154 THE CHRISTIAN DOCTRINE OF THE TRINITY. is attributed to God ; Heb. i. 1. "God who at sundry times, and in divers manners, spake in times past until the fathers, by the prophets," &c. And 2 Tim. iii. 16. "All scripture, is given by inspiration of God.. But this very work of inspira- tion is frequently ascribed to the holy Spirit ; 2 Sam. xxiii. 2. " The Spirit of the Lord spake by me." Ezek. xi. 5. " The Spirit of the Lord fell upon me, and said unto me, speak," &c. 2. Pet. i. 21. Holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost." Therefore the Holy Ghost is God. 2. The body of Christ is said to be conceived in the virgin Mary, by the operation " of the Holy Ghost ;" Mat. i. 20. and by the overshadowing power ofthe Highest ;" Luke i. 35. that is, the holy Spirit by whom divine power is exerted ; and yet for this very reason Christ is called the Son of God, because he was conceived by the influence of the Holy Ghost : which would hardly have been expressed in that manner, if the Holy Ghost had not been God. 3. Lying to the Holy Ghost, is lying to God ; Acts v. 3, 4. " Whyhath Satan filled thy heart, to lie to the HolyGhost ? Thouhast not lied unto men, but unto God." The holy Spirit seems to becalled God in this text. 4. That God who dwells in us as his temple, is the holy Spirit; 2 Cor. vi. 16. ".Ye are the temple of the living God, as God hath said, I will dwell in them." Compared with 1 Cor. 19. " Know you not, that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost which is in you." Now for what reason can any thing be called the temple of God, in God's own word, but be- cause God himself dwells in it 5. To which I might subjoin in the last place, that blas- phemy against the Holy Ghost has a greater penalty annexed to it under the gospel, than blaspheming against God or Christ. SeeMat. xii. 31, 32. " All manner of sin and blasphemy shall be forgiven unto men; but the blasphemy against the Holy Ghost, shall not be forgiven unto men. And whosoever speaketh a word against the Son of man, it shall be forgiven him : But whosoever speaketh against the Holy Ghost, it shall not be for- given him, neither in this world, neither in thatwhich is to come." Now it is not to be supposed, that if the Holy Ghost were but a mere creature, the sin of blasphemy committed against him, should have a more express and dreadful threatening of utter destruction pronounced against it, than blasphemy against God the Father, or against his Son, who is his express image. I grant, that the most obvious and direct sense of that threatening, is to denounce damnation, without hope, upon those who shall wilfully and útterly reject the last and fullest demonstrations of the Messiah, and the brightest evidence of the gospel, by re- sistingthe convictions of the Holy Ghost, in all his miraculous
RkJQdWJsaXNoZXIy OTcyMjk=