The Work of the Spirit in Us
For days we have been celebrating the Feast of the Descent of the Holy Spirit. We would like our lecture today to be about the Holy Spirit and our relationship with Him. Scripture says that we are temples of the Holy Spirit, and that the Holy Spirit dwells in us. We have received the Holy Spirit in the Sacrament of the Holy Chrism (Myron), and the Spirit has become the One who leads our lives, as a Church and as individuals. But is this truly so? Or is it our human thinking and our human lusts that lead us? What is the measure of the work of the Spirit in us?
The Work of the Spirit in Us (1)
When the Spirit of God dwells in us, He has manifestations, fruits, and signs that indicate His work. What are they? They are:
1- Spiritual Fervor:
The Apostle asks us to be “fervent in spirit” (Rom 12), because when the Spirit of God dwells in a person, He ignites him with fervor.
The Spirit of God descended on the Day of Pentecost in the form of “tongues as of fire.” Indeed, He inflamed the Apostles, and the entire Christian world was transformed into a flame of fire—in service, in preaching, in zeal and enthusiasm, in love which Scripture likened to fire, saying that many waters cannot quench it.
In the story of the prophet Isaiah, one of the seraphim took a burning coal from the altar and touched his lips, so he was purified, and his heart was inflamed with fire.
In the story of the prophet Jeremiah, the word of the Lord in his heart became like fire, so that he could not remain silent despite the afflictions he faced.
If the Spirit of God enters your heart, the saying of the psalmist applies to you: “Zeal for Your house has eaten me up.” And if the work of the Spirit weakens in you, your life is afflicted with “lukewarmness,” that is, your fervor diminishes.
Therefore Scripture says: “Do not quench the Spirit,” that is, keep His fervor working in you continually. Be like the burnt offering in which the fire burns continually and is not extinguished…
“Our God is a consuming fire.” Therefore John the Baptist said about the Lord Christ that “He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire.” Thus, the person in whom the Holy Spirit works is continually inflamed.
David, upon whom the Spirit of the Lord came, had his heart inflamed with fire when he heard Goliath reproaching the ranks of the living God. While everyone else was silent, he could not remain at rest until he relieved the people of his reproaches. And the Apostle Peter, who had been fearful before, when the Spirit of the Lord came upon him, filled the world with preaching, and said to the Jewish leaders who threatened him: “We cannot but speak…”
Is this fervor present in your heart or not? Have you received from the Holy Spirit this sacred fire to inflame your heart?
In the wilderness, in the Tabernacle of Meeting, they carried with them continually the sacred fire that had previously descended from heaven. This fire accompanied the Church in the age of the Apostles and in the ages of the saints, but it was a non-material fire—the fire of the Spirit in their hearts.
The person in whom the Spirit of God dwells: if he prays, his prayer is fervent; if he serves, his service is with great fervor. He is a person with an inflamed heart in everything he does.
You are the temple of God, and the sacred fire ought to be continually in the temple. The Virgin Mary was likened to a golden censer, “the censer of Aaron,” because the Holy Spirit descended upon her like burning coals.
Has the Holy Spirit ignited your black coals so that they were inflamed and cried out in joy: “I am dark, but lovely, O daughters of Jerusalem”? The fire gave the coal a glow, so it forgot its nature and became fire…
If the Holy Spirit is working in you, then you are a flame of fire… you become entirely fire, and this fire consumes every worldly lust and desire… and this fire kindles the love of God in your heart…
The first manifestation, therefore, of the work of the Spirit in us is fervor. What else, then?
2- The Spirit of Holiness:
By the Spirit of God, you live as a spiritual person, walking according to the Spirit, and living a spiritual, holy life. What then about the sinful person?
The sinner is a person who grieves the Spirit of God who dwells in him…
Therefore Scripture says: “Do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, by whom you were sealed” (Eph 4:30). Your spiritual life has two meanings:
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That your spirit leads your body, so that you walk according to the spirit and not according to the flesh.
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That the Spirit of God leads your spirit, and you submit yourself to the leadership of the Spirit of God.
