The New Pentecosts
Owen, in his Pneiunatologia affirms that every age has its own test of orthodoxy or apostasy, and that the criterion of a standing or falling Church in this age is found in its attitude toward the Spirit of God.
The gospel age is especially His dispensation. This divine person peculiarly fills the horizon as we study the Acts of the Apostles; and we cannot open the pages of this book of the Acts without starting an inquiry which is first in order and fundamental in importance. What is the actual place which Pentecost fills in Christian history? Was that outpouring both the first and the last, or only the foremost in a series of similar effusions? Was that revelation of the Spirit’s power and presence full and final, or was it, like Christ’s own advent, but the beginning of miracles and wonders with others to follow? and is that first advent of the Spirit to be succeeded by another, even more glorious, at the end of the age?
Christ’s Incarnation was, in fact, a hiding of His true self behind a veil of flesh. His star in the East, seen by a few wise watchers, guided them to his cradle, and a few holy souls who waited for His salvation were not taken by surprise. A little band of disciples felt His charms and bowed to His claims: they saw His glory shine at times when, as in the Transfiguration and Ascension, His disguise was laid aside. In fact. His Baptism, Transfiguration, Resurrection, Ascension, were so many stages of revelation of His glory, which is to be fully disclosed when, at His second coming, the curtain is finally lifted, and the last act in this divine drama completes the marvellous manifestation.
There is a mystery of correspondence between Christ and the Paraclete. Possibly that upper chamber was but the cradle of the Spirit’s revelation: other and higher unfoldings and unveilings of His grace and glory are yet to follow; more signal triumphs over Satan; louder and clearer voices and visions of God; new raptures and radiances when devout souls, transfigured in His presence, are changed from glory to glory by the Lord the Spirit, as they with open face behold His supernal beauty. That coming of the Spirit may have been, like the blush of the “conscious water” at Cana, only the beginning of miracles, wherein He showed forth His glory, a type and prophecy of things to come. This question is not one of idle curiosity, but of practical value; and is reverently raised at the vestibule of this theme, because upon our answer all that follows is dependent.
It has been commonly assumed, without Scriptural warrant, that on the day of Pentecost the Spirit was, once for all, poured out, thenceforth to dwell in the individual believer, and especially in the collective body of believers — the Church; and some hold that to pray for the outpouring of the Spirit, either upon saints or sinners, implies absurdity and contradiction, since He is already bestowed upon and abiding in the Church.
To this position exception may certainly be taken. First of all, there is in the way an exegetical difficulty. The inspired Scriptures are marked by an exactness in the use of words which shows that the Spirit guided in language as well as in thought. When Peter quotes that unique prediction of Joel, ‘* I will pour out of my Spirit upon all flesJi,’” his words are carefully chosen. He does not say: * ‘Now is fulfilled that which was foretold by Joel;” but, “this is that which was spoken by the prophet Joel.”
Precision is one mark of perfection, and to perfection nothing is trivial. Matthew’s uniform phrase, when he refers to the coincidences and convergences of prophecy and history is, “then was fulfilled,” or “so that it was fulfilled which was spoken by the prophet” — often naming the prophet. But, when referring to Christ’s residence in Nazareth, he, for the first and only time uses the plural — “that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the prophets: He shall be called a Nazarene;” because while no single prediction was thus accomplished, the trend of many prophecies is in this direction. So in the Gospel according to John, it is very noticeable with what accuracy of precision two prophecies are referred to in connected verses, yet in different terms. Christ’s legs were not broken, but His side was pierced; and it is added, as to the former fact, “that the Scripture should be fulfilled a bone of Him shall not be broken;” but, as to the latter, ‘* and again another Scripture saith, they shall look on Him whom they pierced.” In this latter case the prediction is yet to be fulfilled,* and hence while the language of prediction is applied to the event by way of correspondence, how carefully is the record guarded so as not to exclude its true fulfilment hereafter.
