Life in the spirit systematic theology [Second Printing edition]

Table of contents :
Preface vii
Introduction 1
PART I. THE HOLY SPIRIT
Chapter 1. The Person of the Holy Spirit 15
The Deity and Personal Identity of the Holy Spirit; Holy Spirit in Holy Triad
Chapter 2. The Work of the Spirit 31
Before the Coming of the Son; After the Coming of the Son; The Personal Indwelling of the Spirit
PART II. SALVATION
Chapter 3. The Way of Repentance 79
Introduction to the Study of Salvation; The Narrow Way of Repentance; Issues of Penitence and Confession
Chapter 4. Justification by Grace Through Faith 108
Justification by Grace; Faith in Christ; Faith Working Through Love; Regeneration
Chapter 5. Baptism of the Spirit 177
The Spirit’s Indwelling, Baptism, Gifts, and Sealing;
Adoption into the Family of God
Chapter 6. Union with Christ and Sanctification 205
Union with Christ; Sanctification; Perfecting Grace and the Fullness of Salvation; The Full Consequences of Salvation; A Reprise
PART III. THE CHURCH
Chapter 7. The Community of Celebration 261
Complementary Ways of Defining the Church; The Church as Body of Christ
Chapter 8. Marks of Ekklesia 297
By What Evidences Is the Church Recognizable? Unity;
Holiness; Catholicity; Apostolicity
PART IV. HUMAN DESTINY
Chapter 9. Last Things: Death and Personal Survival 369
Last Things; Death and Personal Survival; Issues of the Intermediate State
Chapter 10. The End of Human History 397
Expected Events of the End Time: Resurrection, Return, Millennium, and Judgment; Parousia; The Millennium;
General Judgment
Chapter 11. The Communion of Saints and the
Life Everlasting 444
The Communion of Saints; The Final State of the Unjust;
Life Everlasting
Postscript 469
Epilogue 473
Abbreviations 503
Indexes 513

Citation preview

Thomas C. Oden

SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY: VOLUME THREE

-J

Life in the Spirit

Life in the Spirit SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY: VOLUME THREE

Thomas C. Oden

PRESS

For my major mentors Jewish and Christian, without whom this series would never have been conceived— Will Herberg and Albert Outler

Prince Press, an imprint of Hendrickson Publishers P O. Box 3473 Peabody, MA 01961-3473 Printed in the United States of America Prince Press edition ISBN 1-56563-130-7 Second printing

—

January 2001

Reprinted by arrangement with HarperSanFrancisco, a division of HarperCollins Publishers, Inc. All rights reserved.

All quotations from the Bible, unless otherwise noted, are from The New International Version. LIFE IN THE SPIRIT, SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY: VOLUME THREE. Copyright © 1992 by Thomas C. Oden. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews. For information address HarperCollins Publishers, 10 East 53rd Street, New York, NY 10022. HarperCollins Web Site: http://www.harpercollins.com HarperCollins®, and HarperSanFrancisco™ are trademarks of HarperCollins Publishers, Inc. FIRST

HARPERCOLLINS

PAPERBACK EDITION PUBLISHED IN 1994

Contents Preface

vii

Introduction

PART I.

1

THE HOLY SPIRIT

Chapter 1. The Person of the Holy Spirit

15

The Deity and Personal Identity of the Holy Spirit; Holy Spirit in Holy Triad

Chapter 2. The Work of the Spirit

31

Before the Coming of the Son; After the Coming of the Son; The Personal Indwelling of the Spirit

PART II.

SALVATION

Chapter 3. The Way of Repentance

79

Introduction to the Study of Salvation; The Narrow Way of Repentance; Issues of Penitence and Confession

Chapter 4. Justification by Grace Through Faith

108

Justification by Grace; Faith in Christ; Faith Working Through Love; Regeneration

Chapter 5. Baptism of the Spirit

177

The Spirit’s Indwelling, Baptism, Gifts, and Sealing; Adoption into the Family of God

Chapter 6. Union with Christ and Sanctification

205

Union with Christ; Sanctification; Perfecting Grace and the Fullness of Salvation; The Full Consequences of Salvation; A Reprise

PART III.

