John 16

Day 124 – John 16:16-33

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Take Heart!

John 16:16-33

“I have told you all this so that you may have peace in me. Here on earth you will have many trials and sorrows. But take heart, because I have overcome the world.” – John 16:33 NLT

The clock is ticking. With each hour that passes, Jesus is one step closer to His final destiny. All the teaching, miracles and messages He gave will mean nothing if He does not complete the task for which He came. And as this moment draws nearer, Jesus continues to try and prepare His disciples for what is to come. He tells them, “In a little while you won’t see me anymore. But a little while after that, you will see me again” (John 16:16 NLT). This statement did little but confuse the disciples. It sounded like a riddle to them. We understand it because we have the benefit of being on this side of the resurrection. But to them, it would have made little to no sense, and would have provided little in the way of comfort. Jesus sensed their confusion and attempted to make His meaning clearer. “I tell you the truth, you will weep and mourn over what is going to happen to me, but the world will rejoice. You will grieve, but your grief will suddenly turn to wonderful joy” (John 16:20 NLT). I can’t help but imagine the looks on the faces of the disciples as Jesus spoke. They had to be looking at one another with looks of confusion, wondering how what Jesus was saying was supposed to clear things up for them. How would their weeping be turned to joy? How would their grieving turn into rejoicing?

Jesus continued to explain what He meant using the metaphor of childbirth. There would be a period of pain followed by a moment of sheer joy and excitement. There was going to be a time of extreme sorrow followed by unbridled happiness and abundant joy. Not only that, they would have direct access to God. They would be able to ask anything from Him, and as long as they did so in Jesus’ name, God would answer their requests. “Then you will ask in my name. I’m not saying I will ask the Father on your behalf, for the Father himself loves you dearly because you love me and believe that I came from God” (John 16:26-27 NLT). Jesus was letting them know that the future was going to be bright for them. Yes, it was going to get dark for a time. He was going to suffer and die. They would even abandon Him in His darkest moment. But He was going to rise from the dead and appear before them in His resurrected state. Their sorrow and grief would be turned in joy. But I think this passage is also letting them know that Jesus would leave them again. This time to ascend to His Father in heaven. And when He did, there would be a time of sorrow as well. The disciples would feel abandoned this time. But their sorrow would be turned to joy once again when the Holy Spirit descended on them at Pentecost. It would be at that time when they learned the truth of Jesus’ statements. They would ask of the Father in Jesus’ name and watch as He answered their requests in miraculous, powerful ways.

Jesus closes His little talk with them by saying, “I have told you all this so that you may have peace in me. Here on earth you will have many trials and sorrows. But take heart, because I have overcome the world” (John 16:33 NLT). He is trying to prepare them for all that is to come. Not only in the next few hours, but in the years to come. He warns them that they were going to have many trials and sorrows. Life was not going to be easy. But He tells them to take heart and assures them that not matter how bad things may appear, they are to remember that He has overcome the world. This is an interesting statement, because as of that moment, He had yet to die. But Jesus spoke with certainty and confidence because He knew that He was going to do what He came to do. He was going to overcome the world. With His death, He would pay the penalty owed to God for the sins of mankind. With His resurrection, He would defeat the power of death and provide a glimpse of the transformative power of God available to all men through belief in Him. If God could literally raise His own Son from the dead, He could raise spiritually dead men and women to new life. Jesus can and did overcome the world. And we need to be reminded of that fact. Here on earth we face many trials and sorrows. We encounter all kinds of difficulties. We suffer because we live in a sin-filled world. But Jesus reminds us to take heart. He assures us that He has overcome the world. The word Jesus used was “conquered.” It was a military term. Jesus is saying that, with His death, He has won a military victory over the forces of this world. It will still hate us and attempt to destroy us. He made that clear in chapter 15. But we need to live with an attitude of victory. We are on the winning side. What Jesus accomplished on the cross has sealed the future and guaranteed our success. It will not be easy. There will be difficulties. But we can cry out to the Father in Jesus’ name and He will hear and answer us. He will guide us through His Holy Spirit. He will teach us through His written Word. He will protect us with His powerful hand. He will preserve us and one day send His Son to return for us.

Paul gives us encouragement with these words: “For our present troubles are small and won’t last very long. Yet they produce for us a glory that vastly outweighs them and will last forever! So we don’t look at the troubles we can see now; rather, we fix our gaze on things that cannot be seen. For the things we see now will soon be gone, but the things we cannot see will last forever” (2 Corinthians 4:17-18 NLT).

