Article 5 of the 39 Articles of Religion
“The Holy Ghost, proceeding from the Father and the Son, is of one substance, majesty, and glory, with the Father and the Son, very and eternal God.”
This second part of my discussion of Article Five of the 39 Articles of Religion, which deals with the nature and work of the Holy Spirit, has to do with the role of the Spirit as he relates to the created order and to the Church in particular.
I am presently teaching an adult Christian education series entitled “Heresies and Cults.” The class is designed to show the close relationship between ancient and modern errors. We discuss an ancient heresy for about two weeks and then, for the following two weeks, we turn to a modern heresy and/or cult and note the similarities. Thus far we’ve interspersed discussions of Marcionism and Arianism with lessons on the Watchtower Society and Mormonism. It’s fascinating to see ancient heresies reinvented in the guise of modern cults and, as a pastor, it is nice to see my people understand the connection.
In any case, one of the men in the class, a relatively recent convert (about two years since his conversion) who regularly participates in bible studies and Sunday school recently expressed (to my shame) surprise at the idea that the Holy Spirit, along with the Father and the Son, is to be described as a “Person” within the Godhead. He had apparently, up to that point, understood the Holy Spirit to be a sort of impersonal exertion of divine power.
As I explained the concept of the Trinity of Persons within the Godhead, I realized that he was not alone in his misunderstanding. The Holy Spirit’s identity and role within the Trinity is, at least in my congregation, widely confused. I imagine, given that political indoctrination and social activism has taken the place of theological instruction in many Episcopal parishes, this confusion might be somewhat widespread.
In my previous essay on this topic, I defined the Holy Spirit as a Person within the Godhead. Today I hope to distinguish, at least in broad outlines, his primary role in Creation and in Redemption.
To do this we must start at the beginning.
The Holy Spirit in the work of Creation
“In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. The earth was without form and void, and darkness was over the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the waters. And God said, “Let there be light,” and there was light.” (Genesis 1:1-3)
As a quick side note, many have asked after reading that text, “if God created the universe: ex-nihilo” or, “out of nothing” then where did the water come from?” It is important to recognize the metaphorical use of the concepts of “waters” and the “deep”. To the ancient mind these images represent the lack of both created order and substance. To say that darkness was over the face of the deep and that the Spirit hovered over the face of the waters is to say that there was simply God’s Spirit and an empty void. Genesis 1:1-3 does not say or imply that there was some previous unformed material that God simply reformed or refashioned into the present cosmos.
Rather, God spoke and the cosmos leapt into existence. John tells us that the Word he spoke, the Word through which and by which he Created, is the Son:
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things were made through him, and without him was not any thing made that was made. (John 1:1)
In an earlier part of this series I discussed the range of meaning contained in the Greek word, ‘logos’ translated as “Word.” “Logos” refers to the underlying order, thought, and structure of an object, organism, or structure.
In our readings of John 1, we tend to apply “logos” primarily to creation in a general sort of way but “logos” is not a term limited to the general. Creation in general, of course, has a “logos” but everything within the created order also has its own specific “logos.” Without a “logos,” without an underlying order and logic, nothing can be that is. The point of John 1:1 is that God the Son is not simply a logos within the cosmos, but he is the Logos both of the cosmos as a whole and of all things within it. Paul expands on this concept in Colossians 1:
He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation. For by him all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities—all things were created through him and for him. And he is before all things, and in him all things hold together. (Colossians 1:15-17)
Nothing exists, no power or authority, apart from the Logos. The Word is the foundation of all things collectively and individually. Were the Word of God removed, for even the twinkling of an eye, the entire cosmos and all things and beings within it would instantaneously come undone. This knowledge causes demons to shudder and reminds, or ought to remind, redeemed sinners that every breath bears witness to the grace and mercy of God toward an undeserving rebellious race.
But the creating and sustaining Word of God is not alone. When you speak you breathe out, you exhale. Without breath, you cannot articulate your words nor can you be heard.
In the Eastern Church this fact is used to illustrate the complimentary work of God’s Word and his Spirit. When God the Father speaks through his Word, his “logos,” his Son, with creating and sustaining power, he also “breathes” being and life through his Spirit. The Hebrew word that is commonly translated as “spirit” “ruah” is also the word used for breath or for wind.
The Spirit is the wind, the ruah, the breath of life that brings animation and being. Together Word and Spirit create and sustain the cosmos.
God, for example, breathed into Adam in the beginning.
“...then the Lord God formed the man of dust from the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living creature” (Genesis 2:7)
And he breathed his spirit into the dry bones in Ezekiel’s vision:
So I prophesied as I was commanded. And as I prophesied, there was a sound, and behold, a rattling, and the bones came together, bone to its bone. And I looked, and behold, there were sinews on them, and flesh had come upon them, and skin had covered them. But there was no breath in them. Then he said to me, “Prophesy to the breath; prophesy, son of man, and say to the breath, Thus says the Lord God: Come from the four winds, O breath, and breathe on these slain, that they may live.” So I prophesied as he commanded me, and the breath came into them, and they lived and stood on their feet, an exceedingly great army. (Ezekiel 37:7-10)
Notice the interplay between Word and Spirit in Ezekiel’s vision. The prophet speaks the Word of God and the Breath brings life to dead bones. That pairing of Word and Spirit is echoed throughout the scriptures. The dynamic relationship between the two forms the basis for a biblical understanding of both God’s creating and sustaining work and his work of revelation and redemption. God speaks his Word and all things are, through his Spirit, are given being and/or the breath of life.
