Journal of Pentecostal Theology 18 (2009) 95–110 brill.

nl/pent

Pentecostal Understanding of Sanctification

from a Pentecostal Perspective*

R. Hollis Gause**
Church of God Theological Seminary
900 Walker ST NE, Cleveland, TN 37311, USA
hgause@cogts.edu

Abstract
The doctrine of the Holy Trinity is the product of divine revelation, and is a doctrine of divine
worship. The expressions of this doctrine come out of worshipful response to divine revelation
demonstrating the social nature of the Trinity and God’s incorporating the human creature in
His own sociality and personal pluralism. The perfect social union between God and the man
and woman that he had created was disrupted by human sin. God redeemed the fallen creature,
and at the heart of this redemptive experience lies the doctrine of Holy Trinity, with the Holy
Spirit as the communing agent of all the experiences of salvation. The Spirit is especially active
in the provision and fulfillment of sanctification, which is presented here as the continuum of
‘holiness-unity-love’. He produces the graces of the Holy Spirit – the fruit of the Spirit.
He implants the Seed of the new birth which is the word of God. He purifies by the blood of
Jesus. He establishes union and communion among believers and with God through His Son
Jesus. This is holiness.

Keywords
Wesleyan theology, sociality, unipersonal, Trinity, sanctification

Introduction: Definitions

This paper will address the issue of sanctification from the viewpoint of
Trinitarian theology with particular attention to the work of the Holy Spirit
as divine Person in the provision and application of the redemptive work of
sanctification.

* This paper was originally presented to the Oneness-Trinitarian Dialogue meeting in conjunc-
tion with the Society for Pentecostal Studies prior to the annual meeting of the society in 2006. It
was read to the dialogue group by Dr. Kimberly E. Alexander, PhD in the absence of the author.
** R. Hollis Gause (PhD, Emory University) is Professor of New Testament and Theology at
the Church of God Theological Seminary, Cleveland, TN, USA.

© Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2009 DOI 10.1163/174552509X442174

96 R.H.Gause / Journal of Pentecostal Theology 18 (2009) 95–110

The Trinitarian doctrine that is affirmed in this paper is stated in the second
article of the Church of God ‘Declaration of Faith’: ‘We believe . . . in one
God eternally existing in three Persons; namely the Father, the Son and the
Holy Ghost’. This is, of course, standard language in the tradition of Nicea.
We share this understanding of Holy Trinity as the confession of the holy
catholic church.
The doctrine and redemptive experience of sanctification affirmed here
stands in the tradition of Wesleyan theology as it has been adapted to
Pentecostal theology and experience. This definition of sanctification includes
the holiness emphasis on being ‘set apart’. Separation, however, is not the
primary emphasis of this doctrine of sanctification. This separation is intrinsic
to one’s initial experience in coming to know Christ as Savior. To be redemp-
tively known by Jesus the Savior is to be set apart from the world by saving
faith.1 Our Lord prayed for his disciples that they might receive sanctifying
grace to be kept from the evil that is in the world and be made one with
Christ the Son of God and with his Father (Jn 17.11-12); He extended that
prayer to include all those who would believe on him through the word of his
disciples (Jn 17.20-21).
Being set apart is not the only emphasis in Scripture on the nature and
experience of sanctification. The hortatory Scripture references on this
subject are consistently addressed to those who are in Christ, and the primary
emphasis of these exhortations and instructions depends on such words
as hagiadzo and katharidzo. These are words of separation, but they are
more particularly words of purification and cleansing. It is an act of cleansing
from all unrighteousness (1 Jn 1.9) or being set free from the law of sin
and death (Rom. 8.2). The metaphors of cleansing, washing, purging
and being set free are not adequately represented by the concept of separa-
tion. Neither are they adaptable to forensic, positional or imputational
language. Wesleyan theology presses the language of impartation, cleansing
and transformation.
In the tradition of John Wesley, Pentecostal Wesleyanism embraces the
belief in entire sanctification expressed in the language of Christian perfection
or perfection in love. With Wesley, Pentecostal Wesleyanism makes no claim
that those who are entirely sanctified cannot sin or cannot be tempted to
sin. The Wesleyan believer understands his/her vulnerability to temptation.

1
Robert W. Burtner and Robert E. Chiles, A Compend of Wesley’s Theology (Nashville, TN:
Abingdon Press, 1944), p. 182; cited from ‘The Scripture Way of Salvation’, III, 3 (S, II, 452-
53). ‘Everyone that believes is sanctified, whatever he has or has not. In other words no man is
sanctified till he believes: every man when he believes is sanctified’.
 R.H.Gause / Journal of Pentecostal Theology 18 (2009) 95–110 97

This view of sanctification is a personal relational issue and the Johannine

emphasis on perfection in love demonstrates the personal nature of holiness.
This cannot be reduced to platonic forensic language; such language is imper-
sonal and deals in the declarations that have not been actualized, and cannot
be actualized until one is glorified.
Wesleyan theology presses the language of the crucifixion of the old nature,
of being set free from the law of sin and death and the radical excision of the
root of bitterness. In the tradition of John Wesley Pentecostal Wesleyanism
embraces the belief in entire sanctification which is expressed in the language
of Christian perfection or perfection in love. It is provided in Christ’s prayer
to the Father for the sanctification of believers (Jn 17); the provision for it is
Christ’s intercession for believers (v. 17). The redemptive ground for it is
Christ’s sanctifying of himself (v. 19). Agents for its actualization are the Word
of the Father (v. 17) and the Holy Spirit (2 Thess. 2.13; 1 Pet. 1.2).

