SPIRIT OF GOD Description of God in action, God in motion. The word “spirit” (Hebrew, ruach; Greek, pneuma) is the word used from ancient times to describe and explain the experience of divine power working in, upon, and around people.

In the Old Testament There are three basic meanings evident in the use of “spirit” from the earliest Hebrew writings: It was a wind from God, it was the breath of life, and it was a spirit of ecstasy.

First, it was a wind from God (the same Hebrew word translated “Spirit” in Gn 1:2) that caused the waters of the Flood to subside (8:1). A wind from God blew locusts over Egypt (Ex 10:13) and quail over the camp of Israel. The blast of his nostrils separated the waters of the Red Sea at the exodus (14:21).

Second, it was the breath of God that made man a living being (Gn 2:7). It is one of the earliest perceptions of Hebrew faith that humans live only because of the stirring of the divine breath or spirit within them (Gn 6:3; Jb 33:4; 34:14–15; Ps 104:29–30). Later, a clearer distinction was drawn between divine Spirit and human spirit, and between spirit and soul, but at the earliest stage these were all more or less perceived to be synonymous manifestations of the same divine power, the source of all life—animal as well as human (Gn 7:15, 22; see Eccl 3:19–21).

Third, there were occasions when this divine power seemed to overtake and possess an individual fully, so that his or her words or actions far transcended those of normal behavior. Such a person was clearly marked as an agent of God’s purpose and given respect. This was apparently how leaders were recognized in the premonarchy period—Othniel (Jgs 3:10), Gideon (6:34), Jephthah (11:29), and the first king, Saul (1 Sm 11:6), as well. So, too, the earliest prophets were those whose inspiration came in ecstasy (1 Sm 19:20–24).

In the earlier stages of Hebrew thought, ecstatic experience was seen as the direct effect of divine power. This was true even when the ecstasy was recognized as evil in character, as in the case of Saul’s seizure by the Spirit (1 Sm 16:14–16). A spirit from God could be for evil as well as for good (see Jgs 9:23; 1 Kgs 22:19–23).

In the Writings of the Prophets For Isaiah, the spirit was that which characterized God and distinguished him and his actions from human affairs (Is 31:3). Later, the adjective “holy” appeared as that which distinguished the Spirit of God from any other spirit, human or divine (Ps 51:11; Is 63:10–11).

The problem of false prophecy emphasized the danger of assuming that every message delivered in ecstasy was the word of the Lord. Thus, tests of prophecy evaluated the content of the message delivered or the character of the prophet’s life, not the degree or quality of inspiration (see Dt 13:1–5; 18:22; Jer 23:14; Mi 3:5). This sense of a need to discriminate between true and false inspiration and to distinguish the word of God from the merely ecstatic oracle may help to explain the otherwise puzzling reluctance of the major eighth- and seventh- century bc prophets to attribute their inspiration to the Spirit.

In the Exilic and Postexilic Writings In exilic and postexilic literature, the role of the Spirit is narrowed to two major functions: that of the prophetic Spirit and that of the Spirit of the age to come.

The later prophets again spoke of the Spirit in explicit terms as the inspirer of prophecy (see Ez 3:1–4, 22–24; Hg 2:5; Zec 4:6). As they looked back to the preexilic period, these prophets freely attributed the inspiration of “the former prophets” to the Spirit as well (Zec 7:12).

This tendency to exalt the Spirit’s role as the inspirer of prophecy became steadily stronger in the period between the OT and NT, until in rabbinic Judaism the Spirit was almost exclusively the inspirer of the prophetic writings now regarded as Scripture.

The other understanding of the Spirit’s role during exilic and postexilic times was that the Spirit would be the manifestation of the power of God in the age to come. That eschatological hope of divine power effecting a final cleansing and a renewed creation is rooted principally in Isaiah’s prophecies (Is 4:4; 32:15; 44:3–4). Isaiah speaks of one anointed by the Spirit to accomplish complete and final salvation (11:2; 42:1; 61:1). Elsewhere, the same longing is expressed in terms of the Spirit being freely dispensed to all Israel (Ez 39:29; Jl 2:28–29; Zec 12:10) in the new covenant (Jer 31:31–34; Ez 36:26–27).

