es 'objective material reality,' nor
about what are the laws of prophetic ecstasy and vision, to discuss such
a question as that. Nor is there any need to moot it. It does not matter
one rush whether bystanders would have seen anything or not. It does not
matter in the least whether there was any actual excitation of auditory
or visual nerves. It does not matter whether there was anything which
people are contented to call _material_--a word which covers a depth of
ignorance. Enough for us that this was no fancy, born in a man's brain,
but an actual manifestation, whether through sense or apart from sense,
to consciousness, of a divine outpouring and communication. Enough for
us that the voice which spoke was God's, and that that which descended
was the Spirit of God. As to all other questions, they may be amusing
and interesting, but they are insoluble, and therefore unimportant.

Well, then, taking that point of view, the next question that arises is
as to the purpose of this descent of the Spirit. Plainly, as I have
said, it was the coronation and anointing of the Monarch. But a man is
king before he is crowned. Coronation is the consequence and not the
cause of his royalty. It is but the official and solemn announcement of
a previous fact. No additional power, no fresh authority, comes of the
crowning. And so the first purpose of this great fact is distinctly
stated, in John's Gospel, as having been the solemn, divine pointing out
of Messiah to the Baptist primarily, but in order that he might bear
witness of Him to others. The words which follow are a commentary on,
and part of the explanation of, the descent of the Holy Spirit. They
are God's finger, pointing to Jesus and saying, 'Arise, anoint Him, for
this is He.'

But it must be remembered always that this was neither the beginning of
that divine Spirit's operation upon Jesus, nor the beginning of His
Messianic nature and consciousness; nor the beginning of His Sonship.
That day was not in deepest truth the 'day' on which the Son was
'begotten.' Before the baptism there was the consciousness of
Messiahship witnessed in these words, so singularly compacted of
humility and authority: 'Suffer it to be so now, for thus it becometh us
to fulfil all righteousness'; and before His baptism, and even before
His birth, that divine Spirit wrought His manhood, and ere the heavens
opened, or the dove fluttered down upon His head, He from everlasting
was the Son in the boso