THE CHURCH

Chapter 7. The Community of Celebration Complementary Ways of Defining the Church; The Church as Body of Christ

261

CONTENTS

VI

Chapter 8. Marks of Ekklesia

297

By What Evidences Is the Church Recognizable? Unity; Holiness; Catholicity; Apostolicity

PART IV.

HUMAN DESTINY

Chapter 9. Last Things: Death and Personal Survival

369

Last Things; Death and Personal Survival; Issues of the Intermediate State

Chapter 10. The End of Human History

397

Expected Events of the End Time: Resurrection, Return, Millennium, and Judgment; Parousia; The Millennium; General Judgment

Chapter 11. The Communion of Saints and the Life Everlasting

444

The Communion of Saints; The Final State of the Unjust; Life Everlasting

Postscript

469

Epilogue

473

Abbreviations

503

Indexes

513

Preface As Basil observed, “The athlete does not so much complain of being wounded in the struggle as of not being able even to secure admission into the stadium” (Basil, On the Holy Spirit III.29, NPNF 2 VIII, p. 48). I am grateful for admission into this theological stadium, where a lengthy race is now coming to its last round. Modest Reaffirmations. At the end of this journey I reaffirm solemn commitments made at its beginning: • To make no new contribution to theology • To resist the temptation to quote modern writers less schooled in the whole counsel of God than the best ancient classic exegetes • To seek quite simply to express the one mind of the believing church that has been ever attentive to that apostolic teaching to which consent has been given by Christian believers everywhere, always, and by all— this is what I mean by the Vincentian method (Vincent of Lerins, Comm., LCC VII, pp. 37—39, 65—74; for an accounting of this method, see LG, pp. 322-25, 341-51) I am dedicated to unoriginality. I am pledged to irrelevance if relevance means indebtedness to corrupt modernity. What is deemed relevant in theology is likely to be moldy in a few days. I take to heart Paul’s admonition: “But even if we or an angel from heaven should preach a gospel other than the one we preached to you, let him be eternally condemned! As we [from the earliest apostolic kerygma] had already said, so now I say again: If anybody is preaching to you a gospel other than what you accepted [par o parelahete, other than what you received from the apostles], let him be eternally condemned [anathema esto}\” (Gal. 1:8, 9, NIV, italics added). My purpose is to set forth the teachings of the person and work of the Holy Spirit, saving grace, the called-out people, and the consummation of history, on which there has been substantial agreement between traditions of East and West, Catholic, Protestant, and Orthodox. I will listen intently for the historic ecumenical consensus received by believers of widely varied languages, social locations, and cultures, whether of East or West, African, or Asian, whether expressed by women or men of the second or hrst Christian millennium, whether European or decisively pre-European, post- or pre-Constantinian. My aim has not been to survey the bewildering varieties of dissent, but to identify and plausibly set forth the cohesive central tradition of general lay consent to apostolic teaching, not through its centrifugal variations but in its centripetal centering. I will spend little time trying to knock down others’ cherished views. The focus is upon setting forth plausible layers of argument traditionally employed in presenting in connected order the most commonly held points of biblical teaching of the saving work of the Spirit in persons and community, within and beyond history, as classically exegeted by the leading teachers of its first five centuries. Theological innovators who still doubt that the scriptural textuary is the crucial wellspring of Christian existence and reflection will always be disappointed in Vll

