Fourth Sunday After Pentecost
Fourth Sunday After Pentecost
Light of Christ Anglican Church
The Rev. Michael Moffitt July 6th, 2025
Romans 8:1–11
Recently I had the pleasure of watching a videotape of President Ronald Reagon giving his last speech as the President of the United States. He made the point that you can go and live in any another country, for instance France. You will never be considered French but an American living in France. The same is true in every other country. It’s like living on the Northern Neck of Virginia, if you are born here you are “a been here” but, and I don’t care if you have lived here for 50 years, unless you were born here you’re a “come here.”
Reagon pointed out that you can come from anywhere else but once you become a citizen, you’re an American.
The same principle is true of being a Christian, by that I mean a “Christ follower.” The truth is that many, many people go to church and consider themselves Christian’s, but going to church doesn’t make you a Christian any more than standing in a garage makes you a car.
Our Epistle reading from Romans 8:1–11 makes it clear that the evidence of being in Christ is setting our mind on the things of the Spirit, as opposed to setting our hearts on the things of the flesh. In verse 7 Paul writes,
For the mind set on the flesh is hostile to God, for it does not submit to God’s law, indeed it cannot. Those who are in the flesh cannot please God.
Over the past several months I’ve been focusing on the Bible’s revelation of the Holy Spirit, the 3rd person of the Trinity. It’s not uncommon for Christians to focus more on the Father and the Son, and when they do consider the Holy Spirit it’s often concerning the gifts of the Spirit.
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As important as they are that’s only a small fraction of what the Bible has to teach us about the Holy Spirit.
For the most part in the Old Testament, the people of God didn’t even know who the Holy Spirit was. It wasn’t until the New Testament that Jesus began to reveal the Holy Spirit as a distinct person within the Trinity, and as the person of the Godhead who’s most intimately involved in our lives.
Remember that Jesus sought to comfort the disciples by promising that when he left them it was a great thing because he would send back the Helper, the Holy Spirit. At this point they didn’t have any real reference as to why this was to their advantage. What they knew was that Jesus was leaving, and their hearts were broken.
But Jesus knew that it was the Holy Spirit who would open the hearts and minds of unbelievers making belief possible and He would reveal all that Jesus had told them. The Holy Spirit would open them up to all that God had for them.
So often those who haven’t yet understood this treat the Holy Spirit as an add on or a bonus given to those who invite Jesus Christ to be the Lord of their lives. In reality the Holy Spirit completes the work of the Trinity in our lives.
The truth is that it’s the Holy Spirit who enables us to faithfully follow Jesus Christ. In John 16:13–14,
“When the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all the truth, for he will not speak on his own authority, but whatever he hears he will speak, and he will declare to you the things that are to come. 14 He will glorify me, for he will take what is mine and declare it to you.”
It was when the Holy Spirit was poured out at Pentecost upon those who had been waiting for Him that the words of truth taught them by Jesus came into focus for the first time.
So with that in mind, this is the first sermon in a series on the person and work of the Holy Spirit. My intent is to help us understand that the Holy Spirit is a full and equal member of the Godhead (Trinity), and it’s through Him that God moves in us in extraordinary ways.
Historically, the doctrine of the Holy Spirit as a distinct, uncreated person of the
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Trinity took a long time to develop. This was due largely to the fact that God chose to reveal this aspect of his being over time. And as God revealed more and more of himself, we began to develop a fuller understanding of his Trinitarian nature.
Traditionally, systematic theologians have defined the Trinity by saying: God has three persons, but only one essence.
By the term “person,” we mean a distinct, self-aware personality. And by the term “essence,” we’re referring to God’s being, his fundamental nature, or the substance of which he consists. I realize that this type of explanation might sound cold or impersonal, but nothing could be further from the truth. It’s just that there is nothing in our experience with which we can compare to the Trinity that really provides an adequate example.
The doctrine of the Trinity was hinted at in the Old Testament, but only the person of the Father was expressed with much clarity. In the New Testament, all three persons of the Trinity were fully revealed: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. And the nature of their relationship with each other was also defined. It was in the early church that all those details were formulated into theological doctrines that Christians have embraced ever since. By early church I mean the first 3–4 centuries.
