Romans 15:13 - Homiletics

The office of the Holy Spirit.

Paul was not one of those upon whom the Spirit fell on the Day of Pentecost. He was at that time a scholar; living probably in Jerusalem, and certainly studying the Law and the traditions of his nation, with all the energy of an ardent, zealous, and persevering mind. He may have known at the time of the remarkable events which occurred; but if he did, they made no great impression on him. For only two or three years afterwards, when Stephen was stoned, Saul was one of those who "consented to his death." And, as we read, he "made havoc of the Church," and "breathed out threatenings and slaughter" against the disciples of the Lord. But if for a while neither the crucifixion of Christ nor the descent of the Holy Spirit had any effect upon the Pharisee who boasted himself to be of the school of Gamaliel, the time came when the faith which he despised and persecuted laid hold upon his great heart, and assumed the lordship over his active life. And now observe two things very noticeable in Saul's history. First, when Anauias was sent to the smitten and blinded persecutor, to release him, in the name of Jesus, from his privation and doubt, and, in the same name, to commission him as the apostle to the Gentiles, the servant of the Lord declared the purport of his visit to be that, Saul might be " filled with the Holy Ghost !" And secondly, when, at Antioch, the Holy Ghost called Barnabas and Saul to a missionary enterprise, they are said by the inspired historian to have been " sent forth by the Holy Ghost. " So, although Paul was not present when Peter and the rest of the brethren were made partakers of the spiritual outpouring by which the new dispensation was inaugurated, it is clear that he received, and that he knew that he received, the Holy Ghost as well as they. In his conversion, his whole nature was influenced by the Divine enlightenment and quickening; in his commission, the impulse and the authority of his missionary life were conferred by the living Spirit of God. It is not to be wondered at, then, that the apostle of the Gentiles, in his preaching and his writings, laid stress upon the office of the Divine Comforter. He could not have exalted the Spirit more constantly and gratefully even if he had listened to the Master's discourses in which the Paraclete was promised; even if he had been amongst the favoured company on the Day of Pentecost, when cloven tongues of fire sat upon the heads of the disciples of the Lord. In fact, just as the mediatorial work of Christ is at least as fully stated and explained by Paul as by the other apostles, so is he not behind them in the exposition of the offices of the Comforter, and the results of his perpetual indwelling in Christian hearts, in Christian society. It needs not be said that the offices of the Holy Spirit are not only precious, but manifold. Paul was well aware of this fact. But attention is asked especially to one result of the dispensation of the Spirit; to one valuable fruit which all Christians growingly appreciate. The Divine Spirit is set before us in the text as the Author and Inspirer of a cheerful and hopeful disposition of the mind: "Now the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, that ye may abound in hope, through the power of the Holy Ghost." It is often observed that, in a cultivated and reflective state of society, there is a tendency to a mournful and even desponding disposition. When people have much leisure to think, and large knowledge of human life and history, they often cherish gloomy and hopeless forebodings. Unable to resolve their own difficulties, disappointed with efforts made to improve society, they are prone to abandon themselves to scepticism, and to ask whether all things do not exist in vain, and whether the philosophy of the royal sage is not sound and just: "Vanity of vanities," saith the preacher; "all is vanity!" The Holy Spirit was given to banish such a temper of mind, and to inspire us with cheerfulness and with hope. He is the Spirit of life, quickening the spiritually dead; the Spirit of truth, revealing the realities of the Divine character and government; the Spirit of holiness, fostering in the soul of man all pure thoughts and purposes. And our text brings before us the welcome truth that the Spirit of God has power to fill us with "joy and peace in believing," and to cause us to "abound in hope." There is no broader and more obvious distinction between Christians and unbelievers than that which is suggested by our text. The Christian, speaking generally, is the man who hopes; the infidel is the man who is hopeless. The preacher has known in the course of his life, and has conversed with, many unbelievers—some of them honourable, virtuous, and, within limits, benevolent men. But they