The Life-Giving Spirit

THE LIFE-GIVING SPIRIT

What the Bible teaches about the Holy Spirit

By Pastor Brian Wilbur 

Date: February 22, 2026

Series: The Basics of the Christian Faith

Note: Unless otherwise noted, Scripture quotations are from The ESV® Bible (The Holy Bible, English Standard Version®), copyright © 2001 by Crossway. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

INTRODUCTION

We declare in the Apostles’ Creed, “I believe in the Holy Spirit”. This confession of belief in the Holy Spirit is expanded in the Nicene Creed, which says, “We believe in the Holy Spirit, the Lord and Giver of life, who proceeds from the Father and the Son, who with the Father and the Son is worshipped and glorified, who has spoken through the prophets.” In the South Paris Baptist Church Articles of Faith, we likewise confess faith in the person and work of the Holy Spirit. And our Church Covenant begins, “Having been led by the Holy Spirit to receive the Lord Jesus Christ as our Savior”.

Understanding the Holy Spirit in terms of who He is and what He does is essential to a healthy Christian life, and that’s why we are considering Him now in this seventh sermon in The Basics of the Christian Faith series. We don’t want to be like those dozen men in Acts 19 who, when Paul asked them, “Did you receive the Holy Spirit when you believed?”, answered, “No, we have not even heard that there is a Holy Spirit.” (Acts 19:2) By God’s grace, their ignorance was quickly remedied, and so might ours.

One pastor named Mark Christian made the observation:

“It's easy to understand God the Father. It's easy to understand Jesus as King and Savior. But the Holy Spirit often seems background theology, optional, use it when needed.”[1]

We don’t want the Holy Spirit to be “background theology”. While it is perfectly true that the Holy Spirit’s aim is to glorify not Himself but the Lord Jesus Christ, and in that sense we ought to be more focused upon Jesus than upon the Spirit, nevertheless the Bible teaches us about the Holy Spirit and His crucial role in creation, in salvation, and in the transformation and fruitfulness of God’s people. The very fact that we are instructed to “keep in step with the Spirit” (Galatians 5:25) drives home how important it is for us to be mindful of the Spirit’s holy presence and leadership in our lives.

So let’s listen to what the Bible tells us about the Holy Spirit.

THE HOLY SPIRIT: WHO HE IS AND WHAT HE DOES

The Holy Spirit is one of the three members of the Trinity

To begin with, we must understand that the Holy Spirit is one of the three divine persons who constitute the blessed Trinity. We believe in the Triune God. We believe in one God who eternally and always exists in three persons: the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. One God, three persons. Basil of Caesarea, one of the early church fathers of the fourth century, wrote:

“It is impossible to conceive of Him [the Holy Spirit] as separated from the Father and the Son. For He is not ranked with them as a stranger, nor does He exist apart from them; but in every operation He is inseparably conjoined with Them.”[2]

Amen. The Holy Spirit is the Spirit of the Father and of the Son. And the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit always work together in perfect harmony as they carry out the works of creation, providence, and redemption. Alistair Begg put it this way: the Father plans, the Son procures, and the Holy Spirit applies.[3] Or we might say: the Father is the architect, the Son is the on-site engineer, and the Holy Spirit is the project superintendent. Of course, words fail to fully capture the infinite three-in-one God. But Scripture teaches it, and we believe it.

If you find it difficult to wrap your mind around the Trinity, that is as it should be. Scripture aims to reveal and affirm the reality of the Trinity, but Scripture doesn’t aim to explain all the metaphysics and inner workings. How could we wrap our minds around infinite Deity anyway? But I do hope that you can see the clear Trinitarian structure of the New Testament. For example:

• “Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit” (Matthew 28:19).

