Salvation, Baptism in the Holy Spirit, and Experience of God

2021 ◽  
pp. 67-80
Author(s):  
William J. Abraham
Keyword(s):  
Holy Spirit ◽  
Human Agency ◽  
Christian Tradition ◽  
Divine Action ◽  
Union With Christ ◽  
Christian Life ◽  
Experience Of God ◽  
The Holy Spirit ◽  
Point Of Departure ◽  
The Church

This chapter begins by charting the failure of Herbert Asbury’s conversion, using this as a point of departure to review two classical ways to provide a taxonomy of divine action for the Christian life, especially the experience of the Holy Spirit. The Christian tradition imparts a variety of concepts like sanctification, theosis, holiness, baptism in the Spirit, and union with Christ to speak of the experience of the Christian believer. Furthermore, the tradition speaks of the action of the church and the action of other believers on Christians. By attending to the concepts of divine and human agency, this chapter provides a way forward through this debate.

Divine Action in Symeon the New Theologian

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
William J. Abraham
Keyword(s):  
Holy Spirit ◽  
Personal Life ◽  
Divine Action ◽  
Christian Life ◽  
Spiritual Theology ◽  
The Holy Spirit ◽  
Divine Forgiveness ◽  
The Church

This chapter examines the spiritual theology of Symeon the New Theologian. It examines Symeon’s thought on the role of human agents in providing forgiveness of sins in the life of the church, ordination in priesthood, divine equipping of the laity to speak on God’s behalf to those seeking salvation, and the deeper questions these questions raise about divine action in salvation. The questions about the mediation of divine forgiveness among the laity inevitably raise questions about the nature of the action of the Holy Spirit in the Christian life, whether one can know that God is present in the personal life of the believer, and how these claims can be defended epistemologically.

Formation in Christian Worship

2019 ◽  
pp. 143-184
Author(s):  
Gifford A. Grobien
Keyword(s):  
Holy Spirit ◽  
Lord's Supper ◽  
Union With Christ ◽  
Marie Chauvet ◽  
Form Of Life ◽  
The Holy Spirit ◽  
Christian Worship ◽  
The Church

In conversation with Oswald Bayer, Bernd Wannenwetsch, and Louis-Marie Chauvet, this chapter explains comprehensively the power of Christian worship ethically to form Christians in union with Christ. Language and ritual theories explain the power of speech and ritual to institute forms or orders of life. Christians who have been united to Christ through God’s justifying word are inaugurated into the ecclesial form of life. In this communion, they are formed by the Holy Spirit to act in accordance with the speech of God and the institution of the Church. Furthermore, as grace-filled speech, preaching and the sacraments form Christians also by the supernatural “inscription” of the Holy Spirit. The particular power of Baptism and the Lord’s Supper to unite Christians to Christ and to each other, and to form Christians ethically, is explored in Luther’s and Philip Melancthon’s writings.

The Divine Trinity

2018 ◽  
pp. 39-53
Author(s):  
William J. Abraham
Keyword(s):  
Holy Spirit ◽  
Divine Action ◽  
The Holy Spirit ◽  
Attributes Of God ◽  
Vision Of God ◽  
The Church ◽  
The Trinity ◽  
The Way

The Christian vision of God is that God is three Persons in one Substance. This vision went beyond Scripture in order to do justice to Jewish monotheism, encounters with Jesus as an agent of divine action, and personal and corporate experiences of the Holy Spirit. Objections based on entanglement with Greek metaphysics and on certain feminist claims about male language fail. Loss of the Trinity involves serious impoverishment of the life and work of the church. Its continued embrace prepares the way for the exploration of the attributes of God.

