We're going to join chapter 14
and we're going to read from verse 15. And it's the Lord Jesus Christ
who is speaking and this is what he says. If you love me, keep my commandments
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. I will not leave you comfortless,
I will come to you. Yet a little while, and the world
seeth me no more, but ye see me. Because I live, ye shall
live also. At that day ye shall know that
I am in my Father, and ye in me, and I in you. He that hath
my commandments and keepeth them, he it is that loveth me. And
he that loveth me shall be loved of my Father, and I will love
him and will manifest myself to him. Judas saith unto him,
not Iscariot, Lord, how is it that thou wilt manifest thyself
unto us and not unto the world? Jesus answered and said unto
him, 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. Amen. May the Lord bless to us
this reading from his word. Just a little point there, that
reference to Judas speaking, that's not Iscariot. It's really
lovely that the Holy Spirit identified this Judas. This is the Judas
or Jude. who wrote the little epistle
at the end of our Bibles. We studied that together a few
months ago. This is the same Jude or Judas,
but it's lovely that the Holy Spirit distinguishes him from
the betrayer, from he who betrayed the Lord to the Jews. It just shows us that even in
something as small as this, the Holy Spirit is well aware of
the distinctions amongst people and he allows us to know who
this is that is speaking. Right. We remember that the Lord Jesus
was comforting his disciples in this passage. Remember we
started John chapter 14 reading together, So the Lord was telling his disciples plainly
that he was about to leave them and return to his father in heaven. And their discouragement at the
loss of their master and their disappointment for the loss of
their earthly ambitions was being countered in this passage in
the Lord's speech. by Christ's encouragements of
spiritual and heavenly blessing. And I want us just to pause there
at the very outset. It will be in this world that
we will encounter earthly discouragements. But the Lord has a richness for
his people, a blessedness for his church that resides not in
the temporal, fleeting blessings and happinesses of this world,
but in the eternal, the enduring privileges of the spiritual realm. And we must always remember to
lift our eyes above the trials of our times, and to concentrate,
to dwell upon the eternal blessings that the Lord has for his church. That is what he is teaching his
disciples here. His words are what we're going
to think about. The details are what is important. But the general principle is
sound. Let us always remember to look
beyond our immediate trials, to see the glory of Christ and
the privileges of being joined to him and united with him. When we come to see the Lord
speaking here and think about what it is that he is saying,
we find that the Lord purposefully reinforces his authority to speak
as he does. The disciples knew who the Lord
was. Peter had been able to say many
months before, thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God. They
had seen the miracles. They had heard the ministry,
the sermons of the Lord. They had a a very good understanding
of who the Lord was. It wasn't full, it wasn't perfect,
it still had to be enlarged, it still had to be increased,
but they knew who the Lord was. Nevertheless, As if to ground
it, as if to make it firm and foundational, the Lord reinforces
His authority by giving a clear statement as to His own divinity
and equality with God the Father. And he says to his disciples,
I am in the Father and the Father in me, expressing both union
and perfect equality between the Father and the Son. But this isn't all. The Saviour
says, When he teaches in these verses, he tells the disciples
that he shall pray to his father on their behalf. So his prayer
is still in this mediatorial capacity that he has. So Christ, when he came into
the world as a man, accepted a subordinate position to his
father. He prayed to his father. He worshipped
his father. He lived as a servant to his
father in his mediatorial capacity. He was still the Lord God. He
was still equal and co-equal with God the Father and God the
Holy Spirit. But in his mediatorial capacity,
he would pray, to the Father on behalf of his disciples that
the Father would send the Holy Spirit to them, that the Father
would bestow upon them the gift of the Holy Ghost to further
strengthen and equip and bless his people. He, the Holy Ghost,
shall be another comforter to the Church with Christ. And so begins this amazing passage
of divine revelation as the Lord Jesus Christ opens to his disciples
his divine plan for the church and the sublime relationships
that exist between God and man. relationships that will flow
from the Lord's death, accompany his resurrection, and mark his
return, his ascension to his father. And it is safe to say that this
passage, and we could speak about this passage, the verses before
us today, or the broader passage of chapters 14, 15, 16, and 17,
which God willing, I trust we will be able to go through in
the coming weeks and months. But it is safe to say that this
passage is of exquisite value to the church. Indeed, if it
were not for the clear statements of our Saviour, we would fear
to overstep ourselves in conceiving what the Lord here promises to
us as a matter of fact. If we were to conceive, if we
were to come up, if we were to construe and imagine these things
to be so, had it not been that the Lord had so clearly set them
before us, we would fear to overstep ourselves. But here, scripture
