Come to Jesus and Receive the Spirit (John 7:37-39)

It is the case that Jesus said and did things that his disciples did not understand at the time. He spoke about returning to heaven and blessing them from there, even saying that it was better for them that he should go away because when he did, the Holy Spirit would come to them. How could that be better? What could be better than the visible presence of Jesus?  

Maybe the invisible presence of Jesus would be, especially if it meant that he could be with all his disciples at the one time, no matter where they were, indeed be with all of them all of the time, no matter where they were, even if they were miles apart from one another. When would that happen, and what would it mean in reality?  

 

The surprising time

On this particular day Jesus spoke about his followers receiving the Spirit. It was the last day of the Feast of Tabernacles, and this day which was the seventh day of the festival was regarded as the most important because of certain celebrations that took place. A priest and the crowd went to the pool of Siloam where the priest filled a golden pitcher with water. Then they went back to the temple and walked seven times round the altar of burnt offering before the priest poured the water through a funnel down to the base of the altar. The incident recollected the miracle that occurred during the time the Israelites were in the wilderness and water was provided for them every day from a rock. It was an annual reminder that God was the source of spiritual refreshment, of permanent spiritual refreshment. No doubt, pious Jews would have longed for the fulfilment of all that was illustrated at the Feast of Tabernacles. Often, the occasion was connected to Isaiah 12 which predicted a time when people would drink from the wells of salvation.

 

The striking manner

John tells us that Jesus stood up and cried. He must have been sitting watching the procession and observing the faces of the crowd. At the same time he knew their hearts and wanted to do something about it. Now he stands up so that people can see him, and he shouts so that they can hear him. The Gospels mention several times when Jesus cried with a loud voice. The author of Hebrews says that Jesus used loud cries when he prayed.  He cried with a loud voice when he commanded Lazarus to leave the realm of the dead. And he cried with a loud voice on the cross when he asked his Father why he had forsaken him. Again on the cross he spoke loudly when he cried, ‘It is finished.’ Those references remind us that Jesus often spoke loudly when he had a significant message to pass on to others.

 

The sweet offer – ‘If anyone thirsts, let him come to me and drink.’

What did Jesus mean by thirsty? No doubt, several answers could be given to this question. An obvious one would be the inadequacy of religious rituals. What real and permanent satisfaction could there be from merely watching this procession on the last day of the feast? Some people do like rituals, but the question that needs to be said to them is, ‘What effect does that ritual have on your inner life?’ One person may say, ‘Oh, it was a very solemn service!’ Yes, but what effect did it have on your thirsty heart? Another may say, ‘Oh, it was a moving service!’ Yes, but what effect did it have on your thirsty heart? Another may say, ‘Oh that was an interesting service!’ Yes, but what effect did it have in relieving your thirsty heart?

 

Another answer would be the inadequacy of inferior alternatives. Augustine, the church father, once said something that is true of every person concerning the absence of God: ‘You have made us for yourself, and our hearts are restless, until they can find rest in you.’ Something similar was said by Pascal, the French mystic: ‘There is a God-shaped vacuum in the heart of each man which cannot be satisfied by any created thing but only by God the Creator, made know through Jesus Christ.’ 

You and I have a heart that can only be truly satisfied by having a relationship with Jesus. Into our hearts, we can pour many things, but they don’t fit. We can try riches, pleasures, careers, ambitions, hobbies, but they all have one thing in common – they do not fit or fill our hearts. And the outcome of all of them is that we are drained and dissatisfied by inadequate alternatives.

Jesus invites his listeners to do two things. First, they have to come to him and, second, they have to drink him. We may find those suggestions a bit odd because in a literal sense we can do neither. But he does not expect us to understand them literally. Instead he is showing us what faith in him looks like. The coming and the drinking are illustrations of faith. And they are illustrations that reveal that faith is an active grace. It goes to Jesus for benefits that he promises to give.

Coming to Jesus indicates that we have to leave somewhere. We could go down to the city centre and see lots of people who have come to it. They did not all come from the same place and they did not all come by the same way. We would find that they came from all directions and we would find that various motives caused the people to come to the city.  But they could not come there without leaving somewhere else. In a far higher way, we leave the desert that makes us thirsty, wherever that desert is, and go to Jesus. We are encouraged to come to him through his great and precious promises that say we will receive a great welcome from him.

 

What can be said about the requirement to drink? Obviously, it is a reference to what the water symbolised, which was the provision of God for his people when they were travelling through the desert. So at least Jesus is saying that he can do for people at that time what was done for those that God helped in the desert. He is the supplier of satisfying refreshment. But Jesus does not merely say that this refreshment is like the stream or river that followed the Israelites in the desert. Instead, this refreshment has many rivers, and instead of a lot of people sharing one river, each person would have many rivers to drink from. Such is the abundance.

 

It is not agreed regarding who has the streams to share because it depends on where punctuation is placed. The original manuscript did not have punctuation, so it can be translated as in our version which says that the believer will have the rivers to give, or it could be translated in a way that indicates Jesus will have the rivers to give. I doubt if it makes much difference what translation we wish because even if the second option is correct, it is unlikely that Jesus would want the effect of the rivers to end when they entered a believer. In addition, they would flow on for the benefit of others.

 

The coming of the Spirit

John provides an exclamation of what Jesus meant. Jesus was predicting what life would be like after he had been glorified. His glorification took place when he ascended to heaven forty days after his resurrection. Upon his glorification, there would be a new experience of the Holy Spirit, a greater experience than what had been known before. So what does this mean? Obviously, John is referring to the Day of Pentecost and what took place then.

