Psalms 104:30

Psalms 104:30

The breath of the Most High, mentioned in the text, is the Holy Spirit of the Father and the Son, the Third Person in the Trinity, proceeding from the Father and the Son to give life, and order, and harmony to His creatures, especially to make His reasonable creatures, angels and men, partakers of His unspeakable holiness.

I. If this parable of breath be well considered, it may seem to account for other like parables, so to call them, by which Holy Scripture teaches us to think of this our most holy Comforter. For instance, the Holy Spirit is sometimes compared to the wind, as in the discourse of our Saviour to Nicodemus. Thus the wind, when we hear or feel it, may remind us of the breath of Almighty God; and the effects of the wind the clouds which it brings over the earth, the moisture which the air takes up, the dews which descend, the rains which pour down, the springs which gush out, the waters which flow over the earth all these are in Scripture tokens of the same Spirit, showing Himself in gifts and sanctifying graces and communicating spiritual life to His people.

II. We are hereby taught to think of our own spiritual and hidden life, the life which we have concealed and laid up for us with Christ in God, the life which is altogether of faith, not at all of sight. Whatever puts us in mind of the Holy Spirit puts us in mind of that life, for He is "the Lord and Giver of life." The natural life of the first Adam was a gift of the Spirit, a token of His Divine presence, but much more so the spiritual life which Christians have by union with the second Adam.

III. Whatever else we do, then, or refrain from doing, let us at least endeavour to open our eyes and contemplate our real condition. The outward world indeed is to us the same as if we were no Christians; the breath of heaven is around us, the dew falls, the winds blow, the rain descends, the waters gush out, and all the other works of nature go on as if we had never been taken out of this wicked world and placed in the kingdom of God: but in reality we know that there is a meaning and power in all these common things which they can have to none but Christians. The good Spirit is around us on every side; He is within us; we are His temples: only let us so live, that we force Him not to depart from us at last.

Plain Sermons by Contributors to "Tracts for the Times," vol. vii., p. 144.

References: Psalms 104:30 . J. E. Vaux, Sermon Notes, 4th series, p. 52; J. Keble, Sermons from Ascension Day to Trinity Sunday, p. 164; A. J. Griffith, Christian World Pulpit, vol. xii., p. 8; H. Wonnacott, Ibid., vol. xvii., p. 314; G. Avery, Ibid., vol. xxvii., p. 269; R. D. B. Rawnsley, Ibid., vol. xxx., p. 172; J. M. Neale, Sermons in Sackville College, vol. i., p. 382.