John 14:1-27 10.30 am Sun 30 May 2004
TWICE it says in the passage read, “Those who OBEY my commandments are the ones who LOVE me.” It adds, "All those who love me, WILL DO WHAT I SAY.” It also says -
The truth is, anyone who believes in me will do the same works I have done.”
We need to recognise and know what OUR WORK for GOD is. We must actively seek God for his command. If a person is truly born again, then they enter on a journey. A never ending journey where they are getting to know Jesus and HIS WILL for their life, better and better.
Many people think more money, or more things will make them happy. Or a more attractive body or better health. But I am sure we can all think of many Christian saints who were very poor, possessed little and were full of joy.
God knows what we need more of, better than we do. He says we need him. He says we need love. He says we need filling and re-filling with his Holy Spirit, and we need to love and obey him.
Trust in God and not your own ideas. Let God control your life.
We may start out by taking Christ as our saviour because we don’t want to go to hell. We want the hope of eternal life, and we can see, that Jesus is good, and is the way to that eternal life.
Do you love Jesus? Do you really love Him? Do you love him with all your life, with all your money?
The answer to that first question, “Do you love Jesus” could be “Yes” for everyone here. You believe in a just, all powerful, merciful God, and you believe in his son Jesus who lived, and died and rose again. You know you have made many mistakes in your life and are very grateful to Jesus for accepting the punishment for them.
But do you really love him, by obeying him and continuing his work?
Jesus’ work – teaching people how to have a relationship with God, miracles, healing, everything that helps to brings glory to God
We need the Holy Spirit for God’s work on earth.
In this life we need more and more of God’s Holy Spirit to help us, if we are to stay close by him and obey his teaching. That first acceptance of Christ isn’t enough for a whole life’s journey.
And neither is regular church attendance, prayer or Bible reading. You may still be a bad witness for him. True disciples will show other examples of following Jesus in the ministries they undertake. Giving their love, in work for God’s glory, with the help of the Holy Spirit. But beware, people can forget their first love and try to work their way into eternal life.
But don’t give up. Anyone who has offered their life to God, is God’s property. Satan stole you for a while but Jesus bought you back. Redeemed means to be bought back. You have been paid for by Jesus. If you do make a mistake, it doesn’t mean you no longer belong to HIM. Say you are sorry and choose to listen more attentively to God from now on.
Obey him more and more, as you learn more of His desires for your life, and are filled more with the Holy Spirit. This may mean really big changes to your life. In fact, if you don’t seek the help of the Holy Spirit, you may start to question if you really do love him, “That much”.
In an arranged marriage the couple are introduced before the wedding but often don’t get to know each other before the wedding day. When you accept Jesus into your life, it may be a bit like an arranged marriage because you don’t really know Jesus and his character at all.
You have been pleased to accept this “arranged” marriage to Jesus but now you have got to learn to love him. In an arranged marriage the couples have to get to know one another better, and grow to trust one another, and hopefully eventually fall deeply in love. It is the same with your relationship with Jesus.
May be, thinking of marriages reminds you of marriages where the love has all but disappeared. You remember what it was like, but now the love has gone. Don’t let that happen to your love for Jesus.
Jesus won’t reject or divorce you. If you have lost that first love, then Jesus is crying, you have done the rejecting, but the loss will be yours.
Somewhere in your Christian journey in this life you must fall deeply in love with Jesus, your saviour. Then want to serve him with your whole life.
But to obey Jesus you need more than just your own will power. You need the power of the Holy Spirit.
Do you really trust God when all seems to be going wrong?
Jesus said in the reading, “You know where I am going and how to get there.” Anxious, upset, fearful, ready to cry, Thomas, who was worried he wouldn’t be able to follow Jesus, replied, “We haven't any idea where you are going, so how can we know the way?" Are you like that? Jesus gave Thomas reassurance, and later in faith, Thomas accepted the power, the confidence of the Holy Spirit.
Are you worried that your faith isn’t strong enough? Do you need help to obey Jesus? Thomas certainly didn’t have peace in his heart at that time. He was troubled and afraid.
