Online Resource Library
Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.com | DownloadQuiet Talks by Samuel Dickey: Gordon, Samuel Dickey - Quiet Talks on Power: 31. A Significant Name
TOPIC: Gordon, Samuel Dickey - Quiet Talks on Power (Other Topics in this Collection)
SUBJECT: 31. A Significant Name
Other Subjects in this Topic:
A Significant Name
Do you remember that heart-to-heart talk that Jesus had with the eleven disciples that last night they spent together in the upper room? John tells us about it in chapters thirteen to sixteen. The Master talks a great deal that night, about some One else, who was coming to take His place with them. They did not understand what He meant till afterwards. He packs more into that one evening's talk about this coming One than all He had said before, put together. Notice that now He gives a name, a new name, to this person, repeated four times that night. It is an intensely significant name—the Comforter. Will you remember, and keep constantly in mind, the actual meaning of that new name? it is simply this: one called alongside to help.
Let me attempt to suggest a little of its practical meaning.
Here is a little girl standing on the curbstone downtown on Broadway in New York, with a bundle in her arms. She has been sent on an errand, and wants to get across the street. But the electric cars are whizzing past in both directions, and wagons, and carriages, and omnibuses, and horses jam the street from curb to curb, and she cannot get across. She stands there gripping her bundle, watching eagerly for a chance, and yet afraid to venture. But the jam seems endless, and she grows very tired, and by and by the corners of her mouth begin to twitch down suspiciously, and a big tear is just starting in each eye. just then a big policeman steps up, one of the finest, six feet tall, and heavy and broad. He seems like a giant to her. He stoops down. Would you imagine he had such a gentle voice? "What's the matter?" "Can't—get—'cross." Oh! is that all; he'll fix that. And he takes her little hand in his with a reassuring "come along." And along she goes, past cars, under horses' heads, close up to big wheels. She is just as small as before, and just as weak. But though her eyes stay pretty big, the tears are gone, and there is an air of confidence, because this big, kind-hearted giant by her side is walking across the street as though he owned the whole place, and he is devoting his entire attention to her. That policeman is a comforter in the strict meaning of the word.
Here is a boy in school, head down close to the desk, puzzling over a "sum." It won't "come out." He figures away, and his brow is all knitted up, and a worried look is coming into his face for he is a conscientious little fellow. But he cannot seem to get it right and the clouds gather thicker. By and by the teacher comes up and sits down by his side. It awes him a little to have her quite so close. But her kindliness of manner mellows the awe. "How are you getting along?" "Won't come out right"-in a very despondent tone. "Let me see, did you subtract that?" "Oh-h-h! I forgot that," and a little light seems to break, as he scratches away for a few moments; then pauses. "And this figure here, should it be... " "Oh-h-h, I see." More scratching, and a soft sigh of relief, and the knitting brows unravel, and the face brightens. The teacher did not do the problem for him. She did better. She let him feel her kindly interest first of all, and gave just the light, experienced touch that showed him the way out, and yet allowed him the peculiar pleasure of getting through himself. That is what "Comforter" means.
One summer a friend suggested to me spending a week on Lake Chautauqua. I did not have the money to spare, and so told him I was not sure I could arrange to get away. But he seemed to divine the basis of my objection, and insisted on my going along. We went. I had very little money with me. I got on the train without a ticket, took a seat in the parlor car, stopped at the best hotel, had a choice room on the ground floor, patronized the well-ordered dining-room regularly, and made free use of the place. And all the time I had practically no money with me. But would you believe me I was not a particle concerned about paying for those privileges. Never felt less concern about anything in my life. You know why. I had a trustworthy friend with me who was concerned for me.
Now these are simple suggestions, illustrating partly the meaning of that marvelous name Jesus gave to the Holy Spirit. I will send another Comforter, one who will be right by your side to help, sympathetic, experienced, strong; and He will stay with you all the time. In the kitchen, in the sitting-room, the sick-room, with the children, when work piles up, when things jangle or threaten to, when the baby's cross, and the patching and sweeping and baking, and all the rest of it seem endless, on the street, in the office, on the campus, in the store, when tempted-almost slipped, when opportunity opens for a quiet personal word, everywhere, every time, in every circumstance, one alongside to help. Is not that wonderful?