Well we come back to John chapter
14 this morning and the title of the message is God Manifest
Only to His People and it was prompted by verse 22, Judas saith
unto him, not Iscariot, not Judas Iscariot, another of the disciples
was called Judas, Lord How is it that thou wilt manifest thyself
unto us, he's believing disciples, and not unto the world? Because
Jesus said the world won't be able to see, but you will be
able to see, you will know. How is it that you'll do that?
And Jesus answered and said, if any 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. The triune God, the one God,
who is known in three persons, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
We will come, he says, we will come unto him and make our abode
with him. God comes and makes his abode,
he lives with his people, he lives in his people. That's how
the people of God are aware, discern the manifestation of
God, and the world doesn't, because he doesn't inhabit the rest of
the world. This Word of God that we have
before us, I've said it many times, but it's worth repeating,
this is God's Word for God's people. It isn't God's Word for
humanity in general. Yes, there are lessons that all
humanity can learn from it, there is wisdom that all humanity can
take from it, but The purpose of God's Word is to reveal the
Christ of God to His people, because it is in and through
Christ alone that the Gospel of salvation is declared, is
accomplished, is made known, is apprehended, is believed,
and the life of God is in the souls of His people by this knowledge. The Word of God is for God's
people. I think I told you many, many
years ago, probably 40 plus years ago, a Jehovah's Witness on the
doorstep was arguing with me and I quoted to him some verses
from Ephesians. And he said, oh, you shouldn't
be reading that, that's not for you, that's just for the 144,000.
And you know something? I think he was dead right. The
144,000 is symbolical of the people of God on earth at any
one time. The Word of God is for the people
of God. God's message of assurance of eternal life, of the accomplishment
of qualification for heaven. Do you know how many people call
themselves Christians and they have no assurance that salvation
is accomplished? You know, they don't know, because
it depends on their decision. There were years when I wondered,
had I made a decision that was right enough for God, that was
the correct decision? And it was all down to me, but
no, the truth of God, it's in what God has done, is that the
qualification for heaven is accomplished. It's accomplished! Which is why
Christ cried, it is finished from the cross. There's confidence
of the attainment of eternal glory. We shall be there. You
believe in the Lord Jesus Christ again and again in this chapter.
If you believe, you must believe. If you believe, you can be sure. You have the blessed assurance
of faith, as the epistle to the Hebrews says. The assurance of
faith. It's that which God gives, by
which you apprehend and know the truth of the living God.
It's the comfort of the certainty of it. You can rest in it when
it's certain. You know, you do a job, you do
some project or other, and I've just done a big job. Some of you who look at what
I put occasionally on Facebook will see it's a bit of plumbing.
And I must say, I was incredibly nervous about it. I was very
nervous that it wasn't going to work, or that we were going
to end up with a flood all over the place. And it all came together,
and it's completed now, and we're about three days down the line,
and there's not a drop of water anywhere, and it's all working
fantastically. And do you know something? There's
a comfort in the certainty of it that wasn't there before.
There was a real anxiety before it wasn't going to work. you
know, little illustration, but the salvation that God in Christ
has accomplished is absolutely certain, and there's a comfort
in that. You can rest in it, and the unbelieving
world has no sense of this. none whatsoever. They go through
their life with no sense of the truth of God, of the life of
God in the soul. For the apostles, for these to
whom he's talking in this chapter 14, Judas Iscariot, the betrayer,
has gone. He's left with the eleven, intimate,
close to him. The eleven apostles, not even
Martha and Mary and Lazarus, not even them, just the apostles,
the eleven. For them God had become man. He had dwelt with them for three
and a half years. They, as John said in John chapter
1 and verse 18, they had beheld his glory. This man in whom is
no comeliness that we should desire him, they had beheld the
glory of God. in the face of Jesus Christ.
