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I. Before the consummation of the Spirit, He was:
А. The Spirit of God in God’s creation — Gen. 1:2.
B. The Spirit of Jehovah in God’s contact with man — Judg. 6:34; Isa. 61:1.
C. The Spirit of holiness in God’s dealing with man — Psa. 51:11; Isa. 63:10-11.
II. Through the processes that the Triune God has completed, the Spirit of God as the processed Triune God has been consummated into the all-inclusive life-giving Spirit to be:
А. “The Spirit,” who was not yet before the resurrection of Christ (John 7:39), compounded with Christ’s divinity, humanity, death with its effectiveness, and resurrection with its power to be the compound anointing ointment — Exo. 30:23-25.
B. The consummated Spirit of the Triune God as the consummation of the Triune God.
C. The Spirit who has been consummated to be the consummation of the Triune God as the eternal Husband speaking with His bride, the Body of Christ, to be the eternal and universal couple — Rev. 22:17.
D. The Spirit of life — Rom. 8:2.
E. The Spirit of Christ, who is the Spirit of the Christ in resurrection — the pneumatic Christ — v. 9.
F. The indwelling Spirit, who dispenses the resurrection life to the believers’ mortal body — v. 11.
G. The Spirit of Jesus is the Spirit of the incarnated Savior who, as Jesus in humanity, passed through human living and death on the cross. This indicates that in the Spirit of Jesus there is not only the divine element of God but also the human elements of His human living and His suffering of death — Acts 16:7.
H. The Spirit of Jesus Christ, who ministers the bountiful supply to the believers — Phil. 1:19b.
I. The seven Spirits before the throne of God — the sevenfold intensified Spirit — to meet the need of the believers in the degradation of the churches — Rev. 1:4; 4:5; 5:6.
III. The consummated Spirit as the consummation of the processed and consummated Triune God has been breathed into the believers in Christ — John 20:19-22:
А. As the Spirit of life, not the Spirit of power who is poured out in Acts 2.
B. By the resurrected Christ — the pneumatic Christ.
C. On the day of resurrection.
D. As a sign of being sent by Christ — John 20:21.
E. As a conclusion concerning God, who was mentioned at the beginning (1:1) of John’s Gospel on life (see chapter 7, II.T., on the all-inclusive consummated Spirit).
John’s writing begins with a new point in chapter 8. This new point is that the all-inclusive Christ who is everything to us is our Shepherd. He is not just everything to us; He is also taking care of us. His caring for us is of two aspects: the aspect of shepherding by the Shepherd and the aspect of comforting by the Comforter. These two aspects of Christ’s taking care of us are of two stages. The shepherding is in His stage in the flesh. The second aspect of comforting is in the second stage of Christ as the Spirit, the pneumatic Christ.
In John 14 the Lord said that He is in the Father and the Father is in Him (v. 10). They are coinhering. Then He said, “I will ask the Father, and He will give you another Comforter” (v. 16). This indicates that He was the first Comforter. The first Comforter was not called the Comforter but the Shepherd. The Shepherd supplies the necessities of the flock, but we need something more intrinsic, more organic, and more tender. We need an inward, organic comforting — shepherding as in 1 Peter 2:25, which says that He is the Shepherd of our souls. This is the inward shepherding of the processed and consummated Triune God united, mingled, and incorporated with His regenerated and transformed elect.
In John 14 there are four ins showing this incorporation. Verse 17 says that the Spirit of reality as the Comforter will be in us. Then verse 20 reveals that the Son is in the Father, the believers are in the Son, and the Son is in the believers. These four ins show how intrinsic and organic our relationship with the processed Triune God is. Many Christians are not clear about this intrinsic, organic relationship between the processed Triune God and the transformed believers. Today is not the stage of Christ in the flesh. Today is the stage of Christ as the Spirit, the pneumatic Christ. If He were still in the flesh, He could never be in us, and we could never be in Him. For Him to be in us and for us to be in Him, He must be pneumatic; He must be the Spirit. We must see this great vision.
This union, mingling, and incorporation issue in three great things: the Father’s house, the vine tree, and the new child. The first issue is the house of the Father in John 14: “In My Father’s house are many abodes” (v. 2). Verse 23 says that the Son and the Father will come to His lover, who is indwelt by the Spirit, and make a mutual abode with him. This is the building. The second issue is the organism of the Father, the great vine tree, which is Christ Himself (15:1). We are His branches, His members, to bear fruit to express the Father (vv. 5, 8). The third issue is the new child, who is the new man, brought forth by the travailing woman (16:21-22). The new man was created by Christ on the cross in Himself as the element (Eph. 2:15) and was born, brought forth, in resurrection to be a new babe. These three — the Father’s house, the universal vine, and the new child to consummate the new man — refer to the church as the Body of Christ that consummates in the New Jerusalem for Him to be the base of the heavenly ladder, not in divinity but in humanity as the Son of Man.
He is the Son of Man at the right hand of God in ascension (Acts 7:56). During the church age He is trimming the lampstands as the Son of Man (Rev. 1:13). He will sit on the cloud as the Son of Man to reap His harvest at the end of this age (14:14-16). He will return as the Son of Man in His second coming (Matt. 26:64). Finally, in eternity He will be the Son of Man as the heavenly ladder bringing heaven to earth and joining earth to heaven forever (John 1:51). Our Lord is divine, yet He has become the Son of Man. He is solid and strong in His humanity. He defeated Satan as a man (Heb. 2:14). God would not lower His rank to defeat Satan directly. Thus, He became the Son of Man in humanity, in the rank of a creature, to defeat another creature, the rebellious Satan.
