Revival - Part 6 — Doc Greenway

Knowing the Holy Spirit as a Person

As we said last Tuesday evening, in all the vast areas of Church life today, there is probably the greatest undiscovered province lies within the area of the work and ministry of the Holy Spirit. And so just as we did last Tuesday evening, instead of looking at revival as such, we want to look at the Holy Spirit who is the agent in revival, and attempt by the grace of God and by the guidance of the Spirit to see something of what his ministry and fellowship should mean to us as believers.

If he is the sole agent in revival, then it is important that we should know him. Not simply know about his work and ministry, not know about the manifestation of the Spirit in the wondrous gifts that he gives to his Church, but to know him as a person.

To know him in the sense of having fellowship with him, as we have fellowship one with the other. To know the kind of life that he leads, to know the sort of disposition that he has, and above all else, to know his absorbing passion, which is to magnify and glorify the Lord Jesus Christ.

I suppose that most Church-going folk today have learned to think of God in terms of fatherhood, and they think of him in this way quite naturally, God is the Father. Many have thought of Jesus Christ in terms of saviourhood, and they believe him to be the saviour of the world.

Perhaps not their own saviour, but at least that he died on Calvary, and soon they will be remembering this great fact. But when it comes to the Holy Spirit and his work, well, their testimony is not quite so strong, and their word is not quite so sure.

Because here, somehow, they're on strange ground. I'm speaking now, of course, in general terms. To some, the Holy Spirit is simply a sweet influence that has come to be imparted. To others, he is an emanation from God, whatever that might mean.

To yet others, he's an outflowing force. To yet other people, he's an impersonal power. But somehow, so many seem to fall short of the mark of what he really is, because the Holy Spirit is a person. At the season of Pentecost, it is the custom of the Church to recall the fact that he came.

But his coming is simply historically recognized. So far as his coming experientially is concerned, well, I'm very much afraid this is a different matter. I suppose that many are prepared to agree that his presence in the Church is valid, but I don't think it's very vital.

At least, it doesn't appear to be in some places. Certainly the Spirit of God is here as some wondrous influence, but you can't pinpoint his worth. You can't sort of signify by any definite or positive demonstration what it is he is doing in the midst of the people.

And I'm sure this is all wrong. God never intended that this should be at all. After all, the results of this indifferent attitude to what the Holy Spirit is trying to do and who the Holy Spirit is results in many who are twice born, but compared with the early Church, are only half alive.

They have never known the Spirit of God in any personal and powerful sense of the word. And I'm sure that this attitude is what God wants to correct. After all, the work of the Church in its administration is so vast, it demands a universal intelligence to control it and a universal presence to pervade it and to preside over it.

And therefore, it demands the presence of the Holy Spirit as the sole administrator of the affairs of Christ in his Church from the day of Pentecost until the day when Jesus returns again. In this so-called dispensation of the Holy Spirit, then, he is the sole administrator.

He is the absolute dictator, if you like. So it's an important thing that we should understand something of what it is he is seeking to do in our lives, in our day, and in our times. You remember Jesus said, My Father worketh hitherto and I work.

The context there shows that the Jews who were censoring the work of Jesus were actually passing judgment on the work of the Father at the same time. They were doing it automatically. And I don't think it's too much to say that in just the same way, if we discredit the ministry of the Holy Spirit, we automatically disparage the work of the Father and of the Son because the Father and the Son are behind the sending of the Holy Spirit into the Christian Church.

So if we discount his ministry, we are actually disparaging the ministry of the Father and of the Son of God. A Church which is actively engaged in self-appointed programs and tragically devoid of spiritual power is, in my way of thinking, a truly pathetic sight.

Partnership with the Spirit in Revival

But you know, partnership with the Spirit of God can change all this. This is the glorious thing about it. It need not be this way at all. For if we are engaged in partnership, in communion, in fellowship with the Holy Spirit, then we soon discover that this displaces our human impotence with his divine omnipotence.

That somehow our natural ignorance gives way to his intelligence. And our conscious sinfulness is cleansed away by his essential holiness. And what is more to the point, our self-sufficiency is dethroned by God's absolute efficiency.

And surely this makes all the difference in the world. Not only in the Church, but in the life of the believer. John Hyde, on his way to the mission field, received a cablegram from some of his praying friends.

And the substance of it was that they were praying that you may submit to the major partnership of the Holy Spirit. And he was affronted. He thought his life was given over to God. And he was annoying.

