Holy Spirit in Spiritual Creation
Text: John 15:26
Series: Restoration Sermons
Date:
Speaker: Ed Rangel
Location: Waupaca Church of Christ
Bible Version: NASB 1995
Sermon Type: Expository
Learning Objectives
By the close of this lesson the hearer should be able to:
- Explain the analogy between material and spiritual creation — what the two realms have in common in terms of the persons involved and the administration employed.
- Describe the specific roles of each member of the Godhead in the incarnation — what the Father did, what the Son did, and what the Spirit did.
- State five facts about the incarnation drawn from Section II and identify the Scripture text for each.
- Explain the analogy between material and spiritual creation from Section III: how the same three persons worked in both, and what differs between the two.
- Identify the four things the Holy Spirit did to establish the laws of the spiritual realm (Section IV) and the Scripture basis for each.
Thesis
Material and spiritual creation both came from the same source and operate through the same three persons — but with different materials: the Spirit organized and perfected matter in the one; in the other, he organized and perfected the spiritual realm through the incarnation, the apostles, and the ongoing witness to Christ. The Spirit who moved over the waters of material chaos now bears witness to Christ and declares the things of Christ to the church.
Burden
The series on the Holy Spirit has established his personhood, his work in inspiration and revelation, and his work in material creation. This sermon completes the structural picture: the spiritual realm — the kingdom of God, the church — is not less deliberately created than the material realm. It was planned by God, brought into being through Christ, and organized and governed by the Holy Spirit's specific work. The person who understands this does not treat the church as a human institution that God endorses; they understand it as the spiritual creation that the Holy Spirit organized just as he organized the material universe.
Introduction
"When the Helper comes, whom I will send to you from the Father, that is the Spirit of truth who proceeds from the Father, He will testify about Me" (John 15:26). The Spirit's role in the spiritual realm is to bear witness to Christ — to declare the things of Christ, to guide the apostles into all truth, to continue and complete the revelation of the Son.
Two realms exist: material and spiritual. They share remarkable similarities in their origin and structure. Both came from the same source — the Tri-Unity who created all things. Both involve the same three persons in their creation and administration. Man is called to live in both. The analogy between material and spiritual creation is not accidental; it reflects the consistent economy of God's working.
I. The Godhead in the Incarnation
The spiritual realm's creation required the incarnation — the entry of the eternal Son into human existence. All three members of the Godhead participated.
Only one member became flesh. The Father did not become incarnate; the Spirit did not become incarnate; the Son alone took on human nature. "And the Word became flesh, and dwelt among us" (John 1:14). The specific identity of the one who became flesh — the second person of the Tri-Unity — is not an arbitrary detail; it was the Son's unique role to become the Mediator, the one who stands between God and men (I Tim. 2:5).
He was Immanuel. "Behold, the virgin shall be with child and shall bear a Son, and they shall call His name Immanuel, which translated means, 'God with us'" (Matt. 1:23). The name is the theological summary of the incarnation: the eternal God, present with human beings in human form.
The Holy Spirit overshadowed Mary. "The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you; and for that reason the holy Child shall be called the Son of God" (Luke 1:35). The Spirit's role in the incarnation was the specific work of bringing about the miraculous conception — the same creative, organizing, life-giving work that characterized his work in material creation applied to the beginning of the spiritual creation.
Mary was with child by the Holy Spirit. "Now the birth of Jesus Christ was as follows: when His mother Mary had been betrothed to Joseph, before they came together she was found to be with child by the Holy Spirit" (Matt. 1:18). The Spirit who organized matter in Gen. 1:2 organized the union of the divine and human natures in the incarnation.
The fullness of the Godhead dwelt in him. "For in Him all the fullness of Deity dwells in bodily form" (Col. 2:9). The incarnate Son was not a partial expression of the divine — the full content of deity was present in bodily form. This is the ground of the incarnation's sufficiency: nothing essential to God was absent from the one who came in the flesh.
God and the Holy Spirit fully shared in the incarnation — not as incarnate persons themselves but as fully active in the event through which the Son became incarnate.
II. Facts About the Incarnation
Five specific facts ground the theological claims.
Jesus begotten of God. "No one has seen God at any time; the only begotten God who is in the bosom of the Father, He has explained Him" (John 1:18). "God has fulfilled this promise to our children in that He raised up Jesus, as it is also written in the second Psalm, 'You are My Son; today I have begotten You'" (Acts 13:33). The eternal generation of the Son is the inner-Trinitarian basis for the incarnation; the specific, temporal begetting in Mary's womb is the historical expression of it.
