Part 3, Chapter 6: Of Particular Communion with the Holy Spirit

Of particular communion with the Holy Spirit. Of preparation for it: valuation of the benefits we receive by him; what it is he comforts us in and against; with what, and how.

The way being thus made plain for us, I come to show how we hold particular communion with the Holy Spirit, as he is promised by Christ to be our Comforter, and as working out our consolation by the means formerly insisted on. The first thing I shall do herein is the proposal of what may serve as some preparation to the duty under consideration — and this by leading the souls of believers to a due valuation of his work toward us, from which he is called our Comforter.

To raise up our hearts to this frame and fit us for the duty intended, let us consider these three things.

First, what it is he comforts us against. Second, with what he comforts us. Third, the principle of all his actings and operations in us for our consolation.

There are three things in the whole course of our pilgrimage in which the consolations of the Holy Spirit are useful and necessary.

First, in our afflictions. Affliction is part of the provision that God has made in his house for his children, Hebrews 12:5-6. There is a measure of them appointed for every one. To be wholly without them is a temptation, and so in some measure an affliction. That which I am to speak to is that in all our afflictions we need the consolations of the Holy Spirit. It is the nature of man to relieve himself when he is entangled by all ways and means. According as men's natural spirits are, so do they manage themselves under pressures. The spirit of a man will bear his infirmity; at least it will struggle with it.

There are two great evils, one of which generally seizes on men under their afflictions and keeps them from a due management of them. The apostle mentions them both, Hebrews 12:5: despise not the chastisement of the Lord, neither faint when you are reproved. Men fall into one of these extremes: either they despise the Lord's correction, or they sink under it.

First, men despise it. They account that which befalls them to be a light or common thing. They take no notice of God in it. They can shift with it well enough: they look on instruments and second causes, provide for their own defense and vindication, with little regard to God or his hand in their affliction. And the ground of this is that they take in succors in their trouble that God will not mix his grace with. They fix on other remedies than what he has appointed, and utterly lose all the benefits and advantage of their affliction. And so shall every man do who relieves himself from anything but the consolations of the Holy Spirit.

Second, men faint and sink under their trials and afflictions. The first despise the assistance of the Holy Spirit through pride of heart; the latter refuse it through dejectedness of spirit and sink under the weight of their troubles. Had we not learned to count light of the chastisements of the Lord and to take little notice of his dealings with us, we should find the season of our afflictions to comprise no small portion of our pilgrimage.

There is no due management of our souls under any affliction — so that God may have the glory of it and we ourselves any spiritual benefit or improvement thereby — but by the consolations of the Holy Spirit. All that our Savior promises his disciples when he tells them of the great trials and tribulations they were to undergo is: I will send you the Spirit, the Comforter; he shall give you peace in me when in the world you shall have trouble. He shall guide, direct, and keep you in all your trials. And so the apostle tells us it came to pass, 2 Corinthians 1:4-6. Under the greatest afflictions this carries the soul to the highest joy, peace, rest, and contentment. So the same apostle, Romans 5:3: we glory in tribulations. He had said before that we gloried in the hope of the glory of God, verse 2. And what if manifold afflictions and tribulations befall us? Even in them also we glory, says he. But from where is it that our spirits are so borne up to a due management of afflictions as to glory in them? He tells us, verse 5: it is from the shedding abroad of the love of God in our hearts by the Holy Spirit. And therefore believers are said to receive the word in much affliction with joy of the Holy Spirit, 1 Thessalonians 1:6, and to take joyfully the spoiling of their goods. There is no management nor improvement of any affliction but merely and solely by the consolations of the Holy Spirit. If it is of any esteem or value to you that you lose not all your trials, temptations, and afflictions — learn to value that whereby alone they are rendered useful.

