The Work of the Son and the Work of the Spirit Are Inseparable

Threefold Workplace of the Anointed One

One useful manner of organizing the weather of the saving work of Jesus is to contemplate it underneath three places of work, Christ as prophet, priest, and king. These three places of work are Outdated Testomony classes, and within the Outdated Testomony they had been kind of distinct places of work crammed by completely different folks. Contemplate David’s command relating to his son Solomon, to “let Zadok the priest and Nathan the prophet . . . anoint him king over Israel (1 Kings 1:34).

However when Christ fulfills all three of those roles spiritually, we now not converse of them as three places of work however as a single, threefold workplace. John Calvin, who was the primary to present prolonged consideration to this threefold workplace of Christ, introduces it this manner: “So that religion might discover a agency foundation for salvation in Christ, and thus relaxation in him, this precept should be laid down: the workplace enjoined upon Christ by the Father consists of three components. For he was given to be prophet, king and priest.”¹

From right here, Calvin dives into an exposition of the methods through which Christ fulfills every of those roles in his one complete ministry. It’s a wealthy research. However we should always pay shut consideration to the work of the Holy Spirit within the threefold workplace. Although Calvin might not at all times point out the Holy Spirit by title when he explains the threefold workplace, the Spirit is actually the entire level. What prophet, priest, and king have in widespread is that they’re all set aside by God and anointed to meet their duties. The anointing, symbolized by the ritual software of oil, was a particular endowment by the Holy Spirit on prophets, clergymen, and kings. Every of them was anointed, or christened, or Christ-ed, by the Spirit. And that is the important thing to Calvin’s selection of those three roles as those that discover their heart in Jesus who’s the Christ, the uniquely anointed one. Because the Christ, he completely carries out the aim of christening. The anointed one has the one anointing.

This has layers of pneumatological that means for us. First, it leads us to acknowledge that the Messiah himself wouldn’t be who he’s with out the presence of the Holy Spirit. The Messiah is just not the identical individual because the Holy Spirit, however they go collectively. The Messiah is the one that is actually and absolutely and finally anointed by the Holy Spirit. They’re very shut collectively, as seen by the very that means of the title. Each time we are saying, “Jesus Christ,” we’re rehearsing the truth that Jesus (his title) is the Christ (his title, the Greek phrase for the Hebrew phrase messiah). As soon as once more, on the very level the place we focus as immediately as attainable on what’s particular concerning the work of the Son, we discover our greatest instruction concerning the work of the Holy Spirit in, with, and underneath it.

Second, the presence of the Spirit in Christ signifies that in each side of Christ’s work, there’s a fullness and comprehensiveness that spills out of the historic accomplishment of salvation and overflows into our current reception of it. The Heidelberg Catechism, which at all times has a eager eye on the religious software of doctrine, asks about Jesus in Query 30, “Why is he referred to as ‘Christ,’ that means ‘anointed’?” And its reply unfolds in a Spirit-filled threefold workplace:

As a result of he has been ordained by God the Father and has been anointed with the Holy Spirit to be our chief prophet and trainer who completely reveals to us the key counsel and can of God for our deliverance; our solely excessive priest, who has set us free by the one sacrifice of his physique, and who frequently pleads our trigger with the Father; and our everlasting king, who governs us by his Phrase and Spirit, and who guards us and retains us within the freedom he has received for us.²

With out dropping its grip on the historic work of Christ throughout his pre-Easter lifetime, the catechism shifts our consideration to the continued work of the risen Christ within the Holy Spirit. He completely reveals God to us, advocates our trigger, and protects us—current tense. The identical Christ who acted as prophet, priest, and king in his personal lifetime, “within the days of his flesh,” now acts from the precise hand of the Father within the ongoing energy of that threefold workplace, by the Spirit.

The Messiah is the one that is actually and absolutely and finally anointed by the Holy Spirit.

Third, the presence of the Spirit in Christ signifies that the anointing is just not just for himself but additionally for believers by the use of intentional overflowing. Calvin says, “He acquired anointing on behalf of his entire physique that the ability of the Spirit is perhaps current within the persevering with preaching of the Gospel.”³ The train ing of the threefold workplace has at all times enabled a deeper understanding of the church as taking part within the ministry of Christ. The preaching workplace continues his ministry as prophet; reward and intercession proceed his ministry as priest; and gathering as a neighborhood inside a accountable church order continues his ministry as king.

Fourth, the presence of the Spirit in Christ lifts our eyes as much as the everlasting communion that the Son and the Holy Spirit have with one another within the Holy Trinity. The messianic work of the Son within the energy of the Spirit is itself an excellent manifestation of that everlasting unity. Irenaeus of Lyons (130–202) didn’t expound on Christ’s threefold workplace within the Spirit, however he did draw out the implications of Christ’s very title containing the messianic thriller of God’s triunity. In reality, Irenaeus finds the entire Trinity revealed on this side of the Son’s work: For within the title of Christ is implied, He that anoints, He that’s anointed, and the unction itself with which He’s anointed. And it’s the Father who anoints, however the Son who’s anointed by the Spirit, who’s the unction, because the Phrase declares by Isaiah, “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, as a result of He hath anointed me,”—declaring each the anointing Father, the anointed Son, and the unction, which is the Spirit.⁴

“Christ” means “anointed” means “Messiah,” and “Messiah” is certainly a historic class. However what involves the fore in that historic, messianic work of the Son is an everlasting relation between the anointing Spirit and the anointed Son. “Unction” is a title of the Holy Spirit that’s eternally current in God’s personal being and on that foundation takes place within the work of Christ for us and our salvation.

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This text is customized from The Holy Spirit: An Introduction by Fred Sanders.

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