I feel within the Holy Spirit

BY THE time we reach the clause in regards to the Holy Spirit within the Apostles’ Creed, we’re hurtling towards the tip (of the creed, though not of this series: following the liturgical calendar means taking clauses out of order). We might not be giving each line the eye it deserves. But what if we remain with those few words — “I feel within the Holy Spirit” — and look to search out in them an announcement of the Christian gospel? Will we discover it? We will, and greater than may very well be packed into this column.

For one thing, this clause in regards to the Holy Spirit is very important for fascinated by the excellent news, because, with it, the creed has accomplished its occupation of God as Trinity. With these words, the creed has now named Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

The Christian message — our Christian gospel — is nice news about God as Trinity. The threefold lifetime of God, replete in love and relation, is every part: it’s where the Christian proclamation springs from; and the form of the way it unfolds; and the destination to which we’re being drawn. The excellent news shouldn’t be about forgiveness handed down from some distant generic deity. It is reconciliation with the triune God. It is the drama of being drawn into that love and relation: into the relation of the Son to the Father; into that love which is the Holy Spirit. Only with the Trinity can we actually see the gospel for what it’s: an invite to be participants within the divine nature (2 Peter 1.4); an invite to be adopted as little kids through the Son; an invite to share within the fellowship that’s the Trinity, through the Holy Spirit.

THAT is all thoroughly, you would possibly say, but don’t move too quickly on to Trinity Sunday before you have got considered Pentecost. Fair enough. Then allow us to see that the sending of the Holy Spirit reiterates the gospel message we first hear with the incarnation, at Christmas: that “God is with us”. Christ’s departure on the Ascension, he tells us, opens up the best way for the Holy Spirit to be sent (John 16.7; Acts 2.17-18). The gospel of Pentecost is subsequently the proclamation of Christmas — “God is with us” — although in a unique key.

In its way, this presence of the Holy Spirit is yet more extensive than the incarnation, for the reason that Spirit is poured upon “all flesh” (Joel 2.28–29; Acts 2.33). In one other way, for us, it’s much more intimate, for the reason that Spirit enters everybody who receives him, whereas the person Jesus speaks to us externally, as one person speaks to a different. There is, then, emphatically, a proclamation of the gospel on this clause of the creed, extending and completing the message of God’s presence and solidarity.

THE Apostles’ Creed is mostly succinct. It is actually succinct here, with six words in English: “I feel within the Holy Spirit.” Let us subsequently turn for a moment to the Nicene Creed for some extra material. There, we read that the Holy Spirit is “the Lord and Giver of Life”. In that, too, we hear the gospel, since life lies at the center of the Christian announcement: “I got here that they could have life, and have it abundantly” (John 10.10).

There is a lot in this concept of the Spirit as “Giver of Life”. Although it takes us beyond all that we could imagine, all that’s ours by nature, it doesn’t despise nature, or run it down. Far from it: the gospel opens our eyes to creation as God’s gift, and to its goodness. The Spirit is the origin of life in nature, and the origin of the lifetime of grace; he creates; he saves; he elevates us to a dignity beyond that of any unfallen state.

FOR those used to hearing sermons, the more familiar point is likely to be that the Spirit, as “Giver of Life”, offers to those that turn to him a life beyond any we could imagine: a participation in God’s own life — abundant life, everlasting life. But there’s one other angle to the excellent news here: a proclamation in regards to the goodness of what we already experience, but may not understand; what lies around us, but may not appreciate. Biological life, social life: these, too, are the Spirit’s work and gift.

There seems to me something vital here in regards to the gospel. It each guarantees a life beyond nature and yet also celebrates the life and nature given in creation in latest and forceful ways. It takes us beyond God’s gift in creation; it also calls us to acknowledge that gift, and to live richly inside it. The gospel of the Spirit as Giver of Life meets the nihilism of our time — often now expressed as “post-human”, or “anti-human” — on two fronts directly. It opens up upon a destiny beyond what the created order could offer, with latest heavens and a latest earth, while also insisting in latest and dazzling ways on the worth and dignity of creation, and particularly of human life. Hence, so many within the Anglican social tradition have said that it follows from Christian theology to be lively in the availability of fine drains.

FINALLY, no less than for this temporary survey of the gospel within the creed’s clause in regards to the Holy Spirit, we should always recognise that the Spirit is known as as “Holy”. In this we hear the gospel’s call to repentance, for the reason that Spirit is holy, but we should not. That call shouldn’t be only God’s challenge and warning, but in addition his gift, since God wishes to work true holiness in us, conforming us to his Triune holiness (Leviticus 11.44-45; Matthew 5.48; Romans 8.29; 2 Thessalonians 2.13 — and spot the Trinitarian pattern in 1 Peter 1.2).