In this series we’ll begin our search for the Holy Spirit in the beginning of God’s word. So today we’ll begin to see how the Holy Spirit appears in the Old Testament, and a hint at what the New Testament teaches about him.
Now, we know that God has always existed in Trinity. And the personal distinctions between the Father, Son and the Holy Spirit have always been true of him. All three persons are, and always have been, uncreated and fully God. But during the days of the Old Testament, God’s people didn’t understand that God existed in three persons. They simply knew and worshiped him as the one true God. Of course, we can see hints throughout the Old Testament that the Holy Spirit is a distinct person. But it’s only with the clarity of the New Testament that we can recognize these hints.
The 20th century theologian B.B. Warfield, compared the Old Testament to a room that’s richly furnished but poorly lit. He said that when we introduce better lighting, it doesn’t change what’s in the room. It simply enables us to see the
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things that were already there. Listen to how Warfield applied this idea to the Trinity in his work The Biblical Doctrine of the Trinity, published in 1915:
The mystery of the Trinity is not revealed in the Old Testament; but the mystery of the Trinity underlies the Old Testament revelation, and here and there almost comes into view. Thus the Old Testament revelation of God is not corrected by the fuller revelation which follows it, but only perfected, extended and enlarged.
There are many ways to investigate the Holy Spirit in the Old Testament. But for our purposes, we’ll focus on the Old Testament’s references to God’s Spirit, and on how those references indicate the Spirit’s divinity or deity, and his personhood. Let’s look first at some Old Testament references to God’s Spirit.
The Old Testament uses several names for God’s Spirit, including “Holy Spirit,” “Spirit of God,” “Spirit of the Lord,” and, sometimes, when God is speaking, “my Spirit.” In the Old Testament, the Hebrew translated as “spirit” is ruach. In general terms, ruach can refer to a variety of things. It can be wind or breath. In animals, it can be the principle of life that animates them. In human beings, our ruach is often our immortal soul. Ruach can also refer to spirits that don’t have material bodies. But when used of God, it’s generally either a synonym for God himself, or it refers to his personal presence and active engagement with creation.
In the names “Spirit of God,” “my Spirit,” and “Spirit of the Lord,” ruach is combined with a name or pronoun for God, indicating that God’s Spirit is associated with God in some way, or that it actually is God. And the Old Testament name “Holy Spirit” couples ruach with the Hebrew word qodesh, meaning “holiness.” God’s qodesh or “holiness” is his “otherness” or “apartness” — his quality of being different from his creation. It includes things like his absolute moral purity, as well as the splendor of his appearance. The same word is also reflected in other names for God, like “the Holy One,” as we see in places like 2 Kings 19:22, Isaiah 30:11–15, and Hosea 11:9–12.
When we speak of the Holy Spirit’s divinity or deity, we have in mind that the Spirit is actually the uncreated God, and not simply one of God’s agents. As we’ve seen, Old Testament references to God’s Spirit sometimes identify God himself and sometimes describe his engagement with creation. But in both cases, they point to his eternal, uncreated divinity. We’ll consider three Old Testament characteristics of God’s Spirit that point to his divinity, beginning with references
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that equate the Spirit with God himself.
Let’s look first at a passage written by the prophet Isaiah. After describing the ways God had saved and redeemed Israel, Isaiah criticized the way Israel had responded to God. Listen to what he wrote in Isaiah 63:10:
They rebelled and grieved his Holy Spirit. So he turned and became their enemy and he himself fought against them.
Isaiah applied the name Holy Spirit to God himself, probably to emphasize that God’s holiness was what caused him to take offense at their sin. This is similar to the grieving of the Holy Spirit that Paul warned against in Ephesians 4:30. And in response, God punished his people by fighting against them. And listen to how Isaiah continued in 63:11–14:
Then his people recalled the days of old, the days of Moses and his people—where is he who brought them through the sea … who set his Holy Spirit among them, who sent his glorious arm of power to be at Moses’ right hand, who divided the waters before them, to gain for himself everlasting renown, who led them through the depths? … they were given rest by the Spirit of the Lord. This is how you guided your people to make for yourself a glorious name.
