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Welcome again to our meditations on the Lord Jesus through the gospel of John. 2 Corinthians 4:6, “For God who said that light would shine out of darkness, is the One who has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ.” The principle I want to focus on is God who said, “Light, shine,” God told the light to shine, but it says that He’s the One who is shone in our heart. He didn’t say, “Let there be light in our heart.” He came in as the light. God shone in our heart, and I know He gives light, but He also IS the light, and I’m just praying that we might see Him as the light. No matter what we learn, we want to see Him. Let’s pray.
Our Heavenly Father, thank You so much that You, the very One that spoke the universe into existence, is the One that has come into our heart, and You shine in us and through us. We commit our meditations unto you and ask, Lord, for your grace, and we just pray that Your people might see the light in the vessel. We ask in Jesus’ name.
This morning we’re coming to that important section of the gospel of John, and I’m super excited to begin this section. John 13 through 17, and sometimes this farewell discourse, people divide up to chapter 17 like the tabernacle. The first twelve chapters, He ministered to the world; that would be like the outer court. Then in 13-16 He’s ministering to His priests; so, that would be like the Holy Place. And chapter 17, the great prayer of our Lord Jesus is the Holy of Holies. Many have divided it that way.
I’m not going to take time to give a review of what we did last week, only enough to give the connection to where we were to where we are now. Again, I don’t want to take time in the review because there is so much to share as we begin this tremendous section.
Because of the importance of these next five chapters, I’m just asking you, brothers and sisters, to be patient with me. I want to jump right in and look at the vine and the branches, and let’s look at the foot washing and all that. But I feel like I wanted us to enter in the same way the disciples at that time entered in, and what were they going through. I want us to stand in their shoes and hear the truth as it was unfolded to them. My wife helps me on this, “Don’t rush; take your time,” so we don’t want to miss anything. We will always miss something because it’s an infinite book, but it’s imperative that we embrace everything that the Lord said the day before He died.
When we were in chapter 12, we were one week away from the cross, redemption, Palm Sunday; that’s where we were in chapter 12. You take a little step into chapter 13 and we’re one day away; this is the evening of Gethsemane. So, things are moving quickly, and our Lord Jesus has so much to share before He dies, and He shares it with His own.
Last week, the last verses of chapter 12, Jesus makes a testimony, a proclamation, and He said, “I lived, when I was on the earth, thirty-three and a half years, and especially these last ministry years, I lived the exchanged life. I lived as God intended man to live.” John 12:44, “Jesus cried out and said, ‘He who believes in Me does not believe in Me.” Isn’t that an interesting verse? “He who believes in Me does not believe in Me, but in Him who sent Me. He who sees Me, sees the One who sent Me.” That’s because He lived the exchanged life, and He lived in dependence upon His indwelling Father, and that’s how He lived. John 12:49, “I did not speak on My own initiative. The Father Himself who sent Me has given Me a commandment of what to say and what to speak. I know His commandment is eternal life. Therefore, the things I speak, I speak just as the Father taught.” And just before this last day He’s reminding them, “That’s how I live, and I’m going to call you as the Father sent Me, I’m going to send you.” God intended everyone to live the exchanged life. And He said, “I’ve put it on display. I’m about to explain it, so you’ll understand what is coming, but right now know that I live dependent upon My Father. I did nothing on My own initiative. The words I spoke came from My Father. The miracles I did, I didn’t do; He did through Me. I went where He sent Me, and I always did. John 8:29, “He who sent Me is with Me; He’s not left Me alone. I always do the things that are pleasing to Him.” That’s how Jesus lived. John 4:34, “Jesus said to them, ‘My food is to do the will of Him who sent Me and accomplish His work.’”
Jesus put the Christians, life as God intended it to be, on display. He lived it first, and they saw it. They saw it displayed in Him. That was the preparation, the end of chapter twelve, because He is about to tell them, “Now, what you’ve observed, you are going to experience, and you yourselves need to live that way.” How they were to live the life, He’s going to explain, but before we get to the how, I want to focus on the why. Why did God require the exchanged life? What was that all about? Why in His choosing the way man was intended to live, why did He say it was the exchanged life? And then, once we look at that, we’ll see how we do that.
