in your hearts by faith;” more correctly rendered, “the faith” or the gospel.  How does the Spirit dwell in us?  In Gal. 3:2, Paul asks the Galatians:  “Received ye the Spirit by the works of the law, or by the hearing of the faith?”—­or the gospel.  The above Scriptures clearly teach that when the words, thoughts and Spirit of God are controlling in our lives, God dwells in us; that when the gospel controls us, Christ dwells in us; that when we receive the gospel by the hearing of faith, the Spirit dwells in us.

Now, what reason has any man for declaring that the Spirit dwells in us in any other way, unless he can point to an explicit declaration of God’s word defining and explaining that other way?  This can not be done, for there is no such passage.  “But,” says one, “I do not have to depend upon the Word.  I know it by my own consciousness.”  It is a principle as old as metaphysics that consciousness does not take cognizance of causes, but of effects.  You may be conscious of an effect within you, but you can not be conscious of the cause that produced the effect.  Suppose you are lying asleep on the ground; you are suddenly awakened by a severe pain in your lower limb; consciousness tells you that you are suffering pain, but it does not tell you what produced that pain.  This must be decided by reason or faith.  If you find a thorn in the grass where your limb was resting, reason says the thorn stuck you; if you find a bumblebee mashed in the grass, reason will say the insect stung you; or, if some one near you says a boy with a pin in his hand ran away from you, faith will say the boy stuck you.  But in either case it was reason or faith that decided the cause of your pain.  Now, when a man says, “I am conscious of the presence of the Holy Spirit within me,” he simply means, “I am conscious of a feeling within me which I have been taught was caused by the Holy Spirit.”  If the man has been taught wrong, he assigns a wrong cause for the feeling.  What is the feeling usually assigned for the presence of the Holy Spirit’s personal indwelling?  It is a feeling of joy, peace and love.  But can not such feeling be excited by other causes?  We know there are dozens of causes that will produce such feelings.  In the absence of clear testimony, what right has any one to attribute such feeling to the personal presence of the Holy Spirit?  A man is found murdered.  The testimony shows that any one of a dozen men could have killed him.  Is there an intelligent jury in the land that would convict any one of the men of being the murderer?  What would you think of a jury that would render such a verdict?