We have many relationships in our lives – with family, friends, colleagues at work; and with maybe a hairdresser, a tax preparer, a doctor. Most of us I suspect don’t have a close or ongoing relationship with a lawyer, certainly not the type that represents you in court.
The sort of relationship with an advocate is very different from most of the other relationships we might have. It is very close, since you have to be totally open with that other person in order to have them represent you effectively. And in representing you, they completely stand in for you. In front of the court, they are you – what they say is as if you said it. Typically you are not even allowed to speak for yourself, only through them. Which is why the openness is so important, because you want them to to be able to represent you effectively, so they have to know and understand you.
I suspect the unusual nature of this intimate relationship and the public way it plays out is why we find it so fascinating – at least if the number of portrayals in TV series is anything to go by.
So why does John use this legal terminology when telling us about our relationship with the Risen Jesus. If the Spirit is our advocate, is that because we are somehow on trial and need to ask for our lawyer (as in all the best legal dramas)?
There is no indication at all that John is thinking of us being in some sort of adversarial legal situation – quite the opposite. In fact, we might be better off thinking of an advocate not so much in the context of a court but as when we talk about an advocacy organization – arguing for someone or some cause, particularly when that person cannot make their case for themself. Here we also get closer to the other meaning of the term that is used in older translations “the Paraclete” (you’ll hear it sometimes in hymns) – this can mean both the person who argues for you, but also more generally one who helps, “a comforter”.
Why does all this matter? Are we in danger of just getting caught up in some linguistic game here? I hope not. We have to recognize and accept that John does speak using sophisticated, often rather philosophical language – as when he starts with “In the beginning was the word, and the word was with God, and the word was God” – this is not your daily conversational language, however you come at it.
If we want to get the most out of what John is telling us, we are going to need to work at it a bit. So, pressing on…
Jesus says: “the Father will give you another Advocate to be with you always”. Why? What is this Advocate doing for us?
One thing to notice is he says “another Advocate” – so the disciples already had an advocate. That first advocate is Jesus. The Father is not giving the disciples something new, He is just passing the role that Jesus had onto another, the Spirit of truth.
Jesus understands he cannot be with the disciples for ever in human form, but he will be with them forever as the Spirit – “this new advocate (my replacement) will be with you always”.
Which brings us to another statement which can seem hard to untangle. This concerns the relationship between Jesus and the Father, and us: “I am in my Father and you are in me and I in you”. We are now brought into this intimacy. Remember how Jesus said in the reading we heard last week – “if you have seen me, you have seen the Father”. The closeness that Jesus has with the Father, we are part of it, we are drawn into it. That’s what Jesus wants for us.
In establishing this new set of relationships, Jesus isn’t doing something only for those few people he met in person in his human life on earth. He is setting up a new reality for everyone who follows after. We can chose to enter into this life he has opened up, by following the instructions he gave for that life (his commandments – which John summarizes as simply “Love!”). If we do that then we are brought into this new relationship. “Whoever has my commandments and observes them is the one who loves me. And whoever loves me will be loved by my Father, and I will love him and reveal myself to him”. The way this can happen is because the Father has given us the Spirit, His Spirit, Jesus’ spirit, Jesus still with us.
And the advocacy – where does that come in? The advocate is not our advocate, arguing our case. The Advocate is Jesus, still with us, in us, advocating the Father’s case. The first Advocate for the Father was Jesus, then his disciples, through the ages, then us.
We have Jesus, the Advocate, in us so that we can argue his (i.e. his and our Father’s) case in the World. So that the world which neither sees nor knows the truth can be brought to see and know.
We might have thought we didn’t have a close relationship with a lawyer. In fact we are one! The Spirit of truth, Jesus living in us, the Father living in us, enables us to argue the case for God’s love. As we are comforted by that love inside us, so we are called to be comforters to others.