have been, without exception, neither happy nor hopeful. Their view of human life is invariably melancholy, and their forebodings for humanity's future are usually dark and despondent. At the time when our Divine faith was first preached in the world, observant and thoughtful men were under a cloud of depression. Dissatisfied with the superstitions of their fathers, disgusted with the corruptions of society, they were without any faith that could sustain and cherish a lofty hope for the race. It did not enter into their minds that any moral power could be introduced into the world capable of even attempting, far less achieving, the regeneration of society—of raising the uncivilized, and redeeming those who were civilized and cultivated, but corrupt and cynical and selfish. What a revelation must Christians—not merely Christianity, but Christians—have brought to the ancient society! Here was a sect of men, distinguished, indeed, by their beliefs and practices, their pure and beneficent life, from those around them, but in nothing more distinguished than in this —they were the men in the world who hoped ! Whilst the multitude, and even many of the philosophers, were saying, "Let us eat and drink; for to-morrow we die;" whilst the thoughtful and high-minded mourned the corruptions of the times, and despised their degraded fellow-creatures, and saw no prospect of the salvation of society; the followers of Christ appeared, each one with a hope which death could not tear from him, for himself; each one with a yet sublimer hope, that no disappointment could quench, for the unhappy but not forsaken race of which he was a member. You remember the honour which was bestowed upon a patriot—that, in days of darkness and of threatening, he did not despair of his country. Of every lowly Christian the yet more remarkable eulogy would have been true, that he did not despair of his race. And this, in days when Christianity had yet its triumphs to win, its great renown to achieve! The Holy Spirit was given to reveal to the disciples of Christ a " God of hope. " Men's dejection and despair arise from their want of faith in God. And nothing but a sound and rational belief in God can bring them to a better mind. What so fitted to inspire with cheerfulness as the conviction that a God of righteousness and of grace lives and reigns, takes the deepest interest in men, and provides for their true well-being? Now, when the Holy Ghost was given, on the Day of Pentecost, he was given as "the promise of the Father," as the bestowal of a gracious God. Let the truth be recognized that a good hope must begin in God. The counsel of the ancient psalmist was sound as well as pious: "Hope thou in God." Fix your hopes, as many do, upon human beings, upon human institutions, upon human plans, and their failure will involve you in cruel disappointment. But if for you the Lord liveth and reigneth, if he be the God of man, the God of salvation, then there is a sound basis for your hopes—a basis which no power on earth, and no power from hell, can overturn or even shake. It was the power of the Spirit that ratified the words and sealed the authority and authenticated the mission of Christ. Jesus had promised that, if he went away, he would" send the Comforter." He knew that the approach of his departure filled their hearts with sorrow, and he bade them rather rejoice, inasmuch as this was the condition of the gift of the Comforter. And when, in fulfilment of his assurance, he shed forth the gifts they needed for their spiritual quickening and for their qualification for apostolic service, the friends of Christ must have felt the encouraging and inspiring influence of the faithfulness and grace of their Lord. After his resurrection, the disciples were "glad when they saw the Lord" After his ascension, "they returned to Jerusalem with great joy" And when the Spirit was poured out, their confidence in their Saviour was naturally confirmed; and their habitual demeanour was that of happy and hopeful spirits. They "ate their meat with gladness and singleness of heart, praising God;" and, when persecuted, they retraced that they were counted worthy to suffer shame for his Name." It was Jesus Christ who brought hope, even as he brought every other blessing, to this benighted and unhappy world. That he cherished hope, is known full well. His parables regarding the progress of his kingdom, his assurance that when lifted up he would draw all men unto him, his prediction of his reign and his return—all show an unwavering confidence and a calm expectation regarding the future. And in order that this attitude might be shared by his disciples, he provided for the descent of his Spirit, by whose influences they should be brought into living sympathy with himself. Our hope may be said to have three main outlooks:

