What Jesus Said About Him // The Holy Spirit and Me, Part 2

Jesus said some strange things.  Just before He was crucified He said to His disciples – ‘You know something it’s good for you that I’m going away.’  Really? What was that all about?

When life is parched and dry, empty and hollow Jesus has a plan. That plan is to pour fresh living water into us, deep, deep inside. His plan is to fill us to overflowing with the Holy Spirit. Sounds all religious doesn’t it? But here's the thing I really like about Jesus. He's not so much into ritual and religion.  No not that at all. There's another 'R' word that's much, much higher on His list. Relationship… and that's where the Holy Spirit comes in.

But who or what is the Holy Spirit? What's He like? What's He about? Why does He exist at all? Well today let’s check Him out. What did Jesus have to say about the Holy Spirit and what’s the Holy Spirit got to do with you and me?

Fresh living water is God’s plan for a parched dry life. It's a great plan, in fact I think life is meant to get parched and dry and thirsty sometimes because God wants to make rivers in the desert and turn our lives into a fresh vibrant living life and the living water that He promises is God himself, God the Holy Spirit. Now God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Spirit are the three persons in the one God head. Don't ask me to explain it to you, it's a mystery. We don't fully understand why God is like that but we know that God is three persons in one.

Now God the Father, Dad, as Jesus called Him which outraged the Jews, we have a picture of what a good dad is like. Maybe we all haven't had good dads but we understand what God is saying about Himself when He says, "I'm Dad."

And Jesus, Jesus the Son, well we know what He's like because we've seen Him in the flesh. We can read about Him in the four Gospels, Mathew, Mark, Luke and John which are the accounts of Jesus life and all He did, the things He said. So we can picture Him. Tender hearted, He loved and healed and blessed and fed the outcasts. He hated religious hypocrisy, He suffered, He died, He rose again, we can read all about Him. We can in a sense see Him and hear Him.

But the Holy Spirit, well He's not Father and He's not Son but He is spirit and holy and that’s not easy to picture or to understand and sometimes I've heard people call Him "it". So who is He and what's He like?

Jesus told us that. Jesus was about to be crucified, He'd lived for three, three and half years with His disciples, He'd been out doing His public ministry. He'd been out healing people and blessing people and preaching amazing sermons and just being Jesus and being God and being just the most wonderful, wonderful saviour. And they're about to go into this tough scary time because Jesus offended just a few people.

Jesus showed up the religious hypocrites. Jesus went and healed people that the religious leaders wouldn't have even given a tuppence for. So there was this plot afoot for Him to be crucified because He was upsetting the religious apple cart and this is what He says to His disciples who, at that point in time, were fearing for their lives.

Jesus had been telling them that He was going to be crucified, they were petrified, they saw this man who they knew to be God but He was going to be killed, what’s that all about? And into that He speaks a promise, it's always what God does you know, we expect God to disappear when life gets tough, we think He's a million miles away and all of a sudden God shows up with a promise and here's the promise that Jesus had for them.

He said, "If you love me you'll obey what I command and I'll ask the Father and He'll give you another counsellor to be with you forever, the Spirit of truth. The rest of the world can't accept Him because they don't see Him or know Him but you do because He lives with you and He'll be in you. I won't leave you as orphans."

Jesus says, "I'll come to you. Before long the world won't see me anymore but you'll see me because I live, you will live too. On that day you'll realise that I'm in the Father and you are in me and I am in you. Whoever has my commands and obeys them he is the one who loves me and he who loves me will be loved by my Father and I'll love them too and show myself to you and I'll come and make my home with you as will the Father."

Jesus promises another counselor, another comforter, another one just like me literally is what the words say in the Greek. So all of a sudden we know what the Holy Spirit is like, the Holy Spirit is just like Jesus. Jesus was crucified, He rose again, He went back to be with Dad in heaven and the disciples really didn't understand what was happening, what was going to happen, they were devastated.

And into that Jesus says:

This Holy Spirit I'm going to send, this other advocate, this other comforter who's just like me, it's not for everyone, it's not for everyone in the world because a whole bunch of people wont get it but if you love Me, if you follow Me, if you give your life to Me, if you're prepared to die for Me the way I am for you then I will send you another one just like me and we will come and make a home in you. I'm in my Father, you're in Me.

You know this close and tender and wonderful relationship with God and the Holy Spirit is God in us dwelling, abiding, never leaving, never getting up in a huff and moving out. No that's not what Jesus said, "If you love me you'll obey what I command and I will ask the Father and He will give you another counselor to be with you forever."

Just let’s think about that for a moment. Jesus is saying, "God is not some distant concept. God is not some idea or book or building. God is not the dry, boring religious patriarch that we might expect. This God that I'm going to send you, God the Holy Spirit is just like Me."

This Jesus who went into the tax collectors house and sat and had dinner with them, this Jesus who reached out and touched the outcast leper and healed him. This Jesus who looked the religious leaders in the eye and called them, "You brood of vipers. You hypocrites." This Holy Spirit is just like Jesus and in the same breath Jesus says, "Peace I leave with you and my peace I give to you. I don't give the way the world gives so don't let your hearts be troubled, don't let them be afraid."

These disciples had everything to be afraid of, they were in fear of their own lives and Jesus said, "This Holy Spirit, this is Me coming to dwell in you and this Spirit that I'm giving you and putting into you and pouring out into your life will bring you peace and joy and living water in a parched land." In fact, Jesus said to them, “You know something, it's good for you that I'm going to go away because if I wasn't you wouldn't get the Holy Spirit."

Isn't that awesome? Jesus is saying, “it's better that you should have the Holy Spirit than it is that you should have Me because the Holy Spirit can be with you 24x7 and the Father and I and the Spirit can dwell in you 24 hours a day, 7 days a week without any physical limitations.” This is an intimate, intimate desire of God to dwell in us, to give us joy and contentment.

Father, I pray for each one of us, that you would just open our hearts and pour your Spirit in, in Jesus name.