The Doctrine of the Trinity

The doctrinal and experiential pattern of sanctification presupposed above is a

pattern in pluralism; that is the essential nature of intercession. This is not the
origin of the doctrine. As to its origin, the doctrine of the Trinity has two
distinctives. First, it is a doctrine dependent on divine revelation as to its
origin. It is not the product of dialectical philosophy or theology, nor is it
the product of polytheistic religion and mythology. Dialectic has settled for
various extremes such as deism, dualism, pantheism and process theology.
Polytheism and its mythologies have surrendered all unification in the interest
of having a god for every need, mood, pleasure, fear and location. They have
forfeited infinity for ubiquity. The history of religions school is hard put to
map out a refinement pattern by which such disparities have moved from this
disintegration and crudity to unity and holiness, which is where the Bible
begins. The trajectory of Scripture is movement from the pristine to the cor-
rupt. The redemptive movement in Scripture is toward repristination, but by
divine intervention not by natural development.
Second, as to its applications in Scripture the doctrine of the Trinity is a
doctrine of worship. The patterns of worship are revealed progressively
throughout Scripture. In the Old Testament, the covenant of promise, this
revelation occurs through theophanies, oracles and the spiritual experiences of
the faithful. In the New Testament, the covenant of fulfillment, the wonder of
this revelation of God bursts forth in the Incarnation and is demonstrated
repeatedly by such events as the baptism of Jesus, the transfiguration, the
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resurrection of Christ, his ascension, the outpouring of the Holy Spirit and
the promised parousia.
The church by the instructions of Jesus and under the guidance of the Holy
Spirit has affirmed its belief in the Holy Trinity by various acts of worship.
Some of these have taken on liturgical character and have been preserved for
us in Scripture in liturgical form. A number of these formulas contain specific
affirmations of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. Witness such affirma-
tions in creedal statements or allusions (Rom. 9.5; 1 Cor. 15.3, 4; 1 Tim.
3.16) in prayer (Rom. 8.15; Gal. 4.6 and perhaps Acts 4.24-31), in hymns
(Phil. 2.5-11) and in benedictions (2 Cor. 13.14 [13 in the Gk. text]).
Certainly, we cannot forget the powerful hymnody of Luke chs. 1-2 and the
entire book of Revelation.
The confessional liturgy of water baptism is based on the instructions of
Jesus in Matthew 28.19; this is the formula which our Lord gave the Apostles
and which the Holy Spirit has preserved for us in the record of this gospel.
The origin of this formula is not the Sitz im Leben in the life of the church but
in the life and revelation of Jesus Christ. The commandment to baptize is not
the product of the liturgy of baptismal practice, but the product of the com-
mand of Jesus. In the practice of baptism, whether Christian or pagan, bap-
tism is an act of worship, and it is most often associated with redemption.
The object of worship in the rite is the one(s) named as redeemer. In the New
Testament baptism is a soteriological confession of the person(s) named in the
oral formula. It is the confession of the lordship and divine nature of each of
the persons named in the rite. This not only represents the belief of the
communicant, but of the community of believers that authorizes and admin-
isters the ordinance.2
For these reasons the early Christian community worshiped God in water
baptism in obedience to Christ’s command, ‘Go ye therefore, and teach all
nations baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the
Holy Ghost’ (Mt. 28.19). We honor this spoken formula for the following

2
Geoffrey Wainwright, Doxology: the Praise of God in Worship, Doctrine and Life (New York,
NY: Oxford University Press, 1980), pp. 228, 229. Wainwright cites Ambrose: ‘Ambrose, for
example, takes the baptismal interrogations and responses as teaching the orthodox doctrine of
the Trinity: “So you went down (into the water). Remember what you answered: that you
believe in the Father, you believe in the Son, you believe in the Holy Spirit. It is not a case of:
I believe in a greater, a lesser, a least. But by the pledge of your own word you are bound to
believe in the Son in the same way as you believe in the Father, and to believe in the Spirit in the
same way as you believe in the Son; the only exception is that you profess the necessity of belief
in the cross of the Lord Jesus alone” ’ (note 541).
 R.H.Gause / Journal of Pentecostal Theology 18 (2009) 95–110 99

