Like Spring Rain: Towards a New Pentecostal Doctrine of the Holy Spirit.

By John Brough

Looking at key concepts such as sealing, regeneration, indwelling, filling, baptism, spiritual gifts and speaking in tongues, this book seeks to set the Pentecostal and Toronto experiences on a biblical, doctrinal basis which is both evangelical and conservative.

• Language: English
• Publisher: WestBow Press
• Release date: Nov 1, 2011
• ISBN: 9781449728083

John Brough

John grew up in a conservative evangelical church. When the charismatic renewal burst on the scene in the late 1960s, the church took a fierce stand in opposition to it. While attending university, John encountered many charismatics; they didn’t seem to be as evil as the church had portrayed. A subsequent experience of the Holy Spirit accompanied by speaking in tongues created a quandary. Theologically John could see holes in the Pentecostal doctrine, but the experience was real. This book is the result of forty years of reflection on the quandary, starting from the premise that if the experience really was God, then it should be able to be explained scripturally without the obvious contradictions in popular theology. John has a B. Theology degree from Auckland University. He is a trained primary school teacher and has served as a pastor and Bible teacher. He is married with three adult children. John lives only a few minutes’ walk from a beautiful beach in Whangaparaoa, New Zealand, a setting conducive to reflection on the things of God. John attends his local Assembly of God church.

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Copyright © 2011 by John Brough.

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ISBN: 978-1-4497-2810-6 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-4497-2811-3 (hc)

ISBN: 978-1-4497-2808-3 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2011918044

Printed in the United States of America

WestBow Press rev. date: 10/20/2011

Contents

DEDICATIONS

AUTHOR’S PREFACE

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

CHAPTER 1

SECTION 1

CHAPTER 2

CHAPTER 3

CHAPTER 4

CHAPTER 5

SECTION 2

CHAPTER 6

CHAPTER 7

CHAPTER 8

CHAPTER 9

CHAPTER 10

CHAPTER 11

CHAPTER 12

CHAPTER 13

CHAPTER 14

SECTION 3

CHAPTER 15

CHAPTER 16

CHAPTER 17

CHAPTER 18

CHAPTER 19

CHAPTER 20

CHAPTER 21

CHAPTER 22

SECTION 4

CHAPTER 23

CHAPTER 24

CHAPTER 25

APPENDICES

APPENDIX 1

APPENDIX 2

APPENDIX 3

BIBLIOGRAPHY

NOTES

DEDICATIONS

To my wife, Ailsa,

Who encouraged me to write a book.

Here is the first fruits of your encouragement.

May there be more.

To the Godly saints in the congregation I grew up in,

most of whom have long since departed for more glorious shores.

You taught me the maxim:

Don’t believe anything unless you can prove it from the word of God.

It still seems like good advice.

It has saved me from accepting easy answers that don’t work.

I hope this book proves to be an example of this maxim.

AUTHOR’S PREFACE

Several years ago I was caught in the middle of a dilemma—a doctrinal conflict which I was finding extremely difficult to resolve.

The situation was a common set of circumstances. I had been brought up in a very conservative evangelical church. Then I began to attend university and met large numbers of young Christians from Pentecostal and Charismatic backgrounds who believed certain things I did not. They talked of an experience called the baptism in the Spirit and another phenomenon called speaking in tongues along with other gifts of the Holy Spirit. Things I had never heard of and knew nothing about.

Then in my church it all blew up. There were a number of sermons on the evils of Pentecostalism and how deceived and dangerous these people were. I was taught that certain of the more supernatural gifts had passed away with the death of the apostles and that the baptism in the Spirit was when we received the Holy Spirit at conversion. I was told there was no second blessing.

Yet the lives of those I was encountering at University did not seem to evidence demonic deception. Rather they seemed to be earnest, dedicated Christians—more so than most of my evangelical colleagues. These Pentecostals attended prayer meetings, involved themselves in worship, church, Bible studies, evangelism and other healthy Christian disciplines and activities to a degree unmatched by their evangelical counterparts. They didn’t seem to me to be deceived—rather they were concerned to see others won to Christ. However, my conservative background did not allow me to accept what they were saying.

