Đấng Biện Hộ Thứ Hai

If there is anybody here today who has recently felt rejected (You know, you’ve applied or you’ve auditioned or you’ve proposed, or you just tried to break into some circle, and you were maybe rebuffed or, worse, ignored; you feel like you’ve being dogged by failure.), I’d like to say something to you.

Secondly, there may be some others who are in a little more of a subtle situation, and that is you’re a considerable success in a certain area of your life, but in some other areas of your life, areas that may be not quite as public, you are facing humiliating defeat, or at the very least, utter confusion as to what to do.

Third, even more subtle, you’ve been falsely accused lately. Somebody has criticized you in an unfair way, and you’re ready to come out fighting. Yet there’s a funny feeling you have, and that is, on the one hand, though you know the accusations are unfounded, there’s another part of you that feels like, “Maybe, though, I deserve something like this.” All of you need, and all of us ultimately need, two advocates. I want to talk to you about the word advocate.

In this particular passage, Jesus Christ calls the Holy Spirit, who he is about to send, a certain name. If any of you are reading along if you brought your Bibles, you’ll find that depending on your translation, a different word popped up. Some of you might have been reading along, and you read Jesus Christ says, “I will send the Holy Spirit, the Counselor.” Others of you found the word “Comforter.” Others of you found the word “Advocate.” Others of you may have found the word “Strengthener” or “Encourager,” and so on.

Whenever you take a look at 10 translations and you find six different words translating that particular Greek word, what you know is the Greek word has such a richness that you just can’t convey it. A single English word can’t carry all the freight. The word Jesus talks about, the word he says, what he calls the Holy Spirit, is allos parakletos, which means another Paraclete. Now today I’m going to use the word (just because we have to choose a word and because this is the one I like the best) advocate.

Now Jesus is telling you (we didn’t read it, but we’ll look at it next week) in verse 27, “Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you.” If you have this Holy Spirit, this Advocate, you’ll have this tremendous peace, but if you want to know what that peace is (and who doesn’t want to know what that peace is), you have to understand what the Holy Spirit has come to do. So let’s ask ourselves three questions … Who or what is an advocate? Who or what is the first advocate? Who or what is the second advocate?Because, you see, when Jesus says, “I’m going to send another advocate,” he must mean there was already a first one. So if we’re going to understand how to get this peace, if we’re going to understand all the things Jesus is talking about, we have to understand what an advocate is, who the first advocate was, and who the second advocate is.

1. What’s an advocate?

Now there are a number of different words that are used here, but let me just go back down to the word Jesus uses: Paraclete. “I’m going to send you another Paraclete.” Now it’s a nice and easy thing to pull apart. You pull the two words apart, the two parts apart. The word para- is a Greek word for beside, and the word -kaleo is the word to call. So what you first of all have in the word kaleo, it means to speak a message, to tell the truth.

With the word para-, you have a word that means beside. A Paraclete is somebody who doesn’t go in front of you and say, “Let’s go!” or who stands behind you and says, “Get going!” but someone who comes alongside of you. Now the reason I like the word advocate is because the Latin word for Paraclete is advocare. The word ad- means alongside, and -vocare means to speak (obviously from which we get our word vocal).

An advocate simply is someone who comes alongside of you who is for you and by you and who fearlessly speaks the truth to someone or something that has what you need. An advocate is a substitute. An advocate is a representative. An advocate is a helper. An advocate is someone who stands right alongside of you and says, “What do we have to do?” So, for example, social workers, in some cases, have to take upon themselves the role of advocate. You get a social work textbook, and it will talk to you about advocacy.

What’s an advocate? Someone who takes a powerless person and who deals with the powers that be on their behalf. You’re not in front of them or behind them. You’re standing alongside of them, and you’re representing them. Or a lawyer. You go into court, and what are you? You’re an advocate. Advocare. There are two parts to it. On the one hand, you’re speaking to a judge or to a jury or to a body that has something your client needs. On the other hand, you’re in the place of your client. There’s both a hardness and a softness about an advocate. There’s both a toughness and a sympathy and an intimacy. That’s an advocate.

