In the first place, it is the Holy Spirit who seals the Word.
This has reference to the “testimonium Spiritus Sancti,” of which our fathers
used to speak and by which they understood the operation whereby He creates in
the hearts of believers the firm and lasting conviction concerning the divine
and absolute authority of the Word of God . . . Of all clericalism, that of the
intellectual stamp if the most unbearable; for one is always silenced with the
remark, “You don’t know Greek,” or, “You don’t read Hebrews”; while the child
of God feels irresistibly that in the matters that concern eternity,
Greek and Hebrew can not have the last word. And this apart from the fact that
to a number of these scholars Professor Cobet might say in turn: “Dear sir, do
you still know Greek yourself?” Of the shallow knowledge of Hebrew in the
largest number of cases, it is better not to speak.
No, in that way we never get there. To make the divine authority of the
Holy Scripture real to us, we need not a human but a divine testimony,
equally convincing to the simplest and to the most learned—a testimony that
must not be cast as pearls before swine, but be limited to those who can gather
from its noblest fruit viz., to them that are born again.
And this testimony is not derived from the Pope and his priests, nor
from the theological faculty with its ministers, but comes with the sealing from
the Holy Spirit alone. Hence it is a divine testimony, and as such stops
all contradiction, and silences all doubt. It is a testimony the same to all,
belonging to the peasant in the field and to the theologian in his study. Finally,
it is a testimony which they alone receive who have open eyes, so that they can
see spiritually.
However, this testimony does not work by magic. It does not cause the
confused mind of unbelief suddenly to cry out: “Surely the Scripture is the
Word of God!” if this were the case, the way enthusiasts would be open, and our
salvation would depend again upon a pretended spiritual insight. No, the
testimony of the Holy Spirit works in an entirely different way. He begins to
bring us into contact with the Word, either by our own reading or by the
communication of others. Then He shows us the picture of the sinner according
to the Scripture, and the salvation which mercifully saved him; and lastly, He
makes us hear the song of praise upon his lips. And after we have seen this
objectively, with the eye of the understanding, He then so works upon
our feeling that we begin to see ourselves in that sinner, and to feel
that the truth of the Scripture directly concerns us. Finally, He takes
hold of the will, causing the very power seen in the Scripture to work in us.
And when thus the whole man, mind, heart, and will, has experienced the power
of the Word, then He adds to this the comprehensive operation of assurance,
whereby the Holy Scripture in divine splendor commences to scintillate before our
eyes. (Abraham Kuyper, The Work of the Holy Spirit [trans. Henry De Vries;
Grand Rapids, Mich.: Eerdmans, 1975], 190, 192-3, italics in original)
