The holy spirit of love

THE HOLY SPIRIT OF LOVE
EDITED BY GLENN PEASE
HYLES
The Holy Spirit loves. Romans 15:30, "Now I beseech you, brethren, for the Lord
Jesus Christ's sake, and for the love of the Spirit, that ye strive together with me in
your prayers to God for me." He has a mind. Romans 8:27, "And He that searcheth
the hearts knoweth what is the mind of the Spirit, because He maketh intercession
for the saints according to the will of God." He possesses knowledge. I Corinthians
2:11, "For what man knoweth the things of a man, save the spirit of man which is in
him? even so the things of God knoweth no man, but the Spirit of God." He can be
insulted. Hebrews 10:29, "Of how much sorer punishment, suppose ye, shall he be
thought worthy, who hath trodden under foot the Son of God, and hath counted the
blood of the covenant, wherewith he was sanctified, an unholy thing, and hath done
despite unto the Spirit of grace?" He can become your enemy. Isaiah 63:10, "But
they rebelled, and vexed His Holy Spirit: therefore He was turned to be their enemy,
and He fought against them." He can instruct, remind and uncover truth and offer
us stability. Nehemiah 9:10, "Thou gavest also Thy good Spirit to instruct them, and
withheldest not Thy manna from their mouth, and gavest them water for their
thirst." We are to fellowship with Him and commune with Him. II Corinthians
13:14, "The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the
communion of the Holy Ghost, be with you all. Amen."
It is very interesting that we tell our Heavenly Father that we love Him, and we tell
the Lord Jesus that we love Him. We sing, "My Jesus, I love Thee, I know Thou art
mine. For Thee all the follies of sin I resign." Isn't it amazing then that we never tell
the Holy Spirit that we love Him? We rejoice that God the Father loves us. We sing,
"O Love that wilt not let me go." We sing, "The love of God is greater far than
tongue or pen can ever tell." We think of Jesus loving us. We sing, "Jesus loves me,
this I know." We sing, "I am so glad that Jesus loves me." Yet, we never seem to
dwell upon the fact that the Holy Spirit loves us too! He is as much a person as is
God the Father and God the Son.
Why then do we not dwell on His love? We praise the Father. We sometimes say,
"Praise God!" and "Praise the Lord." We praise Jesus, and yet, did you ever hear
anybody say, "Praise the Holy Spirit"? Isn't He deserving of our praise? We thank
the Father for what He does for us. We thank Jesus for what He does for us. Why
not thank the Holy Spirit? Oh, beloved, realize that He lives! He is a person like God
the Father is a person, like God the Son is a person. He wants to be accepted as
such. Begin a new day in your life by pausing now to love Him, to praise Him, to
praise Him even as you would praise the Father and the Son.

(C. H. Spurgeon.)
It is very interesting that we tell our Heavenly Father that we love Him,
and we tell the Lord Jesus that we love Him. We sing, "My Jesus, I love
Thee, I know Thou art mine. For Thee all the follies of sin I resign."
Isn't it amazing then that we never tell the Holy Spirit that we love
Him? We rejoice that God the Father loves us. We sing, "O Love that
wilt not let me go." We sing, "The love of God is greater far than tongue
or pen can ever tell." We think of Jesus loving us. We sing, "Jesus loves
me, this I know." We sing, "I am so glad that Jesus loves me." Yet, we
never seem to dwell upon the fact that the Holy Spirit loves us too! He is
as much a person as is God the Father and God the Son.
Why then do we not dwell on His love? We praise the Father. We
sometimes say, "Praise God!" and "Praise the Lord." We praise Jesus,
and yet, did you ever hear anybody say, "Praise the Holy Spirit"? Isn't
He deserving of our praise? We thank the Father for what He does for
us. We thank Jesus for what He does for us. Why not thank the Holy
Spirit? Oh, beloved, realize that He lives! He is a person like God the
Father is a person, like God the Son is a person. He wants to be accepted
as such. Begin a new day in your life by pausing now to love Him, to
praise Him, to praise Him even as you would praise the Father and the
Son.
THE HEART PERFUMED
DELIVERED BY C. H. SPURGEON, AT THE
METROPOLITAN TABERNACLE,
NEWINGTON, ON THURSDAY EVENING
SEPTEMBER 13, 1866.

“The love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by
the Holy Spirit who was given unto us.” Romans
5:5.
AS one reads the opening verses of this chapter,
one cannot help saying, “What marvelous
treasures are those which belong to the people of
God!” Hezekiah took the Babylonian ambassadors
through all his varied treasure houses and herein
he did evil—but if you can conduct your mind
through the spiritual treasure houses and the
minds of your friends in the same direction, you
will do well. What is the wealth of God’s people?
Who can count it? It is wondrous and beyond
conception! The apostle seems to have taken up a
whole handful of brilliants in the first verses of
this chapter and he now holds them up, one by
one, and lets them glitter in the light, no not
merely a handful plucked at random, but they
seem to be striving together, for one follows on
after the other! “Therefore” is the link which
connects justification with “peace,” and then there

is a connection between this “peace” and “access,”
and from this “access” to God we go on to “rejoice
in hope of the glory of God.” And when we have
got as far as this string of pearls, the apostle adds,
“And not only so,” and then he holds up a cluster
—and when he has spoken of them he adds that
“tribulation works patience, and patience
experience, and”—another, “and”— “experience
hope,” and then another, “and”—“and hope
makes not ashamed.” And then at the end of this
string of jewels he brings up the language of the
text—“Because the love of God is shed abroad in
our hearts by the Holy Spirit who was given unto
us.” I suppose the allusion in the text is to the
pouring out of water—the love of God being to us
like a spring shut up, a fountain sealed until the
Holy Spirit comes—and then the love of God flows
in, a pure and crystal stream being shed abroad in
our hearts! But perhaps another figure may suit
us as well tonight. The love of God is comparable
to precious spikenard, but it is in the alabaster
box. The Holy Spirit opens that box and then the
sweet perfume is “shed abroad” in our hearts, not
merely “shed,” but, “shed abroad.” Not only

poured out as the oil was on Aaron’s head, but
running down to the skirts of his garments and
perfuming all the room, just as it did in his case.
Now observe, to some extent we can shed abroad
the love of God in this house. While the preacher
is preaching of it, there will be a sweet savor
Christ. There is, as it were, a spiritual perfume in
the assembly of the righteous whenever Jesus
Christ is spoken of, for, “Your name is as ointment
poured forth; therefore do the virgins love You.”
But the text means something more than this. It is
the love of God shed abroad, not in the assembly,
but in the heart. The one is the aggregate, but this
is the individual and personal sense of it—not in
the house, I say, but in the heart! The preacher
sheds abroad this love when he preaches of Christ,
but he cannot shed it abroad in the heart. He can
only speak of it. He cannot bring it home to your
own personal realization. It must be shed abroad
in your heart by the Holy Spirit, but if it once gets
there, the sweet perfume of it is always recognized
by your inner man. It is not the preacher—neither
is it the letter of this book—it is the Holy Spirit
who most graciously comes there to shed abroad

the love of God in your heart! Oh, see, then, how
much we are indebted to the third person of the
blessed Trinity! With what reverence should we
always speak of Him! With what rapture should
we love Him! With what devotion should we adore
Him! The love of God, itself, is, even to us, as
spikenard unperceived until He brings it to the
spiritual senses and makes it sweet to us! The love
of God is like light to a blind eye until
2 The Heart Perfumed Sermon #3339
2 Tell someone today how much you love Jesus
Christ. Volume 59
the Holy Spirit opens that eye! It is like food and
raiment to a dead man until the Holy One of
Israel comes and gives us life to enjoy these
mercies. Oh, then, may the Holy Spirit now be
here in each one of us, to shed abroad the love of
God in our hearts! I shall first, then, and for a
very little time, speak of the precious ointment
which is here said to be shed abroad, namely, the
love of God; secondly, upon the shedding of it
abroad; thirdly, upon the blessed results of its
being shed abroad in the heart; and then, fourthly,

upon some matters which tend to hinder our
enjoyment of the shedding abroad of this love in
our hearts. First, let us speak of— I. THE
PRECIOUS OINTMENT WHICH IS HERE
SPOKEN OF—“the love of God.” Now, although I
have to speak of this, yet it is a thing which, as to
its essence, is not to be spoken of. It is to be
enjoyed and to be felt, but no words can convey its
unmistakable sweetness!— “The love of Jesus,
what it is None but His loved ones know.” No
words, either of the pen or the tongue will ever be
able to convey it either to hearer or reader. We
receive the love of God doctrinally and I think we
do well to do so. We may speak of it in various
theological senses. We may declare the love of God
to be in some respects universal—for, “His tender
mercies are over all His works” and “the Lord is
good to all.” But we may delight most of all to
speak of it in its discriminating and distinguishing
character, as revealing itself in the full blaze of its
splendor to those whom He has chosen unto
Himself. I believe the preacher does well who
comments upon this love of God in its eternity,
who says of it that it is an ancient thing, more

ancient than the hoary mountains, or the aged sea,
who speaks of it as an unchangeable and
inimitable thing, abiding forever fast to those
chosen ones who possess it. He does well, I believe,
who speaks of it as being without an end, who
shall declare in God’s name that Christ, having
loved His own who were in the world, loves them
to the end and that this is but a picture of the
great love which is in God our Father towards us
—that having loved us once, He will never cease to
love us, but we shall always be the object of His
heart’s affection. But, brothers, it is very easy to
talk doctrinally about the love of God, but you
may not know anything about the love of God
when you know all that! If I were to give a
description of a father’s love to some poor orphan,
here, I dare say I might make him feel envious. I
might make him desirous to have something of the
kind, but it would be quite impossible by any mere
words to tell him what a father’s love really is if he
had never known it. It would be something like
showing a skeleton to an angel who wished to see a
man. A man is something more than a set of bones,
nerves, muscles and ligatures—you cannot present

the man by any description that you may give,
however anatomically correct! Neither can you
describe the love of God by merely doctrinally
giving an outline of it, as the theologian would do,
for there is vastly more there than the mere
theologian has ever learned! You know some
people have a herbarium in which they preserve
specimens of various plants. Among the Alps you
are asked by persons to buy collections of the flora
of such-and-such districts. Well, you may buy
them, and you will be interested in them when you
get them home, but when you turn over the leaves
and find the plants dried between the papers, they
are nothing at all like what they are as they bloom
on the Alps! The gentian has not the marvelous
yellow blooms which startle you as you find them
on the side of the glaciers. It is a dry, dead thing
now—you cannot convey to your friends what the
flower is really like when at home—to know that
fully you must take them to see it! So is it with
theology—it is easy to preserve the living things of
the truth of God in a dry form, but you have not
really understood them until you have seen them
in life and known them by experience! Again, you

