Jesus continues to impress upon the disciples his instructions for their future. He warns them that the world will hate them because the world hated him. This hate is also a fulfillment of a prior prediction. Reminding them a servant is no greater than his master, he explains that they will do these things because they do not know the Father. Reinforcing the joined nature of the Father and Son, Jesus states, "Whoever hates me hates my Father also." John 15:23
"The allusion is to Psa_69:4 (or Psa_35:19). The hatred of the Jews toward Jesus the promised Messiah (Joh_1:11) is “part of the mysterious purpose of God”"-RWP
Jesus does not mean to say that the world would have committed no sin at all if he had kept away from it. The meaning is that it would not have been guilty of the sin of rejecting Jesus. They would have been excusable.
Psalm 69:4--"More in number than the hairs of my head are those who hate me without cause; mighty are those who would destroy me, those who attack me with lies. What I did not steal must I now restore?"
Psa 35:19--"Let not those rejoice over me who are wrongfully my foes, and let not those wink the eye who hate me without cause."
He also clarifies that they are guilty because he has come and completed miracles and works, otherwise they would not be.
"But now I go unto him that sent me; and none of you asketh me, Whither goest thou? But because I have spoken these things unto you, sorrow hath filled your heart. Nevertheless I tell you the truth: It is expedient for you that I go away." John 15:5-7
"The disciples had asked the Lord whither he was going (John 13:36; 14:5), but their question had a very different meaning from that which Jesus here suggests to them. They asked it to ascertain whether his departure would involve a separation or whether it would be a withdrawal from the world in which they could accompany him. The question which he suggests [672] has reference to the place to which he was about to journey, that place being the home and presence of his Father. The question asked was selfish, as if the apostles had asked, "What will your departure mean to us?" The question suggested was generous, intimating that the apostles should have asked, "What will this departure mean to you?" -Fourfold
He comforts them with the truth the the Holy Spirit will aid them and lead them into truth. The Holy Spirit and the disciples will witness to the world regarding Christ:
“But when the Helper comes, whom I will send to you from the Father, the Spirit of truth, who proceeds from the Father, he will bear witness about me. And you also will bear witness, because you have been with me from the beginning." John 15:26-28
The Fourfold Gospel points out that the Spirit is to reveal and remind, not institute additional teachings:
"The Holy Spirit was to bring no absolutely new teaching. The Son of God here claims for himself all that the Spirit taught even to the declaration of things to come. The Spirit would bring to mind and republish in the minds of the apostles all the words which Jesus had spoken, and would add those things which, being now in the mind of Jesus, were really part of his teaching, but which he at this present forbore to utter, the apostles not being able to bear them." -Fourfold Gospel
I find this helpful because it takes the Holy Spirit out of the realm of unpredictable additional revelation-no more "wild card." It makes sense. The Spirit teaches and reinforces what the Son taught which is teaching and reinforcing the vision and will of the Father.
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