When the Spirit of Truth Comes
February 11, 2024
Preached by Noah Gwinn
Scripture Reading
John 16:4b-15
4b “I did not say these things to you from the beginning, because I was with you. 5 But now I am going to him who sent me, and none of you asks me, ‘Where are you going?’ 6 But because I have said these things to you, sorrow has filled your heart. 7 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. 8 And when he comes, he will convict the world concerning sin and righteousness and judgment: 9 concerning sin, because they do not believe in me; 10 concerning righteousness, because I go to the Father, and you will see me no longer; 11 concerning judgment, because the ruler of this world is judged.
12 “I still have many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now.13 When the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all the truth, for he will not speak on his own authority, but whatever he hears he will speak, and he will declare to you the things that are to come. 14 He will glorify me, for he will take what is mine and declare it to you. 15 All that the Father has is mine; therefore I said that he will take what is mine and declare it to you.
Good morning, everyone! Well, today is Super Bowl Sunday, one of America’s most treasured holidays. I don’t know about you, but I love watching the Super Bowl. Even if my team, the Steelers, are not playing in the Super Bowl, which they have not done much recently, I love watching the Super Bowl. And one of the reasons why I love watching the big game is because it seems like every year, we see at least one unbelievable play happen. From David Tyree’s helmet catch in 2008, to the Philly special in 2018, to the greatest play in Super Bowl history, the Steelers’ Santonio Holmes’ toe tap touchdown in the corner of the end zone to win the game in 2009, there have been some glorious, unbelievable plays in the Super Bowl.
But whether or not you like watching the Super Bowl, I think we can all agree that the Bible is likewise full of unbelievable things. All throughout the Scriptures, we are smacked in the face with things that are really hard to believe. And if I were to survey the room right now about things in the Bible that are really hard to believe, I’m sure we would hear things like: “it is hard to believe that God created all things out of nothing” or “it is hard to believe that one man with no nautical knowledge (Noah) could build a boat large enough for thousands of animals to live on for an extended period of time during a worldwide flood” or “it is hard to believe that a man (Jesus) could raise himself from the dead.” The list could go on and on. In our passage today, we see one of the hardest things for us to believe as Christians. In John 16:7, Jesus says to his disciples, “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.” Again, Jesus says, “I tell you the truth: it is to your advantage that I go away.” You could also understand Jesus to be saying, “It is better for me to go.” Do you believe him? Well, if we’re going to believe him, we’re going to need his help, so let’s pray for that now.
Heavenly Father…
INTRODUCTION
This morning, as we’ve been doing over the past five weeks, we are going to take a look at some of the words of Jesus on his final evening with his disciples before he would die. And, as pastor Tim Keller said in a sermon on this passage, “when you’re about to die, you don’t make small talk.”[1] Have you felt that over these last few weeks? There’s this urgency in Jesus’ message to his disciples. He’s got limited time with them. But, just as there is great urgency in his message, it also means that every word that Jesus says here is super important. He’s not making small talk.
So, with great care and urgency, he tells his disciples about the Holy Spirit. Specifically, he tells them that the Holy Spirit is the floodlight that shines on the sin of the world and the Savior of God’s people. And as we study this passage together this morning, we’re going to break it up in two chunks. We’ll look at the coming of the Spirit and the work of the Spirit.
THE COMING OF THE SPIRIT
First, we’ll take a look at the coming of the Spirit. Look with me in your Bible at verses 4-6. We’ll pick up in the middle of verse 4.
(Jesus speaking) “I did not say these things to you from the beginning, because I was with you. 5 But now I am going to him who sent me, and none of you asks me, ‘Where are you going?’ 6 But because I have said these things to you, sorrow has filled your heart.