may think about the love of God historically and
what a wonderful topic is here! Begin— where?
Well, since there is no beginning, begin where you
will. Begin with the council chambers of eternity!
Begin with the purpose, the election, the covenant,
the suretyship engagement. Then go on to the love
revealing itself in the first promise—love sparing
guilty man, love manifesting itself by slow degrees
through the mist and smoke of the Mosaic ritual
and, at last, bursting into its full splendor upon
the cross in the person of the dying Savior! Then
go on to love developing itself in our experience,
beginning by convincing us of our folly and our
danger and proceeding until it takes us into the
arms of God, and puts
Sermon #3339 The Heart Perfumed 3
Volume 59 Tell someone today how much you love
Jesus Christ. 3
us there forever in the enjoyment of the beatific
vision! But, my dear friends, you know reading
the story of a battle cannot give you any idea of
the battle itself! Every man who has heard the

sound of the cannon and has marked the pain and
misery of those who fall beneath the sword of war
will tell you that no description, however graphic,
can ever make you feel what a battle is. So with
regard to the love of God, you may give the
history of it with the greatest accuracy, but when
you have given it all, you do not know what it is
unless you have really tasted and handled it in
your own soul’s experience; so that if I am to
speak of this ointment, I know not where I shall
find words. I must rather ask that you may have it
shed abroad in your hearts. I think there is a way,
too, of speaking of the love of God in such a
manner as to get none of it. I think that arguing
over practical gospel truths is about the surest
way of depriving you of the unction and the savor
of them. I think we ought to treat divine truth
very much as the true mother treated her child
when they were before Solomon. Let us not rend
it. But there are some who rend it anyway, as long
as they can keep their share of it. Oh, yes, for a
hair’s breadth of a doctrine, for some infinitesimal
point, for one Greek article, or a half a word, some
men would mar the fellowship of the saints and

drive away some of the best-beloved of God out of
their communion! They are like the simpletons
who, to find out who shall drink a jug of milk, spill
it altogether and neither of them get a drop of it.
They have some choice of rare fruit, but they
trample it under their feet in a rush as to who
should eat it! Let us beware of so doing with the
love of God—and yet we have sometimes felt that
we have handled themes connected with the love
of God in such a controversial spirit as to take the
bloom from the surface and the very juice from
the grape. After all, dear friends, the best we can
say of the love of God is just this—you must know
it and feel it for yourselves. But oh, the wondrous
love! Angels marvel at it! To think that God
should love His sinful creatures! You will marvel
at it, even in heaven! When you shall have grown
accustomed to wonders, this will still strike you as
being a great marvel. I believe you will— “Sing
with rapture and surprise His lovingkindness in
the skies,” and that when you have dived into the
greatest deeps that your intellect can bear, you will
find the wondrous depth of love both beneath and
above you! When your faculties shall have been

expanded to the heavenly size and you shall be
elevated to become the peer of the angelic host,
even then you shall feel that the love of God
surpasses your powers of knowledge and
comprehension! This, then, is all we will say
concerning it, that the love of God is the precious
ointment. But secondly, the text says— II. THIS
LOVE OF GOD IS “SHED ABROAD IN OUR
HEARTS.” What does this mean? Does it mean
our merely knowing that God is love? We must
know that as a preliminary step, but oh, the
shedding abroad of the love of God is vastly more
than that! It does not mean merely prizing that
love, the coming into a state of desiring after it.
When we feel that it must be a precious thing to be
beloved of God. That is a very proper state of
mind, but it is not what is meant here; it is not
even believing in the love of God. That is the
Christian’s privilege and should be his constant
position— believing that God loves him, resting
confident that even under affliction’s cross the
love of God is still the same—and that if God
should hide His face, yet His heart is not changed.
But the love of God shed abroad is more than that.

It is not even the waiting for visits from God’s
face. It is a sweet thing to sit at Christ’s door and
wait until He comes to us. If I may not feast at the
table, I may be grateful to be allowed to hunger
and thirst to do it! Next to having Christ, a real
longing after Him is one of the most precious gifts
of the Holy Spirit. But still, a great deal more than
this is meant here. It is not even remembering
former love-visits. That is often very consolatory
— “Our former favors we recount When with
Him on the holy mount.”
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And we sometimes think on the Hermonites and
the hill Mizar, and find great comfort in the
thought that He did once shine upon us—He did
once show His love to us and we rejoice greatly.
But the shedding abroad of His love is more than
this. It is not the remembrance of a thing, however
precious, that is past and gone, but the deep
enjoyment of something that is now present!
What is it, then? Well, is it not just this? When the

Holy Spirit brings home to our souls a sense of the
love of God, we no longer entertain the slightest
doubt—we are assured of God’s love to us. We are
now far past the range of questioning. It is no
longer with us— “‘Tis a point I long to know Oft
it causes anxious thought.” It is there, and we
know it is there! I called today upon a friend
whose business calls him to the use of many
perfumes. And I was shown into his little room
where there were various articles with which the
perfumes were made. Now, I can suppose him to
lose one of those pots of perfume, but I cannot
suppose him to lose it and not know where it is
when it is shed abroad, for then he cannot help
smelling it and perceiving it—and then he says,
“Why, here it is—the room is filled with it.” So
when the love of God is shed abroad, you do not
ask where it is! Your heart is filled with it. All your
passions and powers are flavored and scented with
it. It is not, “Where is it?” but, “Here it is!” Oh,
the joy of saying, “Here it is!” If all the powers of
earth and hell combined say that God does not
love me, I can deny and refute them all, for I feel
that love shed abroad in my heart! It is a clear

perception of the fact that God loves me as a
believer in the Lord Jesus Christ! It is a
persuasion of the presence of the Holy Spirit, of
the sealing of the Spirit, of the Spirit bearing
witness with our spirit that we are born of God!
And even more than that. It is a thing that we
hardly need a witness about. It is a consciousness,
a perception, of the love of God as it is shed
abroad in our soul, so that this love of God being
shed abroad seems to us to mean that it is deeply
and intensely enjoyed. Treasure it up in the bottle
and you do not enjoy the perfume—shed it abroad
and then all the fragrance fills the room and every
nostril is regaled. Oh, there are times when we are
as full of heaven as we can hold this side of the
Jordan! And when we know Christ’s love because
He kisses us “with the kisses of His mouth” and
we drink deep draughts of His love, it is better
than wine! We do not look on at the feast—we
feed! We do not admire the rich clusters—we take
them and drink the nectar thereof! We do not look
from Pisgah’s brow, as did Moses, with the eyes of
faith—we come to the woods that drop with honey
and, like Jonathan, we dip our spear into it and

feel that our eyes are enlightened as doves’ eyes.
Oh, Christian! You know what this means! You
have had it in the prayer chamber when you have
been alone with God! You have had it in the depth
of trouble—some of you have had it on a sick bed,
some in the furnace—and yet so manifestly was
Christ with you there that the furnace glowed with
joy as with the pain you felt! You rejoiced in
Christ Jesus and as your tribulations abounded, so
your consolations also abounded. The love of God
was enjoyed by you; you felt it, you were ravished
with it! Where the love of God is shed abroad, it
fills the whole man. There are some perfumes
which if you once spill but a few drops of them,
you would not only know it yourself, but
everybody else would know it, too. “Gently,” said
my friend, when he was showing me a certain
perfume and I was going to pour out a drop, “if
you do not want to smell of that for a month, do
not do that,” and as I did not particularly desire to
smell of anything for so long a time as that, I kept
my fingers off! If you could once get the love of
God shed abroad in your heart, you would be
flavored by it—and when it is once shed abroad,

there, it will be there to all eternity! There will be
no fear of its being taken away from us when it is
once fully poured out in its entire glorious efficacy
into our hearts. You must have felt it, my brothers
and sisters in Christ, when from morning till night
the whole day was full of the love of God! When
you woke, you did not know how it was, but
instead of a care and a fear about the day, you
woke with a hymn, a verse, a comfortable
promise, as though you had put a wafer made with
honey between your lips when you went to sleep
and it had been melting there till it had sweetened
your mouth and your whole soul! And when you
went downstairs, it did not matter whether things
went cross or not—they seemed to you to go well
all the day, for your will was, through this love of
God, brought to His will—and that pleased you
which pleased Him!
Jesus Christ. 5
You were very rich, today, not that you had more

than formerly, but you had the love of God to
sweeten all! You were today kept from using the
tongue too freely—you did not need to speak
about the great many things which once had
engrossed your conversation because your
meditation of Him was sweet and you wanted to
speak with Him. That day persons noticed you—
they could not help it. If your face did not shine,
your conversation did! And if you met with any of
God’s people who had a spiritual taste to
appreciate your conversation, they remembered
that you dropped pearls of soul-enriching from
your mouth, for you spoke as one who had “been
with Jesus and learned of Him.” Do you
remember, too, locking up your heart at night and
giving God the key? And then when you woke up
remembering David’s words, “When I wake I am
still with You”? Perhaps you did not remain with
Him long, but, whether longer or shorter, it was
the best exposition that could have been given you
of the meaning of our text, “The love of God shed
abroad in your heart by the Holy Spirit.” I know
this, dear friend, if you have ever known this, you
will thirst and hunger after it again! This wine of

heaven is such that if a man drinks of it, the more
he drinks, the more he needs. If you have ever
eaten the bread of heaven, the bread of earth will
never satisfy you! If you have ever eaten of the
bread which drops from heaven, and on which
angels feed, the food of common mortals will have
lost its sweetness for you! You have been made to
feast at the “feast of fat things, full of marrow, and
of wines on the lees well-refined”—you have been
taken up from where men grovel and where you
are, yourself, now groveling—and on the wings of
eagles you have been made to mount into a clearer
atmosphere! And you will feel heavily oppressed
in the dense smoke of this world, and you will
want to be away with Christ again. Perhaps you
are singing— “Ah, woe is me that I In Meshech
sojourn long! That I in tents do dwell, To Kedar
which belong!” But it shall not always be so. You
shall soon see His face if you seek after Him and
again shall the “love of God be shed abroad in
your hearts by the Holy Spirit which is given unto
us.” And now, may God help us, while for a few
minutes we go over what we have said, and ponder
— III. THE RESULTS OF THIS LOVE BEING