But by and by he was humbled. And eventually he sought God about this matter. And he became the famous praying Hyde, a mighty man of God. It was when the Spirit of God came into his life as the major partner that it made all the difference.

And when the Spirit of God comes into the Christian Church and is recognized as the major partner in everything, that's what makes all the difference. Revival, I think, is a living proof that a Church which is prepared to accept the absolute dictatorship of the Holy Spirit cannot long remain a weak and vacillating thing, but soon becomes like an army with banners marching on to victory.

And isn't this what we want? Isn't this the thing for which we are longing? Don't you feel deep in your heart a hunger and a yearning to see God moving in this way? His way of moving may not be according to your plan and purpose, but when he moves in sovereign ways, then his Church is suddenly revived and quickened.

And then you see something of the eternal purpose of God being outworked in the sphere of time. Now that's why I'm laying the emphasis so strongly and squarely on our need for a progressive fellowship and partnership with the Spirit of God.

Which means that we walk in the Spirit. We play in the Spirit. We sing in the Spirit. Yes, we live in the Spirit. In other words, in a partnership which is real to us. It may not be real to other people.

They may not be able to appreciate it. But to us, it's everything in the world because it's something personally, in our own experience, a living partnership with the Holy Spirit whom we recognize as being the one in control.

To begin each day with a consciousness that you spread your day before him and you say to him, O Holy Spirit of God, take over in my life today. Guide my footsteps. Guide my hands. Guide my tongue. Yes, control my affections.

Do with me what you would do. But be to me more than I can even ask or imagine. What wonderful days our days would be. Would they not? Now, this is something of what is happening here. I understand there was an occasion when Andrew Carnegie, the great millionaire, was visited by a young businessman who wanted some assistance.

And in the course of conversation, Carnegie said to him, Well, what are your assets, young man? Unfortunately, sir, he said, I have none at all. Well, he said, I'm afraid we don't do business on that basis in this office.

But I like your style and I want to help you. You come with me. So he took him downstairs and down to the pavement, the sidewalk, as they say in America. And linking his arm in the arm of the young man, he walked up and down, up and down for about half an hour talking to him.

Then he shook hands with him and went on his way. Immediately, the young fellow was surrounded by businessmen who were only too anxious and willing to help him all they could. Because of what he was? Not at all, but because of the person that he was walking with.

There's nothing in us. There's nothing in me. I recognize it. But the one with whom we walk, the Spirit of God, if we are in his companionship, if we are engaged in partnership with him, then all heaven waits to pour out blessing upon our lives.

This is the thought behind being in partnership and fellowship with the eternal Spirit of God. For into this common pool he brings all his marvelous abilities, all his riches, all his divine and inexhaustible equipment.

And into this pool we bring simply our yielded personality. As we have said over and over again, not our ability, but our availability. He's got all the ability. What he wants from us is the availability that he might come and possess us and so use us that our lives may make some impact upon the lives of other people.

This is fellowship as I conceive it to be. And so the person we walk with, fellowship with a comforter then is to be cultivated and makes demands upon us. It is to be cultivated because certain things are observed in our lives.

Not Quenching or Grieving the Holy Spirit

Now last Tuesday we mentioned some of these things. We said we must not sin against the Holy Spirit. We must not quench the Spirit by neglecting the study of God's Word which is fuel for the flame. Or by neglecting prayer, the atmosphere in which the fire of God burns.

In other words, if we are to maintain the vital glow in our fellowship with the Spirit, we must not neglect the place of prayer and waiting upon God. There's so many people, they'll try everything. When everything has failed, then as a last resort they'll try prayer.

I heard two ladies talking at the end of a church service on one occasion. They were saying, yes, I had a terrible problem. Well, she said, it was so serious I even prayed. Well, I mean, you can imagine, it must have been awful.

It was so serious I even prayed. We can allow the fire to die down in our fellowship with the Spirit of God. We can quench the Holy Spirit too by allowing the fire to be neglected by the building up forgetting that we have to have an up-to-date fellowship and experience with the living Spirit of God.

We touched on some of these things last Tuesday, so I don't want to enlarge upon them, but simply to make the connection between what we said then and what I want to try and say tonight. We can cause the flame of God to die down in our lives by superimposing some foreign element.

Try to mix the world and God. Try to mix self and the Savior. Try to mix the flesh and the Spirit. It just can't be done. Never the two angels meet. And if you attempt to act in this way, then the fire dies down and we must not grieve the Spirit of God, subjecting Him to the grief of offended righteousness simply because of sin unconfessed in our lives very often.

