What can we really expect the Spirit to do for us, today, in our world?

Years ago, we were going to a new church. When it came time to head home one evening, we could not find our 22-month-old son. He had been with us just a few moments earlier, but as they were turning off the lights and closing the building, Zach was nowhere to be found. The building was new turf for him. He didn’t know his way around. Worst of all, we didn’t know his favorite places in the building. All the lights, except a few in the foyer, were off.

Donna and I were frantic!

What if he made it to the street with it already dark outside with busy streets on both sides?

Where could he be?

How had he gotten away so quickly?

Why wasn’t he crying?

I began a search of the parking lot and the street. Donna searched through all the classrooms in the children’s wing. She found him in his Sunday morning classroom. The lights were off, but a window let light from the parking lot filter through the vertical blinds into where Zach played quietly with the teaching props.

He was perfectly happy, playing with a few toys in near-total darkness. He talked and sang his Sunday school songs, unaware of his crazed parents looking for him. He didn’t feel alone in that room because he was in a place where people who loved him taught him to talk to God in prayer. They had spoken to him about God loving little children in this room where he now sat in darkness. This Bible classroom was home for him. He could be alone and unafraid because his church classroom was a familiar and safe place. We had telescoped our fear for our lost son onto him. We expected him to be frantic because he was alone and lost. We had transposed our adult fears onto him.

Most of us know the terror of being a child who momentarily is lost. Many of us remember a time when we thought we were left alone as a child. Adults who are left alone and left behind collide with even deeper pain. Think of these jarring adult realities:

• Left at the altar.
• Left alone in ER after a beloved one dies.
• Left alone to pay the bills after a business partner has stolen funds.
• Left by a rebellious child who has run away from home determined to leave behind all the values a parent holds dear.
• Abandoned by a parent who left you alone as a child so she or he could live her or his own life.
• Left alone after having been served divorce papers by an officer of the court, surprised, devastated, and in shock.

Jesus’ disciples were about to be left behind by their Lord. So, Jesus shared with them some of the most beautiful and comforting words ever recorded:

[Jesus said,] “Do not let your hearts be troubled. You believe in God; believe also in me. My Father’s house has many rooms; if that were not so, would I have told you that I am going there to prepare a place for you? And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back and take you to be with me that you also may be where I am (John 14:1-3).

As beautiful as these words can be in times of death, our question remains: “What do we do when we feel alone… today… at this moment in history… in the depths of our isolation… in our darkest moments of chaos and uncertainty?”

Jesus’ words of comfort don’t stop with his promise that he is preparing a place for us with the Father later. They don’t stop with his promise to come back to take us home with him later. Jesus makes the following promises based upon the Holy Spirit’s coming to us and living in us, NOW:

• “I will not leave you as orphans, I will come to you” (John 14:18).
• “I too will love [you] and show myself to [you]” (John 14:21).
• “My Father will love [you], and we will come to [you] and make our home with [you]” (John 14:23).
• “But the Advocate, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you all things and will remind you of everything I have said to you” (John 14:26).