Over the last few months, slowly, I've been trying to tackle a couple books on the Holy Spirit: Abraham Kuyper's 'The Work of the Holy Spirit' and a collection of Charles Spurgeon's sermons bundled as 'Holy Spirit Power'. Up to this time, my only exposure to studies of the Holy Spirit have been cursory and through more contemporary authors.
I can come to an early conclusion already. I absolutely underestimate the role of the Holy Spirit. Up to this point I have to say my personal theology has placed the Holy Spirit in lesser position than the Son and the Father. A bookmark, placeholder, or steward if you will in waiting for the return of the Son, but something less than the Son. After reading Kuyper, I can also see where I may have been partially going down the road of something called the Sabellian error; that is to see each person of the trinity as a unique "mode" of God that God dresses himself in one stage at a time, not coexistent. It's definitely got my attention. I'm also always amazed at how so many of the current debated in the church, are not current. Reading past authors and preachers reminds me that all of these questions have been dealt with before, even back to Augustine and then Paul. When new voices, like Bart Ehrman, pop up saying "Look at this new problem I've found", it's most likely not new and very probably not much of a problem.
So, for now, back to reading...
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