Paul in Romans 8:9 calls the Holy Spirit the Spirit of God and the Spirit of Jesus: "However, you are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit-of-God dwells in you. But if anyone does not have the Spirit-of-Christ, he does not belong to Him." Paul tells us here very plainly that Jesus Christ is Yehovah God in the flesh and that the Holy Spirit is His Spirit, God’s Spirit.

One religion tries to say that the Holy Spirit is only an active force which issues out from God, not God Himself. Note however Peter’s comments about the Holy Spirit in Acts 5:3-5,

"But Peter said, ‘Ananias, why has Satan filled your heart to lie to the Holy Spirit, and to keep back some of the price of the land? While it remained unsold, did it not remain your own? And after it was sold, was it not under your control? Why is it that you have conceived this deed in your heart? You have not lied to men, but to God.’"

An active force, cannot be lied to, only a person can be lied to. Peter tells Ananias that when he lied to the Holy Spirit he was lying to God, thus declaring the Holy Spirit God.

The Holy Spirit spoke to men. The writer of Hebrews tells us about the Holy Spirit,

"Therefore, just as the Holy Spirit says, ‘Today if you hear His voice, do not harden your hearts as when they provoked Me, as in the day of trial in the wilderness.’" (Hebrews 3:7-8)

An active force does not speak, only an intelligent being with a mind can speak. The Holy Spirit is a person, the third Person of the ONE Triune-God of the universe.

The Holy Spirit can be grieved. Paul wrote in Ephesians 4:30,

"And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, by whom you were sealed for the day of redemption."

An active force cannot be grieved or anything else, it is a non-conscious power. The Holy Spirit like a person can be grieved because He is a Person.

The Holy Spirit pulls aside and sends men into ministry. Luke wrote in Acts 13:2

"And while they were ministering to the Lord and fasting, the Holy Spirit said, ‘Set apart for Me Barnabas and Saul for the work to which I have called them.’"

Who is doing the calling? The Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit has independent intellect and will, attributes of a person.

The Holy Spirit is a Person, the Third Person of the ONE Triune-God, Yehovah-God, who carries out the wishes of the Father and the Son. Jesus said of the Holy Spirit in John 16:13-15,

"But when He, the Spirit of truth, comes, he will guide you into all the truth; for He will not speak on His own initiative, but whatever He hears, He will speak; and He will disclose to you what is to come. He shall glorify Me; for He shall take of Mine, and shall disclose it to you. All things that the Father has are Mine; therefore I said, that He takes of Mine, and will disclose it to you." (John 16:13-15)

Finally, God is a Trinity of three Persons: The Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Jesus revealed this to us at His water baptism in Matthew 3:16-17:

"And after being baptized, Jesus went up immediately from the water; and behold, the heavens were opened, and he saw the Spirit of God descending as a dove, and coming upon Him, and behold, a voice out of the heavens, saying, "This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well-pleased." (Matthew 3:16-17)

God is not 1 + 1 + 1 = 3, but 1 x 1 x 1 = 1. This is because God is of one essence manifested in three separate persons: The Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. The writer of Hebrews talking about Jesus said,

"And He is the reflected-brightness of His glory and the exact-image of His essence,¹⁴⁹ and upholds all things by the word of His power. When He had made purification of sins, He sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high." (Hebrews 1:3)

Jesus is of the same essence as the Father. This is why Jesus is called the ONLY Son of God in John 3:16 because only He is of the essence of God, God Himself. When a person receives Jesus as Savior and Lord, the Apostles John and Paul tell us that God adopts that person as His son or daughter and thus we are called sons of God.

But unlike Jesus, we are not of the essence of God, we do not become God. We become Jesus’ brothers and sisters through adoption only, but we remain men, creatures created by God. That is why Jesus is the only true Son of God because He is of the essence of God, God Himself, an eternally existing uncreated being.