The Holy Spirit in the work of Redemption
Temporally speaking, God’s primary redemptive act came with the call of Abraham and his election of a particular people to carry his Word and to live in the presence of his Spirit.
Logically speaking, God’s first redeeming act was the Incarnation, the miraculous conception of his Son in the Virgin’s Womb announced by the angel Gabriel and accomplished through the Spirit. We are, in fact, given in the life of Christ a living picture of creation and redemption. There is a parallel between the Spirit’s “coming upon” Mary as Jesus was conceived in her womb apart from the seed of a human male and the Spirit’s hovering over the void in Genesis 1. The apostolic authors of all four Gospels consciously employ the language of Genesis 1 to describe either the conception of Jesus Christ and/or the inception of his ministry. The re-creation or “new creation” signified by the conception and ministry of the Word in the world culminates with his redemptive resurrection by the power of the Holy Spirit, the Breath of the Father. Dry bones live. God creates life and redeems it from the grave.
The same sort of parallel; “new” creation” and redemption by Word and Spirit, is seen in the birth of the Church in Acts 2.
When the day of Pentecost arrived, they were all together in one place. And suddenly there came from heaven a sound like a mighty rushing wind, and it filled the entire house where they were sitting. And divided tongues as of fire appeared to them and rested on each one of them. And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other tongues as the Spirit gave them utterance.
The Spirit descends on the gathered Disciples in tongues of fire and the sound of rushing wind, filling them with the power of God with which and in which they preach the Word of God to the assembled crowd. As Peter explains, the Spirit of God who had once dwelt in the midst of God’s people in the Tabernacle and Temple and, on occasion, filled certain people for specific times and specific purposes, was now, through Jesus Christ, by and through God’s Word, his gospel, being poured out upon the world and into every believing heart.
The nations, dead and darkened by rebellion, are called to obedience and salvation through the resurrected Body of those made alive by the breath of God, the Church. God indwells the Church by his Spirit, cleanses her through his Word, and through her, makes his final appeal fallen creatures before his glorious return, the resurrection, the final judgment, and the consummation of all things in the new heaven and new earth.
The pattern of creation/redemption through Word and Spirit is replicated in the process of personal salvation.
Before we are known by Christ, we are, as Paul says, by nature objects of wrath, dead in sin:
“And you were dead in the trespasses and sins in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience—among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind.” (Ephesians 2:1-3)
We do not, on our own power or by our own exertion turn to God. Dead men do not raise themselves. God acts first. God brings life where there is no life, calling us, by the power of his Spirit, out of death, giving us the capacity and the will to receive his Word, to surrender to and trust in his Son.
But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved—and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, so that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast. For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them. (Ephesians 2:4-10)
And, following our surrender, he makes his home in our hearts. He indwells us as he once indwelt the Tabernacle and the Temple. We are new creations, redeemed by God’s Spirit and his Word and this new spiritual life bears witness to the new bodily life that will one day, by Word and Spirit be ours as well.
But if Christ is in you, although the body is dead because of sin, the Spirit is life because of righteousness. If the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his Spirit who dwells in you. (Romans 8:10-11)
Indwelled by the Spirit, individual believers do not act individually, but they are bound together in the Body, the Church, so that through the Spirit and in the Spirit they might be one with each other and one with Christ.
For just as the body is one and has many members, and all the members of the body, though many, are one body, so it is with Christ. For in one Spirit we were all baptized into one body—Jews or Greeks, slaves or free—and all were made to drink of one Spirit. For the body does not consist of one member but of many. (1 Corinthians 12:12-14)
Summary
It was through the Word and the Spirit that God the Father created all things. It was through his Word and Spirit that he redeemed them. He chose Abraham, called Moses, revealed his law, established his tabernacle, and lived in the midst of his people. Through that people, as one of them, by the power of the Spirit, the Word became flesh and lived, died, and rose among us and now resides in heaven at the right hand of the Father.
In Jesus Christ, Prophet and Tabernacle come together. He is both the Word of God and the One in whom the Spirit dwells and through whom the Spirit is given. And now, through the Son, the Father has sent his Spirit not simply to live among us, but to live in all who believe, and, ultimately, to make all things new, to bind all things together.
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In future commentaries in this series, specifically when dealing with questions of the authority of scripture, the authority of the church and the role of believers, we will address the question of spiritual gifts and their use.
9 Comments •
Matt,
Just scanning through your article, quickly, and I have one picky thing to note. So forgive me for only focusing on this alone. I would like to get back to your article and read it and the previous one more throroughly. The matter of the Holy Spirit is one of the critical issues of the Church today, in my observation. What you discovered about your congregation in regard to their understanding of the work of the Holy Spirit is indicative. Thank you for taking the time to write these up.
Anyway, back to the picky thing: you said, in response to the quote from Acts chapter 2,
“The Spirit descends on the gathered Disciples in tongues of fire and rushing wind, filling them with the power of God..”
Perhaps the order is inconsequential, but certainly one thing is clear from the scripture, What came first was the not a rushing wind, but the sound .....(i.e. no blowing manes, or parting beard hairs, or clutching cloaks) .....and then what looked like flame tongues, or tongues of flame.