reasons. First, it is the formula used by Jesus in the ordination of the practice
of Christian baptism. It is self evident that Jesus has greater authority than the
apostles. His words take precedence over the words of the apostles or the his-
torians such as Luke. So we take his words to be the final authority for the use
of this formula in the rite of water baptism. It is the formula that gives clarity
to all other references to water baptism in Scripture.
Second, the words of Jesus have greater antiquity than the words of the
apostles or the historians of the early Christian church. This is acknowledged
by the enemies of the church when they observed that the apostles Peter and
John were unlettered men, but ‘they took knowledge of them, that they had
been with Jesus’ (Acts 4.13). The apostles consistently submitted to the words
of the Lord as superior to their own authority.
Third, in the pattern of literary development, the use of the phrase ‘in the
Name of Jesus’ or its equivalent is appropriately seen as a derivative of Jesus’
words as recorded in Matthew 28.19. It is more defensible to see the shorter
as a development of the longer than the longer as a development of the shorter.
The Trinitarian controversies such as Sabellianism and Arianism did not
develop in the early Christian community early enough to affect the develop-
ment of the language of Matthew and Luke. Certainly, it cannot be argued
that Matthew was attempting to correct those who had embraced such doc-
trines. Again, it is a truism to observe that the words of Jesus have greater
antiquity than the words of the apostles.
This formula is important for the worship and instructional practices of the
early Christian community. The naming of the persons of the Holy Trinity
honors each equally and as equals in the fulfillment of the redemption that is
being celebrated. The Father is worshiped as the justifier of the ungodly (Rom.
4.5), as the one to whom Christ prayed for the believers’ sanctification (John
17.15-19) and as the one who sends the Holy Spirit as his gift (Lk. 11.13;
24.49). This practice honors the Son who died for the ungodly (Rom. 5.6),
who makes believers the children of God (John 1:12, 13), who is the Sanctifier
of those who call on him (Heb. 2:11; 13.12), is their Holy Spirit baptizer (Jn
15.26; 16.7; Acts 2.33) and who is the only mediator between God and
humankind (1 Tim. 2.5). In the citing of this command the church worships
the Holy Spirit (and incorporates the new believer into its community of wor-
ship) of whom we have been born from above (Jn 3.5), by whom believers
have been baptized into the body of Christ (1 Cor. 12.12), by whom the Father
has shed abroad his love in the hearts of believers (Rom. 5.5), by whom believ-
ers have been washed from past sins (1 Cor. 6.11) and whose presence consti-
tutes believers as the temple(s) of God, the habitation(s) of God through the
Spirit both corporately and individually (Eph. 2.22; 1 Cor. 3.16; 6.19-20).
100 R.H.Gause / Journal of Pentecostal Theology 18 (2009) 95–110

All of these represent individualism of personal activities which arise from

individual and personal minds and wills. The attempt to explain this in terms
of singularity of personhood is an exercise in divine narcissism.

The Union of Word and Spirit in Trinitarian Theology

The subject of this inquiry highlights a major neglect of the fundamental

nature of the doctrine of the Trinity in Evangelical theology. This tradition is
in danger of becoming binitarian in practice and emphasis because it neglects
the nature and work of the Holy Spirit. Pentecostals seem to be standing
in line in order to back into the future along with Evangelical rationalism.
This mentality is represented in the cliché ‘The power is in the Word’. Little
room is allowed for the necessity or even the need for the presence and activ-
ity of the Holy Spirit. Personal salvation becomes a legal contract between
equals and not a redemptive covenant graciously given by the sovereign and
merciful Lord.
The Scriptures never operate on such a binitarian assumption. Jesus said,
‘It is the Spirit that quickeneth; the flesh profiteth nothing. The words that
I speak unto you, they are Spirit, and they are life’ (John 6:63). In context
this is a Trinitarian text: ‘John 6.63b is the summary of Jesus’ authority in
the discourse. His words come from the Father (12.49; 14.10, 24, etc.), are
empowered by the Spirit (3.34) and therefore can give eternal life’.3 This is in
agreement with the reasoning of Paul that it is the Spirit who knows the deep
things of God and reveals them to humankind; those who receive this revela-
tion can speak with the wisdom that the Spirit gives; they have the mind of
Christ (1 Cor. 2:9-16). The summary text is 2 Timothy 3.16a: ‘All Scripture is
God-breathed’ (personal translation).
Word of God comes and fulfills its own commandments and promises only
because of the union of holy Word and Holy Spirit. This statement does not
allow for a static deposit of truth. We have in mind Word that is divine in its
origin, dissemination and propagation. This Word goes forth (expiration from
God) by the continued activity of the Holy Spirit to fulfill the nature of its
holiness in those who hear. As the Word imparts his nature in believers, the
Holy Spirit is no less the agent of the fulfillment of his nature in believers.
Holiness of nature is paramount for both Word and Spirit because holiness of

