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The Indwelling Work of the Holy Spirit
W e come now
to the indwelling work of the Holy Spirit. This work of the Holy Spirit
is also captured in Paul’s first letter to the Corinthians:
For even as the
body is one and yet has many members, and all the members of the
body, though they are many, are one body, so also is Christ. For by
one Spirit we were all baptized into one body, whether Jews or
Greeks, whether slaves or free, and we were all made to drink of one
Spirit.
(1 Corinthians
12:12–13)
We have already covered the first three phrases of
verse 13, which have to do with the baptizing work of the Holy Spirit.
We are now going to work on the last phrase of verse 13, as it relates
to the indwelling work of the Holy Spirit.
Paul states here that
we were all made to drink of one Spirit, i.e. obviously the Holy Spirit.
The tense and voice of this verb is the same as the word "baptized." We
studied this in the last chapter. We are not going to worry about the
voice, but we are just going to touch on the tense. The tense here is
again the aorist tense. So the action here is viewed as summary action
or as if the action took place in a snapshot, and this snapshot was
taken sometime in the past. So, every person that accepts Jesus, the
Christ, is given to drink of one Spirit, i.e. the Holy Spirit.
Now, when we drink
something, we take it inside of ourselves. I believe the phrase "we were
made to drink of one Spirit," refers to the indwelling of the Holy
Spirit. So, we are talking about the indwelling work or ministry of the
Holy Spirit.
Keep in mind that Paul
is explaining the basis for his teaching that although there are many
members of the body, there is only one body of Christ, i.e. one Church.
The basis of our unity is the fact that Jesus, through the
instrumentality or means of the Holy Spirit, baptized us into one body
and we were all made to drink of one Spirit. I believe Paul is saying,
"Because we were all baptized into one body by the Holy Spirit and we
have all drunk of or are indwelled by the same Holy Spirit, we are one
body!" Whether we are Baptist, Methodist, Episcopalian, Pentecostal,
etc., there is but one body of Christ. So, we should stop fighting
against each other. The indwelling of the same Holy Spirit makes us one!
Now, let’s begin to
try to take in some of the blessings of this work of the Holy Spirit. We
won’t be able to cover the many blessings of this work, because of the
scope of this work, but let’s cover some.
First, according to
the text before us, the Holy Spirit not only joins us to the Savior, by
baptizing us into the body of Christ, but He also joins Himself to us,
by indwelling us. Jesus touches on this in John’s account of the Gospel:
Now on the last
day, the great day of the feast, Jesus stood and cried out, saying,
"If anyone is thirsty, let him come to Me and drink. He who believes
in Me, as the Scripture said, ‘From his innermost being will flow
rivers of living water.’" But this He spoke of the Spirit, whom
those who believed in Him were to receive; for the Spirit was not
yet given, because Jesus was not yet glorified.
(John 7:37–39)
On the last day of the
Feast of Tabernacles, which was the great day of the feast because it
was a Sabbath day and the last feast day of the year, "the priest, as
was done on every day of this festival, brought forth, in golden
vessels, water from the stream of Siloah, which flowed under the
temple-mountain, and solemnly poured it upon the altar" (Olshausen). As
the priest poured this water upon the altar, Jesus stood up and cried
out saying, "If anyone is thirsty, let Him come to me and drink." Jesus
said, in effect, "I, in contradistinction to what you are seeing, am the
water of life!"
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