Yesterday on the podcast we were talking about the Holy Spirit and remembering Jesus' promise

that he'd send him to the disciples as another counsellor, another just like himself.

But then he said it was to their advantage that He,

Jesus, would leave them and the Spirit come to them. And for some of us, maybe many of us,

maybe most of us, that's actually hard to believe. How could that be to their advantage? After a which would you rather have,

Jesus or the Holy Spirit? I think most of us would say, surely, Jesus. But I suspect we'll never

really get to know the Holy Spirit unless we get to the bottom of these words of Jesus in

John 16, verse 7.

And the key to understanding them is found in his earlier words when he promised them the

other helper, the Holy Spirit.

He said, the world can't receive the Spirit because it doesn't see him or know him, but

then he added, you know him, for he dwells with you and will be in you.

Now, in the interest of full disclosure, I think these words are often, perhaps usually understood,

as though Jesus meant something like this. In the old covenant, the Spirit was with God's people, but in the New Covenant, he's going

to be in God's people. As though Jesus was answering the question, what's the difference

between the Old Covenant experience of the Spirit and the New Covenant experience?

The answer? The Spirit was with people in the old, but he's in people in the new.

I want to suggest that we think about these words in a different way,

because I believe that what our Lord is saying is this.

Unlike the world that doesn't know the spirit, you already know the Spirit I'm going to send

to you because you've seen Him in me.

You've seen Him dwelling in my life these past three years.

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