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The inspiration of the holy Scriptures.
Peter, in his second epistle, asserts:
`Knowing this first, that no prophecy of the Scripture is of any private interpretation. For the prophecy came not
in old time by the will of man: but holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost' (2 Pet.
1:20,21).
This statement as to the origin of the Word of God is obviously complementary to that of the apostle Paul in
2 Timothy 3:16,17 and it is noteworthy that both Peter and Paul, at the end of their lives, stress the divine authorship
of the sacred Scriptures which are the sole basis for a knowledge of the living Word, the Lord Jesus Christ.
The Revealer of Truth.
Not only is the Holy Spirit the inspirer and author of God's Word, He is the only one Who can give illumination
and understanding of its divine contents. We have noted how Paul stresses the fact that man without the aid of the
Holy Spirit, is unable to receive and comprehend what God has caused to be written. `The things of God knoweth
no man, but the Spirit of God' that by His enlightenment `we might know the things that are freely given to us of
God' (1 Cor. 2:11,12), for `God hath revealed them unto us by His Spirit' (verse 10), and these words are described
as `words which the Holy Ghost teacheth' (verse 13). The Lord Jesus promised the disciples that the Holy Spirit
would `guide them into all truth'. `He shall glorify Me: for He shall receive of Mine, and shall shew it unto you'
(John 16:13,14).
Here is something then which is absolutely vital, something which neither intellectual ability nor theological
training can give by themselves, namely divine understanding of the Bible.
The witness of the Holy Spirit.
`The Spirit itself beareth witness with our spirit, that we are the children of God' (Rom. 8:16). In this work the
Holy Spirit makes real to the believer what has been taken by faith and gives the consciousness of that reality. It is
with this in mind that the apostle John says `He that believeth on the Son of God hath the witness in himself' (1 John
5:10). The enjoyment of this precious witness is conditioned upon our walking with the Lord. If we get spiritually
cold or backslide, we must not expect to experience the assurance that we are really sons of God, although the fact
of our sonship rests squarely upon what the Lord Jesus has accomplished for us and not upon our experiences,
however precious they may be.
Anointing.
In 2 Corinthians 1:21,22 Paul wrote:
`Now He which stablisheth us with you in Christ, and hath anointed us, is God; Who hath also sealed us, and
given the earnest of the Spirit in our hearts'.
John, likewise in his first epistle wrote:
`But ye have an unction (anointing) from the Holy One, and ye know all things' (1 John 2:20).
`But the anointing which ye have received of Him abideth in you, and ye need not that any man teach you: but as
the same anointing teacheth you of all things, and is truth, and is no lie ...' (1 John 2:27).
The verb chrio and the noun chrisma occur only in those Scriptures written during the Acts period and relate to
the distributing of evidential gifts that are listed in 1 Corinthians 12. One of these gifts is spiritual knowledge (verse
8) and the reference in John's first epistle makes it quite clear that this came directly from the Holy Spirit apart from
human mediation; `ye need not that any man teach you'. `Ye know all things'. When we `rightly divide' the Word,
we shall have no problem with the fact that this does not obtain today. It is only as we `search the Scriptures' like
the Bereans of old, meditate and pray for `opened eyes' by the Holy Spirit, that divine illumination comes. If we are