The doctrine of the Deity of Jesus Christ and the doctrine that Jesus Christ was a real man, go hand in hand in the Bible. What kind of a
Saviour, what kind of a Lord Jesus, do you believe in? Do you believe in a Saviour that is a man and man only? Then you do not believe in the Saviour that is presented in the Bible. On the other hand, do you believe in a Saviour that is God and God only? Then you do not believe in the Saviour of the Bible. The Lord Jesus, our Lord and Saviour, presented to us in the Bible, is very God of very God and at the same time He is our brother, our fellowman, and is not ashamed to call us brethren. Oh, I thank God that I have a Saviour that is God, possessed of all the attributes and powers of Deity, all the perfections of Deity, a Saviour for whom nothing is too hard. I thank God that my Saviour is One who made the heavens and the earth, and who holds all the powers of nature and of history in His control; but I equally thank God that my Saviour is my brother man, One who was tempted in all points like as I am, One who is in a position to bear my sins, on the one hand because He is God, on the other hand because He is man. A merely divine Saviour could not be a Saviour for me. A merely human Saviour could not be a Saviour for me. But a Saviour in whom Deity and humanity meet; a Saviour who is at once God and man, is just the Saviour I need, and the Saviour that you need, a Saviour that is able to save to the uttermost all that come unto God through Him.
VI
The Personality of the Holy Spirit
"The Communion of the Holy Ghost."—2 Cor. 13:14.
Our subject this morning is "The Personality of the Holy Spirit." No series of sermons upon the Fundamentals of our Christian faith would be complete without a sermon on the Personality and Deity of the Holy Spirit. The doctrine of the Personality of the Holy Spirit is both fundamental and vital. Any one who does not know the Holy Spirit as a person has not attained to a complete and well-rounded Christian experience. Any one who knows God the Father and God the Son, but who does not know God the Holy Spirit has not attained unto the Christian conception of God, nor to a fully Christian experience. It may seem to you at first thought as if the doctrine of the Personality of the Holy Spirit were a purely technical and apparently impractical doctrine, but it is not so. As we shall see shortly, the doctrine of the Personality of the Holy Spirit is a doctrine of the very first practical importance.
I. THE IMPORTANCE OF THE DOCTRINE OF THE PERSONALITY OF THE HOLY SPIRIT
1. The Doctrine of the Personality of the Holy Spirit is of the highest importance from the standpoint of worship. If the Holy Spirit is a person and a Divine Person, and He is, and if we do not know Him as such, if we think of the Holy Spirit only as an impersonal influence or power, then we are robbing a Divine Person of the worship which is His due, and the love which is His due, and the confidence and surrender and obedience which are His due. And may I stop at this point to ask each one of you, "Do you worship the Holy Spirit?" Theoretically we all do, every time we sing the long metre Doxology,