The Holy Spirit in Jesus Christ part IV

Jesus Christ was baptized by the Holy Spirit. Not only did He derive His person and His incarnate life from the Holy Ghost, but when at thirty years of age He consecrated Himself to His ministry of life and suffering, and service, and went down into the waters of the Jordan, in token of His self-renunciation and His assumption of death, the heavens were opened, and the Holy Ghost by whom He had been born,  Now "came down and personally possessed His being and henceforth dwelt within Him."

No one can for a moment deny that this was something transcendentally more than the incarnation of Christ. Up to this time there had been one personality, henceforth there were two ; for the Holy Ghost was added to the Christ, and in the strength of this indwelling Spirit, henceforth He wrought His works, and spake His words, and accomplished His ministry on earth.

But this also has its parallel in the experience of the disciples of Christ. It is not enough for us to be born of the Holy Ghost, we must also be baptized with the Holy Ghost. There must come a crisis hour in the life of every Christian when he, too, steps down into the Jordan of death, when he yields his will to fulfill all righteousness, like his Master, when he voluntarily assumes the life of self-renunciation and service, which God has appointed for him in His Holy will, and when there is added to him, as a Divine trust, the Holy Ghost; and henceforth it is not one but two, and then these two are one.