SHED ABROAD IN OUR HEARTS. I have
anticipated some of these already, but we remind
ourselves more definitely that the love of God in
our hearts sweetens everything. It sweetens our
duties and they become privileges— “‘Tis love
that makes our willing feet In swift obedience
move.” Oh, when you feel that God loves you,
how you can watch and pray! Then you can fight
and wrestle! “All things are possible to him that
believes,” and more than all is possible to him that
loves! When the heart gets the love of God in it, it
— “Laughs at impossibilities, And cries, ‘It shall
be done!’” A believer may have the most
desperate enterprises and they may involve the
most serious self-denial, but they will be
accomplished with readiness when the love of God
is shed abroad in the heart. It sweetens all our
trials. Trials are scarcely trials when we see them
coming from a Father’s hand. The gardener wept,
you know, when he found that his choicest rose
had been cut. But when he knew that it was the
Master who had taken it, he wept no more, for the
Master had a right to it. There are no murmurings
in the heart of him who can say, “The Lord gave

and the Lord has taken away; blessed be the name
of the Lord.” And, beloved, it sweetens, I am
certain, all our pursuits. We are very apt to think
that our engagements in the world are too humble,
too obscure—and then they become drudgery
when we think so. Do you not know that Jesus
counts the very hairs of your head and He seems
to intimate by that, that your very humblest
pursuits are the objects of His careful
observation? He knows where you are, what you
are and what you have to do—and He knows how
to sweeten it all! But when the love of God is shed
abroad in the heart, how cheerfully the poor
woman, with her eyes all weary and red, plies her
needle and how the hard-toiling
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man finds his load grow light! Poverty seems to
grow rich and the hut and the hovel seem to grow
into a mansion—and even rags seem to glisten like
robes when the love of God is shed abroad in the
heart! Have you never heard how the martyrs

used to sing at the stakes? Why was it? Not
because the fire was made of roses—they did not
find the firewood to be less hot to them than they
would have been to others—but it was because the
love of God was shed abroad in their hearts and,
therefore, they could endure all things for Christ’s
sake, seeing that love was theirs. It sweetens all.
Then again, it overpowers all other things. There
are some perfumes that if they were let loose in a
room, would overpower and kill all others. There
may be other sweet scents in the chamber, but just
unstop this bottle and now where are they? They
are all swallowed up, as Aaron’s rod swallowed up
Egypt’s rods! When the love of Jesus fills our souls
we have love towards our dear friends and
relatives—God forbid that we should not! But
still, the love we have to Jesus seems to swallow
them all up—His love towers above all other loves,
like some mighty Alp above molehills! Best of all,
when this love masters the soul, it kills all evil
loves. During cholera times, people are very
anxious to get something that will destroy all
noxious vapors and bad smells. Ah, there is many
a bad odor in our hearts! There is the old swamp

of natural depravity which is capable of spreading
death and destruction every time we encounter it.
But when the love of God is shed abroad in the
heart, how effectually it kills this! Then the love of
sin dies! The loving principle within subdues and
tramples underfoot all lusts and all corruption—
and we rejoice in the Lord Jesus Christ and are
not daunted by the conflict we feel within. This
love kills all evil. And how blessedly it destroys all
doubt! As I have said, when you smell a perfume,
you cannot doubt but that it is there. If you go into
a field at this time of the year, you might walk all
down a path and not know that there was any
game there, but as soon as ever the partridges
begin to fly, or the hares begin to run, you know
immediately that there is game there because you
can see it. So when our graces are slumbering and
we do not know that they are there, as soon as
ever they get into active exercise, then we discover
them and we are sure of them! So is it with the
love of God. When it has been slumbering in our
hearts, we have had some doubt—but when it is
poured out and shed abroad—its fragrance fills
the entire man and then doubts and fears are

given to the winds! And where this perfume is,
once more, it is quite sure to communicate itself
from the man, instrumentally, to his fellows. He
who has been in beds of spices will smell, thereof,
and they who sit with their Lord will bear away
some tokens of His companionship. All the ways of
the Lord Jesus are full of perfume, because “His
garments smell of myrrh, and aloes, and cassia.”
And when your garments smell of the same,
through having been with Him, you will
communicate something of the savor,
instrumentally, to those whom you meet. God
grant you grace to seek this as a holy ambition,
that, having the love of God in your hearts, it may
be as when one has a candle lit and others bring
their candles to his, and he imparts the light, for it
makes him none the poorer, while they rejoice
therein. And now, to conclude, I think we all who
love the Lord desire to feel His love shed abroad in
our hearts, but we sometimes mourn because we
do not feel it. What, then, is IV. THE REASON
WHY WE DO NOT FEEL THE LOVE OF GOD
SHED ABROAD IN OUR HEARTS? May it not
be, brothers and sisters, because we have

restrained prayer? The common sin of God’s
people is slackness in prayer. If there is one sin
that needs to be preached about more than
another just now, it is the sin of the omission of
secret dealings with God. This is the secret of our
spiritual leanness, the secret of many of our trials,
of our lack of joy, our loss of confidence in God.
Neglect the prayer chamber? Why, the merchant
might as well neglect his office and counting
house! This is the place where you will be
impoverished if you neglect it. I am persuaded
more and more the longer I observe myself, and
certainly the longer I observe others, that when we
grow weak on our knees, it is a sign of weakness
throughout the entire man. How can you expect to
know much of the love of God if you will not go
with Him? If you give no time to meditation, if you
have no season for searching the Scriptures, if you
have no periods for communion with God, why
wonder if you should miss enjoyment with Him?
Jesus Christ. 7

I am persuaded, too, that a great many of us lose a
good deal through neglecting the means of grace. I
do not think that this applies to the most of you as
a congregation. I believe there are none who
frequent the assembling of themselves altogether
as much as you do. I have no cause to complain.
There are some of you who are always here as
often as the doors are opened—and prayer-
meeting and lecture nights are no burden to you.
You come with willing feet to meet with your God.
But it is not so with some professors. Step into
most of the places of worship in London and look
at the weeknight service—and in some country
places they have to give up theirs because there
are not enough to come to make it worth their
while to hold such meetings. There is a sad
deficiency in some places of a love of the means of
grace. There are some professors who, when they
get by the seaside, or a little away in the country,
are always glad of an excuse not to go out to hear
the Word of God. They know but little of the
emotion of David when he counted that to be a dry
and thirsty land when he could not go up to the

public worship of God! Brothers and sisters, we
must use the means of grace or else, as we despise
them, we must not expect a blessing! We must dig
the well when we go through the valley of Baca.
We must not depend upon that well, for it does
not, in this case, fill from the bottom—it is filled
from above! But still, the well must be dug. There
must be our gracious exertions and then there
shall come the divine blessing. May we not also
say that many Christians lose much joyous
fellowship with Christ because of idleness? Christ
is a worker. If we are idlers, we shall not have
communion with Him. “The Father,” says He,
“works hitherto, and I work.” If your possessions
are unconsecrated, if your talents are unused, if
your time is misspent, you cannot wonder if the
Lord Jesus Christ should give you the whip! The
“whip is for the ass, and the rod for the fool’s
back.” Idle Christians must expect to feel the whip
or the rod, but if we will do what we may for
Christ, we shall have sweet consolation in the
doing of it, and the love of God shall be shed
abroad in our hearts! Worldliness, too, is a bar to
the shedding abroad of the love of God in our

hearts. Those who do as worldlings do, who can be
amused and interested as they are, must not
wonder if the love of God is not shed abroad in
their hearts. I am very far from desiring to keep
Christians from certain places of amusement
where the amusement is simple, and only such as
may be derived from social fellowship, science,
music, and so on. But I am satisfied that the
frequenting of such places, even the very best,
must be unfavorable to the piety of the very best
Christian. You will gain but very little compared
with the risk you run of losing very much! If these
things charm you, it is not likely that Christ will
charm you longer. If you get worldly, you cannot
be spiritual at the same time. Is it not, also, very
probable that our little faith prevents this love of
God from being shed abroad in our hearts? If we
trusted Christ more and honored Him more by
resting upon the faithful love of His Father, would
we not find His love shed abroad in us? And may
it not also be our ingratitude as to past favors? We
have not thanked God enough for the comfortable
seasons that we have enjoyed and, therefore, He
keeps us hungering until we thank Him for what

He did in days gone by. And, dear friends, is it not
because we do not sincerely seek conformity to the
likeness of our Savior, that we have not, as we
might, the love of God shed abroad in our hearts?
It is even this, my brothers and sisters, it is even
this! If you have ever known the sweetness of the
love of Christ, you understand that I cannot
exaggerate when I praise it. It is the sweetest, best
and happiest thing of which a mortal can sing. It is
bliss which angels might envy—the sense of the
love of God in a man or woman’s heart! Then how
is it that you and I can endure to be without it?
The true wife would be grieved, indeed, if she had
a doubt as to her husband’s love—she could not be
happy unless she could have an assurance of being
its possessor. And oh, how is it that we can bear
ourselves when we are saying, “Does He love me?”
How is it we can endure, as some professors do,
day after day, not to have a word from His lips, or
a smile from His countenance? Do we really love
Him, or is it all mere talk? Has our heart any deep
affection for Him, or is it only formal profession?
Have we caught it up from others? Have we
stirred merely natural emotions in ourselves and

then thought we loved Him? Oh, I do hope we
may say, “It is not so, we do love Him!
Christ. Volume 59
We would be very wretched if we did not. We
might sooner wish to die than cease to love Him.
He is the chief among ten thousand to our hearts
—we feel He is.” Oh, then, without making vows
and resolutions which we shall soon break, let us
pray, “Oh, Savior, shed abroad Your love in our
hearts by the Holy Spirit! Oh, God the Father,
reveal Yourself in all the fullness of Your love to us
now and we may never lose a sense of it, but have
it abiding with us forever!” What a church would
this be if we all had fellowship with Christ! Oh,
how trivial would the world’s troubles become!
We would then go on serving the Master like
seraphs. I think we would not rest day or night,
but be always praising and blessing His dear
name! This place would be a paradise! We would
have to bless God so continually and our songs
might rival those before the throne of God! “The

