If I'm right here, if I'm correct, from our discussion from last time, we, under the Trinity in the New Testament, we did Roman numeral 4, the deity of the Spirit, A and B. We looked at the difficulties of studying the Holy Spirit, and we looked at the personhood of the Holy Spirit, but we had, we have not done up to this point, the deity of the Holy Spirit. The deity of the Holy Spirit is not as easily established as the deity of the Father or the deity of the Son. Millard Ericsson is certainly correct when he says, and I think I have this statement for you there in the outline. It might well be said that the deity of the Father is simply assumed in Scripture. That of the Son is affirmed and argued, while that of the Holy Spirit must be inferred from various indirect statements found in Scripture. Having said that, we can also add that sufficient evidence exists in the Bible to conclude that the Holy Spirit is not only a person, but also a divine person. He is deity, a person different from the Father and different from the Son, but also equal to the Father and the Son. And the question is, what are the different lines of evidence for the deity of the Spirit? And here we want to look at a few of those lines of evidence. And you have those before you as numbers one through four in the outline. Well, first of all, number one here. Various references to the Holy Spirit show an equivalence with God, even a kind of interchangeability. In such a way that we can say to say Holy Spirit is equivalent to saying God into examples here. First of all, Acts chapter five. When Ananias and Sapphira withheld proceeds from the sale of a piece of property, Peter asked Ananias in verse three, why Satan had filled his hearts to lie to the Holy Spirit. In the very next verse in verse four, or the very next sentence, Peter asserts that Ananias has not lied to man, but he has lied to God. Thus in Peter's mind, lying to the Holy Spirit is lying to God. The second statement is an expansion or elaboration of the first because it further identifies the person to whom Ananias has lied. Our second example here are the body as temple texts in Corinthians. First Corinthians chapter three, verses 16 and 17, and second Corinthians, excuse me, and first Corinthians six, verses 16, verses 19, let me start all over again. You can tell I'm just getting started this evening. The two texts are these. First, see people laughing at me. First Corinthians chapter three, verses 16 and 17, and then also first Corinthians chapter six, verses 19 and 20. Now these two texts are to be taken together because they appear to be substantive parallels. In the first of these, the statement is about the temple of God. In the second chapter six, the statement is about the temple of the Holy Spirit. So again, we have an equivalence as far as Paul's concern to be indwelt by the Holy Spirit. Don't you know that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit? To be indwelt by the Holy Spirit is to be indwelt by God. Therefore, Holy Spirit equals God. Our second line of evidence for the deity of the Holy Spirit is that the Holy Spirit possesses the attributes or characteristics of God. Let's see, first of all there I have knowledge, a little A. First Corinthians chapter two, verses 10 and 11, say this, for the Spirit searches everything even the depths of God. For what person knows a man's thoughts except the Spirit of the man which is in him. So also, no one comprehends the thoughts of God except the Spirit of God. In other words, what God knows the Spirit knows, the Spirit knows the things of God and man does not know them. We could also add here John 16 verse three, 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. In other words, the Spirit possesses all truth. This is really nothing other than what classically we have called missions. God possesses all truth. He knows all things that can be known. The Spirit knows all things that can be known. The Spirit not only has knowledge, the knowledge of God, he has the power of God throughout the Holy Spirit, throughout the Holy Spirit, throughout the New Testament, the proclamation of the gospel and such acts as the performance of miracles. Take place through the power of the Spirit and here you might look at Romans 15 verse nine. In John chapter three, Jesus tells Nicodemus that the new birth takes place through the power of the Holy Spirit. In Matthew 19 verses 16 through 25, we're told that regeneration doesn't take place by the power of man, but only by the power of God. Thus the Spirit possesses powers capacities which only God has. Does that make sense? Putting those two texts together that way, that the Spirit regenerates and that only God regenerates. Well what are we then saying? Synthetically the Spirit is God and along with knowledge and power we have eternality. And again I'm going to put two texts together here. In Hebrews 9 14, Jesus offers Himself in death as a priestly sacrifice. He did that according to the text through the eternal Spirit. But if we go to Hebrews chapter one verses 10 through 12, we learn that only God is eternal. Now if only God is eternal and the Spirit is eternal, then again synthetically the Spirit is God. He possesses the eternality which properly belongs only to God. A third line of evidence for the