As the expression of the Father realized as the Spirit, Christ comes to us with the Father and makes an abode with us (vv. 21-23). In verse 23, the Lord said, “If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word, and My Father will love him, and We will come to him and make an abode with him.” According to this verse, the Triune God in Christ comes to the believer to make a mutual abode with him. The abode mentioned in verse 23 is one of the many abodes found in verse 2. It will be a mutual abode, in which the Triune God abides in the believers and the believers abide in Him. We should not forget that each of us is one of so many abodes in the Father’s house. The Father and the Son take the lover of Jesus as Their abode. The Father and the Son come to the believer to make an abode with him that he and They may have an abiding place. The believer will be Their abode and They shall be his abode. This verse is the basis of 15:4-5: “Abide in Me and I in you.” Most Christians do not realize that the basis of 15:4-5 is 14:23, where we have the mutual abode made by the appearing of the Father and the Son as the Spirit to the believer who loves Him. In other words, this abode is prepared by the visitation of the Triune God. When the Triune God grants us a visit, His visitation makes us His abode and it makes Him our abode. Eventually, we and He, He and we, become a mutual abode. We will abide in Him, and He will abide in us. In such a situation there is no place for sin, the world, Satan, the old man, or the flesh. All such things have been chased away.
We have had this experience in the past. Deep within us there was a sweet appreciation toward the Lord Jesus, and we told Him that we loved Him. Then the Lord told us that since we loved Him, His commandment was that we should not do this and that. We said amen to the Lord, perhaps even with tears in our eyes. Immediately we had the sense of His manifestation within us. We were so much in His presence. At that time we had the sense that He was filling us up with Himself and that we were being drawn into Him. We were abiding in Him, and He was abiding in us. We were His abode, and He was our abode. We all have had this kind of experience, either in a deep way or in a shallow way, either for a long time or just for a few minutes. We need to have this experience all day long.
The Lord Jesus stirs up our love, and in response we may say, “Lord Jesus, I love You.” The Father responds to our love for the Son, and then the Father and the Son come to us to make an abode in our spirit. Actually, the Father and the Son come to take us over, to possess us. In this way the Father and the Son settle within us to make an abode with us, that is, to build the Father’s house. This is a great matter. The abode signifies that we human beings may and can become an abode of God. God in Christ desires, longs, to enter into us, possess us, and make us His dwelling place.
From our experience we know that the Father and the Son pay us a constant visitation. In our daily life the Father and the Son often come to visit us. We may be at home, at school, or at work, but wherever we may be, the Father and the Son come to visit us to do a building work in us, making an abode which will be a mutual dwelling place for the Triune God and for us.
Christ comes to us as the Holy Spirit sent by the Father in the Son’s name. In verse 26 the Lord said, “But the Comforter, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in My name, He will teach you all things and remind you of all the things which I have said to you.” Here we see that the Comforter, the Holy Spirit, was to be sent by the Father in the Son’s name. Therefore, the Holy Spirit comes not only from the Father but also by the Son. Thus, the Holy Spirit comes not only from the Father but also from the Son, and He is the reality not only of the Father but also of the Son. Hence, when we call on the name of the Son, we get the Spirit (1 Cor. 12:3).
The Holy Spirit is not only sent by the Father but “from with” the Father (John 15:26). In Greek, the preposition translated from is para. This word means “by the side of” and often has the meaning of “from with.” This is seen elsewhere in the Gospel of John, for example, in 6:46: “Not that anyone has seen the Father, except Him who is from God.” The word from in this verse is para in Greek. The sense here is “from with.” The Lord is not only from God but also with God. While He is from God, He is still with God (8:16, 29; 16:27). Likewise, the Comforter, the Holy Spirit, is sent “from with” the Father. This means that the Spirit not only comes from the Father but also with the Father. When the Father sends the Spirit, He comes with the Spirit. The Comforter comes from the Father and with the Father. The Father is the source. When the Spirit comes from the source, it does not mean that He leaves the source but that He comes with the source.
The Comforter, the Holy Spirit, is sent by the Father in the Son’s name. Thus, the Holy Spirit comes in the Son’s name to be the reality of His name. The name is the Son Himself, and the Spirit is the person, the being, of the Son. When we call on the name of the Son, we get the Spirit (1 Cor. 12:3). The Son came in the Father’s name (5:43) because the Son and the Father are one (10:30). Now the Spirit will come in the Son’s name because the Spirit and the Son also are one (2 Cor. 3:17). Because the Spirit and the Son are one, the Spirit can be sent by the Father as the Son. This interpretation strongly indicates that the Spirit is the Son. The Father’s sending the Spirit in the Son’s name means that the Father sent the Spirit as the Son. This is the Triune God—the Father, the Son, and the Spirit—reaching us eventually as the Spirit.
The Spirit comes in the name of the Son. When we call on the name of Jesus, the Spirit comes. The name of the Son is Jesus, and His person is the Spirit. God the Father sends the Spirit, and the Spirit comes in the name of the Son. Eventually, it is the Triune God who comes. When the Spirit comes to us, the Father also comes. The Son is also here because the Spirit comes with the Father in the name of the Son. The Father sends the Spirit from with Himself, and the Spirit comes in the name of the Son. The Spirit comes as the Son. He is the Son coming, and this Son coming is from with the Father. Therefore, when one comes, all three are present. By calling on the name of the Lord, we may enjoy and experience Christ as the expression of God realized by the Spirit so that Christ the Son would come to us with the Father and make an abode with us.