In all these respects is apparent the power of the Holy Ghost to inspire us with, and to cause us to rejoice in, hope.

I. HOPE CONCERNING ONE 'S SELF —concerning one's own future—is generally supposed to be matter of temperament. There are persons of a sanguine temperament, who always expect the best possible, and sometimes are confident in hope, though on the slightest ground. And others are given rather to foreboding, and their forecasts are of evil. Now, Christianity does not destroy temperament; but it gives a just bent to the outlook of the hopeful, and instils into the despondent a different spirit. Based, as the Christian life is, upon faith, it must proceed to hope. The God who has loved us With an everlasting love will never leave and never forsake us. The Saviour who has "loved his own" will "love them unto the end." The Word in which we trust is a "Word which liveth and abideth for ever." It is the office of the Spirit of God to bring these great and inspiriting truths home to the minds of Christians, to make them a power real and effective. If hope were based upon confidence in chance and good fortune, or if it were based upon the character and promises of fallible fellow-men, it would in such cases need rather to be checked and sobered than to be encouraged. But just as faith depends for its value upon the person on whom it rests, so is hope justifiable and wise only when based upon the promises of the Being whose character is unchanging, and whose word is never broken. The Christian's hope extends beyond this earthly life. There have been cases in which the followers of Jesus have been tempted to exclaim, "If in this life only we have hope in Christ, we are of all men most miserable." But nothing is more distinctive of the Christian revelation than the clearness with which it speaks of a life to come. By the resurrection of our Lord Jesus from the dead, we are begotten "unto a living hope, of an inheritance incorruptible, and undefiled, and that fadeth not away." And the hope which we have is "an anchor of the soul, sure and steadfast, that entereth into that within the veil." By the power of the Holy Spirit, this blessed hope is awakened and fostered. His gracious influences counteract the earthly and depressing powers by which we are all beset, and make the mediation and the promises of our Saviour effective and helpful to us; so that we are led to abound in hope. The text reminds us that faith, and the joy and peace which faith brings, and these in Divine fulness, are the antecedents of the abundant hope of the Christian. And this is so. The heart that knows nothing of the cheerful gladness which religion imparts to the present can know nothing of the glowing anticipations which religion inspires with reference to the future. If we are to judge the future merely by what we see now, our outlook might be dim and cheerless. But the present is beheld by the medium of faith; and the same glass, when turned towards the coming ages, affords to us the blessed prospect of Christian hope. It is instructive to observe the close connection between the joy and peace which Christians now have in believing, and the hope to which they are introduced by the gospel. The cheerful mind is likely to be the hopeful mind. The rule and the love of God have reference alike to the present and to the future. Our earthly privileges are the earnest of our immortal prospects. And these, in turn, cast something of their inspiring radiance upon the difficulties and the sorrows of the present.

"Oh, who. in such a world as this,

Could bear his lot of pain,

Did not one radiant hope of bliss

Unclouded yet remain?

That hope the Sovereign Lord has given,

Who reigns above the skies;

Hope that unites the soul to heaven

By faith's endearing ties."

II. But HOPE , THAT IS WORTHY OF THE NAME , WILL TRANSCEND OUR INDIVIDUAL PROSPECTS . We are united, by innumerable bonds, to our fellow-Christians and to our fellow-men; and our hopes must include others within their scope and range. Nothing was further from the generous heart and expansive charity of the apostle than any thought of limiting within narrow bounds the prospects and the hopes born of Christianity. Our religion is emphatically unselfish. And being so, those who come under its sway and share its spirit are constrained to take a wide, expansive view. They are members of a mystical body, and are concerned for the health and well-being of the whole. It is not enough to have a good hope of our own salvation; if the mind of Christ is in us, we shall desire "the edification of the body," as St. Paul phrases it. Enlightened and large-hearted Christians are more interested in the spread of Christianity than in anything beside on earth. It is their hope and prayer that the holy leaven may penetrate and vivify the whole mass of human society; that the tree of life may grow and spread, until all nations shall sit with delight beneath its shadow. Taught by the Spirit of truth, they rely upon the faithful word of Christ, who has unfolded before humanity hopes so bright and glorious. Error may seem to prevail, and we may tremble for the truth. Superstition may encroach upon the simplicity of the gospel, and we may ask—Is the old paganism to revive? Lukewarmness may seem to steal over nominal Christians, and to paralyze the activities of the Churches. Yet the Christian is not daunted by these "signs of the times," distressing though they be. He can join in the triumphant chant, "We will not lear, though the earth be removed, and though the mountains be carried into the midst of the sea. The Lord of hosts is with us; the God of Jacob is our Refuge!" When the infidel rejoices over what seem to him tokens of the decrepitude of the Church of Christ; when the atheist foretells the destruction of all religion, and the approach of the millennium of animalism; Christ's followers do not yield to fear. They remember that their Divine Lord has promised that "the gates of Hades shall not prevail against" his Church. Its dead branches may be lopped off, and its living branches may be pruned; but life shall only be the more vigorous, and fruit the more abundant. The gold may be cast into the furnace, and the dross be consumed; but the precious metal shall only be refined and purified, and shall shine with brighter lustre, and be fitter for the Master's use.

