Triadic Patterns
It has been awhile since we dug a little more into some of the elements of John’s Gospel. But chapter 14 has given us an opportunity to highlight something that is interesting, though not necessarily essential to our understanding. If this is the first Digging Deeper you have read, know that this is how I like to try and present material that expands upon that which we are discussing in the regular The Beloved Disciple posts. It gives us a chance to explore these things without allowing them to distract from the most important elements of the Gospel. I hope you find it interesting.
There is something we should highlight about verses 15-24 in chapter 14. You may have noticed that there are three repetitions of a common theme. That is a reference to the fact that whoever loves Jesus will keep His commands after He is gone. Consider each of these again briefly.
“If you love me, you will keep my commandments. 16 And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Helper, to be with you forever, 17 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.” Jn 14:15–17.
“21 Whoever has my commandments and keeps them, he it is who loves me. And he who loves me will be loved by my Father, and I will love him and manifest myself to him.” Jn 14:21.
“23 Jesus answered him, “If anyone loves me, he will keep my word, and my Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our home with him.” Jn 14:23.
In these verse we have what is known as a Triadic Pattern. A method that displays the whole of the Trinity through a teaching. In this case Jesus is showing them that each member of the Trinity through the Spirit will be with them for all time.
“Thus seemingly there is a triadic pattern here placing in rough parallelism the Spirit, Jesus, and the Father (with Jesus).”1
Within this teaching of Jesus there is an anticipation or foreshadowing of the final eschatological fulfillment. A fulfillment that sees believers in Christ re-united once again with God in the New Heaven and New Earth that will be remade.
“However conceived, this is an anticipation, an inauguration, of the final, consummating experience of God after the parousia, when the words of the Apocalypse will be fulfilled…”2
In reflecting upon this consider Ezekiel 37:25-27
“26 I will make a covenant of peace with them. It shall be an everlasting covenant with them. And I will set them in their land and multiply them, and will set my sanctuary in their midst forevermore. 27 My dwelling place shall be with them, and I will be their God, and they shall be my people.”
Thanks as always for joining us in this study of John’s Gospel. Please take a moment to comment your thoughts. And please hit subscribe to follow along for free.
The Anchor Bible Series. The Gospel According to John I-XII. Raymond E. Brown. 1966. 342
D. A. Carson, The Gospel according to John, The Pillar New Testament Commentary (Leicester, England; Grand Rapids, MI: Inter-Varsity Press; W.B. Eerdmans, 1991). 504