To see here one other aspect of the gospel in all the creed can be to be shown the gospel in all of Christian ethics. If holiness is God’s gift — a participation in his life, through the Spirit who’s the Giver of Life — then ethics shouldn’t be primarily about rules (and definitely not rules to be obeyed for the sake of obeying rules) but an invite to be imitators of God, caught up in his fellowship, sharing in “righteousness and peace and joy within the Holy Spirit” (Romans 14.17).

Perhaps, then, seeing the creed in a latest light, as a commentary on the gospel, might lead us to see Christian ethics — with all its rigours — in a latest light as well. There can be excellent news in all of our ethics. Consider Paul’s list of the fruit of the Spirit, where there’s each the decision to repentance (they stand in stark contrast, he writes, to the “works of the flesh”), and such a promise: “The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control” (Galatians 5.22-23). This, too, is the gospel.

The Revd Dr Andrew Davison is Regius Professor of Divinity within the University of Oxford, and a Canon Residentiary of Christ Church.

In the Old Testament:

“When you send forth your spirit, they’re created; and also you renew the face of the bottom.” (Psalm 104.30)

IT IS easy to forget the Holy Spirit’s work in creation (Genesis 1.2). One of the 2 great Western medieval hymns to the Holy Spirit offers a corrective, addressing the “Creator Spirit”. Our verse from a psalm connects the Spirit in creation to the work of restoration or recreation. When biblical authors are trying to find language that’s powerful to precise what God offers by the use of redemption, it appears that evidently often only repurposing the language of creation or birth will do (John 3.3; 2 Corinthians 5.17).

Augustine provocatively took this further, writing that redemption may even exceed creation: that it could be a greater work to make the ungodly righteous than to create righteous beings in the primary place (here fascinated by the hosts of heaven). The conjunction on this psalm reminds us that the Creator Spirit does something much more remarkable than abolishing the sinful creature and replacing it with one other: the Spirit renews the old, and recreates the broken.

In the New Testament:

“Now the Lord is the Spirit: and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there’s freedom” (2 Corinthians 3.17).

THIS verse turns up as an interjection inside Paul’s discussion of how a Christian should relate to the law. Although this verse emphasises freedom, the suggestion shouldn’t be that the Holy Spirit dispenses with the law, as if that meant setting aside what the law teaches us about right and unsuitable, or the character of God. Instead, the Spirit helps us to live in response to the character of God out of affection, relatively than fear. It internalises the law for us, and helps us to thrill in holiness. That is what it means here for the Spirit to bring freedom.

Paul underlines that in the following verse. This freedom is rooted within the transformation of who we’re: “We all, with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord, are being become his likeness.” This reminds us that the gospel guarantees a really extraordinary newness of life: making us holy through the holiness of Christ, and free by the liberty of his Spirit.

Quotations

“Knowledge of the divine individuals was essential for us . . . chiefly, that we might imagine rightly in regards to the salvation of the human race, achieved by the Incarnate Son, and by the gift of the Holy Spirit.” Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae I, q. 32, a. 1, reply to the objection 3.

“The Spirit flew away from us due to sin, however the one who knew no sin became one among us in order that the Spirit might turn out to be accustomed to stay in us. . . Therefore, Christ receives the Spirit through himself for us, and he restores to our nature the unique good.” Cyril of Alexandria, Commentary on John, Book II, ch. 1, on John 1.32-33.

“Through the Holy Spirit comes the restoration to paradise, the ascent to the dominion of heaven, the return to adopted sonship, the liberty to call God our Father and to turn out to be a companion of the grace of Christ, to be called a toddler of sunshine, to take part in everlasting glory, and usually, to have all fullness of blessing on this age and the age to return. We see as in a mirror the grace, as already present, of the products laid up in store for us in guarantees, and we enjoy these goods through faith.” Basil, On the Holy Spirit, ch.15.36.

“For as God alone can properly bear witness to his own words, so these words won’t obtain full credit within the hearts of men, until they’re sealed by the inward testimony of the Spirit.” John Calvin, Institutes, I.7.4, I.72.

“The external word is of no avail by itself, unless animated by the ability of the Spirit.” John Calvin, Commentary on the First Twenty Chapters of Ezekiel, on Ezek. 2.1-2.

“The Father justifies effectively; the Son, meritoriously; the Holy Spirit, applicationally.” Herman Bavinck, Reformed Dogmatics, IV, 205.