3
Gary M. Burge, The Anointed Community (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1987), p. 106.
 R.H.Gause / Journal of Pentecostal Theology 18 (2009) 95–110 101

nature is ontological to both Word and Spirit. There can be no endowment of

the power of the Holy Spirit that is not also an experience in righteousness
and purity.4
This singular emphasis on the Word has many dangers which this author
fears is the development of a rationalistic-analytic use of the Word by which
one develops, applies and confesses the truth or principles of Scripture all the
while confusing this with the profession of faith and conversion. This is espe-
cially dangerous for oneness Pentecostalism; its adherents have posited all
divine reality in a single divine person who is both Jesus and Word. Origin in
God the Father and in the dynamic of his Spirit become modalistic and unreal
perceptions of reality with no concurring facticity. So one is left with Word
devoid of power and with personal change that depends solely on the percep-
tions (faith?) of the believer. This seems more at home in Platonism than in
the New Testament.
Spirituality becomes a profession of faith with little emphasis on the actual-
ity of personal transformation. A further danger is a mantra-like use of
Scripture quotations. Scripture is quoted with guaranteed results in matters of
salvation, healing, physical protection, material wealth and other personal
desires and ambitions. The claim of faith is confessed as reality where there is
no actual evidence of the claim. It becomes easy for individuals to confuse
reality with confessional claims; the claim becomes the reality even where
there is no actual evidence for the claim. This becomes the nature of faith.
So righteousness and holiness are claimed as positional reality in the place of
actual and personal righteousness and holiness. Positional sanctification takes
the place of actual purification and crucifixion of the old nature. This is some-
times even applied to healing with the claim that healing has occurred by the
declaration of God, but the infirmity is still present in the body.5
Spirit baptism is reduced to dynamic for performance and not dynamic for
holiness of heart, experience and behavior. Under these circumstances king-
dom of God is easily politicized into a conquering phalanx and solidarity

4
There can be no endowment with power that is not also an experience in holiness, which
affects behavior by radically changing the ground of behavior. Power without perfection in love
is flawed, even if that power is perceived as being infinite. For this reason the promise of Acts 1.8
is also a promise of love and holiness by the nature of the agent of that power who is the Holy
Spirit. So God whose love and holiness are perfectly united in divine being does not impart the
power of the Spirit without also imparting his love and purity.
5
The author is quick to acknowledge that many Trinitarian believers have made these kinds
of claims. The point is that such claims are consistent with theological/philosophical epistemol-
ogy of Unitarian Pentecostalism, and not with Trinitarian Pentecostalism.
102 R.H.Gause / Journal of Pentecostal Theology 18 (2009) 95–110

instead of spiritual unity. Uniformity and solidarity are confused with unity
and spiritual power. We do well to hear again the warning recorded in
Zechariah 4.6: ‘This is the word of the Lord unto Zerubbabel saying, Not by
might, nor by power, but by my Spirit saith YHWH of hosts’. Though this is
an Old Testament text, Word and Spirit stand in parallel in the fulfillment of
the promises of God.
Such separation of holiness from power is not a biblical view of the king-
dom of God which Paul describes as ‘righteousness, and peace, and joy in the
Holy Spirit’ (Rom. 14.17). Paul also applies these qualities of the kingdom to
the conversion of the nations:
And again, Esaias saith, There shall be a root of Jesse, and he that shall rise to
reign over the Gentiles; in him shall the Gentiles trust. Now the God of hope fill
you with joy and peace in believing, that ye may abound in hope, through the
power of the Holy Spirit’ (Rom. 15.12-13; cf. Isa. 11.10).
Jesus demonstrated this dynamic of the presence of the kingdom by the
manner in which the kingdom is to be actualized. First, he actualized the
presence of the kingdom by his physical presence in the world: ‘The kingdom
of God is in your midst’ (Luke 17.20).6 The kingdom is actualized by the
presence of the King.
Second, he actualized the presence of the kingdom by his authority in the
Holy Spirit: ‘If by the finger of God I cast out demons, then the kingdom of
God has arrived’ (Luke 11.20).7 After his ascension Jesus continued to fulfill
the kingdom by His actions through the agency of the Holy Spirit who con-
tinues to be the actualizer of the kingdom even in the physical absence
of Jesus. He had promised that his disciples would do the works that Jesus
had done and even greater works through the paraclete whom he would send
(Jn 14.12). The writer of Hebrews observes this order of the fulfillment
of the gospel and the kingdom in his statement that God bears witness

6
The Greek phrase entos humon carries the primary meaning ‘among’, or ‘in the midst of ’;
J.H. Thayer, Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 1962
reprint), pp. 218-19. See the discussion of this phrase in I. Howard Marshall, The Gospel of
Luke: A Commentary on the Greek Text (NIGTC; Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1978, reprint
1986), p. 655.
7
Mt. 12.28 offers a parallel statement: ‘And if by the Spirit of God I cast out the demons,
then the kingdom of God has come upon you’. Luke is using the metaphor ‘finger of God’ to
identify the Holy Spirit as the Agent of Christ’s authority over demons and thus actualizing the
kingdom in the earth. The use of this metaphor dates back to Old Testament references to the
activities of God through the power of the Holy Spirit (Exod. 31.18; 32.16. Pharaoh had used
this expression to define the signs and wonders of Moses [Exod. 8.19]).
 R.H.Gause / Journal of Pentecostal Theology 18 (2009) 95–110 103

