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I am using readings from the 49 Week Bible Challenge as the basis for these devotions. I encourage you to join me in this discipline. Today’s readings are John 16; Nehemiah 8; Psalm 25; Lamentations 5.
John 16:1-15
[Jesus says,] “I have said all these things to you to keep you from falling away. 2 They will put you out of the synagogues. Indeed, the hour is coming when whoever kills you will think he is offering service to God. 3 And they will do these things because they have not known the Father, nor me. 4 But I have said these things to you, that when their hour comes you may remember that I told them to you.
“I did not say these things to you from the beginning, because I was with you. 5 But now I am going to him who sent me, and none of you asks me, ‘Where are you going?’ 6 But because I have said these things to you, sorrow has filled your heart. 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. 8 And when he comes, he will convict the world concerning sin and righteousness and judgment: 9 concerning sin, because they do not believe in me; 10 concerning righteousness, because I go to the Father, and you will see me no longer; 11 concerning judgment, because the ruler of this world is judged.
12 “I still have many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now. 13 When the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all the truth, for he will not speak on his own authority, but whatever he hears he will speak, and he will declare to you the things that are to come. 14 He will glorify me, for he will take what is mine and declare it to you. 15 All that the Father has is mine; therefore I said that he will take what is mine and declare it to you.
From my earliest years of biblical understanding, I knew of the Holy Spirit. I might not have been able to express his existence under the concept of the triune nature of God. But I knew there was a Holy Spirit. And I believed in him – at least conceptually. But when in high school I attended worship with my friend Jerry, and we spoke the Apostle’s Creed, I learned about believing “in the Holy Spirit, the holy Christian Church; the communion of saints…” The Holy Spirit was right up there with Jesus, God’s Son and the Father who created the heavens and the earth. God: Father, Son and Holy Spirit – in whose name I had been baptized.
I continue to learn about the Holy Spirit: How he propels the Mission of God (cf. Acts 13:2), how he calls to mind the truth of God and the words of Jesus (John 16 above), inspired the writers of the Old and New Testaments, brings us to faith, and glorifies Jesus.
Jesus speaks of a threefold conviction of the world, explaining that the Holy Spirit (the Helper) will convict the world in this way: concerning sin, because they do not believe in me; concerning righteousness, because I go to the Father, and you will see me no longer; concerning judgment, because the ruler of this world is judged.
Simple faith in Jesus—trusting him even before we fully grasp what that means—avails before God; this is saving faith. A more fully formed and robust faith embraces the truths that you are a sinner in need of forgiveness, that Jesus’ sacrifice on the cross has secured your salvation and now he reigns at the right hand of the Father, and that Satan’s defeat is certain. This deeper, more resilient faith steadies us when the harder challenges of life press in on every side.
We may not be fully there, but to the extent that we are, we can thank the Holy Spirit, the Lord and giver of life, who proceeds from the Father and the Son, who with the Father and the Son together is worshiped and glorified [Nicene Creed]. May he continue to work in our hearts and lives for Jesus’ glory, the cause of his kingdom, and our and our neighbor’s eternal good.
David Bahn - Reflections 
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