Isaiah referred to the miracles God had performed when he rescued Israel from Egypt. These included dividing the Red Sea, allowing the Israelites to cross unharmed, and drowning Pharaoh’s army. These miracles are also recorded in Exodus 14, 15. In Exodus 15:3–6, Moses wrote:
“The Lord is a warrior; the Lord is his name. Pharaoh’s chariots and his army he has hurled into the sea… Your right hand, O Lord, was majestic in power. Your right hand, O Lord, shattered the enemy.”
Here, it’s clear that the Lord himself performed these works. So, when Isaiah attributed them to God’s “Holy Spirit” and to the “Spirit of the Lord” in Isaiah 63, he intended his original audience to interpret these as names for God himself.
In addition, when Moses spoke of God’s “right hand” winning the victory, he was using metaphoric language that compared God to a human warrior. And his point was that God himself had directly entered and won the battle. In the same way, when Isaiah later equated God’s Holy Spirit to God’s arm, he meant that God himself was invisibly present as a warrior fighting on behalf of his people.
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And something similar is often true of the name “Spirit of God.” For instance, listen to Genesis 1:2,
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 deep.
In Job 33:4, “The Spirit of God has made me, and the breath of the Almighty gives me life.”
And in Psalm 106:32, 33, “he is God, the Lord, against whom the Israelites rebelled and grumbled at Meribah.” The result was that they made the “Spirit of the Lord bitter.” In these and many other places, the context identifies or equates the Spirit of God with God himself. The most astounding part of these examples is that they reveal that God is involved with His creation, in every aspect.
A second fact that points to the divinity of God’s Spirit in the Old Testament is that the Spirit empowered prophecy and visions.
When the Spirit of God inspired Old Testament prophecies and visions, he often revealed knowledge that only God could possess. And he also delegated authority to the prophets to speak on God’s behalf. In all these situations, it’s reasonable to conclude that the Spirit of God was actually God himself.
But one of the most dramatic movements of the Spirit of God happened to the wicked prophet Balaam in the book of Numbers. Throughout Numbers 22–24, Balaam was willing to curse Israel on behalf of their enemy Balak, king of Moab. Four times he tried to speak a curse on Israel, but Balaam admitted that he could only curse Israel if the Lord permitted it. And contrary to Balak and Balaam’s intentions, the only prophecies Balaam could deliver were blessings on Israel. God so overwhelmed Balaam that the prophet was incapable of saying anything God hadn’t commanded.
In Numbers 24:2–4, we find this record of Balaam’s encounter with the Spirit of God:
And Balaam lifted up his eyes and saw Israel camping tribe by tribe. And the Spirit of God came upon him, 3 and hetook up his discourse and said, “The oracle of Balaam the son of Beor, the oracle of the man whose eye is opened, 4 the oracle of him who hears the words of God, who sees the vision of the Almighty, falling down with his eyes uncovered…”
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The Spirit of God provided Balaam with the words of God and a vision from the Almighty. This explained why Balaam, a pagan prophet failed to curse Israel— God himself provided the words that Balaam was compelled to speak.
Like the “Spirit of God,” the “Spirit of the Lord” was also the source of prophecies, indicating that this name could also refer directly to God. In Numbers 11:29, Moses revealed that the Lord’s Spirit was the source of his own prophetic gift, as well as of the gifts of other Israelite prophets. In Ezekiel 11:5, the Spirit of the Lord put God’s words in the mouth of the prophet Ezekiel.
King David’s last words before his death directly equate the Spirit of the Lord with the God of Israel himself. Listen to what David said in 2 Samuel 23:2–3,
“The Spirit of the Lord speaks by me; his word is on my tongue. 3 The God of Israel has spoken; the Rock of Israel has said to me: When one rules justly over men, ruling in the fear of God…”
Finally, God himself used the name “my Spirit” to describe the pouring out of the spiritual gift of prophecy on all his people during the last days. In Joel 2:28–29, God said:
“I will pour out my Spirit on all people. Your sons and daughters will prophesy, your old men will dream dreams, your young men will see visions. Even on my servants, both men and women, I will pour out my Spirit in those days.”