to the proclaimers of the gospel through signs and wonders and various
miracles and the distributions of the Holy Spirit according to his will
(Heb. 2.4).
The spectacular nature of the manifestations of divine power and the pres-
ence of the kingdom has led many to neglect the power of the Holy Spirit to
fulfill spiritual transformation. They present a truncated view of the Holy
Spirit as if his coming and the consequent baptism with the Holy Spirit were
primarily a vocational endowment with power. This view neglects the role of
the Holy Spirit in the new birth, in the fulfillment of the fruit of the Spirit
and the necessity of walking in the Spirit. These also are manifestations of the
power of the Holy Spirit. Witness the description of the kingdom in the spir-
itual graces named in the beatitudes (Mt. 5.2-12; cf. also Lk. 6.20-23). Note
the spiritual graces which are to be sought in the prayer which Jesus taught his
disciples to pray (Mt. 6.9-13; Lk. 11.1-4). These are profound statements of
holiness. This union of holiness with the power of the Holy Spirit is clearly
demonstrated in the expression ‘fruit of the Spirit’ (Gal. 5.22) and in the
exhortation that believers ‘walk in a line with the Spirit’ (Gal. 5.25). There
could be no clearer evidence of this than Paul’s statement in Romans
5.5: ‘because the love of God has been poured out in our hearts by the Holy
Spirit who has been given to us’.

Holiness-Unity-Love

The theology of 1 John may be summarized in the continuum that heads this
segment of this paper: holiness-unity-love. Certainly this could be said of
other writings that bear John’s name, but it seems to be the primary thrust of
1 John. The topics in this continuum have to do with the sociality of God.
They are qualities of relationships, and there are no relationships in uniper-
sonal existence.
From these three perfections of divine existence we will argue for the neces-
sity of divine Trinity in the fulfillment of divine revelation. The perfections
of divine existence are not three separate components of deity; they are
attributes of divine nature that all inhere in one another without confusing
or erasing the meaning of the biblical personal names of Father, Son and
Holy Spirit.
Holiness is a social/communal grace. The definition of this sociality in God
lies in God in an eternal social community which we see as fulfilled in Holy
Trinity. That sociality is represented in the eternal communion of Persons in
the Holy Trinity by their love for one another and their unity with one
104 R.H.Gause / Journal of Pentecostal Theology 18 (2009) 95–110

another.8 The love between Father, Son and Holy Spirit is explained by John
in the simple dictum, ‘God is love’ (1 Jn 4.8). The being of God is fulfilled
eternally and unchangeably by the loving responses which each offers the
other and each reciprocates. This is the essence of divine holiness, and it is the
essence of God.9 This is sociality in eternal nature infinitely fulfilled in God;
the role of the Holy Spirit is expressed in the ancient benediction: ‘The grace
of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the koinonia of the Holy
Spirit be with all of you’ (2 Cor. 13.14). These are relations in the fulfillment
of reality that are pluralistic in nature; to speak of them as a singular personal
being is self-contradictory. Their love one for another is eternally fulfilled in
the extension of love to each other and the infinite/perfect reciprocation of
that love. As to the interrelatedness, this is social and in its essence it is
eternal. This interrelatedness requires some sort of pluralism. As to its eternal

8
The term ‘persons’ is not without problems, but the Christian tradition has settled on it in
order to define the distinct qualities represented by the ‘I-Thou-He’ relationship in the social
Trinity. Its use distinguishes Trinitarian theology from any kind of Unitarianism or modalistic
distinctions. The author does not insist that the word ‘persons’ is an essential word in Trinitarian
theology. What is essential is the social character of divine nature, and its fulfillment in Father,
Son and Holy Spirit. These are biblical designations, and we are not at liberty to lay them aside
or to define them in such a way as to destroy their meaning. Though one may argue with the use
of the word ‘persons’, one cannot argue with the fact that Scripture has canonized the terminol-
ogy Father, Son and Holy Spirit. We are not limited to these terms, but neither can we simply
discard them. We hold to these terms because they are biblical in origin, and because they are
essential to the manner in which God is revealed in Scripture.
Neither can it be argued that the names/titles represent unreal ontological designations with-
out violating Scripture. It is also essential to know that Father is not Son; Son is not Father;
Father and Son are not the Holy Spirit; Spirit is neither Father nor Son. Not one of these is the
combined personal essence of the other two persons.
There must be personal social relations that allow one person to speak to another person in
the company of another. This is the sine qua non of sociality. If divine personhood is eternal,
unchangeable and necessary, the personal distinctions that create that sociality must be eternal,
unchangeable and necessary. If they are not, the realities that they represent (love, unity, holi-
ness) are temporal, changeable and unnecessary. The social/personal nature of deity is also tem-
poral, changeable and unnecessary. What we are saying is that these distinctions are ontological
to God. In the absence of this ontology, there is no ground for personhood or sociality in the
creature. Neither is there any ground for the social relationships of love and unity. If these
qualities are not grounded in the being of God, they are not an adequate basis for moral
mandate.
9
‘The Cappadocians of the fourth century—Basil the Great, Gregory of Nysus and Gregory
of Nazianzus—saw personal communion as something central to the very nature of God.
A thousand years later, in the twelfth century, Richard of St. Victor wrote strongly about the
love which flows between the three persons of the Trinity’. Clark Pinnock, ‘The Holy Spirit as a
Distinct Person in the Godhead’ in Mark W. Wilson (ed.), Spirit and Renewal (Sheffield:
Sheffield Academic Press, 1994), p. 36.
 R.H.Gause / Journal of Pentecostal Theology 18 (2009) 95–110 105

