May it please the Lord to bless
us together this evening as we meditate in his word. Let's turn
to the Gospel of John, chapter 14, and we'll read verse 18.
The Gospel of John, chapter 14, and reading verse 18. I will
not leave you comfortless, I will come to you. These were, of course, words
that the Lord Jesus spoke to his disciples on that Passover
night in the upper room, just a very short time, a few hours,
before he was to be arrested and then taken to Pontius Pilate
and eventually crucified upon that cross at Calvary. And here
in these few chapters in the Gospel of John is recorded the
wonderful address that he gave to his disciples, and the encouragement
that we read from it today, and how encouraging it must have
been to the disciples, not knowing really what was to occur. The Lord had spelled it out on
several occasions, but it hadn't really sunk into their minds,
and yet the Lord graciously gave them this wonderful account.
They will be able to think upon and rely upon and bless God for. He says, I will not leave you
comfortless, I will come to you. Well, we need to realise of course
who the comforter is. And the Word of God tells us
in the chapter we read, and verse 26 tells us, but the Comforter,
which is the Holy Ghost, whom the Father will send in my name,
he shall teach you all things and bring all things to your
remembrance whatsoever I have said unto you. Now that was demonstrably
true for the disciples, but it is also true for the whole Church
of God. How wonderful it is that we have
the Holy Spirit to convey to us the truth of Almighty God. And as that truth is conveyed
to us, surely it will bring comfort to our hearts. The verses just before this 18th
verse tell us, and I will pray the father and he shall give
you another comforter that he may abide with you forever, 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." Well that was true, wasn't it,
of the disciples because we know that by this time Judas Iscariot
had left and gone out. And therefore the Lord was now
addressing his disciples who were truly blessed with this
great truth that the Spirit of God did indeed dwell with them
and was in them. And that's not confined of course
to the disciples. It's true of the Church of God. And my friends, the great important
question for us isn't it, is whether that Holy Spirit of God
is dwelling with us and shall be in you. And if it is, and if we have
the evidence of it, then the truth will be the Lord will not
leave us comfortless. I will come to you and we shall
receive the comfort of the work of the Holy Spirit, which again
is spoken to us in this 26th verse, we refer to, he shall
teach you all things and bring all things to your remembrance
whatsoever I have said unto you. Now that can be in a general
way with regard to the truth of scripture, but also it is
relative to a very personal way. That which the Holy Spirit does
for us and speaks to us and instructs us in, there will be those times
then when that Holy Spirit will bring these things to our remembrance. And what encouragement that must
be to us. What wonderful encouragement
it must be to us. I just told John before the service,
and I'll just mention it to you now. I don't speak, as you know,
very much about myself. But I can be thankful, and it's
to God's glory, that there are really two occasions in my life
when such words were wonderfully true. One was many, many years
ago, and one was very recently. The one I think you may know
about many years ago when I was in India and in Delhi and I was
really quite ill and I was in bed and I thought, well, I'm
really too ill to get out of bed and I needn't read the Bible
and the devil said, well, you're too ill, you stay in bed, there's
no problem at all. Well, I believe the Spirit of God gave me the
willpower and the effort to get out of bed and I sat in the chair
and I opened the Word of God and I read the short epistle
of Titus. If you know it's not a very long
book but it's a very glorious and it's a very precious book
and I read through it until I came to these words in the second
chapter, looking for that blessed hope and the glorious appearing
of the great God and our Saviour, Jesus Christ. And in my situation
then, the Lord came and just brought text after text into
my soul and it just flowed in. I didn't think, the words just
flowed in. It really was like, we read in
Revelation as pure water, that river of pure water, clear as
crystal. The Word of God just flowed in.
And for several minutes, I enjoyed the peace and blessing of God.
And the wonderful effect was, it brought peace. It was indeed
the evidence, was it not, of the work of God. He brought these
things to my remembrance. And then recently, just a few
weeks ago, I woke up in the morning and I had literally just woken
up and I was quite clearly awake and the Lord brought back into
my mind the many, many things that the Lord had done for me
in my life and I didn't have to think about them and it really
began from the beginning and one after another thing flowed
into my mind and it was very clearly the work
of the Spirit of God. What did it do? Well, it brought peace into my
heart. And so we can think, no, I'm
not setting that as any standard. Please, the Word of God is a
standard. But just to be encouraged that still today the Lord does
work in these ways. And it is a wonderful evidence
for us and an encouragement to us that we are possessing the
work of the Holy Spirit within us. Because these are not things
which our flesh can produce. I've told you on several occasions
the case of John Warburton, when he was wonderfully blessed in
his life. He went into a field and he danced
in the field unto the Lord. And the devil came and said,
well, I did that. So John Warburton said, well,
devil, if you did it, do it again. And of course, the devil was
not able to produce that light blessing. And neither is he.
