What is the role of the Holy Spirit? What is His

Reveal Answer

in our lives?

• Helpful Definitions

// Wayne Grudem >> The work of the Holy Spirit is to manifest the active presence of God in the world, and especially in the church.

// New City Catechism >> [In the life of the believer] The Holy Spirit convicts us of our sin, comforts us, guides us, gives us spiritual gifts and the desire to obey God; and he enables us to pray and to understand God’s Word.

// Baptist Faith and Message >> The Holy Spirit is the Spirit of God, fully divine. He inspired holy men of old to write the Scriptures. Through illumination He enables men to understand truth. He exalts Christ. He convicts men of sin, of righteousness, and of judgment. He calls men to the Saviour, and effects regeneration. At the moment of regeneration He baptizes every believer into the Body of Christ. He cultivates Christian character, comforts believers, and bestows the spiritual gifts by which they serve God through His church. He seals the believer unto the day of final redemption. His presence in the Christian is the guarantee that God will bring the believer into the fullness of the stature of Christ. He enlightens and empowers the believer and the church in worship, evangelism, and service.

• Today, we move into the passage where Jesus begins to explicitly describe the person and work of the Holy Spirit.

15 “If you love me, you will keep my commandments.

• We believe that salvation is by grace through faith, not of works. However, once Jesus has transformed a person, the child of God is called to consistently live life under the expressed

of Jesus Christ.
• Wayne Grudem >> [One of the unique facets of the the doctrine of the Holy Spirit is that He] gives stronger or weaker evidence of the presence and blessing of God according to our response to Him.
• Obedience to the leadership of God through His Word is the key evidence of salvation and the key to fellowship with the Father, which is the

Reveal Answer

to the presence and leadership of the Spirit.
• V. 15 and v. 21 form a chiasm emphasizing obedience as the core of being a follower of Christ.

16 And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Helper, to be with you forever, 17 even the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees him nor knows him. You know him, for he dwells with you and will be in you.

• The Holy Spirit is the

sent from the Father
• Helper = Greek paraclete; literally one who comes alongside; also translated enabler, counselor, advocate, intercessor, helper, comforter
• Oswald Chambers >> Call the Comforter by the term you think best—Advocate, Helper, Paraclete, the word conveys the indefinable blessedness of His sympathy; an inward invisible kingdom that causes the saint to sing through every night of sorrow.
• The Holy Spirit

Reveal Answer

with us >> Paul calls Him the seal (Ephesians 1:13-14 | In him you also, when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation, and believed in him, were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit, 14 who is the guarantee of our inheritance until we acquire possession of it, to the praise of his glory.)

18 “I will not leave you as orphans; I will come to you. 19 Yet a little while and the world will see me no more, but you will see me. Because I live, you also will live. 20 In that day you will know that I am in my Father, and you in me, and I in you.

• The Holy Spirit is the literal

of God with us, the confirmation of our place in God’s family (“see me”) and of the reality of God’s existence and power.

// Romans 8:8-9, 11 | Those who are in the flesh cannot please God. 9 You, however, are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if in fact the Spirit of God dwells in you. Anyone who does not have the Spirit of Christ does not belong to him…11 If the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his Spirit who dwells in you.

// Romans 8:15 | For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received the Spirit of adoption as sons, by whom we cry, “Abba! Father!”
• The Holy Spirit is the

Reveal Answer

of God given to us.

// John 10:10 | The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy. I came that they may have life and have it abundantly.

// Philippians 2:12-13 | …work out your own salvation with fear and trembling, 13 for it is God who works in you, both to will and to work for his good pleasure.

21 Whoever has my commandments and keeps them, he it is who loves me. And he who loves me will be loved by my Father, and I will love him and manifest myself to him.”

• V. 15 and v. 21 form a bookend of obedience rooted in

.

What does this mean?

• Are you in the game or on the bench? There is no “bench” in the Christian life. God has given His Spirit to all believers so that we can live out the life of Christ in this world and bear witness to the fact that He is the source!
• Galatians 5:22-23 | But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, 23 gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law.
• Vance Havner >> [Peter and the other disciples] were not the same men and never were again. What happened? The Lord JESUS CHRIST had come from the grave with a new body, had promised them His Presence, had returned to the Father, had sent them the Paraclete. No other explanation can account for the early church…