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such an effort. But all who wear this festive wedding garment are warmly welcomed to the feast. My intention is not to try to satisfy the finicky appetites of naturalistic skeptics who will always remain hungry. Nor is it to find a clever way of making the way of salvation conveniently acceptable to the prejudices of modernity. I am pledged not to become fixated upon the ever-spawning species of current critical opinion, but instead to focus single-mindedly upon early consensual assent to apostolic teaching of how God the Spirit works to fulfill the mission of God the Son on behalf of God the Father. That the Holy Spirit is fulfilling the mission of the Son is less an argument than a historical fact. My purpose is not to seek to establish by argument that the Spirit is God, but rather to show that this has indeed been believed by Christians of countless cultural settings, times, and social locations. I do not assume that my reading partner already affirms classic Christian teaching, but only ask that he or she is willing to give fair hearing to the ways in which classic Christian teaching has reasoned about its own grounding and empowerment. I will not evade or eviscerate the traditional language of the church, or seek constantly to substitute diluted terms congenial to modernity. The tested language of the church speaks in its own unrelenting ways to modern minds struggling with the follies and limits of modernity. Deteriorating modern ideologies must now catch up with the ever-new forgings of classic Christianity, not the other way around. Whether one breathes easiest at a high liturgical or at a down-to-earth, socially engaged, pragmatic altitude, whether one’s imagination is awakened more by theoretical or by practical interests, whether one enters the fray with Eastern or Western sympathies, whether one feels more comfortable with an Enlightenment or pietistic vocabulary, I hope that each one of these varied partners may recognize the best of their own recent traditions as already at home and included within the embrace of classical Christian exegesis. Christian orthodox exegesis deserves advocates who try to do what Rachel Carson did for birds or what Archie Carr did to advocate the cause of endangered sea turtles. The Reference System. Theological argument does well to view itself modestly as merely an introduction to its annotations. I earnestly wish more attention to be paid to notes than text, more to primary sources than my arrangement of them, more to the substance of the references than to the particular frame in which one observer beholds, places, or organizes them. If it is possible for an author sincerely to ask a reader to rivet radical attention upon the sources to which he points and relatively less to the sequence and structure of his own inventions, I would indicate from the outset that as my true intention. Picture me as on my knees begging you to do just this one thing. Over fifteen thousand specific primary source references to consensus-bearing exegetes are offered in this series. The weighting of references may be compared to a pyramid of sources, with canonical scripture as foundational base, then the early Christian writers, first pre-Nicene then post-Nicene, as the supporting mass or trunk, then the best of medieval followed by centrist Reformation writers at the narrowing center, and more recent interpreters at the smaller, tapering apex— but only those who grasp and express the anteceding mind of the believing historical church. I am pledged not to try heroically to turn that pyramid upside

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down, as have those guild theologians who most value only what is most recent or most outrageous. Earlier rather than later sources are cited where possible, not because older is sentimentally prized, but because they have had longer to shape historical consensus. Consent-expressing exegetes are preferred to those whose work is characterized more by individual creativity, controversial brilliance, stunning rhetoric, or speculative genius. Complaints about proof-texting must not lead one to ignore the very canonical textuary upon which classic Christian teaching thrives. The modern form of historical exegesis that sincerely intends at every step to place every scriptural reference in its historical context risks becoming a long string of historical excursi on modern commentators so as to inadvertently forget the apostolic text itself. In this way the well-motivated attempt at historical critical exegesis may take a heavy toll on both catechesis and morality. The history of orthodox Christian teaching is primarily a history of exegesis. It would be absurd to provide references to early exegetes but fail to mention the texts themselves. Most common points of consensual Christian exegesis on the Spirit, the church, and the meaning of history were reasonably well formulated by the fifth century. Upon these we will focus. Like Kierkegaard, I now reach out energetically only for my one reader—you. To you I wish to offer the full energy of my life insofar as a black-and-white page can convey it. Like Gregory Nazianzen, I know that “I am a little shepherd, and preside over a tiny flock, and I am among the least of the servants of the Spirit. But Grace is not narrow, or circumscribed by place. Wherefore let freedom of speech be given even to the small—especially when the subject matter is of such great importance” (Gregory Nazianzen, Letters XLI, NPNF 2 VII, p. 450). Is this project intransigently antiquarian and reactionary? I can think of nothing more forward-looking than taking the risk of allowing ourselves to be addressed by the texts of scripture and tradition. I am drawn to the living tradition, not dead archaisms. I hope rather to treat solidly conserving forms of Christian tradition with an attentiveness to their own originally fresh sense of imagination. Where highly imaginative forms of Christian traditioning have received general lay consent, I seek to be attentive to their deeper rootage in ancient tradition. It is not impossible to do both, for this is what the classic exegetes did consistently—they treated conserving forms of Christian tradition with lively imagination, and imaginative forms of Christian experience with a celebration of their antecedents. Theology attempts to be systematic insofar as it looks for a cohesive, internally consistent grasp of the whole of Christian teaching so as to view each part in relation to the whole. As for those points where the meaning of the apostolic witness is contested or remains ambiguous, the subject will be left open for further inquiry, acknowledging principal viewpoints remaining in tension. For the reader who is paying the detailed attention to embedded annotations for which I am hoping, several technical conventions may help locate references: References to Migne (MPG, Patrologia Graeca, MPL, Patrologia Latina) cite column numbers. In some cases I have made my own translations of a text, and in other cases referenced alternative translations. Where a Latin or Greek document is unavailable in full in standard English translation but well quoted by another source, I have referenced that source. At times two translations or editions of a text may be cited when both carry pertinent nuances of the original, with the first

