How about while your eyes still close, take a deep breath.
I go in and out.
That is our respiration.
And you are also listening to me, since you are giving me some accommodation
and you're using your hearing, your ears, everyone can now open your eyes.
And these are our natural, natural senses.
And Wesley, actually, this is part of his gift, I think, is that he uses these
natural senses and moves to spiritual senses.
And that's one of the things we're going to talk today.
We begin from the birth of spiritual life and move towards spiritual maturity.
So there's a lot of movement, so to speak,
theologically or in Wesley's taxonomy towards Christian perfection.
What does Christian perfection, the
Spirit's inner witness, the spiritual senses and creation.
Your vision, your hearing, your
respiration is being perfected both in the natural sense and in the spiritual sense.
Title of my presentation is John Wesley's Doctrine of the Holy Spirit.
The triumph god, Father, Son, Holy Spirit as the foundation and tell us of creation.
Creation is such a huge topic, so we're
just going to focus, obviously, because of time constraint on one of the divine
agents in creation, particularly the only creature made in the image of God.
And we're going to tie the spiritual
senses, inner witness, Christian perfection to the divine image, the image,
the beauty of Wesley's theology is in its dynamic formulations and practicability.
It is both earthly and heavenly in that it
is a theology of heaven coming down to earth, transforming earth to new creation.
His doctrine of the Holy Spirit depicts an
active Christian life, both an inward and outward, holiness and love.
And this divine activity is grounded in
the dynamic life of the Father's, Son and Holy Spirit.
I've added numbers to your handout so
you'll be able to follow me, and I'll mention the numbers.
Number one. John Wesley's sole sermon that articulates
his doctrine of the Trinity is entitled on the Trinity.
The purpose of the sermon actually was to defend the mystery of the doctrine.
In it, he expresses that he prefers the term the three one God, as opposed to the
widely and historically known theological terms of Trinity and person.
He emphasizes that the Spirit of God
witnesses with his Spirit that he is a child of God.
The spirit of God commences God's revelation in a person.
The Holy Spirit reveals to God's, people and creation that he is three in one.
It is the power of the Holy Spirit that matures the believer's knowledge of God.
Wesley's dermatology and theology as a
whole exudes the language and logic of trinitarian theology.
Albert Outler comments that Wesley has a
persistent concern for a trinitarian doctrine of the Holy Spirit.
Number two, the first of the two aspects
due to time, we'll only deal with two today of the Spirit's divine act in
creation is the Spirit's inner witness and its trinitarian character.
And tell us the nature and activity of the three one God.
Underscores the close connection between the Spirit's inner witness and Christian
perfection, wesley articulates a redemptive trinity.
He explains the trinitarian shape of salvation such that salvation was purposed
by the Father, purchased by the Son, and applied by the Spirit.
Wesley's Sotriology is grounded in the
biblical narrative of creation, fall and redemption.
Though the divine acts of creation, fall and redemption are distinct realities,
wesley weaves these three divine action in his account of redemption.
Salvation is both individual and collective.
It is both personal and social.
A truly mature spirituality engages social reform because reform is the social analog
to the personal restoration of the divine image.
Salvation is just not an inner reality, but a growing reality from the inside out,
from one's heart to one's behavior, from the private life towards the public life.
Number three the relationship of the
Spirit's inner witness with Christian perfection is the divine image, the beauty
and glory of the three one God in creation.
Wesley's doctrine of creation highlights the moral law as that which mirrors the
heart of God, the divine nature, and the eternal mind.
Adam and Eve were created in the moral image of God so that holiness, justice and
goodness reigned in their hearts as made in the image of God.
Adam and Eve were also made in the natural image of God, that is, having the ability
to choose either to obey or disobey their inner moral law.
Scripture narrated in Genesis three how
Adam and Eve exercise their choice, that is, to disobey God.
Number Four to Wesley, the corruption of humanity.
His doctrine of sin is the disintegration of humanity's communion with God and the
spiritual death that accompanied this separation.
This spiritual death includes humanity's
inability to experience or respond to God the divine act of redemption.
Doctrine of redemption is the restoration of the divine image in humanity.
The Holy Spirit works to shape humanity,
to reflect the image of God and to participate in the inner life of God.
Number Five the very dynamics of Wesley Soteriology implies its trinitarian
foundations such that the Father, Son and Spirit work in unity in this restoration.
This complex and intricate soteriology is actually very simple and very relational.
Number Six wesley ascribe distinct roles
to the Father, Son and Spirit in bringing people to repentance and conviction of
sin, God the Father draws the Son enlightens and the Spirit convicts.
His doctrine of redemption restores humanity to God's intended design through
the work of the Son and Spirit in creation.
In the sermon entitled the Scripture Way
of Salvation, his emphasis are Christological and pneumatological.
The Father forgives the believer for the
sake of Christ, by which a right relationship with God begins.
Simultaneously, this change of relationship with God occurs with a real
change of regeneration brought by the Holy Spirit.
Wesley's So theology is not only
relational, but highlights the restoration of the divine human relationship.
