The promise…

Of the Spirit (part 16) 

In preparing his disciples for a future without him in person with them, he tells them they should love one another as he had loved them. For two reasons: first of all, that it would identify them as his disciples, and secondly, because love was the heart and soul of God’s kingdom, that he would now be setting up on this planet, starting with them. 

And to make that double challenge even greater, Jesus told them they couldn’t resort to any worldly means or practices. Only by his love, his peace and his attitude of service could the kingdom be demonstrated, displayed and developed through them. 

Which, of course, was a massively tall order, because it soon became apparent that they didn’t have it in them to fulfill either challenge. When it came to their feet needing washing, for instance, none of them thought of doing it for each other. And when it came to displaying God’s kingdom with Jesus’ attitudes, Peter sliced an ear off the high priest’s servant.  

They were dead in the water, therefore, before they even got started. So how on earth were they going to carry on after Jesus was gone, following in his footsteps of love, peace and service, in the state they were in only hours before his death? 

Jesus answered that with an amazing promise: “I tell you the truth, anyone who has faith in me will do what I have been doing,” John 14:12. Oh, so this was how these two impossible challenges could be fulfilled by the sorry likes of them. The key, clearly, was “faith in him.” But how did that work exactly? Faith in him for what, or have faith in him in what way? It would be so much easier if he just stayed with them, because they’d have little trouble with faith then. 

Ah but, Jesus says, “If you loved me you would be glad I’m going to the Father,” verse 28, because it would be from that vantage point now that Jesus would be with them, not as a physical presence, but with his Father now directing him to do in us what the Father had done in him. Same Father, same purpose. Their faith, then, was in Jesus still “doing exactly what my Father has commanded me,” verse 31, only in even greater power now, and in them too, verse 12…(more on this tomorrow)