This done through the Holy Spirit. The Spirit was the agent through whom the eternal Son entered human existence (Matt. 1:18). The same Spirit who organized material creation organized the entry of the divine into material humanity.
God sent Christ to the world. "For what the Law could not do, weak as it was through the flesh, God did: sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh" (Rom. 8:3). The incarnation was a divine sending — not an independent decision of the Son in isolation from the Father, but the coordinated act of the Tri-Unity: the Father sent; the Son was sent; the Spirit brought about the conception.
Jesus came of his own free will. "Have this attitude in yourselves which was also in Christ Jesus, who, although He existed in the form of God, did not regard equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied Himself, taking the form of a bond-servant, and being made in the likeness of men" (Phil. 2:5-7). The incarnation was not imposed on the Son — he came freely, willingly, choosing the condescension that the redemption required.
God came in Christ. "God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself" (II Cor. 5:19). The incarnation was not merely the Son's private project — God was in Christ in the act of reconciliation. The whole Tri-Unity was involved in what the Son did in the flesh.
III. An Analogy
The parallel between material and spiritual creation is structural and deliberate.
The same persons were involved in both. The Father who originated material creation also originated the spiritual realm. The Word (Christ) who was the agent of material creation was the agent of the spiritual realm's establishment — by his death, resurrection, and ascension. The Holy Spirit who organized matter organized the spiritual realm through the incarnation, the apostles, and the ongoing witness to Christ.
The administration was the same in both. Just as the Father planned and originated material creation, the Spirit organized and perfected it, and the Word was the creative agent — so in the spiritual realm, the Father planned and sent, the Son was the agent who established the kingdom through his completed work, and the Spirit organized and perfects it.
The Holy Spirit worked with material in the one; with spirits in the other. In material creation, the Spirit gave form, vital force, and law to matter. In spiritual creation, the Spirit works with and in human spirits — illuminating, convicting, regenerating, sanctifying, guiding into truth.
Hence there is a spiritual realm. The existence of the spiritual realm — the kingdom of God, the church — is not the accidental result of a human movement; it is the deliberately created, Spirit-organized spiritual counterpart to the material creation. It was planned from before the foundation of the world (Eph. 1:4-5; I Pet. 1:20) and brought into being by the same Tri-Unity who created all things.
IV. The Holy Spirit Gave Laws for the Spiritual Realm
Just as the Spirit gave laws to perpetuate the material creation (Sermon 166), he gave laws to govern the spiritual realm.
Christ revealed the Father's will. "My food is to do the will of Him who sent Me and to accomplish His work" (John 4:34). The content of the spiritual realm's law was the Father's will, which Christ came to reveal and accomplish. Everything that governs the church — its worship, its ethics, its mission, its ordinances — derives from the will that Christ revealed.
The Holy Spirit spoke through the apostles. "For it is not you who speak, but it is the Spirit of your Father who speaks in you" (Matt. 10:20). "But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in My name, He will teach you all things, and bring to your remembrance all that I said to you" (John 14:26). The Spirit who organized the material realm gave laws through the apostles for the spiritual realm — not new laws of a different kind from Christ's teaching but the complete unfolding of what Christ revealed.
The Holy Spirit bears witness of Christ. "When the Helper comes, whom I will send to you from the Father, that is the Spirit of truth who proceeds from the Father, He will testify about Me" (John 15:26). The Spirit's ongoing work in the spiritual realm is witness — maintaining and communicating the truth about Christ that the spiritual realm is organized around.
The Holy Spirit declares the things of Christ. "But when He, the Spirit of truth, comes, He will guide you into all the truth; for He will not speak on His own initiative, but whatever He hears, He will speak; and He will disclose to you what is to come. He will glorify Me, for He will take of Mine and will disclose it to you" (John 16:13-14). The Spirit's disclosures are not independent of Christ — they are the things of Christ, fully disclosed through the apostolic witness, now preserved in the Scripture the Spirit inspired.
Application
The spiritual realm was deliberately created by the same Tri-Unity who created the material realm. This is the theological basis for the church's authority: it is not a human institution but the Spirit-organized spiritual creation of God. The person who treats the church as optional — who accepts the spiritual creation's benefits while declining its obligations — has not understood what the church is.