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to be taken as the primary reference. Where cf occurs, I am signaling the reader to compare. From welcome feedback from friendly critics I have become aware that some wish that references might pursue more fully the context of the quote, while others wish that the references would be less detailed. I have tried to strike a balance between excess in either direction. If upon searching for a reference a reader finds that some sections deal with subjects other than those under discussion, please look for particular portions of the larger discussion that pertain to the subject at hand. I have sought to make page references neither too long or short, hoping not to weigh down the reader with historical complexities and hoping not to withhold from the reader any pertinent information about where the ideas are best found. A short reference may be embedded in a longer discussion necessary to provide its context, in which case I have usually referenced the larger context. If anything, I have erred on the side of brevity. Where an extended number of pages is referenced, it is deemed useful that the reader grasp the context of the constellation of ideas referenced. The Thread of Life—A Personal Word of Gratitude. The recurring theme that has held this series together since its inception a decade ago is life—its source, its appearing as incarnate Word, and the gift of Life in the Spirit. I did not know then that my own life would be gravely threatened, hanging by a thread for several days after heart surgery just before completion of this last volume. I am grateful to God that I fully recovered to continue this study of the Giver, Redeemer, and Consummator of life. I am especially thankful for my physician Carlos Garces, cardiologist Stephen Guss, heart surgeon Grant Parr, and the nurses at Morristown Hospital and Execor Rehabilitation Center, who kept this body alive under trying circumstances. The experience has intensified my love of life and my sense of the value of the unrepeatable gift that God has given each person, and deepened my awareness of how God’s strength is made perfect through human weakness. Paul expressed his ongoing confidence that “he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion” (Phil. 1:6). This volume is all about the lifeenabling, maturing, completing, consummating work of the Spirit. It brings to completion, amid real hazards, ajourney I set out upon long ago. If Michelangelo could invest eleven years on the Rondanini Pieta, I do not regret spending a decade hammering and polishing this argument. For rabbinics partners in dialogue, especially Rabbi Judah Goldin, my colleague Peter Ochs, and the late Will Herberg, I am inexpressibly grateful. To Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger I remain especially indebted for his critical insight and caring concern. To superb Protestant, Catholic, and Jewish partners in dialogue in the New York circle of theologians in the Avery Dulles duodecim I am truly appreciative. Especially for the extended ministry of friendship of Richard John Neuhaus and Father C. John McCloskey, I give thanks. Orthodox theologians to whom I am most deeply indebted include Thomas Hopko, John Breck, Vigen Guroian, and David Ford. Among Catholic thinkers upon whom I have most depended are Hans Urs von Balthasar, Louis Bouyer, Michael Novak, and George Weigel. Evangelical scholars to whom I continue to be indebted include Carl F. H. Henry, David Wells, Timothy Smith, Ward Gasque, James I. Packer, Clark Pinnock, and Stanley Gundry. Other Protestant partners