After the Lord’s long discourse in John 14 through 16, which was His last speaking on earth, He had a concluding prayer in chapter 17. Chapters 12 through 17 are on Christ’s death unto glorification. He is the grain of wheat who needed to die (12:24). For Him to die was not bad but glorious, because His death as the grain of wheat was unto glorification in His resurrection. In verse 23 of John 12 He said, “The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified.” Then in John 17 He prayed, “Father, the hour has come; glorify Your Son that the Son may glorify You” (v. 1). Death is unto resurrection, and resurrection means glorification. When Christ is resurrected, that means He is glorified. This is the issue of His death. If Christ had remained living, He could never have been glorified. He needed to go through the death that issued in His resurrection, that is, in His glorification.
Now that we have covered the Word, God, and the all-inclusive Christ, we need to go on to see the consummated Spirit.
Before the consummation of the Spirit, He was the Spirit of God in God’s creation (Gen. 1:2). In God’s creation He was the Spirit of God brooding over the death waters.
He was the Spirit of Jehovah in God’s contact with man (Judg. 6:34; Isa. 61:1).
He was the Spirit of holiness in God’s dealing with man (Psa. 51:11; Isa. 63:10-11). First, God created man, then God contacted man, and then God dealt with man as the Spirit of holiness. In the Old Testament the title the Holy Spirit was not used. The Holy Spirit was first used as a divine title in the New Testament in relation to the incarnation (Matt. 1:18, 20; Luke 1:35) to make man holy. He was the Holy Spirit to sanctify the One who was born through incarnation.
Through the processes that the Triune God has completed, the Spirit of God as the processed Triune God has been consummated into the all-inclusive life-giving Spirit to be the following items.
He was consummated to be “the Spirit,” who was not yet before the resurrection of Christ (John 7:39), compounded with Christ’s divinity, humanity, death with its effectiveness, and resurrection with its power to be the compound anointing ointment (Exo. 30:23-25). The Spirit was not yet at the time of John 7:39 because He had not yet been consummated by the resurrection of Christ. Before the resurrection of Christ, that is, before Christ’s glorification, the Spirit was not yet. The Spirit of God in the Old Testament was the Spirit with merely the divine element, but in resurrection He was compounded with the humanity of Christ, with His all-inclusive death and its effectiveness, and with His resurrection and its power, which repels all the negative things. He is now rich with all these elements.
He is the consummated Spirit of the Triune God as the consummation of the Triune God. This means that He is the totality of the consummated Triune God because He has gone through incarnation, human living, death on the cross, resurrection, and ascension.
The Spirit who has been consummated to be the consummation of the Triune God is the eternal Husband speaking with His bride, the Body of Christ, to be the eternal and universal couple (Rev. 22:17). The consummation of the Triune God is a Husband. The Bridegroom is Christ (John 3:29), and the regenerated believers are the bride. Eventually, Christ will have a wedding, and that wedding day will last one thousand years in the kingdom age. The kingdom age will be a celebration of the wedding of Christ (Rev. 19:7-9), and the New Jerusalem will be the bride (21:2). In Revelation 22:17 the Spirit is with the bride; therefore, the Spirit must be the Husband. This is a universal romance between the saving God and the saved believers.
The compounded Spirit is the Spirit of life (Rom. 8:2).
He is also the Spirit of Christ, who is the Spirit of the Christ in resurrection — the pneumatic Christ (v. 9). Romans 8 speaks of the Spirit of Christ, the Spirit of life, and the Spirit of God. These terms are interchangeably used. These are not three Spirits but one Spirit in three aspects referring to the same person — the pneumatic Christ.
The consummated Spirit is the indwelling Spirit who dispenses the resurrection life to the believers’ mortal body (v. 11). If we allow the Spirit to indwell us, He will enliven and strengthen our weak and dying body.
The Spirit of Jesus is the Spirit of the incarnated Savior who, as Jesus in humanity, passed through human living and death on the cross. This indicates that in the Spirit of Jesus there is not only the divine element of God but also the human elements of His human living and His suffering of death (Acts 16:7).
He is the Spirit of Jesus Christ, who ministers the bountiful supply to the believers. Philippians 1:19 reveals that we can be saved organically in our daily life by the bountiful supply of the Spirit of Jesus Christ. Day by day we pass through trying circumstances and sufferings that can bring us down, but we have the bountiful supply of the Spirit of Jesus Christ to save, support, strengthen, hold, and establish us.
The consummated Spirit is the seven Spirits before the throne of God. He is the sevenfold intensified Spirit to meet the need of the believers in the degradation of the churches (Rev. 1:4; 4:5; 5:6).
The consummated Spirit as the consummation of the processed and consummated Triune God has been breathed into the believers in Christ (John 20:19-22).
He was breathed into the believers as the Spirit of life, not the Spirit of power who was poured out in Acts 2 on the day of Pentecost. The breathing breath in John 20 is not the blowing wind in Acts 2.
The resurrected Christ, the pneumatic Christ, was the Breather.
The consummated Spirit is the divine breath, breathed by the pneumatic Christ into the believers on the day of His resurrection.
His breathing the consummated Spirit into us is a sign that He is going to send us (John 20:21). We are now receiving the breathing to be sent as sons of God and prophets to speak to our relatives, neighbors, and colleagues.
This is a conclusion concerning God, who was mentioned at the beginning (1:1) of John’s Gospel on life. John 1:1 tells us that the Word was God. At the beginning He was God. At the conclusion He is the Spirit as the breath, breathed into all of us. Now He is the indwelling Spirit.
