Understanding The Holy Spirit
Word-Of-The-Day: ‘<Jesus said to His Apostles,> “But the Advocate, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you all things and will remind you of everything I have said to you.”’ (John 14:26); ‘(19) Do you not know that your bodies are temples of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have received from God? You are not your own; (20) you were bought at a price. Therefore, honor God with your bodies.’ (1 Corinthians 6:19-20)
In our Bible Study during Life Group yesterday, we got into a great discussion about the Holy Spirit. It is the least discussed portion of the Trinity; we know the three parts or persons of God are 1) God the Creator (the Father), 2) God Manifested (Jesus the Son), and 3) God Indwelled (the Holy Spirit), but we talk about and pray to the Father and to Jesus and go over their attributes and activities but seldom do we get into the Holy Spirit. The items below are to provide the ‘starting point’ of understanding the Holy Spirit, but to truly comprehend them requires one to build a deepening relationship with Him to fully know what the Holy Spirit can do for you.
All three persons of God have been present since before Creation, as we know God in Genesis 1:1 existed before He created us and the universe we live in. God the Creator is the source of the Trinity’s power, with no boundaries or limitations – so powerful that His presence, even without seeing God the Creator Himself, can kill instantly a person who is unprepared or unclean. (Pity the High Priest who entered the Most Holy Place in the Temple to face the Ark, who perhaps didn’t spiritually prepare himself completely – evidently this is why they wore bells and had a pull rope on the ankle so their body could be recovered.)
Moses was only allowed to see a small portion of God once, and his repeated visits with God caused his face to radiate like a bright lamp. It is unfathomable but God the Creator knows all things all at once – the past, present, and future – and is in each of these periods at the same time. He is the one who made the universe, the earth, and all realms from heaven to hell and in between. Though all three parts are equal the role of leader in the hierarchy of the three is God the Creator, with Jesus as the second in line, and the Holy Spirit supporting both.
We know Jesus (God Manifested) was often with man before His earthly birth in several accounts; he walked in the Garden of Eden with Adam and Eve, He may have wrestled Jacob, and He was with Joshua leading the angelic army in Joshua 5. Jesus was also in the furnace with the ‘Pep Boys’ (Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego) and kept them safe from the fires. Of course, the Gospels (Matthew, Mark, Luke and John) and the first chapter of Acts we know Jesus also walked among us during his 33 years (the last three the documented portion of His ministry).
God the Creator provides the power Jesus (God Manifested) has to be the ruler over all of the realms God has created, and is the ‘implementer’ of God the Creator’s plans for them and for us. If we think of it as a business, God the Creator is the Chief Executive Officer, having the plans and the directions made, with God Manifested (Jesus) as the Chief Operating Officer fulfilling those plans and directions through the perfect execution of what God has laid out.
Like the Father and Jesus, we know the Holy Spirit was also present before Genesis 1:1; and His first Biblical appearance is in Genesis 1:2, as the Spirit flew above the waters of the Earth before there was even light. The Holy Spirit (God Indwelled) often did indwell many people in the Old Testament and was likely ‘sealed’ inside the prophets, such as Isaiah, Ezekiel, Samuel, Nathan and Elijah, or those who strongly kept their Faith and devotion for God.
It is likely David also had the Holy Spirit as well indwelled and sealed in him, as we today do. This sealed indwelling, though, was not promised until Jesus pronounced it before the end of His ministry at His Ascension in Acts 1. In the Old Testament, the Holy Spirit could ‘come and go’ from people; in 1 Samuel 16 the Holy Spirit departed Saul to allow an evil presence to come over Saul, which had him turn away from God’s will.
The ‘seal’ to bind the Holy Spirit to the Faithful did not come until the ‘baptism by fire’ (foretold by John the Baptist) at Pentecost in Acts 2. This ‘seal’ binds the Holy Spirit to those who have accepted and pronounced without reservation Jesus as their Lord and have repudiated their sinful nature. As with the prophets and with others such as David and Saul, the Holy Spirit’s purpose is to first protect us from evil indwelling within us. One can think of our bodies as a home; if it is fully occupied by the Holy Spirit, an evil entity can try to enter but the Holy Spirit, armed by God the Creator’s omnipotent power, will repel the evil spirit away – a Spiritual ‘Castle Doctrine’ enforced.
This does not mean an evil spirit cannot hang outside the premises; Paul spoke of the ‘thorn in his flesh’ being an evil entity of Satan, to torment and perhaps tempt him in 2 Corinthians 12:7, but Jesus, through the Holy Spirit told Paul (after three requests to remove it) that God’s Grace was sufficient to live with it. Like Job, Paul’s Faith in adversity advertised the strength of the Lord’s power to overcome such evil.
The Holy Spirit is also sealed within to provide us a permanent ‘guidance counselor’ for our Spiritual affairs. The Spirit identifies our gifts or best attributes we can use to become a functional and beneficial component of the ‘Body’ of the Church, and can enhance and grow those gifts, not only for our benefit but for the benefit of the body as a whole. While we still have free will, and can make mistakes in our physical lives as part of the secular, unclean world we live in (remember, those evil spirits may not dwell in us but they are hanging out outside in our yard).
The Spirit convicts us or provides the ‘2×4 to the head’ when we make a mistake, to let us know our action or reaction to a given situation was wrong and provides us guidance to correct the situation and to place safeguards for us not to make that mistake again. He also provides us Spiritual strength to overcome evil when it makes it presence known so we can resist.
We can also communicate to Jesus, who is our intermediary or intercessory to God the Creator, through the Holy Spirit, and vice versa. When a situation arises in front of us that we may not be able to respond to, the Holy Spirit provides us with what we need. One example is when I prepare a Bible Study lesson and I’m just not grasping how to talk about the concepts the Word wants conveyed; the Holy Spirit gives the words Jesus wants spoken. As mentioned, the Holy Spirit supports Jesus and thus also supports God the Creator. The Spirit, if we are in tune and listening to Him, can guide us to make sound, Righteous decisions, and to Righteously talk to others, even in non-Spiritual matters as Holy Spirit allows us to be reflections of Jesus.
Finally, it is the Holy Spirit that will ‘seal the deal’ when it comes to Salvation. Our personal free will decides for us whether we will follow that inane sense inside each of us to follow Jesus or not. The Believer, with the Holy Spirit, shares their belief with others (through the Gospel message in obedience with the Great Commission) but only the individual can decide whether to follow Jesus and inherit the gifts God the Creator provides for His children.
When an individual accepts Jesus as their Lord, the Holy Spirit is a gift from Jesus – a gift that keeps on giving, to be that Counselor, Guide, Messenger, and Protector. We could never be saved by our own selves, but the Holy Spirit, the gift from Jesus for our Faithfulness, provides us the rope that ties us to our Savior.