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in dialogue upon whom I have long depended are Reinhold and H. Richard Niebuhr, Wolfhart Pannenberg, and Albert C. Outler. Recently I have benefited from expository teaching ministries of John McArthur, Charles Swindoll, Warren Wiersbe, Robert A. Cook, Donald Barnhouse, David Hocking, and J. V. McGee, who have enriched my awareness of traditional Reformed and Baptist exegesis, and from the writings of H. Vinson Synon, W. J. Hollenweger, Gary B. McGee, and Frederick Dale Bruner. I have been rescued from innumerable blunders, gaffes, and academic misdemeanors by astute manuscript readers. I am grateful for the steady covenant friendship of colleagues who undertook a careful critique of portions of this manuscript, some of whom are cherished members of my own family (Bishop William B. Oden, the Rev. James Hampson, Professor Amy Oden, the Rev. Robert Stuart Jummonville), and others treasured members of my extended family of former students. To Daniel Clendenin and Alan Padgett, who took on the special burden of thoroughly critiquing the entire manuscript, I am incalculably indebted for dozens of helpful suggestions. Among Drew colleagues, I note special thanks to James M. O’Kane, John F. Ollom, George deStevens, Robert Corrington, Donald Dayton, and Alister McGrath. Among others to whom I owe special gratitude who responded critically to major parts of the manuscript are Bishop Dan Solomon, Chancellor Dennis Kinlaw, and Professors David Buschart, Young Ho Chun, Kenneth Collins, Daniel Davies, David Eaton, Robert Jenson, Roderick Leupp, Fred Norris, Darius Salter, Donald Thorsen, John Tyson, William Ury, Charles Villa-Vicencio, Woodrow Whidden, Robert Wilken, and Ben Witherington. Innumerable hours have been selflessly devoted by these colleagues to this project. I have valued thoughtful critical responses from Pastors Michael Graef, Gregory Johansen, Paul Stallsworth, and James Heidinger, and from my highly esteemed graduate teaching assistants at various stages: Kent Branstetter, Kenneth Brewer, Christopher Hall, and Paul Sparacio. To each one of the above, who collectively and unpretentiously constitute something of a continuing seminar and postcritical theological connection, I offer a deeply felt personal word of t hanks. With each of these colleagues I have felt the freedom to debate, respectfully differ, painstakingly argue, and hear rigorous argument, and from each I have learned. This farflung circle of collaborators stretching from Africa to the Far East and to Oxford, Tubingen, and Rome means all the world to me. I am grateful to have been permitted to live in such momentous times as these, when both church and university stand at a decisive crossroads. I am grateful for being given an academic home in a university of the evangelical heritage where just such issues as pneurna, ekklesia, and eschaton could be pursued on the (elsewhere) almost comic premise that they are just as crucial to the university as those of the hard sciences. Only at the end of this lengthy process am I becoming aware of some surprising feedback. Some of my readers are telling me that even if they cannot join in the premises of Christian teaching, they nonetheless find it beautiful, aesthetically whole, and of immense interest merely as a historical exercise. Though I welcome this kind of reader, it has been clear in my mind from the outset that this work is addressed primarily to the ekklesia, not to the secularizing culture. If the saeculum finds it beautiful or edifying, I can only invite further inquiry into the truth of why.

Introduction

Some of the most intriguing and difficult questions of theology lie straight ahead under the topics of the work of the Holy Spirit in the renewal of persons in community.

The Saving Work of the Spirit The Living God, first volume of this series, set forth the ancient ecumenical Christian understanding of God, creation, and providence. The Word of Life, volume 2 of Systematic Theology, asked whether the Word became flesh, and whether that has saving significance for us. Life in the Spirit asks how the work of God in creation and redemption is being brought to consummation by the Holy Spirit in persons, through communities, and in the full range of human destiny. Though grounded in this larger sequence, this volume can be read as a self-contained argument. It points toward but does not require the reading of its companion volumes. The issues ahead have been more prone than others to defensive polemics and special institutional memories. There is an understandable reason why these practical, churchly, and end questions of theology are at sensitive points more resistant to consensual interpretation, for they take the theological task ever closer to the varieties of personal experience, concrete variables of social and political order, ideologies and competing worldviews, histories of church polities, and particular ways of engaging in the mission of the Spirit. Despite these obstacles, this study hopes to find an audience with Catholics without offense to Baptists, with charismatics without losing touch with Eastern Orthodox communicants, with social liberationists without demeaning pietists. How? By seeking the shared rootage out of which each has grown. Defining Sources of Classic Consensual Teaching. Who are the “principal consensual exegetes” to whom the argument so frequently turns? Above all, they are the ecumenical councils and early synods that came to be often quoted as representing the mind of the believing church; the four standard ecumenical teachers of the Eastern church tradition (Athanasius, Basil, Gregory Nazianzen, John Chrysostom) and of the West (Ambrose, Jerome, Augustine, and Gregory the Great), as well as others who have been perennially valued for accurately stating certain points of ecumenical consensus: Cyril of Jerusalem, Cyril of Alexandria, Hilary, Leo, John of Damascus, and Thomas Aquinas. “Classic” in this definition includes classic Reformation sources from Luther, Melanchthon, and Calvin through Chemnitz and Ursinus to Wesley and Edwards and consensus-bearing Protestant formularies consistent with ancient consensual exegesis. I do not hesitate to quote at times relatively nonconsensual writers like Origen, Fertullian, Novatian, and Menno Simons, but I do so on those points at which they generally have confirmed or articulated or refined consensual views, not on points where

