Another Advocate

The word Jesus uses for the Holy Spirit in this chapter is sometimes translated Advocate, sometimes Comforter, sometimes Helper. It describes someone called alongside to help, the way a friend stands with you in a courtroom or a hospital. Jesus says he will ask the Father, and the Father will give them another Advocate to be with them forever. The word another is doing quiet work. Jesus has been their advocate for three years. Now there will be another of the same kind.

This is how Jesus answers the disciples' fear of being abandoned. He will not leave them as orphans. He is going away, but through the Spirit he is coming to them, and the Father and the Son will make their home with anyone who loves him and keeps his word. What the disciples had in a single room with a single man, the whole church will have everywhere, always.

The Spirit's work is described in a few plain phrases. He is the Spirit of truth. He lives with them and will be in them. He will teach them all things and remind them of everything Jesus has said. That last promise is why we have the Gospels. The disciples did not understand much of what happened that night, and Jesus knew it. He built in the remedy. The Spirit would bring it back to them with understanding.

The one idea here is that the Christian life was never meant to be lived out of memory alone. If following Jesus meant recalling what a teacher said long ago and trying to apply it, it would be a heavy and lonely thing. It is not that. The one who spoke the words is present, by his Spirit, in the person trying to obey them. Teaching, reminding, and comforting are happening now.

Jesus ties this to obedience in a way that is easy to misread. If you love me, keep my commands, he says, and then promises the Spirit. Obedience is not the price of the Spirit's presence. It is the shape love takes, and the Spirit is the one who makes it possible. The turn toward life is to stop trying to follow Jesus from a distance, as though he were absent, and to begin the day expecting that the Advocate is already alongside. Ask him to remind you of what you have forgotten. That is a prayer he has promised to answer.