November 24 Daily Devotional

Bible Verse

"Nevertheless, I tell you the truth: it is to your advantage that I go away, for if I do not go away, the Comforter will not come to you. But if I go, I will send him to you" (John 16:7).

Devotional

There is no sorrow of the believing heart of which the Holy Spirit is ignorant, to which he is indifferent, which his sympathy does not embrace, and which his power cannot alleviate.

The church in which he dwells, and whose pilgrimage he guides, is a tried church. Chosen in the furnace of affliction, allied to a suffering Head, its course on earth is traced by tears, and often by blood. How deeply it needs a Comforter.

And who can compute the individual sorrows which may crowd the path of a single traveler to his sorrowless home? What a world of trial, and how varied, may be comprised within the history of a single saint!

But if sorrows abound, comfort much more abounds since the Comforter of the church is the Holy Spirit. What a mighty provision—how infinite the generous gift!—the God of all consolation has made in the covenant of grace for the sorrows of his people, in appointing the Third Person of the blessed Trinity to this office!

What an importance it attaches to, and with what dignity it invests, and with what sanctity it hallows, our every sorrow! If our heavenly Father sees proper in his unerring wisdom and goodness to send affliction, then who would not welcome the message as a sacred and precious thing, thus to be soothed and sanctified?

Yes, the Holy Spirit leads the sorrowful to all comfort. He comforts by applying the promises—by leading to Christ, by bending the will in deep submission to God, and by unveiling to faith's far-seeing eye the glories of a sorrowless, tearless, sinless world.

And oh, who can portray his perfection as a Comforter? With what promptness and tenderness he applies himself to the soothing of each grief! How patiently he instructs the ignorant! How gently he leads the burdened! How skillfully he heals the wounded! How timely he meets the needy! How effectually he speaks to the mourner!

When your heart is overwhelmed within you, through the depth and foam of the angry waters, he leads you to the Rock that is higher than you are. There he matures the kingdom. There he perfects the building. There he completes the temple he commenced and occupied on earth.

He leads to glory. No power shall oppose, no difficulty shall obstruct, no contingency shall thwart the consummation of this, his glorious purpose and design. Every soul graced by his presence, every heart touched by his love, every body sanctified as his temple, he will lead to heaven. Of that heaven he is the Pledge and the Earnest.

While Jesus is in heaven, preparing a place for his people, the Spirit is on earth, preparing his people for that place. The one is maturing glory for the church, the other is maturing the church for glory.

Come, Holy Ghost, God and Lord!
May all your graces be outpoured
on each believer's mind and heart;
your fervent love to them impart.
Lord, by the brightness of your light
in holy faith your church unite
from every land and every tongue;
this to your praise, O Lord our God, be sung:
Hallelujah! Hallelujah!

(Martin Luther, 1524; tr. cento)

Be sure to read the Preface by Octavius Winslow and A Note from the Editor by Larry E. Wilson.

Larry Wilson is an ordained minister in the Orthodox Presbyterian Church. In addition to having served as the General Secretary of the Committee on Christian Education of the OPC (2000–2004) and having written a number of articles and booklets (such as God's Words for Worship and Why Does the OPC Baptize Infants) for New Horizons and elsewhere, he has pastored OPC churches in Minnesota, Indiana, and Ohio. We are grateful to him for his editing of Morning Thoughts, the OPC Daily Devotional for 2025.