deity of the Spirit is that he performs work which described only to God. A little bit of reduplication here as you'll see in a second. First of all the Spirit is involved in the work of creation. Genesis 1, 2 the Spirit hovered upon the face of the waters in Psalm 104 30. He's involved with the ongoing cycle and renewal of life. Second the Spirit gives the oracles of God or we could say it this way. He is involved in the writing of Scripture. Second Peter 121 the biblical writers spoke from God as the Holy Spirit worked through them. And third here we can mention the Spirit's work and human beings. Speaking about regeneration we've already mentioned John chapter 3 and Jesus' statement to Nicodemus. Well we could add Titus 3, 5, 2 John 3. God saved us by the washing of regeneration and the renewal of the Spirit. Again the Spirit is the regenerator. We could also add here that the Spirit is the sanctifier in 1 Peter 12. Quite simply the Spirit gives the grace of God. And fourth here undersea resurrection. In Romans chapter 8 verse 11 Paul tells us that the Spirit raised Jesus from the dead and he will raise us up on the last day. Obviously the Spirit is far more powerful than sin, than death, than the grave. He possesses powers. He engages in ministries that are appropriate only for God. Our last line of evidence for the deity of the Holy Spirit here number 4 is that the Spirit is associated with the Father and the Son. We looked at this a little bit last week when we talked about the Spirit is associated with the Father and the Son in ways which only one like unto them could be so associated. Three quick little sub points here. The baptism in the threefold name Matthew 19, basically 19, Matthew 28, 19. The disciples are instructed to baptize in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. There is an implied equivalence there. There is an implied personhood to the Spirit as well. Second, the benediction of 2 Corinthians 13, 14. The three persons, Father, Son, and Spirit give grace, love, and fellowship. And then third, all three have a parts in salvation as the Father for loves, the Son cleanses, and the Spirit divides faith from faith lessness. So, Romans 4 and our present discussion, the interpenetration of a three persons. While the New Testament materials do not give us a nice, neat, analytic statement about the Trinity, they do seem to speak of three persons. Three distinct, identifiable, even numberable persons. But we have more than simply three persons. We also have a connection between the three. A connection that goes far beyond a mere sympathetic, moral, or functional connection. We can even say that the three members of the Trinity interpenetrate one another, or use language that we might be more familiar with, the three in dwell one another. And this interpenetration is usually referred to under the term paracoresis in classical theology. If you recall our discussion of the Aryans from last week, you may recall that they pointed out that Jesus often distinguished between himself and the Father. Jesus said that the Father is greater than he is in John 1428. And he said that his words are not his own, but the words of the Father who sent him. That's verse 24 of John 14. In short, there was a real stress placed upon the distinctiveness of personhood, or the consciousness of the Son apart from the Father. The Son was aware of being the Son rather than the Father. The Son should not be confused with the Father or the Spirit. One person can speak of the other as the other. That should be appreciated from the Aryans, but it can be taken too far. It can be taken as the Aryans did to deny the very deity of the Son. But it could be taken in the other direction, it seems to me. It could be taken all the way to tri-theism. Each member of the Godhead is an autonomous God. Each is so fully God. Each is so fully God in himself that he is a God without reference to the other two. It's this very problem that the doctrine of paracresus is meant to address. In other words, paracresus is meant to guard against tri-theistic implications with internitarianism. Now, the term paracresus arose in Eastern Orthodoxy, in such people as John of Damascus and pseudodynesius. That does not suggest, however, that the term arose simply as a solution to a theological problem. There is ample evidence in Scripture for a doctrine of paracresus. In other words, I'm going to suggest that it is a beautiful reality. In the Gospel of John, we clearly see that each of the three persons shares the life of the others, even that each lives in the other two. And again, I'm going to suggest something like what we are, we don't have any problem, I think, with the idea of indwelling that God indwells the people of God. I think that the doctrine of paracresus is much like onto that. The Father indwells, the Son and the Spirit. The Spirit indwells the Father and the Son. I think we have four ways of speaking of this inter-penetration or indwelling. First of all, each of the three members of the Trinity is equal to the other two. That is to say, each is as much God as the others, even though there's only one God. Second, I think we need to take these four points in an accumulative fashion and to add them all together to get there. Second, each of them gladly submits to the