om we have least
expectation. For the Spirit, as Christ says, breathes where he will,
and touches hearts when and where he knows them to be receptive.

22. It is relative to the power and energy wrought by the Holy Spirit
that John speaks, indicating the source and means of the power of this
witness, when he says of Christ, "This is he that came by water and
blood," etc. In this sentence is included all we possess in the
kingdom of Christ, and here is extolled the efficacy of our beloved
baptism and the blood or sufferings of Christ. Here John unites all
the elements in one bundle, so to speak, making a triune witness. They
bear joint witness to our faith and confirm it--these three: the
water, the blood and the Spirit.

BAPTISM BY WATER AND BLOOD.

23. Christ comes, first, "by water"; that is, by holy baptism. He
employs baptism as an outward sign of his work in the new birth of man
and in man's sanctification. This water by which Christ comes cannot
be a mere, empty sign; for he comes not merely to cleanse or bathe the
body with water, but to purify the whole man from all pollution and
blemishes inherent in him from Adam. Christ has instituted a cleansing
wholly unlike the Mosaic ablutions under the Old Testament
dispensation. Moses came with various laws relating to washings and
purifications, but they were only cleansings of the body or of the
flesh and had daily to be repeated. Now, since these ceremonials
contributed nothing to man's purification in God's sight--a thing to
be effected by nothing short of a new birth--Christ came with a new
order of cleansing, namely, baptism, which is not a mere external
ablution from physical impurities, but a washing effective in man's
purification from the inward pollution of his old sinful birth and
from an evil conscience, and bringing remission of sin and a good
conscience toward God, as Peter says. 1 Pet 3, 21. Paul, also (Tit 3,
5), calls baptism the "washing of regeneration and renewing of the
Holy Spirit."

24. Christ first instituted baptism through John the Baptist. To
distinguish it from the Mosaic baptism, the old Jewish rite of
washings, Christ styles it "a baptism unto repentance and the
remission of sins." He designs that therein man shall perceive his
inner impurities and know them to be, in God's sight, beyond the power
of outward Mosaic ablutions to reach; shall know also that
purification of the conscience and remission of sins must be sought
and obtai