The Comforter

John 14:26, But the Comforter, which is the Holy Ghost, whom the Father will send in my name, he shall teach you all things, and bring all things to your remembrance, whatsoever I have said unto you.

In this passage, Jesus promised the gift of the Holy Spirit to His apostles (and ultimately to the whole world). He described the Holy Spirit with the term parakletos, (παράκλητος, Strong's Number 3875). 

Parakletos is a compound word: para (παρά, Strong’s Word 3844) which means near or beside and kaleō (καλέω, Strong’s Word 2564) which means to call or to bid.  The term is translated many different ways including Comforter, Helper, and Advocate. Its parts literally mean, “Called beside.” This paints a picture of the Holy Spirit as One who stands beside us, helping us, encouraging us, and comforting us. It’s a marvelous picture of the Holy Spirit’s work in our lives.

As I was reading 1 Thessalonians 4, where Paul mentions the Rapture of the Church, Paul concludes his thoughts with this, “Wherefore comfort one another with these words” (1 Thessalonians 4:18).   The word comfort sort of leapt out at me.  I looked up the Greek word being used and saw that it was parakaleō (παρακαλέω, Strong’s Word 3870) which is the verb form of parakletos (the same way “drive” would be the verb of “driver” in English).  

I thought it was interesting that the same word used to describe the Holy Spirit would be used to command Christians how to act.  What He is to us, we are also commanded to be to one another: helpers, comforters, and advocates. We are to stand beside them, encouraging them, just as the Holy Spirit stands by us. To be sure, we are poor shadows of the True Spirit but we are called to comfort, help, and encourage notwithstanding.

So how do we go about this task? I suggest we should let the Spirit be our Guide. See again what Jesus said of the Spirit:

He shall teach you all things, and bring all things to your remembrance, whatsoever I have said unto you.

Wow, Paul’s instructions are similar to what Jesus said of the Spirit: “Comfort one another with these words.”  That’s how we can be a comfort to others, by reminding them of the words of Jesus.

Do you know someone who is struggling in a relationship?  Tell them what the Bible says!

Is there a parent in despair over a wayward child?  Tell them what the Bible says!

Is someone convicted by sin in their life? Tell them what the Bible says!

How simple. When people need to be comforted or encouraged, we need only remind them of the words God has given us! 

Why I’m a cessationist… sort of

Mark 16:15-18, And he said unto them, Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature. He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved; but he that believeth not shall be damned. And these signs shall follow them that believe; In my name shall they cast out devils; they shall speak with new tongues; They shall take up serpents; and if they drink any deadly thing, it shall not hurt them; they shall lay hands on the sick, and they shall recover.

Jesus promised His disciples that, when He ascended to the Father, He would send a Comforter, the Holy Spirit, who would dwell inside them and abide with them forever (John 14:16-17).  Acts 2 describes how the Spirit appeared to the Apostles as “cloven tongues like as of fire” and descended upon them like “a rushing mighty wind.” Being filled with the Holy Ghost, the Apostles began preaching to the crowd gathered for Pentecost, speaking in new languages (tongues) and declaring the wonderful works of God.  In Mark 16, cited above, Jesus promised that similar signs - like speaking in new tongues or healing the sick - would follow the believers in the new covenant once they accepted Christ and were filled with the Spirit.

Today, many churches still practice “speaking in tongues.”  There are still churches that practice “faith healing.”  There are even a few churches that practice snake handling because of this passage from Mark.  Yikes!  However, there are many other churches that believe these signs don’t continue anymore.  They do not speak in tongues, they don’t practice faith healing, and they certainly don’t handle snakes!  The question, then, is this: which view is correct?  Do the signs promised to the early church continue or don’t they?

The idea that the signs given to the early church have ceased is called cessationism.  It’s the belief that God would sometimes give the ability to do miracles to His prophets, with the understanding that it was a unique and temporary ability meant to demonstrate that the prophet was speaking with the authority of God.  

We see the giving of signs first used with Moses in Exodus 4.  When God had commanded Moses to go free His people, Moses raised this objection: “But, behold, they will not believe me, nor hearken unto my voice: for they will say, The Lord hath not appeared unto thee” (Exodus 4:1).  God gave Moses 3 miracles to perform, and if the people doubted he was truly sent by God, he was to perform these miracles in front of them.  After all, anybody could say he spoke for God but not just anybody could perform miracles to prove it.  If a person could do something miraculous, it was evidence that God was with him.

We see this same thing in John 3, when Jesus was speaking with Nicodemus.  In John 3:2, Nicodemus confirmed he knew Jesus was sent by God because of the miracles Jesus performed; in his own words, “Rabbi, we know that thou art a teacher come from God: for no man can do these miracles that thou doest, except God be with him.”  

Jesus Himself attested that His miracles testified to His own authority.  He demonstrated that He could forgive sins when He healed the paralyzed man (Mark 2:5-12).  He demonstrated that He was the Resurrection and the Life when He raised Lazarus from the dead (John 11:17-44).  Jesus told the Pharisees that the works He did testified that He was sent by the Father (John 10:25).  These are just a few examples of how miracles are meant to be signs for unbelievers.