2. Who is the first advocate?

You see, if Jesus says he is going to send the Holy Spirit as another advocate, there is no way to understand what that means unless we ask ourselves, “Well who is the first one?” Now what’s pretty clear from the context is that Jesus is the first one. He says, “I’m going away, but I won’t leave you orphans. I will come to you in a new sense in which I send you another advocate.” That means he must be the first one.

John, the writer of John in his first epistle 1 John, makes it very clear. In 2:1, of that epistle he says, “My little children, I’m writing this so that you would not sin, but if you do sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous.” There it is. We have a Paraclete. So it’s very clear Jesus is the advocate, but my question is what does it mean when we talk about Jesus’ advocacy? How is Jesus an advocate for you?

If there is anybody here, two-and-a-half years ago when I preached the first sermon to a little tiny group of people here in the evening, you will remember, if you were here, this was the subject, because I don’t think there’s a more important subject than this. What does it mean when we say Jesus is an advocate? In the Bible, his role as an advocate assumes three things.

First, the Bible says all of us stand before the judgment seat of God accused. All of us stand accused before the judgment seat of God. The reason Jesus is an advocate is because we are in a position of being accused. We stand before the court, the bar of God. Now somebody out there says, “I don’t believe you still believe that, and why do you believe that? How can you believe that?” The answer is the Bible says so, but I’d also like to appeal to you that your own heart knows it.

Why is it that there is not just an indelibility about guilt but an immediacy? Why is it that you can be walking down the street sometime, and something will trigger a memory, and suddenly an old flaw or an old sin or an old indiscretion suddenly begins to run right across your view in Technicolor? Why is it that over the years when I have spent time with people who are dying, I find the thing they most have trouble dealing with as they get closer to death is regret, is their past, is their flaws? They feel like their past is being run (all their flaws and all their sins) in Technicolor in front of their face.

Why is it that all of us (at least many of you, certainly in this room) are wrestling with this desperate, desperate feeling that you need to be perfect? You know, your friends tell you how unreasonable it is, but you know, when you tell a friend how unreasonable it is you think you ought to be perfect, yet you know you’re having the same struggle. You go to a counselor, and the counselor says, “That’s pathological.”

I remember almost 20 years ago, I went to see a counselor. When I was talking to that counselor, he said, “Well, you know, it’s absolutely unreasonable for you to think you need to be perfect.” I was just coming to grips with the Christian faith at that time. I turned to him. He was a very, very intelligent man. I said, “How do you know I shouldn’t be perfect?” He said, “Well, it’s not reasonable.” I said, “But aren’t you assuming there is no God who demands perfection?”

“Oh no. I’m not assuming anything. I’m not giving you any value judgments.” I said, “But you’re assuming there is no God to tell me that. You’re doing religion! You can’t tell me it’s unreasonable to feel that I should be perfect unless you already believe and assume there is no God or there’s no God who really matters to me.” He looked at me, and he said, “You’re right. I take it back.” That was the end of his ability to help me.

Why do we struggle with this feeling we need to be perfect? Why do we struggle with the Technicolor past? Why is it that there’s not just an indelibility about our guilt but an immediacy? Why does it seem like we’re continually being freshly accused … freshly accused? Because our conscience knows there is a courtroom. There is a judgment seat. There is a court before which we all stand accused. There is a justice with which we all have to deal. There’s a standard which we all know we violated.

You know, there is a passage in the play Death of a Salesman which just gives, I think, anybody who is really listening or watching it or reading it a cold chill. It’s a place where Willy Loman, the seedy salesman, just idolizes his son Biff. Biff sort of idolizes his father. Biff is this great athlete, and his father kind of lives out his life vicariously through Biff, if you can remember that. At one point in the play, Biff discovers his father in a hotel room with a naked woman. Remember that?

