But when we turn to the Holy Spirit there seem to be no human terms and no human terminology in which his nature and character can be expressed and understood.  The symbolism in Holy Scripture does not take us very far – the dove of peace and gentleness, the tongues of fire, the sound like the rush of a mighty wind; and the still small voice.

But in point of fact in the New Testament we have something much more intelligible than those symbols.  We have the actual effects of the Holy Spirit on real people living a real life in a real world.

Both the Acts of the Apostles – which is a contemporary history of the first 30 years of the Church – and also the Letters in the New Testament, they are all crowded with references to the Holy Spirit; and the reason is that the ordinary Christian people who lived at that time were so undeniably aware of the activity of the Holy Spirit in their midst and within themselves; and that awareness was irresistibly corroborated by the practical evidence of the transformation which the Holy Spirit had effected in their lives and characters.

And that transformation was nothing less than the creation and the growth of the character of Christ himself within them.  And that was no accident.  Jesus himself throughout his earthly life was filled with the Holy Spirit.

At the Annunciation the Angel Gabriel told Mary, “The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you; therefore the child to be born will be holy; he will be called Son of God” (NRSV, Luke 1:35).  And at his Baptism in the River Jordan the Holy Spirit descended upon Jesus like a dove and formally anointed him for the work of his ministry and, as St Luke tells us, “…Jesus, filled with the power of the Spirit, returned to Galilee…” (NRSV, Luke 4:14).

So later St Peter described Our Lord’s ministry itself by saying, “…God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and with power;…he went about doing good and healing all who were oppressed by the devil, for God was with him” (NRSV, Acts 10:38).