John 14:16-18, “And I will pray the Father, and he shall give you another Comforter, that he may abide with you for ever; Even the Spirit of truth; whom the world cannot receive, because it seeth him not, neither knoweth him: but ye know him; for he dwelleth with you, and shall be in you. I will not leave you comfortless: I will come to you.”
I love our text passage of Scripture. Notice in verse 18 that Jesus promised
His disciples, “I WILL COME TO YOU,” speaking of the indwelling Holy Spirit.
Romans 8:9, “But ye are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, if so be that
the Spirit of God dwell in you. Now if any man
have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of
his.” Carefully notice that the “Spirit of God” and the “Spirit of
Christ” are used interchangeably, that is, they refer to the same person,
God.
I found the following helpful quote today by Dr. John R. Rice, from page 59 of his 1973 excellent book (arranged by Miss Viola Walden) called, “Dr. Rice, Here Are More Questions...”:
Does God Actually Exist in Three Persons?
Yes, He does. This historic Christian position, held by nearly all Christians through the ages, is based on the Bible; and only those who have been in touch with some false cult, I think, would doubt or deny it.
It is easy to see from the Bible that there are three persons in the GODHEAD. in John 14:16, Jesus said, “And I will pray the Father, and he shall give you another Comforter, that he may abide with you for ever.” Jesus, one Person, prays to the Father, another Person, and the Father sends the Comforter, another Person. Yet all three are of one mind and of one principle and are not to be separated as if one were without the other or against the others.
Again, in Acts 10:38, Peter says, “How God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Ghost and with power: who went about doing good, and healing all that were oppressed of the devil; for God was with him.” God the Father anointed Jesus with the Holy Ghost. Here the Bible speaks distinctly of three personalities.
When Jesus was baptized, God spoke aloud from Heaven and said, “Thou art my beloved Son; in thee I am well pleased” (Luke 3:22). So God the Father and Jesus were separate, distinct personalities, in this case, surely. And there are many, many Scriptures to show that God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Ghost are One and yet separate and distinct Persons, but John 14:16 is sufficient for this proof.
SOURCE: Dr. John R. Rice; “Dr. Rice, Here Are More Questions...,” chapter 11, “Bible Doctrine,” p. 59; Sword of the Lord Publishers,©1973.
Good stuff!
In the following Scripture passage we see all three Persons the Godhead. John 14:16-18, “And I will pray the Father, and he shall give you another Comforter, that he may abide with you for ever; Even the Spirit of truth; whom the world cannot receive, because it seeth him not, neither knoweth him: but ye know him; for he dwelleth with you, and shall be in you. I will not leave you comfortless: I will come to you.” Clearly, the Holy Spirit is a distinct Person, as He is called “ANOTHER COMFORTER”!
And yet we see that Jesus came back with the Holy Spirit, after He ascended into Heaven, to comfort His disciples (and every Christian believer today). Jesus has His own body, which is up in Heaven today, seated on the right-hand of the Father. Colossians 3:1, “If ye then be risen with Christ, seek those things which are above, where Christ sitteth on the right hand of God.” And yet Jesus lives inside of the body of every believer in the form of the indwelling Holy Spirit, which evidences that the Godhead is One.
Also, God the Father abides inside every born-again believer. John 14:23, “Jesus answered and said unto him, If a man love me, he will keep my words: and my Father will love him, and we will come unto him, and make our abode with him.” So here we see that God the Father, and God the Son, live inside every believer as God the Holy Spirit. The fact that Jesus uses a first person plural subjective case pronoun, “we,” evidences that the Godhead is comprised of three distinct Persons. Jesus didn't say “I”; but rather, He said “we” (which means more than one). If God were only one Person, then the Lord wouldn't have used the first person plural pronoun “we.” John 14:23b, “we will come unto him, and make our abode with him.”
And please notice also, in John 14:23b above, the first person plural possessive case pronoun “our” (which again means more than just one). There is only one God (Deuteronomy 6:4); but that one God exists and manifests Himself to mankind in the three individual Persons of God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit. This is the Godhead, or Trinity. As Dr. Wendell Evans taught us at Hyles-Anderson College in chapel, “The Trinity may not make good math, but it makes good Bible!”
“Nothing
in my future can ever affect the salvation that I have... Once you trust
the Lord Jesus Christ as your Savior, you are eternally secure!”
—Pastor Hank Lindstrom (1940-2008), a quote from the classic MP3 sermon
titled, “