spirit truly is willing, but the flesh is weak,” but,
“we have a high priest who can be touched with a
feeling of our infirmities.” Let us draw near to
Him with confidence and let this be the burden of
our prayer, “Abide with me! Continue with me,
for Your love’s sake, Amen.”
LOVE WITNESS LEE
Another attribute of the Spirit is love. Romans 15:30 speaks of the love of the Spirit;
Galatians 5:22 indicates that love is the fruit of the Spirit; and Colossians 1:8 mentions
the believers’ love in the Spirit. The love which is an attribute, or excellency, of the Spirit
is the nature of God’s essence. This love is the essence of God’s being, the very substance
of the divine life.
Love is necessary for human life. In order to live as human beings, we must have love.
Without love the situation in society and in our families would be pitiful. Love is needed
even the more for the Christian life and the church life. Apart from the divine love, we
cannot live together as members of Christ. Therefore, the Lord Jesus charged us to love
one another (John 13:34-35). If we do not love one another with the divine love, we
cannot have the church life. But through the love that is an attribute of the Spirit we can
love others. Through the enjoyment of this love we are able to love anyone, even those
who hate us and persecute us. The divine love, the love of the Spirit, cannot be exhausted
by any kind of situation.
It is necessary for us to differentiate our natural, human love from the love that is the fruit
of the Spirit. Before we received the divine life and were saved, we had some capacity to
love. But our natural virtue of love does not contain anything of God, whereas the love
that is the fruit of the Spirit is filled with a spiritual substance which is divine. We should
remember that genuine love is the fruit of the Spirit. The substance, the element, of this
love is the Spirit. Therefore, the difference between our natural human love and the love
that is the fruit of the Spirit is that our natural love does not contain anything of the Spirit,
whereas the love of the Spirit is full of the substance and element of the Spirit. What we
need in the church life is a love full of the substance of the Spirit.
Only one kind of love is genuine, and that is the love that is the issue of the dispensing of
the Triune God. Because the Spirit has the attribute of love, the more we are under His
dispensing, the more genuine love we have. Actually, the more the Spirit is dispensed into
us, the more we become love in the sense of being constituted of the divine love. Then we
shall have the love that is the expression of the Spirit, and we shall respond to others with

this love.
DANIEL STEELE
ENLARGEMENT OF HEART BY THE HOLY
SPIRIT.
I T was the Psalmist who, according to the Septuagint
version, testifies: “I ran the way of thy command¬
ments when thou didst enlarge my heart.” In his
early spiritual life there was in this Old Testament saint
the same straitness, slowness and lack of momentum
which characterize young Christians in modern times.
His service had been enforced by the law and its
penalties. Duty was a word which had not been
written over and almost concealed by the super¬
imposed capitals which spell Love. But it seems there
was a crisis in his religious life where constraint ends
and joyous liberty begins; where irksomeness disap¬
pears and spontaneity in service is a permanent char¬

acteristic. The crisis which separates these two expe¬
riences is the enlargement of the heart. This is a figure
for what St. John calls “ perfect love,” and which
St. Paul elsewhere describes as “ the love of God shed
abroad in the heart by the Holy Ghost,” though he
once, at least, employs the Old Testament phrase: “ O
ye Corinthians, my mouth is opened unto you, my heart
is enlarged.” Reverse the order of these clauses, and we
have the cause and the effect. A full heart makes an
unloosed tongue. The inquiry is all-important, When
is this crisis reached? Some say: “Never this side the
dying bed.” But no Scripture proof of this dismal doc¬
trine is ever given. It is not true that the believing soul
must be a partly filled goblet till it is overflowed by the
waters of the river of death. Others say: All souls at
the new birth are deluged with love to the brim, a love
that drives their chariot wheels as swiftly as the myste¬
rious electric current drives our street-cars up and
down

our tri-mountain city. Such a steady motive power is
not the experience of multitudes, yea, the vast majori¬
ties who are truly regenerate. Their inertia is great and
the impelling power is feeble. Indeed, something worse
than inertia is to be overcome; a strong opposition often
arises within, which it takes all their strength to over¬
come. They have not a heart at leisure from itself to
concentrate upon the work' of God. True it is that a
few Christians, like John Fletcher, very soon after their
birth into the kingdom, because of a correct apprehen¬
sion of their privilege in the dispensation of the Spirit,
are deluged with divine love and become giants in faith.
The mass of believers are mere babes in spiritual devel¬
opment. They see days of great weakness and are often
on the verge of surrender to the foe. Some, alas, throw
away their arms and run away from the fight and never
renew the battle. Others fight all their lives with foes
in their own hearts and never overcome and cast them
out. They have been told by their preachers that this

war in the members is the normal Christian life. Hence,
believing their preachers instead of the Word of God,
they limit His power by their unbelief, and never gladly
run, but always sadly drag themselves along the
heavenly
way. This large class of Christians need enlightenment
and encouragement, and not denunciation. They need
to dwell in thought upon “ the exceeding great and pre¬
cious promises,” that they may have an experience of
the
“exceeding greatness of God’s power to usward who
believe.” They need to lock arms with St. Paul and
walk through his glorious epistles, and get his large view
of the extent of Christ’s saving power, since He has sent
down the Holy Spirit, the Sanctifier. They should study
the new Greek words which Paul coined to express the
fulness of divine grace and the wealth of privilege
which are the heritage of those who fully believe;
such as that translated by “more than conquerer”
(Rom. viii. 37); “much more abound” (Rom. v. 20,

II Cor. vii. 4) ; “ and the grace of our Lord abounded
exceedingly with faith and love” (I Tim. i. 14). Es¬
pecially should they ponder that declaration of God’s
ability to save, found in II Cor. ix. 8, in which are two
“ abounds ” and five “ alls ” — “ God is able to make all
grace abound towards you; that ye, always having all
sufficiency in all things, may abound to every good
work.” They should daily repeat St. Paul’s prayer for
the Ephesians, emphasizing each petition, especially the
ascription at the close, “ Now unto him that is able to
do exceeding abundantly [.superabundantly above the
greatest abundance , A. Clarke] above all that we ask
or think, according to the power that worketh in us”
(Eph. iii. 20). There is not sufficient familiarity with
the promises on the part of professed Christians.
While unbelievers neglect the threatenings, believers
are prone to neglect the promises of the Holy Scrip¬
tures. Again, the growing failure to magnify the Holy
Spirit results in constraint and the legal spirit, instead

of the freedom of the evangelical spirit, inspiring cour¬
age to run through troops of foes. How many so-
called evangelical Christians there are whose creed is
practically as defective as was that of the first believers
in Ephesus: “We have not so much as heard whether
there be any Holy Ghost” as receivable into the heart.
This important item dropped out of a Christian’s
faith palsies his tongue, paralyzes his hands and en¬
feebles his feet. If he is a preacher, his- message will
be delivered in the weakness of uncertainty and doubt.
Splendid rhetoric and oratorical tones and attitudes
are beggarly substitutes for the unction of the Holy
Ghost. The anointed pulpit will always be mighty.
The Spirit inspires fearlessness, imparts freedom of
utterance, enkindles zeal and unconquerable love of
souls. All of these are elements of genuine eloquence.
They furnish the man, the subject and the occasion.
The formal prayer meeting would be transformed by

the enlargement of the heart. Dumbness, the penalty
of unbelief (Luke i. 20), will find a ready and glad
utterance, and the dry harangue will be replaced by the
hallelujah.
Let the heart of Protestantism be enlarged by the
fulness of the Comforter, and rivers of salvation would
flow out unto the ends of the earth, vitalizing those
organizations which He can use, and sweeping away
those which have been devised as substitutes for His
regenerating and sanctifying power.
How intimate is the connection between efficiency
and success in saving souls and the fulness of the Spirit,
may be seen in the study ot the lives of those among
the laity and the ministry who have instrumentally
turned many to righteousness* It is an open secret
that their suasive power dated from the hour when
their hearts were enlarged by the baptism of the Holy
Ghost. From this experience in the city of New York,

in answer to the prayers of a few consecrated women,
Dwight L. Moody dates the beginning of his highest
efficiency as an evangelist. This made Mrs. Catharine
Booth’s preaching so pungent in convicting of sin
among the middle and upper classes in the West End
of London; while by the same mighty power as a con¬
scious experience, her husband, Gen. Booth, was con¬
quering the slums in the East End of that city of nearly
five millions of souls. Dr. Finney, after the Spirit
anointed him, was like an electric dynamo from which
streams of power went forth whenever he stood up to
preac'h, and sometimes from his speechless presence.
Benjamin Abbott, converted late in life, so extremely
illiterate that he preached on the “ oyster man,” mis¬
reading “ austere man,” preached in New Jersey, Penn¬
sylvania and Maryland under the anointing of the
Spirit with so great success that thousands were added
to the Lord. A layman by the name of Carpenter was
comparatively a cipher in the Presbyterian church un¬

til he was filled with the Holy Ghost, when he became,
through personal effort, the most successful winner of
souls in his generation. He drew men to Christ to the
number of several thousands as estimated at his funeral.
These are a few instances out of myriads in which the
baptism of the Spirit has given all the qualities requi-
site for moving souls from sin unto Christ, love, self-
sacrifice, persistence, faith, fearlessness, tenderness and
sympathy. We should have mentioned joyfulness as
an element of great power in drawing sinners to salva¬
tion. Joy always attends the fulness of the Holy Spirit.
It differs from all other kinds of happiness which arise
from a pleasant environment and depend on things
external and hence changeable and transient. The joy
of the Holy Ghost is internal, abiding and eternal. The
joy of men and women pelted with brickbats and rotten
eggs, taking joyfully the spoiling of their goods, has a
strange power to convince the persecutors of the truth
of the gospel, on the principle that “ the blood of the

martyrs is the s.eed of the Church.”
ABRAHAM KUYPER, D.D., LL.D
The Love of the Holy Spirit in Us.
“O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, how often would I have
gathered thy children together, even as a hen
gathereth her chickens under her wings, and ye
would not.”—Matt. xxvii. 37.
The Scripture teaches not only that the Holy Spirit
dwells in us, and with Him Love, but also that He
sheds abroad that Love in our hearts.
This shedding abroad does not refer to the coming
of the Holy Spirit’s Person, for a person can not be
shed abroad. He comes, takes possession, and
dwells in us; but that which is shed abroad must
consist of numberless particles. The verb “to pour
out” (to shed abroad) is used primarily of water,
grain, or fruit; i.e., of liquids or solids composed of
parts or particles of one kind, passing from one
vessel into another. In Scripture the verb is used
metaphorically. Hannah said: “I ‘have poured out
my soul before the Lord” (1 Sam. i. 15); the
Psalmist: “Pour out your heart before Him”