nature, it is ontological to, necessary and unchangeable to divine essence

(1 Jn 4:8). Its necessity lies in God’s eternal personal nature.
This sociality is also represented by the unity of divine persons in the Trinity.
To speak of the unity of a monad is redundant to the point of absurdity, and
it also ignores and denies any social or personal understanding of deity. To
speak of love in such a being is equally wrong and self-contradictory because
love exists only in a context of the exchange of love. From the standpoint of
biblical theology, this is what it means to be personal; and this is what it
means to be divine. If God is unipersonal, on what ground is He called per-
sonal? It cannot be love (Yet ‘God is love’ [1 Jn 4.8]) since this requires a love,
a loved one (beloved), and a reciprocating and equal respondent in love.
Unity is also a social and pluralistic relationship because it is a union of
individual persons, and is possible only in community. Some may object that
we have made a gratuitous leap to use the word ‘person’. It would seem that
such a word is necessary if we conceive of God as communicating with the
creature and as establishing community with the creature. If God is by ontol-
ogy a communicating and social being, is that not a personal quality? If God
is not personal, on what ground is any creature personal? How can we call
ourselves personal if this quality is not grounded in God our Creator and in
whose image we have been created? If we call ourselves personal and it has no
ground in God, it is a false claim.
The fulfillment of joy in personal relationship is an eternal relationship
which God extended to the creature by creating humankind in the divine
image. This unity and communion of the creature between God and humans
demonstrate community between the Creator and the creature. This joy is
archetypal in God and ectypal in the creature, but it is real in each. This joy
between God and the creature was interrupted by sin; however, in the grace of
redemption God restored union and reestablished community, which had
been forfeited by humanity. Each of the provisions of redemption addresses
these issues of our social relationship with God, and this relationship is neces-
sary for the fulfillment of redemption. Nowhere is this more adequately dem-
onstrated than in the petition of our Lord, ‘And now, to you I come; and
these things I say in the world in order that they may have my joy fulfilled in
themselves’ (Jn 17.13).
In repentance the creature turns back toward God and seeks the harmony
that has been lost. In justification and regeneration God provides forgiveness
and the transformation of a new nature created after the image of God (Rom.
5.1-5; Col. 3.10). In adoption God re-forms the holy community under
terms of family relationships. As Adam was child of God by creation
and divine image (Lk. 3.38), the believer in Christ becomes child of God by
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recreation of divine image (Col. 3.10; Eph. 2.10) and by adoption, and it is
the Holy Spirit who testifies of this new status (Rom. 8.14-16). This divine
community consists of God the Father ‘who has begotten us through a living
hope by the resurrection of Jesus Christ’ (1 Pet. 1.3), God the Son who has
given us power to become the children of God (Jn 1.12, 13) and God the
Holy Spirit who is the breath of God for our rebirth (Jn. 3.5-6) and Source of
the divine Word (1 Tim. 3.16) which is the incorruptible seed of our new
birth (1 Pet. 1.23). Believers are swept up into this divinization and become
partakers of the divine nature by the ‘exceeding great and precious promises
of God’ (2 Pet. 1.4). God authenticates this re-forming of the family of God
through the Spirit of adoption by whom we cry ‘Abba, Father’ (Rom. 8.15-
16). This redemptive transformation continues in the pursuit holiness
(Heb. 12.14) as the Holy Spirit—the Spirit of holiness—washes, justifies and
sanctifies believers (1 Cor. 6.11) and their bodies become temples of the Holy
Spirit (1 Cor. 6.19). As believers worship God through the rite of water
baptism, it is appropriate that they and all the congregation celebrate the
redemptive roles of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit (Mt. 28.19).
Gordon Fee sees in 1 Cor. 6.11 ‘latent Trinitarian language in which God
saves, through the work of Christ, effected experientially by the Spirit’.10
Our Lord’s intercession recorded in John 17 illustrates this social wholeness
in the grace of sanctification. The petitions of this prayer are that the disciples
be made one with each other, with the Son and with the Father, that they be
purged/cleansed, that they have Christ’s joy fulfilled in themselves and that
Christ’s glory should be placed upon them. The oneness which Christ seeks in
this prayer is a redemptive oneness and not a uniformity or solidarity. When
Jesus asks that his disciples be made one with one another, with himself and
with his Father, he maintains the personal identity of all parties to this unity.
The pattern of the disciples’ unity is the unity which exists between the Father
and the Son. So, when Jesus prayed for the disciples to be made one with him
as he and the Father are one, he was not praying for them to lose their per-
sonal distinction and to become one separated from each other only modalis-
tically. Inasmuch as the unity between the Father and the Son is the paradigm
for the unity of believers, we must assume a common understanding of one-
ness throughout this context. If Christ was not praying for an indistinct soli-
darity between believers and was not praying for modalistic differences
between believers, then that is not the unity that exists in the paradigm.

