HOLY SPIRIT-OLD TESTAMENT
It is not uncommon for
Christians to claim that the saints of the Old Testament period experienced God’s
Spirit in a fundamentally different manner from that of New Testament believers
or modern Christians. Many have relied
on specific idioms of the Old Testament to argue that the Holy Spirit only came
upon people in the Old Testament but into people in the New
Testament. Thus, the Holy Spirit was
only bestowed temporarily, and then externally, to Old Testament believers as
opposed to the permanent indwelling of the early church. Such preaching and teaching drives a wedge
between the Testaments, placing too much emphasis on disunity rather than on
mutual interdependence between the Old and New. This is an inadequate and incomplete understanding of the role of
the Spirit in the Old Testament. Though
the Spirit of God sometimes comes upon individuals in the Old Testament to
empower for specific (and temporary) tasks, there can be no doubt that His role
is also more extensive. He has an
indwelling and transforming presence in the Old Testament believers as well and
is described as the animating feature that effects spiritual renewal.
Bill Arnold
NIV Application Commentary-1 Samuel, 2003, p. 234, 235.