Grace, mercy and peace be to you from God our Father, and from our Lord Jesus Christ.
Text: (John 14:23-31)
The Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, he will teach you all things and bring to your remembrance all that I have said to you.
Kä bi Cuum, min la Yiëë in Gɔaa in Rɛl Rɔ, min bi Gua̱a̱r ɛ ja̱k kɛ ciötdä yɛ ŋi̱eec kɛ ti diaal, kä bɛ yɛ ti̱em ti diaal tëë cä la̱t yɛ.
Prayer: Let the words of my mouth, and the meditations of our hearts be acceptable in your sight, O Lord, our Rock and our Redeemer. Amen.
Ten days after Jesus ascended into heaven, the Holy Spirit was poured out on his disciples. This was the day of Pentecost.
And this event didn’t happen so that Jesus’ disciples could be a bunch of show-offs and know-it-alls who then went on to become some sort of travelling circus with magic tricks. The Holy Spirit wasn’t given so that people could have a big show. The Holy Spirit wasn’t even given so that Christians would feel good.
The Holy Spirit was given so that, just as Jesus ascended into heaven, an opportunity would be given for all people everywhere throughout the world to rise to everlasting life. And that one fact brings great joy!
The Holy Spirit is not just for this life. St Paul says in 1 Corinthians 15: “If in Christ we have hope in this life only, we are of all people most to be pitied.” [Kä mi ŋa̱thdan rɛy Kritho ɛ kui̱ teekä mɛmɛ kärɔa, kä ba par ni kɔn ɛlɔ̱ŋ kä ji̱ ɣɔaa ɛmɛ diaal.] The Holy Spirit is given by God in advance as a down payment of eternal life. Ephesians 1 says: “In Christ you also, when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation, and believed in him, were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit, who is the guarantee of our inheritance until we acquire possession of it, to the praise of his glory.”
Do you hear that word: “guarantee”? That means a “down payment”, a “deposit”, so that God can come and collect us later.
That’s why in the creed, it says: I believe in the Holy Spirit, the holy Christian church, the communion of saints, the forgiveness of sins, the resurrection of the body and the life everlasting.
The Holy Spirit calls you by the gospel, and gathers you into the holy Christian church. He gives you his holy things—his holy gifts of baptism and the Lord’s Supper—and makes you part of his fellowship, his communion of saints. But also in the church, you are given the forgiveness of sins: I believe in one baptism for the forgiveness of sins. We preach the forgiveness of sins. We receive the blood of Christ in the Lord’s Supper, shed for us “for the forgiveness of sins.”
And what’s all this for? So that through the Holy Spirit, through the church, through that communion of saints, and the forgiveness of sins, we would have the resurrection of the body and life everlasting.
As we say: “The body of our Lord Jesus Christ and his holy precious blood keep you in body and soul until life eternal.”
All this is made possible, because of the day of Pentecost.
Every Sunday we read from one of the four Gospels. But the day of Pentecost is not recorded in any of the four gospels, but at the beginning of the Book of Acts. And so our Gospel reading is not about the day of Pentecost, but rather tells us about what Jesus taught about the Holy Spirit, once again on Maundy Thursday, the night before he died.
So we might think this is very unusual—why don’t we replace the gospel reading today with the reading about the actual event of Pentecost?
I’ll tell you why!—What did the apostles do once they received the Holy Spirit? They preached about Jesus to people. On the Day of Pentecost, those many years ago, Peter got up and said, “This Jesus…you crucified and killed by the hands of lawless men. … This Jesus God raised up, and of that we are all witnesses. Being therefore exalted at the right hand of God, and having received from the Father the promise of the Holy Spirit, he has poured out this that you yourselves are seeing and hearing.”
When the Holy Spirit came, the apostles preached the gospel. They preached Jesus Christ, his life, his works, his actions. And so, even today, we read the gospels—the life and words of Jesus—because we want to receive the Holy Spirit.
In our Gospel reading today, Jesus says to his disciples: “the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, he will teach you all things and bring to your remembrance all that I have said to you.”
He will teach you all things. When you are taught about Jesus, and when you are taught the words of Jesus, you can be sure that this is the Holy Spirit’s work. The Holy Spirit will teach you all things. This is exactly what St Peter did on the day of Pentecost: he taught people about Jesus, and brought them to repentance and baptism. So not only was he sent the Holy Spirit together with the disciples, but he also shared the Holy Spirit through speaking about Jesus.
He will teach you all things and bring to your remembrance all that I have said to you. When the words of Jesus are brought to your remembrance, then you know that this is the Holy Spirit’s work. The Holy Spirit doesn’t just remind you of things, but he actually comes and physically puts these reminders into your mind and heart. The Holy Spirit doesn’t just give you a tap to remind you about Jesus, he shows you that Jesus is with you always. He points you to Jesus who is walking with you, and praying for you. He will teach you all things and bring to your remembrance all that I have said to you.