See, these things are the blessed work of the Holy Spirit. And truly, you see, when we realise
and recognise and receive the work of the Holy Spirit, it is
indeed very comforting to us. And so the Word tells us tonight,
I will not leave you comfortless. And the work of the Spirit in
our souls is that which is gloriously comforting to us. You may say,
why is that? I'll tell you why it is. Because
it clearly shows to us that the Holy Spirit is working in our
soul. Because the Lord has done and
is doing that for us that you and I could not do ourselves. That really is a very tangible
and a very clear evidence of God's work. Perhaps we received
a word from God. The Lord may have spoken very
quietly. The Lord often does speak very
quietly. The Lord often speaks in a way that we perhaps didn't
expect. Elijah received the word of God. It wasn't in the earthquake.
It wasn't in the storm and tempest. It was a still, small voice,
but it was an effectual word and it spoke to him so appropriately. What was the word? What doest
thou hear Elijah? He'd run away. God had wonderfully blessed him on
Mount Carmel and now, being left to the weakness of his flesh,
he'd run away. Well you see sometimes the Spirit of God comes to us
and just speaks to us in a very quiet way, a very significant
way. And we realise it is the Lord. It's the Lord that's come and
addressed us. It may be perhaps you've been
walking down the road suddenly a word may drop into your heart.
Maybe a line of a hymn, maybe a text, maybe a word directly
from God in a separate way. But it will be that which you
were not expecting. I think that's often the case. There are those times obviously
when we may be waiting very much for the word of the Lord to answer
and to speak, and he does in his time. But there may be those
other times when the Lord comes to us and speaks to us. And when he comes, there are
comforting words. What do they show to us? Well,
they show to us his great love toward us. No one receives any word from
the Comforter who God does not love. But you see, those whom
God loves, he meets with, he addresses. And so how good it
is to realise, and don't forget the word of God is true, he says,
I will not leave you comfortless, I will come to you. We need to be encouraged, don't
we, in our little lives, that the Lord is with us. You might
remember in the days of Joshua, well, the Lord had commissioned
him to take on the mantle of Moses. That wasn't easy, was
it? And Joshua no doubt realized
what he was like, and the Lord spoke to him. very encouraging
words. And he says this, There shall
not any man be able to stand before thee all the days of thy
life. As I was with Moses, so I will be with thee. I will not fail thee, nor forsake
thee. Now Joshua needed the words of
the Holy Spirit to be applied to his heart. He got a difficult
job to carry out, to bring the children across Jordan into Egypt,
into Canaan. And so the Lord tells him, be
strong and of a good courage for unto this people shall they
divide an inheritance, the land which I swear unto their fathers
to give them. Only be thou strong and very
courageous that thou mayest observe to do according to all the law
which Moses my servant commanded thee, turn not from the right
hand or to the left, that thou mayest prosper whithersoever
thou goest." What gracious words they were from the Holy Spirit
to Joshua and how he needed them as he journeyed on in his life
and carried out the commission that God had given him. Well,
we do need the strength and we do need the support of the Holy
Spirit and of course that was to Joshua but also the Apostle
Paul directs us in very similar terms when he wrote to the Hebrews
and he tells us in these words Let your conversation be without
covetousness, and be content with such things as you have.
For he hath said, I will never leave thee, nor forsake thee."
Now that surely is the encouragement that you and I need, to know
the Lord will never leave us, nor forsake us. We may fear sometimes
the Lord will leave us and forsake us. may recognise that we deserve
to be left unforsaken. The Lord graciously doesn't deal
with us according to what we deserve, but he deals with us
in love to our souls and shows to us his great mercy. And so he encourages us these
words and as the Apostle went on to say, therefore we may boldly
say, the Lord is my helper. I will not fear what man shall
do unto me. Sometimes we fear don't we? Well
let us remember the encouraging words of our God and realize
it is the great and blessed work of the Holy Spirit We spoke this
morning, didn't we, of the Word, the Lord Jesus Christ, and that
great and glorious work that the Saviour has done. And now
here we have this evening the great and glorious work of the
Holy Spirit. And the work of the Holy Spirit
is to direct us to the Saviour. And how wonderful it is that
that does occur. And I believe as the work of
God enters into our soul, it's a blessed consideration to come
to that place whereby the work of the Spirit,
we are blessed with love to God the Father because of his love
to us. Love to God the Son, because
of his love to us. And love to God the Holy Spirit,
because of his love to us. Now, the result. Peace. Peace, isn't it? The Lord reveals these things
to you and me. It brings peace. Because we have
peace with God. The Lord comes and reveals these
blessed things to us and moves our spirit, moves our heart. It is gracious and glorious work. And what are we proving? We're
proving this. I will not leave you comfortless.
