what DOES the Holy Spirit do? confusing.

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bigdummy

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They just looked like men but they are not.

Malachi 3:8 ESV Will man rob God? Yet you are robbing me. But you say, 'How have we robbed you?' In your tithes and contributions.

Malachi 3:9 ESV You are cursed with a curse, for you are robbing me, the whole nation of you.

Malachi 3:10 ESV Bring the full tithe into the storehouse, that there may be food in my house. And thereby put me to the test, says the LORD of hosts, if I will not open the windows of heaven for you and pour down for you a blessing until there is no more need.


If someone can quote me a chapter and verse from either the Old or New testament where robbing God refered to money I would appreciate it as tithing in the bible was to my knowledge given in the form of live stock and grain, correct me if I am wrong (I often am, if my wife was living she would varify that) it was not in the form of money as many churches would have you believe, the widows mite and the coin Peter took from the mouth of a fish was used as tax money to support the Temple needs, today money is given as an offering to support the church and needy members but is not manditory as some of the TV evangilest would have you believe, see 2 Cor.9:7 If the tithe was refering to money the 11th verse would not be referring to the fruit of the ground or vine.Please quote me a verse in the bible where Jesus payed a tithe or required the working class to do so, He did ask a rich man to give his wealth to the poor but not to the church of his day...God Bless...Ray
 

Guestman

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Sure He is.

When speaking of The Holy Spirit, it means to speak of God's Spirit, and means one is speaking about God Himself. And God is a Person. He is manifested by The Father, The Son, and The Holy Spirit Comforter.

Dan 7:13-14
13 I saw in the night visions, and, behold, one like the Son of man came with the clouds of heaven, and came to the Ancient of days, and they brought him near before Him.
14 And there was given him dominion, and glory, and a kingdom, that all people, nations, and languages, should serve him: his dominion is an everlasting dominion, which shall not pass away, and his kingdom that which shall not be destroyed.
(KJV)


Ps 110:1
1 The LORD said unto my Lord, "Sit thou at My right hand, until I make thine enemies thy footstool."
(KJV)


It's not a mistake that the "He" is in the first person in the following...

John 14:16
16 And I will pray the Father, and He shall give you another Comforter, that He may abide with you for ever;
(KJV)

If we speak of The Father, The Son and The Holy Spirit are automatically included. If we speak of The Son, the Father and the Holy Spirit are also included. Thus if we speak of The Holy Spirit Comforter, The Father and The Son are also automatically included. Their Divine Nature cannot be separated.


Be careful that you don't slide into the "God of forces" idea per Dan.11:38. The Godhead is about three Divine Entities existing as One.



The holy spirit is not a person, but is God's active (not latent) force. Though the holy spirit is called "the helper" (Greek paraclete [comforter] ) at John 14:26 and is not a person, so is wisdom not a person but spoken of as having "children" (Luke 7:35) and of Jesus as being "filled with wisdom"(Luke 2:40) just as the 120 disciples on the day of Pentecost were "filled with holy spirit".(Acts 2:4) Furthermore, death is said to have "ruled as king from Adam down to Moses" and yet death is not a person. The use of metaphors to express thoughts is a common practice with almost every language. The use of non-living objects are, at times, spoken of as living or even a living person.(Judges 9:14, 15)

David, after his sin with Bathsheba, asked God to "put within me a new spirit, a steadfast one....and your holy spirit O do not take away from me."(Ps 51:10, 11) Just as the "new spirit" or new driving force that David requested was not a person, so likewise of the holy spirit, for it is God's active force (or motivating force) that empowered David to change his conduct to one that is now clean in God's eyes. Even the use of God having "eyes" (Prov 15:3) is not literal, but only put within the characteristics of language to make the Bible understandable to us.

At Proverbs 17:22, it says that "a heart that is joyful does good as a curer, but a spirit that is stricken makes the bones dry." Is the "spirit" here a person ? Even modern dictionaries recognize that the word "spirit" means "1. Life force of individual: a vital force that characterizes a living being as being alive; 2. will: somebody's will, sense of self, enthusiasm for living; 3. disposition: somebody’s personality or temperament; 4. attitude: somebody’s attitude or state of mind".(Microsoft® Encarta® Reference Library 2005) The writer of Psalms 104 said of God, that "if you conceal your face, they get disturbed. If you take away their spirit, they expire, and back to their dust they go."(Ps 104:29) Is the "spirit" here a person ?