Those first disciples found that they needed to receive the Holy Spirit on many occasions. Initially, they needed the Holy Spirit to proclaim the Good News to those outside the upper room where they were staying on the day of Pentecost.
Then when facing opposition they needed the Holy Spirit to fill them and give them boldness when confronting opposition.
They needed the Holy Spirit to fill them so that they could lay hands on, and heal sick people. They needed the Holy Spirit for their ministries. Many needed the Holy Spirit to give them strength at the end of their journey in this life, to face martyrdom.
When you fall in love with Jesus, somewhere along the line, you make a transition from just wanting God in your life, to get you out of trouble, to wanting to serve him with your whole life.
Thomas wanted to follow Jesus but he was frightened and scared. He needed the Holy Spirit to counsel him, to give him peace, to help him with his fears.
To Philip, Jesus said in today’s reading, “Philip, don't you even yet know who I am”. Philip had already seen God at work. People healed when he prayed for them in Jesus’ name. But, Philip’s faith still needed strengthening. He needed Jesus’ true identity to be revealed. Who did this, so that he became an Apostle, who stayed in Jerusalem despite persecution?
It was when he was filled with the Holy Spirit at Pentecost. When the Helper came to live not just with him, but in him, that Philip received confidence, Apostolic, ministerial and other gifts from the Holy Spirit.
When you first believe in Christ you may still have some worries, some doubts about total commitment. About giving your whole life to following Jesus’ example. May be like Philip you have even prayed for people and seen miraculous healings but you still have occasional doubts. You like Philip need to ask for more of the Holy Spirit in your life.
But for this supernatural work you need supernatural help.
We each need to choose to become a container for the Holy Spirit. A container owned by God. We no longer have the right to go around doing what we want to do all the time. We belong to God. When tempted we call for the Holy Spirit’s protection.
God wants you to be happy. God wants the best for you. God wants you to be joyful.
In China some churches welcome new believers with the words, “Jesus now has a new pair of eyes to see with, new ears to listen with, new hands to Help with, and a new heart to love others with”.
We can’t obey God without the Holy Spirit, and the gifts the spirit gives us.
But some people are afraid of the Holy Spirit.
When you read in the Bible about the people in the upper room at the time of Pentecost, all receiving the Holy Spirit and all speaking in tongues, have you ever thought, “God can keep that. I don’t want it”?
“I don’t want to speak in tongues. Or if you still don’t use the gift of tongues in private prayer, are you willing to accept this gift?
Why did they need the Gift of Tongues at Pentecost? Two reasons.
1 To preach the Good News in the Languages of the people in the street.
2 To do what they desired to do which was to praise God.
If I was to go around the congregation asking everyone to name something they wanted to praise God for, and then do it again several times; many people would panic. “I can’t think of anything else that hasn’t already been said.” The people in the upper room on the day of Pentecost were ordinary people who fell deeply in love with God, and ran out of ways to express it. So God helped them.
But it wasn’t very long before they discovered that “speaking in tongues” as it became known had other uses. If one person was speaking in a tongue, others realised that they knew and understood what the person was saying, and that it was a message from God.
At our second placement church whilst Duncan was at theological college; a tongue, and an interpretation of that tongue, was a regular weekly occurrence. I didn’t like it, because I thought it would upset visitors. They might think us all loopy. Truthfully, it upset me.
One Sunday I grumbled to God about a tongue been spoken. “What does it mean anyway?” Instantly I knew. Soon I had a sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach when someone else in the congregation gave the interpretation. For a split second I had the temptation to shout out “Yes, that’s right. I was given that too.”
Then I remembered I didn’t like it!
The following week, when the tongue was spoken, I gingerly asked God what it meant, and again someone else gave the interpretation, that I already knew. I am sure there must be people here, who would feel uncomfortable like I did, but I know that God does speak to his people that way at times.
“Speaking in tongues” is a way of communicating God’s message to others, and praising God, but also the disciples discovered, it was a way of praying to God that made the feel better. Presumably, sometimes they would speak a tongue in prayer to God and he would answer immediately, and at other times they would just feel peace knowing that they had prayed.
