As spirit is nothing less than the inmost principle of life, and the spirit of man is man himself, so the spirit of God must be God (see 1 Cor. 2:11—Meyer). Christian experience, moreover, expressed as it is in the prayers and hymns of the church, furnishes an argument for the deity of the Holy Spirit similar to that for the deity of Jesus Christ. When our eyes are opened to see Christ as a Savior, we are compelled to recognize the work in us of a divine Spirit who has taken of the things of Christ and has shown them to us; and this divine Spirit we necessarily distinguish both from the Father and from the Son. Christian experience, however, is not an original and independent witness to the deity of the Holy Spirit: it simply shows what the church has held to be the natural and unforced interpretation of the Scriptures, and so confirms the Scripture argument already adduced.
The Holy Spirit is God himself personally present in the believer. E. G. Robinson: “If ‘Spirit of God’ no more implies deity than does ‘angel of God,’ why is not the Holy Spirit called simply the angel or messenger, of God?” Walker, The Spirit and the Incarnation, 337—“The Holy Spirit is God in his innermost being or essence, the principle of life of both the Father and the Son; that in which God, both as Father and Son, does everything, and in which he comes to us and is in us increasingly through his manifestations. Through the working and indwelling of this Holy Spirit, God in his person of Son was fully incarnate in Christ.” Gould, Am. Com. on 1 Cor. 2:11—“For who among men knoweth the things of a man, save the spirit of the man, which is in him? even so the things of [pg 317]God none knoweth, save the Spirit of God”—“The analogy must not be pushed too far, as if the Spirit of God and God were coëxtensive terms, as the corresponding terms are, substantially, in man. The point of the analogy is evidently self-knowledge, and in both cases the contrast is between the spirit within and anything outside.” Andrew Murray, Spirit of Christ, 140—“We must not expect always to feel the power of the Spirit when it works. Scripture links power and weakness in a wonderful way, not as succeeding each other but as existing together. ‘I was with you in weakness ... my preaching was in power’ (1 Cor. 2:3); ‘when I am weak then am I strong’ (2 Cor. 12:10). The power is the power of God given to faith, and faith grows strong in the dark.... He who would command nature must first and most absolutely obey her.... We want to get possession of the Power, and use it. God wants the Power to get possession of us, and use us.”
This proof of the deity of the Holy Spirit is not invalidated by the limitations of his work under the Old Testament dispensation. John 7:39—“for the Holy Spirit was not yet”—means simply that the Holy Spirit could not fulfill his peculiar office as Revealer of Christ until the atoning work of Christ should be accomplished.
John 7:39 is to be interpreted in the light of other Scriptures which assert the agency of the Holy Spirit under the old dispensation (Ps. 51:11—“take not thy holy Spirit from me”) and which describe his peculiar office under the new dispensation (John 16:14, 15—“he shall take of mine, and shall declare it unto you”). Limitation in the manner of the Spirit's work in the O. T. involved a limitation in the extent and power of it also. Pentecost was the flowing forth of a tide of spiritual influence which had hitherto been dammed up. Henceforth the Holy Spirit was the Spirit of Jesus Christ, taking of the things of Christ and showing them, applying his finished work to human hearts, and rendering the hitherto localized Savior omnipresent with his scattered followers to the end of time.
Under the conditions of his humiliation, Christ was a servant. All authority in heaven and earth was given him only after his resurrection. Hence he could not send the Holy Spirit until he ascended. The mother can show off her son only when he is fully grown. The Holy Spirit could reveal Christ only when there was a complete Christ to reveal. The Holy Spirit could fully sanctify, only after the example and motive of holiness were furnished in Christ's life and death. Archer Butler: “The divine Artist could not fitly descend to make the copy, before the original had been provided.”
And yet the Holy Spirit is “the eternal Spirit” (Heb. 9:14), and he not only existed, but also wrought, in Old Testament times. 2 Pet. 1:21—“men spake from God, being moved by the Holy Spirit”—seems to fix the meaning of the phrase “the Holy Spirit,” where it appears in the O. T. Before Christ “the Holy Spirit was not yet” (John 7:39), just as before Edison electricity was not yet. There was just as much electricity in the world before Edison as there is now. Edison has only taught us its existence and how to use it. Still we can say that, before Edison, electricity, as a means of lighting, warming and transporting people, had no existence. So until Pentecost, the Holy Spirit, as the revealer of Christ, “was not yet.”Augustine calls Pentecost the dies natalis, or birthday, of the Holy Spirit; and for the same reason that we call the day when Mary brought forth her firstborn son the birthday of Jesus Christ, though before Abraham was born, Christ was. The Holy Spirit had been engaged in the creation, and had inspired the prophets, but officially, as Mediator between men and Christ, “the Holy Spirit was not yet.” He could not show the things of Christ until the things of Christ were ready to be shown. See Gordon, Ministry of the Spirit, 19-25; Prof. J. S. Gubelmann, Person and Work of the Holy Spirit in O. T. Times. For proofs of the deity of the Holy Spirit, see Walker, Doctrine of the Holy Spirit; Hare, Mission of the Comforter; Parker, The Paraclete; Cardinal Manning, Temporal Mission of the Holy Ghost; Dick, Lectures on Theology, 1:341-350. Further references will be given in connection with the proof of the Holy Spirit's personality.
2. Intimations of the Old Testament.
The passages which seem to show that even in the Old Testament there are three who are implicitly recognized as God may be classed under four heads: