The LORD Dwells With Us / John 14:23-31 / Pr. Ted A. Giese / Sunday June 8th 2025 / Day of Pentecost / Mount Olive Lutheran Church

Mount Olive Lutheran Church / Pr. Ted A. Giese / Sunday June 8th 2025: Day of Pentecost / John 14:23-31 “The LORD Dwells With Us”

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 us pray: May the words of my mouth and the meditations of all our hearts be acceptable in Your sight O Lord. Amen.

Grace peace and mercy to you from God our Father and from our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. Good Christian Friends our Gospel Reading today starts out “Jesus answered him,” and as soon as you hear it start out like that three questions might come to mind:

1) ‘Who is asking the question that Jesus is answering’ and

2) ‘What is the question being asked’ and

3) ‘When is the question being asked?’

To the first question of ‘who is asking the question’ Saint John gives us the answer a litter earlier in the chapter 14 of his Gospel, this is a Judas but this is not that Judas, this is not Judas Iscariot the one who betrayed Jesus. Just like you find multiple women named Mary in the Gospel and they are not all the Virgin Mary, Jesus’ mother, you also have men who share the same first name, names like John and James and Judas were popular back then so this Saint Judas is not to be confused with the cowardly disloyal enemy of Jesus, Judas Iscariot. In fact to help keep these two men named Judas straight for the reader of the Bible, for the hearers of God’s Word, today’s Judas is set apart: in the Gospels of Saint Mark[1] and Saint Matthew[2] this Judas is called Thaddaeus and in the Acts of the Apostles he referred to as Judas the son of James.[3] We may be more familiar with Jesus calling the fisherman Simon by the name Peter or Saul’s being called Paul after his conversion, but this is similar. When Scripture calls this Judas Thaddaeus the very name itself is making the distinction because Thaddaeus means something like “courageous heart” or “my friend with the courageous heart.” This man was one of the Twelve Disciples handpicked by Jesus who had been with Jesus for the three years of His public ministry leading up to His crucifixion and death and this courageous and faithful friend of our Lord is the one who asks the question that Jesus is answering in our Gospel Reading today.

To the second question of ‘what is the question being asked’ by this Saint Thaddaeus, this Saint Judas (not Judas Iscariot) the answer is this: he asks Jesus, “Lord, how is it that You will manifest Yourself to us, and not to the World?”[4] This is in response to Jesus saying, “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 My 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.”[5] And so this faithful and courageous friend of Jesus asked, “Lord, how is it that You will manifest Yourself to us, and not to the World?” Jesus’ answer points forward to the event in the history and life of the church that we remember today; Jesus’ answer points to the Day of Pentecost and the promised sending of the Holy Spirit.

Jesus is telling His courageous friend with the stout and faithful heart that Jesus will make Himself manifest in the believer when God the Father and Jesus Himself make a home with this man right in the disciples heart, and so Jesus also says to him and to the rest of them, “Let not your hearts be troubled, neither let them be afraid.” Dear ones: With God the Father and Jesus in your heart what’ve you to be fearful of in this World? With God the Father and Jesus in your heart what trouble could befall you in this World that They are not bigger than? Is there anything stronger in this World than They are? Is there anything more powerful in this World than They are? No. This is what Jesus promises to Saint Thaddaeus and to us all, to make a home with His disciples, to make a home with us. At the beginning of chapter 14 of the Gospel of Saint John Jesus promises to go a prepare a place for them in His Father’s house that has many rooms, a promised future and eternal home,[6] and now here just a bit further into the chapter Jesus is promising also to make a promised home with them not just in the restored world which is to come, the new heavens and the new earth,[7] but in this life right now.

But how will it be done? This is explained when Jesus says, “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.” And so we see how this is dovetailing into what we celebrate today because part of this new life with His faithful followers requires that the Holy Spirit be sent to them.[8] Remember what Saint Paul would later teach when he says, “do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God? You are not your own, for you were bought with a price. So glorify God in your body.”[9] So if you’re keeping score the Christian has the promise that God the Father, and Jesus His only begotten Son and the Holy Spirit will make a home with the Christian in their body: that we would be walking, talking temples of the Most High, God Almighty. “Lord, how is it that You will manifest Yourself to us, and not to the World?”

