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The Fundamentals.
the reader is unwilling to accept and you are refusing to lis ten. Perhaps you are treating that truth, which in the bottom of your heart you know to be true, with contempt, speaking 'scornfully of it. If so, you are not merely treating abstract truth with contempt, you are scorning and insulting a Person, a divine Person. LYING TO THE HOLY SPIRIT. In Acts 5 :3, we read, “But Peter said, Ananias, why hath Satan filled thine heart to lie to the Holy Ghost, and to keep back part of the price of the land?” Here we are taught that the Holy Spirit can be lied to. You cannot tell lies to a blind, impersonal influence or power, only to a person. Not every lie is a lie to the Holy Spirit. It was a peculiar kind of lie that Ananias told. From the context we see that Ananias was making a profession of an entire consecration of everything. (See ch. 4:36 to 5 :11.) As Barnabas had laid all at the apos tles’ feet for the use of Christ and His cause, so Ananias pre tended to do the same, but in reality he kept back part; the pretended full consecration was only partial. Real consecra tion is under the guidance of the Holy Spirit. The profession of full consecration was to Him and the profession was false. Ananias lied to the Holy Spirit. How often in our consecra tion meetings today we profess a full consecration, when in reality there is something that we have held back. In doing this, we lie to the Holy Spirit. BLASPHEMY AGAINST THE HOLY SPIRIT. In Matt. 12:31, 32, we read, “Wherefore I say unto you, All manner of sin and blasphemy shall be forgiven unto men: but the blasphemy against the Holy Ghost shall not be for given unto men. And whosoever speaketh a word against the Son of man, it shall be forgiven him; but whosoever speaketh against the Holy Ghost, it shall not be forgiven him, neither in this world, neither in the world to come.” Here we are
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