Our Lord Jesus in his last conversation with his disciples before his crucifixion said, “But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, he will teach you all things and bring to your remembrance all that I have said to you” (John 14:26 ESV).

Here we have a twofold work of the Holy Spirit, teaching and bringing to remembrance the things which Christ had already taught. We will take them in the reverse order.

The Holy Spirit brings to remembrance the words of Christ.

This promise was made primarily to the Apostles and is the guarantee of the accuracy of their report of what Jesus said; but the Holy Spirit does a similar work with each believer who expects it of him, and who looks to him to do it.

The Holy Spirit brings to our mind the teachings of Christ and of the Word just when we need them for either the necessities of our life or of our service. Many of us could tell of occasions when we were in great distress of soul or great questioning as to duty or great extremity as to what to say to one whom we were trying to lead to Christ or to help, and at that exact moment the very Scripture we needed—some passage it may be we had not thought of for a long time and quite likely of which we had never thought in this connection—was brought to mind.

Who did it? The Holy Spirit did it. He is ready to do it even more frequently, if we only expect it of him and look to him to do it. It is our privilege every time we sit down beside an inquirer to point him to the way of life to look up to the Holy Spirit and say, “Just what shall I say to this inquirer? Just what Scripture shall I use?”

There is a deep significance in the fact that in the verse immediately following this precious promise Jesus says, “Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you” (John 14:27 ESV). It is by the Spirit bringing his words to remembrance and teaching us the truth of God that we obtain and abide in this peace. If we will simply look to the Holy Spirit to bring to mind Scripture just when we need it, and just the Scripture we need, we shall indeed have Christ’s peace every moment of our lives.

One who was preparing for Christian work came to me in great distress. He said he must give up his preparation for he could not memorize the Scriptures. “I am thirty-two years old,” he said, “and have been in business now for years. I have gotten out of the habit of study and I cannot memorize anything.”

The man longed to be in his Master’s service and the tears stood in his eyes as he said it. “Don’t be discouraged,” I replied. “Take your Lord’s promise that the Holy Spirit will bring his words to remembrance, learn one passage of Scripture, fix it firmly in your mind, then another and then another and look to the Holy Spirit to bring them to your remembrance when you need them.”

He went on with his preparation. He trusted the Holy Spirit. Afterwards he took up work in a very difficult field, a field where all sorts of error abounded. They would gather around him on the street like bees and he would take his Bible and trust the Holy Spirit to bring to remembrance the passages of Scripture that he needed and he did it. His adversaries were filled with confusion, as he met them at every point with the sure Word of God, and many of the most hardened were won for Christ. Amen.