III. Is there HOPE FOR HUMANITY ? Is this race of man destined to deteriorate; is it doomed to remain for ever a prey to strife, to vice, to sin; or is it appointed to sure progress and to final happiness? Questions these which have disturbed many a sensitive and philanthropic mind; clouded many a generous, disinterested life with sorrow and with gloom. The pessimism which is a sort of fashion in some circles refuses to take any comfort in looking forward to the future of mankind. As the individual is of necessity unhappy, as life is of necessity a calamity, a disaster, and death the only alleviation, annihilation the only thing worth looking forward to; so for the race, composed of units thus unhappy, no destiny that is desirable can be in reserve. Progress is an illusion, and the general happiness a baseless dream. The Spirit of God—the God of hope—has taught the Christian a very different lesson from this. That Spirit encouraged Hebrew prophets of old to anticipate a universal reign of righteousness, knowledge, and peace. That Spirit directed evangelists and apostles to base, upon the incarnation and sacrifice of the Son of God, the broadest of all beliefs and the brightest of all hopes. That Spirit has sustained the faith and inspired the energy of Christ's people, amid the darkness of human ignorance, the din of human conflict, and the desolation of human despair. The omen of the birth of Christ and Christianity has not been falsified. The progress of the truth has been slow, the hindrances have been many, the corruptions and distortions have been serious. War, cruelty, slavery, vice, ignorance, brutality, are still scourging this human race. But no candid observer can say that the religion of Christ has attacked these evils in vain. And no Christian, convinced of the supernatural powers of his religion, can do other than bravely hope in the progress of enlightenment, the victory of righteousness, the reign of Christ.

"Yet with the woes of sin and strife

The world has suffered long;

Beneath the angel-strain have rolled

Two thousand years of wrong;

And man at war with man, hears not

The love-song which they bring!

Oh hush the noise, ye men of strife,

And hear the angels sing!

"The promised time is hastening on,

By prophet-bards foretold,

When with the ever-circling years

Comes round the age of gold;

When peace shall over all the earth

Its undimmed splendours fling,

And the whole world send back the song

Which now the angels sing!"

Observe the richness and fulness of the apostle's prayer: "That ye may abound in hope." This is an emotion which admits of many degrees. There are cases in which men say, "There is no hope!" and melancholy indeed was the inscription which the poet read over the infernal portals: "Leave every hope behind, all ye who enter here." Sometimes there is a little hope, a faint glimmer, as it were, to relieve the darkness. Hope can grow, as the dawn brightens into the morning. And hope can become a strong, happy, unhesitating persuasion, with no shade of anxiety, fear, or doubt. When the wish is uttered that we may "abound in hope," it is implied that hope is good, and so good that there is no possibility of our having too strong a hope. Abundance is "more than enough;" and what is besought for Christ's people is the "full assurance of hope." This is a "living hope," a hope whose life is vigorous and vital; a "hope which maketh not ashamed," which is confident, and which produces happiness and peace. The Christian should be the possessor of such a hope. Let the unbeliever walk, if he will, in the twilight; it is for us to come out into the fulness of the noonday light. This we may enjoy, not through the power of reason, or of fancy, or of public opinion; but through the power of the Holy Ghost. It is the Divine Spirit, and not a spirit of error or illusion, that prompts our hope. Hope is of God, and is in God; and such a hope may well be abundant. For there is no hope which he inspires which he cannot and will not satisfy; and when Divine fulness meets with human hope, our vessel is filled, and filled to overflowing, from the heavenly, the perennial spring.