Holy Spirit is God. He is part of the Triune God. He becomes personal to us believers when we receive Him in our life and the Holy Spirit dwell in us. Dwell means “to live in”, it suggests that the Trinity or the person of God the Father, God the Son and the Holy Spirit resides in a believer’s heart not only living for a short while but forever. The work of the Holy Spirit is to empower and encourage every believer to live holy and pleasing to Him. Oftentimes I, myself were amazed with the help of the Holy Spirit. Many pastors testify that when they preached the Word of God with the help of the Holy Spirit people changed, but not only that they also set an example. Sometimes, I was tempted to join gambling to have more money but there is something in my heart that always telling me, ‘be an example’. I believe that the Holy Spirit is present to encourage me to live a godly life and helps me to be a better person as well. The works of the Holy Spirit give evidence of His deity.
John 14:15 tells us that Jesus gives us ‘another Counselor to be with ‘us forever - the Spirit of truth.’ In my understanding, the word ‘Counselor’ is a person or somebody who is always giving an advice to his/her counselee. Likewise the Holy Spirit is our automatic adviser. He advice in all aspects of our life, the way we think, talk and act. This is the advantage of the believers to the non-believers because believers have the extra ordinary counselor and that is the Holy Spirit.
Millard Erickson in his book Christian Theology shows us the history and different views about the Holy Spirit. It seems that they were contradicting. They were trying to picture out who or what the Holy Spirit looks like. But because of their difficulties in studying the Holy Spirit they can not come up with the same view. Perhaps, the orthodox view and the Christian view today hold on to this view that “the Holy Spirit is fully divine, consubstantial with the Father and the Son”. I do believe with this idea because the “Bible is rich with data about the Spirit from which a major theological segment can be readily constructed.”
Friedrich Schleiermacher mentioned and insisted that “religion is not a mater either of beliefs or behavior. It is not a matter or receiving and examining doctrines… rather feelings constitutes the essence of religion… ” I think he didn’t grasp what religion is. Religion is “people's beliefs and opinions concerning the existence, nature, and worship of a deity or deities”. As human beings, we need to study and examine what we believe so that we will not regret about our belief or faith whether it is true or not. The Holy Spirit is revealed in the Bible for us to know that He is true God and that He works in us and through us.
As Erickson concluded that the Holy Spirit is a person and that He is God and I strongly believe in it. Amen.