The Trinity in Africa

2009 ◽  
Vol 3 (2) ◽  
pp. 125-143 ◽  
Author(s):  
James Kombo
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Identity ◽  
Holy Spirit ◽  
Point Of View ◽  
Experience Of God ◽  
Greco Roman ◽  
The Holy Spirit ◽  
The Common ◽  
The Church ◽  
The Trinity ◽  
Theological Thinking

AbstractThe African pre-Christian experience of God has turned out to be the gate through which Yahweh has penetrated Africa. This does not only mean that for the African Christians the Trinity must emerge from Nyambe, Nyame, Nyasaye, and so on—as various African peoples call God—but also that the Son and the Holy Spirit are now constitutive in the identity of those names. In this case, confession of one God (monotheism) is not in the 'common substance-essence' terms of the Greco-Roman heritage, nor in the 'monotheism as one-ness, non-divisible essence' in Islam and Neo-Platonism, nor as oneness in the sense of 'absolute subject' in the philosophy of Idealism. Here, oneness of God is confessed in the context of the fatherhood as contemplated from the point of view of the Father whose NTU is split between the Son and the Holy Spirit. The Father in this case is the 'Great Muntu' (God) who uniquely shares the Divine NTU with the Son and the Holy Spirit. In this mix of things, four things are noteworthy: 1) there emerges yet another way of thinking about God, 2) the Christian faith receives alternative resources for renewal of the church, 3) assumptions of conventional theological thinking are once again re-examined, and 4) Christians have an opportunity to use their own cultural identity for God's glory.

scholarly journals Prayer, the encounter and participation, the experience: A Pauline exhortation towards a spirituality of prayer

2018 ◽  
Vol 39 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Dirk G. Van der Merwe
Keyword(s):  
New Testament ◽  
Old Testament ◽  
Holy Spirit ◽  
Christian Spirituality ◽  
Spiritual Experiences ◽  
Experience Of God ◽  
Daily Events ◽  
The Holy Spirit ◽  
The One ◽  
The Church

Numerous references to prayer occur throughout the Old Testament and New Testament. These prayers relate closely to particular circumstances and needs where the petitioner appeals to God, illustrating the importance of prayer as part of the dialogue and communication between God (in the image of a Father) and Israel and the Church (in the image of his children). This article investigates Paul’s contribution to this dialogue. In 1 Thessalonians 5:17, Paul exhorts (using the imperative) the Thessalonians to pray ‘constantly’ (ἀδιαλείπτως), an exhortation located in the last pericope of the epistle, between two other exhortations (imperatives) indicating time (‘always’) and space (‘all circumstances’). Paul thus uses two more exhortations (surrounding the exhortation, ‘pray constantly’) to define what he means by ‘constant’ (without ceasing) prayer. His conviction of this necessity leads him to offer himself as an example of ‘praying constantly’ when he writes to the community in Thessalonica. Prayers in Paul’s epistles focus on the existential needs of daily living, to stand firm against evil and the spiritual need to live pure and blameless lives (complete sanctification) until the parousia. Conclusions arising from Pauline textual references on prayer include: the experience of God is not limited to extraordinary events, but subsists essentially in ordinary daily events; the understanding of God’s participation in the lives of believers is not always obvious and comprehensible; the Holy Spirit enables believers spiritually to see, hear and understand God’s daily involvement in their lives; and, prayer for the believer facilitates spiritual experiences which provide continuous transformation for the one who ‘prays without ceasing’. The result, for Paul, of this form of dialogue and communication between God and his Church, is that regular prayer constitutes joy and thankfulness.Intradisciplinary and/or interdisciplinary implications: This research relates to the disciplines of New Testament and Christian Spirituality. The focus is how to experiencing dialogue with the divine regularly every day. A specific mindset is needed to accomplish this; a mindset to see, hear and experience the divine in everyday life in the ordinary events in life.

scholarly journals Communio und Eucharistie. Ekklesiologische Parallelen bei Dumitru Stăniloae und Joseph Ratzinger

2014 ◽  
Vol 6 (1) ◽  
pp. 73-101
Author(s):  
Constantin Prihoancă
Keyword(s):  
Holy Spirit ◽  
The Body ◽  
Body Of Christ ◽  
Christian Life ◽  
Christian Community ◽  
Critical Engagement ◽  
The Holy Spirit ◽  
Communion Ecclesiology ◽  
Catholic Churches ◽  
The Church

