There are many who think of the work of the Holy Spirit as limited to man.
But God reveals to us in His Word that the Holy Spirit’s work has a far
wider scope than this. We are taught in the Bible that the Holy Spirit has
a threefold work in the material universe.
I. The creation of the material universe and of man is effected through
the agency of the Holy Spirit.
We read in Ps. xxxiii. 6, “By the word of the LORD were the heavens made;
and all the host of them _by the breath of His mouth_.” We have already
seen in our study of the names of the Holy Spirit that the Holy Spirit is
the breath of JEHOVAH, so this passage teaches us that all the hosts of
heaven, all the stellar worlds, were made by the Holy Spirit. We are
taught explicitly in Job xxxiii. 4, that the creation of man is the Holy
Spirit’s work. We read, “_The Spirit of God_ hath made me, and _the breath
of the Almighty_ hath given me life.” Here both the creation of the
material frame and the impartation of life are attributed to the agency of
the Holy Spirit. In other passages of Scripture we are taught that
creation was in and through the Son of God. For example we read in Col. i.
16, R. V., “For in Him were all things created, in the heavens and upon
the earth, things visible and things invisible, whether thrones or
dominions or principalities or powers; all things have been created
through Him and unto Him.” In a similar way we read in Heb. i. 2, that God
“hath at the end of these days spoken unto us in His Son, whom He
appointed heir of all things, _through whom_ also He made the worlds
(ages).” In the passage given above (Ps. xxxiii. 6), the Word as well as
the Spirit are mentioned in connection with creation. In the account of
the creation and the rehabilitation of this world to be the abode of man,
Father, Word and Holy Spirit are all mentioned (Gen. i. 1-3). It is
evident from a comparison of these passages that the Father, Son and Holy
Spirit are all active in the creative work. The Father works _in_ His Son,
_through_ His Spirit.
II. Not only is the original creation of the material universe attributed
to the agency of the Holy Spirit in the Bible but _the maintenance of
living creatures_ as well.
We read in Ps. civ. 29, 30, “Thou hidest Thy face, they are troubled: Thou
takest away their breath, they die, and return to their dust. Thou
_sendest forth Thy Spirit_, they are created: and Thou _renewest_ the face
of the earth.” The clear indication of this passage is that not only are
things brought into being through the agency of the Holy Spirit, but that
they are maintained in being by the Holy Spirit. Not only is spiritual
life maintained by the Spirit of God but material being as well. Things
exist and continue by the presence of the Spirit of God in them. This does
not mean for a moment that the universe is God, but it does mean that the
universe is maintained in its being by the immanence of God in it. This is
the great and solemn truth that lies at the foundation of the awful and
debasing perversions of Pantheism in its countless forms.
III. But not only is the universe created through the agency of the Holy
Spirit and maintained in its existence through the agency of the Holy
Spirit, but _the development of the earlier, chaotic, undeveloped states
of the material universe into higher orders of being is effected through
the agency of the Holy Spirit_.
We read in Gen, i. 2, 3, “And the earth was (or became) without form and
void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And _the Spirit of God
moved_ upon the face of the waters. And God said, Let there be light: and
there was light.” We may take this account to refer either to the original
creation of the universe, or we may take it as the deeper students of the
Word are more and more inclining to take it, as the account of the
rehabilitation of the earth after its plunging into chaos through sin
after the original creation described in v. 1. In either case we have set
before us here the development of the earth from a chaotic and unformed
condition into its present highly developed condition through the agency
of the Holy Spirit. We see the process carried still further in Gen. ii.
7, “And the LORD God formed man of the dust of the ground, _and breathed_
into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul.” Here
again it is through the agency of the breath of God, that a higher thing,
human life, comes into being. Naturally, as the Bible is the history of
man’s redemption it does not dwell upon this phase of truth, but seemingly
each new and higher impartation of the Spirit of God brings forth a higher
order of being. First, inert matter; then motion; then light; then
vegetable life; then animal life; then man; and, as we shall see later,
then the new man; and then Jesus Christ, the supreme Man, the completion
of God’s thought of man, the Son of Man. This is the Biblical thought of
development from the lower to the higher by the agency of the Spirit of
God as distinguished from the godless evolution that has been so popular
in the generation now closing. It is, however, only hinted at in the
Bible. The more important phases of the Holy Spirit’s work, His work in
redemption, are those that are emphasized and iterated and reiterated. The
Word of God is even more plainly active in each state of progress of
creation. God _said_ occurs ten times in the first chapter of Genesis.