others. I should qualify that little bit. We don't see a clear submission of the Father to the Son or Spirit, but we do see a clear submission of the Son to the Father and we see a submission of the Spirit to the Son and the Father. And we see this primarily in the whole notion of sending. In John 14, as the Father has sent the Son, so the Son will send the Spirit. All three enjoy an intimacy. This is point three with the others. And fourth, there's a mutual difference between or among the persons. Let me just give you a couple of texts from I have a whole list of them here. We could spend all night going through the Gospel of John looking at these realities. In the very first verse, in the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God and the Word was God. We see the Father and the Son are equals, but we also see a submission that's going on. In again, chapter 1, verses 14 and 18, we see a submission, we also see intimacy. And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us and we beheld his glory, the glory of a unique Son, full of grace and truth. In verse 18, no man has ever seen God, but the unique Son, the monogonace, the one and only Son has made him known. There's intimacy there. There's also a submission. You might want to turn to, let's look at one text here very quickly, John chapter 3, verses 34 and 35. While you're turning there, you do want to jot down chapter 14 and chapter 17 and chapter 14. It is primarily the relationship between the Son and the Spirit in terms of submission and intimacy. And in chapter 17, it's the issue of the Son's relationship to the Father. In chapter 17, Jesus speaks to the Father and chooses the Father's will and many other issues there. Look particularly at verses 21 and 22 of chapter 17. But I mentioned in chapter 3, verses 34 and 35, for the one whom the Father has sent speaks the words of God and was being spoken up here as the Son. The Father, excuse me, the Son is the one whom the Father has sent. And he speaks the words of the Father. For God gives the Spirit without limit. The Father loves the Son and has placed everything in his hands. And then of course he goes on whoever believes in the Son has eternal life. But whoever rejects the Son will not see life. For God's wrath remains on him. Of course, what's going on here is Jesus is saying that how one responds to him will bear fruit either in terms of the blessing or the curse of the Father. Rhonda, I would say just the other way around the question is, is there a possible submission of the Father to the Spirit through the prophets? The purpose of the prophets, it seems to me, is to act as mouthpieces for the Spirit whose own ministry is to proclaim the whole work of God. So if anything, I think it would probably be the other way around. But hang on to this. I think there's a certain kind of historical submission that we do see which I'll get to in a second. What I'd like to get to it right here is see Calvin's contribution. This is where we're going to get to this. And my comments here are in reference to Bray's chapter five of Bray's book. Bray, if you recall, wants to suggest that John Calvin has some real contribution to make in terms of our understanding of the Holy Spirit. And I'll do this here just by way of a couple of numbered points. First of all, the relativization of the question of essence. I think Bray reads Calvin rightly when he claims that Calvin held that God may have an essence, but the revelatory base for that is rather slim. And it's slim because the biblical concern lies elsewhere. The biblical concern lies in God's person rather than essence. If you recall again from last week, we suggested that we may need the idea of an essence somewhere. It was helpful at NICEF. It's helpful in talking about these three persons as relating by way of a shared or a single usia. Remember that word from last week? A shared essence. But the biblical concern does not appear to lie with that oneness. It seems to be more concerned with communicating God as three persons. And that's where Calvin comes down as well. We should be very careful not to speculate too far beyond the biblical parameters about God. In fact, over against the rationalism of medieval scholasticism, Calvin continually stressed the limits of human rationality in thinking about God. And God always comes to us personally in history, acting in that history, acting as a person in that history. There's no way to talk about God apart from his works, apart from his relationships. Second, or the second point of Calvin's contribution, is that all three members of the Trinity are equal to one another in every respect. Now, Calvin makes this point, and Bray thinks that Calvin's contribution here because of the direction that the tradition had gone up to the time of Calvin. Both East and West tended toward a kind of monarchianism. And if you recall that term, the monarchians wanted to think in terms of the father primarily as God. The West would tend to take this in the direction of modalism. You start with the father. Remember that the father becomes the son and the son becomes the spirit. So you're starting with the father. The East would tend to take it or think of it in terms of subordinationism, a kind of ontological subordinationism. The father is God in and of