Receiving the Spirit

In theory all Christians are Spirit-something Christians. No Christian denies the work of the Spirit completely. Although my own experience of growing up in an evangelical free church left me in a similar situation to the disciples Paul encountered in Ephesus (Acts 19:2), “We have not even heard that there is a Holy Spirit.”

Now there are a lot of ways to think about the whole process of the Spirit in the lives of believers, Tim Suffield thinks there are about 960!

In a follow up post Tim then shows the relevant Greek words and the frequency of their occurrences. It’s really helpful to see all the ways the Bible speaks about the Spirit.

Tim says the most frequent occurrences are for ‘receiving’ and ‘being filled’ but he misses a collection of phrases which all the range of meanings ‘to dwell’ which have similar prominence.

The Spirit does many things but to take those together we have a really helpful framework for understanding the work of the Spirit. The Spirit dwells within us, we receive the Spirit into our lives and as the Spirit dwells, the Spirit also fills. It is an inner, ongoing, living transformation.

Or as Tim says,

God in Christ by his Spirit clothes you, rests on you, strengthens you, renews you, sets you apart, makes you alive, unites with you in marital bliss, lives in and with you, sends you out, partners with you, supports you, falls upon you, pours upon you, abides with you, begets you, fills you, drowns you, anoints you, cleanses you, causes you to drink, seals you, invades you, appoints you, and is a gift that you receive from the hand of Jesus.

On Receiving the Spirit

Here is my friend Liam Thatcher giving a great sermon on the baptism of the Spirit. Plunged in so it would never be the same again!!