Or if it is not sin unconfessed, then it may be sin which we know God has forgiven but which we can't forgive ourselves. How many people are in this trap in Christian living? They know they have failed.

They know they have sinned. They have confessed their sin to God. They know God has forgiven them. They can't forgive themselves for having failed, for having sinned in this way. And this can be a grief to the Holy Spirit, the grief of offended righteousness, because we are doubting His ability to forgive and to cleanse and to remove.

And there is also the grief of thwarted purpose when we choose self instead of the Spirit and we sow to the flesh and so of the flesh reap corruption. This too can be a grief to the Spirit of God. And there is the grief of slighted love when He moves toward us, wooing us by His overtures of love and kindness and understanding and patience and loving kindness.

And we are found repulsing that advance that He makes, sometimes through ignorance, often through indifference, because we cannot somehow respond to His overtures of love toward us. This too is a way of grieving the Spirit of God.

And the awful thing is, you see, that these sins are committed not by unsaved people but by Christian people, church-going people, people who profess to love the Lord. This is the awful thing about it.

We must be so very careful then that we do not quench the Spirit of God, we do not grieve the Spirit of God, we do not resist the Spirit of God, we do not tempt the Spirit of God, we do not lie to the Spirit of God in anything that we do or say, but that in this fellowship we have one with the other.

There is an absolute flow of compassion, in understanding, in sympathy, that sense of belonging that comes. What a wonderful thing this is. And it is to this end that God, I believe, is trying to bring us.

Progressive Fellowship and the Spirit's Symbols

But you see, not only must this fellowship be a personal thing, but as we try to show it must also be a progressive fellowship. Progressive in the sense that we must know the Spirit of God under all the emblems and symbols and figures of speech by which He is presented.

Because God condescends through our human limitation to use picture language in order to explain to us what the Holy Spirit is like. Last Tuesday night we had a look at one of these emblems just briefly, the oil of anointing.

And I said then that there is need also to know Him as the wind or breath of God penetrating and invigorating and life imparting. We must know Him as the dove brooding tremulous with mother love with all His creative power and ability.

We must know Him as the clothing protecting and securing us in the midst of an alien world. We must know Him as the fire purging, cleansing, consuming deep within our lives. We must know Him in this way too.

We must know Him as the rain, as the rivers, as the dew in all His marvelous refreshing. We are to know Him and know a relationship with Him under all these figures of speech. And when you come to an end of these, if ever you do, there are all the titles of the Spirit of God, twenty-four of them.

And there are all the prepositions of the Spirit of God all to be known and comprehended in this sense of progressive fellowship which we are to have with Him. It is boundless. And when people are concerned about speaking with tongues or prophesying or having some demonstration or some tremendous revelation which half of it is only imagination and they think they have arrived, how foolish it is when God has so much to give us, so much to impart simply through our fellowship developing and being cultivated with the blessed Holy Spirit of God.

You must forgive me if I feel strongly on issues like this. I feel strongly because I see so many of God's dear people being robbed of the very best, the highest, the choices that God could give because they are being fobbed off with what is demonstrative only which will only end in the course of time in disappointment and frustration.

I am not against a hearty shout for the Lord if you have got something worth shouting aloud. I am not against that. I am not against dancing if this is what the Spirit of God ordains. But I am very much against those demonstrations which begin in the flesh with a hope that they will end in the Spirit.

I am against that sort of thing. Very much so. And I have seen a lot of it and I know it for what it is worth. But believe me, to know the Spirit of God as a person to know His tenderness, His sympathy, His understanding, His compassion, His love, to know Him as a person, this to me is far more important than having any one of the ecstatic gifts that are mentioned in the book of God.

It is more important because it is going to last longer. Sometimes I wish I didn't feel as strongly as I do about these things. But there it is. So tonight I want to move on with you a little bit and think of the Holy Spirit tonight as the wind of God, as the breath of God.

In Hebrew, the word ruach is used. In Greek, the word pneuma is used, for spirit. And literally, it just means the wind. So the wind of God, the breath of God, if you like. And let us say, first of all, that as the wind, the Spirit is invigorating, life imparting.

