John 14:7-11 – If you had known me, you would have known my Father also. From now on, you know him, and have seen him.” Philip said to him, “Lord, show us the Father, and that will be enough for us.” Jesus said to him, “Have I been with you such a long time, and do you not know me, Philip? He who has seen me has seen the Father. How do you say, ‘Show us the Father?’ Don’t you believe that I am in the Father, and the Father in me? The words that I tell you, I speak not from myself; but the Father who lives in me does his works. Believe me that I am in the Father, and the Father in me; or else believe me for the very works’ sake.

As we continue with Jesus words spoken directly to His disciples before His death we come to another extremely valuable teaching for us as Christians today. Here Jesus makes it very plain that He represents the Father by living the life of the Father. What I love about this specific passage, is that it clearly expresses the fact that God can naturally live out His life inside of a human being like you and I.

Jesus was a human being, born from Mary. He was capable of living in such a way that God the Father’s very own life was being lived out by Jesus. It says here that God was doing “His works” right through Jesus.

The reason that I am making such a big deal about this is that this is exactly how the Holy Spirit works in you and I as Christians today. The Holy Spirit that lives in us does His works through us. Jesus life with the Father demonstrated how we should submit ourselves to the Holy Spirit right now.

The Holy Spirit is the power and life of God that is within every believer today. He is sometimes described in the Bible as the “Spirit of Jesus.” Jesus lives in us as the Father lived in Him by the Holy Spirit that is given to every believer. In order to take advantage of this, as believers we must maintain an appropriate relationship with the Holy Spirit, just as Jesus maintained an appropriate relationship with the Father. As Jesus submitted to the Father, so we must submit to the Holy Spirit in everything.

If we do this, then God can live His life in us and we can experience the joy of doing what is right.

He That is Spiritual by Lewis Sperry Chafer is an old book, but it is a very good one on this topic.

To study more on this topic, see Romans 8 and Galatians 5:16-26.