Unless he went away, the Comforter would not come. Now the true and exact meaning of the Comforter is the Strengthener, the Encourager—one who gives a man strength of mind, and courage of spirit, to do his work. Without that Comforter, the apostles would be weak and spiritless. Without being encouraged and inspirited by him, they would never get through the work which they had to do, of preaching the Gospel to the whole world.
We may surely see, if we think, some of the cause of this. The apostles, till our Lord’s ascension, had been following him about like scholars following a master—almost like children holding by their father’s hand. They had had no will of their own; no opinion of their own; they had never had to judge for themselves, or act for themselves; and, when they had tried to do so, they had always been in the wrong, and Christ had rebuked them. They had been like scholars, I say, with a teacher, or children with a parent. Yea rather, when one remembers who they were, poor fishermen, and who he was—God made man—they had been (I speak with all reverence) as dogs at their master’s side—faithful and intelligent truly; but with no will of their own, looking for ever up to his hand and his eye, to see what he would have them do. But that could not last. It ought not to last. God does not wish us to be always as animals, not even always as children; he wishes us to become men; perfect men, who have their senses exercised by experience to discern good and evil.
And so it was to be with the apostles. They had to learn, as we all have to learn, self-help, self-government, self-determination. They were to think for themselves, and act for themselves; and yet not by themselves. For he would put into them a spirit, even his Spirit; and so, when they were thinking for themselves, they would be thinking as he would have them think; when they were acting for themselves, they would be acting as he would have them act. They would live; but not their own life, for Christ would live in them. They would speak: but not their own words; the Spirit of their Father would speak in them; that so they might come in the unity of the faith, and the knowledge of the Son of God, to be perfect men, to the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ.
My dear friends, this may seem deep and a mystery: but so are all things in this wondrous life of ours. And surely we see a pattern of all this in our own lives. Each child is educated—or ought to be—as Christ educated his apostles.
Have we not had, some of us, in early life some parent, friend, teacher, spiritual pastor, or master, to whom we looked up with unbounded respect? His word to us was law. His counsel was as the oracles of God. We did not dream of thinking for ourselves, acting for ourselves, while we had him to tell us how to think, how to act; and we were happy in our devotion. We felt what a blessed thing, not merely protecting and guiding, but elevating and ennobling, was reverence and obedience to one wiser and better than ourselves. But that did not last. It could not last. Our teacher was taken from us; perhaps by mere change of place, and the chances of this mortal life; perhaps by death, which sunders all fair bonds upon this side the grave. Perhaps, most painful of all, we began to differ from our teacher; to find that, though we respected and loved him still, though we felt a deep debt of thanks to him for what he had taught us, we could not quite agree in all; we had begun to think for ourselves, and we found that we must think for ourselves; and the new responsibility was very heavy. We felt like young birds thrust out of the nest to shift for themselves in the wide world.
But, after a while, we found that we could think, could act for ourselves, as we never expected to do. We found that we were no more children; that we were improving in manly virtues by having to bear our own burdens; and to acquire,
‘The reason firm, the temperate will,
Endurance, foresight, strength, and skill.’
And we found, too, that though our old teachers were parted from us, yet they were with us still; that (to compare small things with great, and Christ’s servants with their Lord) a spirit came to us from them, and brought all things to our remembrance, whatsoever they had said to us; that we remembered their words more vividly, we understood their meaning more fully and deeply, now that they were parted, than we did when they were with us. We loved them as well, ay, better, than of old, for we saw more clearly what a debt we owed to them; and so it was, after all, expedient for us that they should have gone away. That parting with them, which seemed so dangerous to us, as well as painful, really comforted us—strengthened and encouraged us to become stronger and braver souls, full of self-help, self-government, self-determination.
And so we shall find it, I believe, in our religion.
We may say with a sigh, ‘Ah, that I could see my Lord and Saviour. I should be safe then. I dare not sin then.’