Let’s remember the context of this passage. In last week’s sermon, Pastor Benjamin led us through the end of chapter 15, where Jesus tells his disciples that as they go about gospel ministry, the world will hate them, just as it hated Jesus. And now here we see Jesus saying, in the same conversation, “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.” What he’s saying is that for three years, Jesus absorbed nearly all of the persecution on behalf of his disciples. To use Benjamin’s image from last week, persecution can feel like a hostile desert. And for years, Jesus has been enduring the heat of the desert so that the disciples wouldn’t have to. But now, he is going away, so he is telling them how to endure the Sahara of persecution. And, just for a second, put yourself in the disciples’ shoes. Your friend, your Rabbi, tells you he is leaving and that persecution is coming your way. What is your response? For the disciples, their response was that sorrow had filled their heart. So real.
So naturally, we might ask, how did Jesus comfort his followers? Read verse 7 with me.
7 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.
Now, I have been on the giving and receiving end of poor comfort before. And it is hard to know how to respond to poor comfort. I would imagine that if we could have a video of the disciples’ response to this comment, that there would be a lot of blank stares. I wonder if, just for a second, they thought this to be poor comfort. Again, put yourself in the disciples’ shoes – your close friend who you’ve given up everything for has just told you he is going to die and that persecution is coming your way. You are filled with sorrow. And then he tells you, “it is better that I go away.” If you and I have a hard time believing that, it would have been next to impossible for the disciples to believe that. Yet, this is not poor comfort. In fact, in response to the disciples’ sorrow that he is going away, Jesus does not offer cheap, empty platitudes, but a rock-solid promise of the coming of a Helper.
He says that it is to the disciples’ advantage for him to go so that the Helper can come, so let’s ask two questions: who is the Helper, and why is better for Jesus to leave and the Helper to come?
Who is the Helper?
So, who is the Helper? The first answer to the question of who the Helper is is quite simple. You don’t have to turn there with me, but Jesus answers this very question two chapters beforehand in John chapter 14. He says, “the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you all things and bring to your remembrance all that I have said to you” (Jn. 14:26). Jesus says that the Helper is the Holy Spirit.
The second answer to the question of who the Helper is is answered in the way the question was asked. Who is the Helper? Not what is the Helper, but who. The Helper, or the Holy Spirit, as we’ve said, is not an “it” but a “he”. The Holy Spirit is not an impersonal force but is a person. The great theologian of our day, Luke Skywalker, once said, “The Force is… the energy between all things, a tension, a balance, that binds the universe together.” And this, if we’re not careful, starts to impact the way we view the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit is not a power from a galaxy far, far away that we can harness to accomplish what we want. The Holy Spirit is not a genie in a bottle that we can rub when we want to make a wish. The Holy Spirit is, in fact, God – one of three persons of the Trinity, who has a will and wields sovereign power and glory to accomplish that which he intends. This is not Star Wars, nor Aladdin, this is our ever glorious and wonderful almighty God.
A third answer that I’ll mention to the question of who the Helper is, at risk of pointing out what might be obvious, is that the Helper is a helper. Other Bible versions translate this word for “Helper” to also read “counselor” or “mediator” or “advocate” or “intercessor” and later in the passage we see the Helper described as “the Spirit of Truth”. All of these would help us to understand the role of the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit is one who comes alongside you to help, counsel, mediate, and advocate on your behalf.
So just for sake of clarity, the Helper is the Holy Spirit, a person of the Divine Trinity, who is identified as one who comes alongside to help and counsel.
Why is it better for Jesus to leave and the Helper to come?
That answers our first question of who the Helper is, but we still need to ask the burning question: why is it better for Jesus to leave and the Helper to come? There are a few reasons, I think.
The first reason why it is better for Jesus to leave and the Spirit to come is because when Jesus came to earth, he took on flesh. He took on a body. Which means in his body, he could only be at one place at a time. He could be in Jerusalem OR Galilee OR Samaria, but he could not split his body to be in each of those places at once. But, when the Spirit would come, as the prophet Joel promised, God would pour out his Spirit on all believers (Joel 2:28). That means that whether you are a believer in Jerusalem or Galilee or Samaria or Harrisburg, God himself who is present everywhere by his Spirit is there with you. He does not need to put on sandals and travel to reach you. He does not need to fit you into his schedule. To make this very practical for us, although your feelings may tell you otherwise, loneliness will never be your reality. If you are a Christian, you are indwelt by the Spirit of the Living God. He is there with you while you eat with your family, and he is there with you while you eat in your apartment with no one else. God, by his Spirit, has bonded himself to you so that although you may not see anyone with you, you are never alone.