On the Feast of the Descent of the Holy Spirit, you should ask yourself: Do I live a spiritual life? Or a worldly life? Or a fleshly life? Or a psychological life, or a social one? Does the Spirit of God have authority in my life, or do I resist the Spirit?
The most difficult thing in the spiritual life is that if our resistance to the Spirit continues, God removes His Spirit from us. As it was said about King Saul: “The Spirit of the Lord departed from Saul, and a distressing spirit from the Lord troubled him” (1 Sam 16). This is what David feared when he said in the psalm: “Do not take Your Holy Spirit from me” (Ps 50)… Thus a person reaches blasphemy against the Holy Spirit.
Blasphemy against the Spirit is the complete and continual rejection of every work of the Holy Spirit in the heart. Thus, a person cannot reach repentance, and without repentance there is no forgiveness…
Say to Him: O Lord, the works in which You do not share with me, give me the power not to do them. I want to work with You continually, and I rejoice to enter into the fellowship of the Holy Spirit…
How beautiful is the prayer that says: “Share in the work with us,” and “Share with Your servants in every good work”… Yes, what is the benefit of being a temple of the Holy Spirit if I do not share with Him in the work?
One of the main reasons for not involving the Spirit with us is our great reliance on our own personality, and our great confidence in our own planning and thinking, while Scripture says: “Do not lean on your own understanding.”
An example of this: many want to repent, relying on their own strength and determination without involving the Spirit of God with them. One of them says: I will leave this particular sin… I decided such and such… I resolved to do such and such… I will not do such and such in the future… And we ask this person:
How will you repent? By your human arm? Or through fellowship with the Holy Spirit? How beautiful is the psalmist’s saying: “Restore me, O Lord, and I shall be restored.”
Let us look at the prophet David and how he repented: he cries out to God and says: “Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be clean; wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow.” “Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity, and cleanse me from my sin.”
He asks God to wash him, to cleanse him, and to grant him repentance. He asks God to enter into his life, because every good gift is from Him, coming down from above, from the Father of lights.
I, O Lord, am unable to purify myself. If I had this ability to be pure, I would not have fallen into sin. “For to will is present with me, but how to perform what is good I do not find…”
“For the evil I will not to do, that I practice… It is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells in me” (Rom 7:14–20).
If I am thus a helpless person, “sold under sin,” then to You I flee, that You may deliver me from “this body of death”… Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity, and cleanse me from my sin. Wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow…
I do not want to work alone; I want to enter into the fellowship of the Holy Spirit. I want Your Holy Spirit to grant me holiness from Himself…
Your Spirit is the One who “convicts me of sin,” and Your Spirit is the One who gives me life in the spiritual life, and Your Spirit is the One who leads and guides… I am like the sick man who had no one to put him into the pool, and like Peter who, when his hand was held, was able to walk on the water.
Not only in repentance do I ask for the work of Your Spirit, but in service as well…
Your Holy Spirit is the One who does all the work. He is “the One who spoke in the prophets,” and He is the One who “gives a word to the preachers.”
Therefore He rightly said to His disciples: “You shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you,” and then “you shall be witnesses to Me,” and “do not depart from Jerusalem until you are endued with power from on high.”
For this reason, the apostolic fathers stipulated even for the deacon that he be “full of the Holy Spirit,” because it is the Spirit who will work in him and with him.
Service is not a human arm, nor a human effort. It is not human wisdom… otherwise the credit would return to people and not to God.
We remember again the saying of the psalm: “Unless the Lord builds the house, they labor in vain who build it,” and also the saying of the Lord: “Without Me you can do nothing.”
Pour yourself out, then, before God, and take from Him strength for service, and ask His Holy Spirit to work with you.
Every failed service is caused by the servant not taking the Spirit of God with him in service, but serving alone. Therefore God did not choose “the wise of the world” nor “the mighty,” who rely on their wisdom and strength…
The servants who pour themselves out every day before God for the sake of service, and ask the Spirit of God to work, these succeed. As for the human arm, “she has cast down many wounded, and all her slain are strong.”
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An article by His Holiness Pope Shenouda III – Al-Keraza Magazine – Sixth Year (Issue Twenty-Seven), 4–7–1975.
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