John 14:17 Bible Teaching

John 14.24
December 7th 2014

Welcome to December!

This is the Milk Gathering of CAMPUS which meets here in the studio church in Salt Lake City Utah and we are streaming live out to any and all who tune in from other parts of the world.

If you haven’t been with us before we believe that Christianity is a wholly subjective experience as every individual will stand alone before God for the faith they embraced and love they expressed.

Here we pray . . .
Hear the word of God set to music
Sit in silent reflection for a few minutes and when we come back today we will continue our verse by verse discussion of John 14 (starting again at verse 15)

Let’s pray.
(music)
(silence)

Alright, last week we covered verse 15-16, which say:

15 If ye love me, keep my commandments.
16 And I will pray the Father, and he shall give you another Comforter, that he may abide with you forever;

We talked about the gender of God at the end of our discussion in addition to the fact that the Holy Spirit is always written in the Greek in the neuter with occasion where there are masculine forms tied to Him – with these passages in John 14-16 being the most common.

Jesus continues to describe the Holy Spirit, among other things and says that He is:

17 Even the Spirit of truth; whom the world cannot receive, because it seeth him not, neither knoweth him: but ye know him; for he dwelleth with you, and shall be in you.

This passage says so much . . . and we’ll get to it in a minute but let’s talk a bit more about the Holy Spirit.

