Scripture: "Tarry ye until ye be clothed with power from on high.— LUKE xxiv. 49.
The Lord had said to the disciples: "Without Me ye can do nothing." And now, why is it that He has chosen these impotent, helpless men to send them out to conquer the world for Him? It was that in their feebleness they might yield them¬selves and give Him as Lord, the opportunity on His throne, to show His power working through them. As the Father had done all the work in Christ when He was upon earth, so Christ in heaven would now be the Great Worker, proving in them that all power had been given to Him in heaven and on earth. Their place would be to pray, to believe, and yield themselves to the mighty power of Christ.
The Holy Spirit would not be in them as a power of which they could have possession. But He would possess them, and their work would be in very deed the work of the Almighty Christ. Their whole posture each day would be that of unceasing dependence and prayer, and of confident expectation.
The Apostles had indeed learned to know Christ intimately. They had seen all His mighty works; they had received His teaching; they had gone with Him through all His sufferings, even to the death of the cross. And they had not only seen Him but known Him in the power of His resurrection and the ex¬perience of that resurrection life in their own hearts. Yet they were not capable of making Him known aright, until He Himself, from the throne of heaven, had taken possession of them by His Spirit dwelling in them.
Everything calls the Gospel minister to rest content with nothing less than the indwelling life and power of the Holy Ghost revealing Jesus in the heart as the only fitness for preaching the Gospel in power. Nothing less than having Christ speaking through us in the power of His omnipotence will make us able ministers of the New Testament, bringing salvation to them that hear us.