This leads us into the second answer to the question of why it is better for Jesus to leave and the Spirit to come. Remember the context. The disciples were just told that they were going to be entering a season, or more accurately a lifetime of persecution that would feel like a desert. And no longer would Jesus be there with them in the desert. Instead, Jesus is providing them with something of an oasis in the desert. He is giving them himself in greater measure in order to withstand the persecution that would come their way. And the kind of persecution the disciples would face would require the power of the Spirit if they were going to remain faithful. According to church tradition, all of the disciples except for John were killed for their faith, including Peter being crucified, James being killed by the sword, and so on. Even John, who was not killed, is said to have been boiled in oil and miraculously survived. This kind of persecution requires the ongoing power and never-leaving presence of the Spirit.
You may read these verses and think, “okay, but why does Jesus say that if he doesn’t go away, the Helper will not come? Can’t we just have them both?” Great question! Thanks for asking. I think this actually provides us with our third insight into the question of why it is better for Jesus to leave and the Helper to come. The reason the Helper will not come unless Jesus leaves is not because there’s some kind of relational tension between the two of them. This isn’t like you checking the guest list to that party you were invited to seeing if that one person is going to be there to know whether or not you will consider going. This isn’t Jesus and the Holy Spirit not getting along. Instead, the reason that the Holy Spirit will not come until Jesus leaves is because so much of the Holy Spirit’s job is applying the finished work of Jesus to the life of the believer. And so, until Jesus’ work is finished, the Holy Spirit will not come.
Now, I know that all of this could raise a lot of questions related to the role of the Holy Spirit in the Old Testament. We won’t get into every detail of that but suffice it to say that in the Old Testament, the primary way that the Holy Spirit interacted with people is that he would come upon people for a certain time for a certain task. You can think of when the Holy Spirit came upon Bezalel and Oholiab for the task of constructing the tabernacle in Exodus 31 or the Spirit being upon Moses for the task of leading God’s people in Numbers 11. One of the things that is new about the New Covenant is that rather than the Spirit coming upon people temporarily for specific tasks, there is a unique, permanent indwelling of the Spirit of the Resurrected Christ that takes place in the life of the believer. So, until the work of Christ is done – his perfect life, his death, his resurrection, and his ascension – the Holy Spirit would not come. The Spirit would wait to be sent once and for all in the resurrection power of Jesus Christ.
So, if you are like me, and have at times been prone to say things like, “If only I had been there and had seen Jesus, it would be so much easier to believe” or “If only Jesus could be here right now, things would be so much better”, this passage answers emphatically that, if we say these things, we are wrong. How do I know? Because Jesus is talking to people who were there! And even to them he is saying, “it is to your advantage that I go.” If you need proof of why this is, just look at the disciples before the Spirit comes at Pentecost and after Pentecost. In the Gospels, before receiving the Holy Spirit, the disciples are a bunch of bumbling fools. They are constantly arguing, constantly doubting, getting things wrong all the time, lacking faith. But, after receiving the Holy Spirit at Pentecost, the disciples are a force for the Kingdom of God. They are preaching boldly in the face of persecution, they experience supernatural unity, see people saved and cared for. How is this possible? Because it was to their advantage that Jesus go so that the Helper could come. Unless Jesus leaves and the Spirit comes, they (and we) cannot be changed.
Let me put it to you baldly. If you were able to hop into the DeLorean with Doc and Marty McFly from Back to the Future, and somehow find yourself back in the time of Jesus’ ministry. If you saw with your own eyes not only the feeding of the 5,000, and not only Lazarus being raised from the dead, but also the very resurrection of Jesus, that would not be as spiritually transforming an experience as right now, today, if you receive the Holy Spirit.[2] If you are a Christian, you are indwelt by the very Spirit of the Living God, the Spirit of the Resurrected Christ. And that is something, that until Pentecost, followers of Jesus could only dream about.
