Daily Read - WHO IS THE HOLY SPIRIT?

Series: How Can I BE Filled With The Holy Spirit?
Author: Martin R. De Haan II



Before we can discuss being filled with the Holy Spirit, we need to know who the Holy Spirit is. Some people insist that the Holy Spirit is an influence - a power or source of God-given spiritual energy. Others see Him as a ghostlike force, entering or leaving us as a kind of cosmic magician, elusive and vague, who drops mysteriously into our lives to make religious things happen and then leaves just as quickly as He came.

The Bible makes it clear, however, that the Holy Spirit is a person who lives within every Christian. It also teaches that He is God, the Third Person of the Trinity.

HE IS A PERSON
The Scripture give us five clear evidences that the Holy Spirit is a person, not strange power.

1. The Holy Spirit is spoken of as 'He'. Jesus referred to the Holy Spirit as 'He'. He promised His disciples: "I will pray the Father, and He will give you another Helper, that HE [the Holy Spirit] may abide with you forever" (Jn.14:16).

2. The Holy Spirit has intelligence. He knows the "deep things of God" and reveals them to us
(1 Cor. 2:10:11). Only a person has this kind of intelligence.

3. The Holy Spirit makes decisions. He gives gifts to the Lord's people, "distributing to each on individually as He will" (1 Cor.12:11). Only a personal being can make decisions.

4. Holy Spirit has emotions. He feels love (Rom. 15:30) and grief (Eph. 4:30). An influence cannot feel emotions like these.

5. The Holy Spirit is active. He does things only a person can do:

• speaks (Rev. 2:7)
• intercedes (Rom. 8:26)
• teaches (Jn. 14:26)
• leads (Rom. 8:14)
• appoints (Acts 20:28)
• empowers (Acts 1:8)

HE IS GOD
The Holy Spirit is also referred to in the Bible as God. He is the Third Person of the eternal Trinity, one with the Father and with the Son. The following factors show His deity:

1. Spirit's name appears as equal with the Father and the Son in the formula for baptism and in some of the New Testament prayers (Mt. 28:19 ; 2 Cor. 13:14).

2. The apostle Peter said that the Holy Spirit was God. When Ananias' sin was exposed, Pere told him that he had lied to the Holy Spirit. He went on to say that this lie had not been "to men but to God" (Acts 5:3-4).

3. The Holy Spirit is called "Lord" (2 Cor. 3:17-18).

4. The Holy Spirit possesses qualities that belong only to God: eternality (Heb. 9:14), the ability to be everywhere at the same time (Ps. 139:7-10), sovereign power (Lk. 1:35, 37), and the knowledge of "the things of God" (1 Cor. 2:10-12).

The Bible teaches that the Holy Spirit, who lives within every Christian, is a person and the He is God. Admittedly we can't grasp the great mystery of how the Holy spirit can live within us. But we don't have to understand it. We just have to trust that what the Bible says is true.