Chapter 22

which one may know whether he has received it or not. In this passage Paul says to the believers in Galatia, “This only would I learn of you, Received ye the Spirit by the works of the law, or by the hearing of faith?” Their receiving the Spirit had been so definite as a matter of personal consciousness, that Paul could appeal to it as a ground for his argument. In our day there is much talk about the baptism with the Holy Spirit and prayer for the baptism with the Spirit that is altogether vague and indefinite. Men arise in meeting and pray that they may be baptized with the Holy Spirit, and if you should go afterwards to the one who offered the prayer and put to him the question, “Did you receive what you asked? Were you baptized with the Holy Spirit?” it is quite likely that he would hesitate and falter and say, “I hope so”; but there is none of this indefiniteness in the Bible. The Bible is clear as day on this, as on every other point. It sets forth an experience so definite and so real, that one may know whether or not he has received the baptism with the Holy Spirit, and can answer yes or no to the question, “Have you received the Holy Ghost?”

In the second place it is evident that _the baptism with the Holy Spirit is an operation of the Holy Spirit distinct from and additional to His regenerating work_. This is evident from Acts i. 5, “For John truly baptized with water; but ye _shall be_ baptized with the Holy Ghost _not many days hence_.” It is clear then that the disciples had not as yet been baptized with the Holy Ghost, that they were to be thus baptized not many days hence. But the men to whom Jesus spoke these words were already regenerate men. They had been so pronounced by our Lord Himself. He had said to them in John xv. 3, “Now ye are _clean through the word_ which I have spoken unto you.” But what does clean through the word mean? 1 Peter i. 23 answers the question, “_Being born again_, not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible, _by the word of God_, which liveth and abideth forever.” A little earlier on the same night Jesus had said to them in John xiii. 10, R. V., “He that is bathed needeth not save to wash his feet, but is clean every whit: and _ye are clean but not all_.” The Lord Jesus had pronounced that apostolic company clean—_i. e._, regenerate men—with the exception of the one who never was a regenerate man, Judas Iscariot who should betray Him (see verse 11). The remaining eleven Jesus Christ had pronounced regenerate men. Yet He tells these same men in Acts