The Process is Our Common Source of the Holy Spirit Empowering Us

The New Covenant is administered by the life-giving power of the Holy Spirit poured out through the resurrected Christ after his ascension. Jesus was God, but he humbled himself through the virgin birth when he became a man. Jesus was God in human flesh. He did not have to grasp for equality with God because in him the very fullness of deity dwelt (Col. 2:9). He never ceased being God, but he was fully human. It’s the great mystery of the faith that the Son of God chose to humble himself “lower than the angels” (Heb. 2:9) by stepping into flesh and blood. Theologians call this the "hypostatic union," where Jesus remains fully God and fully man simultaneously.

The prophetic scriptures are wrapped in the redemptive story going back to the origins of man.

To undermine the reality of God coming to us in human flesh through the lineage of Adam is to undermine the very foundation of our faith. It’s part of the mystery that’s been revealed. Our roots don’t just go back to Mary the mother of Christ, but to David, Jacob, Isaac, Abraham and all the way to Adam the father of us all.

Jesus lived as a man just like you and me. He had all the bodily functions of a man except he was still God and therefore sinless. He appeared like any other child playing and growing. We get a glimpse into who he was at the age of 12 as recorded in the gospel of Luke when he stayed behind in Jerusalem and did not join the family caravan back home after the feast of Passover. It says it took them three days to find him. He was in the temple “sitting among the teachers, listening to them and asking them questions.” His reply to his parents was: “Why were you looking for me? Did you not know that I must be in my Father’s house?” (Luke 2:41-52). Jesus could read so that would mean he was educated, and Jewish custom would also mean he did carpentry work since Joseph his father was a carpenter (Matthew 13:55).

At the age of 30 when priests were eligible to enter service (Numbers 4:30) Jesus was baptized in the Jordan River by his cousin John the Baptist. John fulfilled the prophecy concerning Elijah the prophet sent to prepare the way (Luke 1:17) for the one called Immanuel which means God with us. Matthew 3:16-17 says: “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.”

We see God in human flesh go under the water then come up and God the Spirit anoint him for his ministry while God the Father speaks from an open heaven. The concept of the Trinity is presented in a clear and observable manner. Jesus spent 40 days in the wilderness just like the children of Israel spent 40 years in the wilderness, yet Jesus was without sin. He passed the test. He fulfilled prophecy after prophecy through his ministry. He came for one purpose which was to do the will of the Father.

Jesus needed the anointing of the Holy Spirit to fulfill the will of the Father.

Jesus is portrayed as the Spirit-anointed Messiah whose ministry flows from the Spirit’s empowering presence. He did not demonstrate power to heal the sick and cast out demons until the Holy Spirit empowered him, yet he was God. Jesus demonstrated the need to rely on the Holy Spirit throughout his ministry. However, Jesus’ uniqueness lies in his identity as the incarnate Son, not merely as a Spirit-filled man.

We can never be Jesus because he is set apart on his own as a first fruit or prototype since he alone is God. Luke in his gospel and in the book of Acts emphasizes Jesus’ reliance on the Spirit as the model for the church. New covenant ministry is impossible apart from the Spirit. We are not little gods nor little Christ, but Jesus is our example, and

we are his disciples called to follow in his footsteps. Discipleship means adherence to Christ, not absorption into divinity. We need to be filled and empowered with the same Spirit so that we too can accomplish the will of God for our lives. As Paul says, “our sufficiency is from God, who has made us sufficient to be ministers of a new covenant…of the Spirit” (II Cor. 3:5-6).

The heart of the New Covenant is about living, abiding and demonstrating the love of the Father through the cruciform life. Participation in Christ means conformity to his death-shaped life. It’s living a life intertwined with the life of the Spirit by daily eating the flesh and drinking in the blood of the covenant. Jesus did not act by drawing on divine privilege but by living in radical dependence on the Spirit. It’s taking up our cross and following in the footsteps of our Lord who came as an actual man because the Spirit empowers believers to live out the cruciform pattern of Christ. Jesus said: “A disciple is not above his teacher, nor a servant above his master” (Matthew 10:24). If Jesus needed the Holy Spirit, then as his disciples we are dependent on the Spirit to walk in our spiritual gifts.

Let’s look at the opening of John’s gospel. John 1:14: “the Word became flesh and dwelt among us and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.” John’s focus is on God becoming man through the gift of Christ sacrificial life. The truth that was veiled or hidden under the Mosaic Law has come in the person of the Messiah. John’s gospel put a central focus on the place of the Holy Spirit.

• It’s only John’s gospel that tells the story of Nicodemus and our need to be born from above through the new birth of the Spirit. He shows that our new life in Christ is energized by the Holy Spirit.

• It’s only in John’s gospel that the woman at the well in Samaria is recorded where Jesus speaks of true worship of the Father in spirit and truth. He talks about the living waters of the Holy Spirit flowing through our lives.

• It’s only in John’s gospel that the Spirit is spoken of in terms that can only be described as God. Large portions of John chapters 14 and 16 are dedicated to understanding the ministry of the Holy Spirit. The mystery of the Godhead is clearly spoken of in the gospel of John as no other book in the entire Bible.

Now the Bible does not tell us everything about how to live life. Does the Bible tell us where to geographically live? Where to work? Who to marry or not to marry? The Bible does not tell us a lot of things about the decisions that we have to make daily. The million-dollar question is how do we make these important daily decisions? I’m going to call this subjective truth, and this is where the Holy Spirit plays a role in our daily lives.

Jesus ascended to the right hand of the Father and sent the Holy Spirit to be with us here as the third person of the Trinity until he physically returns at his second coming. John 14:18 Jesus said: “I will not leave you as orphans; I will come to you.” In verse 26 he said: “the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, he will teach you all things and bring to your remembrance all that I have said to you.” In John 16:13 Jesus said when: “the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all the truth, for he will not speak on his own authority, but whatever he hears he will speak, and he will declare to you the things that are to come.”

The primary role of the Holy Spirit is to lead us into the objective truth found in Christ.

The Holy Spirit keeps us centered on the redemptive work of the cross and our common foundation. The Holy Spirit also has an active role in aiding us, convicting us of sin, teaching us, empowering us to operate in spiritual gifts and speaking to us of things to come which is subjective truth (John 16:6 - 13).

John in his first epistle says that we have all been anointed and given the Holy Spirit. In 1 John 2:26-27 it says: “I write these things to you about those who are trying to deceive you. But the anointing that you received from him abides in you, and you have no need that anyone should teach you. But as his anointing teaches you about everything, and is true, and is no lie—just as it has taught you, abide in him.” The scripture is not telling us we don’t need teachers to help us understand. It is telling us that just as the prophet, priest and king were all anointed under the Old Covenant in the same way under the New Covenant all believers are given the anointing of the Holy Spirit. The anointing safeguards believers from deception rather than eliminating the role of teaching.

The author of Hebrews in 8:10-11 says it this way: “I will put my laws into their minds and write them on their hearts and I will be their God and they shall be my people. And they shall not teach, each one his neighbor and each one his brother, saying, ‘Know the Lord,’ for they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest.” Again, it’s not saying that we don’t need teachers who help us to understand the word of God:

• It’s saying the Holy Spirit makes the redemptive work of the cross a reality in our hearts. • It’s saying that the Holy Spirit aids, supports and empowers us in our daily lives with spiritual gifts so that we can perform the good works that we have been called to operate in.