As we all know the Holy Spirit is attributed in traditional Christian thought as being “the third person of the Holy Trinity.”
In the literal Greek Holy Spirit or Holy Ghost as the King James names him it reads: “hagios pneuma” with hagios being translated into English as Holy and pneuma being translated Spirit or Ghost.
To be honest I don’t really appreciate either word – Spirit or Ghost – for the translation of pneuma.
The only thing I can say is because the few words we use in English with pneuma in it tend to relate more to breath or airflow than Spirt or Ghost.
For example pneumonia is an infection of the lungs where air is captured by the body and pneumatic tools – like a pneumatic drill – are tools that are powered by air and air pressure and not electricity.
When we look at some specific examples in scripture that speak of the Spirit we see the relationship to air.
For example in Genesis 2:7 we read at the creation of Adam that it says:
“And the LORD God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul.”
The Greek translation of the passage in the LXX uses pneuma where we write the word, “breathed.”
In one of the most beautiful illustrations of new birth in the OLD Testament Ezekiel writes the following in chapter 37 beginning at the first verse:
Eze 37:1 ¶ The hand of the LORD was upon me, and carried me out in the spirit of the LORD, and set me down in the midst of the valley which was full of bones,
2 And caused me to pass by them round about: and, behold, there were very many in the open valley; and, lo, they were very dry.
3 And he said unto me, Son of man, can these bones live? And I answered, O Lord GOD, thou knowest.
4 Again he said unto me, Prophesy upon these bones, and say unto them, O ye dry bones, hear the word of the LORD.
5 Thus saith the Lord GOD unto these bones; Behold, I will cause breath to enter into you, and ye shall live:
6 And I will lay sinews upon you, and will bring up flesh upon you, and cover you with skin, and put breath in you, and ye shall live; and ye shall know that I am the LORD.
7 So I prophesied as I was commanded: and as I prophesied, there was a noise, and behold a shaking, and the bones came together, bone to his bone.
8 And when I beheld, lo, the sinews and the flesh came up upon them, and the skin covered them above: but there was no breath in them.
9 Then said he unto me, Prophesy unto the wind, prophesy, son of man, and say to the wind, Thus saith the Lord GOD; Come from the four winds, O breath, and breathe upon these slain, that they may live.
10 So I prophesied as he commanded me, and the breath came into them, and they lived, and stood up upon their feet, an exceeding great army.
11 Then he said unto me, Son of man, these bones are the whole house of Israel: behold, they say, Our bones are dried, and our hope is lost: we are cut off for our parts.
12 Therefore prophesy and say unto them, Thus saith the Lord GOD; Behold, O my people, I will open your graves, and cause you to come up out of your graves, and bring you into the land of Israel.
13 And ye shall know that I am the LORD, when I have opened your graves, O my people, and brought you up out of your graves,
14 And shall put my spirit in you, and ye shall live, and I shall place you in your own land: then shall ye know that I the LORD have spoken it, and performed it, saith the LORD.”
Later in the New Testament, John 3 specifically, Jesus said, in describing the Spirit said:
John 3:8 (NKJV) “The wind (Greek pneuma) blows where it wishes, and you hear the sound of it, but cannot tell where it comes from and where it goes. So is everyone who is born of the Spirit (also pneuma).”
It’s not that Spirit isn’t correct but it’s just in our day and age (and for centuries prior) when we say Spirit we think of a person or being in the form of a human being, or shape of a being, sort of appearing in the room.
This imagery is very different from the word Breath or Wind or Air that scripture uses to describe the Spirit.
We remember that on the day of Pentecost that when the Holy Spirit fell from heaven they heard a sound as it were a great rushing wind, yet another evidence of the Spirit which we talk about coming as a force of air traveling from one place to another.
Looking at the Genesis account such air literally traveled out from God (God breathed) and into the clay of Adam – giving Him life.
Jesus will say in our next chapter, at John 15:26:
“But when the Comforter is come, whom I will send unto you from the Father, even the Spirit of truth, which proceedeth from the Father, he shall testify of me.”
I can’t help but liken or see the breath that came from God and gave Adam life and the “pneuma of truth which proceeds from the Father,” more as God’s breath (just like Jesus was God’s Word made flesh) than it being a third and separate spirit being that was dispatched by the Father from heaven to comfort us.
When we think of the breath of God, when we think of pneumonia, when we think of respiration we arrive at another word we use associated with scripture – inspiration and inspired – which translated into English means God breathed.
In 2nd Timothy 3:16 we read:
“All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness.”
That word translated inspiration in the King James comes from the Greek, THEOPNEUSTOS – Theo (GOD) Pnuestos (as in Pneuma meaning breathed)
“God breathed” – all scripture is God breathed.
To me it is of great interest that all of the divine manifestations of God found in scripture come “out of His non-human spirit mouth, so to speak” –
His WORD (made flesh)
And HIS Spirit (breathed out upon those wnho are, by it, given new life).
To multiply the complexity of this we read something really fascinating in John chapter 20.
John 20:19 Then the same day at evening, being the first day of the week, when the doors were shut where the disciples were assembled for fear of the Jews, came Jesus and stood in the midst, and saith unto them, Peace be unto you.
20 And when he had so said, he shewed unto them his hands and his side. Then were the disciples glad, when they saw the Lord.
21 Then said Jesus to them again, Peace be unto you: as my Father hath sent me, even so send I you.
22 And when he had said this, he breathed on them, and saith unto them, Receive ye the Holy Ghost:
23 Whose soever sins ye remit, they are remitted unto them; and whose soever sins ye retain, they are retained.
We’ll cover this really unique passage in the months to come but the point is to link the giving of the Holy Spirit with breathing. And the AMAZING fact that Jesus GAVE THEM the Holy Spirit by His breathing on them.
For me this shows that the Holy Spirit is more the breath of God than an individuated spirit being or person separate from the Father and the Son.
That being said, part of the reason for the Holy Spirit given “personality” and being distinct as in individual being or person is the result that scripture DOES assign attributes of personality to it or Him (like intelligence and volition).

The Holy Spirit is also said to do certain things (like reprove, help, glorify, and intercede) which tend to give Him automony and individuation as a person rather than just a force or breath from God.

For example, in Romans 8:26 Paul writes:

“Likewise the Spirit also helpeth our infirmities: for we know not what we should pray for as we ought: but the Spirit itself maketh intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered.”

Because we read, The Spirit (capital S) we tend to assign Him personality instead of seeing Him as an extension that came from God y way of His “breath.”

Additionally, and admittedly because of the following passages, the Holy Spirit is said to execute offices peculiar only to a “person or being” rather than an essence or manifestation of the living God.

Once office is that of a teacher, which is why Luke 12:12 says:

“For the Holy Ghost shall teach you in the same hour what ye ought to say.”

It’s admittedly natural for us to think of the “Hagias pneuma “ in the capacity of a teacher as a person rather than a wind from God, right?

Acts 5:32 describes the Holy Spirit as a “witness,” another office which seems to indicate that He is a masculiune He rather than a neutered it.

Acts 15:28 appears to give the Holy Spirit the attributes of being pleased, saying:

“For it seemed good to the Holy Ghost, and to us, to lay upon you no greater burden than these necessary things.”

Another support for thinking of Him as a He rather than an it.

