The Comfort of the Spirit

John 14:16-17 And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Helper, to be with you forever,even the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees him nor knows him. You know him, for he dwells with you and will be in you.

John 14:26 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.

John 15:26 But when the Helper comes, whom I will send to you from the Father, the Spirit of truth, who proceeds from the Father, he will bear witness about me.

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.

Acts 9:31 So the church throughout all Judea and Galilee and Samaria had peace and was being built up. And walking in the fear of the Lord and in the comfort of the Holy Spirit, it multiplied.

There is no greater comfort to the heart of man than the Holy Spirit. For the believer to boast in knowing that the Comforter dwells inside him, places God where He should be – glorified above all things.

The comfort of the Spirit could be talked about in many ways. However, there is nothing more satisfying to the soul of man than knowing and seeing the Spirit engaged in this particular work in their life. This Comforter is like none other, as He is one with the Son and Father, being always faithful to the believer. There are no days off, vacations, or breaks. The Holy Spirit is faithful to those who are the Father’s at all times. The same love of God read about earlier in the book is the love of the Spirit, and in the Spirit’s comfort He displays not only His love, but also His love for God’s people. The Spirit is both loving and comforting in His work in the heart of the believer. The Spirit acts as the greatest Comforter in that He is what restores the soul to God when in conviction and in doubt. For there is nothing that can bring about rightful living in the believer’s life other than the Holy Spirit. The Spirit is always alive, in that He – even now – molds the believer and beings to show them how to live for the gospel by making it known above all things. Through enjoying its truths, the believer is given a sense of comfort in whom they are rooted in, and what they are rooted in – namely, the gospel.

When the believer is stressed or in a time of need and cannot find aid in human hands, the Spirit of comfort is always there to aid in bringing the soul of man back to Christ. When man is in sorrow because of a situation or because of his own sin, the Spirit is there to comfort the soul. The believer often becomes so stressed at life in general that they tend to forget what the gospel gave them: the Holy Spirit as their Comforter. Nothing makes the gospel known more than when the believer runs into the arms of the Spirit, depending upon Him, and not his own self in time of need. Depending on a comforter that never falters, never fails, but is altogether wise brings comfort to the soul of man, so that he can boast in the gospel truth of always having a Savior, a Father and a Comforter in the time of need. It is this Spirit in which the believer can boast: the Spirit who brought them to God, out of sin to righteousness, and keeps them from eternal judgment (and these are only part of the ways in which the Spirit comforts the soul!). For the believer to wake every morning and know with certainty that no matter what they face their hearts have been cleansed from all sin and they will be forever redeemed by the cleansing of sin, is something that should bring about such joy in the Father’s plan of redemption set forth in Christ.

The Spirit of God came not just to cleanse men from sin, but to dwell in them until the day of the renewing of their bodies to the state of glorification forevermore. Here on earth, in the flesh, conflicts often arise, troubles occur, and hardships set in. The death of children, parents and grandparents happen every hour, and diseases that take over the earthly body seem to worsen every day. Day after day men die because of the curse of sin. Even for believers it is often hard to deal with such areas of life. Cancer, AIDS, MS, and numerous other worse, or lesser-known diseases, take over and set in to destroy not only the flesh, but the heart of man as well. Hardships in friendships and relationships, ruined marriages, the loss of a child running down the wrong path, are all areas that crush and break down the soul of a believer, that can sometimes black out the gospel from the believer’s sight. Broken cars, broken hearts, run-down houses, bodies worn out from work, financial struggles, etc – all will never compare to the lost state and debt that the believer was in before the Spirit of comfort brought them to God. The great truth of this comforting Spirit is the knowing the truth that in all times there is one in whom the believer can run to for comfort. The world does not know sin the way that a believer does, and has no clue that they are in sin – bringing forth their own death. Of all of the comforts the Spirit gives, none compares to the comfort He gives in the gospel. The Spirit bringing man out of sin and into the hand of God is THE greatest comfort He can – and will – give to the believer’s life every single day. The believer boasts in this, remembering that the Spirit comforted them once so much that that act alone was – and is – enough for the believer to enjoy the gospel for the rest of their earthly lives, until they enjoy the gospel eternally with God – the very gospel Himself. The believer, in enjoying the comforts of the Spirit that are given to him at the moment of salvation, also boasts in the truth of the Spirit – bringing all the glory to God by the work of Christ for the satisfaction of the soul of man. That, and that alone, is boasting properly in the gospel which the Spirit comforted the lost soul with, and it should be boasted of every day!