The Unconscious Working of the Spirit

‘* He said unto them, Have ye received the Holy Ghost since ye believed? And they said unto him, We have not so much ag heard whether there be any Holy Ghost,” — AcTs xix. 2,

& e ND these men were disciples! They are 3 in so many words ranked among the

believers, and yet they say that they never heard of the Holy Ghost. I thought no man could be a believer except through the Spirit. Neither he can, but it does not follow that he should at once see where his belief comes from. The infant can only recognise an outer world through the light, yet the infant never heard the name of light. Even so is it in the spiritual world. We see at the outset a beauty to which we cannot give a name; like Jacob’s angel it wrestles with us but refuses to be defined. We perhaps deny to ourselves even the name of Christian, while all the time Christ is in our heart and in our mind. We perhaps call our lofty thoughts by other names — culture, civilisation, social progress, development, while behind all these, at the birth of all these, there has been hiding within our souls the presence and the power of the Eternal.

Spirit of Christ, help me to trace more widely Thy presence and Thy power. Teach me that Thou art the source of all light even when it shines amidst those who deny Thee. I distinguish between gifts of nature and gifts of grace; teach me that nature itself is a gift of grace from Thee. Give me the power to impute Thy presence wherever I behold the works of love. ’ There are men who say, “I will not,” and yet go — men who call themselves unbelievers and yet do the works of the Father. Help me to impute ‘ to them more than they claim, to see that no man could do these works unless Thou hadst sent him. Help me to give to such the hand of brotherhood, the bond of fellowship, the cup of communion, to recognise that we must reach the unity of the heart before we can come into the unity of the faith. Help me to detect the family likeness that binds me to men of other creeds — the evidence of one Fatherhood, the proof of one humanity; then shall I rank amongst my Lord’s disciples many even of those who say that they never heard of the Holy Ghost.