I involved myself in two lines of research on the subject. The first was private—I spent time in the Bible and in reading books on the subject from every possible point of view. The second was public—I would engage in debate with both Pentecostals and with Conservatives. The university chapel had a wonderful lounge where students used to meet for coffee. I would simply join a table populated either by Conservatives or by Pentecostals and proceed to debate the issue with them taking the opposing side to those sitting at the table. Both camps were totally convinced I was in the other camp but really I was just trying to find out what they believed and why.

These debates resulted in a deep sense of dissatisfaction. I felt neither side really understood the position of the other—nor even of their own. More than that, it seemed that neither side really had a good grasp on what the Scriptures said about the issue.

For the Conservatives, fear of possibly being wrong seemed to be the motivating factor in their rejection of the Pentecostal position. The Pentecostal position had some theological inconsistencies and this was enough to send the Conservatives running for cover. Because of these inconsistencies, it was easy for Conservatives to say Pentecostals were deceived. This meant they did not have to really examine what Pentecostals were saying, to see if there was any truth in it at all. The presence of some error was enough to reject the whole; the baby was thrown out with the bathwater. Interestingly, many of the strongest Conservatives in that group have gone on to full time Christian work in some capacity and are now Charismatics or Pentecostals themselves.

The Pentecostals, on the other hand, didn’t seem to care about doctrine at all—they had experienced God and that was all that mattered. Explaining it doctrinally was not important to them. This in itself was frightening—especially to me. My church background clearly told me that one had to be able to demonstrate things from Scripture in order to protect oneself from deception.

Meanwhile, the reading I was doing on the subject left me with the strong conviction the Conservative doctrine on the baptism in the Holy Spirit was correct—a position I still hold with some modifications (as will become clear later). On a personal level I had a Pentecostal experience and began to speak in tongues, a practice I still continue. So the conflict in my mind became greater.

Then one day God gave me a key to reconciling the contradiction. That key is the essence of this book. The key came through a book of sermons by a man who was considered (by the stream I belonged to) to be almost infallible. His Study Bible was the general workbook for most of the people in my church. He would be surprised to see how his sermon led me to the conclusions I have written in this book.

This book is, in a sense, an account of my personal journey through this controversial question. In it I try to raise and discuss the various questions and objections which confronted me. These are answers which, at least to me, seem to resolve the difficulties I struggled with. Along the way I unearthed some problems and some answers I didn’t expect. In one sense there is nothing new here, so the reader looking for a great new insight is likely to be disappointed. My late father used to often say, Originality is not coming up with something new but it is putting things together in a new way. Really, after 2000 years of people doing theology there is probably not much new that can be said, but it can be said in a new way. I hope this is original enough to warrant the effort of writing it. I believe I have arrived at an approach that is original in the discussion and which I hope many will find a helpful resolution of the issue. It works for me.

Of course I am not so naïve to assume that everyone will agree with the conclusions; the last thirty five years since my University days has shown me that. Some will reject it out of hand. Others will claim it is too complex, even though really it is simple. Some will say I am making what is simple into something complex. I believe I am making clear what is found in scripture. I didn’t write Scripture but I do have to be honest with what is there. Maybe the camps have been so polarized that no one could see a middle way through.

I expect Conservatives will be surprised because the resolution I propose is very Conservative. Pentecostals will be surprised because along the way they may see they have been missing out when they thought they had it all and others didn’t.

This is not a theological book in the technical sense, though I admit I am doing theology. Doing theology is, after all, just thinking about God and the questions that faith involves. To do a formal theological book I would have had to consistently cross reference ideas to the writers who supplied me with food for thought along the journey. The brief notes I made many years ago often did not include the titles of books and their authors so that would be an impossible task. This means, in the main, I cannot give acknowledgements, so I have written in a non technical style. Where possible, I have acknowledged sources. Books mentioned in the text are those I have found especially helpful over the years. If you, as an author, see your words in this book then, thanks a heap! You have been important in the development of my thoughts.

This is more an account of my own journey so at times it reads like that. Every now and then I make a personal comment to show the direction my mind was travelling. At other times it reads more like theology. I hope you will find it inspirational, in a devotional way, as well as a challenge to your own spiritual growth. I hope other teachers in the Body will find things here they can use in their teaching and preaching. Primarily, I hope that the many who have been in the same sort of church I was in and are grappling with this issue will find answers here to the many questions it raises.