Peter might naturally have said, at Pentecost, ‘’Now is fulfilled that which was spoken;” but Joel’s prediction was not then fulfilled. The “great and terrible day of the Lord “is yet to come, and the wonders in heaven above and in the earth beneath have yet to be wrought. And another and greater effusion — the universal outpouring of the Spirit upon all flesh — is in the future. Joel’s prophecy, though not fulfilled, furnished the true philosophy of Pentecost, explaining what was then seen and heard. Spectators said, “these men are full of new wine.” Peter answered, that this was not spirituous intoxication but spiritual exhilaration; they were not drunk with wine wherein is excess, but were filled with the Spirit, the new wine from heaven’s vineyards. Careful comparison of the second chapters of Joel and of the Acts must
* Comp. Revelation i, 7.
convince us that the cup of prediction has not yet been full to the brim, and waits for a more copious outpouring. Pentecost was the summer shower after long drought; the final outpouring will make springs gush forth and turn the desert into a garden, and a thousand rills, singing their song, shall blend in rivers of grace that roll like a liquid anthem to the sea.
There is also a grammatical reason for not limiting to the original Pentecost the Spirit’s outpourings. Different prepositions are used to express the relations of the Spirit to the believer. A sharp line seems drawn between ‘’ in “or “within,” and ‘’ on “or ‘’upon.” When the work of the Spirit in regenerating, renewing, sanctifying, is referred to, “in” and “within” represent His permanent influence and abiding presence: for character must be perpetual. But when Plis office in qualifying for service by special enduement is referred to, “on” and “upon” are the prepositions commonly used to express that endowment or enduement which is not permanent but is for the period of such service.
This distinction is more than grammatical: it is philosophical. A renewed heart must neither lose its renewal nor let go its Renewer. But the anointed tongue needs its special unction only while it is used in witness for Christ. Charles G. Finney held that a true servant of God might have more than one enduement, and that he who, even in spiritual self-culture, forgets his call to service, may forfeit his enduement. It is possible to be so absorbed in the permanent ministry of the indwelling Spirit as to overlook the occasional ministry of the enduing Spirit.
Even if it be conceded that, on the day of outpouring, the Spirit was once for all given in saving and sanctifying power, it does not follow that He does not, from time to time, come anew to saints in gifts of power for witnessing and working. Some careful Bible students regard Pentecost as a baptism wherein the Spirit was outpoured as into a vast reservoir, and would now urge disciples to ask not for a baptism of the Spirit, but to be Ji//cd with the Spirit, like empty vessels dipped into this Divine fulness.
But our contention is not for a form of statement. The one practical question is, whether we are in faith and by prayer to seek for new effusions of power from on High, for tongues of fire to make our witness a Divine flame. Here lies the hope of world-wide missions. Without some new unction from the Spirit, we shall never feel that burning fire shut up in our bones which compels us to witness; nor will our witness without that be a power. If that lost art of Apostolic days may be recovered to the Church, it were worth while to learn it in the severe school of fasting and prayer. A Church half asleep, a world wholly dead, wait for such a renaissance.
Yet a third argument is the historical. As a fact Pentecost was not the last, but only the first outpouring. It actually opened a series of such manifestations. This book of the Acts records repeated wonders similar in kind if not in degree.
When Philip preached in Samaria, and the rumour of his success reached Jerusalem, Peter and John were sent thither by the Apostles; and when they came down they prayed for the Samaritan converts that “they might receive the Holy Ghost; for as yet He was fallen upon none of them.” And they also received the Spirit, similar signs following as at Jerusalem.
Again, at Cesarea, when Peter first preached to a representative Roman audience, as he began to speak the Holy Spirit fell on them, and, as he expressly adds, ‘’as on us at the beginning.” Here, once more, were the signs of the first Pentecost wrought, repeated even in the gift of tongues. The gathering of the kinsmen, friends and retainers of the Centurion in the palace of the Caesars is believed to have exceeded in number the original hundred and twenty at Jerusalem; certainly the results were proportionately larger, for the Holy Spirit fell on all those that heard the word, not only in advance of baptism but, apparently, of believing also. And here possibly we have a forecast of the final outpouring upon all flcsJi,
Yet again, at Ephesus, among the Greeks, Paul found certain disciples, probably adherents of Apollos, who, like him, had not got beyond John’s preliminary baptism of repentance; and when Paul laid hands on them, the Holy Spirit came upon them also, and they spake with tongues and prophesied.