In the period prior to Jesus, the understanding of the Spirit as the Spirit of prophecy and as the Spirit of the age to come had developed into the widespread dogma that the Spirit was no longer to be experienced in the present. The Spirit had been known in the past as the inspirer of prophetic writings, but after Haggai, Zechariah, and Malachi, the Spirit had withdrawn (1 Macc 4:44–46; 9:27; 2 Bar 85:1–3; see also Ps 74:9; Zec 13:2–6). The Spirit would be known again in the age of the Messiah, but in the interim the Spirit was absent from Israel. Even the great Hillel (learned Jewish leader and teacher, 60? bc–ad 20?), a near contemporary of Jesus, had not received the Spirit—though if anyone was worthy of the Spirit, it was he. There is a tradition that at a meeting of Hillel and other wise men, a voice from heaven said, “Among those here present is one who would have deserved the Holy Spirit to rest upon him, if his time had been worthy of it.” The wise men all looked at Hillel.

The consequence of this accepted dearth of the Spirit was that the Spirit in effect became subordinated to the law. The Spirit was the inspirer of the law, but since the Spirit could no longer be experienced directly, the law became the sole voice of the Spirit. It was this increasing dominance of the law and its authoritative interpreters that provided the background for the mission of Jesus and the initial spread of Christianity.

In the New Testament If we are to understand the NT’s teaching on the Spirit, we must recognize both its continuity and discontinuity with the OT. At many points NT usage cannot be fully understood except against the background of OT concepts or passages. For example, the ambiguity of John 3:8 (“wind,” “Spirit”), 2 Thessalonians 2:8 (“breath”), and Revelation 11:11 (“breath of life”) takes us back to the basic Hebrew meanings of “spirit.” Acts 8:39 and Revelation 17:3 and 21:10 reflect the same conception of the Spirit that we find in 1 Kings 18:12, 2 Kings 2:16, and Ezekiel 3:14. The NT writers generally share the rabbinic view that Scripture has the authority of the Spirit behind it (see Mk 12:36; Acts 28:25; Heb 3:7; 2 Pt 1:21). The principal continuity is that the NT brings the fulfillment of what the OT writers looked forward to. At the same time, Christianity is not simply fulfilled Judaism. Jesus’ coming and his giving of his Spirit to live within his believers marks off the new faith as something new and distinct.

The Spirit of the New Age The most striking feature of Jesus’ ministry and of the message of the earliest Christians was their conviction and proclamation that the blessings of the new age were already present, that the eschatological Spirit had already been poured out. With the exception of the Essenes at Qumran, no other group or individual within the Jewish religion of that time had dared to make such a bold claim. The prophets and the rabbis looked for a messianic age yet to come, and the apocalyptic writers warned of its imminent arrival, but none thought of it as already present. Even John the Baptist spoke only of one about to come and of the Spirit’s operation in the imminent future (Mk 1:8). But for Jesus and first-century Christians, the longed for hope was a living reality, and the claim carried with it the exciting sense of being in “the last days.” Without some recognition of that eschatological dimension of the Christians’ faith and life, we cannot understand this teaching on, and experience of, the Spirit.

Jesus clearly thought of his teachings and healings as fulfillment of the prophetic hope (Mt 12:41–42; 13:16–17; Lk 17:20–21). In particular, he saw himself as the one anointed by the Spirit to provide salvation (Mt 5:3–6; 11:5; Lk 4:17–19). So, too, Jesus understood his exorcisms as the effect of the power of God and as manifestations of the end-time rule of God (Mt 12:27–28; Mk 3:22–26). The Gospel writers, especially Luke, emphasize the eschatological character of Jesus’ life and ministry by stressing the role of the Spirit in his birth (Mt 1:18; Lk 1:35, 41, 67; 2:25–27), his baptism (Mk 1:9–10; Acts 10:38), and his ministry (Mt 4:1; 12:18; Mk 1:12; Lk 4:1, 14; 10:21; Jn 3:34).

