Old Testament Saints and the Holy Spirit

From basic dispensational teaching I heard that — per John 7:39 and later references to Christ sending the Holy Spirit (Pentecost) – Old Testament saints were regenerated but did not have the permanent indwelling Holy Spirit; the Holy Spirit only came upon them from time to time, for special empowerment, whereas we now have the permanent indwelling.  Yet I wondered about it, as something that didn’t make sense: how could people be regenerated and yet NOT have the indwelling of the Holy Spirit? In daily Bible reading of the Old  Testament, we come across so many descriptions of believers who have “a different spirit” and a relationship to God in so many ways like ours.  John 3 tells us that OT believers were regenerated, as this was something that Nicodemus was expected to already know as a present reality, and Luke 1 and 2 (the birth narrative) include many references to godly people and the Holy Spirit present in their lives, before Christ’s birth.

As I’ve recently learned, the Protestant/Reformed understanding is that OT saints had the permanent indwelling of the Holy Spirit and the same salvific relationship to God (their understanding on the hope of what God would accomplish; and Christ’s work on the cross is applied to those who lived before Calvary).

The following posts from David Murray’s blog address this very question, of the difference between the Old and New Testament indwelling of the Holy Spirit.

• Did the Holy Spirit Indwell OT Believers?
•  10 ways that believers experienced the Holy Spirit in the OT
•  A Sponge, A Dropper, and a Pressure Washer
•  Two Mistakes in Bible Interpretation

Regarding the original idea above (OT believers regenerated but didn’t have the indwelling Holy Spirit) I especially appreciate his point in the first post, that if Old Testament ‘believers’ believed by the regenerating work of the Holy Spirit but kept believing without the indwelling work of the Holy Spirit, then Old Testament believers were not as depraved as we are, as they did not need the ongoing indwelling work of the Holy Spirit. (And in some ways, this debate really is a debate about the nature of human depravity in the Old Testament. Could anything less or other than the indwelling of the Holy Spirit keep a believer believing, repenting, hoping, obeying, etc?)

I also find helpful the analogy of the sponge with a water dropper, versus a sponge with a pressure washer. The difference in the Holy Spirit experience of OT and NT believers is one of degree and extent, not of quality or type. The OT believers had a small amount to sustain them in their personal lives, but after Pentecost the Holy Spirit flows out in excess, giving believers greater joy that overflowed and led to great missionary zeal and desire to share the gospel with unbelievers – and the amazing (humanly speaking) spread of the gospel during the 1st century and beyond.  As shown in the many quotes in the last post linked above, many commentators throughout history, as far back as Augustine and including also the Reformers as well as 19th century preachers including J.C. Ryle, have affirmed this as well, that OT believers did have the indwelling Holy Spirit, and the difference between then and our age post-Pentecost is one of degree and extent.

As a side note here, I find it interesting that this same difference of degree between the OT and NT — of the great spread of the gospel in the NT – is said by amillennialists to be the result of a supposed “binding of Satan” allowing the gospel to spread unhindered. Yet as premillennialists have pointed out, what really hinders or allows the spread of the gospel is the Holy Spirit – as evidenced in the book of Acts, where the Holy Spirit did not allow Paul to travel east to Asia or Bithynia (Acts 16:6-7). Understanding the difference between the indwelling of the Holy Spirit in Old and New Testament times (the water dropper versus the pressure washer) fits the biblical data much better, both in relating to the OT saints continually sustained by God and His presence, as well as the results of the great spread of the gospel that began at Pentecost.

Are the Saints in Heaven Aware of Us?

Often nowadays in my Bible studies, I will hear the same idea from two or more sources at about the same point in time.  At the time of the Bible Prophecy Blog article about Lordship salvation, for instance, I was continuing to hear more of the issue from things said by S. Lewis Johnson in a special message about it and elsewhere (such as in his Matthew series).  More recently, another idea — are the saints in heaven aware of things going on down here? — was mentioned by S. Lewis Johnson and by Spurgeon, in two unrelated messages:  first in SLJ’s message about the transfiguration, and a few days later in Spurgeon’s sermon #203, “The Sympathy of the Two Worlds.”

From SLJ I learned that John Bunyan certainly believed that the saints in heaven are aware of what’s going on down here, as depicted in Pilgrim’s Progress:  when the pilgrims from this world call at the gates, Moses and Elijah and some other saints are looking out over the gates.  Knowing how Spurgeon was greatly influenced by Bunyan explains Spurgeon’s similar view:

Does not the Apostle tell us that the saints above are a cloud of witnesses? After he had mentioned Abraham and Isaac and Jacob and Gideon and Barak and Jephthah, did he not say, “Therefore seeing we also are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight”? Lo, we are running in the plains and the glorified ones are looking down upon us! Your mother’s eyes follow you, young man! A father’s eyes are looking down upon you, young woman!  The eyes of my godly grandmother, long since glorified, I doubt not, rest on me perpetually. No doubt, in Heaven they often talk of us! I think they sometimes visit this poor earth—they never go out of Heaven, it is true, for Heaven is everywhere to them. This world is to them but just one corner of God’s Heaven, one shady bower of Paradise.

The saints of the living God, are, I doubt not, very near unto us when we think them very far away. At any rate, they still remember us, still look for us, for this is ever upon their hearts—the truth that they without us cannot be made perfect—they cannot be a perfect Church till all are gathered in and, therefore, do they long for our appearing!

As to the Hebrews 12 verse referenced by Spurgeon, though, some Bible teachers — including S. Lewis Johnson, as well as John MacArthur — do not hold to such an interpretation.  Rather, they see that text as referring to the Old Testament saints — not as spectators of us but as witnesses in Scripture, and thus witnesses to us of the life of faith.

Yet scripture does give some hints elsewhere — and only hints — that the redeemed in God’s presence are aware of us in this life.  Spurgeon in the above sermon related it to Luke 15:10, which certainly teaches that the angels in heaven are aware of what’s going on here, since they rejoice over every sinner who repents.  SLJ saw a hint of this also in the transfiguration account, where Moses and Elijah are conversing with Jesus and aware of His soon departure to be accomplished at Jerusalem (reference the parallel account in Luke 9:31).

Johnson also pointed out an answer to the common objection:  how can the saints in heaven possibly be in bliss if they know about all the terrible sin and unhappiness going on down here on the earth?  But God of course also knows about all the terrible things going on here, and yet certainly He is resting in His own bliss.  Likewise the angels are certainly aware of this world’s affairs, since they then rejoice every time a sinner repents and comes to salvation.

It is a nice thought, one I hadn’t really considered that much before, but very possibly true.  In closing I offer up the following somewhat humorous words from S. Lewis Johnson, when he was here with us:

Now that’s a very comforting thing, really. That means that when I get to heaven you can think of me appearing over heaven wondering what’s going on in Believers Chapel.  I’ve often said to my students at the theological seminary, when they depart from the faith my ghost will disturb them.  Now someone might say, well my goodness, if in heaven we know what’s happening down here on the earth with all of the sin and unhappiness and tragedy, how can we possibly be in bliss in heaven if we know what’s going down here on the earth?  Well, I reply with another question.  Does not God know?  Is He not resting in the leisure of His own bliss?  Of course He is.  You see, He knows the end from the beginning, and then we shall have better perspective too.