If you’ll bear with me, I want to go back in the life of Christ. I need to go back. I’m not going to go all the way back to Adam, except to say that he did not live the way God intended men to live. He was supposed to live the exchanged life, and right after His tragic fall, and you know in the Bible, God gave a wonderful promise, that some day there would be a seed of the woman, and some day there would be a Redeemer who would undo all the damage that Adam did by not following God’s plan. So, in the heart and in the mind and in the purposes of God, there was a mission, and a divine reason why Jesus came. Listen to John 8:42, “Jesus said to them, ‘If God were your Father, you would love Me, for I proceeded forth and came from God. I have not even come on My own initiative. He sent Me.” So, even in heaven He’s saying, “God has a mission, and I’m involved, and I didn’t choose it. I’m coming because He sent Me.” Then in John 12:47 He spells out the mission, “If anyone hears My saying, and does not keep them, I do not judge him. I did not come to judge the world but to save the world.” That’s the mission, “I’ve come to save the world.” That was God’s mission to the Lord Jesus, to redeem sinners.
We’re all familiar with the gospel story. We can’t see into each other’s hearts but it’s my guess that everybody here knows the Lord Jesus and is in love with the Lord Jesus, and as Moses lifted up the serpent, the Son of Man was lifted up. You know the gospel; you know the beautiful gospel story. Jesus said in John 12:32, “If I be lifted up, I’ll draw all men to me.” And you were drawn. There was a day. We could go around and ask, “When was that day?” You remember the day the Lord became real to you, and He manifested Himself to you. So, that was the mission. God sent Jesus on that mission to save the world, and He did that; He went to the cross. John 1:1, “In the beginning was the Word. The Word was with God and the Word was God,” and then in verse 14, “The Word became flesh and dwelt among us.” In order to do the mission, He had to become flesh. So, God, God/Man, God in man—that’s the exchanged life, God now in man. He’s going to live before them that exchanged life. We call that the incarnation, when Jesus was born, when God put Himself in humanity, God dwelling in humanity. The “how” is, “How is He going to fulfill His mission? The answer is that through humanity God in man, and there’s no other way, and I’ve got to live that way and carry out the mission. The “why”, is that there was a mission.
When we come to John 12, we are closing His ministry to the world, and we’re introducing the ministry now, and He’s going to speak to His own. We’ll begin in John 13:1, “Before the feast of Passover, Jesus knowing that His hour had come, that He would depart out of the world to the Father, having loved His own who were in the world, He loved them to the end.” I don’t want to be irreverent, but what I’m going to do now is to try to go back to what it was like for them at that time, and I’m going to put in my own words what my study of this session is of what I’m thinking Jesus said to them. We could look at the inspired words, but I’m just going to pretend (I speak as a fool) I’m Jesus, and I’m talking to them. I want you to get this.
Basically, He’s saying to them, “You, dear ones, you don’t have any idea how much I love you. You have no idea how much the Father in heaven loves you. He loves you with an everlasting love, and it will never come to an end; I loved you to the utmost. Even Me as God, I can’t love you any more; I’ve come to the end of My ability to love you any more. You’ve been witnessing for these three years, and you’ve been walking with Me, and you’ve seen miracles, and you’ve seen Me teach and you’ve heard My teaching, and you were involved in many of the miracles. You saw My heart and you saw My compassion and you saw Me deal with the poor, and you saw Me deal with the opposition. But now, this is new, and My time has come, and it’s almost over. The hour has arrived. I kept saying I was protected and that My hour had not come, and My hour had not come, and My hour had not come. But now it’s here and I’m about to go back to the Father who sent Me because He sent Me on a mission, and you need to understand that mission, to save the world. And in My incarnate body God planned that I would pay the penalty for sin and undo every evil that Satan had sinned and Adam had brought into the world. But it’s almost over; I’m leaving.
You’re going to be sad and you’re going to be broken hearted because you don’t understand and you don’t know what is going on, but I have to leave, and now I came to fulfill the mission and I came in the incarnate body and My incarnate body is going to rise from the dead and will be a glorified incarnate body, and it’s going back to heaven, and all of that is necessary, and all of that is going to happen tomorrow. I’m going to finish the work tomorrow. I’m going to the cross tomorrow. It’s always been God in Me, and even tomorrow… Listen to 2 Corinthians 5:19, “God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself.” Even on the cross it was the exchanged life; it was God in Christ letting the Lord Jesus pour out His human blood.
