What Difference Did Pentecost Make?

If you, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will the heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him! (Luke 11:13)

“Teach us to pray,” the disciples ask Jesus (Luke 11:1). It is a terrific request. And Jesus is happy to oblige. First, he tells them what they are to pray (verses 2–4). But Jesus would have his disciples be much more than informed about right content in well-ordered prayer; Jesus would also have his disciples be eager and expectant in prayer. So to instruction on the content of prayer, he adds two encouragements meant to sustain fervent prayer: (1) persistence pays off (verses 5–10), and (2) our heavenly Father gives good gifts (verses 11–13). Jesus’s aim is to inspire committed, fervent prayer, so in the latter instance he speaks of the best “good gift” he can think of to showcase the Father’s astounding kindness and generosity — namely, the Holy Spirit.

Appreciating this best of gifts from the best of fathers is, to say the least, no trivial matter. Faith in the God who lays hold of us in Christ through the power of the Spirit should zealously seek to grow in understanding of this same Spirit. Unfortunately, the task is fraught with difficulty, the way is paved with distractions, and the questions needing to be answered are copious and complicated.

Challenging, Complex Questions

The Spirit is, arguably, the most nebulous member of the Trinity: a Father I have categories for, a Son I can easily envision, but where do I begin to make sense of a Spirit?1 The Spirit is, arguably, the most avoided member of the Trinity, at least at a popular level: I would wager that, outside of Pentecostal traditions, most churchgoers have never sat under a sermon series or Sunday school series exploring the person and work of the Holy Spirit.2 And when Christian reflection on the Holy Spirit’s ministry is pursued, it often happens in the context of controversy (e.g., disagreements about the so-called “charismatic spiritual gifts”), and finds itself, arguably, too ready to allow controversy to dictate the shape and focus of the treatment.

In addition to these realities, complicated biblical-theological questions arise concerning the nature of the Spirit’s work. We speak of the Spirit being “poured out” at Pentecost: does this mean he was somehow absent and inactive beforehand? After all, John 7:39 says that the Spirit was not given until Jesus was “glorified.” What do we make of such a statement? How shall we truthfully articulate the difference that Christ’s work and the event of Pentecost make? What does it mean for Christians to have and enjoy the gift of the Holy Spirit, the very treasure of the kingdom given from the ascended King’s throne? These are challenging questions, but they must be attended to if we would know aright the gift of the Father won for us by Christ.

“Jesus’s life is from beginning to end (to new beginning) saturated with the Spirit.”

Given the challenge and complexity of the matter, it can be constructive to narrow our focus. Rather than trying to tackle all or even several areas of concern, in this essay we will zero in on just one limited but strategic starting point. Specifically, we will consider the Holy Spirit in the life of Christ. We will, in other words, seek out some Christological bearings for pneumatology. This is a strategic point of departure not only because, as we shall see, Jesus’s life is from beginning to end (to new beginning) saturated with the Spirit to the point that the Spirit can be called the very Spirit of Christ (Romans 8:9). To know Christ aright is necessarily to know something of the Spirit (and vice versa). But more pointedly, Christological cues in understanding the Spirit’s work in the new age are especially helpful since Christ’s own life and labor exhibits both continuity and discontinuity in the experience of the Spirit, which serves as a paradigm for proper biblical-theological understanding of the work of the Spirit through the ages.