declares what men could never deduce. And the Savior reveals
what only the divine prophet could convey to fallen men and
women. You remember the mediatorial
roles of the Lord, prophet, priest, and king. He was a priest when
he offered his own blood at the cross to atone for the sins of
his people. He is a king because he has a
kingdom and he is king. He is rule over his church and
people. And he is prophet because he
reveals these wonderful truths. He is the fulfillment of God's
revelation to man. He reveals these wonderful truths
of our status, our position, our blessedness in him because
of what he has done. And Christ tells us that through
his atoning death and his cleansing blood, our bodies, our bodies,
these fleshy bodies, these weak, frail, and sinful bodies, this
flesh in which there is no profit, our bodies have become the temple
of the triune God. the temple of the triune God
in his three distinct persons. Now, we are not gods, and we
are not divine, and we will continue to dwell in these sinful bodies
until the Lord changes us from glory into glory and takes us
into heaven to be with him. But right now, in time, We are
joined to the eternal God in a supernatural and transcendent
way. When we talk about conversion,
this isn't just a simple change of mind. This is such a transformation,
such a new creation. that we are only now beginning
to paddle in the shallows of what the Lord has done for us. The eternal God Jehovah in three
persons lives in us. Lives in His people. The Father
lives in us. The Son lives in us. And the Holy Spirit lives in
us. If so be that we are redeemed
by Christ's blood and reconciled to God by the death of the Son. Our verses today and in the coming
weeks comprise an extended lesson from the Lord. It's a big sermon,
if you like. And here the Lord sets out the
promises of divine grace for the comfort of his disciples
and his church. The Lord Jesus identifies his
true people, those who love him and live in him. And he confirms
the glorious gift of the Holy Spirit. And he reveals the harmony
of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit in coming to dwell in
the heart and soul of each believer. Now we're going to return to
this in a moment or two, but before we do that, I want to
leave just a few general thoughts from this passage with you before
we return specifically to this matter of God in us. And first
I want to touch on the early verses that speak to us of Christ's
commandments and then to think about what it is to live in Him. So here's the first point that
I want to mention to you today. Keeping Christ's commandments,
what that means and how we are best to understand it. The first
thing to note is that these commandments are Christ's commandments. We're not speaking here about
the Mosaic Law, or we're not speaking here about the Ten Commandments. This is gospel instruction. These are the things that Christ
has spoken about, that Christ has taught his people, that Christ
has committed to us. They are his doctrines. They
are his truths. It is Christ's way of life and
peace and blessing for his church that is encompassed in this phrase,
keeping my commandments. These commandments are not burdens. They're not chores, they're not
duties and responsibilities that become wearisome and challenging
to us as the Lord's people. Because, remember what the Lord
has said, my yoke is easy, my burden is light. Christ's yoke
is easy to bear. These commandments comprise of
trusting and resting and enjoying the blessings of Christ by faith. They entail learning Christ,
which every believer is forward and eager to do. They comprise of communing with
Christ, which is our singular delight as we deepen our knowledge
of him and we discover more and more how wonderful he is. And it has to do with feeding
on him. Every living creature must feed
and refresh and renew. And so our living souls have
a need to daily be sustained by the Lord. And I pointed out
yesterday how Christian obedience is the fruit of grace in the
heart of a believer. The Lord requires nothing from
a believer that he does not first bestow to us. We often wish that we loved Christ,
that we loved God the Father, that we loved God the Holy Spirit
more. And yet love Him we do. And our
love for Him is growing. Love for God is evidence of spiritual
life. If we are spiritually alive,
we love God. Now we might think that we don't
love Him enough. We shall love him more as we
learn more about him. The grace of God in his people
enables and empowers those traits, those characteristics that the
Lord seeks in the life and the walk and the conversation of
his new creation. And Christ's commandments are
not duties to be obeyed and challenges to be worked through, their gifts
to be exercised, their privileges to be enjoyed. They are blessed invitations,
if you like, to experience happiness and comfort and help at His hand
as we make our way through this world, as we live daily in this
world. Keeping the Lord's commands is
not in isolation a condition or a requirement for God's blessing. We already possess the blessings
of God in Christ. They are free gifts. All of God's
goodness is a free gift of grace. If something were required of
us, we would not fulfill the conditions. It is out of God's
goodness, it is out of his mercy. Surely goodness and mercy shall
follow me all the days of my life, and I shall dwell in the
house of the Lord forever. We already possess many blessings
in Christ. They're his free gifts. And keeping
the Lord's commandments is living in those gifts by faith. And this all believers do. We do keep his commandments,
