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John 16:14–15
“[The Holy Spirit] will glorify me, for he will take what is mine and declare it to you. All that the Father has is mine; therefore I said that he will take what is mine and declare it to you.”
Today we are concluding our brief study of what Jesus tells us about the Holy Spirit in His Upper Room Discourse. Our Savior has made clear that His return to heaven and the descent of the Spirit are most advantageous for the church as the Spirit came to empower God’s people and use the church in a fuller way to declare the gospel to the nations. He has also told us that the Spirit, who is truly God, proceeds from the Father and the Son and works to c0nvict the world of sin and to guide believers. This guidance took place in a special, infallible way through the Spirit’s teaching the Apostles the full ramifications of salvation and inspiring the Scriptures. Yet the Spirit also provides an ongoing guidance to the church by illumining the meaning of God’s Word and giving teachers to the church (John 16:4b–13; see Eph. 4:11–14). Of course, the church has not always followed this ongoing guidance well and has needed periodic reformation, which comes as we return to the Scriptures and bring our traditions into conformity with its teaching.
In today’s passage, Jesus continues to expound on the Spirit’s guidance, telling us that the Spirit takes what belongs to the Son and declares it to the Apostles (John 16:14–15). Here, Jesus makes special reference to the direction that the Holy Spirit gave to the Apostles in their foundational teaching ministry and thus ultimately to His providential leading of the Apostles as they wrote the New Testament. Importantly, we see that as the Spirit spoke to and through the Apostles, He was revealing the person and teaching of Jesus Christ.
That the Spirit takes what is Christ’s and delivers it to the Apostles has important ramifications for our doctrine of Scripture. To put it simply, the words of the Apostles are nothing less than the words of the Son of God. Yes, God used Paul and his particular gifts, Peter and his particular gifts, and so on to give us the New Testament. Yet as the biblical authors wrote, they wrote words that ultimately belong to Jesus. When we read the Apostles, we are reading the infallible instruction of the Son of God.
Finally, the Spirit’s taking what belongs to Jesus and conveying it to the Apostles also informs us of the mission of the Holy Spirit to bring glory to Christ. All that we have by the Holy Spirit comes from the Son, who in turn has it from the Father (John 16:14–15). John Calvin wrote, “The Spirit enriches us with no other than the riches of Christ, that he may display his glory in all things.”
Coram Deo Living before the face of God
Entailed in the doctrine of the Trinity is the truth that not only are the words of the Apostles ultimately the words of the Son of God, but so are the words of the Old Testament. All Scripture, in fact, is the words of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. The writings of Moses, Isaiah, Zechariah, Matthew, Paul, John, and all the other human authors of Scripture have full divine authority and are our only infallible and inerrant rule of faith and practice.
For further study
- Exodus 31:18
- Psalm 119:9–16
- John 14:23–24
- Revelation 2:7
The bible in a year
- Exodus 26–28
- Matthew 21