Someone asked a great man the secret of his success. He answered: “I had a friend.” All of us can name a friend, maybe more than one, who sometime over the course of your life made a difference, someone who helped you get through a difficult time, someone who gave you a boost just when you needed it, someone who as it turns out was a game changer, a life changer, for you. Without this friend you could very well have been a failure, but this friend stood by you, perhaps when others deserted you. No matter what, this friend loved you and had faith in you. Oh, we all need such a friend. To go through life without such a friend would be a frightening journey. A good friend never lets you down, at least not without a rope.
Unfortunately, our friends can abandon us, even family members. You know the ones who say, “If we were on a sinking ship and there was only one life jacket, I would miss you so much.” Yeah, that kind of friend. Proverbs 18:24 says, “One who has unreliable friends soon comes to ruin, but there is a friend who sticks closer than a brother.” Oh, to find such a friend. Is such a friend to be found?
Everybody wants such a friend. It’s no accident that Facebook named followers of each other on their site “Friends.” Who doesn’t want a friend? Heck, on Facebook, with just a few clicks and few clever or outlandish posts, you can hundreds of friends nearly instantly.
Back in the early 90s, British anthropologist Dr. Robin Dunbar came to an interesting conclusion: humans could likely only maintain social relationships with an average of 148 individuals due to the size of our brain’s neocortex, or what’s known as Dunbar’s Number. We can only keep emotional contact and track of about 148 people. Dunbar also found that at most we will only maintain 3-5 close friends throughout a lifetime, sometimes only one.
Forming and maintaining a strong bond with a close friend is not easy to do. We have to cultivate friendships by sharing meaningful experiences, taking time to know each other, helping each other through tough spots, listening to each other, being honest, holding each other accountable, willing to be inconvenienced. Frankly, some people just don’t want to put in the time to form such bonds.
But we truly do need a friend in life. Life was not meant to be lived alone. Ecclesiastes 4:12 says, “Though one may be overpowered, two can defend themselves. A cord of three strands is not quickly broken.” Jesus Christ was this kind of friend. Let’s talk for a few minutes about the friend that we have in Jesus. And I don’t want this to sound quaint or trite. I want you to leave today a true sense of a very real presence of the Christ you can have with as your friend.
Of course, Jesus was a friend to Peter, James, John, and the other disciples. He was a friend to the sick and healed their diseases. He was a friend of sinners. He forgave their sins and gave them a clean, new life. He was a friend to all who wanted His friendship: rich or poor, sinner or saint, ignorant or well-educated, of any race or nation. He gave them a richer, deeper, more unselfish love than they had ever known before — the love of God. He taught them the truth. He helped them with all their problems. But Jesus was limited by a human body. He could be in only one place at a time. He could not be with all of His friends who needed Him. So Jesus reminded his followers that the Spirit of God is available to them even now, because the Christ Spirit that lived in Jesus also dwells within us. In John 14:16, Jesus said to his disciples, “I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Helper, the Spirit of truth, to stay with you forever.” (from CBN).
This helper is the Spirit of God, what we call the Holy Spirit, the third person of the threeness of God. He knows you. He understands you. He is wooing you. He wants to lead, guide and direct you. The Greek word for the Holy Spirit in our text is Paraclete, which means comforter or someone who helps us in the journey. He is called the Spirit of life, the Holy Spirit or Holy Ghost, the Spirit of truth, the Spirit of wisdom, the Spirit of Christ, and the Spirit of God. Whatever your problem may be, your Helper has the solution.
This Spirit of God lies within you. He knows you better than you know yourself. He knows that about you that you sense but cannot put into words. If I live into the Spirit life, the Spirit can communicate and present me to the world more fully, articulately and powerfully than I could ever do as my clumsy, awkward self. I am only half the man unless I am able to express it, but my words cannot adequately express the Truth that I know that is within me in Christ. But my friend the Holy Spirit speaks for me. Luke 12:13 says, “The Holy Spirit will give you the words to say at the moment when you need them.”
Paul explains his experience of how his friend the Holy Spirit communicates his life for him, describing the Holy Spirit words as “wordless groans.” “In the same way, the Spirit helps us in our weakness,” Paul wrote. “We do not know what we ought to pray for, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us through wordless groans. And he who searches our hearts knows the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for God’s people in accordance with the will of God” (Romans 8:26-27). This is very much a mystical experience, not limited to rational ability, but a deeper communication and reality within.
Your friend, the Holy Spirit, is the One who knows you and relates to you without prejudice, ill-intention, resentment, loathing, or bitterness. He does not condemn you. He loves you. He wants to see you shine, fly, succeed, live life abundantly.
Why? Why would he do this? He knows you as you are originally, before the layers of sin, error, desire and aversion began to form like tartar over your soul. He knows you as the original beautiful, wonderful you.
He knows this original you that you do not know because he sees the baptized you. We are baptized by water and fire, by water and Spirit. John says that I baptize you with water, a symbolic gesture, but there is one who comes after me, the Christ, who will baptize you in water and Spirit. The Spirit burns so bright and so hot in your life, that all that is not the beautiful, original you – the image of God – is melted and falls off.
So you are made whole and clean in the eye of the Holy Spirit. This Friend comes to you as a true Friend, with nothing but power, encouragement and comfort for you. So Jesus tells us, “Do not let you hearts be troubled, and do not be afraid.” You’ve got a friend.
He is not a friend who dwells outside of you but in you. He has been breathed into you. Pneuma means spirit and breath. As you breath, as you exhale and inhale, you move in the friendship of the Holy Spirit. The undulations of your soul live and move to the rhythm of the Spirit. The highest peak cannot surpass the joy you feel in the Spirit. The lowest valley is accompanied by green pastures and a rod and staff of comfort. Jesus says, “I am going away, and I am coming to you.” Breathe in the Holy Spirit. Take Him in. Let the Spirit of God enter into every cell of your body, every corner of your heart, your entire soul.
Living inside you, he becomes a Truth-teller, to keep you honest and authentic. Jesus says in John 16:13 “But when he, the Spirit of truth, comes, he will guide you into all the truth. He will not speak on his own; he will speak only what he hears, and he will tell you what is yet to come.” Did you hear that? Open your life to the Spirit, breath in the Holy Spirit, accept Him, open your heart’s door to Him and Truth straight from the lips of God will guide you in truth. That’s powerful stuff.
Finally, your Advocate, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father has sent in the name of Jesus, will teach you everything, and remind you of all that I have said to you (John 14:26). Book learning is admirable. Staying upon current events is helpful. Knowing the latest gossip might be somewhat satisfying to curious ears. But if you open your heart to God’s Spirit, he will teach you everything. All the wisdom of life that you need to succeed in life, in relationships, at work, at home, wherever you go, is revealed to you as you live, move and have your being in God’s Spirit. Now that is some friend.
You’ve got a friend. He dwells in you. He knocks on your heart. He is just waiting for you to open the door, so that he might come in to the deepest part of your soul, the place where you are really you below the layers and crud of life that have been caked to your soul. He is ready to journey with you, teach you all things and be your helper, your best friend.
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