• “The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ and the love of God and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all.” (2 Corinthians 13:14)

• “Peter, an apostle of Jesus Christ, [to] those who are elect exiles of the Dispersion in Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia, according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, in the sanctification of the Spirit, for obedience to Jesus Christ and for sprinkling with his blood: May grace and peace be multiplied to you.” (1 Peter 1:1-2)

• “Nowthere are varieties of gifts, butthe same Spirit; and there are varieties of service, but the same Lord; and there are varieties of activities, but it is the same God who empowers them all in everyone.” (1 Corinthians 12:4-6)

The Holy Trinity is beautifully portrayed at the baptism of our Lord:

“And when Jesus was baptized, immediately he went up from the water, and behold, the heavens were opened to him, and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and coming to rest on him, and behold, a voice from heaven said, “This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased.”” (Matthew 3:16-17)

The Trinity is much more than an abstract doctrine to affirm, for the Trinitarian nature of God shows us that God, in God’s inner life, has eternally and always existed in community, in the inter-relationships between Father, Son, and Spirit. This means that God has eternally and always existed in love. The love shared between Father, Son, and Spirit is essential to understanding God. When you think of the true God, do not think of one person alone in the eternal past who decided that it would be nice to have some company, and so in His aloneness and perhaps loneliness He decided to create a world full of relationships, so that even He Himself could get in on the joy of inter-personal relationships. Do not think that! That is not the right picture! Instead, understand that God has always known the sheer joy of inter-personal, loving relationships. It is for this reason that God created a world full of persons in community, full of inter-dependent relationships, full of love, because that’s what God is like in His inner being.

The Holy Spirit comes to us from the world of eternal Trinitarian love, and He endeavors to make that love known to us, and to draw us into it, so that the holy love of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit shapes our entire lives. It is no wonder that “the fruit of the Spirit is”, first and foremost, “love” (Galatians 5:22).

The Holy Spirit is personal

Second, we must be clear and emphasize that the Holy Spirit is a person, and thus He undertakes His work as a person in a personal way. The Holy Spirit isn’t an it, an impersonal force, or abstract power. In John 16, Jesus speaks of the Holy Spirit as a “He”, not as an ‘it’. While an impersonal force might be felt in various ways, the Holy Spirit does things that persons do: He convicts (John 16:8), He guides (John 16:13), He hears (John 16:13), He speaks (John 16:13), He declares (John 16:14-15), He glorifies (John 16:14), He apportions (1 Corinthians 12:11), He chooses (1 Corinthians 12:11), He “helps us in our weakness” (Romans 8:26).[4] Furthermore, since He is a person, He can be sinned against: He can be blasphemed (Matthew 12:31), He can be lied to (Acts 5:3), He can be resisted (Acts 7:51), He can be grieved (Ephesians 4:30), He can be quenched (1 Thessalonians 5:19), and He can be outraged (Hebrews 10:29). Like the Father and the Son, the Holy Spirit is an intelligent, relational, and personal being who cares deeply about the Father and the Son, and who cares deeply about God’s will for the world, for the church, and for our own individual and family lives.

So when we think, in view of Ephesians 5:18, that we ought to live under the controlling influence of the Holy Spirit, we must not think that we ought to live under the sway of the force (which easily becomes keeping in step with our feelings), but instead we must think that we ought to live under the superintendence of a divine Person who cares deeply for us and who is utterly committed to advancing God’s purpose in and through our lives. When Christians call the Holy Spirit “their best friend”, they are capturing the personal nature of the Holy Spirit’s work in our lives.

The Holy Spirit is powerful

But though we may think of the Holy Spirit as our best friend, we must hasten to add that He is no ordinary friend. Thirdly, then, we must confess that the Holy Spirit is powerful – infinitely powerful, in fact, though He expresses His power in measured ways.

There are several Scripture passages that highlight the Holy Spirit’s power. At the very beginning, at that moment when “God created the heavens and the earth” (Genesis 1:1), “the Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the waters.” (Genesis 1:2) Thus we surmise that God’s Spirit had an animating function in the creation of the world. In fact, Psalm 33 reflects back on Genesis 1 and says this: “By the word of the LORD the heavens were made, and by the breath of his mouth all their host.” (Psalm 33:6) Do you see how this statement is a reflection on Genesis 1? If you were to ask how God created the heavens and the earth in Genesis 1, you could suggest two answers. First, God created the universe by speaking, right? Over and over again in Genesis 1 the phrase recurs, “And God said”. So Psalm 33 says, “By the word of the LORD the heavens were made”. Second, we could also say that the Spirit of God, or the breath of God (for the word translated ‘Spirit’ can also be translated ‘breath), was present and also involved in some way, for the breath or Spirit of God “[hovered] over the… waters.” So Psalm 33 says, “by the breath of his mouth all their host [were made].” Thus God’s Word and God’s Spirit were essential agents in the formation of the universe.

