The Spirit of Wisdom
“He will guide us into all truth.” John xvi:13.
Holy Spirit is promised to us as our personal Guide in the path of life. ‘‘As many as are led of the Spirit they are sons of God.’’ Some persons are so zealous for the Word of God that they deny any direct guidance of the Spirit apart from the Word, but if we truly believe the Word itself we will be forced to accept its distinct statements, that the personal presence of God is given to the humble and obedient disciple for the needed direction in every step of life. “I will instruct thee in the way that thou shalt go; I will guide thee with mine eye.” “The Lord shall guide thee continually.” “When He putteth forth His own sheep He goeth before them and they know His voice.” “In all thy ways acknowledge Him and He shall direct thy paths.” We find the Apostle Paul constantly recognizing the personal direction of the Holy Spirit even in matters where there was no distinct direction in the Word. The whole course of Paul’s missionary journeys was ordered by the personal direction of the Lord. “Being sent forth,” we are told, “by the Holy
Ghost,” he and Barnabas sailed unto Cyprus. A little later the same Spirit restrained them from preaching in Bithynia and Asia, and led them from Troas to Philippi, to begin their European ministry. Still later, we are told that he ‘‘purposed in the Spirit” to go to Jerusalem and Rome, and none of the perils of the way could afterward turn him aside from that which had come to him as the voice of God.
The Spirit guides us by the Scriptures, by their general principles and teachings, and by bringing to us special passages from the Word, either through the law of mental suggestion, and impressing them upon our heart, or by various ways fitted to emphasize a passage as a divine message to our hearts.
He also directs us by His own direct voice when necessary; and yet we must not expect the special and remarkable intimations of the Holy Ghost at all times, or when we have sufficient light from other sources. There is danger of fanaticism here. We have no right to ask God to give us a special revelation of His will where either the light of our own common sense or the teaching of Scripture have already made the matter sufficiently plain.
The Holy Spirit guides us most frequently by intuitions of our sanctified judgment, and the conclusion of our minds, to which He leads us with the quiet assurance of acting in perfect freedom and naturalness, and yet of being influenced by the presence and suggestion of His own Spirit. Under such circumstances the mind and judgment are perfectly simple and natural.
The truly consecrated spirit may expect to be thus held and influenced by the Divine wisdom; and it will often find itself restrained from things by an inward reluctance, or repulsion, which it cannot fully explain, and led to other things by a strong and distinct inclination and sense of rightness and fitness which afterwards prove, by the result, to have been the directing presence of God.
We are sometimes taught that we are guided by providences. A devout mind will, of course, always have regard to the external providences of God, and will be habitually watching to see His hand in everything that occurs; but it would be very dangerous to allow ourselves to be directed by outward events apart from the distinct leadings of God in our spirit and by His Word. Quite as frequently we shall find ourselves led to go in the face of circumstances as to follow the favoring gales of outward events. Most of the important events and accomplished purposes in the lives of God’s servants, as recorded in the Scriptures, were in direct opposition to all the circumstances that were occurring around them.
Let us notice also some of the principles and conditions of divine guidance.
The first is a surrendered spirit. Next, there must be a readiness to obey. He will not give us light unless we mean to follow it. Then we must trust His guidance. We must believe that He is with us and directing us. We must lean upon His arm with all our heart, and implicitly look up into His face and expect Him to be true to us. We must also have ‘‘our senses exercised by reason of use, to know the difference between good and evil.^’ Sometimes our mistakes will become most instructive to us by showing us the places where we have erred, and save us from repeating the mistake afterwards with more serious consequences. We must learn to distinguish between mere impressions and the deeper convictions of the entire judgment under the light of the Spirit, and between the voice of the Shepherd and that of the spirit of error. This He will teach us, and teach us more and more perfectly through experience. We shall have to learn also to walk with Him when we cannot understand the way.
“Through waves and clouds and storms
He gently clears thy way;
Wait then His time, so shall thy night
Soon end in glorious day.”