A Plea:

Discussions I have had over the years have shown me that some people have difficulty with what I say here. This is not because what I am saying is difficult but because people assume I am saying what they’ve heard before. They then read into what I am saying what they think I am saying. This leads to them not actually hearing what I am saying, but rather they hear the echoes in their own minds. Generally when people have stopped assuming I am saying what I am not actually saying, they find what I am saying is straightforward and easy to grasp. This difficulty seems to be true for people on both sides of the discussion—particularly if they have some knowledge of the opposing position. In reality, I am walking a line right down the middle between the two camps.

So I have two requests. First, please don’t assume my conclusions before you get to them and, second, don’t just jump to the end of the book to find the conclusions because the proof along the way is necessary to avoid misunderstanding.

The key thing to remember is this: Wrong doctrine will always end up with wrong practice eventually. It’s my view that both sides of this dispute have some error and some correct understanding. Where they go wrong they both end up missing out (or, at least, are in danger of missing out) on part of God’s provision for us in Christ, but in different ways. I hope this book will enable both groups to come together and for us all to enter fully into the experience of the Holy Spirit that has been provided for us, by the Father, through Christ.

The interesting thing is that evangelicals—whether Conservative, Charismatic or Pentecostal—often end up saying, when they understand this, That’s what I have always believed, but I’ve never seen the implications in this way before.

Conservatives are, surprisingly enough, just as concerned as Pentecostals with the question of whether or not they are experiencing the full provision of God in Christ through the Spirit. They are not novices in the area of spiritual experience. They just don’t think that the Pentecostal formulations adequately explain that fullness. The Conservative pastor wants his flock to experience fully the power of the Spirit as much as the Pentecostal pastor does. He knows the only answer to the problems in his congregation is the power of God through the Holy Spirit. In this we are no different. However, the Conservative pastor is concerned that the quick-fix approach of Pentecostalism may divert his flock from the way of the Cross and so prove to be a deception. Sometimes his fears are justified.

What I want to do is provide the reader with good doctrine that relates to life experience. My aim is to give a Biblical justification for the Pentecostal experience. I hope you enjoy the ride.

I have subtitled the book Towards a New Pentecostal Theology of the Spirit. It is only Towards because I recognize that I don’t have all the answers. These answers work for me; I hope they will work for others also. I hope this book will open up new directions of dialogue and understanding so that there will eventually come a greater unity of doctrine and practice in the Church worldwide. If this book succeeds in moving us Towards such a unity it will have been, in my opinion, worthwhile.

My ultimate aim is not doctrine, rather it is twofold: That we, as Christians, enter into the experience of everything God has provided for us through Christ for this life. This is God’s desire and so I make it my aim also. It is also my desire that we, as Christians, become more fully one instead of fighting. And in that greater unity we will experience a greater presence of the Holy Spirit. As the Psalmist says,

"How good and pleasant it is when brothers live together in unity!

It is like precious oil poured on the head, running down on the beard,

running down on Aaron’s beard, down upon the collar of his robes.

It is as if the dew of Hermon were falling on Mount Zion.

For there the LORD bestows his blessing, even life forevermore."

(Psalm 133)

John Brough, 31 March 2011.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

My thanks to my friends, Laurence Williams,

David Calderwood and Barry Shaw.

They proof read this book and made many valuable

comments and suggestions.

Any excellence in it is thus theirs; any mistakes remain mine.

To Ken Martin.

Who created the cover design.

You took my vague ideas and made an object of great beauty. Thanks.

([e-mail])

All Bible quotations, unless otherwise noted,

are from either the NIV

(© International Bible Society

1973, 1978, 1984.)

Or the

NIV Study Bible

(©Zondervan Bible Publishers,

Grand Rapids,

Michigan 49506, USA)

CHAPTER 1

THE LAY OF THE LAND

The theme of this book is the work of the Holy Spirit. I am not intending to engage in a full theology of the Spirit. Others are better equipped than I am for that task. Rather, I want to discuss the questions raised by the Pentecostal experience. This is often called The Second Blessing because it is generally considered by Pentecostals to be a second work of the Holy Spirit in the individual alongside regeneration.

