The Spirit of Truth Reveals Plans and Ownership
David W Palmer
(John 16:13–15 APE) “... he shall speak whatever he shall hear and he shall reveal the future to you. And he shall glorify me, because he shall take that which is mine and shall show you. Everything that my Father has is mine, therefore I said to you that he shall take that which is mine and he shall show you.”
In this passage, Jesus brings out important revelations about the Holy Spirit—God’s Spirit of Truth—and what he is sent to do. Like Jesus, he will speak only what he hears. Also like Jesus, he will “reveal” the future—God’s intentions and plans.
Jesus says that the Spirit of Truth will “show” you—bring revelation to your inner man. This is his language—the way he communicates his amazing truths and messages to us. This will put us into the same advantage Jesus had when he was operating here:
(John 5:19–20 NKJV) Then Jesus answered and said to them, “Most assuredly, I say to you, the Son can do nothing of Himself, but what He sees the Father do; for whatever He does, the Son also does in like manner. {20} For the Father loves the Son, and shows Him all things that He Himself does …”
The Father “shows” the son his intended actions; the son sees them in his spirit, and then he “does” them “in like manner”—or imitates what he sees with his Father. In a similar way, Jesus said that the Spirit of Truth will “reveal the future to us. In other words, he will show us Jesus’s intentions about what he wants done.
Jesus also said that the Spirit of Truth “shall take that which is mine and shall show you.” When he says, “That which is mine,” what does he mean? Thankfully, he gives a very broad and all encompassing answer when he says: “Everything that my Father has is mine.” This is limitless:
(Hebrews 1:1–2 NKJV) “God … Has in these last days spoken to us by His Son, whom He has appointed heir of all things, through whom also He made the worlds.”
Father God appointed Jesus as the inheritor of all things. To put it simply, our Lord and Savior owns everything. Jesus is both man and God; he owns heaven and the earth—without reservation. When we are in him, we share in this ownership:
(Romans 8:32 NKJV) He who did not spare His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, how shall He not with Him also freely give us all things?
(Romans 8:17 NKJV) and if children, then heirs—heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ, if indeed we suffer with Him, that we may also be glorified together.
(1 Corinthians 3:21–23 NKJV) Therefore let no one boast in men. For all things are yours: {22} whether Paul or Apollos or Cephas, or the world or life or death, or things present or things to come—all are yours. {23} And you are Christ’s, and Christ is God’s.
In this amazing list, Paul says that, in Christ, “all things are yours”; this includes “the world.” However, at the end of the list he reminds us that Jesus not only owns everything—including heaven and earth—he also owns us (See also: 1 Cor. 6:20 NKJV).
What Jesus was explaining to his apprentice / friends at the Last Supper was the role of the Spirit of Truth in bringing the revelation of this ownership to us. What’s more, like Father did with Jesus, the Holy Spirit reveals it to us with the intention of having us possess it, receive it, or do it. Let’s look at the Holy Spirit’s own explanation of this through the apostle Paul:
(1 Corinthians 2:9–12 NKJV) But as it is written: “Eye has not seen, nor ear heard, Nor have entered into the heart of man The things which God has prepared for those who love Him.” {10} But God has revealed them to us through His Spirit. For the Spirit searches all things, yes, the deep things of God. {11} For what man knows the things of a man except the spirit of the man which is in him? Even so no one knows the things of God except the Spirit of God. {12} Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, that we might know the things that have been freely given to