The naked woman leaves. There is quiet. This is just the most awful part of almost any literature I know. There is Biff standing there silently weeping. What does Willy do? What does the father do? He puts his arm around him and says, “Now, now look. You can’t overemphasize something like this. When you’re older, you’ll understand about these things.” Biff stays silent, still weeping. Willy doesn’t know what to do, so he changes his tune. He stands back, and he takes charge. He says, “Biff, get my suitcase. Forget it, I tell you. That’s an order.”

Biff looks at him and says, “How could you do this to Mama? Get away from me, you liar!” He runs out of the room. Willy is left on the floor crying out to Biff saying, “Biff, come back here, or I’ll whip you. Come back here, or I’ll beat you.” We know from the play that Biff goes off, never goes to college. His life is wasted. He becomes a drifter, all because he is so disillusioned.

Now what’s so awful about that and what sends such violent chills through your body is here you have Willy Loman. Like most of us, he has his indiscretions, has ways in which he fudges, has ways in which he cuts corners. He all along has been making excuses. He puts his arm around himself and says, “Well, when you get older, people know these things happen.” At that moment, he is absolutely exposed. He is naked.

All of his excuses crumble at his feet. Why? Because there are two eyes looking at him, and they’re absolutely pure, and they’re absolutely innocent. Before the eyes of an absolute pure and innocent person, all of his excuses, all of his self-indulgences, and all those things are suddenly ripped away, and he has no defenses, and he is exposed for who he is.

Now listen. The reason that sends a violent chill over all of us when we see that is because we know there actually is a pair of eyes, and they are absolutely pure, and they’re absolutely fair, and they’re absolutely honest, and we can’t stand before them. The excuses we use and the things we say to ourselves and the people we look at to justify ourselves, all that will fall to the ground, and it does fall to the ground, and we know it! Think for a minute.

Unless there is a pair of eyes like that, pure and honest and absolutely fair, unless there is a pair of eyes like that, what hope is there for the universe, because there is no hope of good triumphing over evil? You see, if there are no eyes like that, there is no hope, but if there is a pair of eyes like that, what hope is there for us? How could we ever stand before them? There is a justice with which we all have to deal. There is a court before which we all stand accused, and you know it. How else can you explain your own heart and how it operates?

Secondly, Jesus Christ, if he is your Savior, if you’ve received him as your Savior, stands representing you before those eyes. He is the one who was scrutinized. He is the one who stands there. Jesus Christ is your advocate. Now what does that mean? In a court, an advocate is a defense attorney. What is the relationship of the accused person to the defense attorney? Well, here’s John Doe, your defense attorney. Let me tell you what your relationship is: John Doe becomes everything to you.

You see, if John Doe is eloquent, you’re eloquent. If John Doe is savvy and polished, you’re savvy. If John Doe fails, you fail. Why? Is that fair? Of course, because that is the nature of the dynamic of the relationship between you and an advocate. You see, in the court, in a sense you don’t really appear. Not really. You’re lost in your advocate. It’s your advocate. It’s John Doe, you see. It’s John Doe, the lawyer, who is seen, John Doe who is heard.

You’re lost in your advocate. Your advocate’s success is imputed to you. Your advocate’s failure is imputed to you. That’s the nature of advocacy. The Bible tells us that before the judgment seat of God, before those eyes that every one of us in this room know either implicitly or explicitly exist, Jesus Christ stands, and he represents you.

Thirdly, the advocacy of Christ is Jesus doesn’t just stand up there, but he stands up there with an infallible case, like any good defense attorney. See, for years I had heard about this idea that Jesus was an advocate, a High Priest before the Father. You know what I thought he was like? I mean, because I knew what I was like.

I knew about my sin. I knew about my failures. I knew about all the broken promises, an incredible string of them. I thought Jesus Christ was like those high-priced defense attorneys who take rich clients who are guilty of sin and try to get them off light by kind of wheedling, cajoling, and doing histrionics and trying to arouse sympathy.