himself. The son is eternally begotten of the father, so the son is a generation of the father's being and the spirit proceeds from the father. Calvin's response is simply this. He wants to see all three as auto-theos. He wants to see all three as God in his own rights. And by the way, you might want to go back here and look at Bray pages 200 through about 202 is where he enters into this discussion. All three are co-equal in their divinity and united with each other. But listen at this point, not by sharing some impersonal essence, but by their mutual fellowship and co-inherence. In effect, then, what we have is a statement of paracuresis, interpenetration, or indwelling at the level of person, not essence. What can you say about an essence after all? Not a whole lot. Even the relationship between the father and the son, the father and the spirit, the son and the spirit is a personal relationship, not an abstract one, not a purely formal relationship. When we talk about the interrelationships within the Trinity, what we see in Scripture, what we see in the Gospel of John in terms of their relationships, our personal relationships. That makes sense guys. So again, we still don't have a kind of formal abstract philosophical discussion. We have a personal one. Third, and here's where we start to get, I think, to the issue for many of us. The knowledge of one, whether it's the father, the son, or the spirit, automatically involves the other two at the same time. Knowledge of the father does not mean merely cognitive knowledge of God generally, but knowledge of God as person, knowledge of God through his works. The other way of getting at this is that we never have the father without having the son, without having the spirit as well. If you get one, you get all three. If you know one, you know the other two. The son so indwells the father and the spirit that if you know Jesus, you know the father and you know the spirit. The father so indwells the son and the spirit that if you know the father, you have the benefits of Christ, and you have the ministries of the Holy Spirit. Now crucial for Calvin here, and Calvin certainly up through his day, and even in the modern period, did more work and thought more about the Holy Spirit than any other theologian in history of the church. For Calvin, the Holy Spirit was the key here. He wasn't a tag along. By indwelling the people of God, the Holy Spirit's job is to make the father as father and the son as son known. And when the spirit does his job, when he brings home, when he applies the work of the father, when he brings home and applies the work of the son, he has in fact brought home and applied his own work and made himself known as well. Now each person is involved in each work of God. As we're going to talk about in just a couple minutes, creation is not merely the work of the father. It is also the work of the son and the spirit. Yet there is a distinctive work of each, and creation will say is the distinctive work of the father. As break puts it, there is even reason to preserve a certain kind of priority of the father. We need to be careful here. When we talk about the priority of the father, it should not be thought of in a kind of originist, by that of an origin of Alexandria, ontological sense. In the sense that the father is the source of all being, the son is the eternally generated, derived being of the father, and the spirit is the proceeding being of the father. But what we do see is a historical, redemptive priority to the father. And the history of redemption is the key here. The father does in fact send the son. And the son does, in fact, John 14, the key text here, and the spirit, the son does, in fact, promise that he will send the spirit as his replacement. All of this suggests number four. When we speak about God's attributes, they are the attributes of his person. Throughout our biblical discussion of God is a thoroughly personal and historical discussion, because God comes to us where we are. He comes to us in history. He comes to us in creation. I saw a couple of hands. Let me entertain some questions here before we move on. Personal is right here. The question is this. Does Calvin simply ignore the question of essence? I'm not sure that I wouldn't want to say ignore. He certainly does not emphasize essence. Again, to use braze argument for Calvin, God may have an essence, but that's not the medium through which we get at God and understand him. We're going to know God through his persons, through his historical relationships. We may need something like an essence for thinking about the Trinity. It seems to me that Nicaea was right when it did that. Even though it was using extrobiblical language, it was trying to find some way to relate the three, to hold onto monotheism, but to do justice to the threeness that we obviously see in the New Testament. That's right. That's absolutely correct. Three persons who are connected by this idea of pair of choruses that they indwell one another. In that indwelling, there is a oneness. What Calvin is suggesting, it seems to me, is that while we confess God is one, we don't start there. We start with the fact that what we see in scripture is the father, excuse me, the son talks about the father, as another, right? The father, the son, I keep