Sin is the second burden of our lives and much the greatest. To this the consolation of the Holy Spirit is peculiarly suited. So Hebrews 6:17-18 — an allusion is taken from the manslayer under the law, who having killed a man unawares and brought the guilt of his blood upon himself, fled with speed for his deliverance to the city of refuge. Our great and only refuge from the guilt of sin is the Lord Jesus Christ, and in our flying to him does the Spirit administer consolation to us. A sense of sin fills the heart with trouble and disquietness; it is the Holy Spirit who gives us peace in Christ. That gives an apprehension of wrath — the Holy Spirit sheds abroad the love of God in our hearts. From there does Satan and the law accuse us as objects of God's hatred — the Spirit bears witness with our spirits that we are the children of God. There is not any one engine or instrument that sin uses or sets up against our peace, but one effect or other of the Holy Spirit toward us is suited and fitted to the casting of it down.

In the whole course of our obedience are his consolations necessary also — that we may go through with it cheerfully, willingly, and patiently to the end. In a word, in all the concerns of this life and in our whole expectation of another, we stand in need of the consolations of the Holy Spirit.

Without them, we shall either despise afflictions or faint under them, and God be neglected as to his intentions in them.

Without them, sin will either harden us to a contempt of it or cast us down to a neglect of the remedies graciously provided against it.

Without them, duties will either puff us up with pride or leave us without that sweetness which is in new obedience.

Without them, prosperity will make us carnal, sensual, and to take up our contentment in these things, and utterly weaken us for the trials of adversity.

Without them, the comforts of our relations will separate us from God, and the loss of them make our hearts as Nabal's.

Without them, the calamity of the church will overwhelm us; and the prosperity of the church will not concern us.

Without them, we shall have wisdom for no work, peace in no condition, strength for no duty, success in no trial, joy in no state, no comfort in life, no light in death.

Now our afflictions, our sins, and our obedience with their respective attendencies are the great concerns of our lives. What we are in reference to God is comprised in them, and the due management of them with their contraries which come under the same rule. Through all these does there run a line of consolation from the Holy Spirit that gives us a joyful issue throughout. How sad is the condition of poor souls destitute of these consolations? What poor shifts are they forced to betake themselves to? Whether they are conquered or seem to conquer, they have nothing but the misery of their trials.

The second thing to be considered, to teach us to put a due valuation on the consolations of the Holy Spirit, is the matter of them — or that with which he comforts us. This may be referred to the two heads I have formerly treated of: the love of the Father and the grace of the Son. All the consolations of the Holy Spirit consist in his acquainting us with and communicating to us the love of the Father and the grace of the Son. Nor is there anything in the one or the other but he makes it a matter of consolation to us. So indeed we have our communion with the Father in his love and the Son in his grace by the operation of the Holy Spirit.

First, he communicates to us and acquaints us with the love of the Father. Having informed his disciples with that ground and foundation of their consolation which by the Comforter they should receive, our blessed Savior, John 16:27, shuts up all in this: the Father himself loves you. This is what the Comforter is given to acquaint us with — even that God is the Father and that he loves us. In particular, that the Father, the first person in the Trinity considered so distinctly, loves us. On this account is he said so often to come forth from the Father — because he comes in pursuit of his love and to acquaint the hearts of believers with it, that they may be comforted and established. By persuading us of the eternal and unchangeable love of the Father, he fills us with consolation. All the effects of the Holy Spirit before mentioned have their tendency this way. A sense of this love is able not only to relieve us but to make us in every condition rejoice with joy unspeakable and glorious. It is not with an increase of corn and wine and oil, but with the shining of the countenance of God upon us, that he comforts our souls, Psalm 4:6. The world hates me, such a soul as has the Spirit may say, but my Father loves me. Men despise me as a hypocrite, but my Father loves me as a child. I am poor in this world, but I have a rich inheritance in the love of my Father. I am straitened in all things, but there is bread enough in my Father's house. I mourn in secret under the power of my lusts and sin where no eye sees me; yet the Father sees me and is full of compassion. With a sense of his kindness, which is better than life, I rejoice in tribulation, glory in affliction, triumph as a conqueror. Though I am killed all the day long, all my sorrows have a bottom that may be fathomed, my trials bounds that may be compassed — but the breadth and depth and height of the love of the Father, who can express?