I thought Jesus was up there before the Father kind of going like this: “Father, here’s Tim Keller. Yes, you created him. You keep him alive every minute. He owes you everything, and he should build his whole life around you, and he should love you with all his heart, soul, strength, and mind, and he should love his neighbor as himself, but he doesn’t. But he has had a bad week. He has a terrible background. Come on! Give him a break just one more time, just one more week, for my sake.” I thought that’s what he was doing up there.

You know, the idea that Jesus was my advocate and my high priest did not really comfort me. Do you know why? Because I used to sit there, and I used to think, “How long can he keep this up? How long can the Father say, ‘Okay, one more time’? That is not what the Bible says Jesus Christ is doing as the Advocate. See, a good defense attorney does not just try to get sympathy. A good defense attorney tries to say, “This is the law.” He shows the judge, “This is the law!” He makes the case, and this is what the case is.

Jesus Christ goes before the throne of the Father and says, “Here are my brothers and my sisters I died for. Look, Father. Have they lied? Yes. Have they been selfish? Yes. Have they been bitter? Yes. Have they failed to serve people? Yes. Have they failed to love you as they should? Yes, but I have paid. Your law is a just law, Father.

Your law says the only way to pay these debts is through death and blood. Well, here it is. Here’s my body. Here’s my blood. I have made full payment, and your own justice says you cannot take two payments for the same debt. Therefore, I ask for acquittal for my clients. I don’t just ask; I demand it. It’s been paid. I have lived in their place. I died in their place. My Father, I do not ask for mercy for my clients. I ask for justice.”

Now that’s an infallible case. Don’t you see? In every other religion, the justice of God is against you. It’s on the other side of the scale. On your side of the scale, you have to heap up all kinds of good works in order to kind of balance it out. In every other religion, every other philosophy, we know what we’re supposed to be like. The justice, the law, the perfection, the law of love or whatever you think it is, the justice of God is on this side of the scale. We’re on the other side, and we’re furiously trying to live up in a way that balances out the scale. What an incredible burden!

Don’t you see? Here’s the mystery and the wonder of the ages, that if Jesus Christ becomes your advocate, the only time, the only way, the only place, the most incredible thing, the greatest irony in history, now the justice of God is on your side of the scale. It’s on your side!

Thy justice like mountains high soaring above.

The mountains of God, the justice of God is infallible, and Jesus Christ says, “Don’t you see? I have lived the perfect life for them. I’m their advocate. I have died the death and paid every one of their debts for them.” Do you know what it means to be a Christian? It means Jesus is your advocate. It’s not enough to say as a Christian, “I try to emulate him.” Old Dr. Lloyd-Jones, the old Welsh preacher, used to ask people, “Are you a Christian?” If they said, “I’m trying,” he said, “Then I would know they had no idea what it meant to be a Christian.”

You see, being a Christian is a standing. It’s a position. If you say, “I’m trying,” that means Jesus is your example. He is a wonderful example, but first he has to be your advocate. Until you’ve retained him as your advocate, you have no real relationship to him. Do you understand that? If there is anybody here in this room who says, “Well, I’ve tried my best. I’ve lived a good life, at least better than a lot of other people who have better lives than me. I don’t understand. God owes me something.”

If you believe that, if you’re mad because you feel like God owes you something, if you feel like God should answer your prayer because you’re better than most people, you have never retained him as your advocate. You have not entered into a relationship with him as your attorney. Or if you think all this talk about righteousness and judgment and all that is ridiculous and you say, “God doesn’t punish people,” if you say, “God is a God of love. My God is a God of love,” you also have never retained Jesus as your advocate.

Do you know what it means to be a Christian? I’m saying this to those of you who hopefully at this point realize he is not your advocate. What it means to be a Christian is to say, “I see I will never be able to stand up to the scrutiny of those two holy eyes, the pure, the fair, and the honest. I know only Jesus Christ can. I also know I have been trying to be my own advocate.