I will come to you. The Lord comes to us. in unexpected
ways, unexpected conditions, unexpected situations. And what
is the result? Glory to God. Glory to God. Thankfulness to Almighty God
that He should have looked upon us so unworthy of the least favour,
so unworthy of any mercy. to realise the Lord has looked
upon us, the Lord has touched our hearts, the Lord has blessed
us. What a privilege and what a favour
it is. I will not leave you comfortless,
I will come to you. And so it is, so true and so
wonderful to realise we cannot trifle with the work of the Holy
Spirit. And there are those accounts
in the Word of God where there have been those who really trifled
indeed with the things of God. And we read in the Acts of the
Apostles about that very sad case of Adonais and Sapphira. pretended to sell their land
for a price that was less than they actually received, so that
they kept back some for themselves. And Peter addressed Ananias and
said, why hath Satan filled thine heart to lie to the Holy Ghost
and to keep back part of the price of land? whilst it remained,
was it not thine own? And after it was sold, was it
not in thine own power? Why hast thou conceived this
thing in thine heart? Thou hast not lied unto men,
but unto God.' Now the apostle there directs us, you see, to
this great statement. He addresses them, as the Holy
Ghost and also addresses them that it is God. Again the wonderful
proof there that the Holy Ghost is God. The third person in the
Trinity should be encouraging to us to realise how the Word
of God sets things out. Perhaps in locations that we
don't expect, but it's good therefore if our If we're able to study
the Scriptures, it's a great blessing to study the Word of
God. Because again, it is comforting to us as we trace out the work
of the Holy Spirit. And to trace out that the work
of the Holy Spirit is indeed the work of God himself. Well,
of course, sadly, Ananias and Sapphira had both schemed to
be deceitful and to lie to the Holy Ghost. It's very sad, isn't
it? May we not be left to lie to the Holy Ghost. May we be
found amongst those who are honest in the things of God. And so
we have these words that the Lord Jesus speaks. He says, I
will pray the Father and he shall give you another comforter. You
see, when the Saviour had been with them, What a comforter he'd
been to them, but he was going to leave them. What was going to happen? The
Lord tells them, he'll send his comforter, which is indeed the
Holy Spirit, and he will abide with you forever. Forever. Once we are in Christ, once we
are blessed by the work of the Holy Spirit, It is that which
the Lord does, which will not be taken away. We won't lose
it. The work of the Spirit is there
for eternity. Surely that's so humbling, is
it not? To think of that, the work of the Holy Spirit in our
little lives. If we have that evidence of the
Spirit's work, will never be removed. It is an eternal blessing. It is that which the Lord has
done for us, which the Lord has revealed to us. And as he comes then and gives
us this evidence of his work in our hearts, word is fulfilled,
I will not leave you comfortless." What a promise it is to the Church
of God. What a promise for us tonight,
because how necessary it is that we do receive from time to time
the encouragement from the Comforter, We don't want to go on, do we,
in our little life without any blessing. We don't want to be
content with just worldly things. Worldly things perish. Worldly
things vanish away. Spiritual things are eternal. Spiritual blessings come from
God. And so he tells us, These things
have I spoken unto you. The Lord speaks. What a blessing
then for us tonight if we know that we do possess the great
blessing and favour from Almighty God. You know the Apostle Paul,
when he wrote to the Romans, he tells us this. The God of hope. Well, do we
have a hope? Do we have a hope? Why do we
have a hope? Why do you have a hope tonight? Now, the God of hope, fill you
with all joy and peace in believing that you may abound in hope through
the power of the Holy Ghost. It's the work of the Holy Ghost
that gives us that good hope. It's what He's done for our soul. It's of His grace. It's of His
favour. And as it is so, then His name
receives the honour and receives the glory. The God of hope, fill you with all joy and peace
in believing. Now if the Spirit of God has
touched our hearts, what has it actually done? Surely
it has given us that grace to believe in the Lord. Because it's not something that
we produced ourselves. The things that we produce ourselves
come and go, but the things of the Spirit of God are lodged
in our heart. They're eternal blessings. They
will not depart. And so, what a favour it is then
to be blessed with this. And it comes in this way, produces
joy, and peace, joy. It's a very humble joy as we
have the evidence of God's love toward us, the evidence of the
work of the Holy Spirit in our hearts. It must bring joy, mustn't
it, to think that we are born again of the Spirit of God. We haven't been left, we haven't
been forsaken. The Lord's been mindful of us.
We were undeserving of it. The Lord's come. He's drawn us
to himself. He's lodged a word perhaps in
our heart. It's the work of the Holy Spirit.