Thus, within the bounds of this book and the limits of one generation, three instances are on record subsequent to the day of Pentecost, when in each case, with language most explicit, the Spirit is said to have ‘’come upon,” ‘’ fallen upon,” been ‘’received,” by disciples. If within forty years there were four distinct and separate outpourings in the Apostolic age, who is competent to say that in the centuries succeeding there have been no other Pentecostal effusions, and some of them scarcely less wonderful in some respects and aspects than that earliest enduement? May there not be modern saints upon whom the Spirit has not yet fallen in the Pentecostal sense, but would come in power in answer to believing prayer?
Recent history argues with the resistless logic of events that Pentecostal wonders may be repeated. This modern missionary century has been made both lustrous and illustrious by outpourings of the Spirit, in some respects surpassing any recorded in Apostolic days. Witness the story of Tahiti and all Western Polynesia; of the Hawaiian, Marquesan, Micronesian groups; of New Zealand, Madagascar and the Fiji Islands; of Nanumaga under Thomas Powell; of Sierra Leone under William Johnson; of the missions in the valley of the Nile, in Zululand, and on the Gaboon River; in Banza Manteke under Henry Richards, and Basutoland under Dr. Moffat. Read the memoirs of Dr. Grant and Fidelia Fiske in Oroomiah; of Mackay in Uganda and his namesake in Formosa. Follow the work of Judson in Burma, of Boardman among the Karens; of Cyrus Wheeler on the Euphrates, of Clough and Jewett at Ongole, of William Duncan in his Metlakahtla and Joseph Neesima in his Doshisha. What are these, and hundreds more that might be cited, but instances of mighty outpourings, in all essentials reproducing Pentecostal signs and wonders, often on a scale of majesty and magnificence scarcely paralleled.
If this preliminary question seem to have undue heed given to it, it is for a purpose. Our supreme aim is to offset the discouraging lack and need of spiritual life and power by the encouraging fact that from time to time, and in many cases, that original blessing of Pentecost has in its main features been repeated. The history of missions with uplifted finger points to the glowing and glorious records on her shining scroll, and solemnly attests the fact that, wherever the most consecrated witnesses have gone faithfully preaching the gospel, there God has exhibited His power and bestowed His new Pentecosts.
These divine marvels have been wrought especially in the following forms:
First, in the manifest calling and anointing of special messengers to bear the tidings.
Secondly, in the providential removal of the natural barriers of language, furnishing, for the rapid acquisition of strange tongues, facilities which were unknown in ancient times.
Thirdly, in the preparation for the universal diffusion of the gospel message, through numerous translations of the word of God and Christian literature.
Fourthly, in the sudden and strange subduing even of hostile communities and rulers, when human influences were wholly inadequate.
Fifthly, in marked and multiplied cases of conversion and the transformation of whole peoples.
Pentecost may have been repeated in modern times without reproducing its exact original features. Similar effects do not depend on uniform causes, nor do similar causes always produce uniform effects. Facts assume various forms, and are independent of them. God does not waste power, nor use the supernatural where the natural suffices. When human hands may as well take away the stone, He does not bid it move without hands or send angels to roll it away. The great Economist of the Universe works no needless miracles. He may choose not to bestow the gift of tongues, while He so stimulates philological research as that a hundred languages hitherto without written form have their alphabet and grammar, lexicon and literature; and the word of God is without a miracle both preached and translated in over three hundred vernaculars. In our day, within a space of time in which Paul could scarcely have found his way to strange peoples, our missionaries learn to preach in their tongues, and then teach them to read and write their own language and present them with the word of God as the first printed book in their own speech. So multiplied and marvellous are the facilities for the rapid acquisition of the great tongues of mankind that Bengali, Chinese, Japanese, Arabic, Sanskrit, may be learned in the Universities of England and America. This is something more than a triumph of human scholarship; it belongs to the Theology of Inventions, and is part of God’s wonder workings. In these and many other ways He who bestowed miraculous blessing at the Pentecost in Jerusalem is giving in His own unique fashion New Pentecosts of privilege and power to a witnessing Church.