The images in this chapter are of marriage, union and power. And let’s not forget love, devotion and sacrifice. Honestly, John 14 is a great chapter!
Most times when I am quoting from this chapter it’s from the first 6 verses, and it’s at a funeral. I want people to know that Jesus says He will come back and take us to be with him, so we can live where he lives. However, I know Jesus wasn’t describing what happens after we die….He was describing what happens at a wedding. In Jewish days, the bridegroom would get engaged, go home and prepare a place (add on to the family home) and then come back and collect his wife. Before he left, he would present the bride with a ring, signifying she was betrothed and no longer available for others. For you and I, the Holy Spirit is that “ring”. Ephesians 1:13-14 says “And when you believed in Christ, he identified you as his ownd] by giving you the Holy Spirit, whom he promised long ago. 14 The Spirit is God’s guarantee that he will give us the inheritance he promised and that he has purchased us to be his own people.” The NIV says he “marked us with a seal”, here in the NLT it says “he identified you as his own”.
One of the key points Jesus makes in this passage is of “oneness”. If you see Jesus, you see the Father. Clearly the Father is someone else, who has ideas and knowledge and characteristics of His own, but He is also “one” with Christ, to see one is to see the other. I often think of it as paper dolls folded together, they are all three distinct, but when folded you can only see one, and to see one is essentially to “see the other” because they are all the same. Identical and different, and “of the same essence” which in the case of paper dolls means they are all from the same sheet of paper. The same Holy Spirit flows through the Father and the Son, they are the same.
Jesus says in verse 17, speaking of the Spirit, “he lives with you now, and later will be in you”. Jesus was living with them now, and I think that’s what he was referring to. They saw the Spirit in Christ, which is the Spirit of God the Father as well. The unbelievable part of this whole train of thought is when Jesus says “and later will be in you”. I can scarcely stay in my seat as I think about it. Consider it with me…The very thing that connected God the Father to Jesus, making them “one” was the same Spirit. And Jesus decrees that very Spirit will now join you and I to the Godhead. We are family. Husband and wife, joined together by mutual consent, and using Genesis 2:24 as our relational goal with Jesus “the two are united into one”. This first marriage didn’t happen by accident!\
This just occured to me this morning. I have always wondered why Jesus didn’t create Eve from the dust in the same way he created Adam. Today I see that something from the bridegroom was taken to make the bride, in Adams case it was a rib, in Christ’s case it was the Holy Spirit. The Spirit was taken from the Father and Son and deposited into you and I, so we would come to life and be “helpmates” for God. Incredible!
1 Peter 3:7 tells us that wives are equal heirs with men in salvation and the Kingdom. Wives are considered the weaker partner, but partners none the less. Consider this: you and I are the Bride of Christ, partners with God himself! Yes, we are the weaker partners, just as this life foreshadows, but partners still. What an incredible thought! what an incredible gift!
I think one of the main differences between the apostles and early disciples and us is that they understood this, and we do not. Nor do we go out of our way to embrace it! Wow!
Have a great day in Jesus!
PR
dd