But while the Scriptures reveal to us the fact of the personality
of the Holy Spirit, and it is a subject for our faith, to those
in whom He dwells this fact may become a matter of sacred
knowledge, of blessed experience.
How else can we account for the positive and assured way in which
the Apostles and disciples spoke of the Holy Ghost on and after
the day of Pentecost, if they did not know Him? Immediately after
the fiery baptism, with its blessed filling, Peter stood before
the people, and said: "This is that which was spoken by the
prophet Joel: And it shall come to pass in the last days, saith
God, I will pour out My Spirit upon all flesh"; then he exhorted
the people and assured them that if they would meet certain
simple conditions they should "receive the gift of the Holy
Ghost." He said to Ananias, "Why hath Satan filled thine heart to
lie to the Holy Ghost?" He declared to the High Priest and
Council that he and his fellow-Apostles were witnesses of the
resurrection of Jesus: and added, "And so is also the Holy Ghost,
whom God hath given to them that obey Him." Without any apology
or explanation, or "think so" or "hope so," they speak of being
"filled" (not simply with some new, strange experience or
emotion, but) "with the Holy Ghost." Certainly they must have
known Him. And if they knew Him, may not we?
Paul says: "Now we have received, not the spirit of the world,
but the Spirit which is of God; that we might know the things
that are freely given to us of God.
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