“All of that you need to know because My mission is partially coming to an end. I know you’re upset; the thought of Me leaving you is disturbing you and your hearts are heavy, and you are sad; you are going to grieve. I want to use these days, these hours just before I go to explain to you what is going on and what is happening. So, I’m going to spill it all out and I’ll explain everything. Listen carefully to the words I’m about to say because there is only hours to go, and My incarnate body will be on the cross and I will accomplish that part of My mission. In My incarnate body I lived, and I ministered, and I manifested the Father, and I went to the cross and I’m going to die, and I’ll be raised, and I will be glorified and then I’m going away; I’ve got to go back. My work tomorrow will be over, finished, perfectly accomplished—done. There’s nothing to add to it and nothing to take away. It’s going to be a perfect ministry.”
“But what I want you to know is the mission went beyond the cross; the mission was to save the world. The world is not going to be saved tomorrow. I’m going to die tomorrow and I’m going to provide a righteous ground on which any sinner can stand and be acceptable to God, My Father, the Holy God. But My mission was bigger than that; My mission was to save the world. What I want you to know, dear Christians, dear disciples, I came as far as I could come in My incarnate body. I couldn’t come any further in My incarnate body, but My mission is not done. So, I’m going to explain to you that I need a new body to complete My mission; My mission is not done. But I’ve come as far as I can in My incarnate body, but I’m going to have another incarnate body; it’s going to be called “the church”; we are the body of Christ.”
“You can’t add to the mission I’ve made; it’s complete and it’s done and finished and wonderful, but it needs to be proclaimed; it needs to be proclaimed and I’m asking your permission, so I can finish My mission. I’ll still do it, but I just need another body. Will you let Me have your body, so that I can come and live in you the way the Father lived in Me, and you can live the way I lived, and you can look unto Me and trust Me and initiate nothing? Let Me do everything. But I need a new body, and I’m asking your permission. Will you let Me live in you that way so that now I can complete My mission? God sent Me to save the world in My first body, and I came as far as I could come, and I provided the perfect ground upon which sinners could stand and be acceptable to God. But now that needs to be proclaimed all over the earth. Will you allow Me to use you to do that?”
John 14:12, “Truly, I say to you, he who believes in Me, the works I do he’ll do, also, and greater works than these will he do, because I go to My Father.” “In My incarnate body,” said Jesus, “it was God’s heart, but I was so limited. In My incarnate body when I was in Jerusalem, I couldn’t be Bethany. And when I was in Bethany, I couldn’t be in Jericho. And when I was in Jericho, I couldn’t be in Capernaum. And when I was in Capernaum, I couldn’t be in Nazareth. In My new body, when I indwell every Christian, I can be all over the world. I can be in Asia, and I can be in Europe, and I can be in China, and I can be in the Middle East, and I can be everywhere. And it’s still Me; so, greater works, not greater but more; greater works can I do now because I have a new body, but I need your permission. It’s like Mary and had to get her permission for Me to be incarnate the first time.”
“Now, I’m going to explain it and I’m going to ask for your permission. Are you willing? Are you going to let Me use your body? You are out of the picture. I want your body as a vessel, so that I can finish the mission to which God sent Me.” This incarnation of the church we know as Pentecost, and so on. This is how, in my understanding, He’s beginning, and He’s saying, “Before I leave, I need to share My heart.” He’s going to tell them some amazing things. He’s going to tell them some shocking things. Some of this is so surprising. He’s going to tell them things they heard before, but they never heard. We’ve been there. “I’m going to finish the work this weekend, and it needs to be proclaimed, and so I need to explain it because the mission is not finished.”
This is how I think His heart was that day. As I begin these chapters, and I don’t know if you’ve seen them but I’m excited and I’m sort of holding back. I’m anxious to get into these chapters. They were not anxious to hear these chapters; they were not looking forward to what He was going to say; they were not. So, we’re going to begin, not by looking at the foot washing and then at Judas and how he betrayed the Lord Jesus and then look at the New Commandment and then we’ll look at the vine; I’m not going in that order. I want to look at the message of the entire five chapters; the message of the exchanged life as it dawned on them, or as I think it dawned on them. I want us to enter into their situation and put ourselves in their shoes. They’ve heard these words before, but it never registered.