They'd beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten
of the Father, full of grace and truth. They had spent time
in His intimate presence. They'd spent time closely. You know, he says, I call you
friends. Friends tell one another secrets. The secrets, he told
them, were the secrets of heaven, the secrets of the mystery of
godliness, of heavenly life, of eternal life. In his intimate
presence for three and a half years, they'd heard the most
precious words. Even unbelievers Even the Roman
guards sent to arrest him came back without him and said, never
man spake like this man. They'd heard precious words. They'd seen astounding miracles. Anybody claiming to do miracles
today, it's just laughable that anybody takes it seriously. These
were miracles of somebody born blind, being given sight. creation out of spittle and clay,
making eyeballs with which to see. And they'd seen Him progressing
to the hour when He would accomplish redemption. My hour is not yet
come, three and a half years, and now my hour is come. He must
as a seed fall into the ground and die, because only that way
will redemption be accomplished, because only that way will the
The price that the justice of God demands for the redemption
of the people of God be paid in the blood of the Lamb of God.
And now it has come. The hour has come. The price must be paid in full
for the prize to be attained. What prize? The prize, the prize
of the people of God. Behold, I and the children whom
he has given me. Lift up your heads, O ye gates,
and be ye lift up, ye everlasting doors, and the King of glory
shall come in. Who is the King of glory? The Lord strong and
mighty, the Lord mighty in battle. Lift up your heads, O ye gates,
and be ye lift up, ye everlasting doors, and the King of glory
shall come in. Who is the King of glory? The Lord of hosts.
There he is with his children, I and the children whom he has
given me, the prize to be attained, him and his people together,
that my people should be with me where I am and behold my glory. That is what he prays in John
17. Now the time has come for that to be accomplished, but
it necessitated separation. He must go away from them. Can
you imagine how confused they must have been? They'd had three
and a half years of the most intimate of fellowship. And now
he says, he whom their souls loved, he whom their souls couldn't
bear the prospect of being separated from. You know that? People want
nothing to do with God, do they? People in the world. But these,
his disciples who'd spent that time with him, it broke their
hearts These strong rough men, fishermen, tax collectors, these
strong rough men, it broke their hearts that He said, I must leave
you. I'm going away from you. I'm
going away to do that which you don't understand at the moment,
but you will understand. He must leave them. He said that
in verse 2 of chapter 14. In my Father's house are many
mansions, if it were not so I would have told you. I go to prepare
a place for you. I'm going, I have to go. He was
manifested to them, God was manifested to them, in Him, and in Him alone,
and to them alone. He alone, and only to them. And a few more, you know, Lazarus,
and Martha, and Mary, and a few others, and the mother of Jesus,
and you could count them, you know, a few hundred perhaps.
how rich the sense of blessing must have been for these people.
What a tremendous privilege to be that tiny minority of humanity
who had walked and fellowshiped and dined and leaned upon the
body of the Lord Jesus Christ, and seen true life, the truth
of God set forth Eternity and eternal life set before them. You know how we say now, you
know those lovely summer days that at this time of year in
England in January, especially when it's a grey cloudy day like
today, you so much miss those lovely warm sunny summer days,
you want to bottle them, don't you? And keep them and use them
when you feel the need for them. How they must have wanted to
bottle this sense of intimate fellowship with Christ, but he's
going away. How will they manage? Look, verse 1, how will they
manage? He says, verse 1, let not your
heart be troubled. You believe in God? Of course
they do. Believe also in me. How will they manage? Believe
also in me. Verse 11, Believe in me, that
I am in the Father, and the Father in me. Or else believe me for
the very works. Believe. How are they going to
manage when he's gone? Believe him. Believe Christ. Trust him. Trust that what he
says is true. Trust that he is true. Because
in believing, the very reality of the unseen God is manifested
in the soul of man. Do you know that? It's in believing
that the very reality of the unseen God is manifested. You
say, I don't see God. You don't believe him. That's
why you don't see him. The world doesn't see God because
the world doesn't believe in God. It's the highest attainment
of life, this thing which is life, this mystery which is life.
