²⁶ “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 said to you.

This verse adds two important truths to our understanding of the Holy Spirit. Let’s look at the second truth first. Jesus promised the disciples in the Upper Room the gift of perfect recall. This coming Helper would, “bring to your remembrance all that I said to you.” What does it mean? It certainly and obviously can’t mean all Christians will be given perfect recall. Most of us have a difficult time remembering many portions of Scripture even when we make a concerted effort to memorize the Bible. However, this would be a needed ability for the time after Christ left their presence. Human efforts to remember become easily clouded with time. Even two people can have significant differences in how they remember a shared experience.

In Acts just before Jesus ascended into heaven, He spoke to the apostles (Acts 1:2) and said, “… you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you shall be My witnesses both in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and even to the remotest part of the earth” (Acts 1:8). How would anyone know for sure what Jesus taught after He was gone? The early church looked to the apostles for that teaching. Immediately after Pentecost, we find that, “They were continually devoting themselves to the apostles’ teaching and to fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer” (Acts 2:42). Why the apostles’ teaching, and not Jesus’ teaching? Because the only way they would have known what Jesus taught was by what the apostles’ taught. We conclude, then, that the apostles were given perfect recall of all Jesus’ teachings. And that was one of the two primary works of the Holy Spirit that Jesus spoke about in the Upper Room.

The apostles were to be Jesus’ authorized witnesses about His life and teachings. That is why when they needed to replace Judas, they understood that, “… it is necessary that of the men who have accompanied us all the time that the Lord Jesus went in and out among us— beginning with the baptism of John until the day that He was taken up from us—one of these must become a witness with us of His resurrection.” (Acts 1:21–22).

The other truth is that the Holy Spirit would teach the apostles that which was necessary to fill in the gaps. God would continue to teach them long after Jesus was physically gone. And praise God, we now have the benefit of this promise to them, for we can hold the written Word of God in our hands!

Lord, thank You for the assurance that what the apostles taught was accurate and true, both for the early church and for us today through Your written Word.