For the past six months in ministry, the Lord Jesus had been saying uncomfortable things to them. Matthew 16:21, “From that time on,” now we’re talking about six months, six months to the cross, “Jesus began to show His disciples that He must go to Jerusalem, suffer many things from the elders, the chief priests and scribes, be killed, be raised up on the third day. Peter took Him aside and began to rebuke Him saying, ‘God forbid it, Lord; this shall never happen to You.’” Six months before the cross He began telling them, “This is how it’s going to be; I’m going to be arrested, and I’m going to be tried, and I’m going to be crucified; the scribes, the chief priests, the Pharisees are going to come against Me.” They didn’t want to hear that. And the closer He gets to the cross, the more He talks about it. They were still struggling with His testimony that God had a Father. To the Jewish ear, don’t forget, “The Lord our God is One.” That’s all they knew, and all of a sudden Jesus says, “I am the Son of God.” That was blowing their mind. They had no clue, and they had to try to adjust to that.
Now, as we get closer and closer, like when they held the feast to celebrate the raising of Lazarus, and Mary anointed His feet, John 12:7, “Jesus said, ‘Let her alone, so that she may keep it for the day of My burial.’” “Stop talking about Your death.” Sometimes my Lillian goes crazy. I say, “You need to learn about the ministry, if God takes me to heaven.” “I don’t want to hear it; don’t talk about your death.” He made a cryptic statement to the Jews, John 8:21, “And He said again, ‘I go away, and you’ll seek Me. You’ll die in your sins; where I’m going you cannot come.’ So, the Jews were saying, ‘Surely, He won’t kill Himself, will He, since He says, “Where I’m going you cannot come,”? And now, He’s only hours from His death, and He keeps talking to His disciples. As I’ve said, I can’t wait to get into that teaching, but what they’re hearing is, “I’m leaving.” They didn’t want to hear that. Are you kidding me? They were close; they were lovers; they were walking in deep friendship. John 13:33, “Little children, I’m with you a little while longer. You’ll seek Me, and as I said to the Jews, and now I also say to you, where I’m going you cannot come.”
I hope the Lord helps us to enter in at how devastating those words were to the ears to those when they first heard it. John 13:36, “Simon Peter said to Him, ‘Lord, where are you going?’ Jesus said, ‘Where I go you cannot follow Me now; you’ll follow Me later.’” There are many other verses but that’s enough. I wanted to show you the consternation of these disciples. John 13:1, “Before the feast of the Passover, Jesus knowing His hour had come, that He would depart out of the world to the Father…” His hour had come, and it’s happening. They were anticipating, but now it’s here. Again, they’re not looking forward to what is so exciting here, and I hope that it excites you. It’s sort of like Job. His life began in chapter three. He didn’t have chapter one and two. We have chapters one and two; we know the devil and the Lord and, “Have you considered my servant…” He didn’t know that. It’s sort of like that I’m excited about this. They didn’t know; they didn’t have any idea. They’re concerned, they’re nervous, they’re anxious, they’re worried, they aren’t happy at all about the scary things He’s saying. They can see; they knew that the scribes were plotting to kill Him. He had already told them that there was a deceiver in the midst. They don’t want to hear this.
On your sheet there are twelve verses in italics. The reason I put them in italics is because I’m not going to read them, but when you get a chance, read them. They only show one thing—how clueless these disciples were when Jesus said all these things. They were absolutely clueless. They kept asking questions, “We don’t know what He’s talking about.” I’m excited; I want to share what He’s talking about. They were absolutely clueless, and on the last day He’s pouring out His heart to them, and He says, “You’ve got to know this.” And they’re, “Huh? Who? What?” If they’re ever to understand the exchanged life, there’s one truth beyond all others, and that’s where we’re going now, the most basic, the most cardinal, the most fundamental, the most important truth, and it’s indispensable, but it’s a brand new concept to them.
They’re going to learn something for the first time. It’s been around four thousand years, and it’s been implied in shadows and all. Follow along as I read these five passages. John 14:16, “I’ll ask of the Father, and He’ll give you another helper, and He may be with you forever. That is the Spirit of Truth whom the world cannot receive because it does not see Him or know Him, but you know Him because He abides with you and will be in you.” A little while later in John 14:26, “The helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in My name, He will teach you all things and bring to your remembrance all things I’ve said to you.” And then in John 15:26, “When the helper comes whom I will send to you from the Father, that is the Spirit of Truth, who proceeds from the Father, He’ll testify of Me.” John 16:7, “I tell you the truth; it’s to your advantage that I go away. If I do not go away, the helper will not come to you. If I go, I will send Him to you.” John 16:12, “I’ve many more things to say to you, but you can’t bear them now, but when He, the Spirit of Truth comes, He’ll guide you into all the truth and He’ll not speak on His own initiative; whatever He hears, He’ll speak, and He’ll disclose to you what is to come.”