Jesus also gave the ability to do miracles to His apostles when He commissioned them and sent them out to preach the good news.  Mark 3:14-15 says this: “And he ordained twelve, that they should be with him, and that he might send them forth to preach, And to have power to heal sicknesses, and to cast out devils.”

So we see that, time after time, miracles were given by God as a sign that the person performing them had the authority of God behind him.  They were used only at certain times and special circumstances.  When Moses went to the Jews in captivity, for example, there was no Bible.  It was only because of the miracles they’d seen Moses do, that they received the Five Books revealed to him by God which became the first Bible.  Later, as other prophets came, they added more books revealed by God.  Eventually, the entire Old Testament was canon.  

After Jesus came, the New Testament began being written by the Apostles like Paul, John, Peter, and Matthew.  They had been given the gifts of miracles so that people would receive their teachings.  But, just as in Mark 16, the subject verse of this post, God also gave signs to all new believers.  He gave them the authority to speak in tongues and prophesy.  As the New Testament was being compiled, God gave believers a supernatural ability to preach the resurrection of Jesus and speak of the wonderful works of God (Acts 2:11).

But just as in all the instances of miracles in the history of the Bible, I believe these gifts were given for a limited time for a specific purpose.  In 1 Corinthians 13:8-10, we read this:

Charity never faileth: but whether there be prophecies, they shall fail; whether there be tongues, they shall cease; whether there be knowledge, it shall vanish away. For we know in part, and we prophesy in part. But when that which is perfect is come, then that which is in part shall be done away.

The word perfect in the Bible typically means, complete or finished (teleios, τέλειος, Strong’s Word #5046).  Though there is some debate among Christians, it is my interpretation that the “perfect” thing being discussed in this passage is the Bible.  Paul had his revelation.  John had his revelation, as did Peter, James, and Matthew.  They each knew, “in part.”  Now we have the complete Bible, the entire revelation from God.  There is no more need for tongues, prophesy, or knowledge like there was for the 1st century church.  Neither are there any more prophets nor apostles.  That which is perfect has now come!

But wait a minute - why do I say I’m “sort of” a cessationist?  It’s because there continue to be gifts of the Spirit.  I Corinthians 12 tells us that there are diverse gifts of the Spirit that all work together for the edification of the Church.  Paul used the analogy of the members of a body that all work together.  Verse 12 says, “For as the body is one, and hath many members, and all the members of that one body, being many, are one body: so also is Christ.”  

Paul lists several examples of charismatic gifts including, “first apostles, secondarily prophets, thirdly teachers, after that miracles, then gifts of healings, helps, governments, diversities of tongues.” If we say there are no more apostles or prophets, do we also say there are no more teachers or helpers?  You can see how that becomes problematic.  I think the understanding lies in what is meant by these terms.

APOSTLES

If God appoints some to be apostles, we could say, “Yes He does and He named 12 total!”  That does align perfectly with Scripture and needs no further explanation.  However, the term apostle literally means someone who is sent (apostolos, ἀπόστολος Strong’s Word 652).  Jesus appointed the first Twelve (the 12th being Paul, by the way, not Judas) to go and preach the gospel.  Yet even today, churches still send people into different parts of the world to preach the gospel.  We normally call these people missionaries, but I wouldn’t object to them being called apostles as long as it’s understood they don’t have the exact same authority Christ gave the original 12.  I mean, they can’t write epistles that we later make canon! 

PROPHETS

In English, we often think of prophecy as telling the future.  Many times in the Bible, prophets would talk about the future but, in the most fundamental sense, a prophet simply is someone who spoke the words of God.  Prophets often began their messages with, “Thus saith the LORD….”  Again, it is the messages of the prophets that were written down and eventually became the Old Testament.  

Today, there are no more prophets in the same sense as Moses or Daniel.  However, there are still people who speak God’s Word.  We call them preachers.  If you want to say preachers have the gift of prophecy, again, I’m fine with that but they can’t give new revelation which is equal to the authority of the Bible!  I would say the role of a preacher/pastor/prophet today is to boldly speak the Word of God and his message must comport with what has already been revealed in Scripture.  

TONGUES

There is a lot of misunderstanding about the gift of tongues.  In Acts 2, when the apostles first began speaking in tongues, it’s clear they were speaking in a language that the people hearing could understand.  Acts 2:7-8 says, “And they were all amazed and marvelled, saying one to another, Behold, are not all these which speak Galilaeans? And how hear we every man in our own tongue, wherein we were born?” 

God was able to help these poor fishermen, from the backward area of Galilee, preach the gospel to Asians, Africans, Arabians, and Greeks with the fluency of a native.  The gift of tongues helped the apostles preach Christ’s message all around the world without any type of language barrier.  

Today, people are still called to go into other countries with the good news.  I believe the Spirit still helps some people learn the new language quickly and fluently - though perhaps not instantly like the early believers.  We also translate the Bible into many languages so the gift of tongues continues to allow us to tell other people in the world about the wonderful things of God.  