(Psalm lxii. 8); Isaiah: “They poured out a prayer
before Him.” (Isa. xxvi. 16) “To pour out,” always
signifies that the heart is filled to overflowing with
so many complaints, cares, griefs, or distresses
that it can no longer contain them, but pours them
out before God or men in groans and prayers.
With reference to God, we read that He poured
out the fierceness of His anger upon His enemies;
and again, “that He shall pour out the Spirit of
prayer and supplication.” In the first passage, the
metaphor is borrowed from the hail-storm which
overtakes the traveler and prostrates him. So shall
the blows of divine wrath descend like hail upon
the heads of its enemies and prostrate them. And
in the second it is signified that with overwhelming
power His people shall be constrained to prayer.
In this latter sense, the Scripture frequently
applies it to the advent of the Holy Spirit. Both
prophets and apostles declare that the Lord shall
pour out His Spirit upon all. Finally, we read that
the Holy Spirit was poured out. But even here the
primary meaning of the word must be retained,
for by the outpouring of the Holy Spirit we
understand the flowing down into our hearts, or
into the Church, of a multitude of powers of the
same kind that fill the emptiness of the soul.
It may be objected—and this deserves careful

consideration—that in this thought we contradict
our former statement, that it is the Holy Spirit, the
Third Person in the Trinity, who takes possession
of the heart and, dwells therein; for we now say
that it is, not the Person who comes in, but a
working, an element, a power which is poured out.
But, instead of being contradictory, these two are
the same; only, by their mutual connection, they
give us a more correct insight—and that is just
what we need. When I carry a lighted lamp into a
dark room, I enter as the light-bearer, while at the
same moment the light is poured out in the room.
These two should not be confounded. I am not
poured out, but the light. I enter the room, but the
light is carried into it. And this is exactly what the
Holy Spirit does. When He enters the heart the
brightness of His Person is poured out therein.
It is true that in these cases the Holy Spirit is
mentioned in a somewhat modified sense, but
when we speak of the light the same is true. Of an
approaching light we say, “There comes the light,”
altho we know that some one carries the light. At
sunrise we say, “The sun is rising,” altho it would
be more correct to say: “The light of the sun is
rising.” In like manner the name of the Holy Spirit
is used in Scripture in a twofold way: first, with
reference to the Third Person in the Trinity;

secondly, with reference to the heavenly brightness
and blessed activity which He carries with
Himself. And instead of being more or less
incorrect, this two-fold use of the name is much
more correct with reference to the Holy Spirit
than when it refers to artificial light or to the sun.
We should remember that there is a difference
between the lamp and its radiating light; and that
the immense body of the sun and its light are also
two different things. But this is not so with
reference to the Holy Spirit. There is no difference
between Himself and His operations. We make the
distinction to assist our representation, but in
reality it has no existence. Where the Holy Spirit
is, there He works; and where He works, there is
the Holy Spirit. They are the same. The one is
even unthinkable without the other.
There is an advantage in the use of the metaphor
“to pour out.” It teaches that the dwelling of the
Holy Spirit in the congregation of the elect is
neither inactive, nor from compulsion keeping
himself aloof from their persons; but that He can
not come among them without pouring Himself
out in them. And, dwelling in the elect, He does not
slumber, nor does He keep an eternal Sabbath, in
idleness shutting Himself up in their hearts; but as
the divine Worker He seeks from within to fill

their individual persons, pouring the stream of His
divine brightness through every space.
But we should not imagine that every believer is
instantly filled and permeated with that
brightness. On the contrary, the Holy Spirit finds
him filled with all manner of evil and treachery.
Iniquities are piled up on every side. Horrible sins
rise from underneath. The consciousness of his
bitter, spiritual misery harasses him. Moreover,
his heart is divided by many walls and partitions.
Even the brightest light can not penetrate the
whole at once; and by far the greater part remains
for the present at least in deepest darkness.
From this it follows that, when the Holy Spirit has
entered man’s heart, His task is not ended, but
only just begun—a task so difficult that the power
of the Holy Spirit alone can perform it. His
method of procedure is not with divine power to
force a man as tho he were a stock or block, but by
the power of love and compassion so to influence
and energize the impulses of the feeble will that it
feels the effect, is inclined, and finally consents to
be the temple of the Holy Spirit.
Being once firmly established, He gradually
subjects the most hidden impulses and intentions
of the saint’s personality to the power of His Love,
in order thus to prevail. For this end He uses at

once the external means of the preached Word
which penetrates the consciousness and takes hold
of the person, and the internal operation of
blessing the Word and making it effectual. This
operation is different in each person. In one it
proceeds with marvelous rapidity; in another,
progress is exceedingly slow, being checked by
serious reaction which in some rare cases is
overcome only with the last breath. There are
scarcely two men in whom this gracious operation
is completely the same.
It may not be denied that the Holy Spirit often
meets serious opposition on the part of the saint:
not from enmity, for he is an enemy no more, but
because he is commanded to depart from sin, to
renounce his idols, his sinful affections, the many
things that seem indispensable to his joy and life,
and especially when, pointing to the cross, the
Holy Spirit imposes sacrifices, pursues him with
afflictions, covers him with ignominy. Then that
opposition can become so strong and grievous that
one would almost say: “He is no more a child of
God.”
And the Holy Spirit bears all this resistance with
infinite pity, and overcomes it and casts it out with
eternal mercy. Who that is not a stranger to his
own heart does not remember how many years it

took before he would yield a certain point of
resistance; how he always avoided facing it;
restlessly opposed it, at last thought to end the
matter by arranging for a sort of modus vivendi
between himself and the Holy Spirit? But the Holy
Spirit did not cease, gave him no rest; again and
again that familiar knock was heard, the calling in
his heart of that familiar voice. And after years of
resistance he could not but yield in the end; it
became like fire in his bones, and he cried out:
“Thou, Lord, art stronger than I; Thou hast
prevailed.”
In this way the Holy Spirit breaks down every
wall of partition, pouring out His light in all the
heart’s empty spaces, gradually opening every
door, gaining access to the soul’s most secret
chambers, even to the vaults underneath the
structure of our being, until finally, either before
or in death, the outpouring of His brightness is
complete in all our personality, and the whole
heart has become His temple.
This task is executed only by means of Love. The
Holy Spirit allows Himself to be grieved,
provoked, and insulted; but He never yields. He is
never weary of repeating the same thing to the ear
that once was deaf. In our past or present there
can be no sin, however base, of which He does not

comfort us, which He does not pardon. He gives
healing balm for every inward wound. He always
has a word in good season for all that are weary. It
is Love always filling us with shame; but at the
same time ever uplifting, never despairing,
unceasing in its devotion.
It is not merely a Love for men in general, but in
the most exclusive sense a personal Love for the
individual; not only Love for the redeemed taken
as a multitude, but a Love individual, peculiarly
tinted to meet the special peculiarity of our being.
It is not only a pity for all who suffer, like that of
the nurse for the patients of her ward, but Love
that can not meet the need of any one else, but is
for me personally just what it must and can not
otherwise be.
Hence the divine patience in winning thee. One
might say:. “There are thousands of others whom
He might take and influence with much less
trouble perhaps.” But that is not the question.
With all the depth of His divine Love He sought
thee personally. It is Love in the richest, purest,
tenderest sense of the word.
The Holy Spirit prevails by loving us, by proving
His Love, by breathing Love, while, at the same
time, His victory carries Love into our hearts.
Allow Him to enter your soul, and He will carry

Love therein, which imperceptibly imparts itself to
your heart and inclination. We yield, not because
we are compelled by superior power, but being
drawn by Love, we are so affected that we can not
resist it.
And this is the glorious, divine, and beautiful art
of which the Holy Spirit is the chief Artist. He
alone understands it, and they whom He has
taught. All other love is but a feeble shadow or
faint imitation. Not until through Love the Holy
Spirit has prevailed can Love enter our hearts,
and then we, the formerly sinful and selfish, learn
to appreciate Love.
ABRAHAM KUYPER, D.D., LL.D
Love and the Comforter.
“By the Holy Ghost, by love unfeigned.”—2 Cor.
vi. 6.
The question is, “In what sense is the pouring out
of Love an ever-continued, never-finished work?
Love is here taken in its highest, purest sense.
Love which gives its goods to the poor and its body
to be burned is out of the question. St. Paul
declares that one may do these things and still be
nothing more than a sounding brass, utterly
devoid of the least spark of the true and real Love.

In 2 Cor. vi. 6 the apostle mentions the motives of
his zeal for the cause of Christ; and it is
remarkable that among them he mentions these
three, in the following order: “By goodness, by the
Holy Ghost, by love unfeigned.” Goodness
indicates general benevolence and readiness to
sacrifice; of these we find among worldly men
many examples that make us ashamed. Then
comes the stimulating and animating influences of
the Holy Spirit; lastly, Love unfeigned which is the
true, real, and divine Love.
In his hymn of eternal Love the apostle gives us an
exquisite delineation of this “Love unfeigned;”
which shall not cease to command the admiration
of the saints on earth as long as taste for heavenly
melodies shall dwell in their hearts:
“Love suffereth long and is kind; Love envieth
not; Love vaunted not itself, is not puffed up, doth
not behave itself unseemly, seeketh not her own; is
not easily provoked; thinketh no evil; rejoiceth not
in iniquity, but rejoiceth in the truth; beareth all
things, believeth all things, hopeth all things,
endureth all things. Love never faileth . . . . For
now we see in a mirror, darkly; but then face to
face; now I know in part, but then I shall know
even as also I am known. And now abideth faith,
hope, and love, these three; but the greatest of

these is Love.” ( 1 Cor. xiii. 4-8, 12-13)
This teaches how the Holy Spirit performs His
work of Love. 533 And so, says the apostle, must
the fruit of His work be in our hearts. Very well; if
such is the glorious fruit of His work and men
know the tree by its fruit, may we not conclude
that this is but the description of His own work of
Love?
The means employed by the Holy Spirit in the
shedding abroad of the Love of God in our hearts
is simply Love. By loving us He teaches love. By
applying love to us, by expending love upon us, He
inculcates love on us. It is the Love of the Holy
Spirit whereby the shedding abroad of love in our
hearts has become possible. As, according to 1
Cor. xiii., Love ought to manifest itself in our lives,
so has the Holy Spirit wrought it in our hearts.
With endless longsuffering and touching kindness
He sought to win us. Of the love which we gave to
the Father and the Son He was never envious, but
rejoiced in it. His Love never made a display of us
by leading us into unendurable temptations. It
never impressed us as being self-seeking, but
always as ministering love. It ever accommodated
itself to the needs and conditions of our hearts.
However much grieved, it was never provoked. It
never misunderstood or suspected us, but ever

