Well, good morning. I invite you to turn with me in your Bibles today to John 14. John 14. We are going to be reading together verses 15 to 31, and before we read that together and pray, just want to thank you for your warm welcome. Be patient with us as we try to get to know you and remember names. There’s many, many of you and had that, that feeling this week as I’ve been in the office, saying there’s a lot of layers to this church and a lot going on. But we are blessed to be here. We are thankful for your call. We are eager to get to know you and to minister among you and praying that God will bless that richly as we serve here.

John 14, verses 15 to 31. Let’s read this together, then we’ll pray after that. Remember as we read this that this is God’s Holy Word.

Jesus said, “‘If you love Me, you will keep My commandments. And I will ask the Father, and He will give you another Helper, to be with you forever, even the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees Him nor knows Him. You know Him, for He dwells with you and will be in you.'”

‘”I will not leave you as orphans; I will come to you. Yet a little while and the world will see Me no more, but You will see me. Because I live, you also will live. In that day you will know that I am in the Father, and you in Me, and I in you. Whoever has My commandments and keeps them, he it is who loves Me. And he who loves Me will be loved by my Father, and I will love him and manifest myself to him.’ Judas (not Iscariot) said to Him, ‘Lord, how is it that You will manifest yourself to us, and not to the world?’ Jesus answered him, ‘If anyone loves Me, he will keep My Word, and my Father will love him, and We will come to him and make our home with him. Whoever does not love Me does not keep My words. And the word that you hear is not Mine but the Father’s who sent Me.'”

“‘These things I have spoken to you while I am still with you. But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in My name, He will teach you all things and bring to your remembrance all that I have said to you. Peace I leave with you; My peace I give to you. Not as the world gives do I give to you. Let not your hearts be troubled, neither let them be afraid. You heard me say to you, ‘I am going away, and I will come to you.’ If you loved Me, you would have rejoiced, because I am going to the Father, for the Father is greater than I. And now I have told you before it takes place, so that when it does take place you may believe. I will no longer talk much with you, for the ruler of this world is coming. He has no claim on me, but I do as the Father has commanded me, so that the world may know that I love the Father. Rise, let us go from here.'”

Let’s pray together. Lord Jesus, as You promised the Holy Spirit in this text, we pray for your Holy Spirit to fall and rest upon us. We pray that Your Spirit would take Your Word and drive it deep into our hearts. We pray that Your Holy Spirit would accompany us so that we are not only hearers of Your Word, but that we would be doers of it as well. We’re thankful, Lord, that we not only celebrate today the promise of Your Holy Spirit, but as New Testament Christians we are also able to give thanks for the outpouring of Your Holy Spirit, and so teach us now. We wait upon You. We pray these things in Christ’s name. Amen.

Well, dear people of God, a period of leaving is always a painful time of life. A leaving means loss and that stings, whether that be the death of a loved one or you’re sending your child off to college or kindergarten, or you’ve lost your health or your job… All of these kind of events, all of these leaving events, they bring uncertainty, they bring vulnerability, they bring pain into our life.