The Christian church began with the in-breathing of the Holy Spirit on the day of Christ’s resurrection (Jn 20:22), followed by the outpouring of the Spirit at Pentecost “in the last days.” The overwhelming experience of vision and inspired utterance was taken as proof positive that the new age prophesied by Joel had now arrived (Acts 2:2–5, 17–18). Similarly, in Hebrews the gift of the Spirit is spoken of as “the powers of the age to come” (Heb 6:4–5). More striking still is Paul’s understanding of the Spirit as the guarantee of God’s complete salvation (2 Cor 1:22; 5:5; Eph 1:13–14), and as the first installment of the believer’s inheritance of God’s kingdom (Rom 8:15–17; 1 Cor 6:9–11; 15:42–50; Gal 4:6–7; 5:16–18, 21–23; Eph 1:13–14). The Spirit is here again thought of as the power of the age to come, as that power (which will characterize God’s rule at the end of time) already shaping and transforming the lives of believers.

For Paul, this means also that the gift of the Spirit is but the beginning of a lifelong process that will not end until the believer’s whole person is brought under the Spirit’s power (Rom 8:11, 23; 1 Cor 15:44–49; 2 Cor 3:18; 5:1–5). It also means that the present experience of faith is one of lifelong tension between what God has already begun to bring about in the believer’s life and what has not yet been brought under God’s grace (Phil 1:6). It is this tension between life “in the Spirit” and life “in the flesh” (see Gal 2:20) that comes to poignant expression in Romans 7:24 and 2 Corinthians 5:2–4.

The Spirit of New Life Since the Spirit is the mark of the new age, it is not surprising that the NT writers understood the gift of the Spirit to be that which brings an individual into the new age. John the Baptist described the way the coming one would baptize with the Holy Spirit and with fire (Mt 3:11). According to Acts 1:5 and 11:16, this imagery was taken up by Jesus, and the promise is seen as fulfilled at Pentecost—the outpouring of the Spirit here being understood as the risen Christ’s action in drawing his disciples into the new age (Acts 2:17, 33).

It seems to be one of Luke’s aims in the book of Acts to highlight the central importance of the gift of the Spirit in conversion-initiation—it is that decisive “gift of the Holy Spirit” that makes one a Christian (Acts 2:38–39). People could have been followers of Jesus on earth, but it was only when they received the gift of the Spirit that they could be said to have “believed in the Lord Jesus Christ” (11:16–17). When the Spirit’s presence was manifested in and upon a person’s life, that was recognized by Peter as proof enough that God had accepted that person, even though he or she had not yet made any formal profession of faith or been baptized (10:44–48; 11:15–18; 15:7–9). So too Apollos, already aglow with the Spirit (18:25), even though his knowledge of “the way of God” was slightly defective (vv 24–26), apparently was not required to supplement his “baptism of John” with Christian baptism. However, the 12 so-called disciples at Ephesus proved by their very ignorance of the Spirit that they were not yet disciples of the Lord Jesus (19:1–6). Paul asked these 12 men, “Did you receive the Holy Spirit when you believed?” (19:2).

This accords with Paul’s emphasis in his letters. Belief and reception of the Spirit go together: to receive the Spirit is to begin the Christian life (Gal 3:2–3); to be baptized in the Spirit is to become a member of the body of Christ (1 Cor 12:13); to “have the Spirit of Christ” is to belong to Christ (Rom 8:9–11); to receive the Spirit is tantamount to becoming a child of God (Rom 8:14–17; Gal 4:6–7). The Spirit so characterizes the new age and the life of the new age that only the gift of the Spirit can bring a person into the new age to experience the life of the new age. For the Spirit is distinctively and peculiarly the life-giver; the Spirit indeed is the life of the new age (Rom 8:2, 6, 10; 1 Cor 15:45; 2 Cor 3:6; Gal 5:25).