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2

they diverge into idiosyncratic thinking (Vincent of Lerins, Comm. 17, 18, NPNF 2X1, pp. 143-45). Because the exegetical questions grow increasingly controverted and technical in these contested theological battlefields, more explanatory detail is required to establish irenic argument. It would be possible to set forth a much briefer summary of these issues, but I am assuming that my reader would prefer to be guided just to that depth that is required for a clear and adequate grasp of the subject matter without unnecessary excursions (Leo, Letters I, NPNF 2 XII, p. 1). Whether the Intent of Classic Ecumenic Referencing Differs from Modern. The religion-teaching guild functions with an underlying value premise that is best termed modern chauvinism. Modern chauvinism holds that whatever is premodern is likely to be relatively worthless; that whatever worth might be encased in premodern sources must be translated in terms that are acceptable to moderns before its worth can be extracted; and that whatever is newer is predictably superior intellectually and morally. Accordingly, a major function of footnoting in guild religious studies, fixated as it is upon novelty, is the identification of the most recent sources that achieve presumably new perspectives and transcend the supposed limits of the old. Regrettably, the premise is as common as it is arrogant. The major function of referencing in the classical ecumenical tradition, by contrast, is the identification of ancient, tried, and consensually reliable formularies and authorities for articulating the mind of the believing church, especially under idiosyncratic or heterodox challenge. The purpose is to set forth sources that have been repeatedly and reliably quoted by the believing community to point to shared affirmations and assumptions (Vincent of Lerins, Comm. 1—3, FC 7, pp. 267-72). Hence the ethic of footnoting that pervades the ethos of modern scholarship must be transmuted by classical Christian scholarship, which has always had little desire to state wholly original ideas or to pretend to identify the first pristine occurrence or expression of an idea in time, aware that all ideas in history live in an organic continuum of historical consciousness and gradual development. The church is approaching its third millennium. It is beyond the capacity of any writer to reference all such sources, especially where the history of exegesis has a multimillennia trajectory. The purpose is not an absolute completeness of reference (the entire project would then turn comically into an endless series of footnotes) but rather a spare and fitting selection of those references that proximately express the mind of the believing church throughout all its history. This has been a variegated history personally unified in Christ, whose oneness is contextually enabled by the Spirit. For the principles underlying this selection, I refer the reader to the prefaces and methodological epilogues to the two previous volumes in the series. ,/

Introducing the Study of the Spirit Pneumatology is the systematic analysis and interpretation of the texts of scripture and tradition that deal with the regenerating and consummating work of the Holy Spirit {pneuma hagion). Like Christology, it has been typically structured around the distinction between the person (identity) and work (activity) of the Holy Spirit—the overarching subject of this volume. So vast is the subject matter

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lhat it requires careful reasoning to establish a fitting route of approach to its range and consequences.

