The Spirit

Good morning, welcome to NHCC, please open your Bibles to John 14.

Tonight- Back to School Bash- 5-8 PM.

Remember to bring a chair.

Next week- Mark’s Gospel.

This morning, from John 3 (the Father), to John’s Prologue (the Son), to the Farewell Discourse in John 14 (the Spirit).

Read John 14:15-17- “If you love me, you will keep my commandments. And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Helper, to be with you forever, even the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees him nor knows him. You know him, for he dwells with you and will be in you.”

Pray.

Set the stage- John 14 in relation to John 6.

John 6:66-69- After this many of his disciples turned back and no longer walked with him. So Jesus said to the twelve, “Do you want to go away as well?” Simon Peter answered him, “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life, and we have believed, and have come to know, that you are the Holy One of God.”

Everything we read must be understood in this context- words of comfort being given to disciples who would soon be grieving the loss of their Teacher and Lord.

The point to be made- the very presence of God almighty has not and will not leave behind those who love and trust Him.

The Spirit is promised as the answer to such grieving. But how will the Spirit work? Four observations from our text.

1. The Spirit enables the keeping of God’s commands.

The text begins with quite the statement. Those who love Jesus will keep the commands of Jesus.

To keep- to conform to. To become more and more of something.

The opposite of ignoring or dismissing such commands.

If you love, then keep commands. If you don’t love, then continue in your own sinful ways.

Consider the impossibility of such a command.

Wronging my wife- Do I still love her?

In these moments, we behave as though we don’t.

So what kind of assurance can we have that we love Jesus when the keeping of His commands seems so difficult?

What is it that differentiates those who receive the Spirit from those in the world, who Jesus says CANNOT receive the Spirit. What difference does the Spirit make?

The Spirit comes to assist. In numerous ways.

Teaches us who God is and how such knowledge redirects our very existence.

Teaches us the life that is wholly devoted to God and gives us a thirst for such life.

This is what drives repentance.

Convicts and corrects our wandering.

None of this comes naturally. Even if we obey commands we do so with the wrong heart and intentionality. So we require the work of the Spirit.

2. The Spirit is given by the Father, and proceeds from the Father.

The Father will give you another helper.

Think about the implications here. The Spirit is given. The Holy Spirit is a gift of grace, undeserved and yet completely necessary.

Continuation of John 3:16- The Son is given because of the love of the Father and the need of the world. So it is with the Spirit.

John 15:26- “But when the Helper comes, whom I will send to you from the Father, the Spirit of truth, who proceeds from the Father, he will bear witness about me.”

Just as the Son is generated by the Father through all of eternity, the Spirit proceeds, or goes out, from the Father and is given by the Father.

The Father is the source of the Son and the Spirit.

The Son is the radiance of the glory of God. The Spirit is the working of God applied in the life of a believer.

Consider all of the work that God does in the life of believers. This is the inner working of the Holy Spirit in our lives.

New life is given as a work of God through the applying of the Holy Spirit to the life of a believer.

Transformation towards Christlikeness is a work of God through the applying of the Holy Spirit to the life of a believer.

Being justified in the sight of God is a work of God through the applying of the Holy Spirit to the life of a believer.

Being enabled for ministry through the giving of gifts is a work of God through the applying of the Holy Spirit to the life of a believer.

The work that God does in the life of a Christian takes place through the giving of the Spirit by the Father.

But there is more. If the Son is always radiating the glory of the Father, and the Spirit is always proceeding from the Father, then there will never be a disconnect between Father, Son and Spirit.

Just as the Son and Father had perfect unity in and with one another, the same is true of the Spirit with the Father and Son.

Example- the brutal cross of Christ. The plan of the Father, carried out by the Son through the work of the Spirit. No disagreement, no arguing.

3. The Spirit is connected to truth.

The Spirit is literally referred to by Jesus as the Spirit of truth.

This is the practical significance of the Spirit being given by the Father and proceeding from the Father. This answers the question, “Why does this matter?”

Consider the loss of Jesus. Why would Jesus’ prediction that He was leaving them be so difficult to receive?