Furthermore, Psalm 104 tells us that God’s Spirit is key to the creation of living creatures, of creatures that have within them the breath of life. After describing God’s providential care for living creatures, for the beasts of the field, wild donkeys, the birds of the heavens, the livestock, the stork, the wild goats, the rock badgers, the beasts of the forest, the young lions, the sea creatures, and even mankind, Psalm 104 then tells us, “When you hide your face, they are dismayed; when you take away their breath, they die and return to the dust. When you send forth your Spirit [or your breath], they are created, and you renew the face of the ground.” (Psalm 104:29-30) The Holy Spirit is the life-giving Spirit.

How is it that the virgin Mary would have a child conceived in her womb without the involvement of a man? Here is the answer she was given? “The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you; therefore the child to be born will be called holy – the Son of God.” (Luke 1:35) The same Spirit who hovered over the waters at the beginning of creation, hovered over Mary’s womb at the turning of the ages, to facilitate the incarnation of God’s Son as a male child in Mary’s womb. He is the life-giving Spirit, full of creative power.

The Holy Spirit not only gives life to creatures in general; He is also the One who gives spiritual life to those who trust Jesus. Jesus said, “It is the Spirit who gives life; the flesh is no help at all. The words that I have spoken to you are spirit and life.” (John 6:63) The Holy Spirit is the One who births people into the kingdom of God: “That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit.” (John 3:6)

The Holy Spirit is powerful to create, mighty to save, and strong to heal, regenerate, and renew.

The Holy Spirit is purposeful

Fourthly, the Holy Spirit is purposeful.

One of the ways that Christians commonly describe meekness is ‘strength under control’. Are you familiar with that concept? But have you ever thought there is no one in all the universe who is more characterized by ‘strength under control’ than God Himself. I mean, God is absolute and infinite power – more powerful than the sun, more powerful than the ocean waves, more powerful than the greatest electricity storage stations on the planet, more powerful than the combined military might of all nations on earth, more powerful than all the demonic hosts and all the diseases that afflict humanity, and more powerful than death itself. And yet, far from throwing His weight around in random and senseless ways, far from expressing Himself merely as raw power, He exercises His power in careful and deliberate ways in order to bring about and sustain a beautiful world with diverse living creatures. Instead of overwhelming us with raw power, He invites us into His life, into His goodness, into His wisdom. And He lends to us breath and life and movement and power, so that we can be meaningful participants in this beautiful, inter-dependent world that He made.

Think about this: the infinitely powerful Spirit of God is present in the church and He indwells each believer, and yet He quite obviously isn’t blowing things up or consuming us. He is moving in ever mysterious ways in order to bring about God’s good purpose in and through our lives.

So the Holy Spirit is an infinitely powerful divine person who is intent on advancing God’s purpose. He is purposeful. What is His purpose? That’s a good question, isn’t it?

I’m not going to attempt to give you a list of all the activities of the Holy Spirit, but let’s focus our attention on His overarching purpose. And remember, if we’re going to be “led by the Spirit” (Galatians 5:18) and “keep in step with the Spirit” (Galatians 5:25), then we must be attuned to His purpose.

THE HOLY SPIRIT GLORIFIES JESUS BY SPEAKING ABOUT JESUS

First, the Holy Spirit’s purpose is to glorify the Lord Jesus Christ by directing our attention to the greatness and graciousness of the Lord Jesus Christ. Jesus conveys this idea in John 16, where He says,

“He [the Spirit of truth, the Helper, the Holy Spirit] will glorify me, for he will take what is mine and declare it to you. All that the Father has is mine; therefore I said that he will take what is mine and declare it to you.” (John 16:14-15)

The New Testament Scriptures

You can draw a straight line between this promise of Jesus and the testimony, teaching, and preaching of the apostles that has been written down and inscripturated in what we call the New Testament. And what is the New Testament but a proclamation of the majesty and mercy of Jesus Christ? The New Testament begins, “The book of the genealogy of Jesus Christ” (Matthew 1:1). The New Testament concludes with a short prayer and simple benediction. The short prayer is, “Come, Lord Jesus!” (Revelation 22:20) The simple benediction is, “The grace of the Lord Jesus be with you all. Amen.” (Revelation 22:21)

