Scripture: John 14:15-23 ; 1 John 1:3.
Text: 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."
There is a poem entitled, "If Jesus Came To Your House", which raises the question as to what we would really do if Jesus really came to our homes and spent some time with us. Think about what it says.
If Jesus came to your house to spend a day or two,
If He came unexpectedly, I wonder what you'd do.
Oh, I know you'd give your nicest room to such an honored Guest,
And all the food you'd serve to Him would be the very best -
And you would keep assuring Him you're glad to have Him there,
That serving Him in your home is joy beyond compare!
But when you saw Him coming, would you meet Him at the door,
With arms outstretched in welcome to your heavenly Visitor?
Or would you have to change your clothes before you let Him in,
Or hide some magazines and put the Bible where they'd been?
Would you turn off the TV set and hope He hadn't heard -
And wish you hadn't uttered that last, loud, hasty word?
Would you hide your worldly music and put some hymn books out?
Could you let Jesus walk right in, or would you rush about?
And I wonder - if the Saviour spent a day or two with you -
Would you go right on doing the things you always do?
Would you keep right on saying the things you always say?
Would life for you continue as it does from day to day?
Would your family conversation keep up its usual pace?
And would you find it hard each meal to say a table grace?
Would you sing the songs you always sing and read the books you read,
And let Him know the things on which your mind and spirit feed?
Would you take Jesus with you everywhere you'd planned to go,
Or would you maybe change your plans for just a day or so? ...
Would you be glad to have Him stay for ever on and on,
Or would you sigh with great relief when He at last was gone?
It might be interesting to know the things that you would do
If Jesus came in person to spend some time with you.
The thought of Jesus coming and spending some time with us raises some interesting questions, and it ought to because Jesus proposes not only to come and spend some time with us but to take up His abode or dwelling place with us and never leave.
Whether Jesus actually does come to us and take up His dwelling place with us and if He does come, how long He stays, is up to us; but Jesus proposes to come and dwell with each one of us in a very real sense on certain conditions.
In our Scripture Jesus talks about manifesting or revealing Himself to those who meet certain conditions and He says that He and the Father will come and make Their dwelling place with those who meet certain conditions.
The Christian religion is not just a faith to believe, though a Christian must have faith and must believe some very definite things about God and Jesus and God's Word.
The Christian religion is not just a life to live, though a Christian does live a life that is different from the way of the world.
The Christian religion is not just knowing some things about God or even knowing God, though a Christian does come to a knowledge of God that one can never have outside of the Christian life.
At the very heart of the Christian life is an experience of the very Presence of God in the here and in the now.
The Old Testament is, to a large degree, a record of God's relationship and dealings with the Hebrew people.
Adam and Eve experienced a personal relationship with God.
Abraham was known as the friend of God.
We read that the Lord spoke unto Moses as a man speaketh unto his friend. Samuel heard the voice of God.
Isaiah, in the temple, found himself in the Presence of God and had a vision of the glory of God.
The prophets were the messengers of God, and through them, God made known His will and purposes to the people.
In Jesus, God was present here on earth in human form.
Jesus came and was with His disciples a number of times following the resurrection, in bodily form so that they saw Him with their physical eyes.
Following His ascension back to Heaven, He sent the Holy Spirit as an abiding Presence, God present with them in Spirit and in power.
In the Presence of the Holy Spirit, the early Christians found that God was with them, and they found that the Holy Spirit was also the Spirit of Christ. Thus, John wrote, "That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon, and our hands have handled, of the Word of life ... declare we unto you, that ye also may have fellowship with us: and truly our fellowship is with the Father, and with His Son Jesus Christ."
The early Christians experienced the Presence of God and of Christ in their lives in a very real and in a very personal way. John calls it fellowship with the Father and with Jesus.
Down across the centuries I suppose there have been those Christians in every generation who have lived so close to God that they, too, experienced His Presence and fellowship in a very real and personal way. They are sometimes referred to as "saints" and perhaps looked upon as having attained unto a spiritual life and a relationship with God that is somewhat beyond the reach of most of us.
Yet, in our Scripture, Jesus is not talking about a revelation of God and an experience of God's Presence that is beyond the reach of those of us who are gathered here this morning. He is talking about an experience of the abiding Presence of God and of Himself that is open to us all. You can have it, and I can have it, and anyone in the entire world can have it simply by meeting certain conditions.
Jesus refers to three things in our Scripture that are essential if He is to manifest Himself to us and if He and the Father are to come to us and take up Their abode or dwelling place with us.
The first is that we have His commandments, that we come to know His will. The second is that we keep His commandments.
The third is that we love Him.
"He that hath My commandments, and keepeth them, he it is that loveth Me: and he that loveth Me shall be loved of My Father, and I will love him, and will manifest Myself to 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."
In plain and simple language Jesus tells us that He reveals Himself to those who love Him and keep His commandments.
Following the resurrection of Jesus, He made a number of appearances to different people here on earth before He ascended to Heaven. He revealed Himself to Mary Magdalene; to two of the disciples who were on their way to Emmaus; to the eleven disciples; and to above five hundred of the Christians at one time; and He also made other appearances.
Nowhere, however, do we read that Jesus appeared to the chief priests or to the scribes or to the Pharisees or to the Roman soldiers or to the indifferent multitude.
Jesus tells us that where two or three are gathered together in His Name, He is present in the midst of them.
We may know that Jesus said this. We may believe that it is true. We may be present in a group that has gathered in the Name of Jesus, and Jesus may be present. Yet, unless we have met the conditions upon which Jesus reveals Himself to us, we may not be aware of His Presence even though others around us may be experiencing His Presence in their lives.