just like we do love him. We are enabled, we are empowered
to do so by grace. And doing so is our pleasure
and our privilege. Every believer loves the Lord
and every believer delights to serve the Lord and to practice
obedience to his calling and to his cause. And I repeat, we're
not sinless. It grieves our hearts when we
fail to be obedient. Our conscience pricks. We feel
like we have let the Lord down when in weakness, The weakness
of this flesh, we are hindered, we're prevented. We're hindered
in doing what our quickened spirit longs to do, which is love and
serve him more. And just let me make a little
practical application here for you, and I trust you'll remember
this. It's a word of warning. Be careful if and when you listen
to preachers who tell you what you should be doing to please
the Lord. Let me say that again. Be careful
when you listen to preachers who tell you what you should
be doing to please the Lord. There is every likelihood that
they will bring you into bondage. You are free. You're in Christ
and you can please God no more than Christ has already pleased
him. You've pleased God perfectly
in Christ. And as a believer, all your righteousness,
all your holiness, all your sanctification is in Jesus Christ. I am crucified with Christ, the
Apostle Paul tells the Galatians. Nevertheless, I live. Yet not
I, but Christ liveth in me. And the life which I now live
in the flesh, I live by the faith of the Son of God who loved me
and gave himself for me. And this is exactly what the
Lord is telling his disciples here. This leads me to my second
point today. The Lord says to his disciples,
because I live, ye shall live also. It is Christ that lives
in us. That's what Paul tells the Galatians. He says, the life which I now
live in the flesh, I live by the faith of the Son of God.
Christ liveth in me. And Christ says, because I live,
ye shall live also. The church of Jesus Christ, the
body of Christ, you and me, who trust in the
Lord, we are alive because our Saviour is alive. Our head is
alive. And we have new life in Christ. Now, okay, I'll say it just for
clarity. There's natural life and there's
spiritual life. The people in the world who are
living in the world have natural life, but we are speaking here
about spiritual life. Believers are spiritual creatures,
and we dwell in a body of flesh. We are a new creation. In Adam
all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive. We are alive
in Christ. If we are in Christ, if we have
been placed in Christ, if we have been set apart and sanctified
in Christ according to the eternal counsel, according to the covenant
of grace, according to the will of the triune God, then we are
spiritual creatures. And here the Lord was telling
his disciples that their perceived loss, their perceived loss, let
not your heart be troubled, their perceived loss at his death was
no loss at all. Rather, he would rise from the
dead, he would defeat death, and he would live forevermore. And because he lives forevermore,
all who are in him live forevermore with him. So it's more than our
natural life. We do not live forever in this
world. These bodies will die. These bodies will die. Sooner
or later, your body and mine will grow sick, will grow weary,
its strength will dissipate and we will go to our graves. Our flesh must be laid down so
that the greater, the fuller life, the heavenly life, the
heavenly glory can be entered into and experienced. and we
shall take up these bodies again. They will be raised from the
dead as Christ and his physical body was raised from the dead. He is the first fruits and we
will follow Him in like manner, in like pattern. The grave has
no dominion over us. It's just a resting place. It's
a bed for our bodies until the Lord comes back and gathers His
church and gathers His people and the dead in Christ shall
rise first and then those who are alive and remain will meet
Him in the air. This is going to happen because
we are spiritual creatures. The grave has no hold on these
bodies. But most important, we have the
spiritual life in Christ, this new creation. And we live a spiritual
life now, although we're in the flesh, although we're in the
world, we live with a spiritual life, a life of grace and holiness
from Christ, a life of faith on him. in which we fellowship,
we serve, we honour, we glorify Him because He gives us all the
traits and characteristics and blessedness and enablements to
allow us to do that. And though this experience is
tainted by sin, and spoiled by the weakness of our flesh, and
it causes us grief and hardship to wrestle daily against the
old man and the confrontation that exists between these two
different life powers, the spiritual life and the physical life, the
fleshly life. We shall hereafter live an eternal
life of perfection and endless pleasure. The troubles of this
age are not worthy to be compared, says Paul, with the glories that
lie before us. We shall live in endless pleasure
with the Father, with the Son, and with the Spirit, because
Christ says, Because I live, ye shall live also. And this
shows that our life now is bound up tightly with Christ's life. So even although we're still
in these bodies, even although we still get tired and weary,
even although we still sin and are tempted to sin, We now have
a relationship with God that is closely bound up with Christ's
life. Our spiritual life is the life
of Christ. Our spiritual life is joined
to his life and is dependent upon it. Our spiritual life is
lived in Christ because it comes from him. It is his life. He is the head. We are his members. We are the members of his body.