That’s the reason why I can’t take criticism. That’s the reason why I’m so destroyed by failure. That’s the reason why I’m so upset when things go wrong, because I’m trying to be my own advocate. I’m trying to recommend myself to God. I’m furiously trying to put as many things on this side of the scale to outweigh the justice of God, but I see now I can’t do that. Oh, Lord Jesus, be my advocate.”

Till that happens, he may be your model, but he is not your Savior. Don’t you see that? He may be your example, but he is not your Lord. Friends, when Jesus Christ is only your model, he is only your example, that’s the most discouraging possible position to be in. As an example, Jesus is an absolute failure. All he does is make you feel terrible. You can’t possibly live up to that. As a model, he is a crushing burden, but as an advocate, knowing that all those great things he did, he did in your place. Para-, you; ad-, you. Beside you, for you … that’s freedom.

3. Who is the second advocate?

You say now as I conclude, “Well, I thought we were talking about the Holy Spirit today.” Well, we have more time. We’re going through the book of John. Don’t you see this? Now Jesus Christ comes and says, “I’m sending you another advocate.” Now and only now can you see what the real job of the Holy Spirit is. It says, “He is going to come to speak to you and remind you of everything I told you. He is going to show you that I’m in the Father, and you’re in me, and I’m in you.”

You know what that means? It is not good enough for me as a preacher to sit here and tell you, “Jesus is your advocate.” First of all, those of you who are Christians know even though this is an intellectual understanding, you’ve heard this before, sort of (maybe not quite as vividly or as laid out as it is today, but you’ve heard it before). Let me ask you a question … Why is it you’re living the way you live? Look at the disappointments that are in your life right now. Something has gone wrong with your career. Something has gone wrong with your reputation. Something has gone wrong with something you’d really put a lot of hopes on.

Why is it you’re so dashed by it? Why is it you’re so worried about this? Because you know that if this failed, you would feel like there was no meaning in life anymore. Do you know why? When your self-esteem is shattered by an event, that means all of your self-esteem was riding on that event. What it means is that was your case before the Father, before those eyes. You were trying to be your own advocate.

You were saying before those two perfect eyes, “I’ve been a good mother. I’ve been a good father. I have earned a lot of money. I’ve gone to church. I’ve given to the poor.” When any of these things fall down, you go crazy. Why? Because so many of our deepest yearnings for success are actually desires to be advocates for ourselves. When these things crumble, that’s our case that’s crumbling, and we feel naked.

You may be going to church for years, and yet you fail in a certain area, and you feel like, “I can never face God again. I can never face anybody again.” Why are you so cast down? Don’t you see? You may believe in a general way about Jesus being your advocate, but you haven’t had it applied to your heart. What is the job of the Holy Spirit? It’s his job to come and say, “You’re in the Father.”

The Holy Spirit, J.I. Packer says, is like a floodlight on Christ. See, when you see a floodlight, you don’t see the floodlight; you only see what the floodlight is trying to show you. The floodlight throws something into relief so you see the beauty of it. The Holy Spirit does not come and speak to you of himself. The Holy Spirit comes and says, “Look at the advocate.” You see, the Holy Spirit is an advocate on the inside. We have to have one not just on the outside (that’s Jesus), but we have to one on the inside. Do you know why? Because of our own stubborn hearts.

The inside advocate has to come alongside of us and say, “Look. Look! I love you, but you’re being stupid.” That’s an advocate. He is against us, for us. Haven’t you ever had one of those, a person like that? You were kind of in a mess, and a person comes alongside of you and starts to talk to you and shows you he loves you. At a certain point, he confronts you and says, “But you have to stop this. It’s killing you.” You turn away, and you want to say, “You don’t understand!” like you said to everybody else, except this one is kind of hard to say that because you know by his love that he does understand.