In Acts 16:6 we read:

“Now when they had gone throughout Phrygia and the region of Galatia, and were forbidden of the Holy Ghost to preach the word in Asia . . . “

Another passage that makes personification of the wind or breath of God easy.

Acts 28:25 we learn that the Holy Spirit speaks, indicating individuation.

Hebrews 2:4 tells us that “the Holy Spirit is capable of giving spiritual gifts” and then, because Hebrews 3:7 says:

“Wherefore (as the Holy Ghost saith) we believe that He has the ability to articulate instructions of His own accord like any being.

The Holy Spirit is also deemed a separate individual person or being in the Trinity because scripture does refer to the Holy Spirit as God.

Additionally other divine attributes are ascribed to him in some non-direct ways – attributes like omnipresence, (Ps 139:7; Ephesians 2:17,18; 1st Corinthians 12:13) omniscience (1Co 2:10,11);
omnipotence (Luke 1:35; Romans 8:11);
eternity (Hebrews 9:4), Creation (Genesis 1:2; Job 26:13; Psalm 104:30), and the working of miracles (Matthew 12:28; 1st Corinthians 12:9-11).

Here in John we have, as mentioned last week, the word translated “Comforter.”

It is used in the New Testament five times with four of those times being applied to the Holy Spirit– Joh 14:16; 21:25; 15:26; 16:7.

Interestingly, in the other instance it is applied to Jesus Himself –

1st John 2:1: “We have an advocate (paraclete — comforter) with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous.”

Because John wrote all these accounts we can see paraklete is only used by John.

From the words of Jesus we learn that the Holy Spirit was particularly sent to

comfort the disciples; to be with them in his absence and to supply his place; and this is properly expressed by the word Comforter.

To teach them, or remind them of truth; and this might be expressed by the word monitor or teacher, Joh 14:26 Joh 15:26,27.

To aid them in their work; to advocate their cause, or to assist them in advocating the Gospel to the world, and in bringing sinners to repentance.

It was also by the Spirit that they were enabled to stand before kings and magistrates, and boldly to speak in the name of Jesus, (Matthew 10:20).

Jesus adds, speaking of the Holy Spirit that He is (verse 17)

Even “the Spirit of truth; whom the world cannot receive, because it seeth him not, neither knoweth him: but ye know him; for he dwelleth with you, and shall be in you.”

He is called here “the Spirit of Truth” (the penuma of alathea) because that is his purpose –to bring all to Christ and teach all of Christ (who is the Way, the Truth, and the Life).

So He is the Spirit of Christ, the Spirit of Truth sent from the Father to testify, teach, warn, direct, guide, inspire and comfort – to protect from error and provide words to speak when called upon to do so.

Jesus says that the World (meaning this fallen world the Kosmos) – full of pride and ambition, and fleshly pleasures will not understand His influence.

Though the King James says,

The world cannot receive nor see, the words mean to perceive or understand him and His ways.

Why so?

The THINGS of GOD are discerned by the Spirit of God and not the flesh.

The natural man cannot discern what is from God unless he is spiritual, born-again, or at least has the Holy Spirit abiding upon him.

This is the key and the dealt to why the Holy Spirit is so vital to Christianity – without it or Him we would not be able to do anything WITH the Truth Jesus Christ.

He would just “be” – sort of like God in heaven trying to relate to the Nation of Israel or maybe even any other religious ruler.

Understand, the Work Jesus did on earth was NOT like any other religious leader – it was supreme and utterly sacrificial.

But what I mean by this is without the Holy Spirit and his ability to take the meaning and message and thrust of Christ and His person into our hearts we would all sort of stand back and look upon His works on the cross and in His life and only relate to them intellectually.

This is NOT the meaning of believing on Jesus and being saved.

The meaning is we look on Him and His life and saving works, and God sends the Holy Spirit to fill us, confirming to us that Jesus is who He said He is and granting us new life no differently than how God gave Adam new life when He breathed into him and He became a living soul.

Here’s the deal – Adam was inanimate prior to being breathed into by God. He was of the dirt and had no life in Him and therefore no ability to perceive ANYTHING – especially God.

But God breathed into Adam and He became a LIVING soul.

Now read verse 17 with me again here. Jesus says, speaking of the Holy Spirit that he is –

Even “the Spirit of truth; whom the world cannot receive, because it seeth him not, neither knoweth him: but ye know him; for he dwelleth with you, and shall be in you.”