Again, he comforts us by communicating to us and acquainting us with the grace of Christ — all the fruits of his purchase, all the desirableness of his person as we are interested in him. The grace of Christ, as I formerly discoursed of at large, is referred to two heads: the grace of his person, and of his office and work. By both does the Holy Spirit administer consolation to us. He glorifies Christ by revealing his excellencies and desirableness to believers — as the chiefest among ten thousand, altogether lovely. And then he shows them the things of Christ: his love, grace, all the fruits of his death, suffering, resurrection, and intercession — and with these supports their hearts and souls. Here whatever is of refreshment in the pardon of sin, deliverance from the curse and wrath to come, in justification and adoption with the innumerable privileges attending them, in the hope of glory given to us — comes in on this head of account.

Thirdly, the principle and fountain of all his actings for our consolation comes next under consideration to the same end — and this leads us a little nearer to the communion intended to be directed in. This principle is his own great love and infinite condescension. He willingly proceeds or comes forth from the Father to be our Comforter. He knew what we were and what we could do and what would be our dealings with him. He knew we would grieve him, provoke him, quench his motions, defile his dwelling place — and yet he would come to be our Comforter. Want of a due consideration of the great love of the Holy Spirit weakens all the principles of our obedience. Did this dwell and abide upon our hearts, what a dear valuation must we needs put upon all his operations and actings toward us? Nothing indeed is valuable but what comes from love and goodwill. This is the way the scripture takes to raise up our hearts to a right and due estimation of our redemption by Jesus Christ. It tells us that he did it freely, that of his own will he laid down his life, that he did it out of love. Herein is manifested the love of God, that he laid down his life for us. He loved us and gave himself for us, he loved us and washed us with his own blood. To this it adds our state and condition as he undertook for us: sinners, enemies, dead, alienated — then he loved us and died for us and washed us with his blood. May we not hence also have a valuation of the dispensation of the Spirit for our consolation? He proceeds to that end from the Father; he distributes as he will and works as he pleases. And what are we toward whom he carries on this work? Froward, perverse, unthankful — grieving, vexing, provoking him. Yet in his love and tenderness he continues to do us good. Let us by faith consider this love of the Holy Spirit. It is the head and source of all the communion we have with him in this life. What a little portion is this of what might be spoken! It suffices that from what is spoken it appears that the work in hand is among the greatest duties and most excellent privileges of the gospel.

Of particular communion with the Holy Spirit. Of preparation for it: valuing the benefits we receive through Him; what He comforts us against; with what He comforts us; and how He does it.

With the way now cleared, I come to show how we hold particular communion with the Holy Spirit — as He is promised by Christ to be our Comforter and as He works out our consolation by the means described earlier. The first thing I will do is lay some groundwork for the duty to be considered — and I will do this by leading believers' souls to a proper appreciation of His work toward us, which is why He is called our Comforter.

To lift our hearts to this frame and prepare us for this duty, consider three things.

First, what He comforts us against. Second, with what He comforts us. Third, the principle behind all His actions and operations in us for our consolation.

There are three things in our entire pilgrimage through this life in which the consolations of the Holy Spirit are useful and necessary.

First, in our afflictions. Affliction is part of what God has provided for His children in His household (Hebrews 12:5-6). There is a measure of affliction appointed for each person. To be entirely without affliction is itself a kind of spiritual danger, and in that sense a form of affliction. What I want to address is this: in all our afflictions we need the consolations of the Holy Spirit. It is natural for people to seek relief from distress by whatever means they can find. How people handle pressure tends to follow the bent of their natural temperament. The spirit within a person can bear up under hardship — or at least struggle with it.

There are two great errors, one of which commonly seizes on people in their afflictions and prevents them from handling them rightly. The apostle mentions both in Hebrews 12:5: 'Do not regard lightly the discipline of the Lord, nor faint when you are reproved by Him.' People fall into one of these two extremes: either they despise the Lord's correction, or they collapse under it.

First, people despise it. They treat what has happened to them as a minor or ordinary thing. They take no notice of God in it. They manage on their own — looking only at outward causes, providing for their own defense and recovery, with little regard to God or His hand in their affliction. The root of this is that they turn to sources of relief that God will not mix His grace with. They seek remedies other than those He has appointed and miss entirely the benefit and profit of the affliction. This is what every person will do who finds relief from anything other than the consolations of the Holy Spirit.

