Three Person Accommodation
Our Bible passage, introduction to Sunday 16th March service and hymns are below.
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Our principal verses are:
Jhn 14:15 If ye love me, keep my commandments.
Jhn 14:16 And I will pray the Father, and he shall give you another Comforter, that he may abide with you for ever;
Jhn 14:17 Even the Spirit of truth; whom the world cannot receive, because it seeth him not, neither knoweth him: but ye know him; for he dwelleth with you, and shall be in you.
Jhn 14:18 I will not leave you comfortless: I will come to you.
Jhn 14:19 Yet a little while, and the world seeth me no more; but ye see me: because I live, ye shall live also.
Jhn 14:20 At that day ye shall know that I am in my Father, and ye in me, and I in you.
Jhn 14:21 He that hath my commandments, and keepeth them, he it is that loveth me: and he that loveth me shall be loved of my Father, and I will love him, and will manifest myself to him.
Jhn 14:22 Judas saith unto him, not Iscariot, Lord, how is it that thou wilt manifest thyself unto us, and not unto the world?
Jhn 14:23 Jesus answered and said unto him, If a man love me, he will keep my words: and my Father will love him, and we will come unto him, and make our abode with him.
Three Person Accommodation
In matters of grace and faith it is important to distinguish between conditions and characteristics, or what the Lord requires of us and what He gives to us. Let me explain. All believers love the Lord. Love for God and the Lord Jesus Christ is a characteristic of every child of God because the Lord implants love in the renewed desires of a converted soul. We love Him because He first loved us and we are inspired to do so by the indwelling presence of God the Holy Spirit. Love to God is the foremost fruit of the Spirit and it is an innate feature of a regenerated, believing soul.
What God requires He gives
Love for God is neither a condition for becoming a Christian nor a prerequisite for blessing thereafter. It is the fruit of grace in the heart of a believer. The Lord requires nothing from a believer that He does not first bestow. We often wish we loved Him more, yet, love Him we do. Love for God is evidence of spiritual life and characteristic of the new birth. The grace of God in His people enables and empowers those characteristics the Lord requires in the life, walk and conversation of His new creation. Christ’s commandments are not duties to be obeyed but gifts to be exercised and privileges to be enjoyed.
Living by faith
Keeping the Lord’s commandments is not, in isolation, a condition or a requirement for God’s blessing. Keeping the Lord’s commandments is living by faith and is characteristic of a believer’s life. We keep His commandments, just like we love Him. We are enabled and empowered to do so by grace and doing so is our pleasure and privilege. Every believer loves the Lord and every believer delights to serve the Lord and to practise obedience to His calling and cause. It grieves our hearts when we fail and when the weakness of this flesh hinders the longing of our spirit.
Layers of goodness
Here in John 14-16, as the Lord prepared to leave His disciples to go first to the cross and then to heaven, He comforted His friends with layers of encouraging promises. Foundational amongst these was the promised gift of the ever-abiding Holy Spirit, the Comforter. Believers never lose the Holy Ghost. When He makes His abode in the body of a sinner He cleanses the soul and makes it fit for the presence of the living God. Here the Lord Jesus tells His fearful disciples how wonderful that will be and what to expect.
Big blessings for little faith
We discover God’s blessings are spiritual and enjoyed by faith. We keep the Lord’s commandments as we keep the faith and trust in Him. The world cannot see the Holy Ghost or the ascended Saviour or the eternal Father. Yet, by faith, the weakest believer knows and understands the truth of sin forgiven and peace with God because the Holy Spirit lives in him and shows him the meaning of the Father’s love and the success of the Saviour’s death.
Seeing the Invisible
Believers view spiritual truth through the eye of faith and what we discover is Almighty God in three persons dwelling in the soul of every redeemed and renewed sinner. Jesus says of the Holy Spirit, ‘He shall be in you’. He then adds, ‘If a man love me’ – which every believer does – ‘he will keep my words: and my Father will love him, and we will come unto him, and make our abode with him’. The Father, Son and Spirit all dwell in the human heart of every converted child of God. In this mystical yet very real way God in three persons dwells in every believer.
Indwelt by Father, Son and Spirit
This union brings immense blessing and encouragement in our daily walk in this earthly life. Our Saviour, Jesus, in whom we live and to whom we are inseparably united as members of His body is Himself God and one with God, His Father. He has the same nature, perfections and glory as the Father and is equal to Him. Having joined Himself to our human flesh Christ has formed Himself in our hearts and created us anew. At conversion He joins our renewed spirit to Himself and He, His Father, and the Holy Spirit each enter and make their abode in our soul.
Practical benefits
Consider what comfort this gives. We are the temple of the living God. How the Lord’s disciples must have marvelled at this heavenly language, these glorious concepts and the unconditional promises falling from the lips of their Friend and Master. Do we believe God the Father lives in us, God the Son lives in us and God the Holy Spirit lives in us? Then what a blessed state we are in and how untouchably safe, incomparably blessed and divinely privileged we are!
Amen
Our hymns are below.
Hymn 1
Gadsby Selection 581
Christ’s Love to his Spouse made Known. John 14. 21
W. Gadsby 8s
1
I’ll speak forth the love of my Lord,
His praises my tongue shall employ;
He bought me with his precious blood,
Nor Gabriel is loved more than I;
Though pure, he for me was made sin;
Though rich, he for me became poor;
Though free, yet a debtor brought in;
For me he has paid the long score.
2
These truths to my heart he proclaimed,
When helpless I stood and distressed,
When I at the bar was arraigned,
With law, sin, and terrors oppressed.
No hand to my help did appear;
The witness against me was true;
Which filled me with horror and fear,
Till Jesus, my Lord, came in view.
3
He saw me distressed, and he said,
“Fear not, I procured thy discharge;
I’m Jesus, who lives, and was dead,
And now will I set thee at large.”
Not one in the court did object,
But all gave a smile when he spoke;
He then took the yoke off my neck,
And ravished my soul with his look.
4
What joy filled my soul, who can tell?
But surely I ne’er shall forget;
My Jesus has all things done well,
And therefore his love I’ll repeat.
To him all the glory belongs;
My soul shall speak well of his name;
He now is the theme of my songs,
And shall be for ever the same.
Hymn 2
Gadsby Selection 348
Safety in Christ. John 14. 19
A. M. Toplady C.M.
1
Thy purchased people, gracious Lamb,
Thou never canst forget;
The piercing nails have wrote their name
Upon thy hands and feet.
2
Satan, in vain, with rage assails
Thy dear peculiar ones;
For them thy righteousness avails;
For them thy blood atones.
3
Vainly against the sheep he strives,
And wars with the Most High;
Their glorious Head for ever lives,
Nor can his members die.
4
Jesus shall his elect avenge,
Nor from his own remove;
Nor cancel his decree, nor change
His everlasting love.
God in three Persons; Father, Son and Holy Spirit are promised to every believer to live in our heart and unite with our soul. The Lord Jesus Christ tells His disciples that that they will be comforted upon His going away from them by the spiritual presence of the Holy Spirit and the coming of the Father and Son to abide with them.