The Holy Spirit and the Christian Mission

The Holy Spirit and the Christian Mission

by F. W. Dillistone

269The very title Holy Spirit presents us with a startling paradox.

Since the publication of Rudolf Otto’s The Idea of the Holy we have come to think of the “Holy” as the awe-inspiring, the withdrawn, the mysterious, that which can only be approached with reverence and godly fear. On the other hand our greater familiarity with the Hebrew background of the conception of Spirit leads us to think in terms of a wonderful power invading human life and bringing vitality, inspiration, energy. But how can that which is infinitely beyond the common touch of man be received into his common life? How can the everlasting burning enter the realm of the temporal and the sinful without destroying all that falls within its path?

I

For an expansion of this paradox I turn to the book of Isaiah. In the earlier part of the prophecy the title “The Holy One of Israel” becomes established for the first time as an altogether distinctive title of Deity, and its implications are disclosed not by formal definition but by the famous story of the call of the prophet in chapter 6. There our imaginations are lifted to the vision of One who is high and exalted and far beyond the common gaze. We sense the glory of eternal light, the purity of eternal fire, and 270the threefold cry of “Holy” finds its meaning within the fullness of the revelation.

Yet although the Holy One of Israel is so far removed from sinful man, the gulf is not absolute. He sends the fire of cleansing. He sends the word of challenge. And the prophet, energized but not consumed by the communications from the divine Presence, goes forth to announce judgment and doom on everything that is opposed to the divine purpose. Man is not cut off entirely from the divine concern but if his only hope was to be set between the fire of purging and the fire of judgment—then indeed he could but go in fear and trembling all the days of his life.

But if it is in the first part of the book that the name of the Holy One of Israel stands revealed, it is in the second part that the nature of Spirit is revealed through the call of God’s Servant. Here the key passage is Isaiah 61 and the whole emphasis is upon grace. The Spirit comes not as fire of cleansing but as the oil of refreshing. Instead of the coal that scorches there is the anointing that re-creates. And the purpose of the Spirit’s activity is all of grace. To bring good tidings to the afflicted, to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, to comfort all who mourn, to build up ancient ruins, to raise up former devastations, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor and through it all to glorify His name—this is the work of the Spirit and, as another passage shows, it stretches beyond the boundaries of Israel to the very ends of the earth.

Yet even in the light of this revelation man has no right to presume. The very nature of the situation from which he is being rescued is sufficient testimony to the precariousness of his life upon the earth and to the poverty of his existence apart from the movement of the divine grace. He is not entirely powerless to order and direct his own life, but if his only hope is in his own efforts then indeed he must go in disillusionment and anxiety all the days of his life.

The Holy—the Spirit. The symbol of an intense purity—the symbol of a boundless grace. The Old Testament linked the two together on only three occasions and even then with the note of holiness altogether determining the significance of the title. It was left to the New Testament to bring the new revelation of Holy Spirit, a revelation only made possible through the fusing of the Holy and the Spirit in the person and activity of Jesus the Christ.

II

The two elements of which I have been speaking are brought together in a remarkable way in the story of Jesus’ baptism. The whole setting of John’s baptism proclaims the holiness of the God of Israel. He is about to act in judgment. His fan is in His hand. He will throughly purge His floor. His agent, the Messiah, will come as the fire to destroy sinners and to separate a holy remnant capable of surviving the judgment and entering God’s holy kingdom. In submitting himself to John’s baptism Jesus acknowledged the holiness and the burning activity of the God whose representative he was.

Yet in the record of the actual moment of baptism a different note is struck. The heavens are opened. Jesus is acclaimed as the Son, the Well-beloved. He is addressed with words taken from the calling of God’s Servant. He is to fulfill a mission which will not only raise up the fallen in Israel but extend God’s salvation to the ends of the earth. Here is a new revelation that the ineffably holy is also the unboundedly gracious: that the one who confesses the holy judgment of God at the same time bears witness to His gracious salvation. a

The dialectic continues in the stories of the Temptation and early ministry which immediately follow. As Jesus withdraws to the wilderness he stands again before the Holy. His mission is to be grounded in the word of the Holy, the worship of the Holy, the waiting for the Holy. Yet returning in the power of the Spirit he declares his mission in terms of the great proclamation of Isaiah 61: “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me because he has anointed me to proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord.” And all wondered at the gracious words which proceeded out of his mouth.