Dear ones, the Christian has this indwelling of the Holy Trinity but the World cannot put it under a microscope, the World cannot test for it with a Geiger counter, or a blood test. There is no autopsy or dissection that will reveal this indwelling of the LORD in your heart. This is a spiritual presence of God that is gifted to the Christian. And so Saint Paul teaches, “For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast.”[10]  Our brother and friend Saint Thaddaeus, this Saint Judas (not Iscariot), could not boast of his personal worthiness regarding this gift of faith and neither can we. Our newest brother and friend in Christ little Saint Elijah, baptised this morning, cannot personally boast of his worthiness either. In fact at any age — from the moment of birth to the moments just before death — faith is not a matter of rational thought or cleaver thinking, it’s not even about earnest and heartfelt feelings, or an exercise of a person’s will in response to the Good news of Gospel. It is first and foremost a gift both promised and given by the LORD. God making His home with you in your heart, God making you His temple to dwell in is not your work, it’s not my work, it’s not ones personal work but God’s work, a work completed and finished in the person of Jesus Christ delivered to you in your need. Ours then is to wait for the Lord, to listen to His Word, to receive His gift of faith and once this indwelling, this faith, is ours to respond with thanksgiving and praise, with a holy life worthy of our new calling and then should we falter in this new life and fall into sin breaking the law of God to return to the giver of the gift of faith with a repentant heart to be forgiven, to amend our lives to align with the righteousness of the Lord who chooses to dwell within us in the first place. Once we have it we are to hold fast to it, to help each other as Christians to do the same and even in that to trust that the Lord is holding on to us better than we are holding on to Him. And so we sing that the Holy Spirit is ever, “quick’ning, strength’ning, and absolving, setting captive sinners free,” ever, “binding Age to age and soul to soul, in communion never ending,” “through the church’s ministry.”[11]

Perhaps you’re still left asking; ‘yes, by what means does God do all of this?’ Well that leads us to the third question and how this in the end applies to you, to us all: ‘when is the question, “Lord, how is it that You will manifest Yourself to us, and not to the World?” being asked?’ This question by Saint Thaddaeus is being asked on the Thursday Night before Jesus’ Good Friday Crucifixion. Jesus’ talk about being with them and then not being with them and then begin with them again is all pointing to His cross and passion, to His death and burial, and to His resurrection and then ultimately to His ascension into heaven and His return on The Last Day when He will return in glory to judge both the living and the dead. His talk about the sending of the Holy Spirit to them is about this event we are celebrating today, how when the day of Pentecost arrived, ten days after Jesus’ ascension to His Father’s right hand, “suddenly there came from heaven a sound like a mighty rushing wind, [filling] the entire house where they were sitting ... [then] divided tongues as of fire appeared to them and rested on each one of them. And [Saint Luke in the Acts of the Apostles recounts to us how] they were all filled with the Holy Spirit.”[12]

This resulted in two things: 1) these men preaching in such a way that people could understand them, and 2) 3,000 people being baptised that very same day. The majority of those being baptised that day were visiting Jerusalem and would be returning to their homes scattered around the Mediterranean Sea and maybe even further abroad than that.[13] They would be returning to their Jewish communities dotted all over the ancient world with news of Jesus’ death and resurrection, their new faith in Him and that the promised messiah that the Jewish people had long waited for had final come in the person of Jesus of Nazareth. Effectively they had heard this Good news, they had the gift of faith given to them in the hearing of the word and in their baptism, and now they had something to confess to the World, something to teach others, they had a new life in Jesus where Father Son and Holy Spirit dwell with them wherever they go.

