- by Carrie Shaw
- on October 17, 2025
The religious community I grew up in did not (and still doesn’t) believe that the Holy Spirit is active today. They would agree that, certainly, the early years of the Christian church were marked by the miraculous, but argue that sometime in the first or second century, it – the Holy Spirit – was essentially “put on ice.”
They were unnaturally twitchy in conversations about the Spirit gifts, particularly the miraculous sign gifts – tongues, prophecy, healing – bundling both the Holy Spirit in general and the gifts, in particular, miraculous or otherwise, into the same basket.
In fact, it was almost impossible to have a conversation about the Holy Spirit without someone prefacing it by saying, “yes, but the Holy Spirit isn’t available today” (which, of course, tended to close the door very firmly on any further conversation on the matter).
That was then – they would say, by way of conclusion – but this is now. We are, it was clearly inferred, quite simply on our own in this Christian walk.
Well, not strictly on our own. God is with us providentially, but that really has nothing to do with the Holy Spirit.
I would later come to realise that their theology around the Holy Spirit was so intrinsically connected to their salvation formula that denial of the Holy Spirit was a given.
Works & The Holy Spirit
Salvation in the community I grew up in goes something like this:
faith + works = salvation.
The work of regeneration and transformation, within this theological framework, is really a human endeavour of willpower and discipline. The Holy Spirit – having, of course, long since ceased – plays no part in this process.
I’ve already talked about the flaws in this formula, why Jesus isn’t merely a “top-up saviour”, and why this soteriological framework is unbiblical. You can read more about that here: https://gospelsaturated.com/the-problem-with-gap-theology/.
But the real tragedy is this: remove the Holy Spirit from salvation, and the entire shape of the gospel collapses. Regeneration becomes self-reform, transformation becomes self-improvement, and the Christian life is stripped of the very power God intended it to have.
What this means, in practice, is that believers are left trying to live a Spirit-dependent life without the Spirit. The result is sincere effort, but not the freedom, assurance, or transformation the New Testament holds out to us.
The Gift Of The Spirit, The Gifts Of The Spirit, And The Fruit Of The Spirit
In all my time growing up in the community, I don’t recall a single robust, exegetical explanation of the gift of the Spirit in Acts 2, the gifts of Ephesians 4, nor how a believer is united to and transformed into the likeness of Christ in any meaningful sense.
Even the fruit produced by the Spirit was somehow untethered from the work of the actual Spirit.
Spiritual growth, overcoming sin, moral transformation, and developing the mind of Christ were put forward as entirely human efforts achieved through willpower, discipline, reading God’s Word, and then applying the teachings of Scripture with enough determination to change oneself.
The Spirit’s fruit becomes the outcome of human resolve rather than the work of the Spirit Himself. “Christ in me” becomes merely a figure of speech, not any kind of literal union or spiritual indwelling.
I don’t mean to be disparaging, but I now wonder – are we even reading from the same holy text?
It’s impossible to read the New Testament and not realise the reality and essential nature of the Holy Spirit in a believer’s life, from start to finish.
And yet, the community I grew up in, in an effort, perhaps, to avoid what they perceived as the excesses of the hyper-charismatic and Pentecostal movements, had dismissed the Holy Spirit so completely that the gospel they preached was stripped of its power and reduced to little more than moral self-improvement.
The Baptism Of The Spirit
Paul writes plainly: “Walk by the Spirit… be led by the Spirit… keep in step with the Spirit” (Galatians 5:16, 18, 25). These are not metaphors for personal discipline but descriptions of a Spirit-empowered life.
Indeed, Jesus himself said that “unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God” (John 3:5).
Being born again (of Spirit) and the promise of the gift of the Spirit (Acts 2) are shown to be the same reality, two ways of describing the one regenerating work God does in the life of the believer.
It is the Spirit Himself* who gives life to our spiritually lifeless souls, so that we who were once dead in our sins are now made alive in Christ (Ephesians 2:4-5).
This is not an abstract idea or a theological footnote, but the very centre of the New Testament’s vision for salvation: the Spirit brings us to life, unites us to Christ, and empowers us to walk in the newness of that life.
At our conversion, God gives us two gifts: the gift of forgiveness, received by faith through grace alone, and the gift of the Spirit, His own indwelling power and presence in our lives. It will be the Spirit’s work to sanctify and form us into the likeness of Christ, restraining the evil desires of our fallen nature and producing the good fruit of Christian character in our lives.
The gift of the Spirit is a distinctive blessing of the new covenant, and it is also a universal blessing, in that every believer receives it. Where water baptism is the initiatory Christian rite, Spirit baptism is the initiatory Christian experience. Even the prophets foresaw this: “I will put my Spirit within you” (Ezekiel 36:27).
This is made clear throughout the New Testament, particularly in the words of Paul the Apostle, who consistently speaks of believers as those who have been sealed with the Spirit (Ephesians 1:13), indwelt by the Spirit (Romans 8:9–11), and baptised into one body by the Spirit (1 Corinthians 12:13).
It is both God who saves and God who sanctifies, and, at the final day, it will be God who glorifies – granting those who have remained in Christ the glorious gift of immortality and life eternal in His presence.
For Paul, there is no category for a Christian who does not possess the Spirit. The presence of the Spirit is not an optional extra or a later addition, but the defining mark of belonging to Christ and the source of all genuine Christian life.
Do Not Grieve The Holy Spirit
One does not need to pray for the Holy Spirit to come, perform acts of faith to receive Him, or undertake any spiritual exercises to secure His indwelling.
The Spirit is God’s gift to every believer at conversion, the seal of our union with Christ, and the beginning of new life in Him. His indwelling rests on God’s promise, not our performance.
