Christ’s Relations To The Holy Spirit
So far all is plain and within the circle of clear light from the “oracles of god.” A new question here arises-a question which, to our knowledge, has not been put before. The question is this: Did the development of manifestation of the spiritual life in Christ depend upon the indwelling, and influence, and baptism of the Holy Spirit the same in all essential particulars as in us? Did He seek and secure this divine anointing as the necessary condition and means of His “finishing the work which the Father had give him to do”-just as we are necessitated to seek and secure the same “enduement of power from on high,” as the immutable means and condition of our finishing the work which Christ has given us to do?
A reference to prophecy furnishes us a definite answer to all such questions: “And there shall come forth a rod of the stem of Jesse, and a Branch shall grow out of his roots, and the Spirit of the Lord shall be upon him, the spirit of wisdom and understanding, the spirit of counsel and might, the spirit of knowledge and the fear of the Lord: and shall make him of quick understanding in the fear of the Lord” (Isa 9:1-3). Here manifestations which shone through Christ were the result of the power of the Spirit which rested upon Him.
The same truth is taught in Isaiah 42:1 “Behold my servant, who I uphold! Mine elect, in whom my soul delighteth; I have put my Spirit upon him; he shall bring forth judgment to the Gentiles.” In Isaiah 61:1 Christ thus speaks of himself in the first person: “The Spirit of the Lord God is upon me; because he hath anointed me to preach good tidings unto the meek, he hath sent me to bind up the broken hearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and the opening of the prison to them that are bound.” The fact that Christ was thus baptized of the Spirit implies that He needed that baptism, and that without it, in the relations in which He then was, He could not have finished the work which the Father had given him to do. In seeking, and obtaining, and acting under the baptism, Christ is our example in respect to the spiritual and divine life which is required of us.
We find the same truth set forth with equal clearness in the new Testament. In John 3:34, we are told, for example, that the reason why Christ spake as he did, and what he did, was owing to the measureless effusion and power of the Spirit which was vouchsafed to Him: “For he whom God hath sent speaketh the words of God; for God giveth not the Sprit by measure unto him.” God, we repeat, does not bestow gifts no influences where and when they are not needed. Christ received this measureless effusion of the Spirit at the beginning and during the progress of His mission, because they were a necessity to Him-just as similar baptisms are a necessity to us in our life missions.
We here have, no doubt, one reason for the fact that our Savior spent so much time alone with God and in prayer to Him. Christ teaches us that god gives the Holy Spirit to those who seek, and ask, and knock at the door of mercy for this anointing. In this respect also, God has made Christ our example, giving the Spirit to Him when He consciously needed His special divine influence and sought for it, just as he gives us the Spirit as we consciously need and seek His anointing.
Not to be misled here, we must carefully distinguish between the state of Christ when, as the eternal Word, He “was made flesh and dwelt among us.” In the former state, He had infinite all-sufficiency in Himself; in the later, He “was in all respects made like unto his brethren,” and had the same need of the baptism of the Spirit that we have, and obtained “power from on high” on the same conditions on which the same blessings are promised to us.
--Asa Mahan
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