Previously God had promised to be with them first in the tabernacle tent of meeting in their exodus and in the Promised Land before the building of the temple, and then after the building of the temple in the city Jerusalem in that temple God had promised to dwell there—that’s why these people had come to Jerusalem for the Passover and why they had stayed the fifty days to the feast of Pentecost which commemorated the giving of the Torah, the Law to Moses, on Mount Sinai—but now God was promising to personally be with them wherever they went, promises to make them into His temple, to dwell with them personally. This is one of the gifts that you received in your baptism; one of the gifts Elijah baptised this morning also received today. And ultimately this is not a ‘me’ and Jesus thing, this is a ‘we’ and Jesus thing. What happens in the death and resurrection of Jesus at Passover and in this coming of the Holy Spirit on the Day of Pentecost is even bigger than the Jewish people being rescued out of 400 years of Egyptian slavery, this is more than one ethnic group receiving the 10 Commandments and the first five books of the Bible as a guide for their life as a future nation, this expands and extends the redemptive and salvation work of God the Father in Christ Jesus through the Holy Spirit to all people;[14] opens up salvation to you and me; opens up the promise of God’s indwelling with us personally.  

Faithful Saint Thaddaeus asks, “Lord, how is it that You will manifest Yourself to us, and not to the World?” Leading up to Jesus’ crucifixion Saint John records Jesus’ prayer to His heavenly Father which paints a picture of our life with God lived out in the World which further answers this question: Jesus prays, “I have given them Your word, and the World has hated them because they are not of the World, just as I am not of the World. I do not ask that You take them out of the World, but that You keep them from the evil one. They are not of the World, just as I am not of the World. Sanctify them in the truth; Your Word is truth. As You sent Me into the World, so I have sent them into the World. And for their sake I consecrate Myself, that they also may be sanctified [made holy] in Truth. I do not ask for these only, but also for those who will believe in Me through their word, that they may all be one, just as You, Father, are in Me, and I in You, that they also may be in Us, so that the World may believe that You have sent Me.”[15] Here Jesus is praying for His loyal apostles, including our courageous friend with the stout and faithful heart Saint Thaddaeus—Saint Judas the son of James (not Iscariot)—those who would be charged with the responsibility and authority to preach and teach the word of God, those who will be sent out to baptise “in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit;”[16] and here Jesus is also praying for those 3,000 baptised on the Day of Pentecost and all those who would be baptised into Christ’s life, dead and resurrection in the years to come, right down to you, right down to Elijah with us today. That Jesus would be manifest in us to the World and not manifested in the World apart from us. That we as Christians in Christ would be in the World but not of the World, living our lives as a beacon, a light, shining forth the faith that has been lit in our hearts, the very light of Christ to a World in deep darkness.[17] In Christ, as Christians, we are ever called together no longer to be confused and scattered as a result of our pride and sin[18] but as ones joined to the Father by the Son through the workings of the Holy Spirit washed clean and renewed daily with thankful hearts full of praise to the glory of God and the good of our neighbour in need. Amen.      

Let us pray: Lord have mercy on us, Christ have mercy on us, Lord have mercy on us, “take our minds and think through them, take our lips and speak through them, take our hearts and set them on fire; for the sake of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, Amen.

[1] Mark 3:18
[2] Matthew 10:3
[3] Acts 2:13
[4] John 14:22
[5] John 14:18–21
[6] John 14:1–7
[7] Revelation 21:1–5
[8] John 16:7 “Nevertheless, I tell you the truth: it is to your advantage that I go away, for if I do not go away, the Helper will not come to you. But if I go, I will send Him to you.”
[9] 1 Corinthians 6:19–20
[10] Ephesians 2:8–9
[11] “Holy Spirit, Ever Dwelling” Lutheran Service Book, Concordia Publishing House 2006, stanza 3.
[12] Acts 2:1–4a
[13] Acts 8:26–40
[14] 2nd and 3rd Articles of the Creed, Luther’s Small Catechism, Concordia Publishing House 2017, pg 17. 
[15] John 17:14–21
[16] Matthew 28:19–20, “Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.”
[17] Matthew 5:16
[18] Genesis 11:1-9

Photo Credit: Main Photo tinted version of Tongues of fire descend on the apostles at Pentecost from wikimedia commons.