Jesus tells the disciples about how He’s going to give them the Holy Spirit. Jesus, God in the flesh, was a man that could only be in one place at a time. He had to become human in order to be a propitiation for our sins, to be able to pay the due payment for our sins and appease the wrath of God against sin.

The Holy Spirit, however, can be with all of us. He’s our personal connection to the Living God. He’s our fellowship with the Father and the Son. He’s the love that connects us to the Godhead and to every other believer.

The Holy Spirit is called the Spirit of truth in John 16. One of His jobs is to guide us into all truth.

We have another promise about being able to ask anything of the Father and receiving it. Here it is connected to asking in Jesus’ name.

That’s not simply saying the word Jesus. That’s abiding in Christ. It’s Christ’s authority and good character and divine nature that receives from the Father whatever it asks. All the power and authority we have is not ours. It’s Christ in us. All authority is His. We only have anything at all as we have Christ and allow Him access and control in our lives.

In this chapter asking and receiving is related to joy.

Jesus says, “Ask, and you will receive, that your joy may be full.

What is making our joy full? It’s not getting all the things we want, certainly not fleshly desires.

This chapter is about sending the Holy Spirit. The Father loves to give the good gift of the Spirit to those who ask. Ask for the Holy Spirit and receive God’s presence in your life, the fullness of joy!

Jesus also told them about the Spirit and things to come so that they would have peace; more specifically, that in Christ we would have peace.

There will be trouble, but we are rooted in the vine. The life of the Son of God is in us and He, as the vine, is keeping us, holding onto us; and the Father, the vinedresser or Gardener, is tending to us in order to produce love, joy, and peace in us by the life of Christ in us.

We have overcome because Christ has overcome.