row is, and to seek grace to keep it in proper control. No affection, if uncontrolled, so disarranges the order of men's minds, and unfits them for the duties of their calling.
7. — [^Nevertheless, I tell you the truth, etc.'] In this verse we set our Lord mercifully condescending to show His disciples the necessity for His leaving them. It was expedient. It was for their good. It was for the real ultimate benefit of themselves and the whole Church that He should go away. If He did not go away the great outpouring of the Holy Ghost, so often promised, could not come down on them and the world. If He went away He would send the Comforter. If he did not go away the Comforter would not come.
There is undeniably much that is deep and mysterious about the contents of this verse. We can only speak with reverence of the matter it unfolds. It seems clearly laid down that the Holy Ghost's coming down into the world with influence and grace, was a thing dependent on our Lord's dying, rising again, and ascending into heaven. It seems to be part of the eternal covenant of man's salvation that the Son should be incarnate, die, and rise again ; and that then, as a consequence, the Holy Spirit should be poured out with mighty influence on mankind, and the Gentile Churches be brought into the fold, and Chris- tianity spread over a vast portion of the world. This seems plainly taught, and this we must simply believe. If any one asks " why the Holy Ghost could not be poured down without Christ's going away ? " it is safest to reply, that we do not know.
One thing is very clear. The universal invisible presence of the Holy Ghost in the Church, is better than the visible bodily presence of Christ with the Church. Christ's body could only be in one place. The Holy Ghost can be everywhere at one and the same time. — Wliatever the disciples might think, it was far better for Christ to go up to heaven, and sit at God's right hand as their Priest, and send down the Holy Ghost to be with the Church till He came again, than for Christ to tarry with them as He had done. — Flesh and blood might have liked better to keep Christ on earth, eating and drinking, and walking and talking in Palestine. But it was far better for the souls of men that Christ should finish His work, go up to heaven, take up His ofiice there in the holy of holies, and send down the Holy Spirit on the Church and the world.
Calvin remarks, " Far more advantageous and far more desir- able is that presence of Christ, by which He communicates Himself to us through the grace and power of His Spirit, than if He were present before our eyes."
Alford remarks, " The dispensation of the Spirit is a more blessed manifestation of God than was ever the bodily presence of the risen Saviour.