The Holy Spirit, will remind you of all that I have said to you
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John 14:23-29New Revised Standard Version |
| 14:23 Jesus answered him, “Those who love me will keep my word, and my Father will love them, and we will come to them and make our home with them.
14:24 Whoever does not love me does not keep my words; and the word that you hear is not mine, but is from the Father who sent me. 14:25 “I have said these things to you while I am still with you. 14:26 But the Advocate, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you everything, and remind you of all that I have said to you. 14:27 Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled, and do not let them be afraid. 14:28 You heard me say to you, ‘I am going away, and I am coming to you.’ If you loved me, you would rejoice that I am going to the Father, because the Father is greater than I. 14:29 And now I have told you this before it occurs, so that when it does occur, you may believe. |
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The Holy Spirit will REMIND you. He is as important as that little part of the brain where our memory resides. In fact, He is the memory of the believer, the Christian and the Church.
Without the memory, there is no connection; no connection neither with the past, nor with the present and nor with the future. Sometimes we tend to suppress our memory, because when we are in a good mood, we do not want our memory to remind us of the bad moods we experienced in the past. Instead of moods you can have experiences. In fact, the mind has a sort of defence mechanism: it cannot cancel what is stored in the memory, so, it shifts certain memories into the sub-conscious so as not to remember them consciously. But without the memory, there is no learning, no growth, no maturity.
It is important for us to be in touch with our memory, to face our memories, even the hard and traumatic ones. Otherwise, we become foolish, repeating the same mistakes, finding ourselves in worse situations than we were before, like the proverb: “once bitten, twice shy”!
So, this is the Wisdom of God (and remeber that the first hint in the revelation of the Holy Spirit in the Old Testament is precisely the Wisdom of God): He comes to remind us what we need to remember. He comes to serve as our memory. We know what we should do today if we only remeber. The Commandments are not something imposed to us from outside; they rise from within, if only we were to remember. Just go through these verses in the Book of Deuteronomy, the book of the Law, and you will understand why we find this imperative to remember 14 times (10% of all its appearance in the whole Bible) in this book and 41 times in the Prophets (another 30%)! Deut 5:15 7:18 8:2,18 9:7,27 15:15 16:3,12 24:9,18,22 25:17 32:7.
The Holy Spirit does not only remind us what Jesus has said, just as when our memory recall to us something we have heard even years back, leaving still a detachment and a distance from the person who pronounced those words for in fact that person might already be dead!
If the Holy Spirit is the memory of the believer, the Christian and the Church, He is a DIVINE MEMORY. He is one with that Word that He is reminding us of; He is one with Him (Jesus) who proclaimed those words. In actual fact, He is even one with the Father who sent His Only Son (the Word), and through Him the Holy Spirit (the Love, Wisdom and Power, what makes an intimate relationship to God possible, the Son present and the Word effective)!
Therefore, in reminding us what Jesus has said, the Holy Spirit makes Jesus present to us here and now; He makes His Words heard in the depths of our hearts so that it “may be fulfilled in our hearing”; thus making it possible for us weak, sinful, human beings to make a personal and intimate encounter with the Person of Jesus Christ just as the first disciples and apostles have done, even if in quite a different way.
“Whoever does not love me does not keep my words”, and the word that you hear is not mine, but from the Father who sent me. Loving Jesus makes a difference, when hearing his word you know it is Him, it is the love of God that makes a difference in our lives. Before i met him life did not make any sense but now that I have experienced his love for me he made my life new I believe one has to be reborn like Jesus told (Nikodemu), The Holy Spirit thought me how to pray,how to wait how to be patient,he opened my eyes,he gave me extra strength, he keeps me going when I am weak,he gives me Hope, he explains things to me,he shows me the way, he sends people to guide me, these are only a few things that HE has done in my life, he made me new, and continues to make wonders in my life. I should be grateful and thank HIM also for the wonders he is doing in other people’s lives that are my friends. Also I would like to thank Him for the small things in life that occur from time to time, opportunities to talk about Him to my family, I believe, it is HIS work. Please Lord I ask you to give and renew the Holy Spirit in my friends lives especially my children and husband. I am grateful and thank you.