Here is some of the best news about the Holy Spirit that we have. Jesus sends him to us as another Helper, like himself.
Because he lives in us, we truly know our Lord Jesus Christ and the Father, and ourselves participating in relationship with them. All of this is miracle. And all of this is God’s kindness to us.
It’s good to realise that Jesus tells us these things at a time when everything is falling apart for the disciples. Official hatred of Jesus is at boiling point. Jesus has told the disciples they will all fail badly. And Jesus says he’s going to leave them.
They need some help! But Jesus doesn’t give them a motivational seminar! He doesn’t gift his disciples with special powers. He promises to send them another Helper—like himself. And he promises them a future so joyously related to God that their troubles will seem quite different. They will be seeing life as God does, rather than from below.
These verses have special relevance to the disciples. They are being prepared—as apostles—to declare and explain and record all that Jesus will accomplish. They will need the Holy Spirit’s help to do this[i]. But the same Spirit is promised to everyone who turns to Jesus Christ for forgiveness and new life[ii].
When it comes to knowing God, Jesus has been the go-to person for the disciples. If they have wanted to know how God rules the world, Jesus tells them—or shows them. If they have wanted eternal life, Jesus grants it. If they have wanted to pray, Jesus teaches them how. And much besides. No wonder they don’t want him to leave!
But Jesus insists it will be better if he goes and the Holy Spirit comes.
He says that the disciples already know the Holy Spirit. They have been watching him at work in Jesus—directing and empowering all he has done. But this same Holy Spirit will soon be in the disciples.
This is what Jesus opens up for us too. It’s what we need—even more than having Jesus physically present. And here’s why.
In the first place, we need the Spirit to come to us because, when he does, Jesus has come to us. And we are alive to God[iii].
We’re not accustomed to talking about people being in one another. In fact, it sounds intrusive. But when it comes to God the Father and Jesus his Son, and the Holy Spirit, this is the language we need. And Jesus uses it freely[iv].
It’s love language. God doesn’t text us. He doesn’t outsource his saving work to the church. He comes to us, as Spirit, in communion with the Son and the Father. We are being treated as family—God’s family.
So, the disciples won’t be abandoned like orphans. The Spirit will come. And in this action, Jesus will love them and reveal himself to them[v]. It won’t be ‘like old times.’ It will be better.
This is true for us too. We are Christians because Christ has sent his Spirit to be in us. And he hasn’t come alone. Jesus has come to be in us, full of the new life he has created in his own flesh—a life freed from sin and set apart for God[vi].
And we know we are in Jesus. We are not alive because of what we do. He has embraced us—complete with our corruptions and frailty[vii]. He has welcomed us, chosen us and laid down his life for us. And through this journey, he has taken us to his Father—purified. And he is happy for it to be so. These chapters of John are full of his affection.
In the second place, we need the Spirit to come to us so that our understanding of God can grow. The Spirit enables us to see that the Son has always been living in his Father. And we know that the Father has always been living in his Son. This living in another didn’t begin with us[viii].
Jesus has shown us what it is like to live in his Father. He loves him. He looks at what his Father is doing and delights to share in it[ix]. He can’t do anything without his Father[x]. He asks to be vindicated by his Father[xi]. The idea of ‘being his own person’ would never have occurred to him.
And Jesus has shown us what it is like for the Father to live in him. The disciples should have recognised this[xii]. What they had seen in him was all produced by the Father. And it’s still true now. When we ‘see’ Jesus, we have seen the Father[xiii].
But when Jesus sends the Holy Spirit, we can see all this. We know that the Son is one with the Father in being God, one in love, one in action. And we know that the Father who loves his Son now loves us who are trusting in his Son[xiv].
This is why Jesus can be so emphatic at the beginning of this chapter in telling the troubled disciples not to be troubled. And why? Because there is plenty of room in the Father’s house for them all. The Spirit comes as the fellowship maker[xv]. In this ‘God-family’, everyone knows everyone—really and deeply!
Jesus is describing a relationship that is more than knowing about God or doing something for him. It’s having fellowship or communion with him. God has fellowship within himself as Father, Son and Holy Spirit. We are knowing this, not as something to work out but as something to appreciate and to share in.
In the third place, we need the Spirit to come to us because he replaces our old self-satisfaction with love for Jesus. Like Peter and the other disciples, the life that was focused on ourselves needs to die. Jesus asks us to abide in his love[xvi], to love him by doing what he says[xvii] and to love one another[xviii].
And he knows that we will love him[xix]. And we realise that in listening to Jesus, and obeying him, we’ve been loving him[xx]. We’ve seen the smallness of living by what we can create because we’ve started to admire and be captured by Jesus. And we are starting to live in a family of God where everything is as it should be, including us.
We tend to live in our accomplishments and human relationships and wonder why we are always on the edge of unsatisfied. Here’s why. We are built to know God and be known by God[xxi]. Remember Jesus saying to the disciples, after a very successful mission, don’t be happy because evil spirits are obedient to you. Rejoice that your names are written in heaven[xxii].
I’m glad that the Father sent the Son to tell us these things and to bring them into being[xxiii]. And I’m glad our three-personed God has sent his Holy Spirit to live within us so that what we know is not a theory or an accomplishment. It’s all love.
This is what we have been born for. And it’s more important than success or safety.
[i] John 14:25-29
[ii] Acts 2:33, 38-39
[iii]John 14:6, 18-19
[iv] One person being in another is used 15 times between 14:11—15:10, besides other ways of saying the same thing.
[v] John 14:21
[vi] John 16:13-15
[vii] John 13:38; 10:14-15
[viii] John 14:20
[ix] John 14:20
[x] John 5:19; 8:28
[xi] John 12:17-32
[xii] John 14:8-10
[xiii] 2 Cor. 4:6
[xiv] Eph. 1:6
[xv] 2 Cor. 13:14
[xvi] John 15:9-10
[xvii] John 14:15, 21-24
[xviii] John 15:12-17
[xix] John 16:27
[xx] John 21:15-17
[xxi] Gal. 4:9
[xxii] Luke 10:20
[xxiii] John 14:24
Simply True 