John 14:26

“But the ideal companion (paraclete), the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, he will teach you all things and enable you to remember all that I have said to you”.

However, they need not fear for another will come Who will replace Him in this task. And that replacement is the Holy Spirit, Who will be sent to them from the Father (see also John 14:16), and Who elsewhere is sent from the Son (‘I will send Him to you' - John 15:26; John 16:7). They need not fear therefore that they will forget or misinterpret His words in the future. His words are too important for that. The coming Holy Spirit, the Spirit of truth, will teach them the full truth from beginning to end and will bring to their memory all His words. Thus does He ensure the preservation of His word (only possible to Hs disciples Who had heard it), and put His seal on their interpretation of His death and resurrection.

These words are vitally important as stressing, on Jesus' authority, that His truth will be reliably and accurately preserved by Divine assistance. The Apostles, and those who wrote under their guidance, will fully preserve the truth. It is probable that some among them such as Matthew the ex-tax collector had already recorded some in writing (it would have been instinctive to Matthew to record what was spoken). Thus does Jesus lay His personal seal on the New Testament, and these words explain why the early church only accepted as divinely authoritative writings with Apostolic connections.

While we ourselves can accept that the Holy Spirit does guide us into truth and often bring Scripture to mind when we need it (e.g. 1 Corinthians 2:11 ff), these words above do not literally apply to us. We are not promised that we will be infallibly guided by the Spirit. This was only so at the beginning among those set apart for this purpose.

How often men say, ‘the Holy Spirit has shown me', or ‘I have been guided by the Spirit'. How often such claims are made to look foolish. For if by this they are claiming that this therefore guarantees the authenticity of what they say or do they are sadly mistaken (as their disagreements with equally ‘inspired' interpreters demonstrate quite clearly. That is why Paul said that the prophets must test out the words of each other - 1 Corinthians 14:19). For our fallible minds are not reliable channels of the Spirit's activity. That is why Paul said of those who ‘spoke by the Spirit' or prophesied - ‘let the others judge' (1 Corinthians 14:29).

That was before there was a New Testament. Now of course we have an infallible guide by which to judge men's teaching in the Scriptures. But all interpreters can so easily be fallible so that we need carefully to interpret each Scripture in the light of the whole, and compare it with the teaching of other Spirit filled men who are not fully of our own narrow persuasion, and thus come to a consensus of opinion, recognising that where there are differences on secondary matters (even though they may seem primary to us) in some of those matters it may be we who are wrong.