Abstract This article is a critical engagement with D. Stăniloae’s and J. Ratzinger’s ecclesiological thought as shaped by the description of church as the body of Christ and the Trinitarian roots of this ecclesiology. Starting from practical problems of prayer and living a Christian life, the authors argue that God’s relationship to the Christian community has primacy over God’s relationship to individual believers. When one conceives of the Christian community as being the body of Christ, one can uphold the elevated Christian ideal of Eucharist Communio without making it unattainable. The authors show that the being of the church is given to the Christian community not as a possession or property, but as a task to be fulfilled through the power of Christ and of the Holy Spirit. One can discover that in becoming the church, the Christian community is elevated to the Trinitarian life in communion. Communion ecclesiology has the potential to bridge the divide between the Orthodox and Catholic churches.

scholarly journals Grundtvig teologiske udvikling til omkring affattelsen af »De levendes land«

1995 ◽  
Vol 46 (1) ◽  
pp. 217-274
Author(s):  
Elisabeth Albinus Glenthøj
Keyword(s):  
Holy Spirit ◽  
Kingdom Of God ◽  
Union With Christ ◽  
The Future ◽  
The Holy Spirit ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Love Of God ◽  
The Church ◽  
The Trinity ◽  
Father And Son

The Development of Grundtvig ’s Theology until about the Time of the Composition of .The Land of the Living. About the Eschatological Tension in the Understanding of the Kingdom of GodBy Elisabeth Albinus GlenthøjIn order to characterize briefly Grundtvig’s ideas about the Kingdom of God, the following statements are crucial: The Kingdom of God will break through visibly at the Second Coming of Christ. Until then the Kingdom is present to Faith and Hope through the Holy Spirit.The tension between the eschatological, visible Kingdom of God and the presence of the Kingdom now is a common theme in Grundtvig’s hymns. This study seeks to trace the development of Grundtvig’s theology towards his fully developed view of the Kingdom of God. The subject of the study is the great hymn, .The Land of the Living., from 1824, which contains beginnings of Grundtvig’s more elaborated view. The basic texts of the study are sermons by Grundtvig from 1821 to 1824, the period in which the eschatological tension emerges.Sections I to II.A. bring a chronological outline of the development of Grundtvig’s theology during the period until and including the year 1824. Section II.B. examines »The Land of the Living«  in the light of this outline. Throughout the study the emphasis is on the emergence of the eschatological tension.From his parents Grundtvig inherits a belief in a Kingdom of God hereafter, but as Grundtvig experiences the presence of the Lord through the Holy Spirit - in his own life and in the Church - the theology develops towards an understanding of the Kingdom of God as already present to Faith and Hope through the Holy Spirit. The future visible Kingdom illuminates the life of the Church already. Thus the eschatological tension emerges.The continuity between the future and the present Kingdom of God is found in the union with Christ through the Holy Spirit. This union is granted in Baptism and is nourished first and foremost through the Eucharist, and, next, through prayer and words of praise. Grundtvig’s experience of Pentecost underlies »The Land of the Living«: The Holy Spirit builds up the heart of man to become a temple for the Father and Son (stanza 12). Stanzas 7 to 11 elaborate the content of this unity with the Trinity. From here originates the life of the Church in the love of God and of one’s neighbour, a life which, through the Holy Spirit, takes man closer to the likeness to Christ; the goal is reached in Eternity. Wherever the love of God prevails, the Kingdom of God is present (stanza 13); that is where men are »co-operating witnesses to the divine struggle of the Spirit against the flesh«, against everything »which seeks to ... wipe out His image, destroy His temple within us« (Eighth Sunday after Trinity, 1824).

scholarly journals A Fifth Mark of the Church?

