Holy Spirit Our Helper
Jesus said He would not leave us comfortless and He hasn’t. He is living in us through the Holy Spirit who is “sealed” to us a sign of our eternal destiny and as a present source of help and hope for any situation of need we may encounter.[1] Because He is holy He shows us what doesn’t belong in us (sin). Because He is wholly good he helps us in the most patient, loving ways imaginable as He works to lead us out of our darkness into the full Light of Christ. All the while He draws so little attention to Himself, you would hardly know He is there. Part of the “fun” is learning to recognize and acknowledge our incomparable Guest.
Nevertheless, I tell you the truth: it is to your advantage that I go away, for if I do not go away, the Helper will not come to you. John 16:7
All scripture citations are from the English Standard Version (ESV) unless otherwise noted.
Help on the Inside
Jesus said that He would send the Holy Spirit to be our "Helper." This has been wildly misunderstood with people thinking that only Christians “have” the Holy Spirit or that the Holy Spirit only 
came to help people after the resurrection. God has always and will always be doing things for us by the Holy Spirit. That is nothing new.[2]
The Holy Spirit did all kinds of great things for Jewish believers in the Old Testament. He does great things for everyone who calls on the Lord and always has. Not only that, He has always been the giver and sustainer of life for everyone and every creature in creation, regardless of whether they know Him or not.[3] None of this has changed through anything that Jesus did for us by His death and resurrection. What did change?
To them God chose to make known how great among the Gentiles are the riches of the glory of this mystery, which is Christ in you, the hope of glory. Colossians 1:27
The altogether new thing that God is doing for us is that the Holy Spirit now lives inside all who give their lives to Christ through faith-conversion and the new birth.[4] This (along with Christ’s sacrifice) makes the “new and living way” possible.[5] The Holy Spirit lives inside of us as our Helper, helping us to live in a “new way” that was never before possible outside of childhood— the way of surrender and trust.[6]
Before we became Christians, the Holy Spirit our Helper was always doing things for us, even if we didn’t know it, but now that we are Christians, He is helping us from the inside to live through Him. [7] Faith conversion helps us in two tremendous ways. We can call on the Lord with confidence that God by His Spirit will do for us more than we can ask or think.[8] We can also call on the Lord for His help in surrendering so that God can live through us in ways He never could before.[9]
A New Way of Life
Naturally, God will go on doing things for us. He always has! The missing element—the part the “sending” of the Holy Spirit is intended to correct—is that now we can truly live for God by trusting Jesus and obeying Jesus with the Holy Spirit helping us on the inside. By indwelling us the Holy Spirit is able to help us live as we were always meant to live with real joy, peace, freedom and faithfulness.
By all means, keep on thinking of God as “out there” and “up there,” but add to that “in here.” Think of Him as willing to work for you, but think also of Him as wanting to live through you. If you are in Christ through faith, then the Holy Spirit is in you, working, working, working to help you learn how to live in and with and through His inner Life.
Your new personality, for instance, looks just like His! Deep down you have been joined to the Holy Spirit and have been given a new heart just like that of Jesus.[10] This means, that although the “old heart” of the old nature will still be throwing up all kinds of negative emotions, false beliefs and wrong desires for you to contend with, you have a choice that was never available to you before. Now that you know who Jesus is, you can choose to cling to Him and call on Him for help to break free of the old ways.[11] This "new and living way" works best when we trust Jesus enough to obey Him step by step in the "full assurance of faith." That may seem like a tall order, but the Holy Spirit will work inside you to help you with this. That’s His “new” assignment!
Therefore, brothers, since we have confidence to enter the holy places by the blood of Jesus, by the new and living way that he opened for us through the curtain, that is, through his flesh... let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith. Hebrews 10:19-22
In any moment in which you choose to surrender your life and your choices to Jesus, the Holy Spirit’s “personality” will emerge inside you. Not perfectly perhaps, but very wonderfully, filling you to the degree that you yield yourself to God. What then begins to flow there is peace, love, joy, and all sorts of good things.[12] This is the mighty river of the new life which Jesus said would flow out of the heart of all who believe in Him.[13] But there is a catch. Just believing in who He is will not be enough to get you into the river of peace most days. You have to believe in Him enough to trust Him with what He allows and follow Him in what He asks.
