God's plan revealed: the Trinity. John 16:12-15

Jesus' had something to say; and his friends were keen to listen. They wanted to learn from their teacher and to be close to him.

John 16:12 "I still have many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now."

Much of what Jesus said went way beyond his hearers imaginations. No human could have understood what he was saying; until after the resurrection. When Jesus spoke to them before his death they heard him in a human context. His friends and his enemies knew him as a man; with a human history and identity like any other. He was a Galilean with a mother and a father. Sure Jesus was a teacher, a prophet, and a healer too, but he had a human history that predated his ministry. His ministry for God was clear; but the reality that he was the Son of God in action on earth remained hidden, in plain sight, before the resurrection.

Jesus ministry as prophet to the nation of Israel was clear for 3 years. He railed against injustice and ministered with compassion. He healed, forgave, and taught openly about the kingdom of God. All the things Jesus did in his ministry as a prophet were signs, not recognized before his death, that he was both son of man and son of God. God had a plan and the Son arrived in flesh. We still have much to learn about God that we can't yet bear. We still need to listen to Jesus as he speaks to get a glimpse into the relationship of Father, Son, and Spirit.

When Jesus spoke he spoke as God in flesh -- but the crowds reacted not as they would to God -- but as they would have reacted to any other human being. The people in need of a savior listened and came ready to be healed. The crowd who needed no savior heard Jesus and rejected what he had to teach. Jesus came to be prophet and the savior. He came to show us the face of God and to reveal mysteries that we now understand only in part. He came as part of God's plan to save what God had made in beginning.

God, Father, Son, and Spirit still has much to tell us that we can't understand, but the Spirit will work to reveal God to all flesh. There is still much about God's power that we can't bear, but just as Jesus promised the Spirit will reveal God to us in time.