Thus, the holy spirit is God's active force, his "power" and not a person, for the apostle Paul wrote to the Romans: "May the God who gives hope fill you with all joy and peace by your believing, that you may abound in hope with power of holy spirit."(Rom 15:13, 19) Just as "joy and peace" are not persons but can "fill" a person, so likewise is the holy spirit not a person but God's active force that is never dormant, but always active.(Gen 1:2)
 

John Zain

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The Holy Spirit has the attributes of a person,
and He did, does, and will do ... the following things

Some people exclaim …
How can they say the Trinity is one God in 3 “Persons”?
The Holy Spirit sure doesn’t sound like a “Person” to me.
Of the 3, the Holy Spirit is the least likely to be a “Person”.

The Holy Spirit has the attributes of a person

has wisdom,knowledge,understanding Isaiah 11:2
has a mind ----------------------- Romans 8:27; Acts 15:28
has a will ----------------------- 1 Corinthians 12:11
has joy -------------------------- 1 Thessalonians 1:6

bears witness -------------------- Romans 8:16; 1 John 5:6
comforts ------------------------- Acts 9:31; John 14:16,14;26,15:26,16:7 (KJV)
commissions ---------------------- Acts 20:28
declares ------------------------- John 16:14
devises plans -------------------- Isaiah 30:1
distributes ---------------------- 1 Corinthians 12:11
fellowships ---------------------- Philippians 2:1; 2 Corinthians 13:14
forbids -------------------------- Acts 16:6-7
guides --------------------------- John 16:13
hears ---------------------------- John 16:13
helps ---------------------------- Romans 8:26; John 14:16,14;26,15:26,16:7 (NKJV)
intercedes ----------------------- Romans 8:26-27
justifies (declares righteous) --- 1 Corinthians 6:11
knows things --------------------- 1 Corinthians 2:11
leads ---------------------------- Romans 8:14
loves ---------------------------- Romans 15:30; Galatians 5:22
reveals things ------------------- Luke 2:26, Ephesians 3:5
sends ---------------------------- Acts 13:4
sets people apart (separates) ---- 2 Thessalonians 2:13; 1 Peter 1:2
speaks --------------------------- John 16:13; Acts 8:29,10:19,13:2; Rev 2:7,2:17
teaches -------------------------- 1 Corinthians 2:13
testifies ------------------------ John 15:26; Acts 20:23
warns ---------------------------- Acts 20:23

can be lied to ------------------- Acts 5:3-4
can be tested -------------------- Acts 5:9
can be insulted ------------------ Hebrews 10:29
can be grieved (saddened) -------- Isaiah 63:10, Ephesians 4:30
can be quenched (hindered) ------- 1 Thessalonians 5:19

My very own personal contribution to "Ripley's Believe it or not" is the incredible fact that
some church leaders have been deceived into believing that the Holy Spirit is only "a force".
Witness the former Moderator (for 8 years?) of the large (Protestant) United Church of Canada.
 

NicholasMarks

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Aug 23, 2011
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Last week, one of the speakers in our Church said that the Holy Spirit does not convict us of sin. That we would not find a verse anywhere in the Bible to say that He did. He convicts the world but not Christians. So, because this is a teaching that goes against what I have previously been taught in my old Church and goes against my personal experience of checks from Him, is this speaker simply playing with words where leading and guiding may work in the same context, or what?


We are already convicted of sin. We are all sinners and the wages of sin is death...We all die...but what we all die from is genetic disorders. Even aging is a genetic disorder for those who have been promised everlasting life so another way of looking at this is...
sin = genetic disorder.

This puts a new light on Jesus' teaching...He was teaching us how to pay back for our individual sins (we will carry the sins of our fathers and our forefathers) whilst, he, supported the weight of them before God. Which equates to showing us how to repair from our genetic disorders, which, will, ultimately, lead us to everlasting life.

If the Holy Spirit is guiding us out of our sins it has already accepted that we are all sinners in the eyes of Almighty God, just as we should too.