In just the same way in John’s writings, the Spirit is characteristically the life-giving Spirit (Jn 6:63), the power from above, the seed of divine life that brings about the new birth (Jn 3:3–8; 1 Jn 3:9), and a river of living water that brings life when one believes in Christ (Jn 7:37–39; so also 4:10, 14). Or again, reception of the Spirit in John 20:22 is depicted as a new creation analogous to Genesis 2:7. Consequently, in 1 John 3:24 and 4:13, possession and experience of the Spirit count as one of the “tests of life” listed in that letter.

Manifestations of the Spirit It will be clear from what has already been said that when the first Christians, like the ancient Hebrews, spoke of the Spirit, they were thinking of experiences of divine power. In the NT, as in the OT, “Spirit” is the word used to explain the experience of new life and vitality (see above), of liberation from legalism (e.g., Rom 8:2; 2 Cor 3:17), of spiritual refreshing and renewal (cf. e.g., Is 32:15; Ez 39:29 with Jn 7:37–39; Rom 5:5; 1 Cor 12:13; 1 Tm 3:5–6). It is important to realize how wide a range of experiences were attributed to the Spirit: ecstatic experiences (Acts 2:24; 10:43–47; 19:6; cf. 10:10; 22:17—“in ecstasy”; 2 Cor 12:1–4; Rv 1:10), emotional experiences (e.g., love—Rom 5:5; joy—Acts 13:52; 1 Thes 1:6; see also Gal 5:22; Phil 2:1–2), experiences of illumination (2 Cor 3:14–17; Eph 1:17–18; Heb 6:4–5; 1 Jn 2:20–21), and experiences issuing in moral transformation (1 Cor 6:9–11). Likewise, when Paul speaks of spiritual gifts, called charismata (acts or words that bring divine grace to concrete expression), he evidently has a wide range of actual events in mind: inspired speech (1 Cor 12:8–10; 1 Thes 1:5), miracles and healings (1 Cor 12:9; Gal 3:5; cf. Heb 2:4), and various acts of service and help, of counsel and administration, and of aid and mercy (Rom 12:7–8; 1 Cor 12:28).

In talking thus of the Spirit in terms of experience, we should not overemphasize particular experiences or manifestations, as though earliest Christianity consisted of a sequence of mountaintop experiences or spiritual highs. There clearly were such experiences, indeed a wide range of experiences, but no one experience is singled out to be sought by all (except prophecy). There is no distinctively second (or third) experience of the Spirit in the NT, and Paul warned against overvaluing particular manifestations of the Spirit (1 Cor 14:6–19; 2 Cor 12:1–10; cf. Mk 8:11–13). Where particular experiences are valued, it is as manifestations of a more sustained experience, particular expressions of an underlying relationship (cf. Acts 6:3–5; 11:24—“full of the Spirit”; Eph 5:18). What we are in touch with here is the vigor of the experiential dimension of earliest Christianity. If the Spirit is the breath of the new life in Christ (cf. Ez 37:9–10, 14; Jn 20:22; 1 Cor 15:45), then presumably the analogy extends further, and the experience of the Spirit is like the experience of breathing: one is not conscious of it all the time, but if one is not conscious of it, at least sometimes, something is wrong.

The Fellowship of the Spirit It was out of this shared experience of the Spirit that the earliest Christian community grew and developed, for this is what “the fellowship [koinonia] of the Spirit” properly means: common participation in the same Spirit (Phil 2:1; cf. Acts 2:42; 1 Cor 1:4–9). It was the gift of the Spirit that brought those in Samaria, Caesarea, and elsewhere effectively into the community of the Spirit (Act 8, 10). So also, it was the experience of the one Spirit that provided the unifying bond in the churches of Paul’s mission (1 Cor 12:13; Eph 4:3–4; Phil 2:1–2). Here we see the real importance of the divine manifestations of the Spirit for Paul: it is out of the diversity of these particular manifestations that the body of Christ grows in unity (Rom 12:4–8; 1 Cor 12:12–17; Eph 4:4–16).