But the gift of the Spirit does not eliminate our responsibility to walk faithfully. The Spirit seals us for the day of redemption, but Scripture also warns that believers can grieve Him through hardness of heart, sin, or unbelief.
The presence of the Spirit is God’s guarantee, but the outworking of our salvation involves real obedience, real surrender, and real cooperation with His work in us.
While the baptism of the Spirit is an initiatory event and so cannot be repeated, the filling of the Holy Spirit needs to be ongoing, because life in Christ is marked not by a single moment of encounter but by an ongoing posture of yielding to His sanctifying work.
Sin can grieve the Holy Spirit, because it pushes against the very character and way of life God is forming in us. When we tolerate sin, we find ourselves less responsive to God’s Word, less shaped by Christ, and less able to grow in the kind of discipleship all believers are called to pursue.
The Spirit Gives Gifts, But He Also Produces Fruit
One of the characteristics of the work of the Holy Spirit in the communal life of the church was to give gifts for the building up of the body.
Some of these gifts were foundational and specific to the earliest stage of the church’s life, not abilities people exercised, but ministries God Himself established and empowered, such as apostles, prophets, and the early witnesses through whom God confirmed the gospel with miraculous signs.
As a soft cessationist, I believe these particular gifts are no longer given or needful for the ongoing building of the church.
The passing of the foundational gifts does not imply the withdrawal of the Spirit Himself. Rather, it reflects the once-for-all nature of the apostolic era, after which the Spirit continues His work in different, but no less essential, ways.
The New Testament itself distinguishes between foundational gifts for the establishment of the church and ongoing gifts for its growth and maturity. The former were temporary; the latter continue as long as the church exists.
The second characteristic of the Holy Spirit in the life of individuals is the fruit He produces – qualities of character and conduct that reflect Christ and demonstrate the Spirit’s ongoing work within us.
These qualities – love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control – are not the result of mere willpower or moral effort; Paul describes them as the Spirit’s work in us.
In other words, the Christian life is not simply about imitating Christ through discipline, but about the Spirit forming the very character of Christ within us as we walk with him day by day.
Is It Possible to Do Christian Life Without The Spirit?
According to the New Testament, the answer is no. Paul is clear that without the Spirit we cannot please God, cannot understand the things of God, and do not belong to Christ (Romans 8:8-9).
Paul goes even further: “All who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God” (Romans 8:14). He persists, “no one can say ‘Jesus is Lord’ except by the Holy Spirit” (1 Corinthians 12:3). Even the first confession of faith is impossible without the Spirit’s presence.
It would seem that life in Christ and life in the Spirit are inseparable in the New Testament.
There is a reason why the mandate to make disciples was followed by the injunction to “baptise in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.”
Entry into the Christian life is not merely intellectual agreement but union with the God who sends, the God who saves, and the God who sanctifies – the One who calls us to Himself, the One who redeems us through Jesus, and the One who transforms us by His Spirit day by day.
So while every believer receives the baptism of the Spirit, whether they knew it or not, the ongoing work of the Spirit in their lives depends on their willingness to walk in step with Him.
The Holy Spirit Is Not “On Ice”
The present work of the Holy Spirit may be a new and unsettling thought for you. Like me, you may have been raised in a religious space that denied the ongoing work of the Holy Spirit, that preached a doctrine of self-renovation and holy discipline, and that saw the fruit produced in a believer’s life as merely the outcome of consistent religious disciplines.
And, like me, you may have been warned about the excesses of certain Christian circles and taught that no gifts are given to believers today. The intention behind the warning may have been legitimate caution, but the result was, unfortunately, often a complete dismissal of the Spirit’s present work.
What Scripture describes as God empowering His people was carefully reassigned to human discipline, careful study, and moral effort. The Spirit who strengthens, comforts, convicts, and builds up was treated as unnecessary – or, worse, unavailable.
Yet when we turn to the New Testament, we see a far richer picture: a God who calls and equips His people, a Spirit who still works within the church, giving gifts as He sees needful for the building up of the church, and a Christian life that depends not on our strength, but on His.
“Even to your old age I am He, and to gray hairs I will carry you. I have made, and I will bear; I will carry and will save.” | Isaiah 46:4
The God who promises to carry His people does not leave them to carry themselves. And the Spirit He gives is not a relic of the past, but the very means by which He continues to help, sustain, and shape those who belong to Him.
If this is you, and you would like to explore this topic further and grow in a deeper understanding of the work of the Holy Spirit today, I’d like to recommend an excellent book by John Stott, called ‘Baptism & Fullness.’
In this short and very accessible book, Stott explains the Spirit’s role in the Christian life with clarity and balance – showing that the Spirit is given to every believer at conversion, that the call is not to seek a second “experience” but to live continually filled with the Spirit, and that the Spirit’s primary work is to make Christ real in us, producing both fruit and power for service.
It’s a grounded, biblical, and deeply pastoral guide for anyone wanting to understand the Spirit’s ongoing work without drifting into extremes.
You can find a copy here: Baptism & Fullness by John Stott
Conclusion
The Holy Spirit is as active as He ever was, moving over darkness, ready to begin His creative work.
Yet the Christian life doesn’t start with reformation. You cannot reform a dead heart. The Christian life starts with a radical regeneration. From spiritual death comes a resurrected life, a new nature, through the work of the Holy Spirit.
For those of us who may have been out of step with the Spirit, now is the time to open our hearts and our lives to the transforming and regenerating work of the Spirit. Now is the time to welcome His presence and listen for His convicting guidance as He leads us in the way of Christ.
And may the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace as you trust in Him, so that you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.
