There are five chapters and I have divided the five chapters under five different subjects because what happens is that the Lord Jesus has an enormous amount of material that he would like his disciples to absorb, to hear, to remember, and to recognize that what he was doing with them on this particular evening, before he was betrayed, he was going to prepare them for the enormous task of going all over the world and preach the gospel. And of course, we find that at the end of the Gospels in various ways in which the Lord Jesus gave what we call the Great Commission and reminded the disciples of their responsibility.

And of course, the book of Acts opens by the departure of the Lord Jesus from Earth, and the coming of the day of Pentecost in fulfilment of the promise from the upper room and preparing these disciples to carry out the work of the Lord Jesus as they were commissioned, but particularly because the Holy Spirit came to them in a remarkable way on the day of Pentecost and Acts 2. So that is kind of a preparation, there are profound realities in the early part of the book of Acts that come out of the out of the Upper Room discourse, and we will review those things as we continue.

So rather than taking a verse by verse, look at this book, I want to extract from these five chapters, the salient features that the Lord Jesus Christ, gave to the disciples and I am amazed and astonished at how many occasions in which the Lord Jesus, in the course of giving the disciples this instruction and challenge and comfort and encouragement that they would receive amazing aspects of ministry. And because of that, and that preparation we find in the upper room discourse that we as believers today, though we come in a different context than they than the disciples. Still. There are amazing truths that are found in these five chapters that we need to understand. Of course, each one of us that have believed the gospel and been born again, having already received the Holy Spirit, whereas the disciples had to wait for the coming of the spirit on the day of Pentecost in Acts chapter two.

So, there are five chapters and each of the chapters present a different major subject and there is a progression in truth from chapter 13 through Chapter 16. And so, as we see the progression of truth, we realize that the Lord more and more in the course of that evening, gave that his disciples significant and important concepts of truth that they would need when the Holy Spirit comes, when they would need, when persecution and suffering came to them as they carried out the responsibilities the Lord Jesus Christ gave them.


Chapter 13
So, in chapter 13, the Lord Jesus speaks to His disciples and all 12 of them are there. He speaks to them as students in school, and they're learning new words. And we will look at those briefly in a few minutes. But the Lord Jesus for the only time speaks to them as little children. John, of course, picks that up and uses it many times in his epistles, but the disciples are students. The Lord Jesus is the teacher, and he has profound and important lessons for them to learn. And he is reminding them of the ministry of the Holy Spirit, for instance, and the Holy Spirit was going to come, but the Lord Jesus was having to depart and be glorified before the spirit could come. And then in chapter 14, the Lord Jesus speaks to His disciples about being sojourners on the road, and they're learning to walk. And as we look at this chapter, we realize that the whole pilgrimage from earth to glory is reviewed. And we have those very familiar and beautiful words. "I am the Way the Truth and the Life."


Chapter 14
The Lord Jesus in chapter 14 says to them that the roadway on which everyone must travel is the Lord Jesus Christ Himself and He identifies himself as providing the way certainly he is the truth, and the life of God is in him. And so, we can, we will remind ourselves that this journey from earth to glory has an end, and it’s the father's house. And we know the early part of chapter 14, where the Lord Jesus says, I'm going to my father, and I want you to go and at the end of the chapter, he said, "let's go", and they leave the upper room and proceed through Jerusalem, toward the garden of Gethsemane on the Mount of olives.


Chapter 15
In chapter 15 of John. Lord Jesus speaks to His disciples as servants. The vineyard is the classroom and they are learning to work and the work is to produce fruit, produce much fruit, produce fruit that remains, and he explains to us in such wonderful detail, the metaphor of the vine and the branches and the husbandman and various other aspects and the metaphor, just springs to life teaches us important lessons about our dependence upon Christ, and Christ provision for all that we need in order that we might bring fruit, bring forth fruit, and that fruit might glorify the Father. And we will touch on some of those aspects of that metaphor, though we won't go in detail. There are some problems of course, in John chapter 15 regarding, the vine and the branches, and the relationship that the disciples were having with the Lord Jesus and would have through the Holy Spirit, with the Lord Jesus Christ in dependence upon him.


Chapter 16
In chapter 16, the Lord Jesus speaks to His disciples as soldiers, He prefaced his remarks by what he said in chapter 15, that there was going to be persecution, that if they'll hate me, they'll hate you. If they persecute me, they will persecute you and of course that reminds us that even the idea of producing fruit to the glory of the vine dresser was also going to face problems and difficulties. And the problems are dealt with in chapter 14, Chapter 15 And in chapter 16, because what we read in chapter 16, has to do with spiritual conflict. The chapter opens by saying that many of you will be killed for their sake and that they will think they're doing God's service by killing some of the disciples and many if not most of the disciples of the Lord Jesus experienced persecution so severe that their lives were taken from them.


Chapter 17
And then chapter 17, at the end of chapter 16, the Lord Jesus says, "In the world you will have tribulation." So those two statements in Chapter 16 The first few verses and the last verse, are like bookends holding together the amazing teaching about the persecution and suffering that those disciples would begin to experience and then in chapter 17, the Lord Jesus speaks to His Father in prayer, and amazing, profound, profound chapter about who the Lord Jesus Christ is and what He is doing, relationship with the father, his dependence upon the father, the compassion and concern he had for his disciples and then, a few comments at the end about his desire that, that all men would believe and the words that would be preached by the disciples would result in the conversion of, of many, many people.


Conclusion
So, these five chapters are just so pregnant, so full, overflowing with meaning for us as it was for the disciples, and there is a growth because in verse in chapter 15, the Lord Jesus talked to them about new words. And that's what that's one of the first things a child learns. He learns to say, Mama and dad and so forth. But the Lord Jesus wants them to learn what it means to be lowly. He teaches them by washing their feet He talks about loyalty. And he uses the example of Judas and Peter, and then he talks about what it is to love one another and to be lovely. In Chapter 14, He teaches them how to walk. And that's the second thing that most children they learn to work, learn new words, In chapter 15, they learn to work and the word disciple becomes a meaningful word, as they realize that they are no longer servants, but friends, but still they must produce the fruit that is manifested in the metaphor of the vine and the branches, and then soldiers learning war and of course chapter 17. The disciples are learning what it means to worship.