Sermon Tone Analysis

Welcome

Good morning everyone!

It is good to be back after the weekend away at Skwim.

It was a good weekend, no one got hurt, and we learned and talked more about what it means to abide in Jesus, to make him our home, our dwelling place.

As we begin this morning, let’s quickly recap were Pastor Dan left off last week.

Last week he touched on the persecution that Christians will face, not because of themselves personally, but because of Jesus within them.

Throughout this night of teaching that Jesus has with the disciples they continue to feel sorrow from what Jesus is telling them, but yet Jesus doesn’t want them to be sorrowful.

He desires for them to begin to see the bigger picture of what is being done.

So as the end of chapter 15 and first part of 16 say, persecution is going to be a reality for many Christians, but as a Christian, a follower of Jesus, we are given the Spirit to help us and to encourage us.

The rest of chapter 16 really gets into the idea of what the Spirit’s role is in our lives.

What exactly does the Spirit do and why do we need it?

That is what I hope to answer this morning as we look at John 16.

As we look at John 16 we are going to break it up into 4 different sections.

We are going to try to cover a lot of scripture today, so we are going to dive right in at John 16:5b, right in the middle of verse 5. Jesus has just finished talking about persecution, how some will persecute them and think they are doing what God wants, and then Jesus says that he is leaving them to return to the father.

This is where our passage picks up.

The Spirit Reveals

John 16:5–11 (NIV)

5 b None of you asks me, ‘Where are you going?’ 6 Rather, you are filled with grief because I have said these things.

7 But very truly I tell you, it is for your good that I am going away.

Unless I go away, the Advocate will not come to you; but if I go, I will send him to you.

8 When he comes, he will prove the world to be in the wrong about sin and righteousness and judgment: 9 about sin, because people do not believe in me; 10 about righteousness, because I am going to the Father, where you can see me no longer; 11 and about judgment, because the prince of this world now stands condemned.

After talking about persecution Jesus points out to them that they are so preoccupied with their grief that they haven’t even asked Jesus where he was going.

Peter did ask Jesus earlier in the night, but he was asking Jesus where he was going for his own personal reasons, he just wanted to go with Jesus and know why he couldn’t go with him.

In Peter’s initial question he was wanting to know how he could go with Jesus, not what Jesus might be doing by going away.

Jesus then tells them that even though he is going away, it is good for them because the Advocate, the Paraclete, will come to them when he does.

This passage is important because it gives us a look at what the Holy Spirit is going to be doing in the world.

The Spirit is a helper, yes, it is a teacher, yes, but it is also convicts us of our sin.

The Spirit works in our lives to point out the sin that we participate in.

The Spirit exposes sin to us while also assuring us of righteousness in Christ.

It might sound less than pleasant to have the Spirit pointing out our sin, but it is part of God’s grace that the Spirit would do this.

Ignorance is not bliss.

Just because you don’t realize you have a problem, doesn’t mean you don’t have a problem.

For example, I have pretty terrible eyesight.

One particular appointment just a few years ago was pretty shocking to me.

I sat in the chair without glasses or contacts on and the worker put the letters up on the screen and asked me to say what letters I could see.

I couldn’t see any so she went to the next.

This repeated itself a few times.

Eventually she questioned me on one.

She asked, “Can you really not read what is there?

Try really hard to see it.”

And I tried the best I could, but it just looked like a blurry black mess of stuff.

She turned the lights back on and told me to put my glasses back on.

When I had my glasses on I noticed what was on the screen and why she was really trying to get me to see it.

It was the giant E, the one that takes up the whole screen!

I knew my eyesight was bad, but I had no idea it was THAT bad.

Part of the Spirit’s work in our lives is to act like glasses.

On my own I don’t often recognize the sin that is in my life.

On my own, I like to think that I’m a pretty good person, I’m not that bad of a guy.

But then the Spirit enters the picture, I look through my life through the lens of the Spirit and the Spirit reveals to me the sin that is a part of my life that I had no idea about.

One author says this about this process, he says, “It is designed to bring men and women of the world to recognize their need, and so turn to Jesus, and thus stop being the world.”

The Spirit reveals truth to us and we recognize that we are not as clean as what we thought.

But still, we have to listen and pay attention to what the Spirit is telling us.

After my eye appointment I could have said, “No, I think you’re wrong, my eyes aren’t that bad.

I can see just fine, it’s not a problem.”

I could have done that!

But if I had, I don’t think I would have my driver’s license anymore and I wouldn’t even be able to read or write anything by my eyesight.

We have to respond when the Spirit reveals our sin to us.

So the first part of the Spirit’s work is to reveal our sin to us, it will convict us of sin in our lives.

(Possibly include surgery illustration.

I didn’t get my knee looked at because I was afraid they would have to do something to it) Do you listen to the Holy Spirit as it convicts you of your sin?

And what do you do after?

The Spirit Points

The Spirit doesn’t just reveals our disease to us, our sin, he also points us to our solution in Jesus.

The Spirit is going to reveal our sin to us, but then also point us to truth.

The truth being that we are sinners saved by grace through the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus.

So yes, having our shortcomings pointed out to us is not a pleasant process.

We don’t really enjoy the feelings we have when the Spirit points out to us that we are more broken and sinful than we can even imagine.

But the Spirit then points out to us that we are more loved by Jesus than we can even imagine.

The Spirit draws us back into the love of Christ, to see the rescue that we have in Jesus.

This goes back to a few weeks ago when I mentioned that our desire to bear fruit for God should be out of love, not obligation.

When the Spirit points out our terrible sin, we should marvel at the love that Christ has for us, repent, and seek to live our lives out of that love for Jesus.

We often want to be like Adam and Eve in the Garden, when after they sinned they tried to hide from God.

Our response to shouldn’t be to hide or run away from God.

It should be to turn toward him, to go to Jesus.

So the Spirit reveals our sin, and then points us to go to Jesus.

Sorrow to Joy

As Jesus continues the disciples get confused.

What does Jesus mean by saying in a little while we won’t see him, but then we will see him?

Jesus knows that they are confused and tells them plainly that they will experience grief and will mourn over what is about to happen.

But, similar to how a woman is able to forget her pain as she holds her child for the first time, so they to will experience joy at the end of their sorrow.

The first part of Jesus’ statement refers to his death and burial, that is his going away, while the second part refers to the disciples seeing him again after his resurrection.

While the disciples will grieve over Jesus’ death on the cross, eventually their sorrow will turn to joy.

The very thing that caused them sorrow, they will look at with joy.

This is still true for us today.

Isn’t it quite shocking that we have crosses hanging up in our church, in our homes.

Isn’t it weird that we have jewelry and all kinds of different things with crosses on them?

The cross was an instrument of death.

It was gruesome.

They nailed people to them and let them hang there until they died!

It is not a pretty think to look at!

But after Jesus’ resurrection, we see the cross in an entirely new light.

The thing that caused great sorrow for the disciples eventually caused great joy for them.

While the cross is gruesome and cruel, it shows us the love of Christ and the way that we are now able to have forgiveness of sins.

Jesus then tells the disciples that their way of praying to God the Father is also going to be different as a result of Jesus.

Up until this point the disciples have not prayed in Jesus’ name, but now they will.

There is this new intimacy with God the father in prayer because of Jesus.

So even though they will have sorrow, remember the joy that will come.

This is true for us even today.

We are not promised an easy life.

We are not promised health and wealth by following Jesus.