10
Gordon Fee, God’s Empowering Presence: the Holy Spirit in the Letters of Paul (Peabody, MA:
Hendrickson, 1994), p. 128. See also nn. 158, 159.
 R.H.Gause / Journal of Pentecostal Theology 18 (2009) 95–110 107

In this prayer for unity Christ is not asking the Father for the disciples to be
absorbed into the personhood of the Son and cease to be personally distinct
from the Son and the Father. The oneness of disciples with their sanctifier
maintains their personal distinction as persons and is fulfilled in unity of
mind, will and nature. It is a unity of love and holiness. We can understand
the unity of the Father and the Son in this way because it is paradigm for
believers’ unity and believers’ unity comes out of the unity of God.
The Apostle Paul associates unity with the grace of peace. He exhorts his
readers that they be ‘striving to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of
peace’ (Eph. 4.3). Peace is the controlling virtue in unity among believers.
Believers are one, but they are not uniform because they continue to be
unique in personality, opinion, behavior, ministry and in many other ways of
difference. The quality of unity in such a community of unique persons is the
grace of peace. The agent of that peace is the Holy Spirit, but this text is in a
Trinitarian setting. As Paul continues this exhortation, he shows how this
unity of God is fulfilled in the entire redemptive experience. In the course of
describing this unity the Apostle names in order the Spirit, the Lord Jesus and
God the Father of us all (Eph. 4.3-6). The unity of redemption, the unifying
quality of redemption and the experiential fulfillment of redemption are based
on the unity that is in God. This ‘passage teaches that the unity of the Godhead
is the foundation of the church’s unity’.11
The pinnacle of all the graces that have been considered is love: God’s love
for the believers, their love for God and their love for one another. This con-
clusion is common to all New Testament writers, but especially to Paul and
John. One need look no further in Paul than 1 Corinthians 13 and Rom.
5.5. 1 John creates the continuum which we have already mentioned: love-
unity-holiness. It is clear from the whole of Scripture that both love and unity
are gifts of God which originate in the nature of God himself. These gifts are
given by God in creation and redemption. They are communicated through
the Holy Spirit, for it is the Spirit who pours out the love of God within the
hearts of believers (Rom. 5.5) and establishes unity in the bond of peace
(Eph. 4.3).
In this work of the Holy Spirit love becomes in the believer the ground of
her/his existence as it is in God. The believer becomes partaker of the divine
nature (2 Pet. 2.4). It is in and by the Holy Spirit that this love is transmitted
to the believer. It is in and by the Holy Spirit that love is shared with God and

11
Arthur G. Patzia, New International Biblical Commentary: Ephesians, Colossians, Philemon
(Peabody, MA: Hendrickson Publishers, 1990), p. 232.
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with other persons. The concept of intercession (such as that in Jn 17) presents
a social dimension because of the parties: the Intercessor (the Son), the one to
whom he offers petitions (the Father) and the ones for whom Jesus offers
prayer (the believers). The community which God established in creation is
redemptively renewed. This sociality is eternal and constant in God, showing
its essential character in him.
It is in this pluralistic social structure that Christ prays for the sanctification
of his disciples; this includes those disciples within his hearing and all those
who will believe in him through their witness (Jn 17.20). He joins the unity
of believers with their purification (Jn 17.11, 17-19). It is in this social setting
that the sanctifier and the ones who are being sanctified are made one (Heb.
2.11, 17), but they are not made one person. It is in this social setting that
love is being made perfect (1 Jn 2.5-6).
In the absence of a pluralistic social community love is nothing more than
a charade. To impute love to a non-social setting does not transform that set-
ting into a community. It only satisfies our imagination by allowing us to
anthropomorphize our impersonal surroundings and to project our own
selves onto the image of God. We thus turn love into a temporal quality which
has it origin and definition in the creature and not in God. It is not divine at
all. It awaits the imagination and faith of the creature. In that case love is nei-
ther eternal, nor unchangeable, nor essential to the divine nature. This would
radically alter our doctrine of holiness as it is presented in 1 John 4.8b, ‘God
is love’.
These redemptive provisions come to believers through the intercessory
work of our Lord Jesus Christ. This sense of intercession/intervention appears
throughout Scripture, and especially in 1 John and Hebrews. Hebrews under-
stands Jesus to be the perfected Author of our salvation, the one who sancti-
fies and the one who calls those who are being sanctified, and have been given
to him by the Father as his brothers and sisters. He was made like his brothers
and sisters in order that he might be a faithful priest in things pertaining to
God (Heb. 2.10-18). God has made him the ‘Apostle and chief priest of our
confession’ (Heb. 3.1). Here the divine community is extended to enclose the
human redeemed community. This is most consistent with John 17.
Priests are chosen by God to offer both gifts and sacrifices, and God chose
Christ for this role (Heb. 5.1). The author of Hebrews elaborates the divine
community and Christ’s priesthood in Hebrews 7-9. Two statements stand
out as highlights of Christ’s communion with the Father. The first is Heb.
7.25, ‘Wherefore, he is able to save forevermore those who come to God by
him seeing that he lives forevermore to make intercession for them’ (author’s
translation).
 R.H.Gause / Journal of Pentecostal Theology 18 (2009) 95–110 109

