the same yesterday, and today, and forever."'

"And so, beloved friends, I say to you tonight, He is the same Savior that He was on the Lake of Galilee; He is the same Savior that He was in the upper room among those disciples. He has the same pierced hands and the same wounded side. He offers the same invitation to receive a free pardon, to accept a glorious commission, and to accept an adequate and all-sufficient power. Will you receive Him? Will you live the life that He lived? Will you know the truth that God knows? Will you love the things that God loves? Will you get somewhere near God’s own level, and know something about the power which God sways?"