Karl Barth’s book told me several different aspects of what he feels the Holy Spirit is. Barth believes there is a dualism between God and humanity. He would say the Holy Spirit is the connection but in my opinion, I would call that faith. Barth has the notion of the Holy Spirit being the act of God, but also an act of human being the subject of the Holy Spirit. In order to believe God and Holy Spirit as the same ideology, one must believe in the trinity. Again, if the trinity is true, I picture Jesus in the garden talking to himself and asking himself if he really has to die on the cross. I only know what I think, but the Jesus portrayed in the Bible does not seem like a crazy person that talks to himself.
In order to understand Barth’s take
Sheed states on page 10 that “In theology, spirit is not only a key word, it is the key word.” Spirt is the thing we know and love and then we end up deciding at the end. So basically, our spirit is everything. It “loves” God and “knows” it loves God.
Sheed says “The Spirit, like the Word, is a person—he, not it.” The huge difference is that God’s idea is someone while our idea is something. An idea being something will contain no mutuality, which is what God has with others.
When Jesus ascended into heaven, God provided His people with the Holy Spirit, a Counselor, to dwell within every believer. John 14:16-17 states the Holy Spirit resides within those who believe
In this paper, I will review Charles Ryrie’s book The Holy Spirit. I will detail what I feel the book is about. I will emphasize various points given by the author that stood out to me. Finally, I will give my personal evaluation of the book.
To start our research, we need to ask a critical question at the very beginning : Who is the Holy Spirit? The Bible teaches that the Holy Spirit is a person. Jesus never referred to “it” when He was talking about the Holy Spirit. In John 14,15 and 16, for example, He spoke of the Holy Spirit as “He” because He is not a force or thing but a person. The point is especially important at a time when pantheistic tendencies are
In Paul, the Spirit, and the People of God, Gordon Fee outlines a theology of the Spirit in the Divine Trinity, the basis within Scripture for the experience of the Spirit, and the interaction of the two. Fee, a Pentecostal scholar, “redefines the terms of discussion about the Holy Spirit in a way that transcends today’s
The Holy Spirit, however, does not have the primary spot in most hearts. “The prince of the power of the air, the spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience,” is the ruler of most individual hearts. Spirits come from two distinct sources. Every spirit that confesses Jesus Christ is of God, and every that does otherwise is not of God. The spirit that is contrary to Christ is antichrist, which is in the world today (I John 4:1-3).
It is important to note the defined goals of the Trinity. One being that God sent His Son, Jesus did not send God. Jesus tells us in John 6, that He came to do the will of His Father. Jesus was not doing His own selfish will but everything He did was for His Father. Jesus and God sent the Holy Spirit according to Jesus’ words in John 14:26, “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”. It is necessary to recognize the distinctions of the roles of the Trinity as if the roles were not distinctive there would be no Trinity.
The Holy Spirit of God is the active force or power in one’s life, which most certainly includes spiritual formation (Pettit, 2008, p. 46). When Jesus was speaking with his disciples he made it clear – by using the analogy of a vine and branches – that apart from him they could do nothing (John 15:5). Only if one is connected to Christ will they have the ability to bear fruit and the way Jesus empowers those connected to him is through the Holy Spirt that that father will send in his name (John 14:26). The fact is that the triune God dwells in the Christian in and through the Holy Spirit. One sees this when they place multiple passages together to gain a full understanding of this concept. For example, Jesus made it clear that he and the father would come and make their home with the disciple (John 14:23). In 1 Corinthians 6:19 Paul reminds the Corinthians that their bodies are the very temple of God because the Holy Spirit dwells in them which is similar to what Jesus said would happen when he sent the Holy Spirit after his resurrection and ascension (John 14:17, 16:7).
ideas of God the Father, Jesus the Son of God and the Holy Spirit in
In this paper, I will review Robert Gromacki’s book The Holy Spirit: Who He is, What He Does I will detail what I feel the book is about. I will emphasize various points given by the author that stood out to me. Finally, I will give my personal evaluation of the book.
The Holy Spirit plays a very vital role in the lives of each and every believer; He can strengthen us with a strength that we cannot even begin to muster up in ourselves. He can bring us joy that we cannot even begin to find in the things of this world. He can bring peace to our lives more than anything that we can ever find on this earth. “The Holy Spirit which is primarily an energizing process, is also a revealing, refining, consuming, illuminating process, and one by which we are made to glow with love to God, and love to man, and love to souls.”
The Holy Spirit gives different gifts to different people. There are multiple ways to use these gifts and the Spirit works in differing ways. More importantly, these gifts are given by the same Spirit, the different ways to use them come from the same Lord and the same God is making these different gifts happen in everyone (1 Corinthians 12:4-6). The Holy Spirit gives these gifts to everyone that is a part of the body of believers (1 Corinthians 12:4). The way that the Holy Spirit is given to each of us is also different but also special to us. This shows that our Heavenly Father cares for everyone and knows what each of us need, in order to benefit the entire body of believers (1 Corinthians 12:7).
The Holy Spirit is God Himself. He is a person that we can have a personal relationship with. Also, the Holy Spirit is the one that God gave to us as a guide, to direct and teach us in living a Holy life (King James Version, John 14:16). The Holy Spirit is the voice inside of us that tells us when something is not right with the choices that we have made. The voice inside of us comes from God, who loves and cares enough to show us our error that we have made. Also, the Holy Spirit is part of the Trinity; where God transformed into three persons, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. When a person is born again, they believe and receive Jesus Christ (John 1:12-13), God comes through people’s life through the Holy Spirit (1Cor.3:16). The
First of all, when describing who the Holy Spirit is, one must understand that the Holy Spirit is not an “it.” The Holy Spirit is a He. He is the third person of the Holy Trinity. He is God, just like the Father and the Son. 2 Cor. 13:14 proclaims the Spirits deity along with the Father and the Son when Paul said, “The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ and the love of God and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all.” His deity is also seen in the Great Commission of Matthew 28:19 where we are told by Jesus to, “Go therefore and make disciples, baptizing them in the name of the Father, Son, and the Holy Spirit.” When speaking of the phrase “another helper”, Charles Ryrie, American Bible Scholar and Christian Theologian, said, “The Promise of our Lord to