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John 14:15-31
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"If you love me, you will keep my commandments. And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Helper, to be with you forever, even the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees him nor knows him. You know him, for he dwells with you and will be in you.
"I will not leave you as orphans; I will come to you. Yet a little while and the world will see me no more, but you will see me. Because I live, you also will live. In that day you will know that I am in my Father, and you in me, and I in you. Whoever has my commandments and keeps them, he it is who loves me. And he who loves me will be loved by my Father, and I will love him and manifest myself to him." Judas (not Iscariot) said to him, "Lord, how is it that you will manifest yourself to us, and not to the world?" Jesus answered him, "If anyone loves me, he will keep my word, and my Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our home with him. Whoever does not love me does not keep my words. And the word that you hear is not mine but the Father's who sent me.
"These things I have spoken to you while I am still with you. But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, he will teach you all things and bring to your remembrance all that I have said to you. Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. Not as the world gives do I give to you. Let not your hearts be troubled, neither let them be afraid. You heard me say to you, 'I am going away, and I will come to you.' If you loved me, you would have rejoiced, because I am going to the Father, for the Father is greater than I. And now I have told you before it takes place, so that when it does take place you may believe. I will no longer talk much with you, for the ruler of this world is coming. He has no claim on me, but I do as the Father has commanded me, so that the world may know that I love the Father. Rise, let us go from here." (ESV)
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He Does Who He Is
Wednesday of Epiphany 5
8 February 2012
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Scripture is replete with divine names and titles for the Holy Spirit. Often, we retreat to the divine works to prove the divinity of the Spirit. However, as useful as this is, it is unnecessary on the grounds that the holy writers often referred to the person of the Holy Spirit using titles and names that are divine. The totality of that scriptural witness is that the Spirit is certainly divine.
The divine names are parallel in use to the names and titles attributed to the second person of the holy Trinity. For example, the Apostle Paul calls Christ "the Lord of glory." Glory is attributed to the Lord Christ by Paul in such a way that it is clearly a divine title. Many of the attributive genitives with both "Lord" and "Spirit" are testimonies of the divinity of the persons so named. Thus the Spirit of truth (Jn 14:17) is the one who is true and truth itself, but who also imparts truth; a divine action. God's names and what He does are inseparable; because He is God there is no distinction between actions and titles. The Spirit is true, truth, and delivers truth. The Spirit is what He does, which is who He is.
Given the manifold titles of divinity attributed to the Spirit it seems shocking that anyone who has actually read the Bible could suggest that He is anything other than fully God and the third person of the holy Trinity. Yet, the capacity for human self-delusion never fails to amaze me in my practice as a pastor of God's people. We are seldom completely honest with ourselves about ourselves, why should we expect to be truthful in our conceptions of God. That is why the divine revelation must always intrude upon us especially to break our theological self-delusions. The divine Word demands that we revise ever and again our faulty opinions. We struggle with God being a spirit, but who also is the Holy Spirit. How can this be? God is incorporeal, that is not tied down to the flesh and its created boundaries. But God is also the third person of the Holy Trinity. He is both spiritual, because He is not a creature, and the Spirit, because He is the third person of the Trinity. We are forced to confess the fullness of the divine Word, who reveals the full divinity of the Spirit.
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Gregory Nazianzus
"The swarm of testimonies shall burst upon you from which the deity of the Holy Spirit (Lk 1:35; 3:22; 4:1) will be shown to all who are not excessively stupid, or else altogether enemies to the Spirit, to be most clearly recognized in Scripture. Look at these facts: Christ is born; the Spirit is His forerunner. He is baptized; the Spirit bears witness. He is tempted; the Spirit leads Him up (Lk 4:1, 18). He works miracles; the Spirit accompanies them. He ascends; the Spirit takes His place. What great things are there in the idea of God that are not in His power (Acts 2:4)? What titles belonging to God are not applied to Him, except only unbegotten and begotten? For it was necessary that the distinctive properties of the Father and the Son should remain peculiar to them, lest there should be confusion in the Godhead, who brings all things, yes, even disorder itself, into due arrangement and good order (Gn 1:2).
"I tremble when I think of the abundance of titles, and how many names they outrage who run afoul of the Spirit. He is called the Spirit of God (Gn 1:2), the Spirit of Christ (Rm 8:9), the mind of Christ (1Co 2:16), the Spirit of the Lord (Acts 8:39), and Himself the Lord (2Co 3:17), the Spirit of adoption (Rm 8:17), of truth (Jn 14:17), of freedom (Ps 51:12)....For He is the Maker of all these, filling all with His essence, containing all things, filling the world in His essence, yet incapable of being comprehended in His power by the world. He is good, upright, princely, by nature and not by adoption. Sanctifying, not sanctified; measuring, not measured; shared, not sharing; filling, not filled; containing, not contained; glorified, and reckoned with the Father and the Son. Held out as a threat (Mk 3:29). He is the finger of God; fire like God; to manifest, as I take it, His consubstantiality [with the Father and the Son].
"He is the Creator Spirit, who by baptism and by resurrection creates anew. The Spirit knows all things, teaches, and blows where it wishes (Jn 3:8). He guides, talks, sends forth, separates, is angry or tested (Acts 5:9); He reveals, illumines, gives life, or rather is the very light and life. He makes temples; gives a share of divine glory. He perfects so as even to anticipate baptism (Acts 10:44-47), yet after baptism is to be sought as a separate gift. He does all things that God does. He divided into fiery tongues (Acts 2:3-4); dividing gifts (1Co 12:4); making apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors and teachers (Eph 4:11). His understanding is manifold, clear, piercing, undefiled, unhindered, which is the same thing as being most wise and varied in His actions; making all things clear and plain. He is of independent power, unchangeable, almighty, all-seeing, penetrating all spirits that are intelligent, pure, and most subtle (for example, the angel hosts); and also all prophetic and apostolic spirits in the same manner and not in the same places; for they lived in different places; thus showing that He is uncircumscribed."
Gregory Nazianzus, Fourth Theological Oration, 29
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Prayer
O Holy Spirit, grant us Your illumination that through the divine Word we might confess You as Lord and God. Amen.
For the family of Anna Janhsen, whom the Lord took from this vale of tears, that they would mourn as those confident of the resurrection of the flesh and the life of the world to come
For the building committee of Memorial Lutheran Church, that the Lord would be with them and grant them wisdom as they consider the needs of the bride of Christ
For President Dale Meyer and the faculty of Concordia Seminary, St. Louis, that, filled with the Spirit, they might proclaim the divine truth
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Art: RAFFAELLO, Sanzio The Transfiguration (1518-20)
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 © Scott R. Murray, 2012
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