HE GREATEST GIFT from the Father and Son is the Comforter, the Holy Spirit.

The Holy Spirit is the greatest gift because he is one with the Father and Son.

God sent his Son into the world, and the Son became the great mediator between

God and man.1 As if by inescapable necessity, the Son took the initiative to ask the

Father to send this the greatest comforter, extending from the Father. It was through

the Son’s great familiarity with the Father and extreme closeness to man that he did

this, so that in the end man would have a connection of life and existence with the

Father and Son and Holy Spirit, none of whom can in any way be excluded from the

others because they are one.

Immediately following this, Jesus Christ revealed to us the greatest mysteries of the

Father and Son and Holy Spirit. He said, ‘I am in my Father, and you are in me, and I

am in you.’2 So in an exceedingly mysterious way, the oneness of the Father and the Son

was revealed, and then our oneness with the Father and Son. Naturally and by necessity,

the extremely mysterious element in the oneness is the Holy Spirit, for he is the one who

unites us in Christ and the Father. The entrance of this oneness that man has obtained is

the Son who by the Holy Spirit took on his body from the Virgin Mary. We find that the

Son ties the keeping of his commands3 and faith in him as a condition for entering into

the Son, and the Son entering into us. So it follows that the Holy Spirit, whom Christ

openly requested from the Father for our sakes and who is in himself a person, stays

with us and is within us.4 He stays with us as a companion and leader in the way; the

way which is the Lord Jesus, and he is in us to give us life with the Father and Son.

Christ called him ‘another Comforter’ in view of the fact that he, Christ, is the first

Comforter for man.

This mystery which we now uncover and reveal, that the Son is in the Father, we are

in the Son and the Son is in us,5 is the greatest of the theological mysteries. We

approach it in fear and respect and the openness of faith, with a humble heart and a spirit

bowed down in order to receive this truth which is the truth of truths in Christian

theology.

We say this to the reader so that he receives his portion and eternal inheritance in

the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. This is the abiding mystery in holy baptism in

which we receive our divine, spiritual birth in the Father, Son and Holy

Spirit. Christ did not leave us orphans6 when he finally ascended to heaven, for he

gave us into the care of another Counselor who fills us completely, teaches us divine

truth, leads us in the way which Christ established by his body on the cross and

opens life within us, which is the life of Christ. So we become one in him and him in

us, as an eternal confirmation of our salvation, giving us an inheritance in all the

possessions of the Son and his glory. Another truth we must reveal to the reader is

that the Father himself has adopted us. He has become our most holy Father, so that

we no longer feel we are estranged from the promise and inheritance of Israel.

Rather, he has made us among the first saints, ‘members of God’s household,’7 and

we will live with them through our life in Christ. The entire Old Testament is no

longer a stranger to us; rather, we are truly counted first class sons of Abraham and

possessors of all the ‘very great and precious promises.’8

July 24, 2005

8 2 Peter 1:4.

2 John 14:20.

3 See John 14:15.

4 John 14:17.

5 See John 14:20.

6 See John 14:18.

7 Ephesians 2:19.

 

 

 

1 See 1 Timothy 2:5.

 

 

||    The Orthodox Faith (Dogma)    ||    Family and Youth    ||    Sermons    ||    Bible Study    ||    Devotional    ||    Spirituals    ||    Fasts & Feasts    ||    Coptics    ||    Religious Education    ||    Monasticism    ||    Seasons    ||    Missiology    ||    Ethics    ||    Ecumenical Relations    ||    Church Music    ||    Pentecost    ||    Miscellaneous    ||    Saints    ||    Church History    ||    Pope Shenouda    ||    Patrology    ||    Canon Law    ||    Lent    ||    Pastoral Theology    ||    Father Matta    ||    Bibles    ||    Iconography    ||    Liturgics    ||    Orthodox Biblical topics     ||    Orthodox articles    ||    St Chrysostom    ||   

||    Bible Study    ||    Biblical topics    ||    Bibles    ||    Orthodox Bible Study    ||    Coptic Bible Study    ||    King James Version    ||    New King James Version    ||    Scripture Nuggets    ||    Index of the Parables and Metaphors of Jesus    ||    Index of the Miracles of Jesus    ||    Index of Doctrines    ||    Index of Charts    ||    Index of Maps    ||    Index of Topical Essays    ||    Index of Word Studies    ||    Colored Maps    ||    Index of Biblical names Notes    ||    Old Testament activities for Sunday School kids    ||    New Testament activities for Sunday School kids    ||    Bible Illustrations    ||    Bible short notes

||    Pope Shenouda    ||    Father Matta    ||    Bishop Mattaous    ||    Fr. Tadros Malaty    ||    Bishop Moussa    ||    Bishop Alexander    ||    Habib Gerguis    ||    Bishop Angealos    ||    Metropolitan Bishoy    ||

||    Prayer of the First Hour    ||    Third Hour    ||    Sixth Hour    ||    Ninth Hour    ||    Vespers (Eleventh Hour)    ||    Compline (Twelfth Hour)    ||    The First Watch of the midnight prayers    ||    The Second Watch of the midnight prayers    ||    The Third Watch of the midnight prayers    ||    The Prayer of the Veil    ||    Various Prayers from the Agbia    ||    Synaxarium