The highest attainment of life is not to get what worldly material
pleasures you can, it's to know God and enjoy Him forever. So he says, Don't let your hearts
be troubled. Don't. Verse 1. Don't let your
hearts be troubled. Verse 27. Peace I leave with
you. My peace I give unto you. Not
as the world giveth. Oh, the world can give you peace,
but that's not the peace he's talking about. He gives heavenly,
saving peace. Let not your heart be troubled,
neither let it be afraid. What's he saying to them? Even
though I leave you, even though I'm going away, you know, verse
12, very verily I say unto you, he that believeth on me, the
works that I do, he shall do also, and greater works, because
I go unto my Father. Even though I leave you, because
I'm going unto my Father. You? Who? Who's he speaking to?
You know, he's not speaking to believers in general there. There's
a lot of confusion caused if you think that. He's speaking
to the apostles. He's speaking to the ones whose hearts were
troubled because of their intimate relationship with him which was
about to be broken by his going away. And he says, don't be troubled. You apostles will do miracles
like I do. Look, the works that I do, you
shall do also. You apostles, believe on me.
the works, the miracles that I do. And they did, didn't they?
From Pentecost onwards. You think of the miracles that
they did, the signs of the apostles. They were the same as the works
of Jesus. The dead were raised, the sick
were healed. They did the works that He did.
But greater works than these, they would do. And all His people
do in that they were to preach to the saving of thousands. When
Peter, the fearful one, who would deny Christ three times before
the cock crew that very night, Let not your heart be troubled,
you'll do greater works. And on the day of Pentecost,
just a few weeks later, he preached and 3,000 men were saved on that
one day. 3,000 men found the truth of
eternal life. So don't be troubled, he says,
and here's the reason why. He's giving the gift of another
comforter. Verse 16, well he says verse
15, 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 for
ever, 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." Christ comforted
his disciples when he was here with them. He comforted them.
They talked with Him. They walked with Him. They went
where He went. They journeyed with Him. They
stayed with Him. They ate with Him. Can you imagine? It's impossible to imagine the
intimacy and the oneness of Him with His people. They ministered
with Him, with the One whose hand controlled creation. They were with him when he said
to the storm on the sea, peace be still. And the wind and the
waves ceased in a moment. And they said, what manner of
man is this that even the wind and the waves obey him? They
walked and talked and journeyed and ministered with this one
whose hand controlled creation. If he must leave them, the one
who had comforted them so much, they need a person. He was a
person. They needed a person to replace
him, if their weak souls are to be comforted. And so Jesus
promises. that when he's accomplished that
purpose for which he came, the purpose of redemption, in heaven
he will pray the Father, and the Father will give the Holy
Spirit. He will pray, not words, as we
understand prayer by words, but by his very person. The Redeemer,
having accomplished redemption, will pray the Father. His interceding
presence in heaven will demand justly of the Father that the
people for whom he died shall be given another comforter. He
who then, in the midst of the throne of God, will justly claim
the fruit of his accomplished redemption. The fruit of his
accomplished redemption is a people justified, qualified for eternal
glory. And he will justly claim the
fruit of that accomplished redemption. His localized, limited comfort
for those disciples there in Jerusalem and where he was, where
he walked, yes he knew in his sovereign, omnipotent godhood,
even as a man he knew way beyond what any other man could know. But he, for a time, was made
a little lower than the angels, was made for a little while lower
than the angels. In that, he inhabited a human
body, yet without sin, in the likeness of sinful flesh, but
without sin. And his presence was localized. He was either in Jerusalem, or
he was in Galilee, or he was in Samaria, or he was in Jericho,
or he was in one place at once. it was limited, his presence
was limited. The comfort that he gave to those
disciples was to those who saw and heard and communed with him
locally. But he said, if I go away, the
Father will send another comforter. And this comforter will replace
that localized, limited comfort with a universally, ubiquitously,
everywhere, ubiquitously, unendingly accessible comfort by God's Spirit
to His people. We here, in 2022, in a room in
this part of the world, and joined with others of you out there
on the internet, we have this, if you believe on the Lord Jesus
Christ, He has given you of His Spirit. And that Spirit gives
you that knowledge that you are the children of God. He ministers
to your spirit. He's the comforter who comes
to your individual souls. As Jesus Christ was made manifest
to His immediate people there, the disciples, the unknowable,
the unseen being of God, is given by this gift of the Holy Spirit
to his people. The Comforter comes to replace
the Lord Jesus Christ. And this is not a, oh dear, isn't
