Ask · The Holy Spirit

Is the Holy Spirit a person or a force?

The Holy SpiritIn theological review

The short answer

The Holy Spirit is a person, not an impersonal force. Jesus calls him the Helper who teaches and reminds, and speaks of him with personal words throughout John 14 to 16. In Acts, lying to the Holy Spirit is lying to God himself, which only makes sense if the Spirit is God and personal.

The fuller answer

The Bible never treats the Holy Spirit as a power to be used, like electricity or influence. Jesus introduces him as another Helper, sent by the Father in his name, who would teach the disciples and bring his words to their remembrance. Teaching, reminding, and helping are the work of a mind and a will. A force cannot remember anything for you, but a person who knows you can. From the start, then, the Spirit is presented as someone, not something, and the rest of the New Testament keeps that pattern without exception.

But the Advocate, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in My name, will teach you all things and will remind you of everything I have told you.

John 14:26 (BSB)

Jesus goes further when he promises that the Spirit of truth will guide the disciples into all truth. He says the Spirit hears, speaks, and declares what is to come, and that he will glorify Jesus rather than drawing attention to himself. Hearing and speaking are personal acts, and self-effacing love is a personal quality. Notice too that Jesus consistently says he, not it. The early church simply followed their Lord here, confessing the Spirit in the Nicene Creed as the Lord and giver of life, fully God alongside the Father and the Son.

However, when the Spirit of truth comes, He will guide you into all truth. For He will not speak on His own, but He will speak what He hears, and He will declare to you what is to come.

John 16:13 (BSB)

Acts settles the matter in a hard scene. Ananias kept back money while pretending to give it all, and Peter told him he had lied to the Holy Spirit, then added that he had not lied to men but to God, in Acts 5:3-4. You cannot lie to a force, and the lie is counted as a lie against God himself. Paul likewise warns that the Spirit can be grieved, in Ephesians 4:30, and grief belongs to a person who loves. Christians therefore relate to the Spirit with reverence and trust, as to God who is personally present.

Did it not belong to you before it was sold? And after it was sold, was it not at your disposal? How could you conceive such a deed in your heart? You have not lied to men, but to God!

Acts 5:4 (BSB)

This is why the church's worship and prayer treat the Spirit personally. Christians ask him to teach, convict, comfort, and fill them, and they sing to the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit as the one God. The question is sometimes pressed by those who call the Spirit God's active force, but that reading has to explain away Jesus's personal words, Peter's charge of lying, and Paul's warning about grief all at once. Taken on its own terms, the Bible's witness is steady: the Holy Spirit is a divine person, God with us and in us.

Sources

  • Berean Standard Bible (BSB)
  • The Nicene Creed (AD 325, enlarged 381)

Review status: in-theological-review. Every Contend page passes a human theological review against the Statement of Faith before it is published as approved teaching. This section is in that queue.

Dig deeper

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Who is the Holy Spirit?The Holy Spirit is God himself, the third person of the Trinity, not a force, a feeling, or God's power in the abstract. He is there at creation, hovering over the waters. He speaks, teaches, and can be lied to, and when Peter confronts Ananias he says the lie told to the Holy Spirit was a lie told to God.What is the Trinity?The Trinity is the Christian confession that there is one God, and that this one God is Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, three persons, each fully God, equal in power and glory. The word itself is not in the Bible. The reality is taught everywhere in it, and the church forged the word to protect what the Bible says from being flattened in either direction.What does the Holy Spirit do?He convicts the world of sin, guides believers into the truth, teaches and reminds them of Jesus's words, and produces a different kind of life in them: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness. His work always points to Jesus rather than to himself, and its fruit shows up in character, not in show.How can God be three and one at the same time?God is three and one in different senses, so there is no contradiction: one in essence, one single God, and three in persons, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Scripture holds both together, confessing that the LORD is one while baptising in the one name of the Father, Son, and Spirit.Who should we pray to: the Father, the Son, or the Holy Spirit?Pray normally to the Father, in the name of the Son, with the help of the Holy Spirit, because that is the pattern Jesus himself taught. Praying to Jesus is also biblical, as Stephen did while he was dying. The New Testament gives no example of prayer addressed to the Spirit, whose own work is to help us pray to God.Bible Character: PeterThe Galilean fisherman who confessed Jesus as the Christ, denied him three times on the night he was betrayed, was restored by the risen Lord, and preached at Pentecost.Bible Character: JesusThe Son of God, born of Mary in Bethlehem, who preached the kingdom of God, was crucified for our sins according to the Scriptures, and was raised on the third day.Lesson: I believe in God, the Father almightyThe Creed opens by naming who God is before it says anything about us. Take the first line apart, word by word, with the Scripture under each word.