The Holy Spirit: Why should we study The Holy Spirit?

Holy Spirit 27 (Photo credit: Waiting For The Word)

This week, we begin a series on studying The Holy Spirit. But first, some would ask, why should we study The Holy Spirit? The best answer to that is, why shouldn’t we?

The Holy Spirit is one of the three persons of God. We should take a concise look at all three persons of The Trinity and delve into each person’s role as He pertains to scripture and to our relationship with Him—how does this person act on our behalf when it comes to salvation, sanctification, prayer, healing, miracles, etc.? How had this particular person of the Trinity acted in the life of Jesus? Where was the Holy Spirit in the Old Testament and where was the Holy Spirit after the resurrection of Jesus in the New Testament?

Delving into the Holy Spirit will help guide us in our personal spiritual walk as well as developing a greater ability to minister to others. So let’s begin.

Jesus referred to The Holy Spirit as a Paraclete when he spoke about the One who will come after His ascension. The word is used to signify a ‘replacement’ for Jesus on Earth (John 14:16). In that sense, we can be sure that as Jesus lived on Earth for a short time, The Holy Spirit is with us for all Christian generations on the Earth—to hear, to speak, to teach, to heal, to comfort—to be the Earthly manifestation of God in place of Jesus.

The term, according to biblestudytools.com, is more closely associated as being an advocate like a defense attorney. We see this term also used in reference to Jesus, who is our ‘defense attorney’ before the Throne of God against Satan, our accuser (1 John 2:1, Rev. 12:10). But for The Holy Spirit, it seems He is an advocate who works to convict us of sin and bring us to live in righteousness. We should rejoice and be at peace that we have The Holy Spirit in us, advocating for our righteousness and bringing us comfort and healing, and giving us (preachers, teachers and evangelists) words in which to speak.