Do you remember that Old Testament story about Balak, king of Moab, who tried to get Balaam to come and curse the people of Israel so that he might be able to drive them out of the land, and the account in the story of Balaam's donkey? Balaam's donkey, you may remember, saw the angel of the Lord standing in the way with a sword in his hand. Three times the donkey turned aside from the way rather than walk into the angel, but Balaam was not even aware that the angel of the Lord was present.
Wouldn't it be something to own a dumb animal that had more spiritual awareness than you did!
Do you remember when the army of the king of Syria surrounded the city of Dothan to capture Elisha who was in the city? Elisha's servant got up early in the morning and found the Syrian host surrounding the city. He was very much disturbed and said to Elisha, "Alas, my master! how shall we do?" The army of the Lord was surrounding Elisha protecting him, but the servant could not even see the Lord's army until Elisha prayed and asked God to open his eyes that he might see.
God can be in our very midst, but unless we have met the conditions upon which He reveals Himself, we may not be aware of His Presence at all.
The eye of an eagle is so keen that, soaring high in the air or sitting on the top of some lofty mountain peak, it can see things that to the human eye would be nothing but a blur if seen at all.
There is a whistle pitched so high that its sound is not audible to the human ear; yet a dog can hear it perfectly, and dog trainers and owners often use it in their work.
The air around us is full of sounds that we cannot hear with our ears but a radio set can catch their waves and transmit them to us.
The great realities in the universe are spiritual, but without spiritual awareness, we can be in the very Presence of Christ Himself and not even be aware that He is near.
In the book, RETURN FROM TOMORROW, George G. Ritchie, Jr., now a highly respected doctor and psychiatrist, describes in part a life-transforming experience he had, apparently in eternity, after being pronounced dead during World War II. Though out of the body, he was still able to see what was going on in the towns and cities he visited and realized that they were crowded with bright angel beings. In eternity, even in the realm of the lost, bright angel beings hovered over the lost and even the Presence of Jesus was there, but the people there as well as those still here on earth in the cities and towns seemed to be totally unaware of their presence. Their attention was focussed on other things.
Joan of Arc, born in 1412 A. D. in France, a peasant girl, went to the court of King Charles and told him that God had revealed to her that she should lead the French army to victory against its enemies. In an interview with the king, she spoke of the strange voices which she heard, giving her the message. The king was irritated. He said that the voices should come to him, the king, and not to a mere subject of his. Joan answered: "They do come to you; but you do not hear them. If you prayed from your heart and listened, you would hear the voices as well as I do."
There is no place on earth where God is not present.
Yet, though God is present throughout His entire universe, we must meet certain conditions if we would be aware of His Presence and have Him come and dwell with us.
Disobedience to God's known will broke the fellowship Adam and Eve had with God. Disobedience always breaks the fellowship and makes us uncomfortable in the Presence of our heavenly Father.
Even though we name the Name of the Lord and can look back to times in our lives when we were aware of His Presence and rejoiced in His nearness, there may perhaps come times when we do not seem as close to Him as once we were. If that happens, we need to remember that it is not God Who has moved.
The Hebrew people had many such experiences in their long history. There were times when God was with them and when He manifested Himself to them; and there were those times when He seemed no longer present and when their prayers seemed to make no difference. In explaining one such occasion to them, Isaiah said, "Behold, the Lord's hand is not shortened, that it cannot save; neither His ear heavy, that it cannot hear: but your iniquities have separated between you and your God, and your sins have hid His face from you, that He will not hear." (59:1-2).
In one scene of an old drama called WINDOWS, an aged window cleaner is washing the windows in the library of a journalist. As he works he talks aloud, apparently to himself, but in reality to the journalist who is sitting at his desk lost in thought.
"People's bedroom windows gets dirty," the old window washer says. A little later, he adds, "People's hall and dining room and their living room windows gets dirty. They gets dirty with soot and dust and grease and smoke. And you can't see out of them very well. It makes all the world look drab and dull and dim." Then he stopped again and glanced over his shoulder to see if the journalist is listening. Satisfied that he is, he went on to say the thing that he really started out to say in the first place: "People's life winders gets dirty, too. They gets dirty with envies, jealousies, prejudices, and greed, and all of life looks dull and ugly and you don't see things as they are. Sometimes you can't see them at all."
The windows of life must be kept clean if we are to see the things of the Spirit. We must live in such a way that we will be comfortable in the Presence of our heavenly Father if He and our Lord are going to be an Abiding Presence in our lives.
The greatest experiences of life are those experiences when Jesus reveals Himself to us and when we have an awareness of the abiding Presence of our heavenly Father and our Lord and Saviour.
These experiences are not special privileges that God reserves for just a few choice souls in each generation. They are available to all of us. We have but to seek God's will and learn it; to love Jesus and keep His words, living in obedience to His commandments, for Jesus to reveal or manifest Himself to us and for our heavenly Father and our Saviour and Lord to take up their abode with us.
Leslie Weatherhead once told of a friend of his who visited a church where the one who spoke set forth the position of the church on a rather difficult-to-understand doctrine. After the service his friend asked an old man who was present if he believed all that the speaker had said. "When I come to Mass, sir, I cannot follow what they do up at the altar. I just kneel down and think about Jesus ... I get very near to Jesus then, sir, and when I go home I feel that Jesus comes with me."
When we truly love the Lord and put Him central in our minds and hearts and seek to live in obedience to His will, we don't have to beg the Lord to come home and live with us. When we love Him and are willing to walk with Him in the light of His word, He is more than willing to walk with us along the pathway of time. "... lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world," is His promise.