The Holy Spirit!

Spurgeon, “Make this Valley Full of Ditches”  We must have the Holy Spirit's power and presence, otherwise our religion will become a mockery before God, and a misery to ourselves. We must have the aid of the Holy Spirit, for ours is not a mechanical religion. It is spiritual, and must be sustained by spiritual means. So dependent is the Christian church upon the Holy Spirit, that there never was an acceptable sigh heaved by a penitent apart from him; never did holy song mount to heaven except he gave it wings; never was there true prayer or faithful ministry except through the power and might of the Holy Spirit. Sinners are never saved apart from the Spirit of God! No moral persuasion, no force of example, no power of logic, no might of rhetoric, can ever change the heart. The living Spirit alone can put life into dead souls! And after those souls are quickened, we are still as dependent as ever upon the Spirit of God. To educate a soul for heaven is as much a divine task, as to emancipate a soul from sin. To comfort a downcast brother, to strengthen his weak hands and confirm his feeble knees, to brighten the eyes of his hope and to give him nerve to hold the shield of his faith- all these are the work of the Spirit of the living God. O Christian, with all the power you have received, you have not strength enough to live for another second, except as the Spirit of God quicken you. All your past experience, all that you have learned and acquired, must go for nothing, except, daily and perpetually, moment by moment, the Spirit of God shall dwell in you, and work in you mightily, to keep you still a pilgrim to the gate of heaven. Thus, each individual is dependent, and the whole church is dependent on the influence of the Spirit. Without the Spirit of God, we are like a ship stranded on the beach when the tide has receded- there is no moving her until the flood shall once again lift her from the sands. Until the Spirit of God shall thaw the chilly coldness of our natural estate, and bid the life-floods of our heart flow forth, there we must be- cold, cheerless, lifeless, and powerless. The Christian, like the mariner, depends upon the breath of heaven, or his barque is without motion. There is no truth that needs to be insisted upon more thoroughly than this, "Without me, you can do nothing." Until we are utterly empty of self, we are not ready to be filled by God. Until we are conscious of our own weakness, we are not fit platforms for the display of divine omnipotence. Until the arm of flesh is paralyzed, and death is written upon the whole natural man, we are not ready to be endowed with divine life and energy.