 

This statement does not mean that the Holy Spirit had not been working in the lives of people previously in Old Testament times or that he had not been present in the life of Jesus. There are numerous references to the work of the Spirit in the Old Testament, including how he helped prophets and leaders of God’s people. We know that Jesus had been conceived in the womb of Mary by the work of the Holy Spirit. Simeon was guided by the Spirit to go to the temple when Mary and Joseph took Jesus there. The Spirit had been with Jesus as a child and teenager. Jesus had received the Spirit in a very wonderful way at his baptism. He had performed many miracles through the power of the Spirit. He was described by John the Baptist as the One who would baptise people with the Holy Spirit and with fire. In John 3, Jesus told Nicodemus that he needed to be born again by the Spirit in order to see the kingdom of God. He had taught his disciples to pray to the Father that he would give them the Holy Spirit. Further, he had told them that the Spirit would teach them what to say when they were on trial. 

 

Yet when we draw near to the close of the life of Jesus he begins to tell his disciples other information about the Holy Spirit. He said that when he ascended back to the Father, he would ask the Father to send the Holy Spirit to them as the Helper, but then described those activities as being like what he would have done if he were present with them. And he told them to wait in Jerusalem for the coming of the Spirit which he would send from the Father. It looks as if he was not merely saying that they would know the work of the Spirit in their hearts, but that he was describing something about the work of the Spirit concerning which there should be greater expectations as to the consequences.

 

Significance of Pentecost

This means that there is something very significant about the coming of the Spirit on the Day of Pentecost. Whatever can be said about it, it was something additional to what had been experienced before then, even by the disciples. It is more that regeneration of sinners, it is more than revival after times of spiritual lethargy, it is more than recovery from spiritual decline, because they had been experienced on numerous occasions before then.

 

Jesus also says that this experience was predicted in the Old Testament, which means that we should search and see what it said would happen when the Spirit came in this manner. There is not a specific verse that says the Spirit would be like rivers of water inside a person, but there are verses that say he would come in great abundance, which is what a picture like rivers of water would indicate.

 

We can see that the experience was not intended to be limited to a spiritual elite because Jesus says that it would affect every person who believed in him. This is what the prophet Joel said would happen: ‘And in the last days it shall be, God declares, that I will pour out my Spirit on all flesh, and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, and your young men shall see visions, and your old men shall dream dreams; even on my male servants and female servants in those days I will pour out my Spirit, and they shall prophesy’ (Acts 2:17-18). Basically, Peter says that all God’s people will be able to speak on behalf of God because of the outpoured Holy Spirit. That is what prophesying means at a common level, but it would be an amazing change from what was known previously because people then would not have known what to say about the Messiah. But after Pentecost, they would. 

 

Here is another Old Testament prediction, this time from Isaiah: ‘For I will pour water on the thirsty land, and streams on the dry ground; I will pour my Spirit upon your offspring, and my blessing on your descendants. They shall spring up among the grass like willows by flowing streams’ (Isa. 44:3-4). We can see the type of ground the Spirit will deal with – dry and thirsty ground; and we can see the outcome – incredible growth, illustrated by grass and trees that flourish beside streams of water. So when the Spirit is poured forth, the people of God will increase, and the following verses in Isaiah’s prophecy predict that people from other nations will identify with them.

 

Significance of the indwelling Spirit

What is it like to have the Spirit in abundance, like rivers of living water? Do you ever wonder if you are missing out experiencing what the Bible describes as the spiritual life? On one occasion, Jesus promised the disciples that the Spirit would be with them and in them. This could mean that he is in them as the source of blessings and with them as the power for them to be a blessing to others. It could mean that there would be constancy of supply.

 

What ideas come to mind by this description? One must be an increased awareness of the presence of God. When the Spirit came on the Day of Pentecost, was it a different day from all the previous ones that the disciples had known, even although they already had known extraordinary days? On it, they saw effects of the presence of God that were astonishing, symbolised by the wind and the fire and the tongues. At the very least, God’s presence was disturbing for some and dynamic for others.

 

The verse also suggests that we can have a great deal of the Spirit. The imagery also points to the experiences of the Spirit being fresh and satisfying as he brings to our experience the things of Christ. And we have in this description a promise for us in our spiritual journey, that says we can have a foretaste of heaven because there the river of life flows from the throne of God and of the Lamb throughout the heavenly city. It is the same river that is promised by Jesus and which flows from the divine throne.

 

Obviously, a lot can be said about this, and we will consider them in future studies when they happen. Meanwhile I will close by quoting some words that McCheyne said in a sermon on this wonderful promise of Jesus. McCheyne’s words are both challenging and comforting: ‘The command is given to us to draw out of His fulness; yet who obeys? Not one in a thousand. A Christian in our day is like a man who has got a great reservoir brimful of water. He is at liberty to drink as much as he pleases, for he never can drink it dry; but instead of drinking the full stream that flows from it, he dams it up, and is content to drink the few drops that trickle through. 

 

‘O that ye would draw out of His fulness, ye that have come to Christ! Do not be misers of grace. There is far more than you will use in eternity. The same waters are now in Christ that refreshed St. Paul, that gave St. Peter his boldness, that gave St. John his affectionate tenderness. Why is your soul less richly supplied than theirs? Because you will not drink: “If any man thirst, let him come unto me, and drink.”’