Still further the Lucan narrative shows him in conflict with the spirit of evil. Even the demonic man recognizes a more-thanhuman presence. “I know who you are, the Holy One of God.” Holiness confronts the unclean and the demonic with the fire of destruction. Yet in immediate succession comes the narrative of his reception of the sick and the diseased: “and he laid his hands upon every one of them and healed them.” Or to give one further example, Jesus teaches his disciples to pray that God will sanctify. His name (“Hallowed be thy name”). Did not this imply that it was at the very heart of Jesus’ mission to act in God’s name against 272all that was opposed to His purpose? Yet when the disciples thought to call down fire from heaven to consume those who refused to receive Jesus on his way to Jerusalem, he turned and rebuked them saying “You do not know what manner of spirit you are of,” and went on to define this Spirit in fuller terms as that which does not destroy men’s lives but saves them.

So in the life and ministry of Jesus the double-sidedness of the Holy Spirit is constantly set forth. That he was the authoritative representative of the Holy God—the God who searches the perversions and iniquities of mankind with His fire of judgment—of that there could be no doubt. At the same time that he was the authentic bearer of the divine Spirit—the Spirit who binds up the wounds of mankind with His grace and salvation—of that also there could be no doubt. It was only when the nature of Holy Spirit had been once-for-all disclosed through the words and deeds of the Messiah, that it was possible for the Christian missionary vocation to receive its classic expression: “Receive the Holy Spirit. As the Father has sent me, even so I send you.”

III

The author of the Acts of the Apostles must be regarded as the foremost interpreter of the work of the Holy Spirit in the Christian mission. At the very outset he shows that the mission of witness is entirely dependent upon the coming of the Holy Spirit in new power. What could be more forceful than Acts 1:8: “You shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you shall be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria and to the end of the earth.” What could be more vivid than the record of the fulfillment of this promise in Acts 2:1-11?

In this record particular emphasis is laid upon three symbols. An event which could not be described in ordinary human terms is mediated to us through (a) a sound of a rushing wind, (b) tongues of fire resting upon individuals, and (c) speech in other tongues. In this initial stage there is an overwhelming sense of the pressure of the Holy in the new situation. There is already a foretaste of the last days, with God enthroned in His universe and the exalted Christ pouring out His Spirit upon men. It is for those who are awake to what is happening to turn to God in order that they may receive His Holy Spirit and be incorporated into the body of God’s elect.

273This is the initial emphasis—a group of men energized by the divine Spirit, cleansed and enkindled by the divine fire, bearing witness to the wonderful works of God “as the Spirit gave them utterance.” But as the first emphasis is so clearly upon the Holy, the second movement, as in the Gospel story, is toward that service which the Spirit so characteristically inspires. We see the Apostles succoring the needy, healing the lame, preaching the Gospel to the poor, bringing release to the captives, proclaiming the acceptable year of the Lord. Through their common prayers and fellowship they refreshed themselves again and again in the presence of the Holy: through their testimony in word and deed to the name of God’s holy servant Jesus (Acts 4:31) they extended his saving work further and further afield.

So the course of the Church’s missionary task was set. It was to hold together two profound movements of the divine Spirit which have often seemed to be mutually exclusive. On the one side God ever moves toward man as the Holy: transcending man’s littleness, shaming his selfishness, challenging his complacency, stretching his boundedness, condemning his perversity. On the other side God ever moves toward man in the Spirit of the Servant: understanding man’s weaknesses, feeling his temptations, healing his wounds, loosing his bonds, restoring his confidence and hope. It is possible to have an awareness of the first and to bow down in awe and contrition; it is possible to recognize the second and to expand in sympathy and good will. But to receive the Holy Spirit revealed in Jesus the Christ, to die constantly to sin and self-will in the presence of the Holy while at the same time the saving compassion of Jesus is constantly made manifest in the power of the Spirit—this is beyond the possibilities of flesh and blood but not beyond the range of the grace of God. This alone is the missionary pattern of the Church of Christ.

