In the last day, that great day of the feast, Jesus stood and cried, saying. If any man thirst, let him come unto me, and drink. (38) He that believeth on me, as the scripture hath said, out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water. (39) (But this spake he of the Spirit, which they that believe on him should receive: for the Holy Ghost was not yet given; because that Jesus was not yet glorified.) (40) Many of the people therefore, when they heard this saying, said, of a truth this is the Prophet. (41) Others said, This is the Christ, but some said, Shall Christ come out of Galilee? (42) Hath not the Scripture said, That Christ cometh of the seed of David, and out of the town of Bethlehem, where David was? (43) So there was a division among the people because of him. (44) And some of them would have taken him: but no man laid hands on him.
I would beg to pause over this short but powerful sermon of Jesus, on the last day of the feast. The Lord knew that all his public ministry was now closing, He stood therefore and cried. Reader! I pray you to turn to Proverbs 8:1 to the end. Isaiah 55:1-4; Revelation 3:20. And let it not be forgotten, that as Christ ended his public preaching with this cry, so did the Holy Ghost close the sacred canon of scripture with words to the same effect. Revelation 22:16-17
I leave the Reader to form his own conclusions as to the result of such powerful preaching on the minds of the people. We read indeed of the different effects. Some were overawed, like the buyers and sellers in the temple, for the moment, and said, of a truth this is the Prophet. Others, hardened, still contended that it could nor be. And some, more daring than the rest, would have seized Christ? Reader! pause and contemplate the awful state of Adam-nature by the fall. Though Jesus sweetly gave the gracious invitation to the thirsty soul, yet we read of none that thirsted.
The observation of the Evangelist, which is inclosed within a parenthesis at John 7:39, is worthy our closest regard. How blessed is it to have our Lord's words so fully explained, in reference to the Holy Ghost. And how doubly blessed when kindred souls are made sensible of that influence, in their own experience? I beg the Reader to observe in this verse the word given, that it is in Italics, meaning that it is not in the original. And I would desire, with all due respect to the labors of our most able translators, to substitute for it rather the word come: for the Holy Ghost was not indeed yet come in all that plenitude of power, in which he was to come after Christ's return to glory; but God the Spirit had always been in his Church, and manifesting grace to his people in all ages. The spirit of Christ, saith Peter, was in the Prophets, when testifying beforehand of the sufferings of Christ, and the glory which should follow. 1 Peter 1:11. And every child of God under the Old Testament dispensation, as well as under the New, are alike partakers in his quickening, regenerating, and renewing mercy. Nehemiah 9:20. But, when it is said that the Holy Ghost was not yet given, or come, it is meant in respect to that more open display of his Almighty power, which was reserved for the latter day glory, when those promises were to be eminently fulfilled. Isaiah 44:3-5; Joel 2:28; Acts 2:1, etc. The kingdom of grace, in the ordination of the Apostles and first preachers of the Gospel, was to be introduced, with visible marks of the personality and Godhead of the Holy Ghost, as the Almighty and Sovereign Minister in the Church of God. See John 14:1 and Commentary.