The spirit of truth

JESUS said to his disciples: “I have much more to tell you, but you cannot bear it now. But when he comes, the Spirit of truth, he will guide you to all truth. He will not speak on his own, but he will speak what he hears, and will declare to you the things that are coming. He will glorify me, because he will take from what is mine and declare it to you. Everything that the Father has is mine; for this reason I told you that he will take from what is mine and declare it to you.”

REFLECTION HE WILL NOT SPEAK ON HIS OWN. Jesus has come down from heaven to reveal the “name” or mysteries of God. He prays to the Father at the Last Supper, “This is eternal life, that they should know you, the only true God… I revealed your name to those whom you gave me out of the world… the words you gave to me I have given to them, and they accepted them and truly understood that I came from you” (Jn 17:3, 6, 8).

The Spirit of truth that will come after Jesus will not have “new revelations” about the Father. Rather, he will take from what is Jesus’ and declare it to the disciples. Jesus says that what he says and who he is cannot be fully understood by the disciples in the present state. But when the Spirit comes with Jesus’ glorification, he will guide the disciples to all truth about Jesus—above all, that he is the Messiah and the Son of God.

When the Gospel of John was written, many of the actions and words of Jesus were already clear to the disciples because of the grace of the Spirit and the light of Jesus’ glorification. An example is Jesus’ declaration about the temple. Jesus tells the Jews, “Destroy this temple and in three days I will raise it up” (Jn 2:19). The evangelist clarifies, “But he was speaking about the temple of his body. Therefore, when he was raised from the dead, his disciples remembered that he had said this” (Jn 2:21-22, emphasis added).

Ponder on the things that are “clearer” to you now because of certain events and of the wisdom that comes with the passage of time.