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the Spirit was promised, or that the Spirit promises anything, but rather that the Spirit is
the pledge and the earnest.
The reader who has followed this series will no doubt be thinking of II Cor. 1: 20:--
"For howsoever many be the promises of God, in Him is the Yea: Wherefore also
through Him is the Amen, unto the glory of God by us. 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" (II Cor. 1: 20-22).
Here, as in Eph. 1: 13, 14, we have the promise, the seal and the earnest associated
with the Spirit, and with a oneness on the part of the recipients of grace. Turning to
Gal. 3: we observe that there, where the promise is, is the reference to the Spirit also:--
"That the blessing of Abraham might come on the Gentiles through Jesus Christ; that
we might receive the promise of the Spirit through faith" (Gal. 3: 14).
What encouragement there is in these words for the Lord's children. Not only have
they promises that are "sure to all the seed", being by faith and by grace, but further,
these promises are all and only "in Christ", and can be enjoyed only as we are "all one in
Christ Jesus". These promises, howsoever many and varied they may be, are all
confirmed and assured in Christ, and to us, in addition, is given the earnest and the seal,
until the day when promises shall be enjoyed no longer in prospect but in reality.