Staying in Rhythm, Part one – Footsteps
“He has made it clear to you, what is good and what the Lord requires of you – act with justice, be merciful, and walk humbly with your God.” – Micah 6:8
“If you love me, you will keep my commandments. And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Advocate, to be with you forever. This is the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees him nor knows him. You know him, because he abides with you, and he will be in you. I will not leave you orphaned; I am coming to you. In a little while the world will no longer see me, but you will see me; because I live, you also will live. On that day you will know that I am in my Father, and you in me, and I in you. They who have my commandments and keep them are those who love me; and those who love me will be loved by my Father, and I will love them and reveal myself to them.” – John 14:15-21, NRSV #truth #advocate #paraclete #thefather #father #john14
“But now I am going to him who sent me; yet none of you asks me, ‘Where are you going?’ But because I have said these things to you, sorrow has filled your hearts. Nevertheless I tell you the truth: it is to your advantage that I go away, for if I do not go away, the Advocate will not come to you; but if I go, I will send him to you. And when he comes, he will prove the world wrong about sin and righteousness and judgment: about sin, because they do not believe in me; about righteousness, because I am going to the Father and you will see me no longer; about judgment, because the ruler of this world has been condemned. I still have many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now. When the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all the truth; for he will not speak on his own, but will speak whatever he hears, and he will declare to you the things that are to come. He will glorify me, because he will take what is mine and declare it to you.” – John 16:5-14, NRSV #john16
In this series, I am going to be talking about the word grace. At a surface level, grace means getting better than we deserve. Without forgetting about this definition, I want to use the word grace in another way throughout this series. Whenever I use the word grace, in this series, I will be describing how God, the Holy Spirit, works in our life. God is not static nor bound by our expectations or the limits of our understanding. God can work in ways that we find unpredictable. God never gets stuck in a rut – God is creative and can work in surprising ways. Yet, God is always consistent with his character. That means that we can study what the Bible teaches us about God and discern some patterns and find some predictable ways in which God works in human lives. To say it another way, we can recognize the rhythm by which God moves. It will be so important, throughout this series, to hold both of the truths in tension. #grace
I have chosen the idea of rhythm to describe how God relates to his creation. I have chosen the idea with care. The ancient church used the word perichoresis to describe the relationship between the three persons of the Triune God. We get our word choreography from the word perichoresis. The word is a term that describes dancing – specifically the back and forth actions of people dancing together. It implies that all of the dancers have a role to play. In the case of a couple dancing together, both take turns leading and following the other. I believe that perichoresis is also an accurate way to describe the way God chooses to relate to us and the rest of creation. He invites us into the divine dance, where life, joy, and real contentment are found. Though I will also be using the imagery of walking with God, I want to say: God wants us to do some of that walking to get us to the dance floor, where God intends to sweep us off our feet, and then set us down gently so that we can do some dancing of our own. #trinity #triuneGod #perichoresis #dance
I want to start this message by saying something very basic about God. The essence of God’s nature is holiness and love. God will never act in ways that do not reflect both. By studying the character of God, we can learn how to get in sync with his rhythm. As long as we allow him to lead the dance, we can match our movements to his. That is what I mean by staying in rhythm with God. #holiness #love
In this series, we will be talking specifically about the third person of the Trinity, the Holy Spirit. If you are unsure about what that language means, that is okay. We are going to unpack it for you and help you to make sense of it and apply it to your life. This series is going to be very practical.
Let’s get started by looking at our passages. The context is that Jesus is spending his last night with his disciples before his death. He knew that Judas had already betrayed him. He also knew that in a few hours, a posse of ruffians would arrest him and hand him over to a kangaroo court. That court would sentence him to death and turn him over to the Roman guard. Jesus uses his last few hours to prepare his disciples for all that is about to happen. In verse 14:16 Jesus tells his followers that he will soon be sending someone to help them. Jesus calls this someone “another Advocate.” The word advocate is the Greek word paraclete, which can mean encourager, counselor, advocate, companion, and a host of other roles. In short, this someone will be for Jesus’ followers what he has been for them. He will be filling the vacancy left by Jesus. That is why Jesus says another. #other #another
In Greek, there are two words for another. One of these words is heteros. The word heteros means two different things. Jesus did not use this word. If he had used heteros, his meaning would have been something like this: “I am leaving, but I am sending a replacement. The new guy may end up being a better fit than I. He might not be as good. Either way, you are getting someone else.” That is not what Jesus says.
The other Greek word is allos, which means a duplicate or something of exact value, quality, or worth. In other words, the One Jesus is going to send will be like having another Jesus with them. The Holy Spirit is like having another Jesus.
We need to say something else about the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit is a personal being to whom we relate, not a cosmic, spiritual-energy that we channel or use. Understanding this helps us to appreciate the Bible’s prohibition on witchcraft. Witchcraft is an attempt to manipulate God as if he were merely energy or power. It is treating God as if he were only a spiritual energy to be directed at our discretion.