it a shame that it's not him with us? He says this is better. It's good for you that I go away
and send this comforter to you. Because wherever you are, in
whatever situation you are, the Spirit of God, if you're his
believing child, the Spirit of God is there with you. A divine
person. person of the Trinity, the third
person of the Trinity, to dwell with and in his people, wherever
you are, whenever you are. This is the blessing of the Comforter,
that Christ having departed, having accomplished redemption,
He prays the Father that the fruit of that accomplished redemption
be given as a gift to His people. It is God who comforts His people. God comforts His people. Look
at 2 Corinthians chapter 1. 2 Corinthians chapter 1 and verses
3 and 4. Blessed be God. even the Father
of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies, listen, and
the God of all comfort, who comforteth us in all our tribulation, that
we may be able to comfort them which are in any trouble by the
comfort wherewith we ourselves are comforted of God. Do you
see that? God comforts his people. This is what he does. God comforts
his people. How does God comfort his people? Primarily in the soul, in the
hidden being. If you're a believer in your
inner soul, the bit that the world and those around you cannot
see, God, the Holy Spirit, comforts you. The world can provide external
comforts, but only God's Spirit can provide comfort inside. And how does He do it? He speaks
peace to the troubled soul. The soul that feels just enmity
from God because of sin, because in our flesh always there is
sin there, yet the Spirit of God comes and applies comfort
to that soul. And the comfort is not some airy-fairy
feeling, That comfort is solid. That comfort is rationally based
on the doing and dying of the Lord Jesus Christ that has given
the reason for God to comfort those who by nature are His enemies. He applies, as it says in Colossians
1 verse 20, peace. through the blood of his cross.
The blood of the cross of Christ accomplishes peace, not airy-fairy
notions of mysterious good, but solid, tangible, rational justification
for peace. You know that word propitiation?
Do you know what it means? It means to turn away the anger
of God. The sacrifice accomplished propitiation. It turned away the anger of God. The blood of the Lord Jesus Christ
shed for the sins of his people turns away the anger of God against
that sin. Propitiation accomplished applies
comfort to the soul. And the anger of God is turned
away. And peace with God comes in its
place. And I might hear it in the ear
from a preacher. I might hear a preacher preach
it to me in my ear. And I might understand it in
my mind. I might see it on the page of Scripture. And I might
see it and interpret the words in my mind. But the Holy Spirit
God's comforter that he gives to his people speaks its reality
in the soul. He's the one who speaks its reality.
You know there's a hymn, we haven't sung it for a while, It is well,
it is well with my soul. How does your soul know it's
well with it? Because of these things that the Holy Spirit applies
in the mind and in the heart. God's people especially need
God's comfort. They do, they do. They are, as
Zephaniah chapter 3 verse 12 says, the people of God are an
afflicted and poor people who trust in the name of the Lord. An afflicted and poor people
who trust in the name of the Lord. In what respect are the
people of God more afflicted and poor than the world in general. Surely you can come across some
very nice prosperous examples of those who say they're Christians
and some very poor and very badly downcast and afflicted people
who are in the world with no knowledge of God. But the reason
is because of this. It's because of soul affliction.
Soul affliction which is brought about by a consciousness of sin
before a holy God. This is how the people of God
are an afflicted and poor people. We know what we are. We know.
What does Jesus say in the Sermon on the Mount? Blessed are the
poor in spirit. Not the rich in spirit. Not those
that are full of their own self-righteousness. Blessed are the poor in spirit.
Blessed are they who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for
they shall be filled. You see, we have this sense of
soul need. And it's God himself, in the
person of his spirit, who speaks comfort in the soul. It's God
himself who applies the accomplishment of redeeming blood to the guilty
soul. And when your soul says, I can
never be good enough for God, it's the spirit inside that says,
look at the blood. Look at that, it's washed away
your sin. As far as the justice of God is concerned, your sins
are taken away. Even troubles which affect all
people can be especially sharply felt in the believing soul. It
was true with David, who had such turmoil in his family. David
said in 2 Samuel 23 verse 5, he's talking about the covenant
that God made with him, but he said, although my house be not
so with God, my family is in a terrible state, Absalom and
other wicked sons who've done wickedly. My house is not so
with God, yet he hath made with me an everlasting covenant, ordered
in all things, and sure, for this is all my salvation. The
people of God can feel that particularly keenly, particularly, because
you have such a burden for the state of the souls of those who
are dearest to you in the flesh. There can be financial difficulties.