stimulated us to new hope. Wherefore it rejoiced
not in iniquity to sanctify it, but when the truth
prevailed in us. And when we had strayed and
done wrong, it covered the wrong whispering in
our ear that it still believed and hoped all good
things of us. Wherefore it endured in us all evil, all
unloveliness, all contradictions. It failed us not as
a lamp that goes out in the dark. The Love of the
Holy Spirit never faileth. And while we enjoy here
all its sweetness and tenderness, it prophesies that
only hereafter it will manifest the fulness of its
brightness and glory, for on earth it is only known
in part. Its perfect bliss shall appear only when,
looking no more by means of the glass at the
phenomenal, we shall behold the eternal verities.
For whatever may fail, being among all our
spiritual blessings the highest, the richest, and
therefore the greatest, Love shall abide forever.
In this way we begin to understand something of
Comfort. Christ calls the Holy Spirit the
“Comforter.” He says: “I will send you another
Comforter, and He will abide with you forever.”
(John xiv. 16)
This does not refer to the “only comfort in life and
death,” for that consists in “that I am not my own,
but belong unto my faithful Savior Jesus Christ”
(Heid. Cat., q. 1). Christ speaks, not of comfort,

but of the Comforter. Not a thing, an event, or a
fact, 534 such as the paying of the ransom of
Calvary, but of a Person, who by His personal
appearance actually comes to comfort us.
Overwhelmed by distress and sorrow, we have not
lost the comfort, for nothing can come to us
without the will of our heavenly Father; but we
may have lost the Comforter. It is one thing to be
watching by the bedside of my sick child, and to
remember that even this affliction may be to
God’s glory and a blessing to the child; and quite
another when a faithful parent enters the room,
and seeing my tears wipes them away; reading my
sorrow seeks to drive it from my heart; with the
warmth of his love cherishing me in the coldness
of my desolation; and leaning my head against his
breast looks me hopefully in the eye; and
smoothing my brow, with holy animation, points
me to heaven, inspiring me with trust in my
heavenly Father:
Comfort is a deposited treasure from which I can
borrow; it is like the sacrifice of Christ in whom is
all my comfort, because, on Calvary He opened to
all the house of Israel a fountain for sin and
uncleanness. But a comforter is a person, who,
when I can not go to the fountain nor even see it,
goes for me and fills his pitcher and puts the

refreshing drops to my burning lips. When
Ishmael lay perishing with thirst, his mother’s
comfort was near by, in the cleft of the rock from
which the water came gushing down; yet with
comfort so near he might have died. But when the
angel of the Lord appeared and showed her the
water, then Hagar had found her Comforter.
And such is the Holy Spirit. So long as Jesus
walked on earth He was the Comforter of His
disciple’s. He lifted them when they stumbled;
when discouraged and distressed by fear and
doubt, He was their faithful Savior and
Comforter. But Himself was not comforted. When
in Gethsemane, being exceedingly sorrowful even
unto death, He asked them for comfort, they could
not give it to Him. They were powerless; they slept
and could not watch with Him one hour. So He
struggled alone, uncomforted and comfortless,
until an angel came and did what sinners could
not do, comforting the Savior in His distress.
When about to depart from the earth, Jesus
foreknew how desolate His disciples would be.
They were weak, helpless, broken reeds. As the
slender vine clings to the oak, so they cling to their
Lord. And now, as the tree was to be removed and
the vines 535 would lie on the ground a tangled
mass, they needed to be comforted as one whom

his mother comforts. And were they now to be left
as orphans, since He who had comforted them
even more tenderly than a mother was to go
away? And Jesus answers: “No, I will not leave
you orphans, I will send you another Comforter,
that He may abide with you forever.”
Thus the deep meaning of Christ’s word, that the
Holy Spirit is our Comforter, naturally discloses
itself. Of course, in, order to comfort us He must
personally be with us. One can comfort only by
means of love. It is the lifting of the too heavy
cross from the shoulders, the constant whispering
of loving words, the gathering of tears, the patient
listening to the complaints of our affliction, the
sympathizing with our suffering, the being
oppressed with our distresses, the identification
with our suffering person. Surely, even a gift can
afford comfort; a letter from a distant land can
cast a ray of hope into the troubled soul; but to
comfort us in such a way that the burden falls
from the shoulder, and the soul revives and loves,
in its love expecting to rejoice—such comfort we
can expect only from the living person who,
coming to us with the key to our heart, cherishes
us with the warmth of his own soul.
And since no one else can always be with us,
wholly enter into our sorrows, fully understand

and comfort us with infinite love, therefore is the
Holy Spirit the Comforter. He abides with us
forever, enters the deep places of every soul,
listens to every throb of the heart, is able to relieve
us of all our cares, takes all our troubles upon
Himself, and by His tender and divinely loving
words and sweet communion raises us out of our
comfortless condition.
This glorious work of the Holy Spirit must be
studied with extreme carefulness.
You can compare it, not to that of the artist who
chisels a statue out of marble, but to that of the
godly mother who with sacrificing love studies the
characters of her children, watches over their
souls while they themselves have no thought of it,
nurses them in sickness, prays with them and for
them so that they might learn to pray for
themselves, bends a listening ear to their trifling
griefs, and who in and through all this spends the
energy of her soul with warnings and admonitions,
now chiding, then caressing, to draw their souls to
God.
And yet, even this is no comparison; for all the
sacrifices of the 536 godliest mother, and all the
comfort wherewith she comforts her children, are
utterly nothing compared to the delightful and
divine comfort of the Holy Spirit.

Oh, that Comforter, the Holy Ghost, who never
ceases to care for God’s children, who ever
resumes with new animation the weaving of their
soul-garments, even tho their wilfulness has
broken the threads! On earth there is no suitable
comparison for it. In the human life there may be
a type somewhere; but a full-sized image to
measure this divine comfort there is not. It is
wholly unique, wholly divine, the measure of all
other comfort. The comfort wherewith we comfort
others has value and significance only when it is
bright with the spark, of the divine comfort.
The Song of Songs contains a description of the
tender love of Immanuel for His Church: He, the
Bridegroom who calls for the bride; she, the bride
who pines with love for her God-given
Bridegroom. This is, therefore, something entirely
different: the love, not of comfort, but of the
tenderest, most intimate communion and mutual
belonging together; the one not happy without the
other; both destined for each other; by the divine
ordinance united, and by virtue of that same
ordinance wretched unless the one possesses the
other. Such is not the Holy Spirit’s love in the
comforting. The communion of Christ and the
Church is for time and eternity; but, the comfort
of the Holy Ghost will cease—not His work of

love, but that of the comforting. Comfort can be
administered only so long as there is one
uncomforted and comfortless. So long as Israel
must pray to be delivered from iniquities; so long
as tears flow; so long as there is bitter sorrow and
distress,—so long will the Holy Spirit be our
Comforter.
But when sin is ended and misery is no more,
when death is abolished and the last sorrow is
endured and the last tear wiped away, then, I ask,
what remains there for the Holy Spirit to comfort?
How could there still be room for a Comforter?
To the question, Why, then, did the Lord say, “I
will send you another Comforter, that He may
abide with you forever”? (John xiv. 16) I answer
with another question: Is it to the honor of a child
that, while he cries for his mother’s comfort, he
forgets her as soon as the sorrow is past? This can
not be; this would be a denial of the nature of love.
He that is truly comforted entertains for his
comforter such intense feeling of gratitude,
obligation, and attachment 537 that he can not be
silent, but after having enjoyed the comfort craves
also the sweetness of love. The same is true
regarding the Holy Spirit. When He shall have
comforted us from our last distress, and removed
us from sorrow forever, then we can not say, “O

Holy Spirit, now Thou mayest depart in peace”;
but, we shall be constrained to cry, “Oh, refresh
and enrich us now with Thy Love forever?”
This would not be so if sin still dwelled in us; for
sin makes one so unthankful and self-sufficient
that after having tasted the comfort he can forget
the Comforter. But among the blessed there is no
ingratitude; but from deep inward compulsion we
shall love and laud Him who, with captivating
love, has divinely comforted us.
Hence a Comforter who is to depart after having
comforted us can not be the Comforter of God’s
children. Wherefore Jesus assured His disciples:
“I will not leave you comfortless. I will send you
another Comforter, that He may abide with you
forever
HOLY SPIRIT LOVE
ROM 5:5 And hope does not put us to shame,
because God’s love has been poured out into our
hearts through the Holy Spirit, who has been
given to us.
FATHER ABOVE US
SON WITH US

