The Implications of the Life of the Spirit

Although these thoughts are over forty years old, George Ladd’s exhortation concerning the Holy Spirit in the life of the believer are just as timely today.

In conclusion, a beautiful practical devotional thought emerges from this study. The believer has already received the life of the Spirit which is the life of the Age to Come (5:25), and he is to show forth by his life in this present evil world the character of the new age, however imperfectly. This thought applies especially to Christians in their relationship one to another. A Christian fellowship is not a social organism or institutional though it is both. It is an eschatological community. Its mission is not only to proclaim the gospel, but to demonstrate by life and fellowship the life of the Age to Come.

George Eldon Ladd, "The Holy Spirit in Galatians," in Current Issues in Biblical and Patristic Interpretation: Festschrift for Merrill Tenney, ed. Gerald F. Hawthorne. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1975.