Father, Thank You for these encouraging words this morning. Sometimes this world really can be filled with all kinds of grief and sorrow. It can become overwhelming at times. But keep reminding me that whatever I suffer here on this earth is nothing compared to the joy I will experience in heaven. Give me an eternal focus. Help me to fix my gaze on those things that I can’t see. Give me the ability to take heart, knowing that Jesus truly has overcome the world. Amen.

Ken Miller
Grow Pastor & Minister to Men
kenm@christchapelbc.org

Day 123 – John 16:1-15

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Better Off Without Him.

John 16:1-15

“But in fact, it is best for you that I go away, because if I don’t, the Advocatewon’t come. If I do go away, then I will send him to you. And when he comes, he will convict the world of its sin, and of God’s righteousness, and of the coming judgment.” – John 16:7-8 NLT

The more Jesus talked about His coming death, the more confused and depressed the disciples seemed to get. Jesus saw it and commented about it: “But now I am going away to the one who sent me, and not one of you is asking where I am going. 6 Instead, you grieve because of what I’ve told you” (John 16:5-6 NLT). And it made sense. They had just spent the last three years of their lives following this man and now He was telling them that He was going to die. Their concept of death, like ours, was permanent. In their understanding of things, once Jesus was dead, He was gone. In spite of all His talk about coming back. That part was a mystery to them. So Jesus somewhat muddies the waters by telling them, “it is best for you that I go away” (John 16:7 NLT). That had to have sounded so strange to the disciples. How in the world could His leaving them be best for them? But Jesus knew something they didn’t know. He knew that when He ascended back to heaven, God the Father was going to send the very Spirit of God to be with the disciples. And that could not happen until Jesus left. For the last three and a half years they had enjoyed the presence of God in the form of Jesus. He was God in human flesh. He had lived with them, talked with them, done miracles among them, and taught them the truth of God on a daily basis. But when the Holy Spirit came they would not only have God with them and among them, but in them. They would be empowered by the very Spirit of God. This was going to be a game-changer for the disciples and for the world, mainly because of the three things Jesus said the Spirit would do when He arrived.

The NET Bible translates verse 8 this way: “And when hecomes, he will prove the world wrong concerning sin andrighteousness andjudgment.” The very presence of the Holy Spirit in the lives of believers would be proof that the world’s view of Jesus was wrong. It was their rejection of Him as Messiah that was their most condemning sin. The Holy Spirit would also convict the world about righteousness because He would only indwell those who had placed their faith in Christ and not on their own self-righteousness. In other words, the Spirit proves that man’s righteousness before God depends not on his own efforts but on Christ’s atoning work for them. Finally, the Spirit would convict the world concerning judgment, because His very presence would prove that Jesus had conquered sin and death by His resurrection and glorification. The Spirit’s presence in the world in the lives of believers would be proof that Satan had already been defeated. His was a lost cause. And the fact that the Spirit of God only lives within the people of God, is a daily judgment on all those who refuse to believe in Jesus. The presence of the Holy Spirit is our guarantee of salvation and as Paul puts it, our down payment on the future promises of God. “…and he has identified us as his own by placing the Holy Spirit in our hearts as the first installment that guarantees everything he has promised us” (2 Corinthians 1:22 NLT).

So when Jesus told the disciples that they would be better off once He was gone, He knew what He was talking about. Jesus was limited to the restraints placed upon Him by a human body. He could not be everywhere at once. He could not indwell His disciples. He had all the limitations we suffer from as humans. His coming to earth was for one purpose and that was to act as the perfect sin substitute. He came to die. But the Spirit came to indwell, empower, convict, and teach. Jesus told the disciples, “When the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all truth. He will not speak on his own but will tell you what he has heard. He will tell you about the future” (John 16:13 NLT). He would teach them, enlighten them, encourage and empower them. They would perform miracles in His power. They would preach and teach in His power. They would spread the Gospel around the world by His power. Not only would the disciples be better off when Jesus returned to the Father, the world would be too. The rapid expansion of the Gospel message immediately after the Holy Spirit’s coming at Pentecost is proof of this fact. Thousands would come to Christ daily and the Good News of Jesus Christ would spread around the world like wild fire. We, as modern believers, are the beneficiaries of the Holy Spirit’s convicting presence in the world. We should be grateful Jesus came, but also thankful that He left and sent the Holy Spirit to live within us. His presence and power are proof of Christ’s resurrection and the reality of our own salvation.

Father, what more can I say than, “Thank You for the Holy Spirit”? I would not be who I am without Him. I would not have proof of what Jesus has done for me without the presence of the Holy Spirit within me. Thank You! Amen.

Ken Miller
Grow Pastor & Minister to Men
kenm@christchapelbc.org