The Old Testament Scriptures

Of course, the Holy Spirit didn’t begin this task when He empowered the teaching of the apostles and their writing of the New Testament. The Holy Spirit had been doing this all along, in the words of the Old Testament. As Peter wrote in his first letter,

“Concerning this salvation, the prophets who prophesied about the grace that was to be yours searched and inquired carefully, inquiring what person or time the Spirit of Christ in them was indicating when he predicted the sufferings of Christ and the subsequent glories.” (1 Peter 1:10-11)

Indeed it was the Holy Spirit who “carried along” the prophets and superintended their articulation and writing down of God’s words (2 Peter 1:21). And taken as a whole, the Old Testament is designed to point people to “the sufferings of Christ and the subsequent glories” (1 Peter 1:11; see also Luke 24:25-27, 44-47).

Preaching in real time

The Holy Spirit didn’t just empower the writing of the Christ-centered Scriptures, but He also empowered the actual preaching work that was done by the first disciples. Peter was “filled with the Holy Spirit” (Acts 4:8) when he preached the gospel in Acts 4, and later in Acts 4 a larger group of disciples “were all filled with the Holy Spirit and continued to speak the word of God with boldness.” (Acts 4:31) Those first evangelists proclaimed the good news “by the Holy Spirit sent from heaven” (1 Peter 1:12). All in fulfillment of that great promise: “But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses” (Acts 1:8).

Illuminating the hearts of the hearers

But the Holy Spirit isn’t just involved in the presentation of the truth from the one who is preaching or writing; He is also involved in the reception of the truth by working in the hearts of the hearers. This is evident in passage like 2 Thessalonians 2:13-14 which says, “God chose you as the firstfruits to be saved, through sanctification by the Spirit and belief in the truth. To this he called you through our gospel” (2 Thessalonians 2:13-14). The Holy Spirit brings conviction (John 16:8-11) and illumination (1 Corinthians 2:1-16, Ephesians 1:16-23). When we read a passage like Acts 16:14, which says, “The Lord opened her [Lydia’s] heart to pray attention to what was said by Paul” (Acts 16:14), it is sensible in light of all that Scripture teaches to conclude that the Lord opened Lydia’s heart through the ministry of the Holy Spirit.

THE HOLY SPIRIT GLORIFIES JESUS BY EMPOWERING JESUS (AND THOSE WHO CAME BEFORE HIM AND PREFIGURED HIM)

The Holy Spirit’s purpose has always been and continues to be to glorify the Son of God, our Lord Jesus Christ. But He has pursued this purpose not only by empowering the proclamation about Jesus and enabling people to receive it, but also by empowering the God-Man Jesus and by empowering the human deliverers who prefigured Him. If you read through the Old Testament, you realize that the Holy Spirit didn’t minister to all Old Testament Israelites in the way that He now ministers to all New Testament believers. The Holy Spirit was upon Moses (Numbers 11:25) and in Joshua (Numbers 27:18). In the Book of Judges, “the Spirit of the LORD was upon him [Othniel]” (Judges 3:10), “the Spirit of the LORD clothed Gideon” (Judges 6:34), “the Spirit of the LORD was upon Jephthah” (Judges 11:29), “the Spirit of the LORD began to stir him [Samson]” (Judges 13:25) and later on three occasions God’s Spirit “rushed upon him [Samson]” (Judges 14:6, 14:19, 15:14). Later, David arose as the Spirit-empowered king who was anointed to deliver God’s people. Before David won the great victory against Goliath in 1 Samuel 17, in 1 Samuel 16 “the Spirit of the LORD rushed upon David” (1 Sameul 16:13). These human deliverers, appointed by God and empowered by His Spirit, prefigured the ultimate Deliverer, the Messiah, the God-Man.

