and hath translated us into the kingdom of his dear Son: in whom we have redemption through his blood, even the forgiveness of sins (Col., 1: 12-14)." There is a line, a point, between the two kingdoms which must be crossedcrossed bodily, crossed mentally, crossed spiritually — and on that line is the point of pardon to every soul that travels that way.

By the process of turning to God and coming to the point of pardon we come into covenant relation with the Lord: "Behold, the days come, saith the Lord, that I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel, and with the house of Judah: not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day that I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt; which my covenant they brake, although I was an husband unto them, saith the Lord: but this shall be the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel; After those days, saith the Lord, I will put my law in their inward parts, and write it in their hearts; and will be their God, and they shall be my people and they shall teach no more every man his neighbor, and every man his brother, saying, Know the Lord: for they shall all know me, from the least of them unto the greatest of them, saith the Lord: for I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more (Jer., 31: 31-34)." Again: "Whereof the Holy Spirit also is a witness to us for after that he had said before, This is the covenant that I will make with them after those days, saith the Lord, I will put my laws into their hearts, and in their minds will I write them; and their sins and iniquities will I remember no more (Heb., 10: 15-17)." The two parties to this covenant are God and man; the surety of the covenant is Jesus the Christ: "By so much was Jesus made a surety of a better testament; and they truly were many priests, because they were not suffered to continue by reason of death: but this man, because he continueth ever, hath an unchangeable priesthood (Heb., 7:22-24)." A covenant is a contract in which the two or more minds come together. The Christian Covenant is the

contract between the Divine Mind and the human mind. The consideration is the remission of sins. This covenant is like all other covenants conditional. God laid down the Conditions, preaching, hearing, believing, repenting, confessing Christ, baptism. The Divine Mind has been revealed; the human mind must come to the Mind of God as expressed in the terms of the gospel, in order that there be established covenant relation. The point where the human mind yields to the Divine Mind, fully, freely, submissively, unreservedly, is the point of pardon, and the point where actual and active covenant relations begin.

No theory of the work of the Holy Spirit in conviction and conversion that eliminates the fact that the Spirit, the water, and the blood agree in one, can be true.

CHAPTER XIV.

Resisting the Holy Spirit.

Nehemiah, after the Babylonish captivity, reviewed the history of rebellious Israel in these words: "Yet many years didst thou forbear them, and testifiedst against them by thy spirit in thy prophets: yet would they not give ear: therefore gavest thou them into the hand of the people of the lands; nevertheless for thy great mercies' sake thou didst not utterly consume them, nor forsake them; for thou art a gracious and merciful God (Neh., 9: 30, 31)." Three hundred years before this, Isaiah the prophet of God had warned these people of the results of their stubbornness and rebellion: "And he said, Go, and tell this people, Hear ye indeed, but understand not; and see ye indeed, but perceive not; make the heart of this people fat, and make their ears heavy, and shut their eyes; lest they see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their heart, and convert, and be healed; then said I, Lord, how long? And he answered, Until the cities be wasted without inhabitant, and the houses without man, and the land be utterly desolate (Isa., 6:9-11)." However, they continued until the days of Jesus on earth, until stubbornness, resistance, rebellion, insolence, and irreverence had become a national characteristic, and God left them many of them-in their sins, and John makes it apparent that resistance had become a habit of the mind to such an extent that those abandoned by the Lord were hopeless and helpless : "But though he had done so many miracles before them, yet they believed not on him; that the saying of Esaias the prophet might be fulfilled, which he spake, Lord who hath believed our report? and to whom hath the arm of the

Lord been revealed? therefore they could not believe, because that Esaias said again, He hath blinded their eyes, and hardened their heart; that they should not see with their eyes, nor understand with their heart, and be converted, and I should heal them; these things said Esaias, when he saw his glory, and spake of him (Jno., 12:37-41).” Paul quoted approvingly Isaiah's prophecy, and applied it to the Jews who rejected Christ in the city of Rome: "And some believed the things which were spoken, and some believed not; and when they agreed not among themselves, they departed, after that Paul had spoken one word, Well spake the Holy Spirit by Esaias the prophet unto our fathers, saying, Go unto this people, and say, Hearing ye shall hear, and shall not understand; and seeing ye shall see, and not perceive for the heart of this people is waxed gross, and their ears are dull of hearing, and their eyes have they closed; lest they should see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their heart, and should be converted, and I should heal them (Acts, 28: 24-28)." Isaiah, Nehemiah, John and Paul unite in giving us a graphic picture of the apostate Jewish mind even from early times; but Stephen, in his defense, repeated the charge with vehement emphasis - their sin had become national, and it had passed down from father to son, from generation to generation; but let him speak for himself: "Ye stiffnecked and uncircumcised in heart and ears, ye do always resist the Holy Spirit: as your fathers did, so do ye; which of the prophets have not your fathers persecuted? and they have slain them which shewed before of the coming of the Just One; of whom ye have been now the betrayers and murderers who have received the law by the disposition of angels, and have not kept it (Acts, 7:51-53)."

It is well for us to examine these quotations with special care, for on them hang mighty issues even to this day.

According to Isaiah, confirmed by John and Paul, God addresses the minds of His people through their eyes and ears; but they were engrossed with the world and their

· God's messages to them understanding

follies to such an extent that all turning power it was in was shut out of their hearts — and this continued until the nation became hopelessly involved in ruin, ruin brought on by their own mental acts.

According to Nehemiah, the Lord testified against them, warned them by His "Spirit in the prophets "— this statement is the key to the whole situation. The Holy Spirit had not come to each individual personally and immediately, but He had inspired a message in the hearts of God's prophets, who spoke to the nation as a whole and to the individual" yet they would not give ear."

According to Stephen, the nation had grown in iniquity; he charged on the Sanhedrin and the nation that they were "stiffnecked," stubborn —" uncircumcised in heart and ears" not cut off from sin, but intimately identified with it. He also charged them that their fathers had persecuted the prophets those through whom the Holy Spirit spoke -and that they had now personally to answer for being the "betrayers and murderers" of Jesus, God's greatest messenger, by the Holy Spirit, unto them. He further charged them with a failure to keep the law.

Please observe: God gave them a law; they broke it, neglected it, trampled it under their feet; He sent prophets to them, who spoke a message in words, their own language, which they could understand; they resisted until this iniquity reached its climax in the murder of the Son of God.

Their attitude was generally one of resistance: "Ye do always resist the Holy Spirit: as your fathers did, so do ye." Heart, ears, eyes, were involved in this resistance. Isaiah, John and Paul unite in making the statement specifically. God made man with a mind, and with eyes and ears and He recognizes these in communicating His message to His wicked, rebellious and ungrateful children. Luke confirms this, for immediately following Stephen's awful charge he adds the statement: "When they heard these things, they were cut to the heart, and they gnashed