Jesus had been their source of all truth. He had reshaped their understanding of the deepest things of life.

How much had their understanding changed as a result of their time with Him? Of God? Of salvation? Everything was made new.

Disciples likely thought they would be losing their access to God’s Kingdom, and their access to God’s truth and reality.

Jesus promises help. But how would this help, this Spirit of truth, compare to what they had always had?

Ministry and truth of the Spirit is a continuation of the Father and Son’s ministry and truth.

John Calvin- “The office of the Spirit promised to us is not to form new and unheard-of revelations, or to coin a new form of doctrine by which we may be led away from the received doctrine of the gospel, but to seal on our minds the very doctrine that the gospel recommends.”

What does this mean for us today?

The Spirit will never take us away from what is revealed by the Father and Son.

Signs, wonders, and dreams.

We always seem to be looking for detours.

Calling an architect.

The Spirit will always bring us back to the revealed word of God, whether it be Jesus the Son, or Scripture.

Remember John 15- He will bear witness about me.

John 16:13-14- When the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all the truth, for he will not speak on his own authority, but whatever he hears he will speak, and he will declare to you the things that are to come. He will glorify me, for he will take what is mine and declare it to you.

This is the work of the Spirit, leading men and women to what is truly true. We are brought humbly to the words of Scripture and the life of Jesus.

4. The Spirit is both with you and in you.

Why is it necessary for both prepositions to be used by Jesus?

Let’s first consider what it means to have the Spirit in you.

The very spiritual nature of God is present in those who have received His Spirit.

Basil of Caesarea (300’s AD)- “Just as when a sunbeam falls on bright and transparent bodies, they themselves become brilliant too, and shed forth a fresh brightness from themselves, so souls wherein the Spirit dwells, illuminated by the Spirit, themselves become spiritual, and send for their grace to others.”

Here is the point of Basil’s musing- that being illuminated by the Spirit brings the power and work of God almighty into the broken vessel of a man or woman.

Something as simple as a finger over a flashlight. Finger isn’t glowing, it’s just revealing the light beneath it.

Same way- The Spirit’s dwelling in man allows for a newness of life, without the need for boasting. After all, the power is not in the finger to glow. All of the power is in the light. Anything we do on God’s behalf is driven completely by God within us.

Everything is accomplished through the indwelling of the Holy Spirit.

But the God’s Spirit does more than dwelling within the believer, He also is with the believer, which indicates a sort of outside presence.

Faith in Jesus Christ is about more than simply what is inward.

Faith is proven in the fruit, in the behavior.

While it is important to have our inward life transformed, our understanding, our love, our knowledge, it is also important for our behavior to change.

The Spirit does more that dwell within, the Spirit guides, leads through life.

Hymn by Fannie Crosby- All the Way My Savior Leads Me- “All the way my Savior leads me, Cheers each winding path I tread, Gives me grace for every trial, Feeds me with the living Bread. Though my weary steps may falter, And my soul athirst may be, Gushing from the Rock before me, Lo! A spring of joy I see.”

Remember, everything that the Father or the Son does in and through our lives is accomplished through the work of the Spirit.

He not only dwells in us, He guides us through this life.

Conclusion- Why is it so necessary to understand the concept of trinity?

The community of love that is shared between the Father, Son and Spirit is the very community into which we are invited.

Michael Reeves- “My new life began when the Spirit first opened my eyes and won my heart to Christ. Then, for the first time, I began to enjoy and love Christ as the Father has always done. And through Christ, for the first time, I began to enjoy and love the Father as the Son has always done. That is how it started, and that is how the new life goes on.”

Ali so brilliantly illustrated this for me. Children with a difficult home life. We are those kids.

This is all the kid has ever known. Until their eyes are opened to there being more.

Even this illustration is imperfect and limited.

The depth of our sin is worse than the known experience of the child. The perfection and beauty of the unity is far greater than the new experience of the child.

Is our desire to remain in the circumstances in which we have always lived? Broken lives with broken relationships and no hope for change. Or might we have our eyes opened to more?

We are invited. The Holy Spirit has made that possible. Will we receive the invitation?

Pray.