HOLY SPIRIT WITHIN US
The person of the trinity who gets closest to us is
the Holy Spirit. He is poured out into our hearts
as the love of God.
Amplified: Such hope never disappoints or deludes or shames us, for
God’s love has been poured out in our hearts through the Holy Spirit
Who has been given to us. (Amplified Bible - Lockman)
Barclay: and hope does not prove an illusion, because the love of God
has been poured out into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has
been given unto us. (Westminster Press)
NLT: And this expectation will not disappoint us. For we know how
dearly God loves us, because he has given us the Holy Spirit to fill our
hearts with his love. (NLT - Tyndale House)
SPURGEON,"Behold a temple for the worship of
the Divine Trinity in my text. Read the fifth and
sixth verses together—“The love of God (the
Father) is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy
Spirit which is given unto us. For when we were
yet without strength, in due time Christ died for
the ungodly.” Behold the blessed Three in One! It
needs the Trinity to make a Christian, it needs the
Trinity to cheer a Christian, it needs the Trinity to
complete a Christian; it needs the Trinity to create
in a Christian the hope of glory. I always like these

passages which bring us so near to the Trinity. Let
us pause a while and adore, “Glory be unto the
Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit: as it
was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be,
world without end! Amen.”
Poured out (1632) (ekcheo from ek = out + chéo = pour) means literally
to pour out, and pictures not a trickle, but a lavish outpouring to the
point of overflowing. In other words, God’s love is not rationed out drop
by drop but is like a mighty endless current!
Three NT uses of ekcheo refer to the Holy Spirit…
Whom (the Holy Spirit) He poured out upon us richly through Jesus
Christ our Savior (see note Titus 3:6)
And it shall be in the last days,' God says, 'That I will pour forth of My
Spirit upon all mankind; And your sons and your daughters shall
prophesy, And your young men shall see visions, And your old men shall
dream dreams; (Acts 2:17)
All the circumcised (Jewish) believers who had come with Peter were
amazed, because the gift of the Holy Spirit had been poured out upon
the Gentiles also. (Acts 10:45)
The pouring out in Romans 5:5 is however not of the Holy Spirit but of
God's holy love. The pouring out of divine love marks an interesting
contrast with John's 9 uses of ekcheo in Revelation 16, all but one
referring to a pouring out of God's wrath. So either one repents and
believes in Jesus and has God's love poured out extravagantly within his
heart or he rebels against and blasphemes Jesus and has God's wrath
poured out abundantly!
Paul also used ekcheo one other time in Romans to describe unbelievers

whose…
feet are swift to shed (ekcheo) blood (Ro 3:15-note)
Poured out speaks of the inexhaustible abundance of the supply and is
reminiscent of the copious provision for the thirsty children of Israel in
the wilderness…
"Then Moses lifted up his hand and struck the rock twice with his rod;
and water came forth (Lxx = exerchomai) abundantly (Lxx = polus =
much), and the congregation and their beasts drank. (Nu 20:11).
God's love flows out in abundance and we experience it in an abundant
manner.
Ekcheo is in the perfect tense which conveys the picture that the
"pouring out" began at some point of time in the past (at conversion)
and the effects, results and benefits of that outpouring continue - they
have not been withdrawn. The idea is that the love of God has been
poured out in our hearts and still floods them. The fact that the voice is
passive supports the interpretation that this is a reference to God's love
for us not our love for God.
Philippi rightly observes that "The love of God does not descend upon
us as dew in drops, but as a stream which spreads itself abroad through
the whole soul, filling it with the consciousness of his presence and
favor."
Wuest paraphrase nicely conveys this thought also picking up the
essence of ekcheo in the perfect tense "has been poured out in our
hearts and still floods them through the agency of the Holy Spirit Who
was given to us."
God’s love comes to us as a brimming and overflowing river, in
“immeasurable torrents” , in “unstinting lavishness”. His love in our
hearts is like a shower of rain soaking parched ground. One of the Holy
Spirit's main roles is to "make us deeply and refreshingly aware that
God loves us."

Guzik - God's love isn't given to us in a trickle, it is poured out in our
hearts. Some Christians live as if it was only a trickle but God wants us
to know the outpouring of His love. (Romans 5)
Leon Morris - While the reference is surely to the love God has for us,
we should not overlook the truth that the Spirit’s pouring of God’s love
into our hearts is a creative act. It kindles love in us, and love “becomes
the moral principle by which we live” (Dodd). Poured out points to
abundance (cf. Moffatt, “floods our hearts”). (Morris, L. The Epistle to
the Romans. W. B. Eerdmans; Inter-Varsity Press)
The rivers of living water now can flow out of believers because God has
poured into them His love by His Spirit.
Within our hearts - The manifestation of God's love is not an external
revelation as one might see in His works of providence or even in His act
of redemption, but it is diffused within our hearts. The Greek
preposition is eis which conveys the primary idea of motion into any
place or thing, in this case into the heart, the "control tower" so to
speak of the believer's being.
Hearts (2588) (kardia [word study]) as used here and most places in
Scripture does not refer to the physical organ but figuratively refers to
the seat and center of human life. Even as the heart is the chief organ of
physical life, the heart figuratively is the inner spring of the personal
life, the seat of the affections. The heart is the wellspring of man’s
spiritual life. The heart is the center of the personality, and it controls
the intellect, emotions, and will. No outward obedience is of the slightest
value unless the heart turns to God.
Vine writes that kardia "came to denote man’s entire mental and moral
activities, and to stand figuratively for the hidden springs of the
personal life, and so here signifies the seat of thought and feeling. (Vine,
W. Collected writings of W. E. Vine. Nashville: Thomas Nelson )

MacArthur adds that "In most modern cultures, the heart is thought of
as the seat of emotions and feelings. But most ancients—Hebrews,
Greeks, and many others—considered the heart to be the center of
knowledge, understanding, thinking, and wisdom. The New Testament
also uses it in that way. The heart was considered to be the seat of the
mind and will, and it could be taught what the brain could never know.
Emotions and feelings were associated with the intestines, or bowels."
(MacArthur, J: Ephesians. 1986. Chicago: Moody Press)
Through the Holy Spirit - This is the first mention of love and the first
mention of the Holy Spirit in believers in Romans (cf Ro 1:4-note).
Hodge notes that "this inward assurance that we are the objects of the
love of God is not the mere result of the examination of evidence, nor is
it a vain delusion, but it is produced by the Holy Spirit: “The Spirit
himself testifies with our spirit that we are God’s children” (Ro 8:16
[note]; 2Co 1:21,22; Ep 1:14 [note]). (Commentary on Romans)
John gave corroborative evidence of Romans 5:5 "We know that we
have passed from death unto life, because we love the brethren" (1Jn
3:14). (Romans Commentary)
John Piper writes that "The Holy Spirit is not a mood-altering drug. He
is an Illuminator of the glory of God's love in the work of Christ. He is a
heart-eye opener to the ravishing reality that in the death of Christ for
us, God loved us infinitely. (Romans 5:3-8)Was given (1325) (didomi)
means to give based on decision of the will of the giver with no merit of
recipient.
This giving of the Spirit does not refer to the giving of the Spirit at
Pentecost in the sense that at that time He came to form the Church, but
to the act of the Spirit at the time of the conversion of every believer, at
which time He takes up His permanent abode in the believer's inner
being.

It is interesting though that Luke used the same verb ekcheo in
describing the event at Pentecost, Peter declaring…
"Therefore having been exalted to the right hand of God, and having
received from the Father the promise of the Holy Spirit, He has poured
forth this which you both see and hear." (Acts 2:33)
Note that this outpouring by the Holy Spirit fulfills God's promise to
Israel in captivity in Ezekiel's day, the prophet recording God's
declaration that…
Moreover, I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you;
and I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a
heart of flesh. And I will put My Spirit within you and cause you to walk
in My statutes, and you will be careful to observe My ordinances."
(Ezekiel 36:26, 27, cf Ezek 18:31)
Calvin adds that "given" means that this love was
bestowed through the gratuitous goodness of God, and not conferred for
our merits (Romans 5)
Paul records the following verses dealing with the gift of the Spirit…
Now He who establishes us with you in Christ and anointed us is God,
who also sealed us and gave us the Spirit in our hearts as a pledge.
(2Cor 1:21-22)
And because you are sons, God has sent forth the Spirit of His Son into
our hearts, crying, "Abba! Father!" (Gal 4:6)
In Him, you also, after listening to the message of truth, the gospel of
your salvation-- having also believed, you were sealed in Him with the
Holy Spirit of promise, Who is given as a pledge of our inheritance, with
a view to the redemption of God's own possession, to the praise of His
glory. (Ep 1:13, 14-note)
Note that every believer has the Holy Spirit (Ro 8:9-note), but not every
believer lives in the fullness of the Spirit (Ep 5:18-note), and not every

believer walks in the Spirit (Ro 8:4, 5-see notes Ro 8:4; 8:5).
The Spirit within sheds God’s love to us and through us. God revealed
His love at the Cross when Christ died for those who were “helpless,”
“ungodly,” “sinners,” and “enemies,” thus proving His great love. Paul’s
argument is that if God did all that for us while we were His enemies,
how much more will He do for us now that we are His children! We are
saved by Christ’s death (Ro 5:9), but we are also saved by His life (Ro
5:10) as “the power of His resurrection” (Php 3:10-note, Ro 1:4-note)
operates in our lives. We have received “reconciliation” (Ro 5:11), and
now the love of God is experienced in our lives.
"We know that we have passed from death unto life, because we love the
brethren" (1John 3:14 ).
G Campbell Here the idea is not merely that God loves us, though
necessarily that is involved. It is rather that He fills us with His love by
the Spirit, so that we love what He loves, and as He loves
The love of God is experienced in the heart. And the love of God is
demonstrated in history. There is fact, and there is feeling. There is
knowledge in the head and there is affection in the heart. There is truth
and there is Spirit.
Love divine, all loves excelling,
Joy of heaven to earth come down;
Fix in us Thy humble dwelling,
All Thy faithful mercies crown. —Wesley
Adam Clarke Commentary
Because the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts - We have the most
solid and convincing testimony of God's love to us, by that measure of it

which he has communicated to our hearts. There, εκκεχυται, it is
poured out, and diffused abroad; filling, quickening, and invigorating
all our powers and faculties. This love is the spring of all our actions; it
is the motive of our obedience; the principle through which we love
God, we love him because he first loved us; and we love him with a love
worthy of himself, because it springs from him: it is his own; and every
flame that rises from this pure and vigorous fire must be pleasing in his
sight: it consumes what is unholy; refines every passion and appetite;
sublimes the whole, and assimilates all to itself.
love in action.
Luke 4:18-19, "The Spirit of the Lord is upon me,
because he hath anointed me to preach the gospel
to the poor; he hath sent me to heal the
brokenhearted, to preach deliverance to the
captives, and recovering of sight to the blind, to
set at liberty them that are bruised, To preach the
acceptable year of the Lord."
Acts 10:38, "How God anointed Jesus of Nazareth
with the Holy Ghost and with power: who went
about doing good, and healing all that were
oppressed of the devil; for God was with him."
I. The love of God. If you would have this love shed abroad in your
hearts you must consider carefully--

