Challenged to explain what he means by the notion that the Father “breaths” the Spirit, Jenson writes: “in the Old Testament ruach often appears as the breath of life, and when it is the breath of God’s life it is a creating wind that blows creatures around like leaves in a . . . . Continue Reading »
Canlis notes two revolutionary innovations in Calvin’s doctrine of the Spirit: “First, he has shifted the primary bond between the human Jesus and the Father from divine substance to the divine person of the Spirit.” That enables Calvin to rescue Chalcedon from confusion: . . . . Continue Reading »
History of the 20th century: God is dead - Nietzsche. No, God is silent - Buber. Then Pentecostalism. . . . . Continue Reading »
Bavinck again on the Spirit’s role in creation: “At the beginning that Spirit moved upon the face of the waters (Gen. 1:2), and He remains active in all that was created.” He expands the point this way: “By that Spirit God garnishes the heavens (Job 26:13), renews the face . . . . Continue Reading »
This is the first Sunday after Epiphany, when we commemorate the appearance of God in His Son. It is a strange appearance. The Son appears in the flesh, lives, dies, rises, and then quickly disappears. Light flickers in darkness, but then the light goes out, goes elsewhere, and when then? Does . . . . Continue Reading »
God doesn’t send dreams, Aristotle argued. How did he know? If God were sending dreams, He would send them to a better sort of folk: “it is absurd to hold that it is God who sends such dreams, and yet that He sends them not to the best and wisest, but to any chance persons” and . . . . Continue Reading »
In his 1519 lectures on Galatians, Luther had this to say about Galatians 1-5: “Now is not the fact that faith is reckoned as righteousness a receiving of the Spirit? So either [Paul] proves nothing or the reception of the Spirit and the fact that faith is reckoned as righteousness will . . . . Continue Reading »
In contrast to later Scholasticism, Peter Lombard argued that the grace given to the soul was not merely a gift from God but God’s gift of Himself. He refuted those who thought that “the Holy Spirit, God Himself, is not given, but His gifts, which are not the Spirit Himself. . . . . Continue Reading »
Is Christ ever without His body? Might as well ask, Is Christ ever without His Spirit? The answer to that is, obviously, No. Anointing with the Spirit is what makes Christ Christ. And the Spirit gathers and knits together what He gathers. Hence: To say “Christ is anointed by the . . . . Continue Reading »
James Miller reviews John Yates’s The Spirit and Creation in Paul (Wissenschaftliche Untersuchungen Zum Neuen Testament 2.Reihe) in the latest Review of Biblical Literature . Like John Levison, Yates places Paul in the context of Judaism; on Paul himself, Miller summarizes . . . . Continue Reading »
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