Maybe, you know, we don't know as much as people did in the
past. You read the testimonies of people like John Warburton
and others of his ilk a couple of hundred years ago, and the
extreme poverty through which they lived, and how ill health
overtook them and took children away from them one after another.
All of these things they particularly keenly felt. There are pressures
from temptation that the world doesn't feel. Temptation that
comes within, in the heart, in the mind, and from satanic attack. But God comforts His people by
His Spirit's presence in all situations and speaks peace in
the inner being. Because what he speaks is truth. What he speaks is truth. Look,
verse 17. He is the Spirit of truth, whom
the world cannot receive. The Father will give you another
comforter, that he may abide with you forever, the Spirit
of truth. The world can't receive him,
because it seeth him not, neither knoweth him, but ye know him,
for he dwelleth with you and shall be in you. The religion
of the world, the religion of the churches that you see all
around, of all the good workers that people say, oh look how
they're working so hard for Christ, it's as darkness compared with
God's truth. God's truth concerns righteousness,
the righteousness of God. Not what we as self-righteous
men and women think is righteousness, No, I'm talking about the righteousness
of God. God's truth speaks that. It speaks
of sin. It speaks of the dreadful, dreadful
curse of sin, how God is of purer eyes than to behold it. It speaks
of redemption, the purchase price for the sins of His people paid.
It speaks of salvation. It speaks of being saved from
the just condemnation. There is therefore now no condemnation
to those who are in Christ Jesus. Because why? Because He's taken
that condemnation away. And glorification, the prospect,
the hope of eternal glorification. You know why men and women in
general don't see the truth of this? Jesus said in John 3, 19,
they prefer darkness rather than light. Why? Because their deeds
are evil. But God's Spirit teaches truth
in the heart. God's Spirit teaches His people
His truth. He is the Spirit of truth, and
He teaches it to His people. It says in John 6 and verse 45,
Jesus said this, they shall all be taught of God, quoting the
Old Testament. His people shall all be taught. How do they know?
Is it because they go to theological college? No, it's because they're
all taught of God. Psalm 119 verse 99, the true
child of God is able to say this, I have more understanding than
all my teachers. Why? Because the Spirit of God
teaches me. False religion will not tolerate
divine truth. It won't. It clashes with it.
It clashes with their kingdom, the philosophy of their kingdom,
the lies that's told by their prince in his shining, shining
appearance, like an angel of light, yet he's telling lies.
He's not telling the truth of God. But the God's true children,
born again of his spirit, taught his gospel, led in the paths
of righteousness, Psalm 23, lead me in the paths of righteousness,
made conscious of sin and of offense against God. Seeing all
of these things and taught by the Spirit of God, when you're
taught by the Spirit of God, you wonder how can any doubt
God's Word? You know, how is it that we understand
that the worlds were framed by God and not according to the
false science of this world? How is it that we know that?
By faith. Where do we get faith? It is not of yourselves, it is
the gift of God. God's Spirit comes, and God's
Spirit teaches us these things. And we see it, and we hear it,
and we believe it. hear it faithfully preached and
respond. You know, I'm not saying that
every true believer believes every doctrine perfectly correctly,
but I tell you what, when a true believer hears one of God's preachers
expound the truth of God according to his word, their response is
this. This is what Bill Clark used
to say years ago. They go, that's my God. That's my God. That's his truth. Everything
else you can Put it in the garbage can. Everything else is not worth
holding on to. That's the truth of God, because
He's taught me it, inwardly. He it is that dethrones self
in the heart. He it is, this Holy Spirit and
His teaching internally, that stirs up love for the brethren.