And because of this Jesus says: Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. Not as the world gives do I give to you. Let not your hearts be troubled, neither let them be afraid.
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Right at the beginning of our reading today, we read three small words: “Jesus answered him”. Well—if he answered him, what was the question? And to whom did he give this answer?
Verse 22 of John 14, the verse before our Gospel reading starts today, says: Judas (not Iscariot) said to him, “Lord, how is it that you will manifest yourself to us, and not the world?”
Think about this question very carefully: Lord, how is it that you will manifest yourself to us, and not the world?
The disciples can’t work it out—if Jesus is going to manifest himself, surely he will do it in such a way that everyone can see it. Plenty of our atheist friends today say, “If God spoke to me out of a burning bush today, or parted the dishwater in my sink for me, then I would believe in him.”
Goodness!—what do you think the church is? A little travelling freak-show for your entertainment with big screens and flashy lights and all the latest music? There are plenty of people who build churches like that, and want to chain the Holy Spirit up, throw him on a stage and force him to do tricks. And of course, plenty of people will show up on Sundays for that sort of thing.
We need to be careful! There are many false prophets in the world today who want to take our eyes off Jesus.
And so Judas (not Iscariot) said to Jesus, “Lord, how is it that you will manifest yourself to us, and not to the world?”
Jesus answered him, “If anyone loves me, he will keep my word, and my Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our home with him.”
This is exactly what happens on the day of Pentecost. The Holy Spirit is poured out on the disciples, the words of Jesus are preached, his death and his resurrection are put before all the eyes of the people gathered there, and they believe these things. And from this faith, the first Christians come to love Jesus, because they know that their sins are forgiven through Holy Baptism, and they know that their heavenly Father loves them. And now, when the Holy Spirit is poured out on them, Jesus and his Father come to them and make their home with them.
What a wonderful day it is! What a wonderful gift the Holy Spirit is!
Of course, there are some people present on the day of Pentecost who think that the disciples are all drunk. Jesus is being manifested to his disciples, and not the world. There are people there who harden their hearts to the event, and reject the Holy Spirit.
And so Jesus says in our reading: “Whoever does not love me does not keep my words.” And the same thing happens whenever we are in church—there are often some people who have not learnt to love Jesus yet, and think that church services are the driest, most boring thing the planet has ever seen. They don’t know what’s going on, and they never seek to find out what’s going on. Their minds grow numb to the language of the church, and they mock the church.
Pray for people like this. Pray for the Holy Spirit to call all people to faith, to gather them into the church, and to enlighten them with all of God’s gifts.
But think once more about Jesus words here: “If anyone loves me, he will keep my word, and my Father will love him, and we will come and make our home with him.”
Listen to the words: “he will keep my word”. What do you hear when you hear those words? So many people think “keeping Jesus’ words” means obeying his rules, and doing everything that he says. And so then people realise that they haven’t obeyed everything that Jesus says, they haven’t done everything that he has commanded, and so they think, “Well, if I don’t do those things, then there’s no hope for me”—and then they despair.
Listen—the Day of Pentecost is actually the day when Moses received the law of God on Mount Sinai all those many years ago. That was the day when the law was given. That was the day when God gave all of his rules to the human race. That’s why the Jews had a festival on this day.
But years later on the particular day of Pentecost that we celebrate today was the first time that salvation in Jesus’ name was preached. “Keeping Jesus’ words” means believing in the words about him as your Saviour, the words that he died for you, that he rose again for you, that he promises to give you the Holy Spirit. “Keeping Jesus’ words” means saying “Amen” when you hear that through the blood of Jesus, God the Father forgives you all your sins.
And when your sins are forgiven, when you trust in this, when you trust in the power of Jesus in your baptism, when you trust in the power of Jesus working through preaching, through the absolution, when you trust that in the Lord’s Supper Jesus is giving you the forgiveness of sins, then you can’t help but love him. And the Holy Spirit is poured out upon you, and constantly wants to show Jesus to you, and just how wonderful, loving and friendly he is.
And when we love Jesus, we keep his word: we believe in his forgiveness. And the Jesus promises that the Father will love you too. The Holy Spirit points you to Jesus so that you will trust in him, and love him—and then the Father also loves you. And Jesus says: “And we will come and make our home in him.”
May God the Father bless you abundantly on this day of Pentecost with the Holy Spirit, who is your guarantee and down payment of everlasting life! May our heavenly Father fill you with the Holy Spirit, and may the Holy Spirit point you to Jesus your living Saviour, risen from the dead and ascended to God the Father, so that you may learn to love Jesus. And then through the preaching and the sacraments outside of you, and through the reminding and presence of the Holy Spirit inside of you, the Father and the Son will come and make their home in you.
Amen.
Come, Holy Spirit, Giver of life, our Helper, our Comforter, teach us about Jesus and bring to our remembrance all that he has said to us. Fill us with the peace that Jesus leaves with us and gives to us. Amen.
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