Let me give you some specific attributes of the Holy Spirit’s
personhood – #personshood
The Holy Spirit has knowledge. 1 Corinthians 2:10-11: “The Spirit searches all things, even the deep things of God. Who among people knows the thoughts of the human heart, except the person’s own spirit? In the same way, no one knows the thoughts of God except the Spirit of God.”
The Holy Spirit makes decisions. 1 Corinthians 12:11: “All of these gifts are the work of the Holy Spirit, and he gives them to each person as he sees fit.”
The Holy Spirit has and can give love. Romans 15:30: “I urge you, brothers and sisters, by our Lord Jesus Christ and by the love of the Holy Spirit.”
The Holy Spirit is sentient and has purposes: Acts 13:2: “While they were worshiping the Lord and fasting, the Holy Spirit said, ‘Set apart for me Barnabas and Saul for the work to which I have called them.’”
The Holy Spirit can grieve. Ephesians 4:30: “And do not grieve the Holy Spirit, with whom you were sealed for the day of redemption.”
The Holy Spirit can hear. John 16:13: “When he, the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all truth. He will not speak on his own; he will speak only what he hears, and he will tell you what is yet to come.”
The Holy Spirit is a person. The New Testament always uses the personal pronoun, “He,” not “it.” Since the Holy Spirit never incarnated and took on human flesh, it is just as proper to use the pronoun she. But we need to avoid using the word “it” because it tempts us to treat God as an object. The Holy Spirit is a person. He is the third person of the Trinity, God’s other-self. #pronouns
That is why Jesus can say in John 14:18 that he was not leaving or abandoning his followers. Instead, he will be with them in a new way. In verse 26, Jesus says that the Holy Spirit will remind them of all that they had learned from Jesus. In other words, the Holy Spirit is going to act in ways consistent with what they have seen and heard from Jesus. The Holy Spirit is not going to have a different agenda.
We find a similar idea at the beginning of chapter fourteen. There, we hear Jesus say, that by coming to know Jesus, his followers have come to know God the Father. To have seen Jesus is to have seen the Father. To know one is to know the other. The same is true of the Holy Spirit. To know the Holy Spirit is to know Jesus more thoroughly and intimately.
Let me make the main point another way. As we look at grace and seek to understand it better, we are taking a look at the character of God. Developing a better understanding of the Biblical idea of grace is really about getting to know God better so that we learn to live in rhythm with God. #rhythm
Let me also repeat – God can and does work in creative, new, and exciting ways that can surprise us. But these new things will always be consistent with his character. Throughout this series, we need to hold both ideas in tension. Having a better understanding of grace will help us recognize how and when God is at work in our lives, without so fully understanding God’s plans that it strips all the fun and spontaneity out of walking with God. We will understand the dance God is trying to lead while also being able to experience the delight of discovering that God still has a few new moves to show us.
Sadly, it is easy to find churches that can hold on to one of these truths, but not both. If they place all of their focus on God doing new things, they stray from the consistent picture of God found in the Bible. When this happens, their understanding and practice of religion and spirituality begin to lose cohesion and become something unrecognizable as Christianity.
If a church places all of its focus on the consistency of God, that form of religion and spirituality can become dry, stilted, inflexible, and lacking in joy. One distortion produces a chaotic form of faith. The other distortion produces a form of faith that would remind one of a morbid funeral. I think most of us have experienced one or both. We are proposing something very different here.
In verse 16:7 Jesus says that it is better that he should go away. Otherwise, the Holy Spirit would not be able to come and do his work. What does that mean? And, how could it possibly be better for Jesus to go away? Wouldn’t it be better if Jesus was still walking around in the form of a human being? The answer is no.
If Jesus were still here in that way, people like you and me would never get a chance to know Jesus. At most, you and I might get to see him on tv. If we were really lucky, we might get a very brief audience with him for a few minutes, once in our lifetime. Seeing Jesus would be like visiting a president or pope.
Ordinary Christians would never get to know him personally. We need Jesus’ presence in a different way. In his physical form, Jesus was God with us. The Holy Spirit is God within us. He is available to us 24-7. Each of us can have an intimate experience of God because the Holy Spirit is not limited to a physical form. That is why Jesus says that it is actually better this way. Each of us can have full access to God.
Now, this does not mean that it was unimportant for Jesus to become a flesh and blood human being. If Jesus had not become flesh, we might think that all God cared about was getting spirits into heaven. Because God became a man, we know that God is up to something much bigger than rescuing disembodied souls.
In verse 16:13 Jesus reminds us that the Holy Spirit is not just some replacement. The Holy Spirit is not going to switch tracks on us or impart a different plan. His work is a continuation of Jesus’ work. And so, learning to get in step with the Holy Spirit is the same thing as learning to get in step with Jesus. And getting in step with Jesus is the same thing as getting in step with God the Father.
As we learn to follow the rhythm of the Holy Spirit, we will be learning to walk, run, and dance with the God who creates, redeems, and sustains us. Amen.