Now, speaking of this spirit, “the Spirit of Truth” the world, who cannot receive Him (cannot understand Him) is like Adam before God breathed into him – dead in sin and not only incapable of living but incapable of comprehending God.

They are like inanimate Adam (and we used to belong to this group) “of the earth, the World,” forged out of the clay but without any life.

Jesus referred those who are in this state as being “dead already” (like the walking dead).

In other words those who are in the world cannot receive the Spirit of Truth (which works on spiritual perspectives) because the wind, or breath of God, has not “inspired them,” . . . yet – not given them life and with life comes the ability to see and respond and recognize etc.

When He has, this Holy Spirit not only “inspire us,” baptizing our hearts with “fire,” but by living in us reveals the invisible God for whom Christ came to describe – whom Jesus came to reveal.

This Spirit, this breath is actually the Spirit of Jesus. It is Jesus Himself in a sense because Jesus is not only the Truth He is also the Life.

So when the Spirit animates a person they are being animated by the Life.

Galatians 4:6 makes this point about the Holy Spirit clear when Paul says:

“And because ye are sons, God hath sent forth “the Spirit of his Son” into your hearts, crying, Abba, Father.”

So in addition to giving us life, and being a teacher, and a comforter, and teaching us to love, and bringing Jesus into our hearts, and helping us know that we are saved, this Spirit – being the Spirit of Christ – allows us to look to God Himself and call Him papa – the way ONLY Jesus could do prior to His ascension and the falling of the Holy Spirit.

I think we do not fail the direction of scripture in the least by saying that Jesus literally lives in us spiritually when we believe.

That is it Him – and He teaches and directs believers in all things as we acquiesce our will and ways over to Him.

With Jesus Being God we say God in us and this is perfectly true.

And so as believers we are all trying to understand how to allow God to have His perfect will in us while our flesh battles to have its will.

Now there are three words in the Greek that describe the Holy Spirits relationship with human beings –

“para”
“en”
and “epi”

Prior to the finished work of Christ God was not able to abide in the hearts of sinful human beings (by His Spirit) simple because the blood of bulls and goats shed were not sufficient in cleansing the human heart of sin and God (who is Spirit) was not going to live in an unclean place.

In Old Testament times the Holy Spirit would work “on” individuals, and would fall “upon” them but was never inside them – never in the human heart.

As a result nobody was spiritually regenerated (or given new spiritual life or was born-again) before the death and resurrection of Jesus, whose shed blood made possible for God to make His abode with human beings.

The Greek word for the way the Holy Spirit worked upon human beings then was para – like the prefix we have to the term, parameter.

It means around . . . but not in.

Once Jesus did His work, the Holy Spirit, by the grace of God according to faith on His only begotten, was able to move in.

The English word we have for “in” (I-N) is EN in Greek – same meaning.

Here in John 14 the disciples are mourning over the departure of Jesus and He has told them that He was going to ask the Father to send them the Holy Spirit, who He says is “the Spirit of Truth” that “the world cannot receive neither can ginosko (know) BUT, Jesus says:

“but ye know him; for he dwelleth with you (THE GREEK WORD FOR THIS LINE, “He dwelleth with you” is “para,” meaning, “He is around you,” (parameter) but then He adds) “and shall be in you.” (the Greek being EN, meaning shall be inside you.)

This line is key to our understanding the difference between the influence of the Holy Spirit on people and God Himself making His abode in our hearts by and through His holy Spirit.

Notice the careful choice of words Jesus uses to His apostles at this time.

The Holy Spirit is with you (para) and by this you know Him AND he shall be EN you – and when would this occur?

At Pentecost for sure. Possibly before in the apostles case.

The reason I say “possibly before” is because the Lord does, in John 20, breathe on them prior to Pentecost (but after His resurrection) and tells them that they have received the Holy Spirit.

Because of this I wonder if the apostles were filled with the Holy Spirit at this time prior.

Hard to tell because the Pentecost experience seems to intimate that it happened then.

Maybe Jesus was giving them a sample of the Spirit when he breathed on them?

What we do know, and what we can tell, is that with the indwelling of the Holy Spirit believers are gifted with a number of miraculous realizations, abilities and gifts.

First, when the Spirit is in us, God is in us. Both the Father and the Son have made their home in us.

As Jesus says in a few verses:

“If a man love me, he will keep my words: and my Father will love him, and we will come unto him, and make our abode with him.”

