Holy Spirit 03

Holy Spirit 03
John 14:17-18

Today’s devotion is number three in our Holy Spirit devotions. We are headed to John Chapter 14, verses 17 and 18. Grab your Bible (I use the NLT), a notebook or journal, and something to write with. I encourage you to make a focused attempt to really spend some relational, interactive time with God as we go through these verses together.

In these devotions, I’m just trying to take “small bites” of scripture to help you get to know the Holy Spirit better and to hopefully inspire you to seek the Holy Spirit and sense the Holy Spirit in your life a little bit more. If you would like to go deeper into this topic in this devotion, I’ll give you some ways to do that at the end.

This is our third devotion from our Scripture By Topic list on the Holy Spirit. You can get the entire scripture list on the Holy Spirit, along with the Daily Devotion Journal at MyDailyChurch.com.

Let’s pray and make our hearts ready to hear from God.

Heavenly Father, we just pray, Lord, that you would speak to us during this time. Lord, we want to sense your presence. We want to hear your voice. And so, we pray that you would fill us with your Holy Spirit, that your Word would speak to us, Lord God, that we would have a meaningful time with you. And we thank you for it in advance. In your name, Jesus, amen.

John 14:17-18 (NLT)
17 He is the Holy Spirit, who leads into all truth. The world cannot receive him, because it isn’t looking for him and doesn’t recognize him. But you know him, because he lives with you now and later will be in you.
18 No, I will not abandon you as orphans—I will come to you.


Awesome verses as we continue through John Chapter 14. Let’s break this down. In our last devotion, we ended in verse 16.

John 14:16 (NLT)
16 And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Advocate, who will never leave you.


And then, we just pick straight up today in the next verse,

John 14:17 (NLT)
17 He is the Holy Spirit,
And so, in verse 16, Jesus promises to send “Another Helper”, an Advocate, that we talked about in our last devotion. And then, in verse 17, Jesus names that helper. The Holy Spirit IS that helper that Jesus promised in the previous verse. He is another of the same kind and quality as Jesus and the Father, who is called alongside us to help. He is equal in every way to the Father and the Son – fully God – and his role is to be that member of the Godhead who lives in us, and comes upon us to be our Helper, to be our Advocate. And guys, we desperately need to learn how to depend on our Advocate – how to depend on our Helper – who is the Holy Spirit.

The Holy Spirit does so much for us. But just one thing he does Jesus brings out here in verse 17. [He] leads [us] into all truth. Guys, in a world that is full of relative truth, and personal truth, and made-up truth, in this world that we live in, we need the Holy Spirit to lead us into the truth. Jesus said I am the WAY, the TRUTH, and the LIFE. There IS absolute truth. It is God’s truth. Jesus is that Absolute Truth personified, expressed to us, and the Holy Spirit is sent to lead us into that true truth – he is sent to lead us into the true truth of God.

And the next sentence in verse 17 says, The world cannot receive him, because it isn’t looking for him and doesn’t recognize him. Guys, the world cannot receive the Holy Spirit because the Holy Spirit IS God. He is God sent into our lives when we put our full faith in Jesus Christ. He is God, the Holy Spirit who is sent to lead us and to guide us, to teach us, to empower us, to seal us for adoption, and to be our peace, among so many other things. He does all of that as God living in us. And so, of course, the world cannot receive the Holy Spirit because it isn’t looking for him and doesn’t recognize him.

But, the end of verse 17 says, But you know him, because he lives with you now and later will be in you. Man, this is awesome! Jesus is speaking to his Disciples before the Cross and before the Resurrection. And so, he says the Holy Spirit lives with you now and later will be in you. Jesus says to his Disciples and later will be in you because the Holy Spirit cannot take up residence in our lives until we are made “positionally righteous” through our faith in the work of the Cross and the Resurrection of Jesus Christ. And so, the Holy Spirit was with the Disciples before the Cross and the Resurrection. Then, after the Resurrection, in John 20:22, Jesus breathed on the Disciples and said, “Receive the Holy Spirit.” And then, the Holy Spirit was in the Disciples.