As with any doctrinal controversy, there are many shades of opinion forming a broad spectrum of views on the Christian experience of the Spirit of God. To help see the breadth of opinion, in this chapter I want to outline some of the positions commonly held, to give a sort of lay of the land. As I see it there are five main schools we need to consider in this discussion. Each of these positions is, itself, a spectrum of views, though there are main threads that group them as distinct schools of thought. These are not straw men invented by me; I have often met representatives of each of these positions. They are:

1.     The Extreme Conservative position.

2.     The Conservative Evangelical position.

3.     The Normal Pentecostal position.

4.     The Charismatic position.

5.     The Extreme Pentecostal position.

THE EXTREME CONSERVATIVE POSITION.

This position has several points:*

*     The baptism in the Spirit happens at conversion.

*     There is no second blessing. We get every spiritual blessing in Christ at conversion (Eph 1:3).

*     There is, however, a need to be filled with the Spirit daily as an ongoing Christian lifestyle.

*     With the death of the apostles some of the gifts of the Spirit ceased, including speaking in tongues. Thus any speaking in tongues today must be, at best, a deception (hysteria) or, at worst, demonic. (It is this point that helps push this position to an extreme.)

The deep fear of Pentecostalism in the group I grew up in led to a state where it was not possible to talk about the Holy Spirit in sermons, or to teach on the subject. Anyone who dared do so was branded Pentecostal, leading to exclusion.

I was often told that Speaking in tongues is of the Devil, thus anyone who spoke in tongues was, by implication, demon possessed. I was also told, No Christian can be demon possessed. Thus this view logically arrives at a position where it says, If you speak in tongues you are not a Christian.

The difficulty I had with this approach was that every person I knew who spoke in tongues had made a Christian commitment of some sort and was attempting to live a holy Christian life. What happened when someone, like myself, had made an evangelical Christian commitment and was clearly living a Christian life, then later had this experience and spoke in tongues? Were we no longer Christians? Had we lost our salvation? Yet these same people strongly affirmed, Once saved, always saved; one cannot lose one’s salvation. The only logical implication was that we had not been saved in the first place—and still weren’t if we spoke in tongues. As such it excluded from the Church any Pentecostal or Charismatic who has spoken in tongues and this exclusion is based on the belief that the gift of tongues is not available to the Church today.

This position had some assumptions which were unsubstantiated from Scripture which led to inner contradictions. It was a response of fear to something not understood—which the Pentecostal teaching on the Holy Spirit at the time didn’t alleviate. However, there is some strong scriptural support for their objections to the Pentecostal position, some of these I will discuss in later chapters.

THE NORMAL CONSERVATIVE POSITION.

There is considerable divergence among Conservatives on this doctrine, so much so that there is really no normal position. There are those who identify the baptism in the Spirit with the coming of the Spirit on the Church on the Day of Pentecost, so the individual Christian does not have a personal baptism in the Spirit. There are those who identify the baptism in the Spirit with conversion, so all Christians are baptized in the Spirit. Then there are those who identify the baptism in the Spirit with water baptism, either infant or adult. Finally, there are those who see it as a second blessing subsequent to conversion.

Conservatives usually hold that there is an experience of being filled with the Spirit (Eph 5:18) but they do not associate this with any particular manifestation or gift and hence not with a particular type of specific experience. Rather they understand the filling of the Spirit to be something every Christian could be and should be experiencing continuously. This filling is evidenced by the expression of Christian character; displaying the fruit of the Spirit (Gal 5:22). Conservatives generally hold that the filling of the Spirit is related to individual consecration and so one can be more filled or less filled. As one yields more areas of one’s life to Christ’s lordship, one is progressively more filled with Christ’s character and presence by the Holy Spirit.

The idea of a second blessing is not unknown amongst Conservatives though this is not always identified with the baptism in the Spirit or the filling of the Spirit. D. Martin Lloyd-Jones¹ presents the case for a second encounter with the Holy Spirit after conversion. This is a gift for empowerment, which he calls the Seal, or baptism in the Spirit. Lloyd-Jones demonstrates how this has been a fairly consistent teaching in the Church from the beginning. Different writers have given it different names including baptism in the Spirit, filled with the Spirit, baptism in Fire and Seal. This second blessing has been presented in various ways, most often as an empowerment for service, or as a work of sanctification (as in the Holiness movement).