New Birth and the Wind of the Spirit

And to see this as Jesus presented it, we have to go back to the third chapter of John and to spend a little time with Nicodemus in his conversation with Jesus and how Jesus dealt with him. We are not looking at this simply from the standpoint of what it means to be born again, but trying to find the lessons concerning the Holy Spirit Himself under this figure of speech, that by so doing, we may learn how to walk with Him and how to commune with Him and how to have fellowship with Him as the breath of God, just as we saw it was possible to have fellowship with Him as the anointing oil of God.

This, then, is our purpose. John 3 and verse 3. Jesus answered and said unto him, that is Nicodemus, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God. So, rebirth is an imperative necessity.

That's the first thing. The man himself must be changed. I hope we all agree with this. It's not a question of changing the environment and therefore changing the man. One quaint old Welsh preacher used to say, in explaining what he meant here, you may put a pig in a parlor but it doesn't make him a gentleman.

And I can recall one of the cities in the old country, I think it was Birmingham, where they decided to raise all the slum dwellings and shift the slum dwellers and put them into new houses which the council had built and this was going to be a tremendous thing and within six months the new houses were slums.

They had changed the environment but they hadn't changed the people. And so Jesus makes it very, very clear here that rebirth is an imperative necessity. Nicodemus saith unto him, How can a man be born again when he is old?

Can he enter the second time into his mother's womb and be born? So he reduces the whole spiritual implication to the level of human logic. And isn't this what is going on all the time? It's like a Christian I know who was talking to a college professor about the redemptive work of Christ.

And the college professor said, Well, I'm sorry, I can't accept this. He said, It offends my intelligence. Within three months he came back to see the Christian. He said, I must accept this. I need forgiveness.

And isn't this so? You may not be able to understand and comprehend all that is involved in the redemptive work of Christ but every living person needs forgiveness. Forgiveness of sin. And the only one who can give forgiveness of sin is God Himself.

And He gives forgiveness because Jesus died and arose again. Delivered for our offenses. Raised again for our justification. This is the gospel, isn't it? And so Nicodemus reduces it to this level of human logic.

But notice how Jesus persists in driving home His point. Verse 5, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit.

Marvel not that I said unto thee he must be born again. Don't be amazed at this. The only way into the kingdom is by being born again. And when we recognize this, what a difference this makes in our lives.

I remember how religious I was. I've often said this. It was a pity I had to be saved, didn't it? I was so good. But the night that I found Christ as my Savior, to my amazement, I entered into a new world, a new dimension altogether.

It was all so different. Somehow, this being born again changed my life completely. I remember once traveling to Ireland and on board the little vessel going across from Stanra to land. I remember a man saying to me that on the trip prior to this, the Salvation Army last was on board.

And she had walked up to an Anglican bishop. She didn't know he was an Anglican bishop. She knew he was a minister. She walked right up to him and said, Excuse me, sir. She said, Are you born again? And he pulled himself up to his full height, which wasn't very high.

And he said, My dear young lady, I am a bishop of the Anglican church. Oh! She said, Don't let that stand in your way. And then Jesus uses an illustration, a very positive one, which underlines the ministry of the Holy Spirit as the quickener, the invigorator, the imparter of life.

Verse 8, The wind bloweth where it listeth, and thou hearest the sound thereof. But canst not tell whence it cometh and whither it goeth. So is every one that is born of the Spirit. Rotherham's literal translation reads, The Spirit where it pleaseth doth breathe, and the sound thereof thou hearest.

But knowest not whence it cometh and whither it goeth. Thus is every one born of the Spirit. Now, what lessons does this teach us about the Holy Spirit as the wind of God? First of all, we are shown the absolute mastery of the Holy Spirit.

The Sovereignty and Mastery of the Holy Spirit

The wind bloweth where it listeth. The word is the teller, where it wills. The breath goes and breathes where it wills. So it establishes the Holy Spirit's mastery. He is the absolute dictator. And you can't have fellowship with him on any other basis.

He is the one in control. And so his supreme sovereignty is established here in this statement by Jesus. Is it a question of spiritual gifts? He divideth severally as he will, will ye. Is it a matter of membership in the Church?

He hath set the members as it hath pleased him. Is it a question of being commissioned? The Holy Ghost said, separated unto me, Barnabas and Saul, and so on. So all the way through, you see, he is the dictator and what he says has to go.

It must be so if he commands it. It must be so if he requires it. We cannot, therefore, expect to control the Holy Spirit. But we must expect that he will control us. You can't organize him, but he can organize you.

