ANOTHER HELPER
John 14:16-26 (5/21/2017)
Introduction: Author Keith Miller tells of an outgoing
40-year-old woman who was part of a sharing group he led. Here is her story: "When
I was a tiny little girl, my parents died and I was put in an orphanage. I was
not pretty at all and no one seemed to want me. But I longed to be adopted and
loved by a family as far back as I can remember. I thought about it day and
night, but everything I did seemed to go wrong. I must have tried too hard to
please the people who came to look me over and what I did was to drive them
away.
"But
then one day the head of the orphanage told me that a family was coming to take
me home with them. I was so excited that I jumped up and down and cried like a
little baby. The matron reminded me that I was on trial and this might not be a
permanent arrangement, but I just knew that somehow it would work out.
"So,
I went with this family and started to go to school. I was the happiest little
girl you can imagine, and life began to open up for me just a little. But then
one day a few months later, I skipped home from school and ran into the front
door of the big old house we lived in. No one was at home, but in the middle of
the front hall was my battered suitcase with my little coat thrown across it.
As I stood there it suddenly dawned on me what it meant---I didn’t belong there
anymore."
Miller
reports that when the woman stopped speaking there was hardly a dry eye in the
group. But then she cleared her throat and said almost matter-of-factly,
"This happened to me seven times before I was 13 years old. But wait,
don’t feel too badly. It was experiences like these that ultimately brought me
to God---and there I found what I had always longed for---a place, a sense of
belonging, a forever family." What a touching story of an orphan, how
eventually found a home in God’s loving family.
According
to UNICEF there is an estimated 140 million orphan children in the world are
looking for homes. What should be our response? Did you know that God cares for
each one of them to find a home? If we care to admit, each of us have a longing
for a home, a sense of belonging to a forever family. No, one likes to live
like an orphan in this hostile world. We have been looking at the final words
and ministry of Jesus before he was taken up into heaven. On one of such
occasions Jesus consoled his heartbroken disciples who had learned about him
going away. They couldn’t bear the thought of how he could just leave them, in
a cruel world. To ease their angst, he promised to send them “Another Helper.” John 14:16-26
I.
NO LONGER ORPHANS:
Vs
18, “I will not leave (forsake) you as orphans; I will come to you.” Why did
Jesus refer them to orphans? You and I may never understand the struggles of an
orphan child unless we ourselves have been orphaned. I read an article that
highlighted 4 struggles of orphan children.1. Children living without loving
parents often experience more difficulty expressing their needs and emotions.
2. Children living as orphans go through a lack of sense of security and
stability. 3. They lack nurture and support. 4. Children without parents will
have to work much harder to develop social skills and achieve higher grades in
school.
The
article ended with these words, “For both children with parents and those
without, the unconditional love of the Father is unending. God sees them, hears
them, and knows the desires of their heart. Every child everywhere is deeply
loved by God, and nothing can ever change that.”[1] That is the heart of God for
every child but also for adults though they seem to have everything may live like
orphans, that includes the followers of Christ who live like spiritual orphans.
God has always assured his people of his ever-abiding presence.
Here
are the parting words of Moses to his successor Joshua: “The Lord is the
one who goes ahead of you; He will be with you. He will not fail you or forsake
you. Do not fear or be dismayed.” Deuteronomy 31:8 God reaffirmed that promise
to Joshua again after the death of Moses, “Just as I have been with Moses, I
will be with you; I will not fail you or forsake you.” Joshua 1:5 Coming back
to Jesus’ disciples, for them following Christ meant leaving everything: behind, their families, parents, known
profession including abandoning their very own lives.
They
were willing to let go of everything and follow Jesus. They were affirmed, that
God’s ever abiding presence was going to be with them. And it was so as long as Jesus was with them,
but now Jesus was saying to them that he was going to be taken away from them.
Can
you imagine the anguish of an orphan child who once was homeless, but has then been
adopted into a family, only to be abandoned again? That may have been the
underlying feeling of the disciples. In that context, Jesus said, “I will not
leave you as orphans; I will come to you.” How was he going to keep that
promise? Was he going to come back
physically and be with them? To find answers let’s look at verses 16&17.