THE WORK OF THE SPIRIT
If you remember, at the beginning of the sermon I said we would break the passage up into two chunks. We just saw Jesus talking about the coming of the Spirit, but now we’re going to turn our attention to what Jesus has to say about the work of the Holy Spirit. Now, I just want to preface this by saying that this passage doesn’t tell us everything there is to say about the Holy Spirit. It doesn’t talk about the fruit of the Spirit, it doesn’t talk about Spiritual Gifts, and it doesn’t talk about the baptism of the Holy Spirit. So, there is definitely more to be said about the Spirit, and if you’ve got burning questions about the Spirit, that’s awesome, and we would love to talk to you more about those, but for this sermon we’re going to try to hone in on what this particular passage says about the work of the Holy Spirit. And Jesus here mentions two groups of people that the Spirit will interact with: the world and the followers of Jesus. So, whether you are here this morning as a follower of Jesus or if you are just exploring Christianity, there is something here for everyone. Just like with our first point about the coming of the Spirit, we are going to look at the work of the Spirit through the lens of two questions. We’ll ask, “how does the Spirit interact with the world?” and “how does the Spirit interact with followers of Jesus?”
How does the Spirit interact with the world?
First, we’ll look at the question “how does the Spirit interact with the world?” To do this, take a look with me at verses 8-11. And as we do that, let’s keep in mind what we said about the world last week. The word “world” could mean lots of things, but the way that Jesus is using it here, and many times throughout John’s Gospel, is in terms of those in opposition to God – those in opposition to Jesus. Let’s keep that in mind as we read these verses and unpack the question of how the Spirit interacts with the world.
8 And when he (the Holy Spirit) comes, he will convict the world concerning sin and righteousness and judgment: 9 concerning sin, because they do not believe in me; 10 concerning righteousness, because I go to the Father, and you will see me no longer; 11 concerning judgment, because the ruler of this world is judged.
An image that is going to be helpful for us is to see the work of the Holy Spirit as a floodlight. And when the floodlight of the Holy Spirit shines on something, it exposes something in order to convince someone of what is true. That’s primarily what’s meant by the word “convict” here. The Spirit of Truth exposes in order to convince someone of what is true. And conviction can sound very negative, but the kind of conviction that comes from the Spirit of God does not have condemnation as its aim, but rather repentance and a call to salvation. One pastor helpfully said that these verses show the Spirit shining a floodlight for the world upon the greatest wrong, the greatest right, and the greatest victory.[3] I’ll explain.
The Greatest Wrong – What is the greatest wrong? Look at verse 9 again. The Spirit will convict the world “concerning sin, because they do not believe in [Jesus]”. The world has plenty of ideas about what the greatest wrongs are, and we can too. The great wrong, the great sin, is not related to sexuality, adultery, abuse, murder, racism, or many of the other things that are legitimately serious sins and break the heart of God. The great sin in the eyes of God is unbelief. And that is the great wrong the Spirit shines a light on for the world. He exposes the unbelief of the world in order to convince them there is something they need to believe in, namely the Lord Jesus Christ.
The Greatest Right – What about the greatest right? Look at verse 10 again. The Spirit will convict the world “concerning righteousness, because I go to the Father, and you will see me no longer”. What does that mean? Well, just as the world has its own ideas about what the greatest evils are, the world has its own ideas about what the greatest “rights” are. Today, individuality, freedom of choice, authenticity, and affirmation are among the world’s most celebrated virtues. And regardless of how you feel about those things, this verse is saying that the Spirit is shining a light on what true righteousness is. And whatever true righteousness is has something to do with the fact that Jesus is going to the Father, where we will see him no longer. What this is saying is that the resurrection and ascension of Jesus is the proof that the way Jesus lived is the very mark by which we should judge all righteousness. It isn’t going with the current of the cultural moral tide, it is judging righteousness by the unchanging character of God as we see it lived out in the life of Jesus. Where the cross was once the world’s “exhibit a” of the unrighteousness of Jesus, the resurrection and ascension flip the script and prove that Jesus is actually the model of righteousness.
