Re: The Early Christians: In Their Own Words

As this story of the apostle John shows, God’s presence is a concrete 
reality in his divine cause. Otherwise there is no reverence for the 
authority of the Holy Spirit. What the Holy Spirit does is identical with 
the Spirit of the law and prophets, with the spirit of Jesus and the 
apostles, with the Bible itself. When the Spirit breaks into people’s
lives 
it brings the apostolic freedom to obey God-given authority. This
authority 
guarantees that freedom will be fulfilled. There is only one determining 
will behind the mystery of the Spirit at work: God himself, creator, 
lawgiver, and coming ruler. The Spirit, since he reveals God, invariably 
engenders strict moral responsibility. The inner voice, heard in every 
conscience awakened by the Spirit, is consistent with the goal of God’s 
way. Therefore, this voice knows when to be quiet in reverence to hear God

speak and when “rightly and worthily” to praise him.