In Acts 2:1–29, the apostle Peter taught that this prophecy was fulfilled when God poured out the Holy Spirit on the church at Pentecost. In other words, Joel’s Old Testament reference to God’s Spirit ultimately refers to the person of the Holy Spirit. The very one that Jesus had commanded to return to Jerusalem and wait for. The one that Jesus promised to send.
Again, this doesn’t mean that Joel’s prophecy explicitly declared the existence of the third person of the Trinity. But it does mean that the Spirit in Joel’s prophecy was none other than God himself.
The third Old Testament characteristic that points to the divinity or deity of God’s Spirit is that he imparted special skill and knowledge to select human beings.
For example, in Exodus 31:3 and 35:31, God filled the craftsmen Bezalel and
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Oholiab with his Spirit so that they could craft the tabernacle and its furnishings. The idea was that God personally blessed them with enhanced abilities and knowledge to ensure that their work would please him.
This was particularly important because, according to Exodus 25:9, 40, the craftsmen were to pattern the earthly tabernacle after the heavenly one. So, they had to have sufficient skill and knowledge of all the crafts necessary to complete this task, such as metalworking, woodworking, stone cutting, embroidery, art, and every other craft necessary to build the tabernacle. It’s important to note that these men had never visited the Heavenly tabernacle.
Most of the Old Testament references to this kind of anointing and gifting refer to the Spirit as the “Spirit of the Lord,” using his covenant name Yahweh. This was probably to emphasize the covenantal nature of these offices, which reported directly to God as their Sovereign.
An example of this can be found in the transfer of this anointing from Israel’s first king Saul to his successor David. Listen to 1 Samuel 16:13–14:
Samuel took the horn of oil and anointed [David] in the presence of his brothers, and from that day on the Spirit of the Lord came upon David in power … Now the Spirit of the Lord had departed from Saul. (1 Samuel 16:13–14).
David received the Holy Spirit when he was anointed as king, even though he hadn’t yet ascended Israel’s throne and wouldn’t for 15 years. Similarly, Saul lost the Holy Spirit’s supernatural blessing and gifting, even though he still ruled as king.
Later, after David sinned with Bathsheba and had her husband killed to hide the adultery and the child that was to be born, he feared the same thing might happen to him. So, in Psalm 51:11, he begged to keep God’s Holy Spirit. He wasn’t asking to keep the throne—he expected to be able to keep that, just as Saul had kept it even when he sinned. Instead, David asked to keep God’s empowering presence that enabled him to carry out God’s royal will.
The Old Testament clearly shows that God is personal. So, when we say that the Old Testament demonstrates the Spirit’s personhood, we don’t mean that it points to him as distinct from the Father and the Son. We just mean that it proves him to be a fully divine, uncreated person.
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As we know, impersonal forces don’t exhibit emotions. Only persons do. In our own lives, we experience grief, anger, joy and many other emotions. And Scripture describes the Holy Spirit in similar ways.
Second, we see the Spirit’s personhood in passages that speak of him actively engaging in relationships with humanity. For instance, in the story of the flood of Noah’s day, Genesis 6:3 speaks of God’s Spirit contending or striving with humanity. This contending was personal because it involved evaluating and intelligently responding to humanity’s sin. There may even be a suggestion that God’s Spirit flooded the world only after his patience had run its course. Impersonal forces don’t contend with us, respond intelligently, or demonstrate patience. In order for the Spirit to do these things, he had to be a person.
Third, the Spirit’s personhood is demonstrated by people’s response to his authority. As just one example, Exodus 17:1–7 records the people’s rebellion at the waters of Meribah. In this account, the people complained to Moses that there was no water for them to drink, and they “put the Lord to the test.”
Psalm 106:33 recalls this same event saying that the people “rebelled against the Spirit of God.” Now, of course, people can rebel against impersonal laws and institutions. But when Psalm 106 says that the people rebelled against God’s Spirit, it means that they rebelled against the Lord who had authority over them, not just against his rules.
In the coming weeks we will be considering the Holy Spirit’s work in creation, in the church, and in the lives of his people. Please pray that the Holy Spirit will open our hearts and our minds in such a way as to forever change us into the people of God we’re intended to be. If we are to actually be the “Light of Christ” to those around us this is essential.
Let’s pray.