Those direct five mentions of the Holy Spirit are old hat to you and to me, but to them it’s all brand new. It’s brand new because they’re hearing a pronoun that they’ve never heard before. John 14:16, “That He may be with you forever.” John 14:17, “The world can’t receive it; it doesn’t behold Him, but you know Him. He abides with you.” John 14:26, “He will teach you all things.” John 14:26, “He will testify about Me.” John 16:7, “I will send Him to you.” John 16:13, “When He, the Spirit of Truth comes, He will guide you into all the truth.” John 16:13, “He will not speak on His own initiative. Whatever He hears, He will speak; He will disclose it.” The pronoun “He”, John 16:14, “He will glorify Me, He will take of mine, He takes of mine.” They’re hearing something they’ve never heard—He, He, He, Him, Him, Him, Him. Up until this time they never knew that the Holy Spirit was a Person. They never knew; that’s brand new. This is earth shaking. They were hard enough trying to figure out that God has a Son, and now they’re going to learn that there is another one, a third Person in the Godhead. This is a jolt to the Jewish mind. God is One, and this is transforming, and they’re hearing it for the first time.
You see, if I say, “Father,” you think masculine. If I say, “Son,” you think masculine. But from the beginning, the word Spirit was neuter; it’s the wind, it’s the breath. It’s the same word. It wasn’t a Person. It wasn’t masculine; it was neuter, and they even thought of God, it was an attribute of God, like when the Spirit of the Lord came on Gideon. Listen to Judges 14:6, “The Spirit of the Lord came upon Him mightily, so that he tore him as one tears a goat.” He had great power; the Spirit of the Lord was power. When Samson struck down those thirty Philistines, the Spirit of the Lord gave him the ability to do that and kill the thousand with a jawbone of a donkey. To them, the Spirit was a thing; it was power, it was might.
Micah 3:8, “On the other hand I’m filled with power with the Spirit of the Lord, with justice, with courage.” It’s not a person; the Spirit of the Lord is bravery and justice. Numbers 11:23, “And the Lord said to Moses, ‘Is the Lord’s power unlimited?’” And then it begins to talk about the Spirit of the Lord that was on Moses. Moses began to complain, “This is a lot of work, I’ve gotten all these people,” so God took the Spirit off of Moses and divided it seventy ways. It doesn’t sound like a person, being divided up. They did not know that the Holy Spirit was a person. And even when it’s about Messiah, Isaiah 11:2, “The Spirit of the Lord will rest on Him, the Spirit of wisdom and understanding, the Spirit of counsel and strength, the Spirit of knowledge and the fear of the Lord.” It’s stuff; it’s things and it’s neuter. It doesn’t sound like a person. When David prayed, “Take not Thy Holy Spirit from me,” he wasn’t thinking about a person. He’s just saying, “The power You’ve given me, the wisdom to reign, don’t let that depart from me.”
Even when you look at the prophesies, Ezekiel’s prophesy of the New Covenant, “I’ll put My Spirit on you and you will obey Me,” it’s a Spirit of obedience. Zechariah promised in chapter twelve and verse ten, “God will pour out the Spirit of grace and the Spirit of supplication,” but it was always a thing. That’s how they understood Spirit; it was not a person, until this glorious day when He announced it to them. Looking back, it’s clear, we can look back and we see the Spirit of God in the Old Testament and we know it’s a Person. We see Him hovering over creation, and in Noah’s days the Spirit will not always strive with man, and the prophets spoke by the Spirit of God, and the Spirit designed the tabernacle. We know that it was a Person. The Spirit overshadowed the virgin, and we know that’s a Person. I hope you can enter into this. To them that was brand spanking new. They had never ever contemplated the idea that there was someone called the Spirit of God.
