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Agent in Redemption, February 18
And hope maketh not ashamed; because the love of God is shed
abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost which is given unto us.
Romans 5:5
.
By nature the heart is evil, and “who can bring a clean thing out of
an unclean? not one.”
Job 14:4
. No human invention can find a remedy
for the sinning soul.... The fountain of the heart must be purified before
the streams can become pure. He who is trying to reach heaven by his
own works in keeping the law is attempting an impossibility. There is
no safety for one who has merely a legal religion, a form of godliness.
The Christian’s life is not a modification or improvement of the old, but
a transformation of nature. There is a death to self and sin, and a new
life altogether. This change can be brought about only by the effectual
working of the Holy Spirit.
It is the Spirit that makes effectual what has been wrought out by
the world’s Redeemer. It is by the Spirit that the heart is made pure.
Through the Spirit the believer becomes a partaker of the divine nature.
Christ has given His Spirit as a divine power to overcome all hereditary
and cultivated tendencies to evil, and to impress His own character upon
His church.
Like the wind, which is invisible, yet the effects of which are plainly
seen and felt, is the Spirit of God in its work upon the human heart.
That regenerating power, which no human eye can see, begets a new
life in the soul; it creates a new being in the image of God.
The thoughtless and wayward become serious. The hardened repent
of their sins, and the faithless believe. The gambler, the drunkard,
the licentious, become steady, sober, and pure. The rebellious and
obstinate become meek and Christlike. When we see these changes in
the character, we may be assured that the converting power of God has
transformed the entire man.
He who looks to Christ in simple, childlike faith is made a partaker
of the divine nature through the agency of the Holy Spirit.
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