We have seen in former sermons that, in the previous context, the Apostle traces Christian hope to two sources:  one, the series of experiences which follow ‘being justified by faith’ and the other, those which follow on trouble rightly borne.  Those two golden chains together hold up the precious jewel of hope.  But a chain that is to bear a weight must have a staple, or it will fall to the ground.  And so Paul here turns to yet another thought, and, going behind both our inward experiences and our outward discipline, falls back on that which precedes all.  After all is said and done, the love of God, eternal, self-originated, the source of all Christian experiences because of the work of Christ which originates them all, is the root fact of the universe, and the guarantee that our highest anticipations and desires are not unsubstantial visions, but morning dreams, which are proverbially sure to be fulfilled.  God is love; therefore the man who trusts Him shall not be put to shame.

But you will notice that here the Apostle not only adduces the love of God as the staple, so to speak, from which these golden chains hang, but that he traces the heart’s being suffused with that love to its source, and as, of course, is always the case in the order of analysis, that which was last in time comes first in statement.  We begin at the surface, and go down and down and down from effect to cause, and yet again to the cause of that cause which is itself effect.  We strip off, as it were, layer after layer, until we get to the living centre—­hope comes from the love, the love comes from the Spirit in the heart.  And so to get at the order of time and of manifestation, we must reverse the order of analysis in my text, and begin where it ends.  So we have here three things—­the Spirit given, the love shed abroad by that Spirit, and the hope established by that love.  Now just look at them for a moment.

I. The Spirit given.

Now, the first point to notice here is that the Revised Version presents the meaning of our text more accurately than the Authorised Version, because, instead of reading ‘is given,’ it correctly reads ‘was given.’  And any of you that can consult the original will see that the form of the language implies that the Apostle is thinking, not so much of a continuous bestowment, as of a definite moment when this great gift was bestowed upon the man to whom he is speaking.

So the first question is, when was that Spirit given to these Roman Christians?  The Christian Church has been split in two by its answers to that question.  One influential part, which has taken a new lease of life amongst us to-day, says ‘in baptism,’ and the other says ’at the moment of faith.’  I am not going to be tempted into controversial paths now, for my purpose is a very different one, but I cannot help just a word about the former of these two answers.  ’Given in baptism,’ say our friends, and I venture to think that they thereby