The Spirit of Peace

Let Not Your Hearts Be Troubled – 3 Sermons

Part 3: “The Gift of a New Peace”

(John 14:22-31, Preaching: Pastor Stephen Magee, October 25, 2009)

²² Judas (not Iscariot) said to him, "Lord, how is it that you will manifest yourself to us, and not to the world?" ²³ Jesus answered 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 home with him. ²⁴ Whoever does not love me does not keep my words. And the word that you hear is not mine but the Father's who sent me. ²⁵ "These things I have spoken to you while I am still with you. 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 have said to you. ²⁷ Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. Not as the world gives do I give to you. Let not your hearts be troubled, neither let them be afraid. ²⁸ You heard me say to you, 'I am going away, and I will come to you.' If you loved me, you would have rejoiced, because I am going to the Father, for the Father is greater than I. ²⁹ And now I have told you before it takes place, so that when it does take place you may believe. ³⁰ I will no longer talk much with you, for the ruler of this world is coming. He has no claim on me, ³¹ but I do as the Father has commanded me, so that the world may know that I love the Father. Rise, let us go from here.

What does Jesus promise the church in her anxiety and fear?

A: “My peace I give to you.” (John 14:27)

The Display of God through the Church (22-24)

One of the songs of ascent, Psalm 122, talks about how the thrones of the house of David were in Jerusalem. The pilgrim on his way to Jerusalem could keep such a thought in the eye of his soul in order to help him to persevere. We are not travelling to the Jerusalem below, but to the one which is above. We are told to set our minds on things above, where Christ is seated at the right hand of the Father (Colossians 3:1-2). It would be delightful if we could see into that heavenly Jerusalem now and look upon the throne of the great Son of David who lives and reigns forever at the right hand of the Father on high. That would help us to keep on going. That would give us peace.

The challenges of anxiety and fear in the Christian community have always been formidable. We are reminded that we need help in this area by the words of Jesus both at the beginning and at the end of this chapter, “Let not your hearts be troubled.” But our hearts are troubled, and we need to find some way to a new gift of peace that Christ promises His disciples. We need that peace that Isaiah spoke of so long ago, “You keep him in perfect peace whose mind is stayed on you, because he trusts in you” (Isaiah 26:3). The disciples are facing the loss of their best friend. He promises them a new home, a new love of their lives, and the gift of a new peace, and all of that was somehow personal. Jesus says He will be seen by His disciples, but that somehow the world will not see Him. This prompts a question by one of them. How will the world not see Him if the disciples are able to see Him?

Jesus says that He will be seen and known in the people who love Him and thus keep His Word. (Think of the end of the 2nd commandment.) These are the ones who are loved by the Father, and Father, Son, and Holy Spirit will come to these ones, and they will make their home with them (lit. make a room with them). The world will not have this experience. That is how the Triune God will be known to people of faith, but not generally to the world. This gift of God making a room in you as you yield yourself to Him and to His Word surely has something to do with the well-being, the peace, that we come to experience as we focus on the Lord, and not on our circumstances.

In terms of the things you want from God right now, where on that list does this experience of having the triune God living with you and in you fit? Are your hearts captivated by the circumstances around you, or by the Lord who lives within you? Will you have peace if and only if certain things you want are given to you, or if and only if you have the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit? The display of God through the church will not be by our outstanding success rate in gaining the best of all circumstances instantly, but in having God in and among us permanently.

The Helper, The Teacher, The Holy Spirit (25-26)

Where is God? Where is the Father now? Where is the Son of God now? Where is the Holy Spirit? When we think of God in terms of place, we are reminded that God is somehow everywhere. Yet we often see God in the Bible as being in some place in a special, powerful, or comforting way. God inhabited the tabernacle, and later the temple. God also occasionally appeared as the One who wrestled with a man, spoke a needed word, or received the worship of one of His servants. But God also seemed to actually live within a few people, especially His prophets, in the person of His Spirit. It is most frequently the case that we think of the Father as inhabiting the highest heaven. The Son of God, Jesus Christ, after making atonement for our sins on the cross, eventually sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high as one who is forever fully God and fully man. But where is the Holy Spirit?