If you’re not quickened to the truth of the exchanged life, we say that it’s sad that they did that. We do it all the time. We forget that the Holy Spirit is a Person. Usually, our prayer life makes it obvious. We say, “Lord, help me; I need help,” and He says, “I am your Helper.” “Lord, give me strength.” In the exchanged life we say that the Lord is my strength. We’re asking God to give us wisdom and to give us patience. That’s what they were doing. They just thought that the Spirit is a thing and it’s neuter. He’s saying, “Don’t you know that I am your sanctification and that I am your song and I am your strength, and I am your fortress.” Will He give those things? Yes, He does, as He always does but there’s a big difference when we say, “Lord, protect me and be my protection, and you are my fortress, and you are my strength, and you are my song and you are my portion and you are my deliverer and you are my light and you are my salvation.” That’s the exchanged life, when you learn that the Holy Spirit is a Person and we stop asking Him to give us things when we don’t need those things. We don’t need His help; we need Him. We don’t need strength. We can go forth in weakness because we have Him.
Anyway, the next step. The first thing they learned is that the Holy Spirit is a Person, and now they need to learn something else. To illustrate it I think this illustrates it more clearly than the John passage. 1 Corinthians 2:9-11, “Just as it is written, things that eye has not seen, ear has not heard, which have not entered the heart of man, all that God has prepared to those who love Him, for to us God revealed them through the Spirit. The Spirit searches all things, even the depths of God. For who among men knows the thoughts of a man except the Spirit of the man that is in him? Even so, the thoughts of God no one know except the Spirit of God.” That parallel helps me understand the word “Spirit”.
There are those who get a great kick out of talking about the body, soul and spirit. Forget that for now, but you don’t have a spirit; you ARE spirit; that’s the you. You ARE spirit. That’s why James said, “The body apart from the spirit is dead.” When you die, your spirit is gone to be with the Lord. James 2:26 is that other verse. When Stephen died, Acts 7:59, “They went on stoning Stephen as he called on the Lord and said, ‘Lord Jesus, receive my spirit.’” If I’m thinking something now (this is Paul’s argument), there’s no way you can know what I’m thinking. I know what I’m thinking, and I don’t know what you’re thinking, but you know what you’re thinking. I never know what Lillian is thinking but if I had her spirit, I would know what she is thinking. That’s why he’s saying that no one knows the mind of God except the Spirit of God, but we have His Spirit, so therefore we have the mind of Christ. We have his mind. Who is the Spirit? It’s the real God, just like your spirit is the real you. When you say Holy Spirit, you are saying God lives in my heart, all of God, the real God lives in my heart. That’s why we have the mind of Christ. Anyway, they had to learn that the Spirit is a Person, and then they had to learn that Person is God, the real God.
Let’s take the next step here. John 16:7, “I tell you the truth. It’s to your advantage that I go away. If I do not go away the helper will not come to you. If I go, I will send him to you.” See, breaking the truth, the Spirit is a Person, and that Person is God, and I’m going to send Him to you and He’s going to live inside of you. That’s old hat to us but to them to hear this, they never knew that. They were walking alongside of Jesus, they had friendship, and they saw Him every day, and they were depending on sight and touch. He said, “There’s something new.” John 14:18, “I will not leave you as orphans; I will come to you.” Read the context. The context is not the second coming; the context is, “I’m going to send the Spirit, and when He comes, I’m coming.” Listen to John 14:23, “Jesus answered and said to him, ‘If anyone loves Me, he’ll keep My word, and My Father will love him and we will come to Him and make our abode with Him.” Who’s coming to live in my heart? He said, “I won’t leave you as orphans; I’ll come.” And He said, “My Father is coming.” And He said, “I’m sending the Spirit.” It’s the trinity, all of God lives in me. I don’t have a part of God, and you have another part. This is mystery and it’s illogical, but all of us have all of God living in us. That’s an amazing thing, but they had to learn it in steps; the Holy Spirit is a Person, and that Person is God, and that Person is coming to live inside of you.
I told you that they were troubled and anxious, “Don’t talk that way; I don’t want you to leave.” John 13:33, “Little children, I’m with you a little while longer; you’ll seek, and I said to the Jews and I’ll say to you, ‘Where I’m going, you cannot come.’” In their hearts they were saying, “No, don’t leave; I don’t want you to leave.” John 16:5&6, “I’m going to Him who sent Me. None of you asked me, ‘Where are you going?’ but because I said these things to you, sorrow has filled your heart.” John 16:20, “Truly, I say to you, you will weep and lament. The world will rejoice, and you’ll grieve. Your grief will be turned to joy.” John 14:16, oh, may God burn this into your heart as He burned it into theirs, “I will ask the Father to give you another helper,” listen, “that He may be with you forever.” They had to know that the Spirit is a Person, and that Person is God, and that God is coming to live in my heart forever; He’ll not depart. “This experience you have that I’m leaving, you’ll never experience it again. I’m leaving, not so that you will grieve My absence, but that I can come to you in such a way that I’m going to show you that you’ll never grieve again because I’m going to live in you, all of God living in you.”