 

SPIRIT OF JESUS CHRIST The Spirit as identified with Jesus Christ.

The most important development and element in earliest Christian understanding of the Spirit is that the Spirit is now the Spirit of Jesus Christ (Acts 16:7; Rom 8:9; Gal 4:6; Phil 1:19; 1 Pt 1:11; see also Jn 7:38; 15:26; 16:7; 19:30; Rv 3:1; 5:6). The Spirit is to be identified as the Spirit that bears witness to Jesus (Jn 15:26; 16:13–15; Acts 5:32; 1 Cor 12:3; 1 Jn 4:2; 5:7–8; Rv 19:10), but also, and more profoundly, as the Spirit that inspired and empowered Jesus himself. This Spirit became available to the believers after Christ’s resurrection.

The apostles John and Paul were quite clear in their writings about Christ becoming spirit through resurrection. The keynote verses penned by John are John 6:63; 7:37–39; 14:16–18; 20:22; and 1 John 3:24; 4:13. The critical passages written by Paul are Romans 8:9–10; 1 Corinthians 15:45; 2 Corinthians 3:17–18; and 1 Corinthians 6:17.

Revelation concerning the Spirit of Jesus is progressive in the Gospel of John. John does not tell us from the beginning that people could not actually receive eternal life until the hour of Christ’s glorification. Throughout the Gospel, Jesus declares to various people that he can give them eternal life if they would believe in him. He promises them the water of life, the bread of life, and the light of life. But no one could really partake of these until after the Lord had risen. As a foretaste, as a sample, they could receive life via the Lord’s words because his words were themselves spirit and life (Jn 6:63); however, it was not until the Spirit would become available that believers could actually become the recipients of the divine, eternal life. After the Lord’s discourse in John 6, Jesus said, “It is the Spirit that gives life, the flesh profits nothing” (v 63). In the flesh Jesus could not give them the bread of life, but when the Spirit became available, they could have life. Again, Jesus offered the water of life—even life flowing like rivers of living water—to the Jews assembled at the Feast of Tabernacles. He told them to come and drink of him. But no one could, then and there, come and drink of him. So John added a note: “But this he spoke concerning the Spirit, for the Spirit was not yet because Jesus was not yet glorified” (7:39). Once Jesus would be glorified through resurrection, the Spirit of the glorified Jesus would be available for people to drink. In John 6, Jesus offered himself as the bread of life to be eaten by people; and in John 7, he offered himself as the water of life to refresh men. But no one could eat him or drink him until he became spirit, as was intimated in John 6:63 and then stated plainly in John 7:39.

Community of the spirit

The two-volume work of Luke the Evangelist, Luke–Acts, presents the church as that community of people in which, and through which, the Spirit of God is working. Insofar as the church is that, it is an extension of a reality already begun by Jesus of Nazareth. In Luke’s Gospel, John the Baptist announces the coming of one who would baptize with the Holy Spirit (Lk 3:16). In Acts, this promise is seen fulfilled in the outpouring of the Spirit (Acts 1:5). As Jesus was empowered for his mission by the Spirit (Lk 3:21–22), so the early Christian community was empowered for its witness in the world (Acts 1:8). As Jesus, the man of the Spirit, was confronted at the outset of his ministry with great obstacles (the temptation, Lk 4:1–13), so the church, as the community of the Spirit, faced the temptation to yield to pressures that would compromise its mission (Acts 2:12–13; 4:1–22; 5:27–42). As Jesus, empowered by the Spirit, proclaimed the Good News and touched the lives of people with reconciliation, release, and restoration (Lk 4:18–19), so the church was empowered by the Spirit to become a caring and sharing community (Acts 2:43–47; 4:33–37). As Jesus, the man of the Spirit, reached out to the weak, poor, and rejects of the Palestinian society (this is a special emphasis throughout Luke’s Gospel), so the community of the Spirit was concerned with taking care of people’s needs (Acts 4:34; 5:1–6). These parallels illustrate Luke’s understanding of the oneness of Jesus’ ministry with that of the church—all because the Spirit of Jesus was, and is, in his church.