THE NORMAL PENTECOSTAL POSITION.

This position holds that the work of the Holy Spirit in the individual is twofold; both of these blessings have been purchased for us by Christ and are the right of every Believer. Both of them are covenant blessings of the New Covenant.

First, there is regeneration, in which a person is born again and becomes a member of the family of God. This accompanies justification and is part of the Christian conversion experience. As a result of regeneration a person is indwelt by the Holy Spirit.

Second, there is a work of empowerment, called the baptism in the Spirit. This can be experienced either in conjunction with new birth or at a subsequent time, but it is a separate or second blessing alongside regeneration. This second blessing is initially evidenced by speaking in tongues. It should be noted that Pentecostals often argue that this should be experienced at conversion and is part of the conversion package. However, because many do not experience it then, it can be experienced later.

To support this teaching, Pentecostals developed an interpretation of the Acts records to demonstrate a two-stage reception of the Spirit.

This is the view of the Azusa St Revival, which began modern Pentecostalism. It is the official view of the main Pentecostal denominations and of many independent Pentecostal Churches.

THE EXTREME PENTECOSTAL POSITION.

In this view, regeneration and the baptism in the Spirit are identified as one and are the Christian conversion experience. All Christians are thus baptized in the Holy Spirit. The baptism in the Spirit is evidenced by speaking in tongues. Thus if a person does not speak in tongues they are not born again; they are not a Christian.

Pressed to its logical conclusion, this position is a denial of the gospel as it makes a work of man, speaking in tongues, necessary for salvation. Thus our salvation would not be totally dependent on Christ’s work and the free grace of God, but on a work we do ourselves, namely, speaking in tongues. It also infers that most of the people in the world who have made Christian commitments are not actually saved and are thus going to Hell—simply because they do not speak in tongues. It also consigns to Hell nearly all Christians of previous generations for the same reason. The extreme Pentecostal may not actually want to say this conclusion, but it is the clear implication of their teaching.

This is the view of several smaller Pentecostal denominations and also of many independent Pentecostal congregations.

In one sense, this conclusion is not dissimilar in its results to the extreme Conservative position. Extreme Pentecostals deny salvation to every person who does not speak in tongues; extreme Conservatives deny salvation to everybody who does speak in tongues.

THE CHARISMATIC POSITION.

Here Charismatic means those people in the established Denominational Churches (both Catholic and Protestant), who have accepted the Pentecostal experience as a valid Christian experience for (all) Believers.

There are three distinct groups in this general position, Roman Catholic Charismatics, those in the mainline Protestant denominations who practice infant baptism and those from a Baptist type background. These groups, because of their various historical understandings of the baptism in the Spirit, feel uncomfortable calling the Pentecostal experience the baptism in the Spirit, so they tend to call it the filling of the Spirit. Since the Charismatic renewal of the 1970’s this terminology has become more popular, so that even Pentecostals often use it to name the experience. I will discuss these views in chapter 12.

Charismatics also feel uncomfortable with the Pentecostal demand that a person speaks in tongues as the evidence of this experience. Rather, they tend to see this experience as a doorway to experiencing all of the gifts of the Spirit including tongues.

Interestingly, the Conservative view of the filling of the Spirit as a lifestyle rather than an event is also taught strongly amongst Pentecostals and Charismatics. There does not seem to be recognition that there is a contradiction between this and other understandings they have of being filled with the Spirit. This fact alone leads me to believe that Pentecostals and Charismatics have really not thought out the implications of their doctrine of the Holy Spirit. I will outline the different understandings of the phrase at the appropriate point in the text.

chart1.jpg

These, then, are the five main schools of thought on the experience of the Spirit. It is clear there are a wide range of views and the lines between them can get quite blurred.

Hollenweger² notes that in the traditional churches there is still too little realization of the fact that the experience and doctrine of the baptism in the Holy Spirit occur in the history of doctrine and religious practice in many places outside the Pentecostal movement. The variety of views should encourage us to be careful in our quest for understanding.