I say presumably because that is my own experience, and it says in - 1 Corinthians 14:4 A person who speaks in tongues is strengthened personally in the Lord.
Speaking in tongues is nowhere near the most important gift for the building of God’s Body, the church. But we all need strengthening for the work God has given us to spread the Good News and grow his church.
When thinking about this talk, I asked myself the question, “Why do we need the Holy Spirit? and noted the following.
We need The Holy Spirit the Helper
The Holy Spirit the Comforter
For all the above situations we need the help of the Holy Spirit, but really our own thoughts and words can’t express our deeply felt prayer to God. But the Holy Spirit our helper can. He knows exactly what spiritual help or spiritual gift we need. So use the gift of tongues if you have it.
You may already have the gift and not know it. That happened to me.
I wanted to pray for someone and didn’t know what to pray. Her life in a hospital bed, having had both legs removed and ulcers threatening her arms, didn’t seem worth living, but I couldn’t pray for her death.
This odd idea came into my head that I should go into the bathroom and pray out loud whatever came out. I expected to control the words, but found myself listening to myself. Afterwards I felt peaceful, and content. I vowed I wouldn’t tell anyone because they would be sure to think I was loopy. I didn’t understand this was God’s gift of tongues.
May be you have already got the gift of tongues and have never used it. When you get home, if you want to talk to God in this way, go into a room on your own, tell God you love Him and want to talk to him in a new way, and then just open your mouth and let the words come out, concentrating on God and not what you say.
When people first hear of the Holy Spirit, usually they haven’t a clue what the Holy Spirit is, because they didn’t know there was anything to look for.
The passage says, “The world isn't looking for him [Holy Spirit] and doesn’t recognise him
As time goes on, you will find there are different aspects to His nature you knew nothing about.
Because they love me, [Jesus] the passage says ,“I will reveal myself to each one of them.” Reveal - More of God’s goodness, more gifts of the Spirit, more manifestations of his love.
To grow as Christians we have to learn to look in he right place so that God will reveal more of himself.
I grew up with a belief in God, but was taught that neither the paranormal nor miracles happened.
When I was 18 I on the Stoke to Manchester train returning to Salford University. A journey I didn’t want to make as I wouldn’t be seeing Duncan for another week. An unfit 18 year old, with a full suitcase, and a brief case full of heavy books. I made a commitment to Christ.
Manchester seemed unusually picturesque. I decided not to catch the bus, picked up my bags and ran to Salford University. I remember thinking it odd that I had the energy, but didn’t really understand. Now I realise it was my first physical experience of the Holy Spirit. I wasn’t looking for, or expecting, anything supernatural. I didn’t know the supernatural existed, and so didn’t recognise the Holy Spirit at work.
Later my faith started to include belief, in answers to prayer, that I felt couldn’t be proved as miraculous, partly because the teaching of my church didn’t include present day miracles. Most people I knew would call these co-incidences. A few would call them God-instances then my prayers were answered.
It was many years after that, before I realised I had to look for the Holy Spirit at work and recognise him.
Recognise him, helping me personally, and helping me to do the work he has for me, as our relationship develops..
Do you know of recent miracles, and healings? Those of you who answer, “No” probably haven’t yet learned to look. Or haven’t looked carefully recently.
(The world at large cannot receive him [Holy Spirit], because it isn't looking for him and doesn't recognize him.)
The rest of us are still learning. I find I often forget the gift of peace of mind and heart that we have been given.
"I am leaving you with a gift--peace of mind and heart. And the peace I give isn't like the peace the world gives. So don't be troubled or afraid.
I know I have felt his peace at times – like when I was in a car plunging 60 ft over the side of a hill to what seemed certain death or serious injury. But I am still learning. We all are.
God wants us to have every spiritual blinker removed. He wants us to love him, trust him in everything. He wants us to work with him, using his gifts, for His Glory, in His Kingdom.
Receive and use every gift he has to offer you. Different gifts, at different times. Seek them, recognise them, and use them to his glory.