IV

The keynote of the Acts of the Apostles is the expansion of Church through the power of the Holy Spirit. But when we turn to the Epistles of St. Paul another aspect of the Spirit’s work comes prominently into view. Now it is not so much extension outward as sanctification inward. The life of the infant churches has to be stabilized and deepened and this can only come about through th continuing operation of the Holy Spirit.:

274The Epistle to the Romans reveals the new confidence in relation to physical death now open to those who walk in the Spirit. It reveals, too, the pattern of the life of prayer in the Spirit with the children of God being guided to make their intercessions according to the mind and purpose of God. The Epistles to the Corinthians reveal the nature of the worship and the moral life which belong to the Spirit-filled body of Christ. The Spirit inspires order, not confusion; purity, not license; edification, not meaningless excitement; cohesion, not blind individualism. As he deals with concrete problems that have arisen in the Christian community, Paul makes it clear that not every inspiration and impulse comes from the divine Spirit. The Holy Spirit is ever working to produce a pattern of corporate life in the Church conformable to that once-for-all revealed in the incarnate life of Jesus the Christ.

Through the Epistles, then, we see the sanctifying work of the Spirit in progress, assuring men of their divine sonship, purifying their relationships, intensifying their intercessions, interpreting their worship experiences. The body of Christ is indwelt by the Spirit who is Holy—and this means the Spirit who is not only powerful to drive forward as wind and to spread outward as the fire but also strong to release from the down-drag of evil and death and to lift up into the realm of pure being and eternal life. That a new note has come into Christian proclamation can hardly be doubted. Will the concern for the purity and the otherworldliness of the Christian family undermine the urgency of the commission to evangelize the nations?

The history of the Christian Church since the end of the first century can be regarded as a continuing dialectic between what today might be called the inner-directed and the outer-directed, between, that is to say, the concern for inner sanctification and the urge to outward service. One may regret that the earlier dialectic between the Holy as burning judgment and the Spirit as healing salvation has been replaced and yet the very nature of the problems with which an expanding Church had to grapple made the change almost inevitable. For as the Church moved out beyond an environment which had been impregnated by the Hebrew tradition it found itself in the midst of peoples who lacked both ethical disciplines and any kind of ordered religious life. In response to a Gospel preached in the power of the Spirit they might indeed turn from idols to serve the living God. But the power of the Spirit was 275now needed above all to draw them away from the works of the flesh and to lift them to a regular experience of filial communion with a Holy Father in the Spirit of His Son.

So it came about that from the second century onwards there was little conscious connection made in the Church between the gift of the Spirit and the call to evangelize. The Spirit had been given to the Church, it was believed, to build it up in sanctity. Through the Spirit-endued ministers of the Church, through the words of Scripture interpreted by the Spirit, through the sacraments made effectual by the Spirit, the Church could grow in holiness and rise to its true life in God Himself. The Church was, in fact, life in the Spirit, and the work of the Spirit was above all to purify and illumine every soul within the Church.

This view of the Spirit’s function has been characteristic of the Eastern Church throughout its history. The Spirit is proclaimed through catechesis and liturgy as the Spirit of truth, of light, of life, of love. He completes the work of Christ and brings every several member of the Church into a personal union with the Triune God. Those who are received into the Church come immediately within the area of the Spirit’s sanctifying power: but that the Spirit is ever moving outwards to bring good tidings to a wider world—of this there is little consciousness in the Eastern tradition.

The Western Church has always been concerned to extend the borders of its influence and to bring the heathen within its fold. Doubtless a variety of motives have been active within this mission, but it is at least open to question how far it has been directly related to the continuing work of the Holy Spirit. It is true that a fine early twelfth-century sculpture above the portal of a church in North Burgundy shows the reigning Christ bestowing his Spirit upon the apostles and beneath them there are representatives of the many nations to whom they were being sent. Again in Langland’s fourteenth-century poem “Piers Plowman” there is a striking reference to the coming of “one Spiritus Paraclitus” to Piers and to his followers. This Spirit, coming as light and fire, made them masters of all men’s language and promised to go with them in the mission of dealing grace and dividing it wisely “among all kinds and conditions who can use five senses.” But in the work of the great theologians the Spirit is, above all, the moving agent who directs the soul of man into union with God. The Spirit leads man 276to contemplate the image of God, to delight in Him, to consent to His will, to be joined to Him in love. The Spirit as sanctifier in the fellowship of the Church is beautifully expressed; the Spirit as moving in the hearts of men with a divine compulsion to go out and seek the lost can less easily be found.

