But let me say to you, that if you get the
gift of the Holy Ghost, you will have to take entire sanctification
with it, for the first thing the baptism with the Holy Ghost does
is to cleanse the heart from all sin."
Thank God, he humbled himself, permitted the Lord to sanctify
him, and he was filled with the Holy Spirit, and mightily
empowered to work for God.
Many have looked at the promise of power when the Holy Ghost is
come, the energy of Peter's preaching on the day of Pentecost,
and the marvellous results which followed, and they have hastily
and erroneously jumped to the conclusion that the baptism with
the Holy Ghost is for work and service only.
It does bring power--the power of God, and it does fit for
service, probably the most important service to which any created
beings are commissioned, the proclamation of salvation and the
conditions of peace to a lost world; but not that alone, nor
primarily. The primary, the basal work of the baptism, is that of
cleansing.
You may turn a flood into your millrace, but until it sweeps away
the logs and brushwood and dirt that obstruct the course, you
cannot get power to turn the wheels of your mill. The flood first
washes out the obstructions, and then you have power.
The great hindrance in the hearts of God's children to the power
of the Holy Ghost is inbred sin--that dark, defiant, evil
something within that struggles for the mastery of the soul, and
will not submit to be meek and lowly, and patient and forbearing
and holy, as was Jesus; and when the Holy Spirit comes, His first
work is to sweep away that something, that carnal principle, and
make free and clean all the channels of the soul.
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