A Conversation With a Neighbor What Is the Holy Spirit?

Is the Holy Spirit a Person?

Scott: Let's look at  a Bible passage that will help us to establish whether the holy spirit is a person or not. You may be familiar with these verses. At Acts 2:1-4, we read: "Now while the day of the festival of Pentecost was in progress they were all together at the same place, and suddenly there occurred  from heaven a noise just like that of a rushing stiff breeze, and it filled the whole house in which they were sitting. And tongues as if of fire became visible to them and were distributed about , and one sat upon each one of them, and they all became filled  with holy spirit and started to speak with different tongues just as the spirit was granting them to make utterance." 

Brad: I'm familiar with that account. 

Scott: Now, Brad, can a person get filled with another  person? 

Brad: Of course  not. 

Scott: Let's look a little further in the same chapter, at verse 17. The first part of the verse reads: 'In the last days,' God says, 'I shall pour out some of my spirit upon every sort of flesh.' "   Let me ask you, Brad, could God pour out a portion of a coequal God? 

Brad: Again, no.

Scott: John the Baptist used a different description for being filled with holy spirit. It's found at Matthew 3:11. Would you like to read the  this verse,  please?

Brad: "I, for my part, baptize you with water because of your repentance, but the one coming after me is stronger than I am, whose sandals I am not fit to take off. That one will baptize you people with holy spirit and with fire." 

Scott: Thank you. Did you notice what John the Baptist said would be done with holy spirit? 

Brad: He talked about being baptized with holy spirit. 

Scott: That's right. Notice that he also mentioned being baptized with fire. Obviously, fire is not a person.Do you  think this verse is saying that holy spirit is a person? 

Brad: No.

Scott: So according to the scriptures we have considered, the holy spirit is not a person. 

Brad: I guess not. 

Next time: A Conversation With a Neighbor What Is the Holy Spirit? -How a "Helper"? 

From the Watchtower magazine, 2010