Holy Spirit as Helper

John Ritenbaugh, continuing his exposition on the source of the Church's characteristics, reiterates that Jesus Christ is the architect, suggesting that the created institution or body must take on the characteristics of the builder, following assiduously His Commandments, hallowing the same Sabbath and Holy days that He did, and reflecting His character. Jesus Christ has handpicked those He wanted, gifting them with abilities to carry out their responsibilities, a process that has been underway for 2000 years, leading to a cumulative 144,000 beings, constituting the First-fruits and Bride of Christ, prepared to assist Him in governing. Those whom God has called are created in His image, but they are not yet of the God-kind until they receive a tiny portion of His Holy Spirit, enabling them to resist the carnal human nature with which they have been born. As God's Spirit displaces carnality, we become a new creation in Christ, born from above, developing godly character and displacing human nature. In developing and building character, we must voluntarily choose to obey, but God does virtually everything, giving us the will and power to work with His Holy Spirit. Spiritual birth occurs within the human heart—a total transformation of the human heart by the immaterial power that motivates us to acquire His characteristics. This transformation does not take place all at once but requires a lifetime to remove all the impurities. As the impurities are refined out of our character, the world will begin to hate the new creation being formed in us and will feel compelled to hatefully persecute us. We have no idea what God is doing with us as He begins to shape and mold us, but we need to remember that He owns us. As Adam contributed nothing to his physical creation, we contribute nothing to our spiritual creation except for our willingness to yield to His workmanship. The characteristics of the Church are being (and have always been) formed from on high.

Government may very well be the most important subject in all the Bible because it contains the vital knowledge of how Christians are to govern themselves under the sovereignty of God. John Ritenbaugh concludes his series on our full acceptance of God's sovereignty by highlighting how Christ helps us to follow God's will as He did.

God's grace is so wonderful and undeserved that, to many of us, it is almost unfathomable. Perhaps we have such a hard time understanding it because we tend to think of it as a "thing" that God dispenses. John Ritenbaugh shows, however, that "grace" is a term that represents God's awesome generosity toward us, His continuously flowing blessings and saving acts.

John Ritenbaugh reiterates that Elohim is a plural noun indicating more than one personality. Elohim could be considered a genus—a God-kind, parallel to human-kind, animal-kind, etc. Jesus Christ, as the second Adam, is the beginning of the spiritual kind. The creation has switched from physical to spiritual as God reproduces His kind. God the Father and Jesus Christ are two separate personalities, with the Father having pre-eminence. The Bible contains no shred of evidence to substantiate a third person in the God family, let alone a third co-equal being in a closed trinity. The Holy Spirit as a person did not enter the Roman Catholic Church until well into the 4th century. The doctrine was developed out of speculation, deduction, and human reason, ignoring and displacing scriptural evidence. The trinity doctrine is read into, rather than read out of the, scripture. The Holy Spirit has been designated as the "power of God" in the angels' announcement to Mary. According to the scripture, people will be immersed in the Holy Spirit, and it will be poured out on people, it will fall in people, it will fill a room, etc. In the salutations in the epistles from Paul, James, and Peter, the Holy Spirit is never mentioned as a personality or a part of the God family, and never mentioned in the chain of command. In Psalm 139, the Holy Spirit was designated as the power of God, the means through which He accomplishes His will, HIS very spirit! The communion of the Holy Spirit makes it possible for us to have fellowship with God and Jesus Christ, and it provides an invisible communication network to connect all of Christ's body simultaneously. When one looks at the figurative applications of the Holy Spirit (metaphor, simile, imagery, personification, anthropomorphism), the idea of the Holy Spirit as a person becomes increasingly absurd.

In discussing the Holy Spirit and the Trinity, John Ritenbaugh reiterates that the Holy Spirit is never venerated as a separate being (Revelation 22:1-3, John 10:30, John 17:3). Spirit (ruach-Hebrew or pneuma-Greek), something never seen, is manifested or personified in many diverse ways such as truth, adoption, anger, courage, grace, faith, (states of mind or emotion, character, or personality) etc. In every instance it is preceded by the words "spirit of." Spirit applies to an invisible force or power within man or beast or angelic being making them unique. Our hope of glory is the "indwelling of Christ" and is used interchangeably with "Spirit of God" and "Spirit of Truth." Jesus promised a spirit of power from on high made available for His disciples (as diverse spiritual gifts) to witness of Him. The Holy Spirit, as a force or power dwelling in us, enables us to keep God's law and to receive our new nature. Pneuma and ruach represent that invisible power applied in many diverse ways manifesting in us the power of God making it possible to have an intimate family relationship with God the Father and Jesus Christ, perfectly unified in purpose and composition, analogous to the relationship of husband and wife—at one in a family relationship. Ruach Ha Kodesh or Pneuma Hagion (Christ in us) provides the metaphoric glue to make this cleavage possible - making our God-family relationship manifest.

Richard Ritenbaugh, focusing on the five parakletos sayings of Christ, affirms that the Holy Spirit is the essence, mind, and power of God and Christ in us, providing us assistance and counsel. Many of the definitions of parakletos, a verbal adjective in the masculine gender, connote distinctive legal or judicial dimensions: advocate, counselor, advisor, intercessor, mediator, or proxy. Many Old Testament figures served in the capacity of an intercessor for others before God. The apostle John, the other Gospel writers, and the apostle Paul emphatically declare that Jesus Christ, the Lord, is our intercessor or parakletos. Jesus describes the function of the Holy Spirit as 1) helper, 2) teacher, 3) witness (proof of Jesus living in us), 4) prosecutor (convicting of sin and prompting to righteousness), and 5) revealer and guide (making God real to us, preparing us for eternal life in God's Family).

As he begins concluding his series, John Ritenbaugh writes that the offerings have a great deal to do with our relationship with God. How closely do we identify with Christ? Are we walking in His footsteps? Are we being transformed into His image?

John Ritenbaugh points out that Jesus Christ, through His voluntary humility (giving up all the perks of being God), has given us a model of the mindset that we need to have in order to attain membership in the family of God. Paul, desiring the Philippian congregation to attain spiritual maturity, urges that they (and we) take responsibility for the nuts and bolts process of overcoming or renouncing our carnal selves (working out our own salvation by the practical application of head knowledge) upon ourselves, cooperating with the shaping power of God (giving us the power to will and to do by means of His Spirit), who desires that we learn in the here and now the style of life (in a climate or environment of love as well as fear of soiling the family name of God) we will live for eternity.

John Ritenbaugh refutes the erroneous belief that glossolalia (or speaking in tongues) constitutes a sign or condition of having received God's Holy Spirit. The dramatic manifestations in Acts 2 (cloven tongues of fire, rushing wind, and the miracle of speaking and hearing extant languages and dialects) were event specific, and not to be a perennial spectacle in so-called "Tarry meetings." Adherents to the Pentecostal movement try to mimic some of the superficial surface manifestations (noise, commotion, and unintelligible gibberish) rather than follow the teaching given on that day- including repentance, unconditional surrender of our will to God, and keeping His Commandments through the power of His Holy Spirit. Receiving the gift of the Holy Spirit (the power to subdue our carnality and live righteously) is dependent upon repentance and baptism. The ability to speak in tongues, although a legitimate spiritual gift for a very specific purpose, is not the identifying hallmark of God's Holy Spirit.