And so, the famous words of Isaiah 61, which in a limited way may have applied to the prophet Isaiah himself, were nevertheless meant to find their ultimate fulfillment in the Messiah King. Standing one day in the synagogue in Nazareth, Jesus took the scroll of Isaiah the prophet and read these words from Isaiah 61:

“The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim liberty to the captives and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty those who are oppressed, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.” (Luke 4:18-19)

Then Jesus sat down and made the audacious statement, “Today this Scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.” (Luke 4:21) Audacious, bold, true. In that very chapter of Luke 4, Jesus is said to be “full of the Holy Spirit” (Luke 4:1), to be “led by the Spirit” (Luke 4:1), and to return to Galilee “in the power of the Spirit” (Luke 4:14). What the Old Testament human delivers were in a partial and limited way, Jesus is in a complete and perfect way: He is the Spirit-empowered King appointed by the Father to redeem God’s people and reign over all of heaven and earth. Indeed, the Holy Spirit empowered Jesus to do the work that the Father had given Him to do: “God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and with power. He went about doing good and healing all who were oppressed by the devil, for God was with him.” (Acts 10:38) As Jesus told the Pharisees in Matthew 12, “[If] it is by the Spirit of God that I cast out demons, then the kingdom of God has come upon you.” (Matthew 12:28)

THE HOLY SPIRIT GLORIFIES JESUS BY BUILDING JESUS’S COMMUNITY

This leads naturally to the final aspect of the Spirit’s purpose to glorify Jesus. The Spirit glorifies Jesus not only by empowering Jesus, and not only by testifying about Jesus, but also by forming the community of disciples that gathers around Jesus. This is prefigured in a remarkable way in the Old Testament, when the Holy Spirit filled Bezalel “with ability and intelligence, with knowledge and all craftsmanship” (Exodus 31:3) in order to build the tabernacle and design all of its features. Think about it: the Spirit of God played a key role in building the tabernacle, which represented God’s gracious presence with His people.

When we turn to the New Testament, what we discover is that God’s intended dwelling place isn’t a physical tabernacle, a physical temple, or any physical building, but His people. For example, Ephesians 2:22 tells is, “In him [Christ Jesus] you also are being built together into a dwelling place for God by [or in] the Spirit.” (Ephesians 2:22) The church of the Lord Jesus Christ is “a holy temple in the Lord” (Ephesians 2:21). And what is a temple? A temple is a place where God dwells. The Holy Spirit is nothing less than the personal, powerful, and purposeful presence of God dwelling with God’s people. We are God’s temple. As Paul wrote to the Corinthians, “Do you not know that you are God’s temple and that God’s Spirit dwells in you? If anyone destroys God’s temple, God will destroy him. For God’s temple is holy, and you are that temple.” (1 Corinthians 3:16-17)

The Holy Spirit brings people into God’s family

But the Holy Spirit isn’t merely present in and among God’s people. He is the One who creates and forms people into God’s people in the first place. The Holy Spirit is the One who regenerates and renews those sinful human beings who hear and believe the gospel (John 3:1-8, Titus 3:5). The Holy Spirit is the One who incorporates us into the body of Christ, which is another New Testament metaphor for the church. Paul writes, “For in one Spirit we were all baptized into one body–Jews or Greeks, slaves or free–and all were made to drink of one Spirit.” (1 Corinthians 12:13) Having placed us into the body of Christ, the Holy Spirit empowers and equips each believer to serve in a unique way: “To each is given the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good…. All these are empowered by one and the same Spirit, who apportions to each one individually as he wills.” (1 Corinthians 12:7, 11).

The Holy Spirit brings us into the reality of divine love

And smack dab in the middle of Paul’s discussion of spiritual gifts in 1 Corinthians 12-14 is his beautiful discussion of love, and we know that love is of paramount importance to the Holy Spirit. Vertically, in terms of our relationship with God, “God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us.” (Romans 5:5). Horizontally, in terms of our relationships with each other, the Holy Spirit is the One who produces love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, [and] self-control” (Galatians 5:22) in our hearts and lives.

So when you put all that together, the Holy Spirit is the One who enlivens us and incorporates us into God’s temple, into Christ’s body, in the first place. He binds us together as a unified body of believers, which is why we are told to be “eager to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.” (Ephesians 4:3) Likewise, it is no surprise that when Paul tells us to “not grieve the Holy Spirit of God” (Ephesians 4:30), he tells us this in the context of telling us to makes that ungracious words and ungracious attitudes have no place in our life (Ephesians 4:29, 31).