1. Who it is that loves you, namely, the most high God. To be loved is a
sublime thought, but to be loved of Him is a right royal thing, A courtier
will often think it quite enough if he hath the favour of his prince. It
means riches, pleasure, honour. And what means the love of the King of
kings to you? All that you ever can need.
2. What He is who so loves you. Very much of the value of affection
depends upon whom it comes from. It would be a very small thing to
have the complacency of some of our fellow creatures whose praise
might almost be considered censure. To have the love of the good, the
excellent, this is truest wealth; and so to enjoy the love of God is an
utterly priceless thing!
3. The remarkable characteristics of that love,
II. The love of God is shed abroad. Here is an alabaster box of very
precious ointment, it holds within the costly frankincense of the love of
God; but we know nothing of it, it is closed up, a mystery, a secret. The
Holy Spirit opens the box, and now the fragrance fills the chamber;
every spiritual taste perceives it, heaven and earth are perfumed with it.
III. This love becomes the confirmation of our hope. Hope rests itself
mainly upon that which is not seen; the promise of God whom eye hath
not beheld. Still it is exceedingly sweet to us if we receive some evidence
and token of Divine love which we can positively enjoy even now. And
there are some of us who do not want Butler’s “Analogy” or Paley’s
“Evidences” to back our faith; we have our own analogy and our own
evidences within, for the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts, and
we have tasted and seen that the Lord is gracious. (C. H. Spurgeon.)
Frequently at the great Roman games the emperors, in order to gratify
the citizens of Rome, would cause sweet perfumes to be rained down
upon them through the awning which covered the amphitheatre. Behold
the vases, the huge vessels of perfume! Yes; but there is nought here to

delight you so long as the jars are sealed; but let the vases be opened
and the vessels be poured out, and let the drops of perfumed rain begin
to descend, and everyone is refreshed and gratified thereby. Such is the
love of God. There is a richness and a fulness in it, but it is not perceived
till the Spirit of God pours it out like the rain of fragrance over the
heads and hearts of all the living children of God. See, then, the need of
having the love of God shed abroad in the heart by the Holy Ghost. (C.
H. Spurgeon.)
1. The method--“shed abroad.” God does nothing with a niggardly
hand. The love of God is not sent in a puny dribble; it comes like the
waters of an incoming tide, mighty, resistless. His love fills the soul and
surrounds it and permeates our nature.
2. The place--“in our hearts.” The heart is the spring of life, and
metaphorically is the centre of spiritual life. It is the heart that is said to
feel love. And so it is represented that the heart receives the love of God.
Our hearts receive all the blood from the body, and then, after purifying
it, sends it back to all parts of the body. So we are to receive the love of
God in the heart to be distributed over all our life and actions.
3. Stimulates. Hope, springing from love in the heart, will quicken all
the faculties of the mind and fire all the passions of the soul. Love will
constrain to consecration, and hope stimulate to action.
By the Holy Ghost which is given unto us.--
The gift of the Holy Ghost is
I. The pledge of what is to come (Romans 8:23; 2 Corinthians 1:22;
2Co_5:5; Ephesians 1:14).

II. The witness of our sonship (Romans 8:16; Galatians 4:6).
III. The Author of all gracious fruits and experiences (Galatians 5:22-
23).
IV. The Revealer of all Divine truth (John 16:13-14; 1 Corinthians 2:10-
12; 1 John 2:20; 1Jn_2:27). The seal and bond of our union with Christ
and God (Ephesians 4:20; Romans 8:9-11). (T. Robinson, D. D.)
GILL
because the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost,
which is given unto us. By "the love of God" is meant, not that love by
which we love God, for hope does not depend upon, nor is it supported
by our love and obedience to God; but the love of God to us, of which
some instances are given in the following verses: us is said "to be shed
abroad in our hearts"; which denotes the plenty and abundance of it,
and the full and comfortable sensation which believers have of it: "by
the Holy Spirit": who leads into, and makes application of it: "and is
given to us": for that purpose, as the applier of all grace, the Comforter,
and the earnest of heaven. Now the love which the Spirit sheds abroad
in the heart, is the source and spring, both of justification itself, which is
owing to the free grace of God, and of all the effects of it, as peace with
God, access to the throne of grace, rejoicing in hope of the glory of God,
the usefulness of afflictions, and the stability of hope, and is here alleged
as the reason of all.

The first view, our love to God, has been adopted by [Augustine ],
[Mede ], [Doddridge ], [Scott ], and [Stuart ] ; and the other, God’s love
to us, by [Chrysostom ], [Beza ], [Pareus ], [Grotius ], [Hodge ], and
[Chalmers ], and also by [Schleusner ] who gives this paraphrase,
“Amor Dei abunde nobis declaratus est — the love of God is abundantly
declared to us.” — Ed.
(THIRD OUTLINE)
THE FOUNTAIN OF GOD’S LOVE
What St. Paul says is, that the mark of a Christian man is the great
flood-tide setting from his heart to God; and that the mark of a
Christian man is that, however dimly, his eye may yet see the great
flood-tide of love setting from God’s heart to him. It is not a great
critical exposition that is needed here, but rather it comes to the very
bottom of Christian life when the Apostle says, Never mind about
yourself; get away from all these miserable thoughts about how you love
and trust, and how you feel towards Him; that is to be flung behind you.
Open your eyes and hearts to this; that pouring down from heaven, a
fountain of the great deep being broken up, upon every human soul
there is that rejoicing, perennial, inexhaustible, immeasurable tide and
ocean of life that will drench and saturate every heart of man.
I. The love of God is shed abroad.—God’s love to me, to everybody, is
poured upon the heart, and the consciousness of it, and not the response
that I make to it—that is a secondary thing—but the consciousness of it
is what makes the Christian. The love of God is shed abroad, is a grand
thing; but the grand thought of the text goes far deeper; it says the love
of God has been shed abroad. So it carries us who are Christian men
and women back to some time in our history, when in some degree the
consciousness of that love was in our hearts. The difference between one
man who is a Christian and one who is not is the difference between a
man standing with his back to the sun and the other with his face to the

sunshine; the one gets light and warmth and cheer, and the other has his
face in the shadow. It is all a question of which way your faces are
turned. And here is a definition, if you will have a definition of a
Christian, not that he loves, but that he trusts. The love will be a sure
result of the trust. The love that is shed abroad in the heart is not my
poor shrunken drop of love, but it is the great stream which comes from
Him, and is ready to pour into my empty vessel, if I will only be steady
and let the flow fill it.
II. Ask yourself, do I know and believe the love that God has?—That is
the meaning of the love of God being shed abroad. You remember the
old story of Christ at the marriage feast of Cana, the six water-pots full
of water, like our hearts, with all the cold, dismal, unsatisfactory joys
and affections of earth, and He puts His hand upon the vessels and turns
the water of the human affections into the wine of the heavenly Canaan.
And instead of our hearts being filled with the insufficiencies and
hollownesses of earthly things, He pours into them the great things, and
the quickening of his own love.
III. The way by which this consciousness of the love of God, the
foundation of God’s love, may belong to me is by His Holy Spirit which
He has given to me. You have all got faith if you are Christian men and
women, and the measure of your faith is the measure of your possession
of the Spirit of God. For the teaching of the New Testament is this, that
the spirit is given to them that believe, and if your hearts are charged
with the happy sense of God’s love, which the Spirit of God kindles and
fosters there, there are two things, one is your faith, and the other is
your believing contemplation of God’s truth. Here are two surface facts
in reference to the working on us by the Holy Spirit; that He works this
on men we believe, and that the means by which the Spirit of God works
upon us is the truth that is here. So then, plainly, the inference is, do you
want to have a deeper, more constant, firmer, brighter, gladder
consciousness of God’s love going with you all through life? Do not work
yourself into it, but look and look, ever look with simple confidence to
the great fact in which all that love is expressed—the love of God shed
abroad in our hearts is the true foundation, and the only foundation

upon which we can build any substantial hope for the future.
Illustration
‘The sunshine of life is its love. Always be trying how much love you can
put into the day. Do not keep a narrow circle. “Shed it abroad.” “Shed it
abroad” as God “sheds it abroad in your hearts.” Let the thought of
every one when he gets up in the morning be—“What love shall I show
to-day? Whom can I make happier? What kind act can I do to any poor
person, or to any rich person, or to any child, or to anybody?” That is
the nearest thing to heaven upon earth—for that is—more than
anything else on this earth—closest to the image of God.’
(FOURTH OUTLINE)
LOVE SHED ABROAD
Observe the emphatic expression: ‘The love of God is shed abroad’—
self-acting, diffusive, filling the whole space: ‘is shed abroad in our
hearts by the Holy Ghost which is given’—perfectly free, unpurchased,
undeserved—‘which is given unto us.’
I. Here, then, is the first condition. You must be united to Christ before
you love God.—The Holy Ghost must then enter into you and do His
own work. And you must believe and realise it as His own solitary
prerogative. Therefore, if you wish to love, look well to it that you begin,
where every good thing does begin, with Christ. That you are His—that
He is yours.
II. Then take care that nothing grieves and stops the Spirit; that there is
no bar across—by sin, or by the world, or by self—to stop the channel of
that river of life.
III. And then the result is sure: ‘The love of God will be shed abroad’—
far and wide, into every crevice of your heart, ‘by the Holy Ghost which
is given unto you.’
IV. And now, subject to this great law, let me suggest to you one or two
ways by which this love is to take effect in your heart.

(a) At this moment, there is some one with whom your conscience tells
you you are not now on the terms on which you ought to be. That feeling
you have, that you are not on right terms with that person, is part of the
‘shedding.’ Honour it. Honour it at once. Adjust your relationships with
that person.
(b) Or the present state of things in your heart may be worse than that.
There may be some one with whom you are really at enmity. It is almost,
if not quite, a quarrel. There is a distance; an unbrotherly feeling, and a
proud spirit—if not positive anger and dislike. Or, if you have forgiven,
and if the first heat of the anger is gone, you have not said it. The
reconciliation is not confessed—therefore it is not complete. Yet, at this
moment, you have a conviction about it, and a compunction of heart, a
desire, which is the Holy Ghost. Then go and do it. Take the lower
ground. Humble yourself. Say that you wish to be friends.
—Rev. James Vaughan.
Illustration
‘There are a great many who are still very worldly, but the real desire of
their hearts is that they could love God. Whether such a desire is not of
itself a proof that it is already love, I do not now stop to consider—I
think it is; but the persons to whom I refer have not yet (their own
hearts would say they have not yet) much real, practical love to God.
They do not treat Him as if they loved Him. And there is not a Christian
on earth who does not feel his love poor and cold in comparison with
what it ought to be—so poor, and so cold, that he must very often
confess—“I have none.” His first wish and prayer every day is—“O
God! more love! more love!”’
COKE
By the Holy Ghost which is given unto us.— The spiritual gifts bestowed
on the first Christians were clear proofs, especially in the case of the
Gentiles, of the love which God bare to them, and of his will that they
should be saved. And therefore, when the Jewish believers, whoreproved

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