The second is Heb. 9.14: ‘How much more shall the blood of Christ who
through the eternal Spirit purge our conscience from dead works that we
might serve the living God’ (author’s translation). The supreme moment of
divine worship for time and eternity shows the character of eternal worship in
which the eternal priest offers the eternal sacrifice to the eternal God on the
eternal and heavenly altar in the power of the eternal Spirit of worship. It is in
this sacrifice that we are sanctified (Jn 17.19). As the sanctifier of the eternal
sacrifice, the Holy Spirit is also the sanctifier of those who come to God
through him and the sanctifier of their sacrifices of praise (Heb. 13.15). So it
is understandable that the person of the Holy Trinity to whom the grace of
holiness is most frequently attributed is the Spirit of God.12
In Jn 17.19, Christ grounds his prayer for believers’ sanctification on his
own sanctification: ‘And on behalf of them I sanctify myself in order that
they, even they, may be sanctified in the Truth’ (author’s translation). Through-
out this prayer Jesus is in communion with his Father whom he asks to sanc-
tify his disciples. In verse 17 the agent of this sanctification is the truth.13 In
verse 19 the atonement ground for this sanctification is the sacrifice of Christ.
Here as in Heb. 9.14 and 13.15 he is both sacrifice and interceding priest.
The anointer for this act of worship is the Holy Spirit.

Concluding Thoughts

It is understandable that the Holy Spirit is emphasized in a number of texts as

the Sanctifier. Note the role of the Holy Spirit in the texts and notations that
follow. Citations of these texts with notations will provide an appropriate
conclusion for this paper.
The most fundamental thing to the holiness of the redeemed is the holiness
of the redeemer. In Luke’s birth narrative for Jesus, he makes clear the Spirit’s
role in the holiness of the Savior: ‘And the angel said to her [the virgin Mary],
“The Holy Spirit shall come on you, and the power of the Highest shall
enshroud you; wherefore that holy One who shall be begotten shall be called
Son of God” ’ (Lk. 1.35, author’s translation). As the result of this conception,
the Child shall be holy. The language here is the language of the descent of
the Shekinah on the tabernacle in the wilderness (Exod. 40.34-35). It is the

12
Gordon Fee, Empowering Presence, p. 130; see also n. 164.
13
For John the truth is a person; this person is the eternal logos who became incarnate and
manifested in the world the eternal glory of God (Jn 1.1-18).
110 R.H.Gause / Journal of Pentecostal Theology 18 (2009) 95–110

descent of the Holy Spirit on the womb of the virgin that sanctified her temple
and the child that was conceived in her womb and born of her. In redemption
the Holy Spirit sanctifies those born of the womb of ‘Jerusalem which is above
[which] is free, which is the mother of us all’ (Gal. 4.26). These are born after
the Spirit (Gal. 4.29). This is the language of the descent of the Holy Spirit on
believers (Acts 1.8; 2.1-4). The Spirit of God is the agent of holiness in the
redeemer and in the redeemed.14
It is the Holy Spirit who pours out the love of God in the hearts of believ-
ers, and this is the essence of holiness (Rom. 5.5). It is the Holy Spirit who
sanctifies Gentile believers as an offering to God: ‘So that the offering of the
Gentiles may be acceptable, sanctified by the Holy Spirit’ (Rom. 15.16).
Believers are constituted the temple of God in the Spirit (en pneumati) (Eph.
2.22). 1 Corinthians 6.18-19 must be understood in the light of 6.11. Here
the experiences of redemption (washing, sanctifying, justifying) are the work
of the Holy Spirit. Therefore, Paul urges believers to shun defiling sins of the
body: ‘Do you not know that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit
which you have from God?’ (v. 19). In 1 Thessalonians 4.7-8 Paul defines
what he means by holy; it is purity, and that grace is the work of the Holy
Spirit: ‘God did not call us to uncleanness, but to holiness’.

14
For an excellent treatise on Luke’s birth narratives see I. Howard Marshall, Commentary on
Luke (NIGTC; Grand Rapids, MI; Eerdmans, 1978, reprint 1986) pp. 62-77.