The Necessity and Importance of the Doctrine of the Holy Spirit. All that we understand of the Father and the Son, we understand through the illumining work of the Spirit (John 16; Ignatius, Eph., ANF I, pp. 49—58). Whatever grasp one may have of God’s revelation is always enabled by the Spirit. In whatever ways sinners are empowered to overcome the corrupting aspects of the world, the f lesh, and the adversary, they do so by the power of the Spirit. The Spirit leads the faithful into all truth by pointing constantly toward the truth embodied in Jesus (John 16:13; Ignatius, Eph. 9, ANF I, p. 53). The Father and Son have given the church no greater gift than the outpouring of God’s own Spirit. “God does not give a Gift inferior to Himself” (Augustine, Faith and the Creed 9.19, FFF III, 1561, p. 44). The Son promised that the Spirit would follow his ministry on earth, and that incomparable blessings would ensue with the ministry of the Spirit. Having once been given the gift of the Spirit at Pentecost, the believing community has never been left without this Comforter (John 14:18; John Chrysostom, Horn, on John LXXV, NPNF 1 XIV, pp. 274—75).

The Neglect of the Teaching of the Holy Spirit. The work of the Spirit has been less studied and consensually defined than the work of the Son. When Paul asked his hearers at Ephesus, “Did you receive the Holy Spirit when you believed?” they answered, “No, we have not even heard that there is a Holy Spirit” (Acts 19:2). Even now many think it possible to teach the gospel of Jesus without awareness of the work of the Spirit. John Paul II has rightly called for renewed study of the Holy Spirit in the last decade of this millennium (Dorninum et Vivipcantem). The modern tendency is to depersonalize the Spirit, to treat Cxod the Spirit as reducible to an idea of spirituality or an attribute of God, rather than God’s own personal meeting with persons living in history. This has contributed to the neglect and misunderstanding of this subject. Perennial distortions associated with naturalistic spiritualism, pantheism, excessive subjectivism, and crude views of faith healing probably would not have burgeoned so abundantly in the history of the church had more thorough attention been given to the systematic understanding of the mission of the Holy Spirit (Augustine, Faith and the Creed 9.19, FFF III, 1561, p. 44). It is a scandal to modern “critical” scholarship that standard discussions of the Holy Spirit often make no inquiry whatever into the great early treatises on the Holy Spirit by Didymus, Basil, Gregory of Nyssa, Gregory Nazianzen, and Ambrose. It remains a mixed blessing that modern charismatic and Pentecostal voices have so stressed special aspects of the work of the Spirit that some other Protestant voices have tended to back away completely from all teaching concerning the Spirit. The texts of scripture, however, leave no doubt in our minds of the importance of teaching of and by the Spirit. “The subject of the Holy Spirit presents a special difficulty,” wrote Gregory Nazianzen, because by the time we get to it, “worn out by the multitude of questions,” we may become like those who have “lost their appetite, who having taken a dislike to some particular kind of food, shrink from all food; so we in like manner have an aversion from all discussion” (Gregory Nazianzen, (hat. XXXI, Of the Holy

