Who is the Holy Spirit? What does He do? What does the Holy Spirit have to do with me and my relationship with God? These are all great questions that need to be answered and understood by all Christians.
The Holy Spirit is known by several different names in Scripture such as the Helper, the Comforter, the Holy Ghost, and the Spirit of God. The Holy Spirit is the 3rd person of the Divine Trinity: “God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit. Some have described the Trinity by saying that God is 3-in-1. Although it is impossible for us as finite humans to completely understand the Trinity, the Bible clearly shows that there are 3 Persons who are distinctly different and yet all are equally God.
Most attempts that I have heard to explain the Trinity just leave me more confused. It is kind of like trying to describe and understand eternity and the fact that God has always been and will always be. Our minds just cannot grasp the concept! However, there are several illustrations that may help us to get a picture of what the Holy Trinity is like.
Some have said that the Trinity is like an egg, which has 3 distinct parts (yolk, white and shell), but all are part of one egg. Others have described the Trinity like water. Water has 3 forms (solid, liquid and vapor), but no matter which form it takes, water is still water. In a lesser sense, the Trinity could be likened to marriage, where 2 individual people come together and through God’s design become one in ways that again we cannot completely understand (Mark 10:7-9).
While these illustrations may begin to help us understand the concept of the Trinity, the best way to explain the trinity and the work of the Holy Spirit is to look at the Scriptures which teach us about this great Truth.
The Work of the Holy Spirit in Scripture
First of all, we see the Holy Trinity and the Spirit of God at the very beginning of creation. Gen. 1:1-3 shows us God the Creator and Father, God the Holy Spirit, and God the Son (Jesus) revealed as the Word of God. (Gen. 1:1-3) (John 1:1-3)
We see the work of the Holy Spirit throughout the Old Testament in the lives of the Judges, Kings, Prophets, and even craftsmen and artisans. Time after time throughout the Old Testament we are told that the Spirit would come upon a person in order to give them power to fulfill a specific task. However, this empowering was always temporary in the Old Testament. The language used is always something to the effect that the Spirit “came upon” (Samson, Moses, etc…) rather than “being filled” with the Holy Spirit like we see happening in the New Testament (we will examine this indwelling more closely next time).
Many of the books of the NT begin with a reference to the Trinity. For instance, (1 Peter 1:2) and (Revelation 1:4-5)
Some people, especially those of Jewish, Muslim or Jehovah’s Witness belief will say that we believe in 3 gods and say that anyone who believes in the Holy Trinity is blasphemous. They might say 1+1+1=3. But their math is wrong. The way we should look at the Trinity is with multiplication 1 x 1 x 1 = 1! They don’t add to one another, they complement each other, in much the same way as a man and woman become 1 flesh in marriage and complement and complete one another.
The Work of the Holy Spirit in the life of Jesus
(1) Birth of Jesus
In Matt. 1:18 Mary is found with child “of the Holy Spirit” (ἐκ πνεύματος ἁγίου, ek pneúmatos hagı́ou); an angel tells Joseph that that “which is conceived in her is of the Holy Spirit” (Matt. 1:20).
The angel told Mary that the Holy Spirit (pneuma hagion) shall come upon her, and the power of the Most High (δύναμις Ὑψίστου, dúnamis Hupsı́stou) shall overshadow her. Here “Holy Spirit” and “power of the Most High” are parallel expressions meaning the same thing.
(2) Baptism of Jesus
Matt. 3:16 declares that after Jesus’ baptism “the heavens were opened unto him, and he saw the Spirit of God descending as a dove, and coming upon him.” Mark 1:10 repeats the statement in substantially the same terms. Luk 3:22 declares that the Spirit descended in “bodily form, as a dove” (σωματικῷ εἲδει ὡς περιστεράν, somatikō̇ eı́dei hōs peristerán). In John 1:32-33 John the Baptist testifies that he saw the Spirit descending upon Jesus as a dove out of heaven, and that it stayed upon Him, and, further, that this descent of the Spirit was the mark by which he was to recognize Jesus as “he that baptizes with the Holy Spirit.”
(3) Temptation of Jesus
In Matt. 4:1 we are told that Jesus was led by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted of the devil. Mark 1:12 declares in his graphic way that after the baptism “straightway the Spirit driveth (ἐκβάλλει, ekbállei) him forth into the wilderness.” Luke 4:1 more fully declares that Jesus was “full of the Holy Spirit,” and that He was “led in the Spirit in the wilderness during 40 days.”
(4) Public Ministry of Jesus
The writers of the Gospels, and especially Luke, conceived of the entire ministry of Jesus as under the power of the Holy Spirit. He declares in Luke 4:14, that Jesus “returned in the power of the Spirit into Galilee.”
Jesus preached in the synagogue there in Galilee from Is. 61:1 that “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me,” with the detailed description of His Messianic activity, namely, preaching to the poor, announcement of release to the captives, recovering of sight to the blind, and to proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord (Isa 61). Jesus proclaims the fulfillment of this prophecy in Himself (Lk 4:21).
(5) Jesus Promises the coming of the Holy Spirit upon His disciples
John 14-17 brings out the Person and work of the Holy Spirit through the words of Jesus. In these chapters Jesus promises that the Holy Spirit will come after Jesus goes back to Heaven after His resurrection. (John 14:16-17, 25-26, 15:26, 16:7-15)
In these passages Jesus refers to the Holy Spirit as the “parakletos” (See HERE for the original Greek meaning)
(Romans 8:14-17)
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