Faith and love are much more important than dramatic miracles

Some people, when they think about the Holy Spirit, are tempted to think in terms of the dramatic, the miraculous, tangible ‘power encounters’, fiery preaching, healings and casting out demons, and receiving special words of wisdom and knowledge. Jesus in Matthew 7:21-23 and Paul in 1 Corinthians 13:1-3 tell us that can have all those things and be completely lost. It’s not that those things are wrong, but they should not have the center of gravity when we think about the Holy Spirit. If you want to know whether the Holy Spirit is powerfully present in a group of people, it isn’t complicated. Where there is the joyful embrace of Jesus as Lord, combined with the warmhearted, generous, and sacrificial love toward each other, there you may be sure that here is a group of people that has welcomed the ministry of the Holy Spirit in their midst.

Do you want to grieve the infinitely powerful Spirit who dwells in our midst? Do you want to grieve your best friend? Or would you rather bring Him joy? You bring the Holy Spirit joy when you speak gracious words that build others up (Ephesians 4:29) and when you are “kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ forgave you” (Ephesians 4:32). Let this question lodge in your heart and mind: ‘Am I this very day making the Holy Spirit smile? Or am I making Him sad?’ He’s not looking at the circumstances of your life to decide whether he’s going to smile or be sad? He’s looking at your heart, your character, the way that you treat people.

Recently I was listening to the Things Unseen podcast by Sinclair Ferguson. Each weekday Sinclair offers a few minutes of reflection on a particular topic. Well, the other day his topic was love, and he shared how the way of love, patience, and kindness is not complicated. Then he says this:

“But the problem is, we are desperately complicated by our sin. But when the Spirit begins to work in us, He uncomplicates us–begins to fill us with love for others and forgetfulness of self. I can’t help thinking about a comment that Peter the Venerable, the abbot of the great monastery of Cluny in the medieval days, once made about his much more famous friend, Bernard of Clairvaux. “Bernard,” he said to him, “You do all the difficult and complicated things well. But you’re failing in the simple thing. You don’t love.” I must say when I read these words first, they were like an arrow in my heart–doing the difficult things, but not doing the simple thing well.”[5]

APPLYING THE MESSAGE: ARE YOU KEEPING IN STEP WITH THE HOLY SPIRIT?

I would like to conclude by challenging you to apply the message to your own life. I’d like to ask you a few questions and then apply it in two ways.

Are you keeping in step with the Holy Spirit?

The first question (drawn from Galatians 5:25) is simply this: Are you keeping in step with the Holy Spirit? The Holy Spirit is given to you to guide you into deeper fellowship with Christ, to guide you into spiritual maturity and growth in character, and to guide you into loving service in and through the body of Christ. Does the evidence of your life suggest that you are, in fact, being led by the Holy Spirit in these ways?

Do you value the presence of the Holy Spirit?

Think about it: the Holy Spirit co-labored with the Father and the Son to create the world in which we live; the Holy Spirit co-labors with the Father and the Son to sustain this world; and as the world became a fallen and sinful world after humanity’s rebellion in Genesis 3, the Holy Spirit co-labors with the Father and the Son to redeem sinners and incorporate them into the people of God, into the body of Christ, into the temple of the Holy Spirit. And if you are included among the sinners that God has graciously redeemed, then you ought to be thinking now about one simple reality: God’s will is that the whole church be filled with the fullness of God’s holy and loving presence. And this reality is meant to be experienced both personally and together.

So the second question is: Do you place tremendous value on the presence of the Holy Spirit in your own life? Think in terms of opening the Holy Spirit’s book, praying (at least on two occasions the Bible tells us to pray in the Spirit, see Ephesians 6:18 and Jude 20), pursuing holiness, and obviously loving those around us. And the third question is: Do you place tremendous value on the presence of the Holy Spirit in the church? If this is a special place where God dwells by His Spirit – a special place where He is pouring out gifts in order to build us up and propel us into the mission – then does your life reflect this work of God?

Both the church community and the individual believer are important

Passages like 1 Corinthians 3:16-17, Ephesians 2:18-22, and 1 Peter 2:4-10 make it clear the church is God’s temple, His special dwelling place – and to be clear, when I say that the church is God’s temple, I don’t mean that this physical sanctuary is God’s temple; instead I mean that we, the people who have been redeemed by the Lord, are God’s temple, God’s dwelling place.

