This is a book that every Christian should read and understand. Gordon Fee is a Pentecostal who has worked long and hard on careful exegesis in the New Testament. This book is a distillation of his work on the Apostle Paul and his understanding of the Holy Spirit. Why I say that every Christian should read and understand this book is because it peels away the preconceived ideas that so many of us bring to our study of Paul's epistles and uncovers some fundamental priorities that have long been neglected.

Part of the problem has been that people have turned to the Pauline epistles expecting a systematic presentation of doctrine. However, that was not what Paul wrote. His letters were written for a variety of reasons, often simply to correct problems in particular churches. For instance, the teaching on communion in 1 Corinthians 11 was only included because the Corinthians were messing things up. With this in mind, Fee carries out a thorough investigation of Paul's understanding of the Holy Spirit and the people of God.

I didn't twig to it at first, but I believe that Fee's book solidly reinforces what I have said about Christian subculture. He says it very differently, and with considerably more exegetical credibility. But the essence is the same, that God has called us to be the people of God, radically different from the world around us. Fee says that we are called to be an eschatological community, that is, living in the already/not yet mode. We already have the Spirit of God in dynamic reality, but we are still living in a world that is dominated by the flesh. We are living between the times, when the final state in us has begun but not been consummated.

Fee also sees Paul as profoundly trinitarian. The Spirit of God is intricately involved with our calling, conversion and ongoing Christian life. The Spirit not only inhabits us individually, with His gifts and fruits, but corporately as the new temple of God. The Spirit's presence in the Church is the literal fulfilment of several Old Testament promises.

Fee does not talk much about culture in this book (let alone subculture) but his work on Paul's understanding of the people of God is brilliant. There is so much more to say. I strongly recommend that you get hold of a copy of "Paul, the Spirit and the People of God". then read it carefully, TWICE!