Deep Dives: The Holy Spirit Throughout The Bible

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Hey His Hands family.

I'm Maya.

Um, and this is Deep Dives.

This is where I take a passionate member from our church and where we dive deep into a certain topic or discussion so that we all can learn together as a church.

And today I have the pleasure of being with Ben Sykes.

Um, and we're gonna be discussing the Holy Spirit.

This is a really big topic to just chop up into sections eventually.

So I feel like a lot of pressure is on you.

Um but hopefully we just get a better understanding out of all of it because it is such an immense topic to be like discussing.

So my first question to try to nibble at the big chunk of what the Holy Spirit is just how does it fit within the Trinity?

Like what's the Holy Spirit's role within that?

If that's it's a really big question.

Yeah.

Like we have all night.

So the Holy Spirit, it's it's a huge question.

It's a it's it's not a what, it's a who.

It's first first place to start.

So the Holy Spirit is all throughout the Bible, and just from my own perspective, like I I've been a believer since I was a teenager, and I'm almost like 50 now.

So I've been a believer for a long time in studying the Bible, but at like key places in my walk, it's always been like, I think I understand the Holy Spirit, and then I always come back to like, no, it's so much bigger.

Then no, it's so much bigger, and like every every five or ten years, it's just a big thing.

Uh so the Holy Spirit, it used to be like I started and I thought the Holy Spirit was just this extra thing that's added on the top at the end.

It's like you got the Bible, and then there's God, and then there's the fall, and God seems mad, and there are all these laws, and then eventually Jesus comes and he's nice, and then everything seems okay, and we accept Jesus, and we're gonna be okay in heaven, but we're not in heaven yet, and so that's the Bible, and oh yeah, by the way, in between with the Holy Spirit, and that's good.

And it was like this extra little cherry on top thing.

But then as I started reading the Bible through, like myself, it really just it's an entirely different type of uh type of discussion.

It's huge.

This first actually got into me uh most recently, like in a deep way, almost 10 years ago, uh I got the flu like super bad.

Uh I've never been this sick in my life.

It's like two weeks, and so I was quarantined in the basement like a lot of people are these days.

Quarantined in the basement for like two weeks, so much so like my family didn't want anything to do with me.

My eyes were crazy, had these secondary infections.

I couldn't work, I couldn't watch TV because of my eyes or whatever.

So the only thing I could find to do that would like bring me comfort, yeah, is I would like turn on uh audio Bible.

Because I do that a lot, like I like to listen to scripture uh rather than just read it.

So I was like, that was my happy place.

And I was sick for so long, I was fine, it's a happy story.

I was sick for so long, like I turned it on, and you can listen to the entire Bible in like five days, eight hours a day, if you have plenty of free time.

And so I got the whole Bible, not just over the course of a year, but like in a week.

And when that happened, it just hit me like wow, I've totally missed the Holy Spirit, because it's everywhere.

Because the Holy Spirit, it the Bible starts, the Holy Spirit is there, uh, like the second verse of the Bible, the Holy Spirit is hovering over the waters in creation and he creates.

And then you don't see it for a while, it seems, uh shows up like inspires Joseph to interpret dreams, and some other guy gets inspired by the Holy Spirit as an artist to build the temple and things like that.

And he'll show up and like when kings are anointed, or he'll uh inspire somebody with a song.

And then you get into the the prophets, and then the Holy Spirit is inspiring tons of stuff in the prophets, and they're speaking about maybe we misunderstood the law, uh, we're convicted of this as a nation, and then they begin to prophesy about Jesus, and so this the spirit is active, but it seems like you never quite know where it's coming from, what it's gonna do.

And then the New Testament happens and Jesus shows up, and the Holy Spirit is it's so much more key.

So, like Jesus is conceived by the Holy Spirit, and then when he's baptized, you know, around age 30 or so, his cousin is John the Baptist, and he's preaching, and he says, This person that's coming after me, I'm not worthy to you know untie the his sandal, and he's I've been baptizing you with water, but he's gonna baptize you with the Holy Spirit.

And so it's like the stage has been set.

And he's the one that baptizes his cousin, he baptizes Jesus, and so when Jesus is baptized, then we see the Holy Spirit like dramatically show up.

So you've got this scene, and Jesus is baptized, and heaven opens up, and the Father sends the Holy Spirit like a dove.