He lives and we live in him and he lives in us. Our life can
never be lost any more than Christ's can be lost. To employ the words of Abigail
to David in the Old Testament. Our lives are bound up in the
bundle of life with Christ. Isn't that beautiful? That was
Abigail that said that to David, but I've pinched it. I've pinched
it because it's such a beautiful phrase and it's a beautiful thought
to dwell upon and meditate upon. Our lives are bound up in the
bundle of life with Christ. We are safe and secure in him,
in God. We are out of the reach of both
men and devils. out of the reach of chance and
circumstance, out of the reach of trials and troubles and temptations,
except to the extent that the Lord is pleased to use such things
for our good. Isaiah tells us of God's covenant
promise to his son. Thy dead men shall live. That's us. That's you and me. Thy dead men shall live. And
the Savior replies, together with my dead body shall they
arise. The Old Testament saints knew
this as much as the New Testament saints. Paul could say in 1 Corinthians
chapter 15, O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is
thy victory? Thanks be to God which giveth
us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. Which brings me
to my third point and what a catalogue of blessings this is in this
passage. These few verses before us today
and more broadly in this whole section John chapter 14 through
to 16, and chapter 17, Christ's high priestly prayer. Maybe we
should think of it as John 14 to 16 is a sermon, and John 17
is a prayer. That's the pattern that I'll
use explaining it, I think. But here we see that the Lord,
as he prepared to leave his disciples to go first to the cross, to
redeem his people and then to heaven to intercede for them,
he comforted his friends with many encouraging promises. And first amongst these encouraging
promises is the promise of the Holy Spirit, the Comforter who
abides with us forever. We will never lose the presence
of the Holy Spirit with us. He abides with us forever. That
new life, that quickened life, that spiritual life, the Holy
Spirit is living in us. It is our life now, and it will
never be lost. We talk about the perseverance
of the saints or the preservation of the saints. Some people like
to emphasize one or the other. Be that as it may, we will live
forever because the life that we now live, we live in Jesus
Christ. It is eternal life. Believers
never lose the Holy Ghost. When he makes his abode in the
body of a sinner, He cleanses the soul, He renews the heart,
and He makes it fit for the presence of all the persons of the Godhead,
all the persons of the living God. And here the Lord Jesus
tells His timorous disciples, His fearful disciples, His despondent
disciples, how wonderful that will be and what to expect. So let me
mention one thing here. All God's blessings are spiritual
and enjoyed by faith. Faith is key to seeing and understanding
and experiencing the goodness and the grace of God. By faith we see what the world
cannot see. We see the Holy Ghost. We see
Him by faith. We experience Him by faith. We hear Him, we feel Him by faith. The risen, ascended Christ. The everlasting Father. We understand
these revelations of Jehovah by faith. And by faith, the weakest
believer knows and understands the truth of sins forgiven and
peace with God by the blood of Christ because the Holy Spirit
lives in him and shows him the extent of the Father's love and
the success of the Savior's death. By faith, we know and are persuaded
that these things are true. And this is what I want to end
on today. This is the point that I want
to finish with. Believers view spiritual truth
through the eye of faith, and we believe and trust what the
Lord Jesus tells us concerning our union and our
relationship with Jehovah the Godhead. Let me say that again
so that we know where we're going with this thought. Believers
view spiritual truth through the eye of faith and we believe
and trust what the Lord Jesus tells us concerning our union
and relationship with Jehovah the triune God. We learn from
Christ, here in this passage, that the Almighty God in three
persons, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, dwells in the soul of
every redeemed and renewed sinner. Jesus says of the Holy Spirit,
he shall be in you. He is telling his disciples that
the Holy Spirit shall be in you. He then adds, if a man love me,
which I trust we've established that every believer does because
that is a characteristic, that is a trait of the Holy Spirit
in the life of a believer, every believer loves the Lord Jesus
Christ. If a man love me, which we do,
he will keep my words, which we do, and my Father will love
him, and we will come unto him and make our abode with him. Wonderfully, amazingly, the Father,
the Son, and the Spirit all dwell in the human heart of every converted
child of God. Now, I don't know how to comprehend