In the sermon entitled The New Birth, he
explains that the exchange from the spirit of adoption from the spirit of bondage to
the spirit of adoption is synonymous to being born of God.
John 113 to be born again is to be raised from death to life with God.
He articulates his trinitarian commitments
in saying it is the change wrought in the whole soul by the Almighty Spirit of God
when it is created anew in Christ Jesus, when it is renewed after the image of God.
An important facet to which the spirit of
adoption and new birth relate to is the inner witness of the Spirit.
That's this number seven, the spirit's
witness, testifies with the human spirit that the person is a child of God.
This highly dynamic articulation
elaborates the spirit of adoption and new birth such that the inner witness is
similar to the newborn's cry at natural birth.
In the new believer, this is the cry abba Father.
Romans 815 the inner witness of the Spirit is the person's experience of God.
One of John Wesley's legacies to the
Church is the experiential emphasis of his theology.
This experiential articulation of the Christian life is due to the robust
account of the nature and work of the Holy Spirit.
He emphasizes that the Holy Spirit enables humans to have an encounter with God.
He accomplished this by reinterpreting the
intellectual developments of his time, particularly the concept of imperialism.
Wesley's historical context was 18th
century England and the Americas, during which society proposed this abstract God
who was an otherworldly entity mutually exclusive from earthly affairs.
He counteracted this cultural
understanding with the theology of religious imperialism.
Number eight such that God's work in
humanity included the awakening of a dead spiritual sensorium.
The fundamental thought of this spiritual
sensorium is the perception of God and in Scripture and in creation.
It is not a supernatural power, but a God
given power to live life with God and to love God.
Wesley's empiricism explains what he means by the Spirit's inner witness.
He uses the language of spiritual senses
to describe the work of the Holy Spirit in the believer's soul.
He understands that humans acquire
knowledge from their environment through the senses.
Wesley's religious empiricism is an
analogy between the physical and spiritual senses.
It was his way of putting language to the mystery of salvation.
Number nine the Spirit creates a new class of sense to perceive spiritual realities.
This awakening of the believer to God's reality and activity includes the person's
consciousness of the work of the Spirit in his or her soul.
These active and dynamic perspectives of the Christian life develop into Wesley's
emphasis that a believer will demonstrate the fruits of the Spirit.
The inner experience will manifest in the person's outward life.
Number ten his religious empiricism
fullest and most profound expression is spiritual respiration.
It implies the same level of importance of natural breathing to spiritual life.
The very physical act of breathing bears a
near relation to spirit once dead to the invisible world of God and God himself.
The Spirit of God ushers the believer to a consciousness of God.
Spiritual respiration is Wesley's
depiction of the life of the Spirit in a person such that God is continually
breathing, as it were, upon his soul, and his soul is breathing unto God.
There's a response.
Wesley beautifully links a believer's
spiritual senses to one's communion with God.
Further, spiritual respiration highlights that those in Christ are drawn ever more
deeply into God's inner life of communion and love.
Wesley's concept of spiritual respiration
captures the dynamic nature of the believer's life with God, a continual
action of God upon the soul, and the reaction of the soul upon God.
Rather than a mystical experience.
Wesley clarifies that spiritual respiration restores a believer to the
image of God by taking away the power of sin.
Spiritual respiration is as Christological as it is nomatological.
Despite Wesley's strong focus on the activities of the Holy Spirit, he
maintains the balance between God's Word and God's spirit.
The inner witness of the Spirit
corresponds to the objective and historical work of Jesus Christ.
The truth of God's Word and humanity's
adoption as God's children through Christ are the contents of the Spirit's witness.
Wesley's spiritual respiration is
fundamentally the life of Christ alive in the believer.
Number twelve.
It begins as a cry above Father, but develops into living a Christlike life.
This journey of growth is in the intricate
and dynamic relationship of the Spirit's inner witness towards mature holiness.
Holiness or sanctification is a critical category in Wesley's theology.
Humanity's consciousness of the Spirit's
inner witness is dynamically connected to one's holiness.
Wesley explains we must be holy of heart
and holy in life before we can be conscious that we are soul, before we can
have the testimony of our Spirit that we are inwardly and outwardly holy.
Although Wesley implies a person's
responsibility with regards to holiness, he clearly details how this is
fundamentally the nature of God and the work of the Holy Spirit.
He says number 13, the title Holy applied to the Spirit of God does not only denote
that he is holy in his own nature, but that he makes us soul.
We are renewed in all holy dispositions and again bear the image of our Creator.
Christian holiness is to be made holy, god himself fulfilling the Old Testament
command you are to be holy to me, for I, the Lord, am holy.
The Vitacos 2026 814 the second aspect of Wesley's dermatology is the Holy Spirit's
work in bringing humanity towards our tell us.
Humanity is communion with God.
The Father's, Son and Holy Ghost is the Orienting vision of life.
15 humanity's, tell us, is to receive God's love poured through the Holy Spirit.
Those who are maturing in Christ are
filled with Christ by the indwelling of the Holy Spirit.
