What does the Bible say about the Holy Spirit?

The Bible passages below can be used in sermons, prayers, pastoral care, or worship planning focused on the Holy Spirit.

Example passages

• Matthew 28:19, baptizing in the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit (the great commissioning)
• John 14:26, the Advocate, the Holy Spirit (the Holy Spirit will teach you everything)
• John 15:26, the Spirit of truth (the Spirit will testify on Jesus' behalf)
• Acts 5:3-4, lie to the Holy Spirit (Peter speaks about how Satan has filled Ananias' heart)
• Romans 8:9, the Spirit dwells in you (you are not in the flesh, you are in the Spirit)
• Romans 8:26, the Spirit intercedes (the Spirit helps us in our weakness)
• 1 Corinthians 2:10, God reveals through the Spirit (the Spirit searches everything)
• 2 Corinthians 13:13, the Holy Spirit be with you (the grace of Christ, the love of God, the communion of the Holy Spirit be with all of you)

Warnings about the Holy Spirit

• Mark 3:29, blaspheming against the Holy Spirit (do not speak against the Holy Spirit)
• Ephesians 4:30, grieving the Holy Spirit (do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God)

Sermon ideas about the Holy Spirit

Moving to Trinitarianism

A sermon about the Holy Spirit can discuss the doctrine of the Trinity. The move from binitarianism to trinitarianism is conceptually and religiously not problematic. If we can conceive of and devote ourselves to two divine persons, probably we can to three. But biblically there are real problems in the move to full three-person theism. The New Testament's treatment of the Holy Spirit is difficult and elusive. Pneuma (Spirit) is not a clearly personal name as are Father and Son. Spirit may refer to a faculty or dimension of a person, as it sometimes does in the Bible (Matthew 5:3, 1 Corinthians 5:3-5). Accordingly, some theologians are functional binitarians, conceiving the Spirit as a name for God's active presence or for the power of God.

The Spirit is called "God" at most once in the Bible (Acts 5:3-4). Old Testament passages about Yahweh are not transferred to the Holy Spirit as they are with Jesus Christ. Contrary to the case with Jesus Christ, no biblical author says that the Spirit is equal with God, or in the form of God, or in the image of God, or God's "exegesis," or one who bears the very stamp of God's being. The Spirit is never said to be uncreated.

Does the Holy Spirit love? The most we can say is that whether the Spirit is ever said to love at all, let alone superlatively, depends on whether the genitive form of pneuma in Romans 15:30 is objective or subjective. More significantly, the Holy Spirit in the New Testament is never an object of worship or of prayer. By the late fourth century, the Niceno-Constantinopolitan Creed could say that the Spirit is worshiped and glorified together with the Father and the Son, but this is a theological deduction from the assumption that the Spirit is divine. It is not a repetition of a biblical claim.

And yet. The Spirit speaks (Mark 13:11), searches (1 Corinthians 2:10), bears witness (Romans 8:16), intercedes (Romans 8:26), teaches (John 14:26), apportions gifts (1 Corinthians 12:11), exercises will (Acts 16:6-7), and can be grieved (Ephesians 4:30). These are functions of a person.

Moreover, if in Romans 8:26 and 34 Paul can attribute the same intercessory function to Christ and to the Spirit, and if intercession is a personal function, and if Christ is a person, then a reasonable inference is that the Spirit is too. Exactly the same goes for "another Advocate" in John 14:16.

The Spirit is repeatedly referred to in the New Testament as "the Spirit of God" or as "the Spirit of Christ." These locutions suggest both close association and distinction.

And the Spirit does perform divine functions. The Spirit judges (John 16:8-11), pours out the love of God (Romans 5:5), gives life free from the tyranny of sin (Romans 8:2), frees believers to be children of God (Romans 8:15) and to know themselves as such (Romans 8:16) and to begin responding as such (Romans 8:15b). The Spirit sanctifies (Romans 15:16); renews (Romans 7:6); and gives love (Romans 15:30), joy (Romans 14:17), hope (Romans 8:17 ff.), peace (Romans 8:6), and faith (1 Corinthians 12:9). 

Moreover, according to Mark 3:29, the Spirit can be blasphemed — unforgivably so. Blasphemy in the New Testament is verbal injury to someone divine, usually God the Father. Finally, the Spirit appears in numerous bi-partite and tri-partite formulas with Jesus Christ, or with Jesus Christ and God the Father, implying that the Spirit is the same sort of being they are.

Pentecost

A sermon on the Holy Spirit can also examine Pentecost. When the Spirit is poured out at Pentecost, fires start and winds blow and people speak and hear in unfamiliar languages. But these are only attention-getters. The real miracle of Pentecost — the God-almighty, Holy Ghost miracle — is that Jews whom Peter has accused of crucifying God's Messiah are "cut to the heart" and saved. The Holy Spirit cut through their armor and regenerated them in a tremendously powerful act. This is the characteristic work of the powerful and mysterious third person of the Holy Trinity.

In fact, wherever previously hostile or indifferent persons find their hearts strangely warmed by the gospel and Jesus Christ newly attractive to them, Christians properly conclude that the Holy Spirit has been in the neighborhood to do the mighty work of raising the dead.

Excerpts about the Holy Spirit

Following are sample excerpts from Zeteosearch.org sermon resources about the Holy Spirit.

• "If their active life in the Spirit had ended there, then they would still be missing the point of what the Holy Spirit makes possible." Sermon Preparation by Frank L. Crouch from Working Preacher
• "Jesus promised to send the Holy Spirit, and that promise was fulfilled at Pentecost. This event also served as a beautiful reminder of God's power, and of the purpose of the church." Children's Sermon or Lesson by Kristin Schmidt from Ministry to Children

Worship ideas about the Holy Spirit

Following are sample excerpts from Zeteosearch.org worship resources about the Holy Spirit:

• "Holy Spirit, Truth divine, dawn upon this soul of mine. Voice of God, and inward Light, wake my spirit, clear my sight." Hymn by Samuel Longfellow from Hymnary.org