V

Even the coming of the Reformation did not immediately lead to a rediscovery of Pentecost and of the world-wide Commission of the Church. There were indeed particular circumstances, social and geographical, which would have precluded any extensive overseas missionary activity. But besides this the great churches of the Reformation were at first seriously beset by the problem of extremists who in so many cases appealed to the Spirit as the inspirer of their social and political activities. In response to such claims the Reformers gave almost exclusive emphasis to the work of the Spirit as bearing witness to and interpreting the Word. The Bible was the very constitution of the new order and it was the constant task of the Spirit to take of the things of Christ therein contained and to reveal them to men. The sixteenth and seventeenth centuries were a time of major upheaval and strife in Europe, and until a reasonable social order had been established it was unlikely that any real freedom of movement would be allowed to those who, conscious of the Spirit’s urging to new adventure, desired to go at his bidding to the regions beyond.

But gradually the changing conditions of the eighteenth century began to lift men’s horizons. An expanding world brought back to their consciousness the risen Lord’s Commission and the Holy Spirit’s enabling. How difficult were the obstacles to be overcome may be seen for example in the record of John Eliot, the pioneer missionary to the Indians. It was in 1646 that he preached his first sermon to them in their own language, after a long period spent in trying to win their confidence and speak their tongue. “Certainly,” Increase Mather wrote afterwards, “it was the Holy Spirit who inspired him to hear and obey that call”—though to many of his brethren at the time there was no such certainty, seeing that in their view the Indians were nothing more than wild beasts whom God had called them to fear and fight. In the mideighteenth century it was William Carey who had to persuade his 277brethren that God was calling His Church to action and that the way was open for a new obedience to the charge to be witnesses to the uttermost parts of the earth.

As is well known, it was at first left to individuals, groups, soCieties, to be the agents of the Holy Spirit in this renewed missionary activity. In more official church circles there was a strong suspicion of enthusiasm, a reluctance to go beyond the traditional patterns of parochial life, and no ready recognition of responsibility toward the inhabitants of remote heathen lands. Yet the few were conscious of the movement of the Spirit, both in their own hearts as motivating power and in the hearts of the heathen as convicting and converting power. One may take, for example, some words from a sermon preached in London in the year 1810 by a certain Claudius Buchanan, lately returned from India. he asks, “were the ordained means of conversion?” He answers:

The Apostle informed the judgment with facts, and addressed the conscience with doctrines, and the holy spirit “guided their minds into all truth.” This influence of the holy spirit was the miracle which produced the conversion of the heathen world, and of the Jewish world. And the influence of the same spirit exists at this day, though less in degree, agreeably to the promise, that it should “abide for ever”; and is manifest, in every case, of the conversion of a sinner, whether he belong to the heathen or the Christian world. Our duty then, my brethren, in regard to the Gentiles in this age, is to do what was done in the first age; to assert the truth of revelation by oral preaching, or by writings sent among them; praying that God would do honour to his own word by the witness of the spirit; and depending on “the author and finisher of our faith,” for a blessing on the work which he hath commanded. But you are to understand, that those who disbelieve the doctrine of the atonement, and of the influence of the holy spirit, will never be solicitous to communicate Christianity to heathen nations; and, for this obvious reason, they have no motives. Survey the whole body of men, now employed in the four quarters of the globe, in promoting the

Gospel of Christ, whether societies or individuals, and whether by

preaching, by writing, by pecuniary contribution, or by personal exertion, and you will find that they ALL, or nearly all, believe in the doctrines of divine grace, and of atonement by “the blood of the Lamb.” For these are the doctrines which engage the heart and affections; and, when men have felt there power and consolation, then they have found MOTIVES for diffusing them. When we shall have 278learned to consider the Gospel as “the UNSEARCHABLE RICHES,” and the INESTIMABLE GIFT, then shall we earnestly desire to impart it to others.