that. I don't know how to explain that
in a way that we could easily understand. But by faith, we
believe it. They all dwell in the human heart
of every converted child of God. In this mystical and yet very
real way, God in three persons dwells in every believer. And this union, this bond should
give great blessing and encouragement in our daily walk in this earthly
life. Whatever it is you've got to
face, maybe you've got to face school tomorrow. Well, God the
Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit will be there
in the classroom with you. Maybe you've got to face the
office. Well, God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy
Spirit will be there in the office with you. Maybe you've got to
go to hospital, or maybe you've got to endure pain, or maybe
you've got to face a trial, or maybe you will be persecuted
by someone in this world that that wants to cause you trouble
and harm. Well, God the Father, God the
Son, and God the Holy Spirit will be in that experience with
you. God the Father loved us so much
that he sent the Lord Jesus Christ to reconcile us to himself. And as soon as that reconciliation
takes place, the Father employs it to secure to himself and unite
to himself those individuals whom he has loved before time. Here's a thought. We talk about
Christ being the way, we talk about Christ being the door,
we talk about Christ being the access for us to go to God. You know what's just as true?
Christ is the door and the way and the access for God to come
to us. because God lives in us. We desire
to go to God and enter his presence, but God is already with us. He's
already come and made his abode with us. Our Saviour, Jesus Christ, in
whom we live and to whom we are inseparably united as members
of his body, having joined himself to our human flesh, now forms
himself in our heart, which is created anew. And the Holy Spirit, who quickens
and energises all for whom Christ died, comes in power to breathe
new life into the dead. And as he converts, he joins
our renewed spirit to himself, and he and the Father and the
Son each enter and make their abode in our soul. And consider what comfort this
gives. We are the temple not only of the Holy Ghost, but of
the triune God. How the Lord's disciples must
have marveled at this heavenly language, these glorious concepts,
these gracious promises falling from the lips of their friend
and their master. You who believe, you who have
faith, Believer, God the Father lives in your body. God the Son
lives in your body. And God the Holy Spirit lives
in your body. This matters, does it not? Does
that not matter to you? You are never alone. The Lord
is always near. He's part of every experience,
with us in every trial and every trouble. Sinning is never secret. He knows. And yet he gives grace
to withstand the wiles of the devil and he protects us from
the fiery darts of the evil one. If God dwells in our body, then
we have cause to take care of our body and not to despise it
and not to abuse it. certainly not to take our own
lives. Those who hurt their body deface
the temple in which God dwells. And I think you can take that
in many different ways. We could take that as far as
the substance abuse that hurts our bodies. We must never lift a hand against our own flesh. we should take care of it. We
care for our body and our life, and we care for the body and
life and well-being of our brothers and sisters in the Lord as well,
because the same triune God that lives in us lives in them too. So when you see your brother
and sister in the Lord, you think to yourself, the triune God is
living in my brother and in my sister. Do you know God the Father
lives in you and God the Son lives in you and God the Holy
Spirit lives in you? Then what a happy state you are
in and how untouchably safe, how incomparably blessed and
divinely privileged you are. God shares our bodies with us. He lives in us, never to leave
us, such is his love for us that he wishes to take immediate possession
of us and he will bring us through all the experiences of life safe
with him into his more immediate presence in heaven. And here
is a fine little summary of our thoughts today, taken from the
writing of one who was present that day when the Lord Jesus
Christ spoke to his disciples. And this is what John writes. Hereby know we that we dwell
in him and he in us because he hath given us of his spirit. And we have seen and do testify
that the Father sent the Son to be the Saviour of the world.
Whosoever shall confess that Jesus is the Son of God, God
dwelleth in him, and he in God. And we have known and believed
the love that God hath to us. God is love, and he that dwelleth
in love dwelleth in God, and God in him. Herein is our love
made perfect, that we may have boldness in the day of judgment,
because as he is, so are we in this world. May the Lord bless
these thoughts to us today. Amen.