Gordon D. Fee, God’s Empowering Presence, The Holy Spirit in the Letters of Paul. Baker Academic, Reprint Edition, 2009.
Companion volume: Fee, Paul, The Spirit, and the People of God
Referenced in: Spiritual Gifts
LifeandLeadership.com Summary
Gordon Fee is a Pentecostal/charismatic scholar who avoids the excesses often associated with Neo-Pentecostoalism on the one hand and the armchair staleness often associated with non-charismatic traditions on the other. The first volume, God’s Empowering Presence, is an encyclopedia of 900-plus pages. The second work, Paul, the Spirit, and the People of God, is a scaled-down version of the first, without the technical exegetical material. Both are important for church leaders.
Since this resource guide is focused on spiritual gifts as they pertain to member involvement, below are the most pertinent chapters:
- Chapter 13 of Paul, The Spirit, and the People of God, “‘To the Praise of His Glory’ The Spirit and Worship,” emphasizes that Paul has the gathered community in mind in his discussions of spiritual gifts (especially in 1 Corinthians 12-14), and is not intending to provide systematic instruction about gifts, but a correction aimed at problems in particular churches.
- Chapter 14 of Paul, The Spirit, and the People of God, “Those Controversial Gifts? The Spirit and the Charismata,” Sets the “spiritual gifts” discussion of 1 Corinthians 12-14 in its exegetical context and offers a needed corrective to the “fad” of “finding your spiritual gift.”
- Chapters 4, 7, and 9 of God’s Empowering Presence offer excellent in-depth exegesis of 1 Corinthians 12-14 (4), Romans 12 (7) and Ephesians 4 (9)
This, alongside the works by D. A. Carson and J. I. Packer provide good theological bearings for the work of the Holy Spirit.
From the Publisher for God’s Empowering Presence
Fee offers a fresh and in-depth exegesis of every Spirit text in the Pauline corpus. Part Two synthesizes the analysis presented in Part One into a coherent invitation to consider the Holy Spirit’s crucial role in Pauline theology.
Endorsement for God’s Empowering Presence
“Fee’s book is the most comprehensive treatment available of Paul’s understanding of the Holy Spirit, a topic that has rarely received sufficient attention in studies of Pauline theology. Fee’s method is exemplary: he first analyzes Paul’s statements about the Spirit, in each individual letter, and then moves to a synthesis of Paul’s general pneumatology. The result is a book that is deeply exegetical, doing justice both to the particularity of Paul’s writings and to the fundamental unity of his vision for the Spirit’s role in the life of the Christian community. Most importantly, Fee emphasizes insistently that the Holy Spirit must be experienced as a living presence within the church. That message is both faithful to Paul and urgent for the community of faith in our time.” – Richard B. Hays, Professor of New Testament, The Divinity School, Duke University
Endorsements for Paul, The Spirit, and the People of God
In Paul, the Spirit, and the People of God, this Penetecostal scholar has redefined the terms of the discussion about the Holy Spirit in a way that transcends today’s paradigm of ‘charismatic’ or ‘noncharismatic’ orientation. His words are a strong reminder of what God, through his Holy Spirit, intends the church to be… . His work is an attempt to point us back to the Bible and reinvigorate our own vision of how the Spirit mobilizes the community of believers in the local church. – Wendy Murray Zoba, Associate Editor, Christianity Today
Gordon Fee, one of our truly master exegetes, has put steel and sinew into the words “Spirit,” “spirit,” and “spiritual” – words that have become flabby through subjectivizing indulgence and lack of exegetical exercise. His accurate, fresh, and passionate recovery of the place and meaning of Spirit in Paul and for us Christians is a provocative stimulus and reliable guide to the recovery of the experienced presence of God in our lives. For those of us who want to live, in continuity with all that has been revealed in Jesus and given in the Spirit, this is an eminently practical book. – Eugene H. Peterson, James Houston Professor of Spiritual Theology, Regent College”
About the Author
Gordon D. Fee (PhD, University of Southern California) is professor emeritus of New Testament studies at Regent College in Vancouver, British Columbia. He is the author of numerous works, including New Testament Exegesis, Listening to the Spirit in the Text, and commentaries on Revelation; Philippians; and 1 and 2 Timothy, Titus. He also coauthored How to Read the Bible for All Its Worth.
***For additional information on this resource, including reviews, click the bookstore links. Check the reference at page top or the links below for resource guides on related topics.***
See Resources on Over 100 Areas of Ministry Leadership: