HOLY SPIRIT

The Holy Spirit is a divine being who is "spirit" in nature (Lk. 24:39), and "holy" in character. (a) The Holy Spirit is not a mere force (as some cultists insist, e.g., the "Jehovah's Witnesses"); rather, he is an individual entity, a person, who speaks, teaches, helps, etc. (1 Tim. 4:1; Jn. 14:26; Rom. 8:26). (b) The Spirit is a separate person from both the Father and the Son (Mt. 28:19; Jn. 14:16; 15:26). (c) He possesses the very nature of God (Acts 5:3-4). (d) He empowered Christ (Jn. 3:34-35; Acts 10:38), the apostles (Acts 1:5; 2:4), and certain persons upon whom the apostles laid their hands (Acts 8:18; 19:6) to perform supernatural works as a validation of their messages. (e) The Spirit endowed the household of Cornelius with the ability to speak supernaturally in other languages in order to establish the fact that Gentiles were to be granted the gospel (Acts 10, 11). (f) Christians receive the Holy Spirit (in a non-miraculous measure) when they are baptized into Christ (Acts 2:38; 1 Cor. 6:19; Gal. 4:6). The Spirit assists God's children in their prayers (Rom. 8:26). (g) The Spirit directed the writers of the Bible in the messages which they produced (2 Sam. 23:2; Acts 1:16; 1 Tim. 4:1) so that these documents can be accepted as the very words of God (1 Thes. 2:13).