John 16 and the Holy Spirit

The Work of the Holy Spirit

“I did not say these things to you from the beginning, because I was with you. But now I am going to him who sent me, and none of you asks me, ‘Where are you going?’ But because I have said these things to you, sorrow has filled your heart. Nevertheless, I tell you the truth: it is to your advantage that I go away, for if I do not go away, the Helper will not come to you. But if I go, I will send him to you. And when he comes, he will convict the world concerning sin and righteousness and judgment: concerning sin, because they do not believe in me; concerning righteousness, because I go to the Father, and you will see me no longer; concerning judgment, because the ruler of this world is judged.
(John 16:4-11 ESV)

It would seem that often people in the church would trade any moment of their current experience to be with Jesus and his disciples in those moments recorded in the New Testament. I admit as a Christ follower and as a historian I would trade functioning parts of my body to witness the events of the Gospel in real time. In contrast to that desire Jesus tells us we are better off now for we have access to the Holy Spirit. In the Spirit we will experience things that are bigger and better than those of the biblical accounts of the Gospel.

Even now God in then the Spirit is holding the universe together, molecule by molecule. Not impressed yet? He infects the hearts of those who would believe and turns them to Christ making his Glory so beautiful that they would forsake this world and say “Lord Lord.” Not impressed yet? He does an illuminating work in the hearts of believers that when they would read the Bible they would understand and be changed. Not impressed yet? Any time any where in the world the soundly converted pray to Jesus they are motivated by the Holy Spirit at work in them.

Any time we feel guilt from our sin and ask God to forgive, that is the Spirit, any time we see injustice and act, that is the Spirit at work in us. The work of Christ is now spread from the God man in Palestine to the hands of the many  Christians around the world whom the Holy Spirit uses as his means of Grace.

I have been following the Gospel of John Chapter by chapter for months now. From God's revelation of himself in Jesus to his first signs. I have followed him through the requirement of being born again to have saving faith, to saying so hard that all but the twelve leave him. Chapter seven he shows himself as living water and in chapter fourteen he tells us that to be in Heaven is to be where he is and now he is describing how he will empower us, the church, to make his a kingdom a reality here. He sends us the Spirit. It changes us, the Gospel in us will give birth to good works not because they are required but because to behold Jesus in the power of the spirit does something to us.

I would argue that the Gospel of John is proposing that conversion and sanctification is all the work of the Spirit. How then do we act in helping to bring His kingdom here? Pray, pray that the Holy Spirit unbind hearts, that he would make Jesus so wonderful to our eyes that we would forsake yet again the pleasures of this world and desire his will to the display of his Glorious work in the Son.

Sola Deo Gloria

Where I am you will also be.

Where I am You will also be. When asked about heaven I hear almost no one quote this verse, but it is the reality of our eternity. Jesus explains to His disciples that being with Him is Heaven. Being in Christ enjoying the love and fellowship of the Trinity is the only all satisfying reality that could hope to hold our attention for eternity,

Think about eternity. Doing any thing or any number of things for eternity. The culmination of your earthly experinces would eventually get boring. Heaven only escapes being a devine torment in that it promises the infinite ability to be interesting or satisfying. Being with the infinitly satisfying God is our only hope to not falling into dispair.

Hell's infinite nature conversly makes it threatening. Tim Keller encourages an audience to think of the worst part of themselves having for ever to cultivate and isolate. Heaven is Jesus forever, hell is us forever. The same people who have had either 6000 years of millions of years to think up new ways to torture each other will get eternty to continue this unbroken streak of attrocity against fellow man unless redeemed from the outside.

Look to the map! "I am the way the truth and the light," He promises. The only way to the father. Cling to that promise or cling to despair those are our options. Unless you truely believe we can self invent something that is all satisfying for eternity? Excuse me if I am a skeptic.

Sola Gratia