224 OF COMMUNION WITH THE HOLY GHOST.
your salvation : but your hearts are filled with sorrow and fears, and you do not so much as inquire after relief," verses 5, 6. Whereupon he adjoins that wonderful assertion, verse 7, " Nevertheless I tell you the truth ; It is expedient for you that I go away : for if I go not away, the Comforter will not come unto you ; but if I depart, I will send him unto you/'
This verse, then, being the peculiar foundation of what shall after- ward be declared, must particularly be considered, as to the words of it and their interpretation ; and that both with respect to the preface of them and the asseveration in them, with the reason annexed thereunto.
1. The preface to them: —
(1.) The first word, aXkd, is an adversative, not excepting to any thing of what himself had sjDoken before, but to their apprehension : " I know you have sad thoughts of these things; but yet, neverthe- less."
(2.) 'Eyw Tviv u,7.n^iiav Xsyw u.a/V, — " I tell you the truth." The words are exceedingly emphatical, and denote some great thing to be ushered in by them. First, 'Eyw, — "7 tell it you, this that shall now be spoken ; I who love you, who take care of you, who am now about to lay down my life for you ; they are my dying words, that you may believe me ; I who am truth itself, I tell you." And, —
'Eyw rnv akri&uav Xiyu, — " I tell you the truth." " You have in your sad, misgiving hearts many misapprehensions of things. You think if I would abide with you, all these evils might be prevented ; but, alas ! you know not what is good for you, nor what is expedient. ' I tell you the truth;' this is truth itself, and quiet your hearts in it." There is need of a gi'eat deal of e^ddence of truth, to comfort their souls that are dejected and disconsolate under an apprehension of the absence of Christ from them, be the apprehension true or false.
And this is the first part of the Avords of our Saviour, the preface to what he was to deliver to them, by way of a weighty, convincing asseveration, to disentangle thereby the thoughts of his disciples from prejudice, and to prepare them for the receiving of that great tiaith which he was to deliver.
2. The assertion itself follows: 2u/xff'f£/ y,a7/, JVa iyu ccjeyJu, — " It is expedient for you that I go away."
There are two things in the words: — Christ's departure; and the usefulness of it to his disciples : —
For his departure, it is known what is intended by it; — the with- drawing his bodily presence from the earth after his resurrection, the " heaven being to receive him, until the times of the restitution of all things," Acts iii. 21 ; for in respect of his Deity, and the exer- cise of love and care towards them, he promised to be with them to
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the end of the world, Matt, xxviii. 20. Of this saith he, Su/x^j^s; IimTv, — " It conduceth to your good ; it is profitable for you ; it is for your advantage ; it will answer the end that you aim at." That is the sense of the word which we have translated " expedient;" — " It is for your profit and advantage." This, then, is that which our Saviour asserts, and that with the earnestness before mentioned, desiring to convince his sorrowful followers of the truth of it, — namely, that his departure, which they so much feared and were troubled to think of, wovild turn to tlieir profit and advantage.
3. Now, although it might be expected that they should acquiesce in this asseveration of truth itself, yet because they were generally concerned in the ground of tJie truth of it, he acquaints them with that also ; and, that we may confess it to be a great matter, that gives certainty and evidence to that proposition, he expresses it negatively and positively : " If I go not away, he will not come ; but if I depart, I will send him." Concerning the going away of Christ I have spoken before ; of the Comforter, his coming and sending, I shall now treat, as being the thing aimed at.
'O •TapayiXrirog: the word being of sundry significations, many trans- lations have thought fit not to restrain it, but do retain the original word " paracletus;" so the Syriac also: and, as some think, it was a word before in use among the Jews (whence the Chaldee paraphrast makes use of it. Job xvi. 20^) ; and amongst them it signifies one that so tauglit others as to delight them also in his teaching, — that is, to be their comforter. In Scripture it hath two eminent significations, — an " advocate" and a " comforter;" in the first sense our Saviour is called 'jrapdycXriTog, 1 John ii. 1. Whether it be better rendered liere an advocate or a comforter may be doubted.
Look into the foregoing occasion of the words, which is the dis- ciples' sorrow and troul)le, and it seems to require the Comforter: " Sorrow hath filled your hearts ; but I will send you the Comforter ;" — look into the next words following, which contain his peculiar work for Avhich he is now promised to be sent, and they require he should be an Advocate, to plead the cause of Christ against the world, verse 8. I shall choose rather to interpret the promise by the occasion of it, which was the sorrow of his disciples, and to retain the name of the Comforter.