And when he does this, remember, his dealings are never unreasonable, but they are super reasonable. And there is a difference. Just as I always say the coming of the Holy Spirit upon a person is not unnatural, it is supernatural.

God always intended it should be so. He designed our bodies to be temples of the Holy Spirit, so when the Spirit of God comes, it's not unnatural, it's supernatural. And the mastery of the Spirit of God in his absolute dictatorship is never unreasonable, but it is super reasonable.

We mentioned in the beginning of this series, Elijah being sustained by a widow woman and she a Gentile. Now that was super reasonable. When Ruth and I, during our married life, our early days, were in a little bit of financial difficulty, I remember we were praying about this and asking the Lord to supply our needs.

We had no idea at all as to how he would do it. But do you know how he did it? He caused a missionary couple on a missionary field to send to our support. And that was humbling. We felt that we should be the ones supporting them, but they felt led of the Spirit of God under his dictatorship, under his guidance, to send to our support.

And month after month after month, we received support from that mission field. Unreasonable? Super reasonable. We got to the place where we overcame our own feelings in the matter and recognized that this was something which God was doing.

God is no man's debtor and you can never out give him. I've proved this and I trust you proved it. And when he does come to meet our need, it's through so many unexpected sources that you are caused to stand in wonder love and praise and just worship him for what he has so marvelously done.

Knowing your need when perhaps no one else knew or if they knew they just didn't care. God has his own way. It almost reminds me of a man I heard praying once. He was quite an intellectual but in his prayer he said, paradoxical as it may appear unto thee, O Lord.

I often thought of those days, you know, it seemed so paradoxical. And yet it was God's way. The breath goes where it wills. So here you have divine sovereignty present. This is what happened, you know, in the revival in Wales.

The breath goes where it wills. The breath of God went into that little Christian endeavor meeting. The breath of God entered into a young woman. She stood to her feet. The breath of God controlling her caused her to say, I love Jesus Christ with all my heart.

And the deluge was outpoured and the revival began. The breath goes where it wills. It is divine sovereignty in the movements of the Spirit of God. And we have to accept this if we are going to have fellowship with the Holy Spirit of God.

He is in charge, not you at all. He is the dictator. He is the controller. He is the one who has absolute sovereignty and mastery in your life. If you want fellowship, it is on this basis or no other.

The Spirit's Manifestation in Conversion and Pentecost

And secondly, we are shown the positive manifestation of the Spirit. Thou hearest the sound thereof. Though unseen, you may sense His presence. There is a reality about His work which cannot be denied by any honest thinking person.

He is present. You hear the sound thereof. And I think, especially in conversion and especially in those dramatic conversions, surely no one could ever deny the miracle of the presence of the pervading life-changing Spirit of God.

He is old Mel Trotter on his way to commit suicide with sugar bags wrapped around his feet because he had no shoes. And as he is on his way, he passes the Water Street Mission and hears the sound of singing and went in and because it was warm, sat in the back seat and promptly fell asleep to be awakened by the voice of the preacher saying, And God is calling to you my brethren, saying, I love you and I want you to be saved.

And he awoke and went forward. Well, what a hopeless situation you would say. Do you know that Mel Trotter lived to see the day when he was voted the most respected citizen in that city? This is the kind of thing the Spirit of God is able to do because He is sovereign and because also there is a positive manifestation when He moves and works and you know, you sense, you feel His presence though you cannot see Him at all.

This is what Jesus taught about the Spirit. I know that not everyone is capable of registering His presence. I understand this. Jesus said that there is a man whom the world cannot receive because it seeth Him not neither knoweth Him.

The world can't receive Him. Three kinds of men, aren't there? There is the natural man, there is the carnal man, there is the spiritual man, the natural man, the psychikos man, the man of the soul, and the carnal man.

Well, he is the psychikos man, the man of the flesh. And there is the spiritual man, the pneumaticos man, the man in whom the Spirit of God is having His right of way. The first fellow, the natural man, has never been touched by the converting and regenerating Spirit of God.

And so, he is in the realm of the soul. He is a soulish fellow. And in the realm of the soul, he has no knowledge of the things of the Spirit. There is foolishness unto him. And so you will see that even though the Spirit of God may be manifestly present to those who are spiritual, He may be down at the South Poles as far as many are concerned, even though they are in the meeting.

They never register because they are not in that sphere, in that initiation, in that realm at all. So Jesus understood this and I believe He taught it quite plainly and clearly. Now, there was a positive manifestation surely at Pentecost, wasn't there?