He comes, the Spirit of Truth, He comes and teaches His people,
that teaches hatred of sin and love of the truth. What blessings
have flowed from Jesus going away and praying the Father to
give us the person of His Spirit. What a blessed place to be in.
Oh, wouldn't it be good, say, son, to have been there walking? Well, yes, no doubt it would.
But do you know something? Jesus said, you're in a better
condition now as a believer, for wherever you are, the Spirit
of God is there with you. And this is a comfort for God's
people alone. In verse 22, that other Judas
said, how will you manifest yourself to us and not to the world? He's
only given to his people, to those who are the elect of God,
that multitude that no man can number, united with Christ before
the beginning of time, loved with everlasting love, redeemed
in the blood of the Lamb, the Lamb slain from the foundation
of the world, redeemed by Christ, sanctified for heaven, made holy
for heaven, regenerated by God's Spirit. You must have that Spirit
of God. For as Paul writes to the Romans
in Romans 8 verse 9, he says, if any man have not the Spirit
of Christ, he is none of his. Don't go claiming that you're
a Christian who hasn't yet received the Holy Spirit. All true believers
have the Holy Spirit. I will send the Holy Spirit,
said Christ. He will come to you. We will
abide with you. If you haven't got Him, you're
not Christ. You're yet in your sins. You're
yet in your ignorance. In this world, full of pride,
full of ignorance, full of prejudice, full of self-righteousness, full
of unbelief, in this world, these things all bar the world to God's
Spirit. They cannot see Him. The world
cannot see Him. As Jesus said to the Pharisees,
He said in John 8, 37, My word has no place in you. And so it
is with the unbelieving world in general. The workings of God's
Spirit are internal in His people alone. As Paul writes to the
Corinthians, 1 Corinthians 2.14, the natural man cannot receive
the things of the Spirit of God. They're foolishness to him, neither
can he know them. Why? Because they are spiritually
discerned. Where do you get spiritual discernment?
It is the gift of God. God comes to His people. He comes,
He promised He would come, and He comes and He gives that heavenly
light in the soul, the light of life from God. will receive external worldly
religion. You know, you see, it's still
very popular all around, isn't it? But they won't receive the
internal workings of God's Spirit. But for God's Spirit, verse 23,
Jesus answered and said, 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. If a man love me, To you who
believe, says Peter, to you who believe He, Christ, is precious,
is immensely valuable, is deemed of higher value than anything
else. He's precious to you. God, by
His Spirit, lives inside. Yes, I know, you say, well that's
not always my experience. I know, the Spirit and the flesh
continue in this life. The Spirit wars against the flesh,
and the flesh against the Spirit, and the two are contrary, and
often the flesh seems to dominate. But that's what distinguishes
God's true people. They know Him. They know the
Spirit of God. As Romans 8.16 says, the Spirit
of God witnesses with our spirit that we are the children of God.
There's that inner witness. He comes to us. He teaches us
the truth of God. To them alone He is precious. to them alone. Faith may be weak,
but if it's genuine, how vast is the chasm from the world's
ignorance of the truth of God. To know something of conviction
for sin, of grace speaking peace in the soul, of Christ revealed
in the soul by the Spirit coming and taking the things of Christ
and revealing them to us, of the sense of eternity that He
gives, of the removal of the fear of death. Oh, is that not
such a comfort? The removal of the fear of death?
Is that not such a blessed comfort, to know that our times are in
His hands? Our times are in God's hands.
He determines our comings and our goings. Oh, how we can rest
so peacefully in that. He dwells in you, verse 17. He dwells with you and shall
be in you. The Spirit of God dwells with
you and shall be in you. How long? Verse 16. Abide with
you forever. He's never, ever taken away. Take not thy spirit from me.
He never takes his spirit away. As believers, as 1 Corinthians
3.16 says, you are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of
God, don't you know this he says, you are the temple of God, and
the Spirit of God dwells in you. forever. This is the gift that
he gives. What comfort, what a cause of
peace, I will both lay me down in peace and sleep for thou Lord
only makest me to dwell in safety. Psalm 4 verse 8. Amen.