Christian life is to be in Christ and Christ in us.
This mutual indwelling between the believer and God in Christ is a life of
constant communion with the Father, Son and Holy Spirit.
This is the tell us of the Christian
journey of creation itself in Wesley God himself, our ultimate end.
The indwelling of the Spirit in the
believer ushers the believer to participate in God's inner life.
The depth of Wesley's Dermatology
articulates a mature Christian known by many as Christian perfection.
Outlaw comments wesley's dermatology allows for the paradox of instant
exhortation and the process of Christian maturation.
Wesley's Christian perfection can be easily misunderstood without the knowledge
of Wesley's trinitarian logic and tell us when understood properly.
Number 16 christian perfection is God's
love in us and is being perfected by the Holy Spirit to enjoy God who is holy love.
More importantly, Christian perfection is rooted in the God of perfect love, in the
very nature of God and directed towards human communion with God.
It is the renewal of the heart in the full likeness of God that created humanity.
Wesley's nomatology underscores the restoration of humanity towards God's
intended design such that humanity reflects God's image.
Number 17 the work of the Holy Spirit is always dynamic.
It begins from the faith of a servant maturing towards the faith of a child.
God's gift of faith is the bridge of the
natural world and the invisible world of God.
Because it is God's gift.
Faith is also the modality of humanity's response to God.
It is God who gives humans the ability to respond to him.
Wesley explains Faith is the evidence of things not seen,
particularly of the existence of that unseen thing, my own soul.
This is your spiritual vision.
Faith as the enabling work of the Holy Spirit is the very means by which the
invisible world of God becomes visible to the eyes of faith.
It is also not bound the present,
but gives us a view of things to come ordinarily whenever we see anything that
is in the present moment but with our spiritual sight, we have a
sense of the future while we are in the present.
Within the category of faith, Wesley
articulates the journey from the fate of a servant to the faith of a child.
He exhorts babes in Christ to press on to the fate of a child.
In a sermon entitled on the Discoveries of
Faith, he explains this progression from faith to faith.
He instructs that those with the faith of
a child become spiritual parents and experience the presence of the Trinity.
Christian perfection also includes a sense
of one's future with God that is, a future time in new creation.
It can also be interpreted that a
spiritual parent has a more developed spiritual senses.
He or she is maturing into Christlikenness such that Christ is revealed in his heart
through the outpouring of God's love by the Holy Spirit.
Number 18 not only do spiritual parents understands the three one God better, the
character of a spiritual parent also exudes the trinitarian nature of God.
Number 19 christian perfection and its correlation in terms of faith that is
fullness of faith is the fuller experience of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit.
This fuller experience is not a mystical
experience, but growing in the likeness of God, in Christ likeness.
Since humanity is made in the image of
God, the restoration of this image is the restoration of the moral image of God in
humanity, that is, God's holiness and love.
The fuller experience is growing in holiness and love that demonstrates itself
through outer works to share in the communion of the three one
God is to bring God's holiness and happiness to others.
This orientation to others mirrors the very life of God.
Number 20 the inner witness of the Spirit
matures into spirit filled, living alive in the Spirit.
The life of Christ is alive in the believer.
Number 21 the faith of a child is to share
the life of the Son of God by the Spirit of God.
This is a life of loving and obeying God the Father.
The mature spiritual senses enable a
believer to have a growing appreciation and understanding of the Spirit's
transformation in oneself, in others, and in creation.
The relation of faith and spiritual senses is that they build on each other.
To exercise one's faith is to develop one's spiritual senses and vice versa.
In conclusion, the richness and depth of
Wesley's dermatology result from his trinitarian commitments.
God is the beginning and the end, the Alpha and the Omega.
Number 22. This study would betray Wesley if we
headed to metaphysics or mysticism or misguided focus on religious experience.
God is not an idea, nor is God an emotion.
He is life himself.
He gives life to others.
Wesley's doctrine of Christian perfection
and its trinitarian underpinnings are much needed in our churches.
The thrust of the inner witness and
Christian perfection is to create spiritual parents.
As leaders in the churches entrusted to
us, we must not be content with having thousands of babes in Christ because God
himself is moving people towards Christlikeness.
Towards Christlike faith.
Wesley's legacy of spiritual sensorium and the faith of a child can equip us today
such that both are the activities of the Spirit.
At the same time, once activated, spiritual sensorium and God given faith
must be exercised to grow, develop and mature.
In other words, spiritual sensorium in faith require perfecting.
From a baby's cry abba father to becoming spiritual parents in Christ.
This is the heart of John Wesley's pneumatology.
As spiritual parents, every breath we take is an invitation to holiness.
How is the respiration of our congregation
each time we see a glimpse of God in scripture or in creation, that is God the
Father drawing us to Himself in Christ by His Spirit.
What is upon us to do when we see someone
at our church who is exercising their faith?
When we hear the voice of God, we are being moved by the Spirit from the faith
of a servant to the faith of a child to childlike faith.
It's the end of my presentation.
Thank you so much. That was.