At the same time, at the individual and personal level, you – your very own life, your very own body – is meant to be God’s dwelling place. When Paul instructs believes to flee sexual immorality and to glorify God by the way that they conduct themselves in their body, He says: “[Do] you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God? You are not your own, for you were bought with a price. So glorify God in your body.” (1 Corinthians 6:19-20)

Show me a man who is keeping in step with the Holy Spirit, and I will show you a man who places tremendous value on the presence of the Holy Spirit in his own personal life and who places tremendous value on the presence of the Holy Spirit in the church family. He doesn’t choose one or the other, but both: he desires to be filled by the Holy Spirit in his own everyday life (as Ephesians 5:18 teaches), and he desires to be in the company of the saints, the church community, where God’s Spirit dwells in a special way, where God’s Spirit forms a community and empowers each member of the community to serve one another in love.

Some people neglect their own personal devotion and content themselves with a dynamic church experience. Other people care only about their own personal devotion and have a dismissive attitude toward the church. But the Bible, the Holy Spirit’s book, doesn’t give us that option.

Paul’s beautiful prayer for God’s presence to fill the church community

Paul’s beautiful prayer for the church in Ephesians 3 certainly has a personal and individual dimension to it, for Paul wants each believer to have a heartfelt grasp of the glory of Christ. At the same time, Paul’s prayer is set in the context of an extended discussion about the church: the church is a holy temple (Ephesians 2:21), the church reveals “the manifold wisdom of God” (Ephesians 3:10), the church is the theatre of God’s glory (Ephesians 3:21), and the church is close-knit community of love (Ephesians 4:1-5:2). Therefore, Paul’s prayer in Ephesians 3:14-19 must be understood as a prayer for the holy and loving presence of the Triune God to fill the church.

Before I read it, take to heart the fact that all the activities of the church, all the events on our church calendar, all of our services and programs, all of our studies and classes, all of our meetings and meet-ups, all of our good intentions in worship and ministry, are ultimately meaningless if the holy and loving presence of God is absent. What does it profit a church to do everything that a church is supposed to do, if the people aren’t being regularly touched and transformed by the Spirit of God? God’s holy and loving presence, mediated by God’s Word and God’s Spirit, forming and filling and overflowing the people who belong to Jesus, is the whole point of the universe. If we are adrift on that point, we are wasting our time.

If you were to ask me ‘What am I supposed to do?’ or ‘What steps should I take to be filled by the Spirit, to be caught up in this work of God in the midst of His people?’, I suppose that much could be said, but here’s the main thing: do you desire to be filled with the presence of God? Jesus said, “If anyone thirsts, let him come to me and drink.” (John 7:37) Those who desire it, seek it and ask for it. Jesus said, “[The] heavenly Father [will] give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him!” (Luke 11:13) And those who seek Him with all their heart find Him. If we are not filled up to overflowing with the holy and loving presence of God, the most likely explanation is that deep down, we really don’t want to be.

With that in mind, hear this Spirit-inspired prayer of Paul: 

“For this reason I bow my knees before the Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth is named, that according to the riches of his glory he may grant you to be strengthened with power through his Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith—that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may have strength to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.” (Ephesians 3:14-19)

ENDNOTES

[1] Mark Christian, “I Believe In The Holy Spirit”. From Christ's Church of Oronogo's Podcast: I Believe In The Holy Spirit, Oct 26, 2025

https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/i-believe-in-the-holy-spirit/id294378197?i=1000733574944&r=256.04

[2] Basil of Caesarea, On the Holy Spirit.

[3] Alistair Begg, “The Holy Spirit”. March 22, 2009. Available online at Truth For Life: https://www.truthforlife.org/resources/sermon/the-holy-spirit/

[4] Mark Christian, “I Believe In The Holy Spirit” (see additional bibliographic information above). Christian says, “According to Jesus in this little small passage in John 14, the Spirit speaks, the Spirit teaches, the Spirit leads, the Spirit reminds, the Spirit helps, and comforts individual believers. We look at that and we think those are not traits of an impersonal force. Those are relational traits.”

[5] Sinclair Ferguson, “Do You Have Love?” February 17, 2026. Available online at Ligonier: https://learn.ligonier.org/podcasts/things-unseen-with-sinclair-ferguson/do-you-have-love