II.
ANOTHER HELPER
Vs
16-17, “I will ask
the Father, and He will give you another Helper, that He may be with you forever; that is the
Spirit of truth, whom
the world cannot receive, because it does not see Him or know Him, but you
know Him because He abides with you and will be in you.” What was Jesus
referring to when he said, “Another Helper’? Let’s look at these words. In the Greek
language, the word used for the Holy Spirit is, “Parakletos.” It has been translated as, ‘Comforter’,
Intercessor, Interpreter, Preacher, and either Prosecutor or Defense Counsel. The
basic meaning of the word is, Para means “beside” or alongside, and Kaleo
meaning to call or to summon. If you put these words together, it refers to, “someone
who is called alongside to help.”
It has the
idea of someone who encourages and exhorts. What is the meaning of the word,
“another”? The Gr. word specifically means “another of the same kind” i.e.,
someone like Jesus Himself who will take His place and do His work. The Spirit
of Christ is the Third Person of the Trinity, having the same essence of deity
as Jesus and as perfectly one with Him as He is with the Father. Recently we
undertook major cleaning operations in our Church. One Saturday, several of us
worked so hard the whole day, by the end of the day got tired, exhausted yet
determined to complete the work for that day, then suddenly showed up two extra
helping hands, “other helpers” I am sure the exhausted crew must have been
delighted and relieved by that extra help. We all could take some extra help,
can we not?
Similarly,
at times our spiritual journey gets tiring, and exhausting. There is always so
much to do, so many people need to hear the gospel, so many new believers to
disciple. So many broken lives to be put together. In the Church, the work
never seems to end. We grow weary in doing God. We desperately need some help! Recognizing,
the enormity of the remaining task and the challenges that come along with it “Jesus
said, I will ask the Father and He will give you another Helper, that he may be
with you forever…He went on further said, “he abides with you and will be in
you.”
What is the
pre-requisite of the Helper to come abide with us and reside in us? Jesus went
one step further and deeper and said, Vs 23, “If anyone loves me Jesus answered
and said to 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 abode (home) with him.” Anything
we do for God should always proceed out of our love for him. God never forces
us to do things out of fear of him like in many other religions where people
serve God out of fear not out of love. A heart that loves, God and is ready to
obey his commandments is the one that receives “Another Helper”
What an
assuring promise of Another Helper. When we have accepted Christ as our Savior,
and express our love for him by obeying his commandments, another Helper, will
come to be with us but also makes a home in us. Paul writing to the Corinthians
reminds them of the fact that they were no longer of their own, they have been
bought by the blood of the lamb and have been given the Holy Spirit to reside
in them. “do you not know that your
body is a [a]temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God,
and that you are not your own? 20 For you
have been bought with a price: therefore, glorify God in your
body.” I Corinthians 6:19-20
III THE
IMPLICATION OF “ANOTHER HELPER”
What
happens when “Another Helper” or the Holy Spirit comes to reside in the heart
of a believer? First of all, the work of changing an unbeliever into a believer
in Christ has to be the primary work of the Holy Spirit. Without him no one
will come to know Christ in the first place. Secondly, since He is called the
“Holy” Spirit, he will clean up the things that are unholy and not pleasing to
God. What does that clean up look like? It differs from person to person.
When
a person comes under the conviction of the Holy Spirit, he confesses his sins
by acknowledging Christ as his savior. In John 1:9, “If we confess our sins, He
is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all
unrighteousness.” In other words, we will be given a clean heart and a fresh
start. The resident Helper will continue to help us to live out that inner
transformation by letting our light shine in the world through our good works.
In
the passage we read, Jesus highlighted the work of the Holy Spirit in the life
of a believer. Vs 26, “But 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 said to you.” It is for next week. Let me now conclude with these
thoughts. The life of a believer begins, is sustained, and empowered by “Another
Helper, the Holy Spirit.” When the Holy Spirit makes his home in us we are no
longer orphans, we have a place, we belong to a forever loving family of God.
Amen