In John 14:16–18, Jesus went one step further in identifying himself with the Spirit. He told the disciples that he would give them another Comforter. Then he told them that they should know who this Comforter was because he was, then and there, abiding with them and would, in the near future, be in them. Who else but Jesus was abiding with them at that time? Then after telling the disciples that the Comforter would come to them, he said, “I am coming to you.” First he said that the Comforter would come to them and abide in them, and then in the same breath he said that he would come to them and abide in them (see 14:20). In short, the coming of the Comforter to the disciples was one and the same as the coming of Jesus to the disciples. The Comforter who was dwelling with the disciples that night was the Spirit in Christ; the Comforter who would be in the disciples (after the resurrection) would be Christ in the Spirit.

On the evening of the resurrection, the Lord Jesus appeared to the disciples and then breathed into them the Holy Spirit. This inbreathing, reminiscent of God’s breathing into Adam the breath of life (Gn 2:7), became the fulfillment of all that had been promised and anticipated earlier in John’s Gospel. Through this impartation, the disciples became regenerated and indwelt by the Spirit of Jesus Christ. This historical event marked the genesis of the new creation. Jesus could now be realized as the bread of life, the water of life, and the light of life. The believers now possessed his divine, eternal, risen life. From that time forward, Christ as spirit indwelt his believers. Thus, in his first epistle John could say, “And hereby we know that he abides in us, by the Spirit whom he gave to us” (1 Jn 3:24), and again, “Hereby we know that we abide in him and he in us, because he has given us of his Spirit” (4:13).

The apostles had quite an adjustment to make after Christ’s resurrection. They had become so accustomed to his physical presence that it was difficult for them to learn how to live by his spiritual, indwelling presence. All through the 40 days after his resurrection, from the time the apostles received the inbreathing of the Spirit, Christ was teaching the disciples to make the transfer. He would physically appear and then disappear intermittently. His appearances were very frequent in the beginning and then they steadily diminished. His aim was to guide the apostles into knowing him in his invisible presence. However, this was so new to them that he had to keep appearing to them in order to strengthen and reassure them. But his real desire was to help them live by faith and not by sight. When he appeared to the disciples as they were all together the second time, with Thomas present, he chided Thomas for his unbelief. Then he prounounced this blessing, “Blessed are those who do not see me and yet believe” (Jn 20:29).

The apostle Paul was such a “blessed” one. He did not know Christ in the flesh. He knew only the risen Christ (2 Cor 5:15–16). In this regard, he had an advantage over the early apostles. They had a great adjustment to make, but from the very beginning, Paul knew the risen Christ as Spirit. Paul became the forerunner of all those Christians who have never seen Jesus in the flesh and who have come to experience him in the Spirit. Yes, Paul had seen the risen Lord; he was the last one to do so (1 Cor 15:8). And from that time onward he realized that Jesus was a glorified man, exalted far above all. Paul wrote much concerning this, but his writings did not leave the far-above-all Jesus far away because this was not what Paul experienced. Any experienced Christian should be able to testify that the Christ in the heavens is also the Christ in the heart.

In his writings, Paul often speaks of the Spirit and Christ synonymously. This is evident in Romans 8:9–10. The terms “Spirit of God,” “Spirit of Christ,” and “Christ” are all used interchangeably. The Spirit of God is the Spirit of Christ, and the Spirit of Christ is Christ. In these verses, it is evident that Paul identified the Spirit with Christ because in Christian experience they are absolutely identical. There is no such thing as an experience of Christ apart from the Spirit. The separation and/or distinction does exist in Trinitarian theology— and for very good reasons—but the separation is nearly nonexistent in actual experience. Several of Paul’s statements are written from the vantage point of experience.