Uh and Luke even says the Holy Spirit descends like a dove in bodily form, whatever that means, and then ascends on Jesus, and Jesus is completely filled with the Spirit, like inspired for his ministry.

And Jesus hears from heaven, from his father, you know, this is my beloved son, in whom I'm well pleased, and like the love of God completely fills him.

So it's dramatic, like Jesus is filled with the Spirit and sent out into ministry.

Uh and so the Gospels give us that a lot, like especially in John, it says over and over again just how much Jesus is completely filled with the Spirit.

And like that's it's like the strategy.

So in the Old Testament, the Spirit is weaving around, inspiring certain people at key times, but then one of the last few things that people begin to prophesy in the Old Testament is that one day the Spirit is gonna be given to everybody.

And the Spirit is going to be like in Ezekiel, it says, I'm gonna give you a new heart.

You have a heart of stone, and I'm gonna replace that with a heart of flesh, and I'm gonna put a new spirit within you.

So, like that's the seed, and then when it arrives in Jesus, it's like a plot twist because the Holy Spirit just comes completely in this one man.

So then Jesus goes around and it's like the Holy Spirit is walking around in the flesh, which is like the Trinity.

I mean, that's what it that's what it is, the way the Trinity works.

And so the same creative force that was hovering over the waters, creating at the beginning of the Bible, is now literally walking around on the earth and creating life.

Like he touches people and they're healed of their disease.

And he speaks words, and his words are just just change people.

There's his words, like people have been preaching about his words for for thousands of years.

And like we're told in the Gospel of John, Jesus is completely given the Spirit strategically so that he can give it to everybody.

But it's like, it's another tease.

Like, how's that gonna happen?

So towards the end of Jesus' life, he says, uh, I'm gonna go, I'm gonna be crucified, and I'm gonna be resurrected.

And everybody pushes back on that as friends, but he says, It's good that that's gonna happen because uh if I don't go, then I can't send the advocate to you, send the Holy Spirit.

And so Jesus knows like this is the strategy.

The Holy Spirit is meant to be given to everyone to have this new capacity to know me, and that's what's gonna happen when I'm resurrected.

So it's a big story.

Like we're we're only halfway done here.

So Jesus dies, pronounces forgiveness, you know, achieves like atonement, and then he's resurrected, and before he ascends, he breathes on his disciples, like we're told.

Um I think this is in John, like as he's right before he's about to ascend, um, he breathes his spirit into his disciples.

So that's the first place, or the next place where the Holy Spirit does something dramatic.

Then he ascends into heaven, but as he ascends, he says, You're gonna be my witness, and he he mentions the Holy Spirit there, but he says, Don't do anything uh until you are clothed with power in the Holy Spirit.

Like wait in Jerusalem first.

So they wait around and they're in prayer, and then the Holy Spirit falls, Pentecost.

So like the next huge, huge plot twist.

And that that kind of feels like what happened when Jesus was baptized.

Like the Holy Spirit comes down and ascends on them like flames of fire, uh, and they're filled with the Spirit and begin to speak in tongues.

So it's from there, at Pentecost, that now the church is founded, and now this is like the promise in Ezekiel, is finally happening, and the Spirit of God is going out into all the world.

So it's like it's a strategy that was, it was described in the Old Testament, but just about everybody missed it.

And like the Holy Spirit says, this is going to be given to everyone, but everyone's sinful and can't accept this until they have a regenerated heart.

And so only Jesus can do this.

So God comes in the flesh, receives the Holy Spirit himself, because he can receive it, because he's perfect, and then he gives it out to his church.

So that's the story of the church.

So then Paul's unpacking that for like all of his books and just describing the joy that we have as believers because the Holy Spirit, God Himself, is at home within us.

So, all that to say, the Holy Spirit is everywhere in the whole Bible.

And then it ends by just, you know, this picture uh in Revelation of one day in new creation, we have new bodies, and then like Jesus Himself and is like light around us.

We're so filled with the presence of God that it just flows like a river from the throne of God.

So yeah.

Okay, so if I got everything that you're saying, um I could repeat it all if you want.

You were talking about your audio books.

I felt like I got like the whole Bible again in like two minutes, which is fantastic.

But like, so you're saying the Holy Spirit went from an influencing force in the Old Testament.

Yeah.

From like an outer influencing force to becoming a more of an internal influencing force within us.

Yes.