2021 ◽  
Vol 68 (2) ◽  
pp. 5-21
Author(s):  
Thaddaeus Lancton
Keyword(s):  
Holy Spirit ◽  
Union With Christ ◽  
John Paul Ii ◽  
The Poor ◽  
The Gift ◽  
The Holy Spirit ◽  
The One ◽  
Divine Mercy ◽  
The Church

In addition to the four marks of the Church, mercy has been emphasized since the pontificate of St. John Paul II as essential to the authentic fulfillment of the Church’s identity and mission. A Christological and pneumatological understanding of these marks of the Church leads to a proper grasp of the Church in relation to mercy. The Church is merciful not de facto because of her works of mercy on behalf of the poor or sinners. Rather, she is first the recipient of unprecedented Divine Mercy, poured forth in the gift of the Holy Spirit, and so shares that same Spirit of Mercy with others through her sacraments, preaching, and service. The Church’s mission of mercy thus extends beyond the myriad of manners to alleviate human misery. In union with Christ, her Bridegroom, the Church is to communicate the one gift of Divine Mercy, the Holy Spirit, to all.

Transmission of Tradition, the Sensus Fidelium, and the Holy Spirit

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gerald O’Collins, SJ
Keyword(s):  
Holy Spirit ◽  
Sacred Music ◽  
Church Architecture ◽  
Religious Art ◽  
Christian Tradition ◽  
Or Groups ◽  
Book Of Kells ◽  
Holy Water ◽  
The Holy Spirit ◽  
The Church

The presence of the risen Christ is actualized by innumerable traditions. This chapter begins by setting out twelve traditions or groups of traditions that embody or at least allude to the Christus praesens: for instance, baptism, the creeds, the Eucharist, Christian marriage, sacred music, church architecture, and such items as the use of palm branches, incense, holy water, candles, icons and other works of religious art, and, not least, glorious copies of the Book of the Gospels like the Book of Kells. The transmitters of Christian tradition include not only bishops and councils but also innumerable individuals and groups who have handed on the treasures of faith: for instance, writers, artists, and saints, not least the thirty-six doctors of the Church. The Holy Spirit is the primary bearer of tradition, and underpins the ‘sense of the faithful’, the instinctive insight of the baptized into their inherited faith.

scholarly journals Calvin as an exegete of Scripture: a few remarks with reference to Calvin research in general

2010 ◽  
Vol 44 (0) ◽  
Author(s):  
V. E. D’Assonville
Keyword(s):  
Holy Spirit ◽  
Word Of God ◽  
Biblical Text ◽  
Classical Literature ◽  
Crucial Importance ◽  
Original Intention ◽  
The Holy Spirit ◽  
Point Of Departure ◽  
The Church

Calvin did not start his famous vocation as an interpreter of Scripture with Scripture itself. After a thorough training in interpreting classical literature as a philologist, he made his debut before turning 23, with a highly respected commentary on Seneca’s “De Clementia”. His focus shifted to Scripture shortly thereafter. Certain features of his exegetical approach as part of his “Word of God theology” can thus be observed, especially as they relate to his use of the concept of “doctrina”. His exegesis used not only the principle of “sola Scriptura” as point of departure, but also the principle of “tota Scriptura”, i.e. to take the whole of Scripture into account when expositing a certain biblical text. For Calvin the original intention of the writer of a particular (Bible) book is of crucial importance. The exegesis should be done using a sound theological-methodological, historical-grammatical method. Knowledge of the original lang- uages of Scripture is therefore a prerequisite for any exegesis. In his exegesis Calvin emphasises the point that Scripture as the Word of God and the Holy Spirit cannot be separated. As the truth is simple, Calvin avoids any traces of allegory in his exegetical activities and aims to keep his exegesis and ex- position of Scripture simple, brief, clear and understandable – exegesis should always exhibit the quality of clarity and brevity. In all exegesis, Scripture as the Word of God should be accepted as the final authority on any issue, not the church as institute.

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