I mean do you believe this? That the Father and the Son actually live in you?
If so that is a radical fact, isn’t it?

We often talk about dying and going to God but in reality we have God living in us now and can – if we allow it – experience Him more and more as if in His presence on high.

All of this being possible by and through the Holy Spirit who takes us in our fleshly, human state and sort-of helps us assimilate into the presence of God while we are here.

Naturally this would take us out of this world and into His realm the deeper we go – making our interactions and engagements and acceptance by the world less and less.

The interesting thing about this is that while the world may reject us as we relate to it less and less THOSE WHO ARE of the truth will engage and relate with us more and more.

Truth seekers will see and know the love of God exuding from us and will navigate toward it rather than be repelled by it.

So where there will be a loss of this world there will simultaneously be a grafting in with other children of light.

Wild huh?

Then we know that we are being influenced and directed by the presence of this Holy Spirit.

Again these influences do NOT operate the way the world operates – if they did then the world would comprehend it.

It’s the reason I have such difficulty with worldly applications assigned to the work of God – like rock concerts and motivational preaching.

The world operates on such premises and NOT the Spirit. When this is forgotten we have an amazing ability to call the peace that the world gives the Spirit – and thereby be manipulated.

The spirit works on and influences in a way very different from the world.

Galatians 5:22-23 says:

“But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance: against such there is no law.”

We have to admit that Paul did not say that the fruit of the Spirit is candlelight, amplified music, emotionalism, or other ambiances that cater to such.

Ephesians 5:9 says “For the fruit of the Spirit is in all goodness and righteousness and truth.”

In the end, without question, the fruit of the Spirit is summarized in one word:

Love – defined as agape love, which is what God is.

We know and are about to be reminded in the coming weeks that the fruit God desires of all His children to bear is this agape love for Him and others – selfless, unconditional love, is what the Holy Spirit moves all who are God’s to do – as exhibited by the life of His Son.

For this reason, when we allowing ourselves to be under the influence of the Holy Spirit there is humility, gentleness, kindness, longsuffering, meekness, peacemaking and the like – things the world cannot comprehend.

Finally, for today, the very presence of the Holy Spirit tells us that God is with us.

1st John 3:24 says it well:
“And he that keepeth his commandments dwelleth in him, and he in him. And hereby we know that he abideth in us, by the Spirit which he hath given us.”

What a gift.

From this point Jesus then launches into a topic related to the Holy Spirit but with a little more detail, reiterating to the eleven (at verse 18)

John 14:18 I will not leave you comfortless: I will come to you.

This is an interesting line.

Back in John 13:33 Jesus addressed the eleven by saying:

“Little children, yet a little while I am with you.”

This is a statement a Father would say to his offspring. Well here when He says,
“I will not leave you comfortless: I will come to you,” the passage from the Greek really has Jesus say:

“I will not leave you orphans – without a parent – I will come to you.”

We know this because the Greek word for Comfortless is ORPHANOS – which literally means “without a parent.”

“I may be going away but I will take care of your future, I will provide for you and your future welfare.”

How?

Though absent in the body He would be present with them by the Spirit.

He adds:

19 Yet a little while, and the world seeth me no more; but ye see me: because I live, ye shall live also.

“In a little while,” (this was all being said the day before his death) the world will not theoreo me any longer (discern me) but you will discern me (colon) BECAUSE I LIVE YE SHALL LIVE ALSO.

In opposition to the walking dead of the world, Jesus is saying that while the rest of the World will no long perceive Him (because He was physically going to go away but they would (how?)

Again, by His Spirit, “spiritually.” Which is the ONLY way people can perceive or discern Jesus Christ today.

When Jesus says, BECAUSE I LIVE He is saying (“though I am about to be put to death I will overcome the grave and will rise again, and because of this I, as the Living King (having overcome sin, the grave, and death) YOU TOO “SHALL” live also.

“You may be existing among the dead physically but you will be spirit-filled, truly living abundantly because I have lived first.”

And then He adds (verse 20)

20 At that day (that day when they shall begin living, that day when the Holy Spirit moves into them, probably Pentecost) “ye shall know that I am in my Father, and ye in me, and I in you.”

And this knowing is of more value than anything else He could have bestowed upon these men – and on us.

Let’s stop there and we’ll pick it up next week.

Q and A

Prayer