In such a sermon we see the main emphases of evangelical life and thought. The central doctrine to be proclaimed is that of God’s gracious act of atonement in and through the saving work of Christ.. The central influence moving men to make the proclamation and moving sinners to receive and believe it is that of the Holy Spirit himself. It is the Holy Spirit who motivates the missionary; it is the Holy Spirit who convicts the sinner and leads him to repentance and faith. The recognition of the work of the Spirit in sanctification and in the creating of fellowship is by no means lost but throughout the century the awareness of his concomitant activity in moving the children of God to share in his witness to the saving work of Christ grew stronger and clearer. The way was being prepared for a more comprehensive theology of the Church’s mission which the twentieth century would bring. By the time of the World Missionary Conference at Madras in 1938 it had come to be understood, at least on the official level, that missionary activity is not simply the task of a small number of people seized by a special concern, but rather the task of the Church as a whole. If the Church is the body of Christ animated by his Spirit, then it must be of its very nature to continue his mission of salvation to the ends of the earth.

VI

At the Willingen Conference in 1952 the theological presuppositions of the whole missionary movement were clearly and forcefully expressed. This movement, it was affirmed, has its source in the Triune God Himself. He has sent forth one Saviour to seek and save all the lost, one Redeemer who by his death, resurrection, and ascension has accomplished a full and perfect atonement and created in himself one new humanity, the body of which Christ is the exalted Head. This is followed by a fine statement:

On the foundation of this accomplished work God has sent forth His

Spirit, the Spirit of Jesus, to gather us together in one Body in Him … to empower us for the continuance of His mission as His witnesses and ambassadors. By the Spirit we are enabled both to press forward as ambassadors of Christ, beseeching all men to be reconciled to God, and also to wait with sure confidence for the final victory of His love…. 279There is no participation in Christ without participation in His mission to the world. That by which the Church receives its existence is that by which it is also given its world mission. “As the Father hath sent me, even so send I you.” 1

This is a simple and yet profound statement of the theology of the Church’s missionary task. It brings us back to the Holy God whose Spirit must always strive with a world estranged and alienated from its true life and destiny. It focuses attention upon the Servant anointed by the Spirit for his work of healing and salvation. It reminds us of the sending forth of the Holy Spirit of him who through death and resurrection had opened the kingdom of heaven to all believers. Henceforward the Church has its task and its enabling. To bear witness to the uttermost parts of the earth is its continuing obligation: to receive power through the Holy Spirit is its constant privilege.

To sum up. There have been times in the history of the Christian Church when the emphasis on the holy in the title Holy Spirit has been altogether dominant. Then men have been concerned for holiness, for purity, for separation, for aspiration heavenwards in the corporate life and worship of the Church, and in the striving for individual sanctity. Again there have been times when the emphasis on spirit has been altogether dominant. Then the concern has been for power, for spiritual energy, for expansion, for urgent proclamation, as constituting the marks of God’s true servants who are endued by His Spirit. But if the Church is indeed the instrument of Holy Spirit then the duality of the title must surely be revealed in a dual pattern of life. On the one side there must be witness to the fire that is never quenched, to the light that cannot be approached, to the glorious majesty of a Holy God. On the other side there must be witness to the energy that is never exhausted, to the grace that has no bounds, to the patient involvement of the divine Spirit in every framework of human culture.

And to this end the Christian’s prayers will also be twofold. He will pray that the Comforter may bestow the “holy flame.”

280To dust and ashes in its heat consuming

And let thy glorious light Shine ever on my sight And clothe me round, the while my path illuming.

He will also pray that the love of God may be shed abroad in his heart by the same Holy Spirit.

Enlarge, inflame and fill my heart With boundless charity divine: So shall I all my strength exert, And love them with a zeal like thine; And lead them to thy open side, The sheep for whom their Shepherd died.

Tip: use the ← and → keys to move between chapters; press Ctrl K to search. Share any printed page with index.html?p=<page>.

↑ Back to top ⬇ Download the scanned PDF