That Inner Illumination
W. Carl Ketcherside
[Page 182] |
All of our readers recognize by this time that translators of the sacred scriptures sometimes find themselves in difficulty when facing the original word for spirit. The Greek pneuma can refer to the Spirit of God, or it can refer to that divinely given attribute within man which makes of him a rational being, able to hold converse with Deity. Even the term hagios pneuma is fraught with problems. It may refer to the Spirit who is holy by nature, or to the spirit in man when purged of the taint and guilt of sin and consecrated unto the service of God.
The passage with which we are here concerned is a good case in point. Some translators capitalize the word and make it Spirit, concluding that the Spirit is the agency of illumination, God's flashlight to conduct the way into deeper recesses of the Word. Others render it spirit, referring to the heart, the intellectual faculty, which is flooded with greater light and thus made more capable of functioning effectively in fulfilling the divine purpose.
Those who are aware of my personal convictions about the work of the Spirit also recognize that I am not perturbed by which position is taken. I hold that the spirit of man is capable of being floodlighted and given insight, and I believe that this is one of the functions of the Holy Spirit. There is a difference between revelation and illumination. The first relates to impartation of truth undiscoverable by other means. It has to do with an action of the divine mind in conveying truth. The second has to do with perceptiveness of that truth and is an action related to the human understanding.
I do not think the Spirit is revealing additional truth to men in our day. I am content to believe that the revelation of divine truth as contained in the sacred scriptures was completed by the special envoys of Christ during their lifetime. But all of the truths in that revelation have not been apprehended. It is one thing to uncover the body of saving truth and a wholly different thing to discover the truths contained in it. I do not feel that the bodies of men today are one whit different than that of Adam, but scientists are discovering new truths about us all of the time. The Spirit does not operate in illumination by imposing the Word upon our minds, else all of us would have an equal knowledge of God's truth. The Spirit dwells in the heart and infuses the mind into the truth to the extent of its willingness and capability. No two persons in the world have the same capacity for understanding. In all of us, the powers of perception, retention, and rationalization differ. We can no more understand alike than we can all look alike. It is for this reason that knowledge can never be made a ground of fellowship any more than can physical stature or appearance.
Our willingness to adopt new truths may be affected by prejudice, loyalty to the party, indifference, or fear of loss of prestige, power or pelf. The Spirit cannot drive us farther than we are willing to go. In order to grasp the greatness of truth one must cast off all shackles and make the leap of faith. The overwhelming desire for truth must become the magnificent obsession, the search for the holy grail, the quest of the golden fleece.
When one arrives at the point where all else is counted as refuse and he surrenders himself unreservedly to the Spirit who dwells within, when he commits himself without restraint to the leading of the Spirit to follow without hesitancy, his heart is prepared for illumination. The word of God will take on new depths of meaning, passages which once were like a blank wall become open gates attracting to the broad fields beyond, those which were interpreted with that inconsistency which is the bane of every faction will suddenly come into focus and proper correlation, and an unbounded joy will fill the heart. This is the promise of God!
The Spirit did not come as a truck driver to dump the truth on an empty lot and then retire to the shade of a tree to watch our fumbling efforts to cement the blocks together into a tabernacle for our God. God is as much concerned that we grasp the truth as that we get it. So the Spirit dwells within each of us, helping us to overcome our weakness, and empowering us to understand. So long as we drowsily confuse the Message of heaven with the call of men, even those who are priests of God, we will be frantic. But when we quietly compose ourselves and say, "Speak Lord, thy servant heareth," the truth will break through. And when this happens it will "make you realize how great is the hope to which he is calling you." This I earnestly crave for all of you because of the love I have for you!