Book Review, The Holy Spirit, Ch 1

I am having to re-read Sinclair Ferguson's "The Holy Spirit" for an upcoming seminary course, so I'm going to condense each chapter into a small review in order to help myself remember it, and be able to refer to it later for the class.

Chapter 1 deals with the Holy Spirit and His history in the ongoing process of biblical revelation. The Spirit is present from creation in revelation, and frequents the OT by empowering prophets, and judges, and working in situations to cause God's intended ends. But in the OT we don't find a strong and distinct "other person" aspect of the Spirit. Many have thought as to whether or not the Spirit could be distinctly a person, or merely a quality of God (i.e. the arm of the Lord).

Since "ruach", the Hebrew word for wind or spirit has at its basis an animation or energy, it is considerably vague as to whether this is mere action of God, or personality at times. There are hints in the OT as to the belief that the Spirit has a "hypostasis", or being, apart from the Father. David prays for God to not take His Spirit away, and speaks of it in a personal, relational sense. While it is vague at times, the OT does speak of God's Spirit in a way associating divine activity, personal activity, and hypostatically distinct (less though). The NT, however, fully articulates all three persons of the Trinity. The Spirit, the Son, and even the Father (John 1:18) are not fully revealed until the revelation of Christ.

So the Spirit is, from the OT, associated with the Divine covenant redemption of God to His people. In the NT the Spirit is revealed distinctly as a person, yet is still as fully integrated in God's covenant of redemption as before.