"But when the Comforter is come,
whom I will send unto you from the Father, even the Spirit of truth which
{195} proceedeth from the Father, he shall testify of me; and ye also
shall bear witness, because ye have been with me from the beginning"
(John 15: 26, 27).

As we have said, it is not only the enthronement of Christ in righteous
approval with the Father that must be certified, but the acceptance of
his sacrificial work as a full and satisfying ground of our
reconciliation with the Father. And the Spirit proceeding from God is
alone competent to bear to us this assurance. Therefore in the Epistle
to the Hebrews, after the reiterated statement of our Lord's exaltation
at the right hand of God, it is added: "For by one offering he hath
perfected forever them that are sanctified, _whereof the Holy Ghost is
also a witness to us_" (Heb. 10: 14, 15). In a word, he whom we have
known on the cross as "the Lamb of God that taketh away the sins of the
world," must now be known to us on the throne as "_the Lord our
righteousness_." But though the angels and the glorified in heaven see
Jesus, once crucified, now "made both Lord and Christ," we see him not.
Therefore it is written that "no man can say Jesus is Lord, _but in the
Holy Spirit_" (1 Cor. 12: 3, R. V.). So also we are told that "if any
man sin we have a _Paraclete_ with the Father, Jesus Christ the
righteous" (1 John 2: 1); but we can only know Christ as such through
that "other Paraclete" sent forth from the Father. It was promised that
"when he, the Spirit of truth, is come, he shall {196} not speak from
himself; but what things soever he shall hear, these shall he speak"
(John 16: 13, R. V.). Hearing the ascriptions of worthiness lifted up to
Christ in heaven, and beholding him who was made a little lower than the
angels for the suffering of death, now "crowned with glory and honor," he
communicates what he sees and hears to the church on earth. Thus, as he
in his earthly life, through his own outshining and self-evidencing
perfection, "was justified in the spirit"; so we, recognizing him
standing for us in glory, and now "of God made unto us righteousness,"
are also "justified in the name of the Lord Jesus _and by the Spirit of
our God_" (1 Cor. 6: 11).

Thus, though unseen by the church during all the time of his
high-priestly ministry, our Lord has sent to his church one whose office
it is to bear witness to all he is and all he is doing while in hea