NOTES for Joh 14:27

Speaking about the peace that is not from this world, Jesus calls His disciples not to be afraid. The issue, of course, is peace in the sense in which this word is used in Yahwism and Judaism, and later began to be used by Christians: peace as God's presence, or more precisely, as the effect of God's presence on human nature, which evokes in a person a sense of inner peace and rest. But the main thing is not the sensations, but the Presence itself. It was, of course, familiar to those seeking God even before the coming of Christ, especially to Yahwists, for God never abandoned His people.

But to be completely delivered from fear: that had never happened. Even those who seemed to stand firmly on the path of righteousness experienced fear. This is understandable: righteousness is not naturally characteristic of the human person. It is not a property or quality of fallen humanity; it is only a state in which one can abide, but which is easy to lose. In essence, a fallen person is righteous in spite of his nature. And in any case he has to oppose the evil and sin that he carries within himself. This means that fears too can find a place in the life of a righteous person. Until human nature is transformed fully and to the end, they cannot be finally removed.

One can only make sure that they do not determine the course of spiritual life and of life in general. But with the coming of Christ the situation changed: with Him the Kingdom entered the world. And this means the possibility of that very full and final transformation of human nature. And accordingly, deliverance from all fears connected with the fall, including the fear of death and the fear of what people consider supernatural, the two main fears of modern humanity. In the Kingdom there are no fears, and Jesus calls His disciples precisely there. After Himself.

Describing the Kingdom, Jesus turns to the image of a vineyard, a vine, traditional for Yahwism and Judaism. But into this traditional image He places a new meaning connected with the essence of the Kingdom that He brought into the world. Of course, there is also room here for the traditional understanding of the Kingdom as a place where only one will acts: the will of God, who created the world. It is no accident that Jesus says that the "prince of this world" "has nothing in Him": for the Kingdom He brought into the world does not exist according to the laws of this world, so that the "prince of this world" can have no power over it, even though the Kingdom, while abiding in our untransfigured world, constantly touches it.

But the image of the vine also becomes an image of relations within the Kingdom, where all are connected with one another and with Christ just as branches are on a vine. This bond is absolute, immediate, and organic: every branch is a continuation of the vine; if it is torn off, it dries up. All the branches live one life with the vine, fed with it by the same sap from one source. Evidently this is exactly how the inhabitants of the Kingdom are connected with one another and with Christ.

From this point of view, the Kingdom can be defined as a single space of relations linking all its inhabitants with one another, with Christ at the center. And it is precisely the fact of Christ's presence that makes the Kingdom the Kingdom. For in order for it to remain itself, such constancy of relations, such stability, is necessary as is unthinkable in the fallen world for the human will damaged by the fall. Only the will of the One who, being Man, remained untouched by sin can become the basis of the stable unity necessary as an indispensable condition for the existence of the Kingdom in our transfiguring, but not yet transfigured, world. This is what the Savior evidently has in mind when He says, "Without Me you can do nothing."

Of course, even in a fallen state a person can sometimes, with God's help, do something good. But to do anything at all for the Kingdom is possible only by being part of the Kingdom. And it is impossible to be part of it without spiritual unity with the One who constitutes its spiritual foundation, who is the spiritual core on which the Kingdom rests.

One end of this core is held by God, who raised His Son from the dead. At the other end are we, who consider ourselves Christians and try, as far as we can, to be Christians. And between us is the Kingdom, entering the world through us.

The Holy Spirit will teach you all things, but He will also bring to your remembrance all things that Christ said. These words contain the answer to a frequently asked question: by what principle were the canonical Gospels selected, given that there were many more Gospel narratives? The words and episodes recorded by the four Evangelists were preserved precisely because the Holy Spirit did not allow them to be forgotten. Meanwhile, anyone even slightly familiar with the “apocryphal gospels” will agree that, although they use certain Gospel motifs, they belong to a different kind of literature.

As He departs, He leaves peace to the disciples, but emphasizes that His peace is unlike the peace familiar to people. Unfortunately, the peace usually established in human relationships can be defined only negatively, as a temporary absence of war and hostility, and therein lie its weakness and fragility. But the peace brought by Christ is equivalent to the authenticity of life. Beside it, every hostility looks like a dark crevice that the light has not yet reached.

Someone somewhere said: "Love is an instrument of knowledge." And in fact, what can we know about someone we do not love? Having turned away from a person, one cannot come into contact with him, cannot become closer to him, cannot understand him. The same is true when the matter concerns the knowledge of God. What can be known about Him without loving Him, without striving toward Him, is only dry and relative "scholasticism" about the fact that He is, supposedly, so great and strong and wise.

But truly to know Him, ("to know," in the language of Scripture, to be united with Him, to "abide in Him") is given only to the one who is ready to love. That is why Jesus says that He will reveal Himself not to the whole world, but only to the disciples, who will receive the Spirit of truth, revealing the Father to those who can understand Him, that is, love Him.

Speaking to His disciples about His path and ministry, Jesus mentions a “Comforter” whom the Father will send them and whom, Jesus Himself says, the world can neither see nor know (vv. 16-17). This “Comforter,” whom Jesus also calls the “Holy Spirit” (v. 26) and the “Spirit of truth” (v. 17), will in due course remind the apostles of everything they are now hearing from their Teacher (vv. 25-26). The mention of God's spirit, or breath—the corresponding Greek word, like its Hebrew equivalent, can mean either—in the context of an account of the Kingdom is, of course, no accident. The Old Testament prophets were the first to speak of God's spirit, or breath. For them the spirit was not an abstract theological or philosophical concept but part of a living experience of communion with God; they truly felt God breathing in their hearts.

But Jesus apparently means something more. He speaks of the spirit as a reality on a universal, cosmic scale that nevertheless remains hidden from the world, for this reality belongs to a different order than our still untransformed world. The breath of God unites everyone who abides in the Kingdom, making them one whole: the Father, Jesus Himself, the apostles, and all who will enter the Kingdom through their prayers and under the influence of their preaching. In the past, only certain people felt God's breath at special, exceptional moments in their lives; now it is revealed to everyone who abides in the Kingdom. And no wonder: God's breath permeates the Kingdom, gives it life, and gives it the power to affect the world by transforming it. Because of this breath there are no distances in the Kingdom; here only the quality of relationships and the intensity of love determine mutual closeness.

Until now, the apostles had seen the Kingdom only because of Jesus: they looked at Him, and through Him God's power was revealed to them. Now they were to enter and see from within what they had previously seen only from outside. The time was coming when Jesus would become invisible to a world capable of seeing only what had not yet been transformed. The apostles themselves would therefore no longer see Him with physical sight; but after entering the Kingdom, they would find Him there, seeing Him no longer with their eyes but with their hearts (vv. 19-20). It is no accident that Jesus speaks of a peace unknown to the untransformed world (v. 27): true peace and harmony are possible only in the Kingdom, permeated by God's breath and joined by bonds of love. Again and again Jesus calls the apostles into this Kingdom so that, having become part of it, they may carry it into the world that so greatly needs transformation and sanctification.