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NASB | John 20:22 And when He had said this, He breathed on them and *said to them, "Receive the Holy Spirit. |
AMPLIFIED 2015 | John 20:22 And when He said this, He breathed on them and said to them, "Receive the Holy Spirit. [Acts 1:8; 2:1-3] |
Subject: Retain or forgive sins? |
Bible Note: Ma'am, though I know Kay Arthur personally, and have a number of her books -- even autographed. I have no signed book by Charles Haddon Spurgeon. But I can honestly say that I know Charles Spurgeon even better. I've read the full set of his sermons, plus the many issues of his magazine, the Sword and the Trowel. I've studied his small revisions to the 1689 London Baptist Confession of Faith -- what he called, "the most excellent epitome of the things most surely believed among us." Spurgeon was a Historic Baptist, moving away from the Baptist Union on these very grounds. Amazing that people still attempt to place him in the camp to which he was so much opposed, the very camp of those who attacked, ridiculed, belittled, and demeaned him. "I suppose there are some persons whose minds naturally incline towards the doctrine of free-will [what we now call decisional regeneration]. I can only say that mine inclines as naturally towards the doctrines of sovereign grace. Sometimes, when I see some of the worst characters in the street, I feel as if my heart must burst forth in tears of gratitude that God has never let me act as they have done! I have thought, if God had left me alone, and had not touched me by His grace, what a great sinner I should have been! I should have run to the utmost lengths of sin, dived into the very depths of evil, nor should I have stopped at any vice or folly, if God had not restrained me. I feel that I should have been a very king of sinners, if God had let me alone. I cannot understand the reason why I am saved, except upon the ground that God would have it so. I cannot, if I look ever so earnestly, discover any kind of reason in myself why I should be a partaker of Divine grace. If I am not at this moment without Christ, it is only because Christ Jesus would have His will with me, and that will was that I should be with Him where He is, and should share His glory. I can put the crown nowhere but upon the head of Him whose mighty grace has saved me from going down into the pit." --Charles Spurgeon He's dead, ma'am... let's not make poor Spurgeon an accomplice to stealing the crown. |