What is the Spirit of truth that Jesus speaks about in John’s Gospel?
When he comes, the Spirit of truth, he will guide you to all truth. He will not speak on his own, but he will speak what he hears and will declare to you the things that are coming.” Jn. 16:13
The foreshadowing of the ascension of Jesus to Heaven and message to his apostles reveal a startling acknowledgement that we as a Christian people must always be watchful and ready, despite not having the existing sensory perception to distinguish His will at the present moment.
As Paul’s first letter to the Corinthians chapter 2 verse 14-15 acknowledges, “Now the natural person does not accept what pertains to the Spirit of God, for to him it is foolishness, and he cannot understand it, because it is judged spiritually. The spiritual person, however, can judge everything, but is not subject to judgment by anyone.”
We as a Christian people must always be ready to equip ourselves with prayer and spiritual armor to be on guard to await the times in our life when the Spirit of truth may speak to us. We must strive to be a spiritual person instead of a natural person per Paul’s classification of our end goal in his epistle to the Corinthians. It is oftentimes easy to get caught up in the distress and temptations of the messed up and fallen world we find ourselves in. For those that are hearing impaired that use hearing aids to listen to the sounds around us, we too must use our own spiritual “hearing aids” to listen to and prayerfully discern the Spirit of truth that may come to us when we least expect it. How can communication with our Lord occur if our spiritual ears, mind, heart and soul are not experienced in learning to be in communion with our God? Speaking to our Lord and listening to His voice each day through prayer, biblical and spiritual reading reflections and other acts of contemplation are needed so we are not caught off guard by our limited understanding of the spiritual realm. Prayer and the spiritual exercises of increasing the fortitude of our souls is oftentimes a lost art in our world today.
In many respects, what will the sound of the Spirit be like? Perhaps, it will be like Elijah’s experience in the reading of 1 Kings, chapter 19 in which our Lord is not present in a mighty wind, earthquake, or fire, but in a whispering sound?
As Jesus lets us know in John’s Gospel, the Spirit of truth will glorify Him and “take from what is mine and declare it to you” (Jn 16:15). Let us prepare for the graces and gifts that our Lord may provide us with this day and each moment we have while on earth. We must always be thankful for the gifts, relationships and moments we have each and every day despite our not being able to understand the Spirit of truth in our limited human understanding.
Come Lord Jesus and come Holy Spirit into my very being and senses this day so that I may be always attentive for the moment that your grace may empower me to comprehend the Spirit of truth.
Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit. As it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, world without end. Amen.
StreetEvangelist 
Great reflection – I read something recently that expresses this spirit of Truth, albeit in a more secular but poetic way – “Heart’s wave could not curl and break beautifully into the foam of spirit, unless the ageless silent rock of destiny stood in its path.” As Christians we are bound by the truths of faith that are handed down by tradition and divinely revealed.
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