That incredible combination of both love and truth makes it impossible for you to really get out from under what he is saying, and so what happens is your self-pity and your self-deception and all those things that were shackling you start to fall at your feet. Haven’t you had anybody like that in your life? It’s marvelous when you get somebody like that. Your opportunities for growth are incredible.

Well, you have somebody like that. The day you make Jesus Christ your advocate on the outside (you might say) in heaven, the Holy Spirit becomes your advocate on the inside. He comes inside, and he says, “Here you’re bitter, but how can you be bitter? Look at Jesus. Look at what he has done for you. Look at the glory of what he has done. Look at his mercy. Look at how he has forgiven you.” The more he shows you Christ, the more you’re able to forgive.

Or you’re worried. The Holy Spirit comes and says, “Look at Jesus Christ. Look at all he has paid. Look at all he has done. Do you think he is going to do all of that and then let your life go bad? Trust him!” You begin to trust him. The Holy Spirit is your advocate on the inside, talking to you about Christ, your advocate in heaven. That’s the job of the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit is a matchmaker.

The Holy Spirit is the second advocate who tells you continually and constantly about the first. That’s how you know the Holy Spirit is in your life, because you find in the past talking about Christ and reading about Christ wasn’t that important to you, but now it’s your very life. It’s the mark of the Holy Spirit to say, “Look at him. Don’t look at me. See his glory. Listen to his Word. Know his joy.”

One last thing to say. There are basically always two kinds of people in any room. On the one hand, you have folks who may have realized by now the reason they are so downcast when they don’t succeed in an area is because Jesus is not your advocate. You’re your own advocate. What do I say?

In order to make him your advocate, you have to, number one, admit there are two holy eyes before whom you will never be able to stand. Number two, you’ve been trying to be your own advocate. That’s the reason you can’t take criticism. That’s the reason why you can’t take failure. Thirdly, you say, “Jesus, you have to be my advocate.”

You need to do that. That’s the only way to get the Holy Spirit in your life. Don’t ask the Holy Spirit to come into your life. Ask Jesus to be your advocate, and the Holy Spirit will come in. Why? Because the Holy Spirit is another advocate. He is not the first one, you see? Don’t sit down and ask in an abstract way for power. “Oh Lord, I have weakness in my life. I’ve come to church. I want inspiration. Give me power.” It won’t work that way. You have to go to Jesus, and you have to make him your advocate. Then the Holy Spirit will enter in automatically and become your inside advocate.

Listen, Christian friends. Some of you may be discouraged right now because you’re forgetting to look at your life through this doctrine. Maybe somebody has been criticizing you lately, and that person really isn’t quite fair in their criticism, but part of it is right, so it hurts. Or maybe you’ve been caught. You’re the only person caught lying. Everybody else in the office has been lying, but you’re the one who gets caught. Or there are some habits that are starting to catch up to you. Instead of thinking about all the injustice of it, do you know what you need to do?

You need to look out there in your life, and you need to say, “If I really have a counselor, if I really have an advocate, of course he is going to be speaking to me about my faults. He is going to be showing me what’s wrong with me, where I need to change. Here I am upset about this critic or upset about the injustice of this, but wait a minute! Holy Spirit, dear friend, trusted counselor and advocate, is it you? Are you the one talking to me now?

Instead of being so mad at this person or that person or the injustice of the situation, are you trying to teach me? It is you, isn’t it? Oh, Holy Spirit, I’m going to sit down. I’m going to start reading the Bible. I’m going to spend time praying. I’m going to write down my insights. Speak to me. Speak to me of my great advocate in heaven. Speak to me of my elder Brother Jesus, how he has covered everything. Show me how I have to change. Will you do that?” What will the Holy Spirit say? He will say, “Of course! That’s why I’m here.”

Life looks terrible if you forget to see the Spirit is always going to be showing you in love the truth. Stop being so angry at the people around you, and start realizing it could be your advocate. “I will send you another Counselor, the Spirit of truth, and he will tell you everything I have said.” Let’s pray.