Evening, February 16
Go To Morning Reading
“Thy good Spirit.”
Nehemiah 9:20
Common, too common is the sin of forgetting the Holy Spirit. This
is folly and ingratitude. He deserves well at our hands, for he is
good, supremely good. As God, he is good essentially. He shares in
the threefold ascription of Holy, holy, holy, which ascends to the
Triune Jehovah. Unmixed purity and truth, and grace is he. He is good benevolently , tenderly bearing with our waywardness, striving with our rebellious
wills; quickening us from our death in sin, and then training us for
the skies as a loving nurse fosters her child. How generous, forgiving,
and tender is this patient Spirit of God. He is good operatively . All his works are good in the most eminent degree: he suggests good
thoughts, prompts good actions, reveals good truths, applies good
promises, assists in good attainments, and leads to good results.
There is no spiritual good in all the world of which he is not the
author and sustainer, and heaven itself will owe the perfect character
of its redeemed inhabitants to his work. He is good officially ; whether as Comforter, Instructor, Guide, Sanctifier, Quickener,
or Intercessor, he fulfils his office well, and each work is fraught
with the highest good to the church of God. They who yield to his
influences become good, they who obey his impulses do good, they who
live under his power receive good. Let us then act towards so good
a person according to the dictates of gratitude. Let us revere his
person, and adore him as God over all, blessed forever; let us own
his power, and our need of him by waiting upon him in all our holy
enterprises; let us hourly seek his aid, and never grieve him; and
let us speak to his praise whenever occasion occurs. The church will
never prosper until more reverently it believes in the Holy Ghost.
He is so good and kind, that it is sad indeed that he should be grieved
by slights and negligences.