The Spirit's witness to Christ (John 15:26) continues through the word the Spirit inspired. The laws of the spiritual realm are the laws Christ revealed and the Spirit transmitted through the apostles; they are fully available in the Scripture; they govern the spiritual realm as fully as the laws of nature govern the material realm.
Conclusion
"He will testify about Me" (John 15:26). The Spirit who organized the material creation from the waters of chaos now organizes the spiritual realm around the witness to Christ. Both realms were planned by God, established through Christ, and organized by the Spirit. Both are real; both are governed by laws the Spirit gave; both are the arenas in which the Tri-Unity continues to work. The person who lives in both lives in the fullness of what God created.
Invitation
The spiritual realm is entered through the new birth: "unless one is born of water and the Spirit he cannot enter into the kingdom of God" (John 3:5). The Spirit who organized the spiritual realm from the beginning is the Spirit who is given to the person who obeys: "each of you be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins; and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit" (Acts 2:38). Enter the spiritual creation.
Word Study
| English Term | Greek Term | Basic Meaning | Usage in This Sermon | Sermon Significance | Key Texts |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Immanuel | Emmanouel | Transliteration of Hebrew Immanuel — "with us God." | Used in Matt. 1:23 as the theological name for the incarnate Son: "God with us." | The name is the entire incarnation theology compressed: the eternal God, present with human beings in human form. The spiritual realm is the realm in which "God with us" continues — through the Spirit who bears witness to Christ. | Matt. 1:23; John 1:14 |
| Fullness | plērōma | The complete content, the total sum of something — not partial but whole. | Used in Col. 2:9 for what dwells in Christ: "all the fullness of Deity dwells in bodily form." | The fullness of deity in the incarnate Christ is the ground of the incarnation's sufficiency: the spiritual realm was established not by a partial divine presence but by the complete Godhead working through the Son. | Col. 2:9; Col. 1:19 |
| Reconciling | katallassō | To change from enmity to friendship — to restore a broken relationship. | Used in II Cor. 5:19 for what God was doing in Christ: "reconciling the world to Himself." | The spiritual realm is the realm of reconciliation — the created order in which the broken relationship between God and humanity is restored. The Spirit who bears witness to Christ bears witness to the one in whom this reconciliation was accomplished. | II Cor. 5:19 |
| Testify / Bear witness | martyreō | To bear witness, to testify from direct knowledge. | Used in John 15:26 for the Spirit's role: "He will testify about Me." | The Spirit's witness is not secondhand; it is the witness of the one who was present throughout the Son's ministry, who knows the things of God (I Cor. 2:11), and who declares the things of Christ to the church. The spiritual realm is organized around this ongoing, reliable witness. | John 15:26; John 16:13-14 |
Scripture Interlock Table
| Theme | Boles' Outline | Supporting Scripture |
|---|---|---|
| "He will testify about Me" — Spirit's role in spiritual realm | Text | John 15:26 |
| "The Word became flesh" — the incarnation | I.1 | John 1:14 |
| "God with us" — Immanuel | I.2 | Matt. 1:23 |
| "Holy Spirit will come upon you" — Spirit's role in incarnation | I.3 | Luke 1:35 |
| "With child by the Holy Spirit" | I.4 | Matt. 1:18 |
| "All the fullness of Deity in bodily form" | I.5 | Col. 2:9 |
| "God was in Christ reconciling" | II.5 | II Cor. 5:19 |
| "God sent His own Son" | II.3 | Rom. 8:3 |
| "Emptied Himself" — came freely | II.4 | Phil. 2:5-7 |
| "He will guide you into all truth" — Spirit declares things of Christ | IV.4 | John 16:13-14 |
| "New birth of water and Spirit" — entry into spiritual realm | Invit. | John 3:5 |
| Baptism for remission — gift of the Spirit | Invit. | Acts 2:38 |
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Converted from H. Leo Boles, Outline 170. Primary text: John 15:26 (stated by Boles). OCR corrections: "creBtion" → "creation"; "Uohn" → "John" (multiple). Doctrinal audit: the Tri-Unity's distinct roles in the incarnation developed carefully — only the Son became flesh; the Spirit organized the conception; the Father sent; no Patripassianism (the Father did not suffer); the fullness of deity in Christ (Col. 2:9) preserved; the analogy between material and spiritual creation developed from the series established in sermons 162-169; the church identified as the Spirit-organized spiritual creation, not a human institution; the Spirit's witness (John 15:26) grounded in the Spirit's knowledge of the things of God (I Cor. 2:11); invitation retains full obedient response (Acts 2:38).