In 1 Corinthians 15:45, Paul says that the risen Jesus became life-giving spirit. Notice the verse does not say Jesus became the Spirit, as if the second person of the Trinity became the third, but that Jesus became spirit in the sense that his mortal existence and form were metamorphosed into a spiritual existence and form. Jesus’ person was not changed through the resurrection, only his form. With this changed spiritual form, Jesus regained the essential state of being he had emptied himself of in becoming a man. Before he became a man, he subsisted in the form of God (Phil 2:6), which form is Spirit and thereby was united to the Spirit (the third of the Trinity), while still remaining distinct. Thus, when the scripture says that the Lord “became life-giving spirit,” it does not mean that the Son became the Holy Spirit. But it does indicate that Christ, via resurrection, appropriated a new, spiritual form (while still retaining a body—a glorified one) that enabled him to commence a new spiritual existence (see 1 Pt 3:18).

In 2 Corinthians 3, Paul explains that the NT ministry is a ministry carried out by the Spirit of the living God (v 3), who is the Spirit that gives life (v 6). In fact, the whole NT economy is characterized as “the ministry of the Spirit” (v 8). At the same time, Paul emphasizes that the function of the NT ministry is to bring God’s people to see and experience the glorious Christ (3:3, 14, 16–18; 4:4–6). It is in this context that Paul boldly declares, “The Lord is the Spirit” (3:17). He who turns his heart to the Lord is, in effect, turning his heart to the Spirit. lf the Lord were not the Spirit abiding in the believers, how could they turn their hearts to him? And how could they be transformed into the same image? Second Corinthians 3:18 says, “But we all, with unveiled face mirroring the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as from the Lord-Spirit.” According to the Greek, the last phrase of this verse could be rendered “the Lord, the Spirit” (see asv) or “the Lord, who is the Spirit” (see rsv, niv) because the expression “the Spirit” is in direct apposition to “the Lord” (i.e., it is a further description of the Lord). Thus, the Lord is the Spirit.

In conclusion, when the Scriptures identify the Spirit with Christ and vice versa, the identification is not equivocation. Christ is not the Holy Spirit. Christ and the Spirit are distinct persons of the Trinity, as is affirmed by the overall teaching of the Word. But the Scriptures do identify Christ and the Spirit in the context of Christian experience. It would be accurate to say that Christians experience Christ through his Spirit, the Spirit of Christ. One cannot know Jesus apart from the Spirit or other than through the Spirit.

See also Resurrection.

 

SPIRIT OF MAN* The innermost being of the human person, corresponding with the nature of God, which is Spirit. Some scholars think the spirit is the same as the soul; others see a distinction. As such, some believe in the tripartite (threefold) nature of a human (cf. 1 Thes 5:23), spirit, soul, and body, as against a bipartite (twofold) nature, material and immaterial.

First Thessalonians 5:23 clearly speaks of a tripartite design for mankind. Other Scriptures see soul and spirit as the same. A clear case of the parallel (synonymous) use of soul and spirit (as in Jb 7:11; Is 26:9, etc.) is in Mary’s “Magnificat.” She says, “My soul magnifies the Lord, and my spirit has rejoiced in God my Savior” (Lk 1:47, nkjv). Rather than divide the two as “parts,” some have suggested that a human has a spirit and is a soul. Usually spirit indicates the vitalizing, energizing, empowering agent; it is that essence of the human being that corresponds with God’s nature and can commune with God, who is Spirit.

Those who are united to Christ experience spiritual union with him—his Spirit with their spirit. This is what Paul meant when he said, “He who joins himself to the Lord is one spirit” (1 Cor 6:17). Note that Paul does not say, “he who joins himself to the Spirit is one spirit”; he uses the word “Lord” as synonymous with “the Spirit.” Union with the Lord is a union of the human spirit with his Spirit. Since the day of regeneration, a believer’s human spirit is united to Christ’s Spirit. Look at John 3:6 (“that which is born of the Spirit is spirit”) and Romans 8:16 (“his Spirit bears witness with our spirit that we are the children of God”). These scriptures show that one’s union with Christ is based upon the regeneration of one’s spirit by the divine Spirit.