Young Christians Beliefs Regarding the Influence of the Holy Spirit
Via Christian Newswire [5]
Teleios recently surveyed the role of the Holy Spirit in our lives in 475 visitors to the Instagram account, InstaPray, of whom: 30% were under 18 and 38% were between 18-30 years of age; 78% were evangelicals and 71% female.
The actions of the Holy Spirit in believers’ lives is an important yet controversial topic. In our survey, the most common response by participants was that the Spirit helps lead them by the word of God (88%).
Also selected by above 80% of the participants, in order, was: The Holy Spirit comforts us that we are children of God, teaches us and gives us power consistent with the armor of God (Ephesians 6:10-17).
These results are encouraging in that they show that both millennials and adolescents, when presented with a list of biblical and non-biblical actions, overwhelmingly identified important scripturally based roles of the Spirit. This is important because the doctrine of the Spirit can be confusing, often because of differences in beliefs between Christian denominations.
The Bible teaches the Holy Spirit has a critical role in both salvation and the Christian life. The Bible indicates that in salvation the Spirit: draws an unbeliever to God by convicting them of sin, baptizes them into the body of Christ (the universal church), regenerates them to a new life and seals them until Christ comes again.
In the Christian life, the Spirit gives power, prays for believers, teaches them, helps them defeat sin, and comforts them by assuring them they are children of God among other actions. All the findings of the survey, as well as other Teleios research, are on our website www.teleiosresearch.com.
Teleios, a non-profit foundation, seeks to demonstrate the truth of Scripture and the Christian faith through the scientific method by providing evidence for the positive results of a biblically-based lifestyle. Prior studies conducted by Teleios have shown that the practice of the Christian faith (praise, prayer, fellowship, service and Bible study) and security of salvation increases well-being while reducing guilt.