Let me close with two symbolic acts. It’s a little bit beyond this chapter but it’s before He ascends to heaven and sends the Holy Spirit. He gave them two symbolic acts. After the resurrection, as you know, He kept appearing and disappearing for a period of forty days. He would show up, and then He would disappear, and then He’d appear to certain people, and then disappear, and He’s here and then He’s not here, He’s present and He’s not present. That was all to their sight because they were used to walking with Him and talking to Him and touching Him and seeing Him and eating with Him. And so, in these forty days He goes, “You are going to see Me. Here’s My hands. Put your fingers in that wound. Here’s My side. Put your hand there.” He’s deliberately condescending to their sight. They’re seeing Him but He’s getting them used to the fact that He’s not always there but He’s always there. They are so used to sight; eleven times He did that. He’s here, He’s gone, He’s present, He’s gone.
John 20:19&20, this is the first symbolic act, “When it was evening,” don’t forget this is pre-Pentecost, Pentecost hadn’t come, “on that day, the first day of the week, when the doors were shut where the disciples were for fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood in their midst and said to them, ‘Peace be with you.’ When He had said this, He showed them both His hands and His side, and His disciples rejoiced when they saw the Lord, and Jesus said to them again, ‘Peace be with you.’” Now here comes the precursor to the exchanged life, “’Peace be with you; as the Father sent Me, I send you.’ And when He said this, He breathed on them and said, ‘Receive the Holy Spirit.’” Symbolic act, John 20 describes that act when He breathed on them. You recall the beginning of the Bible when God made man out of the dust of the earth. The evolutionists say it’s the seed of life. No, we start from death. He made clay image and then He breathed into him, and that was the first creation, and man became a living soul. Now He looks at these disciples in the Upper Room, and basically, He says, “You are as dead as Adam before I breathed into Him. You are just an amorphous lump of clay. You’re nothing, but you are about to learn as the Father sent Me, I’m sending you,” and He breathed on them and said, “Receive the Holy Spirit.” It’s a symbolic act, and He’s saying what He’s going to explain in these chapters, that the Holy Spirit is a Person, and that Person is God, and that God wants to live in you, and that God will never, ever, ever, ever leave you.
He’s showing them that, but there’s a second symbolic act, and this is the day He left. He had been appearing and reappearing, and it’s sight, sight, “I see Him, I see Him, I saw Him, We saw Him, we’re seeing Him, it’s amazing, He’s here.” On that glorious day when He ascended to heaven, Acts 1:9, “After He had said these things, He was lifted up while they were looking up, and a cloud received Him out of their sight.” No more sight—out of their sight. Praise God the cloud didn’t hide Him from their heart, but it’s a new experience and it ends here. He said, “No more are you going to see Me by sight.” The cloud closed off that, and that’s why He said, “Now you are going to have a new experience, and you are going to experience more of Me and a closer union with Me and a deeper union with Me than you could have ever known if I had walked with you all your days.”
This is the introduction; there’s so much more that we’re going to get into, but I wanted you to see the foundation. We still need to see how the Spirit relates to Christ, Christ in me or the Holy Spirit, I’m the temple of the Spirit and yet it’s Jesus and how does that fit together. He’s going to explain that and we’re going to look at the title, the Paraclete, the Holy Spirit, the Comforter; we need to look at all that. There’s much more, but for now, brothers and sisters in Christ, I know you know, but let me say it again, the Spirit is the real God. He’s a Person; He’s God, and He’s come to live inside of you. He came to live inside of you forever, and by your permission, He said, “If you’ll let Me use your body, I can complete My mission. I can use you and proclaim and manifest Myself to the world. Will you give Me your permission?”
Father, thank You for Your precious word, not what we think it might mean, but everything You’ve inspired it to mean. Work that, instead, in our hearts, we pray. And, Lord, as You prepare us to receive the great teaching in this precious section of scripture, we just pray, Lord, that we would be wide open to everything You say to us, and then that You would, whatever is not of Your Spirit, Your promise, route it up. We thank You we can trust You for this. In Jesus’ name. Amen.