Today is “Move-in Day”.  As we worship in the air-conditioned sanctuary, thousands of students are moving into their new dormitory.  There are all kinds of boxes and suitcases making their way up stairs (because they are always upstairs).  Many of these students are Fish – First Year Students, who are more than likely away from home for the very first time, or at least away from home in a very unique way.  In honor of the over 10,000 fish in our community between the two schools of higher education, we begin a series of sermons today entitled, “Fish Food for Everyone.”

It doesn’t take being a freshman to be encountering new experiences or to sense that away from home feeling.  I have discovered that being the parent of a fish, a first year student, can in fact, feel very new.  So while I am certainly praying for and keeping in mind all the freshmen in our community, I am also praying for each of you going through new and somewhat foreign circumstances as I preach on the topic of Fish Food for Everyone.

The disciples of Jesus were not freshmen.  They had completed their third year with the Messiah.  Like college students they had left all behind them.  Unlike college students, they did not have access to their parents’ bank account.  They had left it all for the new experiences of traveling with Jesus.  I’m sure they remembered what it was like when they were so new to all this.  They saw Jesus comfort the poor.  They witnessed him confront the religious leaders who had been become so holier-than-thou that they were actually doing more harm than good for the case of the God that they served.  The disciples were there when Jesus performed miracles of healing and feeding thousands with very little.  In many respects, they were no fish.  But on this night they were there all over again.  New experiences awaited them.  Like many of us who have had the opportunity to help pack people for these new experiences, Jesus started to make a list of things they would need when they had to move on without him.  Listen to how he put it in John 14.  Hear now the Word of the Lord:

¹⁸”I will not leave you orphaned; I am coming to you… ²⁵”I have said these things to you while I am still with you. ²⁶But the Advocate, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you everything, and remind you of all that I have said to you. ²⁷Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled, and do not let them be afraid.

This is the word of God for the people of God.  In this passage Jesus promised his disciples that they would never be alone.  His promise was for an Advocate in verse 26.  That word sounds almost like a legal representative.  Other translations use the word Friend, Helper, or Counselor.  The Greek word is paraclete which means literally, “one who walks alongside”.  That is why I prefer the translation, Comforter, used in the King James Version as well as several modern translations.  I also like Comforter because it was one of the things on the new student list at Bed Bath and Beyond.  I walked in there and discovered one of our members being helpful to so many shoppers.  She handed me this long list of things every first year student needs and told me that I could actually buy them in College Station and pick them up in San Marcos, where my fish is swimming.  I assured her if it could not fit in his car, we did not need it.  But we did needed to make sure he had a good comforter.  I see Jesus doing that for his disciples.  He couldn’t give them everything, but he did want to make sure that they had a good Comforter.
 

The Comforter Assures Us that we are Never Abandoned.

The setting was the night before Jesus gave himself up for us.  They had just completed the Passover meal, where Jesus washed their feet reminding them that they are always servants to others.  Then in response to a series of desperate questions from the disciples he tried to convey to them that this was it.  This was his last night with them.  The next day he would be gone, dead, killed by those he deeply loved.  The more he explained, the more desperate they seemed.  I can imagine him walking toward the garden and talking as they went along the road.  Finally, he stopped turned toward his disciples and looked each of them squarely in the eye saying, “I will not leave you orphaned.”  He assured his disciples that he would never, ever abandon them.  I love how Leon Morris described this promise in his commentary on the book of John.  He wrote, “Jesus will not leave the disciples to battle their way through the world on their own.”  They may feel lonesome and even all alone at times, but the promise from Jesus is they would never be abandoned.  In fact, in verse 25 we read of the immanence of his departure.  “I have spoken these things to you while I am still with you” is a bit ominous.  It communicates that he is leaving, going away from them, but they would never be abandoned.

It is strange how move-in day brings back so many memories.  When Zac was a little boy, he would sit in a room with his comforter, “Dun-Dun”.  It may have been the kitchen watching Tammy prepare dinner, it may have been the living room watching Sesame Street, it may have been his bedroom playing with his toys; but wherever it was he would do the same thing.  If he was alone in that room for very long he would shout out one word, “Mom!”  I am certain that he would shout that one word close to 100 times a day.  Tammy would come back in the room, answer him, and then he would go on doing whatever he had been doing.  It was as if a brief wave of terror had washed over him, I believe it is called separation anxiety.  So about 100 times a day he was assured that he was not abandoned.  She was right there.  I read this week, “Though separation anxiety is a perfectly normal part of childhood development, it can be unsettling.”  I know it can take on some pathological expressions in later life, especially if assurance is not received in childhood.  However, I think that there is this separation anxiety that remains in healthy, adjusted human beings (whatever that looks like).

When we dropped Zac off at school on Thursday and there was this pit in my stomach, I found myself offering a one-word prayer, “God!”  This, of course, meant, “Are you still there?  Can you watch over him and us at the same time?  Will you still protect him and us?”  That one-word prayer meant pretty much the same thing that Zachary’s one-word cry for assurance meant years ago when he would shout out, “Mom!”