When Jesus prepares to leave, and speaks to His disciples of the peace that He will send them, He talks specifically about this Spirit, the third person of the Godhead. Where is the Spirit of God? This is a matter of great concern to the Lord when He speaks the words of comfort contained in this chapter. It is the intention of Jesus together with the Father, upon the ascension of the Son on high, to send forth the promised gift of the Holy Spirit to the church. This pouring out of the Holy Spirit is the beginning of the fulfillment of the Lord’s promise through the prophet Joel (Joel 2:28), “And it shall come to pass afterward, that I will pour out my Spirit on all flesh.” The grand finale of this promise will only be experienced in the heavenly Jerusalem, but we have a true taste of this now according to Peter who cites Joel at Pentecost and says in Acts 2:16-17, “This is what was uttered through the prophet Joel: ‘And in the last days it shall be, God declares, that I will pour out my Spirit on all flesh.’ ”

Before He goes to the Father, Jesus wants His disciples to know that when He ascends on high, His Father will send the Holy Spirit to them. How does the Holy Spirit come to people? He is given by the sovereign will of God. Beyond that, we are told to ask for the gift of the Holy Spirit, and for the graces that are associated with His work among His people. In Luke 11:13 we read these words of Jesus, “If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will the heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him!” To have one of the three persons of the one Triune God is to have the true God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit with you and in you. If them Spirit makes a room in you, somehow the Father and the Son are in that room, and you are a temple.

Jesus says here that the Holy Spirit is a great Helper to us. We need help in many ways. We need a comforter and an advocate for us. We need help in the spiritual battle before us in life. We also need an internal teacher from God, and the Holy Spirit is this teacher, assuring our souls of the truth of God’s Word, and fighting the power of lies that would confuse and destroy us. The Holy Spirit had a special role of teaching the apostles, teaching them again of the things of Christ, and helping them to remember the words of their Master. This teaching role of the Holy Spirit is at work now in us, as the Scriptures come to life in our hearts when we hear the truth of Christ presented to us.

The Peace of God and the Love of Jesus (27-31)

What we must especially see here for our help in faith and life is that the Holy Spirit is a great gift of peace for the church. Do you want peace in the midst of a world that does much to make you anxious and afraid? Your very best ally in the fight of fear is the positive presence of the Holy Spirit, the Bearer and guarantee of the peace of God within you. It is as if the blessing of the Holy Spirit is the gift of Peace Himself to you from heaven. When Jesus leaves the Holy Spirit with you, He leaves Peace with you. When Jesus gives the Holy Spirit to you, He gives Peace to you.

What does it mean to have the peace of God in you? To have the Spirit is to have a permanent, powerful, and effectual gift of peace, regardless of how we feel. By the Spirit we are assured that the obedience of Jesus was for us, and that the death that He died, He died for us. We have the fact of peace with God as a certified reality, since the certificate of the Lord’s ownership of us as His own has been planted within our awakened hearts. This fact of peace is our most profitable reflection in time of anxiety and fear, especially when it seems that we are not able to have what we would like. There may be much missing in your life, but is there something missing in the goodness of Jesus in His life? Is there anything lacking in the power of His blood? If there is nothing wrong with His righteousness and death, then we are assured that we really do have peace with God as a most important fact of spiritual reflection and life. Flowing from this great fact of peace will come some good measure of the comforting gift of a peaceful heart, driving away from us the wrenching oppression of our disappointments as our mind is resting on the Lord, and not on our circumstances.

Through the Holy Spirit you have a fear-removing gift of peace, a gift that you need to live the Christian life now, a gift that you need to believe in God, and a gift that you need to believe God’s Word. Through the Peace of God given to you in the person of the Holy Spirit, you have what you need to live a life of love in this world, the gift that you need to experience healing of your own troubled heart in a world that has been deeply troubled for many people a very long time. Through the gift of Peace in Person, you are made a pilgrim who is now content with the end of the journey, and thus is ready to rise up and walk to the Jerusalem above.

Will you travel on this road that leads to perfect peace? Will you experience the love that Jesus has for the Father, an outward-faced love, somehow abiding personally in you? Will you allow God to evict the hostile tenants of anxiety and fear living in your heart, as His Peace more and takes up residence in the room that God owns?

Jesus is going to the Father. He is telling His disciples what will happen. His circumstances that He will face are not peaceful at all, but He has the fullness of peace somehow in Him. An adversary will come against Him, yet no adversary can have any hold on Him. This Jesus is righteousness, and He is your peace. This peace he gives to you.

1. How does God show Himself today to the church and to those who are becoming disciples of Jesus Christ?

2. What is the role of the Holy Spirit in this process?

3. What is the peace of God and why do we need this gift?

4. What does peace have to do with believing in God and believing God’s Word?