Second, people collapse and sink under their trials and afflictions. The first group despises the Spirit's help through pride; the second refuses it through discouragement, sinking under the weight of their troubles. If we had not learned to take God's chastisements lightly and pay little attention to His dealings with us, we would find that our seasons of affliction make up no small part of our pilgrimage.

There is no right handling of our souls under any affliction — no way for God to receive glory from it or for us to gain any spiritual benefit or growth through it — apart from the consolations of the Holy Spirit. When our Savior told His disciples about the great trials and tribulations they were about to face, all He promised them was: I will send you the Spirit, the Comforter; He will give you peace in Me even as you have trouble in the world. He will guide, direct, and sustain you through all your trials. The apostle tells us this is exactly what happened (2 Corinthians 1:4-6). Under the greatest afflictions, the Spirit carries the soul to the highest joy, peace, rest, and contentment. As the apostle writes in Romans 5:3: 'We also exult in our tribulations.' He had just said that we glory in hope of the glory of God (verse 2). And what if many afflictions and troubles come upon us? Even in those, says the apostle, we glory. But from where does our spirit draw the strength to handle afflictions well enough to glory in them? He tells us in verse 5: it comes from the love of God being poured into our hearts by the Holy Spirit. For this reason believers are said to receive the word 'in much tribulation with the joy of the Holy Spirit' (1 Thessalonians 1:6) and to take joyfully the seizure of their property. There is no right handling or growth from any affliction except through the consolations of the Holy Spirit. If you care at all about not wasting your trials, temptations, and afflictions, learn to value the only thing that makes them useful.

Sin is the second burden of our lives — and by far the heavier one. The consolation of the Holy Spirit is uniquely suited to address it. Hebrews 6:17-18 draws an analogy from the manslayer under the law: a person who had accidentally killed someone, bringing the guilt of bloodshed upon himself, ran urgently to the city of refuge for his deliverance. Our great and only refuge from the guilt of sin is the Lord Jesus Christ, and it is in our fleeing to Him that the Spirit administers consolation to us. A sense of sin fills the heart with distress and turmoil — and it is the Holy Spirit who gives us peace in Christ. Sin produces a dread of wrath — the Holy Spirit pours the love of God into our hearts. Satan and the law accuse us as objects of God's hatred — the Spirit bears witness with our spirits that we are God's children. There is not a single weapon that sin uses against our peace for which one or another of the Holy Spirit's effects toward us is not perfectly suited to counter it.

Throughout the entire course of our obedience, His consolations are also necessary — so that we may carry on cheerfully, willingly, and patiently to the end. In short, in all the concerns of this life and in all our hope for the life to come, we stand in need of the consolations of the Holy Spirit.

Without them, we will either despise afflictions or collapse under them, while God's purposes in them go unmet.

Without them, sin will either harden us into contempt of it or cast us down so that we neglect the remedies God has graciously provided against it.

Without them, duties will either inflate us with pride or leave us without the sweetness that belongs to genuine, renewed obedience.

Without them, prosperity will make us worldly and sensual, content to find our satisfaction in earthly things, and completely unprepared for times of adversity.

Without them, the comfort we find in our closest relationships will pull us away from God, and the loss of those relationships will leave our hearts as cold and hard as Nabal's.

Without them, the calamity of the church will overwhelm us, and its prosperity will fail to move us.

Without them, we will have wisdom for no task, peace in no condition, strength for no duty, success in no trial, joy in no circumstance, no comfort in life, and no light in death.

Our afflictions, our sins, and our obedience — along with everything that comes with them — are the great concerns of our lives. What we are before God is expressed through these, as is how rightly we handle them and the opposites that fall under the same category. Through all of these, a thread of consolation from the Holy Spirit runs, bringing us to a joyful outcome throughout. How sad is the condition of those souls who lack these consolations? What poor substitutes are they forced to turn to? Whether they are defeated or seem to win, they have nothing but the misery of their trials.

The second thing to consider — in order to teach us to properly value the consolations of the Holy Spirit — is their content: what it is He uses to comfort us. This can be grouped under the two headings I treated earlier: the love of the Father and the grace of the Son. All the consolations of the Holy Spirit consist in His making known to us and communicating to us the love of the Father and the grace of the Son. There is nothing in either of these that He does not make a source of consolation for us. In this way, in fact, we hold communion with the Father in His love and with the Son in His grace through the operation of the Holy Spirit.

