Dear Brother—In Matthew 28: 19, Christ commands his apostles to go teach all nations, baptising them into the name of the Father, and of the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Now when Peter preached his first discourse, in answering the question propounded by the audience, "What shall we do?" told them to "repent and be baptised in the Name of the Lord Jesus; and they should receive the gift of the Holy Spirit." Why did he not tell them to be baptised in the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit, instead of "the Name of the Lord Jesus." In the commission they are ordered to do this. But Peter tells them to expect the gift of the Holy Spirit after baptism in the name of the Lord Jesus. Did Peter in this instance obey his instructions? If so, what is the gift of the Holy Spirit?

Again, in Acts 19: 1-6, Paul, finding disciples, asked them if they had received the Holy Spirit since they believed; and being answered in the negative, he inquired, "Unto what were ye baptised?" When told, "unto John’s baptism," he explained to them the nature of that institution, upon which they "were baptised in the name of the Lord Jesus." Why were they not baptised into the name of the Father, &c.? Paul it seems laid his hands on them, and they received the Holy Spirit, instead of being baptised in the name of the Holy Spirit. What is the name of the Holy Spirit, if the term "Holy Spirit" is not?

You see the difficulty with me in both cases is the same. Can you spare the time to give me your views by way of extricating me from it? If you can, you will confer a favour on one who is desirous to know exactly what the Holy Spirit teaches; and much oblige your brother in the gospel,

J. D. BURCH.

Forest Hill, Miss., July 17, 1851.

"THE LORD JESUS."

To be baptised "in the name of the Lord Jesus," is the same thing as to be baptised "into the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit," because it requires the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, for the manifestation of Adoni-Yehovshua, vernacularly styled "the Lord Jesus." Jesus is the Greek form of the name bestowed on the Son by the Father. The Father’s messenger said to Mary, "Thou shalt call his name Yehovshua;" or, in the contract form, Yehoshua, and Yoshua, or Joshua. The termination shua signifies powerful. "Thou shalt call his name Yehov, Jove, Yo, or Jah, (all different forms of the same word,) I shall be powerful, or I shall be the powerful;" and the reason given is, "for he shall save his people from their sins." It requires one that is powerful to effect such a salvation as this; for no less is implied in the salvation than grafting the whole twelve tribes into their own olive as a righteous nation, the overthrow of all their enemies, and the resurrection of the righteous dead.

Lord I-shall-be-the-powerful is the Father manifested through the Son by the Holy Spirit. The Son is the medium of the Father’s manifestation by the Spirit; hence all the doctrine and wonderful works were the Father’s, uttered and performed by the Spirit. Till the birth of the "body prepared" of Mary’s substance, the fleshly medium did not exist—there was no God-manifestation through the flesh, nor even then till the baptismal anointing of that body. Hitherto it was God dwelling in unapproachable light, embosoming the Spirit. But when God manifested himself as a Father, his Spirit, speaking by the Son-Flesh, could say, "Glorify thou me with thine own self, with the glory which I had with thee before the world was." When the prepared body lay in the tomb, the God-manifestation ceased; but when the Spirit of God filled it again, it was on that day begotten as "the Son of God with power according to the holy spiritual nature;" and in relation to the terrestrial system, the preeminent medium of God-manifestation for ever.

Introduction into the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, is coetaneous. A believer of the one gospel cannot be introduced first into the name of the Father, next into the name of the Son, and then into the name of the Holy Spirit; neither can he get into the first and last without getting into the name of the Son: but if he be introduced by the baptismal formula, he is by the one immersion in the name of the Lord Jesus, and then also in the Father and the Holy Spirit, Jesus being the incarnation of them both.

The "gift of the Holy Spirit" was ability to do what could not be done until energised by the Spirit. The Spirit was not given until Jesus was glorified; yet there were genuinely-converted men before his glorification, and such as are rarely met with in or out of churches in our day. The Spirit was given to already-converted men, not for their own special or private advantage, but for the benefit of others, or "the profit of all." They first believed the gospel of the kingdom, were then immersed, being in the name of the Lord Jesus as the result of the operation, and then made the recipients of the Spirit by the imposition of apostolic hands and prayer.

It was "in the name of Adoni-Yehovshua" that Peter commanded the three thousand believers of the gospel of the kingdom to repent and be baptised. Suppose that one or more in five minutes after the command had been immersed into the name of the God-manifestation, during that five minutes their knowledge, faith, feeling, and disposition remaining the same as at the instant the command was given—during this period they were the subjects neither of repentance nor baptism IN the name: but the moment they were immersed into the name of the God-manifestation their new position is reckoned as repentance and baptism in the name, because they are then "in Christ," and for the first time. There is no gospel repentance nor any baptism, any more than any immortality, out of Christ. A man may believe the one only true gospel of the kingdom, and have the disposition and heart of Abraham himself; still, so long as he has not been immersed into the God-manifestation he is not in the name of Adoni-Yehov-shua; and not being in the name of Jesus, his faith is not yet counted to him for righteousness, nor his oneness of mind and heart with God for repentance. Hence the reason why believers in the kingdom, whose hearts have been purified by faith working by love, are commanded to "repent and be baptised in the name of the Lord Jesus"—all the present blessings of the gospel are imparted in the obeying of the truth of God, and to the obedient only, as they will find when they meet the Lord Jesus face to face.

Observe: → It is only believers of the things of the kingdom of God and of the name of Jesus Christ with a true heart, who are commanded to repent and be baptised in the name of the Lord Jesus. It is a moral impossibility for any others to obey the command; for none can obey the truth who are ignorant of it, or do not believe it—none can repent in the name who have not previously the divine oneness of mind which results from the truth believed.

A word upon Yehowah, commonly written Jehovah, and very incorrectly rendered Lord in the English version. It signifies, I shall be; and is compounded of the three parts of the verb hahyah, to be; the ah from the future, y’hi, he shall be; the ho, from the present participle, howeh, he is; and the ahh, from the preterite hahyah, he was. Hence, when the compound word is appropriated as a name of God, or conferred by him upon his Son, it imports that the Name-bearer is one who was, and is, and shall be, the Shua, or Powerful. So that to be in the name of the Name-Bearer is to be in the Father and his Holy Spirit. But I shall treat of this more in detail hereafter. What has been said will, I hope, help our correspondent out of his difficulty.

EDITOR.

March 29, 1854.

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