What does the Promise of the Spirit of Truth mean for us?
- Do you wish you could have been there with Jesus, heard him teach and seen the miracles?
- Jesus says you are actually better off with what you have now:
- The very Spirit of God living inside you and empowering you.
- How do we experience this?
- If you have trouble viewing this video, you can try watching it directly on Vimeo
- Play Audio
Video cover image by Gerd Altmann —Free for commercial use
Sermon Outline - What does the Promise of the Spirit of Truth mean for us?
- I came across this superb example last week
- Story of Corrie Ten Boom
The Hiding Place, Corrie ten Boom
It was at a church service in Munich that I saw him, the former S.S. man who had stood guard at the shower room door in the processing center at Ravensbruck. He was the first of our actual jailers that I had seen since that time. And suddenly it was all there—the roomful of mocking men, the heaps of clothing, Betsie’s pain-blanched face.
He came up to me as the church was emptying, beaming and bowing. “How grateful I am for your message, Fraulein.” he said. “To think that, as you say, he has washed my sins away!”
His hand was thrust out to shake mine. And I, who had preached so often to the people in Bloemendaal the need to forgive, kept my hand at my side.
Even as the angry, vengeful thoughts boiled through me, I saw the sin of them. Jesus Christ had died for this man; was I going to ask for more? Lord Jesus, I prayed, forgive me and help me to forgive him.
I tried to smile, I struggled to raise my hand. I could not. I felt nothing, not the slightest spark of warmth or charity. And so again I breathed a silent prayer. Jesus, I cannot forgive him. Give your forgiveness.
As I took his hand the most incredible thing happened. From my shoulder along my arm and through my hand, a current seemed to pass from me to him, while into my heart sprang a love for this stranger that almost overwhelmed me.
And so I discovered that it is not on our forgiveness any more than on our goodness that the world’s healing hinges, but on his. When he tells us to love our enemies, he gives, along with the command, the love itself.
The Hiding Place © 1971 and 1984 by Corrie ten Boom
1. A bird’s eye view of the passage
View whole passage Let’s see the big picture, don’t focus on the details for now
John 15:26–16:15 The Spirit of Truth is Coming
- When the Companion comes, whom I will send you from the Father
the Spirit of truth who goes out from the Father
- and you also will bear witness, because you have been with me from the beginning.
Chapter 16
- These things I have told you so that you will not fall away.
- They will put you out of the synagogues,
Indeed, a time is coming when the one who kills you will think he is offering service to God - And these things they will do because they have not known the Father or me.
- But these things I have told you so that when their time comes, you will remember that I told you about them.
- But now I am going to the one who sent me,
- But because these things I have said to you. Sorrow has filled your hearts
- But I speak the truth to you, it is to your advantage that I am going away.
- And when he comes, he will expose the wrong in the world concerning sin and righteousness and judgment
- concerning sin, because they do not believe in me;
- concerning righteousness, because I am going to the Father and you will see me no longer;
- and concerning judgment, because the ruler of this world has been condemned.
- I have many more things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now.
- But when this one shall come—the Spirit of truth, he will guide you into all truth.
- He will glorify me, because he will receive from me what is mine and will tell it to you.
- Everything that the Father has is mine;
Translation by Andrew Fountain
2. The Flow of Jesus’ teaching in the passage
Click here for Expandable version Let’s dig down into the text now
3. Receiving the Spirit of Truth
- Open up v. 12–15
Updated on 2020-03-29 by Andrew Fountain
- Login to post comments
