HOW GLORIOUS IT IS Part 7
The wisdom of the fathers
THE FULL BLESSING OF PENTECOST
How glorious it is????Part?7
It is the blessing of Pentecost that will make the Church of Christ what God would have her be. We have spoken of what the Spirit will do in individual believers. We have also to think of what the blessing will be when the Church as a whole shall apprehend her calling to be filled with the Spirit, and then to exhibit the life and the power yea, and the very presence of her Lord to the world. We must not only seek and receive this blessing, every one for himself, but we must also remember that the full manifestation of what the blessing itself is, cannot be given until the whole body of Christ be filled with it. "If one member suffer, all the members suffer with it."??
If many members of the Church of Christ are content to remain without this blessing, the whole Church will suffer. Even in individual disciples the blessing cannot come to its full manifestation. Hence it is of the utmost importance that we should not only think of what the being "filled with the Spirit " means for ourselves, but also consider what it will do for the Church, especially in our own neighbourhood, and by her for all the world.?
To this end, let us simply recall the morning of the day of Pentecost. At that juncture the Christian Church in Jerusalem consisted only of one hundred and twenty disciples, most of them poor unlearned fishermen, publicans, and humble women, an insignificant and despised gathering.?Yet it was just by these believers that the kingdom of God had to be proclaimed and extended : and they did it. By them, and those who were added to them, the power of Jewish prejudice and of pagan hardness of heart was overcome, and the Church of Christ won glorious triumphs. This grand result was achieved simply and only because the first Christian church was filled with the Spirit. The members of it gave themselves wholly to their Lord. They allowed themselves to be filled and consecrated, governed and used only by Him.?
They yielded themselves to Him as instruments of His power. He dwelt in them and wrought in them all His wondrous deeds. It is to this same experience that the Church of Christ in our age must be brought back.
(from "The Full Blessing of Pentecost" by Andrew Murray)