getting them next up here tonight. Well, that's okay. It's a pair of choruses. The son speaks about the Holy Spirit as someone other than himself. And remember, it's God's job to figure out his own oneness. He wants to come to us as three. I think, again, what about John 1428? My father is greater than I. I think that's a statement of that submission that in the history of redemption, the father has the particular ministry of sending the son and the spirit to do his will. I think that makes the best sense of those kinds of statements. Remember you want to put that together with John 111 in the beginning was the word, the word was with God and the word was God. You're going to find some ways to synthetically put those kinds of statements together. If we can, let's turn our attention at this point to the doctrine of creation or the work of creation on page 81 in your outline. And even before we get to Romans 1, let me make a few introductory comments here. When Moses was led by God's spirit to inscriptureate revelation, the first word God wanted Israel in the wilderness to hear. The first word that God wanted his people to hear about him is that he's the creator. The revelation given about creation. Creation both as God's original act and creation as the product of God's act is not given. And I think we need to say this very loudly today. That revelation about creation is not given so that we'll have a primarily have a database concerning origins. It's given firstly so that we know God. It's given primarily that we know God. The creation both as the original event and as the nature of things is revelatory of God. And this creative work of God plays a prominent role throughout the entirety of revelation. Well, run number one. God as the creator of the world. I believe in God the father Almighty, maker of heaven, enter. So opens the oldest of the church's ecumenical creeds. But what does it mean to confess God as the creator? What's the relationship between God and the world to which this confession points? Well, our first point here under room number one or capital A here is that the creation of the world is an act of God. The universe is the results of a divine act of creativity. And within the biblical and Christian tradition, the world is a result of a free act of creativity, a non-necessary act on God's part. It's the result of God's will, and it's the result of God's love. God is not driven to create. He's not forced by some sense of compulsion to bring the universe into existence. No thing external to God, no forces outside of him lie behind the creative act, and no forces within God, no inner necessity compels him to create. If this weren't the case, if some forces outside of God or some forces internal to God did stand behind the creation. Then God's own existence would be thoroughly bound up with the created order, in such a way that any real distinction between God and the material universe would be impossible. So kind of first and foremost here, when we talk about the doctrine of creation, we are talking about the creator, creation, distinction again. Now one way of phrasing the classical presupposition of creation as a free act has been to use the word, the term or the phrase, creatio ex nihilo, creation out of nothing.
Now the intention of this phrase is really kind of two-sided. There are two intentions, I guess I could say. The first is this. It means to tell us that we need, we need no principles, no powers outside of God in order to explain the existence of the universe. Why does the universe exist? Because God made it. But secondly, the second thing a creatio ex nihilo tells us is that God created out of his love, out of his will, not out of necessity. Again, creation is a free act. Now we need to admit that we cannot neatly turn to a particular verse in Scripture and pull out a proof text for creatio ex nihilo. Romans 4, 17 may come the closest. That text tells us that God calls into existence the things that do not exist. Thus that text may suggest that creation took place without any antecedent material cause outside of God. But the doctrine of creatio ex nihilo comes as much as anything from the overall flow, the overall tenor of the entirety of Scripture. God is the absolute monarch. Just as a king commands and his vassals do his being, so God exercises absolute lordship over all things. And of course, Genesis 1 comes to mind here, but you might also jot down Psalm 104. I have verses 7 in mind, but the entire Psalm is about God as a creative lord. In Genesis 1, we don't see Elohim struggling with contrary powers. What we see is, well in Hebrew, it's very, very terse. It's four words. It's belight was life. By a simple executive order, God gives the command. And there is immediate obeisance to that command. He speaks, and it is done. He speaks by his, he creates by his mere word. Be in our outline, hear creation as a trinitarian act. Here's where we're going to have a little bit of fun. Creation is the work of the triune, God. A large number of Old Testament references to the creative act. Attributed simply to God, rather than father, son, and spirit. That makes sense for the distinctions of the Trinity had not yet been fully revealed. The sun had not yet been incarnated. And the spirit had not yet come at Pentecost as