Analogies of
the Holy Spirit
to the Wind

Like the wind, the Spirit is sovereign.

John 3:8 The wind blows wherever it pleases. You hear its sound, but you cannot tell where it comes from or where it is going. So it is with everyone born of the Spirit."

1 Corinthians 12:11 All these are the work of one and the same Spirit, and he gives them to each one, just as he determines.
 

Like the wind, the Spirit is invisible.

John 3:8 The wind blows wherever it pleases. You hear its sound, but you cannot tell where it comes from or where it is going. So it is with everyone born of the Spirit.
 

Like the wind, the Spirit is inscrutable, incomprehensible.

John 3:8 The wind blows wherever it pleases. You hear its sound, but you cannot tell where it comes from or where it is going. So it is with everyone born of the Spirit.
 

Like the wind, the Spirit is indispensable.

John 3:5 Jesus answered, "I tell you the truth, no one can enter the kingdom of God unless he is born of water and the Spirit."
 

Like the wind, the Spirit is lifegiving.

Ezekiel 37:8-10 [8] I looked, and tendons and flesh appeared on them and skin covered them, but there was no breath in them. [9] Then he said to me, "Prophesy to the breath; prophesy, son of man, and say to it, `This is what the Sovereign LORD says: Come from the four winds, O breath, and breathe into these slain, that they may live.' " [10] So I prophesied as he commanded me, and breath entered them; they came to life and stood up on their feet—a vast army.

Compare John 3:5 Jesus answered, "I tell you the truth, no one can enter the kingdom of God unless he is born of water and the Spirit."

Note: Much at least of the difficulty in John 3:5 would disappear if we would remember that "spirit" means "wind" and translate literally: "no one can enter the kingdom of God unless he is born of water and the wind."

In other words, unless a man is born of the cleansing and life-giving power of the Spirit, or of the cleansing word:

John 15:3 You are already clean because of the word I have spoken to you.

Ephesians 5:25-27 [25] Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her [26] to make her holy, cleansing her by the washing with water through the word, [27] and to present her to himself as a radiant church, without stain or wrinkle or any other blemish, but holy and blameless.

James 1:18 He chose to give us birth through the word of truth, that we might be a kind of firstfruits of all he created.

1 Peter 1:23 For you have been born again, not of perishable seed, but of imperishable, through the living and enduring word of God.
 

Like the wind, the Spirit is irresistible.

Acts 1:8 But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.

Compare Acts 6:10 but they could not stand up against his wisdom or the Spirit by whom he spoke.

A man filled with the Holy Spirit is transformed into a cyclone.