ity or even comparison between a person and an influence. If the
promised visitor were to be only an impersonal emanation from God, it
would seem impossible that our Lord should have so co-ordinated him
with himself as to say: "I go to be an Advocate for you in heaven (1
John 2: 1), and I send another to be an Advocate for you on earth."

{39}

But if Christ thus distinguishes the Comforter from himself, he also
identifies him with himself: "I will not leave you orphans: _I will
come to you_" (John 14: 18). By common consent this promise refers to
the advent of the Spirit, for so the connection plainly indicates. And
yet almost in the same breath he says: "The Comforter whom I will send
unto you" (John 14: 26). Thus our Lord makes the same event to be at
once his coming and his sending; and he speaks of the Spirit now as his
own presence, and now as his substitute during his absence. So what
must we conclude but that the Paraclete is Christ's other self, a third
Person in that blessed Trinity of which he is the second.

2. The Paraclete is subordinate yet superior in his ministry to the
church. "For he shall not speak of himself; but whatsoever he shall
hear that shall he speak. He shall glorify me; for he shall receive of
mine and show it unto you" (John 16: 13).

Well may we mark the holy deference between the persons of the Trinity
which is here pointed out. Each receives from another what he
communicates, and each magnifies another in his praises. As Bengel
concisely states it: "The Son glorifies the Father; the Spirit
glorifies the Son." What then is the office of the Holy Ghost, so far
as we can interpret it, but that of communicating and applying the work
of Christ to human hearts? If he convinces of sin it is by exhibiting
the {40} gracious redemptive work of the Saviour and showing men their
guilt in not believing on him. If he witnesses to the penitent of his
acceptance it is by testifying of the atoning blood of Jesus in which
that acceptance is grounded; if he regenerates and sanctifies the heart
it is by communicating to it the life of the risen Lord. Christ is
"all" in himself, and through the Spirit "in all" those whom the Spirit
renews. This reverent subjection of the earthly Comforter to the
heavenly Christ contains a deep lesson for those who are indwelt by the
Spirit[3] and makes them rejoice evermore to be witnesses rather than
originators.

With this subordination of the Holy Spi