Dunn³ concurs with Hollenweger: Within Christianity down through the centuries there has always been a strain of teaching which holds that salvation, so far as it may be known in this life, is experienced in two stages: first the event of becoming a Christian; then, as a later and distinct event, some special and distinctive operation of gift of the Holy Spirit.

Dunn⁴ then traces the history of this doctrine and I summarize him here:

•     In the history of Christian thought this disjointedness was first clearly formulated in the Catholic sacraments of baptism and confirmation. Some writers think that it goes back even beyond that. Berkhof⁵ says, Paul doesn’t use the term ‘filled’ in the same way as Luke but has the same ideas. For him the work of the Holy Spirit is more than just justification and sanctification. An additional work is promised and should be sought. Berkhof concludes that this implies the Pentecostal position is right.

•     With the Reformation’s rejection of confirmation as a sacrament and its switch in emphasis to preaching and Scripture, the two stage view of salvation disappeared below the surface for a time. It began to emerge again with the Puritans, some of whom believed that the experience of assurance was a second and subsequent work of the Spirit in the Christian.

•     It was John Wesley who raised it again to doctrinal status with his doctrine of entire sanctification.

•     A direct line… can be drawn from Wesley to the 19th Century holiness movement… The Keswick Convention was notable for its second blessing teaching and (described) some Christians as living between Calvary and Pentecost . . . . It was the Holiness movement which brought the belief in Spirit baptism into prominence as a distinct doctrine.

•     Towards the close of the Nineteenth Century, particularly in the United States, the emphasis of the phrase changed from the idea of sanctification and holiness (a baptism of fire) to that of empowering for service. R.A. Torrey was the chief mover here.

•     At the same time in the United States there was a growing interest in spiritual gifts.

•     It was directly from this context that Pentecostalism sprang… Its beginnings can be traced to Topeka Bible School where… the distinctive belief of Pentecostals was first formulated at the end of 1900—namely that in apostolic times, speaking in tongues was considered to be the initial physical evidence of a person’s having received the baptism in the Holy Spirit . . . Their own experience, as much as their study of the Bible, led to… the three distinctive doctrines of Pentecostalism.

(i)     The baptism in the Spirit is a second experience distinct from and subsequent to conversion which gives power for witness.

(ii)     Speaking in tongues is the necessary and inevitable evidence of the baptism. This set Pentecostalism apart from the earlier Holiness movements.

(iii)     The spiritual gifts (1 Cor 12:8-10) should be manifested in worship.

For the sake of simplicity in the following discussion, I will only be comparing the Conservative position, the Normal Pentecostal position and the Charismatic position; these cover the range of ideas fairly well.

Because I am from a Baptist-type background I will be arguing my case from that point of view. This will help me keep the issues simpler, but also I believe it best accounts for all the scriptural material. As Pentecostals, like Baptists, mostly practice believer’s baptism by immersion it will also keep the discussion in their context. Along with that bias go a number of premises I will be making without stating them. By making my bias clear most readers should be able to read what I have written in the light of my assumptions. Those from other communions may need to reinterpret what I say in the light of your denominational understanding. In the main it will make little difference, but there are possibly a couple of places that rely strongly on a Baptist-type understanding. If you are from another communion I ask for your grace as you read.

The key question of this book is this: Is the Pentecostal experience of the Holy Spirit scriptural and, if so, what is it like?

Because I have had a Pentecostal experience and speak in tongues, I am going to end up with a positive answer to this question. So my terminus is clear, but I suspect that the route I travel to get there is quite unique. Along the way I try to be honest with the Scriptures. That means that I take issue with some other popular doctrinal constructions, both Conservative and Pentecostal.

For convenience, throughout the book I will call this second blessing by the name the Pentecostal Experience. I will, in due course, explain why I feel uncomfortable with the term second blessing. I also find both the terms baptism in the Spirit and filling of the Spirit inadequate labels for the experience. They lead to misunderstandings when used exclusively, which I will also explain at the appropriate juncture. Where I use the phrases baptism in the Spirit or filling in the Spirit it is intentional, to distinguish them from each other as doctrinal constructs and as gifts of God to us. The meaning of each phrase will become clear in the text.