Tongues were always about sharing the gospel in a language the hearer could understand.  It was never the meaningless gibber we sometimes see in churches today.  

In conclusion, if miracles were ordinary, they would no longer seem miraculous.  This world is not our reward.  The Holy Spirit was given as the down payment of the inheritance we have waiting for us in heaven (Ephesians 1:10-14).  The gifts of the Spirit and the signs shown by the apostles, prophets, and early believers are the evidence that the promises they made are true and that our eternal reward is sure.  Let us not be like the ungrateful crowds who, after being fed when Jesus multiplied the loaves and fish, demanded still another sign before they would believe (John 6:30).  The record of all the signs is right there in the Bible already.  What else do we need?!

The Greek New Testament does not call the Holy Spirit an it!

Grammatical gender is rather ordinary in most languages but completely absent from English.  In English, men are he/him, women are she/her, and everything else is an it.  Because English follows a sort of “natural gender,” English speakers often believe gender in other languages also denotes the sex or personhood of what is being discussed.  If a noun in another language is masculine, for example, English speakers assume it denotes a human male.  

Grammatical gender is merely a type of grammatical designation.  In Spanish, for example, the word for a lady’s dress is el vestido, which is masculine, while the word for a man’s necktie is la corbata, which is feminine.  This seems totally absurd to English speakers because a lady’s dress should obviously be feminine and the necktie, masculine!  

In my opinion, it’s unfortunate we even use the word gender to describe it.  It might help native-English speakers if we imagine the word class when talking about gender.  For example, instead of saying masculine nouns, we could say class-M nouns.  Since this blog is written in English, I’m assuming the people who read it also speak English so grouping nouns into classes instead of gender might help you as you think about this post.  

Spanish only has two genders: masculine and feminine.  There is no neuter gender in Spanish.  However, Greek has three genders, masculine, feminine, and neuter.  Since the New Testament was written in Greek and since English uses he, she, and it, the tendency to project our English understanding of gender onto the text becomes almost irresistible.  Therefore, problems sometimes arise when people try to use the gender of a Greek word to make a doctrinal point.  

A blog that calls itself Examining the Trinity has pointed out that the Holy Spirit in the original Greek is neuter.  They went on to say this:

But "Holy Spirit" in the original Greek is neuter and therefore the neuter pronouns "it," "itself" are used with it in the original NT Greek! Any strictly literal Bible translation would have to use "it" for the holy spirit (since it is really not a person, but God's active force, a literal translation would be helpful in this case).

This is an extremely amateurish argument. It demonstrates how a little knowledge can be dangerous. Most people who use this argument really can't read Greek. Instead, they have heard once that the Greek word for “Spirit” is neuter so, because of their understanding of English, they buy into the argument that the Spirit is an “it.” Of course, there are some people who indeed understand Greek's grammatical use of gender but still repeat the argument with the intention of preying on the audience's ignorance of the subject.

First, this is a blatant example of special pleading because the same people who raise this argument don't apply this same standard everywhere. In Matthew 2:11, for example,  the Bible says the wise men, “saw the young child with Mary his mother.” The Greek word for child here (paidion, παιδίον, Strong’s word 3813) is neuter so, to be consistent, they should translate this verse as “they saw the young child with Mary its mother.” Of course they don't do that. Neither do they refer to the church as her or the book as him or “correctly” render the hundred other instances where Greek gender does not agree with English ideas of gender.

There's another subtle flaw in the above quote that might escape notice. The author seems unaware of the flaw and cites a source that commits the same mistake. See if you can spot it in this quote:

The Greek word for 'spirit' is neuter, and while we use personal pronouns in English ('he,' 'his,' 'him'), most Greek manuscripts employ 'it.' [bold in original]

Did you catch it? If not, don't feel bad because it's sort of a technicality and some might accuse me of splitting hairs. However, I feel it's an important consideration. This quote says, “most Greek manuscripts employ 'it.'” The reality is that NO Greek manuscript contains the word, it! The word it is an English word which conveys a certain meaning in English. It is more precise to say that the Greek manuscripts use the neuter pronoun (auton) whenever the antecedent is a neuter noun. The original authors were not thinking “it” whenever they wrote "auton." Again, think, “class” instead of gender and it might help.  Class-N nouns use class-N pronouns.  

A language is more than its vocabulary; each language also has its own grammar as well as its own idioms. The goal of any translation is to express the same meaning in the target language that is conveyed in the original language. A good translation should obey the rules of the target language – not slavishly render a hyper-literal, word for word exchange of the original language. The pronouns used in our translations should follow the rules of English, not Greek! If the antecedent is an object, the English pronoun should be it. If the antecedent is a person, the English pronoun should be he or she.

If anyone wants to deny the Personhood of the Holy Spirit, he must make his case using Scripture. A weak appeal to the gender of a Greek word – especially an appeal made by someone who can't even read Greek – isn't even close.