Holy Spirit

The most powerful historical manifestation of Jesus’ divinity comes from His appearances to His disciples after His resurrection. These appearances had three features: (1) embodiment manifested as a human form which could be witnessed by many people simultaneously through their physical senses; (2) transmateriality which was not controlled by or subject to the laws of physics (it could pass through closed doors, take on a variety of forms, and disappear from view); and (3) characteristics which appeared to reflect the glory of God.

As N.T. Wright implies, it would have taken something of this magnitude to move the apostles from the status of believers in a dead and humiliated master to a force which ultimately converted the Roman Empire and became a world Church:

It launched a claim on the world: a claim at once absurd (a tiny group of nobodies cocking a snook at the might of Rome) and very serious, so serious that within a couple of generations the might of Rome was trying, and failing, to stamp it out. It grew from an essentially positive view of the world, of creation. It refused to relinquish the world to the principalities and powers, but claimed even them for allegiance to the Messiah who was now the lord, the kyrios.^[20]

Jesus’ risen appearance was experienced as divine power in human history, and unequivocally implied His divine status. Paul’s recounting of an early Christian kerygma (proclamation) makes this connection between resurrection and divinity quite clear:

the gospel concerning his Son, who was descended from David according to the flesh and designated Son of God in power according to the Spirit of holiness by His resurrection from the dead, Jesus Christ our Lord…. (Rm 1:3-4)

Does Jesus’ transformed embodiment and glorified appearance exhaust the evidence for His divinity? Though it is very powerful evidence, it does not. As the above passage from Romans implies, the apostolic Church had access to another entrance of God into history, namely, the Holy Spirit, who was experienced as the personified power of God, and was possessed by Jesus during His ministry, given by Jesus after His resurrection, and connected with the name of Jesus to this very day. James Dunn notes in this regard that:

“wonders and signs” are attributed variously [by Luke in Acts] to the Spirit of God, the name of Jesus and the hand of the Lord, without any attempt being made to explain the relationship of these concepts of power.^[21]