the replacement of the sun. When we turn to the New Testament, we do see differentiation, a differentiation which would lead the classical theological tradition to this formula. The father creates the world through the sun by the spirit. Is that phrase on your outline? Okay. The father creates the world, or the actually the formulas, the father creates through the sun by the spirit. Well, first of all, here the father. It's the father who fulfills the primary role in the act of creation. He constitutes the ground of all that exists. I also use that word ground so I'd better be careful. Ground, not in the sense of origin or source, but ground in the sense of power. God, the father is the power source, not the material source. We'll talk a bit more about that who were done here. In 1 Corinthians 8 verse 6, Paul tells us, for us there is but one God, the father, from whom all things came and for whom we live. And there is but one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom all things came and through whom we live. But in what sense is the father, the source, the ultimate agent of creation? We have a couple subpoints here. First of all, the father's will forms the foundation for the existence of all things. According to Revelation chapter 4 verse 11, the world exists by the will of the father. Secondly, our small B here, God's manifested glory or presence is the goal of creation. The very purpose of creation is to glorify the father. It's Revelation chapter 4 verse 11 and Psalm 191. And small C, the father is the source in the sense of being the father. Matter of fact, what we mean by by source is just that, his fatherhood. As it's put in Acts 17 verse 28, for in him we live and move and have our being, we are his offspring in the same way that I am the source of my children, or I should say in an analogous way, because it's not literally the same, in an analogous way to my being the source of my children. The father is the source of all things. The role of the son, number two, the son's role appears to be one of agency, agency. And here think of John 1 verses 1 through 3 and verse 10 and Colossians 1 verses 16 and 17. Verse 3 of John 1 for example says, through him meaning the logos, the son, through him all things were made and without him nothing was made that has been made. And Colossians 1 16 declares that all things were created by him. Now both texts employ the same Greek phrase, D out to through him which speaks of agency. Through the son the father creates the world. The role of the spirit, three such texts as Genesis 1 3, Job 26 13, Job 33 4, Psalm 104 30, Isaiah 40 verses 12 and 13 suggests that the spirit is the divine power active in the creation of the universe.
Now if you think about this we talked about the father as the creator, the son as the agent of creation, the son as excuse me the spirit as the power of creation, that can all be a little confusing. There may be some conflict or confusion saying that the father is the creator and yet the triune God creates. But the fact of the matter is we ourselves speak about building projects, large projects, massive projects just this way. Okay my house is not a big massive project but I can even speak about the building of my house just this way. Who actually built my house? You ask the architect he'll say he built my house. He designed it, drew up the plans on the very beginning. You ask the contractor, he'll say he built my house. He carries out the plan. Even though he doesn't do the actual construction he will say he built it. And then there's a whole army of carpenters, roofers or roofers, brick layers, painters, electricians and guys I don't know what they do. Who will all say they built my house. We could add building material suppliers and lawyers. Finally I can say I built my house. After all I at least signed, authorized and paid for the house that may help to not get rid of the confusion but at least give us some insight as to how we can speak of both the father as the creator, the son as the creator, the spirit as the creator and the triumphant God as the creator. See in our outline God's status as creator. As the creator God rightly enjoys a special status regarding the world he's made. As the creator God is the king over the things that he's made. He is the source of all authority. Matter of fact he is the ultimate authority. In a word God is sovereign. He's the covenant lord. He's the suzerain over his creation. Ultimately ultimately this means that God alone has the prerogative to declare what creation should be. His will alone is the final norm throughout creation because he's the creator because he's the king, the sovereign lord. He is the law giver for his creation because he's the creator. He has the right to set down the law. The biblical authors employ a quite forceful analogy from the ancient cultural world to get at this, the analogy of the potter and the clay. Just as the potter has the right to do with the clay as he chooses, so also God has the right to act toward his creation in accordance with his will. A whole lot of texts to get at this. Jeremiah 18 verses 1 through 6. Of course Romans 9, actually the entire Romans 9 verses 16 through 21. You want to look at the question there as well. Isaiah 29 verses 15 and 16. Isaiah 45, 9. Isaiah 64 verse 8.