The great way it feels and the God ordained things that keep happening are powerful incentives to keep surrendering to Jesus and flowing in the “river of peace.”[14] Jesus said that believing in Him (at this level of trust) is “the work” you and I are required and expected to do by our God.[15] That is why He has put His Spirit inside of us—to help us with the work of staying surrendered and submitted to Him no matter what is going on around us.
The Inner Witness
The Holy Spirit helps us by being an Inner Witness. He is always reminding us that Jesus is alive and that He is our Savior and Lord.[16] Even the most backslidden Christians still have this inner witness quietly at work on the inside reminding them of the direction they need to turn. Once He sees we are willing to turn, the Holy Spirit will help us pray, reminding us to cling to and call on Jesus. This is absolutely essential!
Until we start calling on Jesus in a situation of trouble or temptation, we are actually “calling on” ourselves. “Self” will never be a sufficient savior. Leaning on yourself always leads to stress, anxiety, depression and fresh disasters. The new life is leaning hard on Jesus, clinging to Him and calling on Him. This activity on the inside does more than anything else to change us from being self-centered creations of our own self-will, to Christ-centered new creations filled with His Spirit.
The Holy Spirit helps as a “Remembrancer,” reminding us what we have already been taught.[17] The enemy ever seeks to steal out of our hearts the Word that God sows. Holy Spirit works to keep God’s truths in our remembrance. (Hint: you can make His work easier by memorizing key scriptures.) Holy Spirit also helps us by being our “Revealer of Truth,” leading us out of our darkness into Christ’s Light.
And when he comes, he will convict the world concerning sin and righteousness and judgment: concerning sin, because they do not believe in me; concerning righteousness, because I go to the Father, and you will see me no longer; concerning judgment, because the ruler of this world is judged. John 16:8-11
Because we all have such a hard time recognizing what may be wrong about things we habitually believe and do, Holy Spirit is our inner guide to what’s true, convicting us of sin (showing us what’s wrong), and convincing us of righteousness (what is good and right from God’s point of view). He also helps us by reminding us of judgment. Just as the enemy will be judged and have to face the full consequences of all the wrong he has done, so our own wrong doing will bring down consequences on us unless we separate from them in time. [18] That gives us plenty of motivation!
In all these ways and more, the Holy Spirit our Helper points us always to Christ, working to get us to trust Jesus with all He allows and all He asks of us. As we trust Jesus, the Holy Spirit raises us into the peace of Christ, shows us the next right thing to do (so that we can follow the Lord step by step), and then helps us want to do that next right thing. All of this, of course, depends on our willingness.[19] But the Holy Spirit will even help us with that—if we want Him to. Learn this prayer, inviting the Holy Spirit to work in your heart, especially at those times when you sense that you don’t want to surrender to God:
A Prayer for Help
Lord, help me want to want what You want, desire what You desire, and hate what You hate. Make we willing to be made willing to surrender everything to You.
Catch the Next Wave
The Holy Spirit, Jesus and You The family resemblance is uncanny. Jesus' earthly relationship with the Holy Spirit is exactly mirrored by our own, practically in every detail. The few remaining parts of the image require our trusting obedience to fill in. Will we allow God to finish the portrait He desires to paint upon the canvass of our life?