SECTION 1

Knowing the Gifts of God

CHAPTER 2

CHRIST THE SOURCE OF ALL BLESSING

The following story is one that has done the rounds of the internet in various forms. It is a good parable of the truth I want to convey in this chapter.

THE PARABLE OF THE FATHER AND THE SON.

A wealthy man and his only son loved to collect rare works of art. They had everything in their collection, from Picasso to Raphael. They would often sit together and admire the great works. When the Viet Nam conflict broke out, the son went to war. He was very courageous and died in battle as he was rescuing another soldier. The father was notified and grieved deeply for his son.

Some months later there was a knock at the door. A young man stood at the door with a large package in his hands. He said, Sir, you don’t know me, but I am the soldier for whom your son gave his life. He saved many lives that day. He was carrying me to safety when a bullet struck him in the heart and he died instantly. He often talked about you and your love for art.

The young man held out his package. I know this isn’t much. I’m not really a great artist, but I think your son would have wanted you to have this.

The father opened the package. It was a portrait of his son, painted by the young man. He stared in awe at the way the soldier had captured the personality of his son in the painting. The father was so drawn to the eyes that his own eyes welled up with tears. He thanked the young man and offered to pay him for the picture.

Oh no, sir. I could never repay what your son did for me. It’s a gift.

The father hung the portrait over his mantle. Every time visitors came to his home he took them to see the portrait of his son before he showed them any of the other great works he had collected.

The man died a few months later. There was to be a great auction of his paintings. Many influential people gathered, excited over seeing the great paintings and having an opportunity to purchase one for their collection. On the platform sat the painting of the son.

The auctioneer pounded his gavel. We will start the bidding with this picture of the son. Who will bid for this picture?

There was silence. Then a voice in the back of the room shouted, We want to see the famous paintings. Skip this one.

The auctioneer persisted, Will someone bid for this painting? Who will start the bidding? $100, $200?

Another voice shouted angrily, We didn’t come to see this painting. We came to see the Van Goghs, the Rembrandts. Get on with the real bids!

Still the auctioneer continued, The son! The son! Who’ll take the son?

Finally, a voice came from the very back of the room. It was the long-time gardener of the man and his son. I’ll give $10 for the painting. Being a poor man, it was all he could afford.

We have $10, who will bid $20?

Give it to him for $10. Let’s see the masters.

$10 is the bid, won’t someone bid $20?

The crowd was becoming angry. They didn’t want the picture of the son. They wanted the worthier investments for their collections. The auctioneer pounded the gavel. Going once, twice, SOLD for $10!

A man sitting in the second row shouted, Now let’s get on with the collection!

The auctioneer laid down his gavel. I’m sorry, the auction is over.

What about the paintings?

"I am sorry. When I was called to conduct this auction, I was told of a secret stipulation in the will. I was not allowed to reveal that stipulation until this time. Only the painting of the son would be auctioned. Whoever bought that painting would inherit the entire estate, including the paintings. The man who takes the son gets everything!"

APPLICATION OF THE PARABLE.

The man who takes the Son gets everything!

This is a beautiful picture of what our Lord has done for us. When we take the Son of God into our lives we get all of the gifts of God with him. This truth is stated several times in Scripture.

"He who did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all—how will he not also, along with him, graciously give us all things (Rom 8:31-32)?"

One of the most marvellous things about the gospel of Christ is the absolute lavishness of the gift that God has given us. When we stop and think about it, the gift of his Son was an amazing thing. The gift of his Son gives us forgiveness of sins, cleansing, freedom from death and many other immediate blessings. Here Paul makes this extend even further: Shall he not also give us ALL THINGS.

He who takes the Son gets everything!

I wonder what all things means?

The Apostle Peter talks about God’s provision in Christ in a similar way and he describes what all things means in more detail: "His divine power has given us everything we need for life and godliness through our knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and goodness. Through these he has given us his very great and precious promises, so that through them you may participate in the divine nature and escape the corruption in the world caused by evil desires (2 Pet 1:3, 4)."

First, it is "everything we need for life." We need to be careful here not to limit the promise Peter makes. He does not say, Everything we need for our spiritual life, and thereby leave out provision for our natural daily life. No! He plainly says God