And there came a sound from heaven as of... Oh, thank God, that was from the right direction, wasn't it? There came a sound from heaven as of a rushing mighty wind and it filled all the place where they were assembled together.

But you know, there was a preparation for that positive manifestation of the wind at Pentecost. It came upon a prepared people. A preparation for Pentecost was marked by expectancy to begin with. These all continued in obedience to the command tarihi.

And the word continued proskaterontos. It's a strong word. It means to have strength towards something. It's continuing without cessation. They were determined they would obey their Lord. And in this determination, in this being strong toward the fulfillment of the command, in this preparation, there came a sound from heaven as of a rushing mighty wind.

I'm sure there is a connection between the two things. This preparation was also marked by unity. They were all with one accord. And that was a marvelous thing. Thomas in his doubting, Peter in his impetuosity, John and James and all the rest of them, so different with all their idiosyncrasies and funniosities, and yet they were made one, amalgamated, blended, made of one accord.

How wonderful this is! You see, they were looking for the kingdom to be restored. When will Thou restore unto us the kingdom, they said. And Jesus said, He shall be baptized with the Holy Ghost that many days hence.

Are Thou at this time going to restore the kingdom? They couldn't take it in. But here they were at last, brought into a place of one accord. And an accord, a unity, which was marked by fervency. They continued all with one accord in prayer.

Now, this wasn't the kind of prayer that you sometimes hear in revival prayer meetings, when there's dead silence for a long time and then somebody ventures to pray a few words, and then just before it's time to finish, everybody seems to pray through, and that's the end of the prayer meeting.

Not at all. This word prayer is different. This is the word prosuchy, and it means intense intercession on fire. It's the word used of the fervent effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man. They continued in prayer.

They laid ahold of God. They believed God. They trusted He would fulfill His word. They expected God to move. And in this kind of praying, they laid themselves wide open for the visitation of the winds of God to come into the midst of them.

My brothers and sisters in Christ, we must remember that there is a necessary preparation where we are concerned too if we are to see revival in our day. You know, this rushing, mighty wind, is very important, isn't it?

I wish there was more time to deal with word by word, but rushing, this word rushing means that which carries everything before it, bearing before it. The word mighty is mighty in manifestation, manifestly mighty.

And so the rushing, mighty wind, doesn't it paint a picture for you? This illimitable power on the move in the early church. This is what they experienced on the day of Pentecost. And I've heard ministers of my own acquaintance, older men much than I am, really, or I was at the time, who were able to say that during the days of the great revival in Wales, they often heard the sound of a mighty, rushing wind.

They could hear it coming in the distance. And they'd get on their knees and they'd wait before God, and suddenly it would come in and come swishing and moving and rushing around the room where they were, and then out again.

And there was dead silence until they found themselves lit up in the Spirit. This is revival. Hallelujah. And we are going to say that we believe for revival in our day? Well, the rushing, mighty wind may be part of the demonstration of God when He comes.

We do not know. He is the dictator, as we have said. He is the controller. He is the one who has his hand upon every single thing. Now, I'm sure it's the purpose of God that the working of the Holy Spirit should be seen in transformed lives.

Transformation, Quickening, and the New Creation

I believe not simply where the unstable are concerned, but where we are concerned, too. Certainly where the unsaved person is concerned, when he comes to the Lord and accepts Christ as Savior, then that experience through which he passes is spoken of as a new creation.

I love this term. Not a new creature, please. A new creation. If any man be in Christ, he is a new creation. All things are passed away. Behold, all things have become new. What a tremendous field of opportunity and possibility is open here.

New potentials, new talents, new abilities, a new personality reconstructed on the image of God's Son. It's all here. It's all possible within this area of the Spirit's moving. Surely a new creation. I remember a man in a village eight miles from my home.

He was what we call a dunce at school. He wasn't intelligent at all. He could hardly read or write, but God laid it upon his heart one day to give himself unreservedly to the Spirit of God, and he did that.

And you know, the Spirit of God so took hold of that man, he remade him, gave him a new personality. It's the only way I can describe it. And he became a linguist. He went out of the mission field and was one of the most successful men in that area of mission work that had ever been known.

This same person. I knew him personally. He could hardly talk to you in the days that I knew him. God can do marvelous things when the Spirit of the Lord is not allowed to have his right of way. Not only transforming the life from within and changing the very being of the person, but transforming the countenance, too.