Does it not bring joy? It's a joy in our heart to think
that this great God has been mindful of me, has not left me,
has not passed me by. And so it is, joy, and that joy
then brings peace, and it's peace with God. Peace with God, it's
beautiful words, aren't they? Peace through his cross, as Jesus
made. The Holy Spirit, you see, reveals
to us the things of Jesus. That's what it does. Reveals
to us the blessed work of the Saviour. You may think, well,
I know all about that. It's when the Holy Spirit applies
the Word. It's when the Holy Spirit comes
and shows that the Lord Jesus Christ is precious to us. It's then There is the great
and glorious effect of it, of His mercy and His love toward
us. We sang our prayer meeting, the
last hymn 766, which has this beautiful last verse, on such
love. Yes, the love of God to our souls. The love of the Holy Spirit in
revealing to us what we are and what Christ is. So work in the
Holy Spirit. Don't expect wonderful things.
Don't expect great revelations. Be thankful for anything that
the Lord has done for you. On such love my soul still
ponder. Love so great, so rich, so free. And think of it in this way.
The love of Christ saves our soul. Eternally blessed. Can't be any greater love than
that, can there? Love so great, so rich, it's so valuable. So valuable. And shown to us
by the Holy Spirit of God. shown to us by this Comforter,
who therefore does not leave us comfortless, because the Comfort
from God reveals His great truths to us. So rich, eternally rich,
and yet we never paid for it. It was free, so free. Free, the love of God. So whilst lost in holy wonder,
and I believe this sets it before us, doesn't it? This great work
of the Holy Spirit that brings comfort to our hearts. We're
lost in holy wonder that this God should have condescended
to come to us. and have compassion on us, vile
sinner that we are. Just like Job, behold, I am vile. But God bless Job and God bless
his people. The comforter comes. Why, O Lord,
such love to me? We will all stand on level ground,
amazed that God, the Almighty God, should have looked upon
us, should have called us out of the darkness of nature
into the glorious light of the everlasting gospel, and it's
the work of the blessed Spirit of God. Say, why, O Lord, such love to
me? Hallelujah. Praise the Lord. Do we not have reason to say
that tonight? That we possess the blessed evidence
of God's work in our heart, to come and say, hallelujah. He writes this, grace shall reign
eternally. God's grace is an eternal blessing. doesn't come, doesn't evaporate. Once in Him, in Him forever.
I will not leave you comfortless. I will come to you. This is the
promise of God. It's not a word of man. It's
the promise of God to know the Lord indeed will not leave us
Comfortless and so may we indeed be blessed with the wonderful
work of the Spirit and just Just to think that's for half a moment
on the words of in the Song of Solomon Where the Bride of Christ
speaks about the glorious truth of this and she says and this
is deliverance and For, lo, the winter is past, the rain is over
and gone, the flowers appear on the earth, the time of the
singing of birds is come, the voice of the turtle is heard
in our land, the fig tree putteth forth her green figs, and the
vines with tender grape give a good smell. Arise, my love,
my fair one, come away. What is it? It's the work of
the Holy Spirit. Yes, how comforting it is to
know this work and to see in our soul, in our spiritual life,
the wonderful working of the Holy Spirit causing in our soul
the flowers to appear, the birds that were to sing, the work of
the Spirit, showing to us the great and glorious work of God. Oh, my friends, how encouraging
and how blessed it is. And what does the Apostle John
say when he wrote to the Revelation, the work of the Holy Spirit?
He that hath ears to hear, let him hear now that the Holy Spirit
has worked in our heart. is open our ears to hear the
word of the Lord and to be encouraged by it and to be strengthened
by it. And surely it is comforting to
us. The promise in tonight is, I
will not leave you comfortless. The margin tells us that this
word comfortless can also be translated as an orphan. Well,
orphans, of course, are sad, aren't they? They've lost their
parents and they're by themselves. Well, the Lord says here, He
will not leave us to be by ourselves. He will not leave us as orphans,
but He will be with us. And you know that's through life
and into eternity and through eternity. To think of the amazing
love and mercy of God, to look upon such unworthy sinners and
to draw them out of themselves towards the Saviour, to direct
them to His great and glorious finished work, and to show to
them the love of God the Father, the love of God the Son, the
love of God the Holy Spirit, to the least of sinners. Apostle Paul spoke of himself
as the least who deserved anything, the greatest sinner. The Lord
came and blessed him. I believe the whole Church of
God take up that view less than the least of all saints. They
won't mourn themselves for someone worthy of any good, but they
will desire name of their God may be honoured and glorified
because of what the Comforter has done for them in blessing
them with life in their souls. There's no greater blessing for
any of us here tonight than to receive the blessed work of the
Holy Spirit within our souls because that work of the Holy
Spirit will not stop. It will not finish. It is an
eternal work, which will be with us throughout eternity. I will not leave you comfortless.
I will come to you. Amen.