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Spirit, NPNF 2 VII, p. 318). The laity have a right to be scripturally instructed, but the clergy remain ill prepared. The Pivot of Pneumatology: From ‘for Us” to “in Us.” We stand at a crucial pivot of Christian theology, shifting the focus from the work of the Son to the work of the Spirit in the church in applying the benefits of the work of the Son. “It is the peculiar office and work of the Holy Ghost to reveal and glorify Christ, and to testify concerning Him” (Luther, Lectures on John 7:39; Jacobs, SCF, p. 185). In volume two of this series we have spoken chiefly of God for us. Now we speak more deliberately of God working in us. We speak not of events addressing us as it were from the outside of our experience (extra nos) but more deliberately of active inward processes and events by which persons in community are convicted, transformed, regenerated, justified, and brought into union with Christ, one by one. This is God’s work within humanity (intra nos) viewed individually and socially. The forgiveness of God the Son, having been once for all offered on the cross, must be ever again received, and at each stage we must be freshly enabled to receive it. In Christ we learn what God has done on our behalf. By the Spirit we are being enabled to reshape our doing in response to what God has done, to reform our loves in relation to God’s incomparable love, to allow God’s redeeming work to touch every aspect of our broken lives. With this pivot, our own decisions and actions now become a crucial part of the salvation story, the history of the body of Christ (for the transition from “for us” to “in us,” see pivot between Books 1 and 2 of Calvin’s Institutes or J. Wesley “On Working out Our Salvation,” WJWB, Sermon 85, WJW VI, pp. 506-13). God not only forgives sin through the Son but through the Spirit works to overturn the power of sin in actual daily interpersonal behavior and life in community. The gospel not only announces the death and resurrection of Christ but calls us to die to sin and live to God by the power of the Spirit. Thus by death we receive true life (Ignatius, Rom. 6, ANF I, p. 76). By the Spirit we ourselves consciously and unconsciously, actively and passively, enter the sphere of God’s saving work. Consensual Christian teaching does not consider the work of the Spirit incidental or ancillary. For here the work of God enters deeply into personal existence to meet and redeem existing persons. Neglect of this part of Christian teaching leads to forgetfulness of how God accomplishes the salvation of humanity. The Lord and Giver of Life. The Spirit is “Lord and Giver of Life” (to kurion, [kai] to zoopoion, Nicene-Constantinopolitan Creed, COC II, p. 57; 1 Cor. 15:45). “The Spirit gives life” (John 6:63; 2 Cor. 3:6). “God our life is the life of all” (Hildegard of Bingen, Symphonia, p. 143). The new life involves entry into a family, into sonship and daughterhood (Rom. 8:12—17; Gal. 4:6) in relation to an incomparably caring parent (Abba, “Papa”). The Spirit bears witness within our spirits that we are children of this Abba in this family (Rom. 8:16). All who have lived out of the history of sin are said to be born of the flesh. Flesh (sarx) refers not merely to the physical body but to the whole person under the power of sin who compulsively pursues works of the flesh (Gal. 5:19—21). All who faithfully receive the Spirit are born anew, given a new spiritual beginning and called to grow in grace (John 3:1—8). The new person in Christ is born of the Spirit to faith active in love (Rom. 8:1—7). Those newly born of God are no longer

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idolatrously enslaved by the elemental spirits of this world (Gal. 4:3). Regenerated life need not any longer be lived out in bondage to psychological scripts from parents and siblings and social influences, or skewed political interests or economic forces of poverty or exploitation. It is lived out in freedom for the neighbor, freeing persons to fulfill their original human purpose whatever the historical conditions, to enjoy all things in God, to receive life day by day from the eternal Giver (Gal. 5; Calvin, Inst. 3.10; 3.23.12). The Third Article of the Creed. All baptismal creeds confess in this or similar language: I believe in the Holy Spirit (pneuma hagion; Lat: Spiritum Sanctum, COC II, p. 55; Der-Balyzeh Papyrus, SCD 1, p. 3; Roman Symbol, Psalter of Rufinus, SCD 2, p. 5). “We believe in one Holy Spirit the Paraclete” (Eastern Form of the Apostles’ Creed, Cyril of Jerusalem, Catecheses, SCD 9, p. 8). This article of baptismal faith became expanded through a history of exposition and controversy into the doctrine of the Holy Spirit. In learning by heart the Creed of Epiphanius (c. A.D. 374, second formula), the catechumen rehearsed twelve clauses that summarily set forth the work of the Spirit: We believe in the Holy Spirit who spoke in the law, and taught by the prophets, and descended to the Jordan, spoke by the Apostles, and lives in the saints; thus we believe in him: that he is the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of God, the perfect Spirit, the Spirit Paraclete, uncreated [aktiston], proceeding from the Father [ek tou Patros ekporeuomenon\ and receiving of the Son [ek tou huiou lambanomenon], in whom we believe. (SCD 13, p. 10; cf. COC II, p. 37) Key points of the third article were concisely summarized as in the Statement of Faith of the United Church of Christ: He bestows upon us his Holy Spirit, creating and renewing the Church of Jesus Christ, binding in covenant faithful people of all ages, tongues, and races, He calls us into his Church to accept the cost and joy of discipleship, to be his servants in the service of men, to proclaim the gospel to all the world and resist the powers of evil, to share in Christ’s baptism and eat at his table,

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to join him in his passion and victory. He promises to all who trust him forgiveness of sins and fullness of grace, courage in the struggle for justice and peace, his presence in trial and rejoicing, and eternal life in his kingdom which has no end. (