First, He communicates to us and makes known the love of the Father. After instructing His disciples about the foundation of the consolation they would receive through the Comforter, our Lord Jesus closes it all with these words in John 16:27: 'The Father Himself loves you.' This is what the Comforter is given to make known to us — that God is our Father and that He loves us. In particular, that the Father — the first person of the Trinity, considered distinctly as such — loves us. This is why the Spirit is said so often to come forth from the Father: because He comes in pursuit of the Father's love, to bring the hearts of believers into an awareness of it so that they may be comforted and established. By persuading us of the Father's eternal and unchangeable love, the Spirit fills us with consolation. All the Spirit's effects described earlier move in this direction. A sense of this love is enough not only to bring us relief but to make us in every condition 'rejoice with joy inexpressible and full of glory.' It is not through an increase of grain and wine and oil, but through the shining of God's face upon us, that He brings comfort to our souls (Psalm 4:6). A soul that has the Spirit can say: The world hates me, but my Father loves me. People despise me as a hypocrite, but my Father loves me as a child. I am poor in this world, but I have a rich inheritance in the love of my Father. I am pressed on every side, but there is bread enough in my Father's house. I grieve in secret under the power of my desires and sin where no one sees me — yet my Father sees me and is full of compassion. With a sense of His kindness — which is better than life — I rejoice in tribulation, glory in affliction, and triumph as a conqueror. Though I am being put to death all day long, all my sorrows have a bottom that can be reached and my trials have limits that can be reached — but who can express the breadth and depth and height of the Father's love?

The Spirit also comforts us by communicating to us and making known the grace of Christ — all the fruits of His redemption, and all the desirability of His person as it belongs to us. The grace of Christ, as I discussed at length earlier, falls under two headings: the grace of His person, and the grace of His office and work. Through both, the Holy Spirit administers consolation to us. He glorifies Christ by revealing His excellencies and His desirability to believers — as 'the chiefest among ten thousand,' 'altogether lovely.' He then shows them Christ's own things: His love, His grace, and all the fruits of His death, suffering, resurrection, and intercession — and with these He supports their hearts and souls. Under this heading comes everything that brings refreshment: the pardon of sin, deliverance from the curse and the coming wrath, justification and adoption with all the privileges that attend them, and the hope of glory given to us.

Third, the principle and fountain behind all His workings for our consolation also deserves consideration for the same purpose — and this brings us a step closer to the actual communion we are directing people toward. That principle is His own great love and infinite condescension. He willingly comes forth from the Father to be our Comforter. He knew what we were, what we were capable of, and how we would treat Him. He knew we would grieve Him, provoke Him, suppress His promptings, and defile His dwelling place — and still He came to be our Comforter. Failing to properly consider the great love of the Holy Spirit weakens every foundation of our obedience. If this truth lived and remained in our hearts, what a deep value we would place on all His workings and operations toward us! Nothing is truly precious unless it comes from love and goodwill. This is the approach Scripture takes to raise our hearts to a right appreciation of our redemption by Jesus Christ. It tells us He did it freely — that by His own will He laid down His life, that He did it out of love. 'In this is love, that He laid down His life for us.' 'He loved us and gave Himself for us; He loved us and washed us from our sins by His own blood.' To this it adds the condition we were in when He undertook our cause: sinners, enemies, dead, estranged — and in that condition He loved us and died for us and washed us with His blood. Can we not in the same way come to value the gift of the Spirit for our consolation? He comes forth from the Father for this very purpose; He distributes as He wills and works as He pleases. And what are we, the ones toward whom He carries on this work? Stubborn, crooked, ungrateful — grieving, vexing, provoking Him. Yet in His love and tenderness He continues to do us good. Let us by faith consider this love of the Holy Spirit. It is the head and source of all the communion we hold with Him in this life. How small a portion this is of what could be said! But what has been said is enough to show that the work before us is among the greatest duties and most excellent privileges of the gospel.