God is Elohim which means These-are-God. This God of one essence is composed of three persons: the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit in eternal relations who created the earth, the heavens and man. This God’s name is Yehovah who is also Jesus Christ in the flesh. Paul wrote about Jesus in Colossians 2:9 "For in Him all the fullness of Deity dwells in bodily form." Note Paul does not say that Jesus was a man in whom God dwelt like demon possession, but that Jesus is God in His entirety in bodily form. This is the God of the Bible who created the earth, the heavens and man. This is why Jesus in the Bible tells us that He is the only way to God. Jesus said:

"I-AM¹⁵⁶ [Egw Eimi] the way, and the truth, and the life; no one comes to the Father, but through Me." (John 14:6)

"Truly, truly, I say to you, he who does not enter by the door into the fold of the sheep, but climbs up some other way, he is a thief and a robber.... Truly, truly, I say to you, I am the door of the sheep.... If anyone enters through Me, he shall be saved and shall go in and out, and find pasture." (John 10:1-9).

The Apostle Paul wrote in 1 Timothy 2:5 "For there is one God, and one mediator also between God and men, the man Christ Jesus" (1 Timothy 2:5). Why is Jesus the only way to God? Because He is the one and ONLY true God in the flesh. The Apostle John wrote in the Gospel of John 1:1 and 1:14,

"In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God and the Word was God." (John 1:1) (qeo" hn o logo")

"And the Word became flesh, and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory, glory as of the only begotten from the Father, full of grace and truth." (John 1:14)

There have been many religious men of the past and present who have claimed to be God’s messengers with a way to God, but what is the Bible’s test of a true prophet of God? Whether or not they confess that Jesus Christ is God who became flesh, man, and the only way to God. The Apostle John wrote in 1 John 4:1-3,

"Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God; because many false prophets have gone out into the world. By this you know the Spirit of God: every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God; and every spirit that does not confess Jesus is not from God; and this is the spirit of the antichrist, of which you have heard that it is coming, and now it is already in the world." (1 John 4:1-3)

Paul talked about the fact that there are other Jesuses who will be taught that are not the Jesus taught in the Bible:

"But I am afraid, lest as the serpent deceived Eve by his craftiness, your minds should be led astray from the simplicity and purity of devotion to Christ. For if one comes and preaches another Jesus whom we have not preached, or you receive a different spirit which you have not received, or a different gospel which you have not accepted, you bear this beautifully. . . . For such men are false apostles, deceitful workers, transforming themselves as apostles of Christ. And no wonder for Satan transforms himself into an angel of light. It is not a great thing then if his ministers transform themselves as ministers of righteousness; whose end will be according to their works." (2 Corinthians 11:3-15)

Jesus is not an angel, He was not a man who became God; Jesus is the ONLY true God who ever was and will ever be from eternity past who in time became man so that now Jesus is fully God and fully man and will remain so forever!

There is only One God and he communicates with and relates to man ONLY through the God-Man Jesus Christ. Hebrews 1:1-2 tells us,

"God, after He spoke long ago to the fathers in the prophets in many portions and in many ways, in these last days has spoken to us in His Son, whom He appointed heir of all things, through whom also He made the ages."

Why? Hebrews 1:3 tells us why:

"And He is the reflected-brightness of His glory and the exact-image of His essence,¹⁴⁹ and upholds all things by the word of His power. When He had made purification of sins, He sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high."

Because Jesus is God in all His essence and power in human form. "For in Him all the fullness of Deity dwells in bodily form" (Colossians 2:9).

The Book of Revelation 19:10 tells us any messenger of God, if truly of God, will testify about who Jesus is and that He is the only way to God, God Himself in the flesh: "For the testimony of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy." The Bible teaches us that any spirit which tells you anything else about Jesus or moves you away from the Jesus of the Bible is not from God and is to be rejected and shunned. If you want to get to know the God of the Bible, there is only one way: by coming to Him through Jesus Christ of Nazareth. As Jesus said, "I-AM the way, and the truth, and the life; no one comes to the Father, but through Me" (John 14:6). There is no other way to God but through Jesus.

How do we know this is true? This is the subject of Chapter 7 of Section 7 titled How We Know Who Is the Only True God and That the Bible Only Is His Word. In the next Chapter of this Section we go into further extensive evidence in the Bible of Jesus being the only true God in the flesh.