The following is in response to David W., and his letter:Taken from: The Root of the Righteous, Pages 34-37"It may Shock some readers to suggest that there is a difference between being Bible taught and being Spirit taught. Nevertheless it is so.It is altogether possible to be instructed in the rudiments of the faith and still have no real understanding of the whole thing. And it is possible to go on to become an expert in Bible doctrine and not have spiritual illumination, with a result that a veil remains over the mind, preventing it from apprehending the truth in its spiritual essence.Most of us are acquainted with churches that teach the Bible to their children from the tenderest years, give them long instruction in the catechism, drill them further in pastor's classes, and still never produce in them a living Christianity nor a virile godliness. Their members show no evidence of having passed from death unto life. None of the earmarks of salvation so plainly indicated in scriptures are found among them. Their religious lives are correct and reasonably moral, but wholly mechanical, and altogether lacking in radiance. They wear their faith as persons in mourning once wore black arm bands to show their love and respect for the departed.Such persons cannot be dismissed as hypocrites. Many of them are pathetically serious about it all. They are simply blind. From lack of the vital Spirit they are forced to get along with the outward shell of faith, while all the time their deep hearts are starving for spiritual reality and they do not know what is wrong with them.....The Most familiar saying probably is, " The Scriptures, to be understood, must be read with the same Spirit that originally inspired them." No one denies this, but even such a statement will go over the heads of those who hear it unless the Holy Spirit inflames the heart.The charge often made against us by Liberals, that we are 'bibliolaters', is probably not true in the same sense as meant by our detractors; but candor and self analysis will force us to admit that there is often too much truth in their charge. Among religious persons of unquestioned orthodoxy there is sometimes found a dull dependence upon the letter of the text without the faintest understanding of its spirit. That Truth is in its essence spiritual must constantly be kept before our minds if we would know the truth indeed. Jesus Christ is Himself the Truth, and he cannot be confined to mere words even though, as we ardently believe, He has Himself inspired the words. That which is spiritual cannot be shut in by ink or fenced in by type and paper. The best books can do is to give us the letter of truth. If we ever receive more than this, it must be by the Holy Spirit who gives it.The great need of the hour among persons spiritually hungry is twofold: First, to know the Scriptures, apart from which no saving truth will be vouchsafed (Granted or disclosed) by our Lord; the Second, to be enlightened by the Spirit, apart from whom the Scriptures will not be understood."5 What then is Apollos? What is Paul? Servants through whom you believed, as the Lord assigned to each. 6 I planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the growth. 7 So neither he who plants nor he who waters is anything, but only God who gives the growth. 8 He who plants and he who waters are one, and each will receive his wages according to his labor. 9 For we are God's fellow workers. You are God's field, God's building. (1 Cor. 3)I write those verses there, because so many in the churches have the seed planted, but no pastors are watering that seed because they have no water to give themselves. God is alive, His Word is Alive, and until we see this, The Gospel is merely a seed in the ground. To those who have a deep desire to bring souls to Christ, Go into the churches and water the field. A seed is dead until it gets watered. The Holy Spirit is the water which will quench that thirst for life.37 On the last day of the feast, the great day, Jesus stood up and cried out, “If anyone thirsts, let him come to me and drink. 38 Whoever believes in me, as the Scripture has said, ‘Out of his heart will flow rivers of living water.’” 39 Now this he said about the Spirit, whom those who believed in him were to receive, for as yet the Spirit had not been given, because Jesus was not yet glorified. (John 7:37-39)Jesus spoke these words on the seventh day of the feast of Booths(tabernacles), when the priests would go down to the pool at Siloam and bring water to the alter. We are the temple, and that water now flows through us. Read Ezekiel 47:1-9, Isaiah 55:1, Zechariah 13:1.God Bless.