Free Downloads
pdf New Life in the Spirit (30-page eBook) (748 KB)
pdf Holy Spirit Our Helper (this article) (312 KB)
Scriptures on the Holy Spirit
On the last day of the feast, the great day, Jesus stood up and cried out, "If anyone thirsts, let him come to me and drink. Whoever believes in me, as the Scripture has said, 'Out of his heart will flow rivers of living water.'" Now this he said about the Spirit, whom those who believed in him were to receive, for as yet the Spirit had not been given, because Jesus was not yet glorified. John 7:37-39
"These things I have spoken to you while I am still with you. 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. Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. Not as the world gives do I give to you. Let not your hearts be troubled, neither let them be afraid. You heard me say to you, 'I am going away, and I will come to you.' John 14:25-28
"I still have many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now. When the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all the truth, for he will not speak on his own authority, but whatever he hears he will speak, and he will declare to you the things that are to come. He will glorify me, for he will take what is mine and declare it to you. All that the Father has is mine; therefore I said that he will take what is mine and declare it to you. John 16:12-15
Endnotes
[1] In him you also, when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation, and believed in him, were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit, who is the guarantee of our inheritance until we acquire possession of it, to the praise of his glory. Ephesians 1:13-14
[2] From the very beginning, God has been “doing” what He does by the powerful working of the Holy Spirit: In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. The earth was without form and void, and darkness was over the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the waters. Genesis 1:1-2
[3] When You send forth Your Spirit and give them breath, they are created, and You replenish the face of the ground. Psalms 104:30 AMP
[4] Holy Spirit our Helper will be with us eternally: “And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Helper, to be with you forever, even the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees him nor knows him. You know him, for he dwells with you and will be in you.” John 14:16-17
[5] As you can see by this verse the “new and living way” is through faith in what Jesus has done for us, but that we are meant to strive for “the full assurance of faith”—a life characterized by the peace-confidence that comes through total surrender: Therefore, brothers, since we have confidence to enter the holy places by the blood of Jesus, by the new and living way that he opened for us through the curtain, that is, through his flesh, and since we have a great priest over the house of God, let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, with our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water. Hebrews 10:19-22
[6] And said, Truly I say to you, unless you repent (change, turn about) and become like little children [trusting, lowly, loving, forgiving], you can never enter the kingdom of heaven [at all]. Matthew 18:3 AMP
[7] Here is just one example of how the Spirit works through us: When they deliver you over, do not be anxious how you are to speak or what you are to say, for what you are to say will be given to you in that hour. For it is not you who speak, but the Spirit of your Father speaking through you Matthew 10:19-20
[8] Now to him who is able to do far more abundantly than all that we ask or think, according to the power at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, forever and ever. Amen. Ephesians 3:20-21
[9] I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me. Galatians 2:20
[10] And I will give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will put within you. Ezekiel 36:26
[11] God makes an unconditional promise that all who call on Him will be saved (think helped, rescued, delivered) in one situation after another: For "everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved." Romans 10:13
[12] It takes putting “the flesh” to death (fear, anger, worry, wrong desire, etc.), by choosing to trust Jesus and do what He says. Then the fruit of the Spirit supernaturally appears: But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law. And those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. Galatians 5:22-24
[13] On the last day of the feast, the great day, Jesus stood up and cried out, "If anyone thirsts, let him come to me and drink. Whoever believes in me, as the Scripture has said, 'Out of his heart will flow rivers of living water.'" Now this he said about the Spirit, whom those who believed in him were to receive, for as yet the Spirit had not been given, because Jesus was not yet glorified. John 7:37-39
[14] For thus says the Lord: "Behold, I will extend peace to her like a river, and the glory of the nations like an overflowing stream." Isaiah 66:12
[15] Then they said to him, "What must we do, to be doing the works of God?" Jesus answered them, "This is the work of God, that you believe in him whom he has sent." John 6:28-29
[16] "But when the Helper comes, whom I will send to you from the Father, the Spirit of truth, who proceeds from the Father, he will bear witness about me.” John 15:26 and He will glorify me, for he will take what is mine and declare it to you. John 16:14
[17] 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
[18] We need that especially, because thinking there won’t be negative consequences is what makes doing the wrong thing seems so appealing.
[19] After the disaster of his sin with Bathsheba, King David saw the need for the Holy Spirit’s help in sustaining him with a spirit willing to do what God desired: Restore to me the joy of your salvation. Uphold me with a willing spirit. Psalms 51:12 WEB
[20] In him you also, when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation, and believed in him, were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit, who is the guarantee of our inheritance until we acquire possession of it, to the praise of his glory. Ephesians 1:13-14
[21] And while staying with them he ordered them not to depart from Jerusalem, but to wait for the promise of the Father, which, he said, "you heard from me; for John baptized with water, but you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit not many days from now." Acts 1:4-5