ope of clearing away some misapprehensions--is one that has often
and often tortured the mind of Christians. They say of themselves, 'I
know nothing of any such evidence: I am not conscious of any Spirit
bearing witness with my spirit.' Instead of looking to other sources
to answer the question whether they are Christians or not--and then,
having answered it, thinking thus, 'That text asserts that _all_
Christians have this witness, therefore certainly I have it in some
shape or other,' they say to themselves, 'I do not feel anything that
corresponds with my idea of what such a grand, supernatural voice as
the witness of God's Spirit in my spirit must needs be; and therefore
I doubt whether I am a Christian at all.' I should be thankful if the
attempt I make now to set before you what seems to me to be the true
teaching of the passage, should be, with God's help, the means of
lifting some little part of the burden from some hearts that are
right, and that only long to know that they are, in order to be at
rest.

'The Spirit itself beareth witness with our spirit, that we are the
children of God.' The general course of thought which I wish to leave
with you may be summed up thus: Our cry 'Father' is the witness that
we are sons. That cry is not simply ours, but it is the voice of
God's Spirit. The divine Witness in our spirits is subject to the
ordinary influences which affect our spirits.

Let us take these three thoughts, and dwell on them for a little
while.

I. Our cry 'Father' is the witness that we are sons.

Mark the terms of the passage: 'The Spirit itself beareth witness
_with_ our spirit--.' It is not so much a revelation made to my
spirit, considered as the recipient of the testimony, as a revelation
made in or with my spirit considered as co-operating in the
testimony. It is not that my spirit says one thing, bears witness
that I am a child of God; and that the Spirit of God comes in by a
distinguishable process, with a separate evidence, to say Amen to my
persuasion; but it is that there is one testimony which has a
conjoint origin--the origin from the Spirit of God as true source,
and the origin from my own soul as recipient and co-operant in that
testimony. From the teaching of this passage, or from any of the
language which Scripture uses with regard to the inner witness, it is
not to be inferred that there will rise up in a Christian's heart,
from some origin consciously beyond the sphere of his own