Theology School

In today’s churches, we witness believers maintaining their own views and understandings of the Holy Spirit. Some would refer to Him as a “dove” or “fire”. However, the greatest misunderstanding of the Holy Spirit can be found in the choruses we sing on a Sunday. The most notorious is, “Come, Holy Spirit”. It is an implicit recognition or failure to recognise the most fundamental fact of the Holy Spirit—that He has already come. These songs we sing speak of the Holy Spirit as if He is absent.

Today, there are many who believe that men do not respond to the gospel in the 21st Century because they have intellectual problems with the facts of Christianity. To set the record straight, no man responds to any Gospel message if the Holy Spirit does not prepare his heart for the reception. One can set forth the gospel in the most beautiful logic, the most beautiful system. Men are just as blind and dead to it as it is possible for a person to be. The only reason men do not respond to the gospel is because the gospel comes to them with the proclamation that they are dead in sin and they regard it as totally irrelevant.

man was to be understood chiefly from the stand point of his rational faculties—his mind. They thought that man’s mind was the immortal principle of man, and thus it was largely a divine principle. Man, then was a rational being and because he possessed reason, he was immortal. Man’s body is the material or the substance in which evil inheres. Therefore, to the ancient man, the body was sinful by definition, and the soul was immortal.

The views that men have had concerning life in the soul are important. Origin believed that the soul was in existence before conception, becoming part of the foetus after conception.

When theologians speak of God as the “Holy other”, they are speaking of Him in His holiness as one who is separated and, therefore, distinct from us.

If scripture had revealed all of the attributes of God […]

If He knows something is to take place, then these actions are certain under various conditions.

Declaring the end from the beginning, and from ancient times the things that are not yet done, saying, My counsel shall stand, and I will do all my pleasure. (Isaiah 46:10)

This lack of personal development is just sheer laziness on the part of many, and as a result, the church is happy simply paying someone else to look after their Christianity. If you believe that scripture is not sufficient for your daily living, then I believe it is time to read your Bible.

Wrong thoughts about the nature of God invariably lead to wrong actions. I would go so far as to say that the presence of wrong thoughts about God is actually idolatry, for wrong thoughts about God are slanderous to His character. When you entertain wrong thoughts about God, you are attributing to the Lord something that is not true of Him. You are then making up a new god and are essentially creating an idol for yourself. Doing this turns God into something He is not.