The Vital Operations of the Holy Ghost
"Wilt Thou shew wonders to the dead? shall the dead arise and praise Thee? Shall Thy loving-kindness be declared in the grave, or Thy faith-fulness in destruction?" -Psalm 88:10, 11 [KJV] This is not the language of a soul dead in trespasses and sins, but it is the breathing of a living soul struggling and grappling with death. What a difference there is, where there is life working in and under death, and where death reigns absolutely! between the quickened soul and that in which there is nothing but death, death without one spark of spiritual life, death without one ray of heavenly teaching. There is no groan, no sigh, no lamentation, no piteous inquiry, no pouring out of the heart before God, where the soul is utterly dead, any more than there is life and breath in a corpse in the tomb. But wherever life is implanted in the soul from the Fountain of life, that life groans under death. It sighs from out of the grave; it gasps for breath, under the corpse which overlies i