Jesus looked at his disciples and I can almost see his eyes fixed on Zachary, fixed on mine as he says, “Listen to me.  I will not leave you orphaned.”  The Comforter assures us that we are never abandoned.  You will never be left alone. 
 

The Comforter Covers Us with the Teachings of Christ.

Jesus described one of the key functions of the Comforter sent by him and the Father was to remind the disciples of all the things he had taught them.  All four gospel accounts reveal repeatedly that the disciples did not grasp the significance of much of what Jesus taught them until after his resurrection.  In fact, all four gospel writers are believed to have written their accounts under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, the Comforter.  What that means is that they were viewing Christ in retrospect through the lenses of the Holy Spirit.  They were being taught even as they remembered.

This reminds me of Moses on Mount Sinai when he asked to see God’s glory and was told that he couldn’t stand to see God face to face.  So God held his hand over Moses’ eyes and walked by him, after He had passed by, God removed his hand and Moses saw God walking away.  William Barclay wrote about that moment, “We often understand God in retrospect, recognizing him only after he has passed by.”  In many ways, that’s what is happening with the disciples.  Though they were with Jesus for three years, they did not fully comprehend the glory that was before them.  It was only after he had passed by them that they would say, “There went God.”  Can’t you see them as they were together reflecting on their experiences and under the power of the Holy Spirit saying, “Oh, that’s what he meant when he said…”

This kind of teaching and reminding still happens through the ministry of the Comforter.  I have read about communion for decades, served communion for years, have taken communion hundreds of times, but only this year has it hit me that each time I take communion I am experiencing a course in a never ending meal that will culminate when Christ comes in final victory and we feast at the heavenly banquet.

The Comforter was with me last year when a Chinese student came up to me and asked me why so many Chinese students come over to America and become Christians.  I had no idea what to say, but then the Comforter began to lead me to scriptures that talk about a “God hunger” that is in each one of us, and something happened. I didn’t see the student for a while and then discovered that she was volunteering at our Coffee House.  Then one day several months ago, that student came up to me grinning from ear to ear and said, “Last week I was baptized!”  She explained that after our conversation she started attending a Chinese speaking church, because it was too hard to keep up with my English.  She started reading the Bible and the same Comforter that led me in my response to her question, led her to Jesus Christ.  You will never be left alone.  The Comforter covers you with the teachings of Christ.
 

The Comforter Provides a Unique Sense of Peace.

Jesus had assured the disciples that they would never be abandoned and that they would be covered with his teachings.  Then he did something extraordinary.  He launched into the language of a last will and testament.  It is as if he was saying, “And to my closest friends I leave my peace.”  To every person in this place who feels like a fish today, experiencing new places in life’s journey, I encourage you to wrap yourself up in this verse like your favorite comforter.  It has the power to sustain you through the most trying times.  Listen to it carefully.  This time I want to read it from a free translation, ^“Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. I do not give this to you as the world gives.  Do not let your hearts be thrown into confusion, neither become cowardly.”  Jesus said, “My peace I give to you.”  What an amazing legacy to leave to his followers.  It was this peace that enabled him to follow the plan to give his life for us.  He gives it to them as one would give the painting over the mantle to one’s nephew who always admired it.  Leon Morris wrote, “Christ gives serenity that prevents against a troubled heart and cowardice.”

There are two main kinds of peace.  One is merely the absence of war.  Those bumper stickers encouraging us to, “Visualize World Peace” are seeking that kind of peace.  However, the peace that is being given here is more than that.  This is a peace that is conveyed with the Hebrew word, “Shalom.”  This is a word that promotes wholeness; a positive word that conveys serenity.  This is what is given by the Savior.

 It was ten years ago that my Grandma Gilts died.  I remember going to her house after the funeral with Dad and being asked if there was anything I wanted from her home before the estate sale.  I chose two things – her everyday dishes from which I ate every time I was in her home and her comforter.  I already have a number of lap blankets that she made.  In fact, one of them has been with me at District Youth Camp since 1990.  Every night at camp and many evenings on my sofa, when I cover myself with that lap blanket, I do not think about security from conflict, I think of the presence of my Grandma.  In her house, I stared at the quilted comforter that she had stitched with her own hand and said, “That’s what I want.” 

It’s hard to describe what I feel when I am underneath one of grandma’s comforters.  I feel connected to my ancestry, covered by the love of the kindest woman I have ever known, and comforted by the many memories that flood my mind. 

           That’s why I prefer the term Comforter as the translation of the word, Paraclete.  The Holy Spirit is our Comforter, especially manifested when we are feeling like fish - persons experiencing newness of some kind.  The Comforter assures us that we will never be abandoned.  The Comforter covers us with the teachings of Christ.  The Comforter provides us with a unique sense of peace.  I invite each of you this morning to see Jesus taking your face in his hands and saying, “Listen to me.  You will never be left alone.” If you get that image in your heart and mind this week, regardless of what this week looks like, you will have a Comforter for your new room. Amen.