The Enlightenment of the Holy Spirit

Our foremost teacher is the Holy Spirit. “Hermeneutics” is the technical name given to the science of interpreting Scripture, and it should be obvious that a truly biblical hermeneutic will be consistent with the nature of the Bible itself. If, then, the biblical authors spoke from God, not on their own impulse but as they were moved by the Holy Spirit (2 Pet. 1:21), it is the Holy Spirit who can interpret what he caused them to speak. The best interpreter of every book is its author, since he alone knows what he intended to say. So God’s book can be interpreted by God’s Spirit alone.

The work of the Holy Spirit in communicating God’s truth to man is now seen to have two stages. The first and objective stage is “revelation,” the disclosure of the truth in Scripture. The second and subjective stage may be called “illumination,” the enlightenment of our minds to comprehend the truth disclosed in Scripture. Each process is indispensable. Without revelation we have no truth to perceive; without illumination no faculty with which to perceive it.

An illustration comes from the days of Isaiah when, in judgment upon his rebellious people, God ceased to speak to them. His truth became like a sealed book, and his people like illiterate children. There were thus two barriers to their receiving his word:

If you give the scroll to someone who can read, and say to him, “Read this, please,” he will answer, “I can’t; it is sealed.” Or if you give the scroll to someone who cannot read, and say, “Read this, please,” he will answer, “I don’t know how to read.” (Isa. 29:11–12)

Once we grant the necessity of the Holy Spirit’s illumination before we can understand God’s Word, we are ready to consider the kind of people the Holy Spirit enlightens.

First, the Holy Spirit enlightens the regenerate, or born-again, person. An experience of rebirth is essential before we are able to grasp heavenly truth. “No one can see the kingdom of God unless he is born again,” Jesus said (John 3:3). This fact the apostle Paul echoed:

The man without the Spirit [the “natural” or “unregenerate” man] does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him and he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually discerned. (1 Cor. 2:14)

Many have borne witness to this out of their own experience. For example, William Grimshaw, one of the leading English evangelicals in the eighteenth century, said to a friend after his conversion that “if God had drawn up his Bible to heaven, and sent him down another, it would not have been newer to him.”¹

I can myself testify to something very similar. My mother brought me up to read a passage of the Bible every day. For her sake and out of habit I continued the practice until my late teens. But it was a largely meaningless routine, for I did not understand what I was reading. After my conversion, however, the Bible immediately began to become a living book to me. I am not of course claiming that I suddenly understood it all. Nor do I pretend that I no longer found some of it dull and difficult. But it assumed a new relevance for me, as the Holy Spirit illumined and applied its message to my life.

Secondly, the Holy Spirit enlightens the humble. There is no greater hindrance to understanding than pride, and no more essential condition than humility. Jesus put the matter beyond dispute:

I praise you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because you have hidden these things from the wise and learned, and revealed them to little children. Yes, Father, for this was your good pleasure. (Matt. 11:25–26)

The “wise and learned” from whom God hides himself are the intellectually proud, and “little children” the humble and sincere. It is not the ignorance or even the simplicity of a child which Jesus commended, but its open, receptive and unprejudiced approach. It is to such only that God reveals himself. As Charles Simeon wrote:

In the beginning of my enquiries I said to myself, I am a fool; of that I am quite certain. One thing I know assuredly, that in religion of myself I know nothing. I do not therefore sit down to the perusal of Scripture in order to impose a sense on the inspired writers; but to receive one, as they give it me. I pretend not to teach them, I wish like a child to be taught by them.²

There is only one way to express such an attitude of humble expectancy before God, and that is by prayer. We need both to pray before we read Scripture and to read it in a prayerful frame of mind, and many Christians have found it helpful to use some of the Bible’s own prayers for illumination. For example, the psalmist’s petition:

Open my eyes that I may see wonderful things in your law. (Ps. 119:18)

Or one of Paul’s great prayers, in all of which he asks in some way for an increase of knowledge or understanding. For example:

That the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the glorious Father, may give you the Spirit of wisdom and revelation, so that you may know him better. I pray also that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened in order that you may know the hope to which he has called you, the riches of his glorious inheritance in the saints, and his incomparably great power for us who believe. (Eph. 1:17–19)

Such a humbling of ourselves before God, acknowledging our darkness and appealing for his enlightenment, will not go unrewarded. Not long after his conversion at Pembroke College, Oxford, George Whitefield wrote in his journal:

I began to read the Holy Scriptures upon my knees, laying aside all other books, and praying over, if possible, every line and word. This proved meat indeed and drink indeed to my soul. I daily received fresh life, light and power from above.³

Thirdly, the Holy Spirit enlightens the obedient. This is much emphasized. Since God’s purpose through Scripture is not merely to “instruct” in general terms but specifically “to make you wise for salvation” (2 Tim. 3:15), he is concerned about the response which readers give to his Word. And the degree of our responsiveness, of our willingness to hear and obey, will to a large extent determine the degree of understanding we receive. Thus Jesus promised that those who have a will to do God’s will would know whether his teaching was true, and that he would show himself personally to those who proved their love for him by their obedience (John 7:17; 14:21). Conversely, it is those who violate their conscience by disobedience who make shipwreck of their faith (1 Tim. 1:19). Nobody who does not practice what he already knows can expect to advance in his knowledge.

Fourthly, the Holy Spirit enlightens the communicative. The understanding he gives us is not intended for our private enjoyment alone; it is given us to be shared with others. We hold it on trust. A lamp is not brought into a room to be put under a bed, Jesus said, but on a stand. In the same way he intended his teaching to be made known, not to be kept secret. The apostles were to take heed what and how they heard. They were to listen to their Master’s teaching, in order to communicate it. Otherwise, they would not receive any more:

With the measure you use, it will be measured to you—and even more. (Mark 4:21–25)

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