And then, finally, Jesus said to his Disciples in Acts 1:8 (NLT) 8 But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes upon you… And that is what the Holy Spirit does for us. He is with us before our salvation. He is in us at the time of our salvation. And he comes upon us for power, and for peace, and for direction, and to be our Helper every day as we walk through this life with Jesus.

And then back in John 14:18 (NLT) Jesus says, 18 No, I will not abandon you as orphans—I will come to you. Because the Holy Spirit is equally God in every way, Jesus says, “I will come to you.” The Holy Spirit, living in us and coming upon us is how Jesus comes to us. The Holy Spirit is how Jesus will never abandon us because the Holy Spirit will never leave us. And so, we’ve got to see the entire Godhead here. This is the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit all working together to be the life of God in us.

The question is, how do we increase our sensitivity? How do we increase our ability to be led by the Holy Spirit? How can we increase our ability to sense the presence of God in us? Well, first, we have to ask – ask and continue asking. We’ve got to be continually asking the Lord to fill us with the Holy Spirit (as Ephesians 5:18 says). And we have to seek the presence of God in our lives. We have to seek his presence and never stop seeking his presence regularly, daily – spending time getting into the presence of God – and purposefully interacting with God in his Word and by his Holy Spirit in us.

Oh! That’s awesome! So, let’s respond to God now by praying through these verses.

Lord God of the Universe, you are so much more than our minds can even begin to grasp. You are one God in three equal and distinct persons. And Lord, we can’t understand that with our minds. But Lord, we pray you would help us to embrace all that you are in our hearts.

Thank you for sending us the Holy Spirit, who will lead us into all truth. And we pray, Holy Spirit, that you would lead us. That you would guide us into true truth, into God’s truth. And Lord, that thing we have on our mind right now, that thing, Holy Spirit, that you are bringing up in our mind right now, we pray that you would give us your truth in that situation, in that circumstance, and that you would lead us into all truth in this specific circumstance. For that thing that’s on our mind that we need your truth in, we pray that you would lead us into true truth in that thing.

And Lord, Jesus, thank you for making a way for us to know you personally, and relationally. And Lord, thank you that through your Holy Spirit you have always been with us. That you come to live in us when we first put our faith in you. And Lord, we pray that we would be filled to overflowing with your Holy Spirit today and every day! We pray that your Holy Spirit will come upon us for power, and for peace, for direction, and to bear fruit in our lives to bring you glory, Lord.

We thank you, Lord, that you will never leave us or forsake us, that we will never be abandoned as orphans. We know, Lord, that by your Holy Spirit, you will always be with us. And we pray that you would keep us walking close to you, Lord. That you would keep us walking in step with your Holy Spirit – that we would not ignore his presence in our lives, but instead, that we would seek you, by your Holy Spirit in us every day. Thank you, Lord, that you live in us, today. Thank you for saving us. Thank you for filling us with your Holy Spirit. In your mighty, life-transforming name, Jesus, we pray. Amen.

Those are awesome verses! I love doing the Holy Spirit verses. If you’d like a way to dig deeper into these verses and into the Holy Spirit in general, and if you’d like to hear full messages on the Holy Spirit, go to MyDailyChurch.com. Click on the Teaching tab, and then look for the   Holy Spirit”  Series and Singles and you’ll get twenty-seven messages on the Holy Spirit there, each with a different focus. And so, you can skim through those messages and take your pick.

Reviewing these messages on the Blog post is an awesome way to meditate on God’s Word, and what we’ve prayed about. I pray that you can spend some more time with God in his Word, in the presence of God, and by the Holy Spirit that this would become more and more a part of your life.

Thank you for being a part of the ministry family. Thank you for your prayers, for your financial support, and thank you for telling others about this ministry. We love seeing God at work in this ministry. You can find out more about this ministry, or contact us by going to MyDailyChurch.com.
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