Musings From the Gospel of John – Number 42

The Scriptures covered in this post are from John 16:12-15

And this passage of Scripture reads as follows, from the NASB translation: “I have many more things to say to you, but you cannot bear them at the present time. But when He, the Spirit of truth, comes, He will guide you into all the truth; for He will not speak on His own, but whatever He hears, He will speak; and He will disclose to you what is to come. He will glorify Me, for He will take from Mine and will disclose it to you. All things that the Father has are Mine; this is why I said that He takes from Mine and will disclose it to you.“

It is so easy to just read through this short passage of words and fail to appreciate and comprehend what Jesus is telling His disciples here. And it’s not that I have any super comprehension ability, because I clearly don’t. But I have learned to read everything that Jesus says very carefully and consider every single word that He says. And bear in mind that I am no scholar, just an ordinary Christian layman. These particular words that Jesus spoke are extremely important because they lay the framework for how and why God’s Holy Spirit works in concert with God the Father and God the Son. And for lack of better words, this functionality that Jesus talks about, speaks of a unity between God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Spirit, that is prevalent throughout all of Jesus’s ministry.

Verse 12 reads: “I have many more things to say to you, but you cannot bear them at the present time.”

One needs to appreciate that Jesus is introducing to His disciples an extension of Himself that will communicate and reveal more of God’s truth in the near future. With Jesus departure after His resurrection and the 40 days of visitations, Jesus ascends to the Father, so this functionality of God’s Holy Spirit is vitally important. And at this particular point in time, His disciples have yet to witness His crucification, nor His Resurrection, nor Pentecost, nor His ascension. So the connotation that I read from “you cannot bear them at the present time” would fall into line with what they had yet to experience.

Verse 13 reads: “But when He, the Spirit of truth, comes, He will guide you into all the truth; for He will not speak on His own, but whatever He hears, He will speak; and He will disclose to you what is to come.”

Jesus calls the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of truth. Bear in mind that Jesus Himself is also the truth, and every word that Jesus speaks comes directly from God the Father. John 12:49 refers. Jesus tells His disciples that God’s Holy Spirit will guide you into all or more of the truth. Note the word “guide”. That word “guide” has the connotation of leading one into a greater understanding. And then note that Jesus says that God’s Holy Spirit will not speak on His own, but whatever He hears, He will speak, which actually correlates with the words that Jesus Himself speaks, as coming directly from God the Father, even now, as Jesus relates these words to His disciples. And then Jesus gets specific, letting His disciples know that they will receive guidance through God’s Holy Spirit or further information (disclosure) on what is to come. That basically means anything beyond the particular point in time that they are currently in, which could be relatively close by or far reaching into Jesus’ return.

Verses 14 and 15 read as follows” “He will glorify Me, for He will take from Mine and will disclose it to you. All things that the Father has are Mine; this is why I said that He takes from Mine and will disclose it to you.”

And here is a statement that we do not want to forget. What does God’s Holy Spirit do? THE HOLY SPIRIT GLORIFIES JESUS. Always keep that in the back of your mind because if you ever see something that is being attributed as being a manifestation of God’s Holy Spirit, whatever it is, if it is a valid manifestation of God’s Holy Spirit, it should ALWAYS glorify Jesus.

And what does glorifying Jesus specifically mean? It means that what is being manifested brings honour and justified acknowledgement to who Jesus is and what He has done, and what is being manifested also honours God the Father, being done properly and in an orderly fashion (1 Corinthians 14:40) and there is testing acknowledgement that Jesus came in the flesh (1 John 4:1-2).

And then in verse 15, Jesus Himself explains what He means when Jesus states, “He will take from Mine and disclose it to you. And the explanation that Jesus gives is that “All things that the Father has are Mine:”

And this statement is in perfect agreement with the following Scriptures in 1 Corinthians 15:27-28 NASB, which reads” “For He has put all things in subjection under His feet. But when He says, “All things are put in subjection,” it is clear that this excludes the Father who put all things in subjection to Him. When all things are subjected to Him, then the Son Himself will also be subjected to the One who subjected all things to Him, so that God may be all in all.” Emphasis is mine.

Actually, reading over the whole of Chapter 15 in 1 Corinthians, in concert with this particular portion of Scripture, is a very good idea.

And lastly, as Jesus indicates, God’s Holy Spirit, will disclose the unfolding supremacy of Jesus to His disciples, until all things are put into subjection to the Son, and then the Son shall subject Himself to God the Father and then God the Father will be all in all.

Note this enhancement of understanding from 1 Corinthians came from God’s Holy Spirit, through the Apostle Paul, after Jesus had ascended to God the Father.

More to follow.

Worthy is the Lamb! Blessings!