The Greatest Victory – Finally, what is the greatest victory? Look at verse 11. The Spirit will convict the world “concerning judgement, because the ruler of this world is judged”. In the death of Christ on the cross, all evidence seemed to point to Satan, the ruler of this world, claiming the victory once and for all. But three days later, when Jesus rose from the dead, his resurrection proved that despite all appearances to the contrary, the cross was not the victory of Satan, but was, in fact, his death blow. The cross and resurrection of Christ together mark the great victory of Jesus over Satan, sin, and death, where the great enemy has been judged and will one day be done away with in full. And this is what the Spirit shines a floodlight on, so that the world can see and be convinced that the victory of the crucifixion is that it is a coronation ceremony not for the ruler of this world, but for the King of the universe.
So, in summary, the way that the Spirit interacts with the world is that he shines a floodlight on the Greatest Wrong, the Greatest Right, and the Greatest Victory in order to convince them of what is true and call them to repentance.
How does the Spirit interact with followers of Jesus?
So, if the Holy Spirit shines a floodlight on sin, righteousness, and judgment for the world, what does he shine a floodlight on for Jesus’ followers? He shines a floodlight on Jesus himself. Look with me at verses 12-15.
12 “I still have many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now. 13 When the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all the truth, for he will not speak on his own authority, but whatever he hears he will speak, and he will declare to you the things that are to come. 14 He will glorify me, for he will take what is mine and declare it to you. 15 All that the Father has is mine; therefore I said that he will take what is mine and declare it to you.
Jesus assures his disciples here that even though he is going away, he will not stop teaching them. Now, when Jesus says that the Spirit of Truth “will guide you into all the truth”, what does that mean? Here’s what it doesn’t mean. It doesn’t mean that because followers of Jesus have the Spirit, that we automatically know everything. This verse isn’t promising that because we have the Spirit we should all be able to know the name of our future spouse, what we should be when we grow up, or whether the Chiefs or the Niners are going to win tonight. “All truth” doesn’t mean he will tell us every fact about everything. So, what does it mean? Well, remember that Jesus is primarily speaking to the 11 disciples here, who go on to become his Apostles. When Jesus says that the Spirit of Truth “will guide you into all the truth”, he means that as part of the Spirit’s work of shining a light on Jesus, the Spirit of Truth will give them supernatural insight to interpret what Jesus is about to do in his death and resurrection. This is how and why we have our New Testament. The work of the Spirit here is to continue speaking the words of Jesus, and in doing so, this shines a floodlight on Jesus, and, as verse 14 says, brings Jesus glory.
But although Jesus is primarily speaking to the 11, he isn’t only speaking to them. We learn in the next chapter of John as Jesus is praying, that you and I are also on his mind this night. So how does this apply to us as Christians today? I think it does in a number of ways.
First, if you are a follower of Jesus, you are indwelt by the promised Holy Spirit. Joel 2, which we mentioned earlier, was fulfilled at Pentecost in the book of Acts. The Holy Spirit was poured out on all kinds of people. All of God’s people now have his Spirit in full. You do not have to wonder if God will draw near to you, he has. Christian, you have Immanuel in your bones.
Next, a primary way that the Holy Spirit guides us into all truth is that we have received the Scriptures, handed down to us all the way from these very men who sat around a table with Jesus eating bread and drinking wine while celebrating Passover. The Spirit empowered them to write down what they had learned. This means that, as helpful as it can be to have “Red Letter Bibles” to see the words of Christ, in reality, the whole Bible is red letters, because all 66 books are the words of Christ given by his Spirit to his people. And the Spirit’s work in guiding us into all truth doesn’t end with the writing of the Scriptures, the Spirit has empowered faithful men and women over the centuries to preserve the Scriptures, translate the Scriptures, and teach the Scriptures, so that by the grace of God you and I could sit here and bask in the glory and wonder of the Spirit of Truth ministering to our hearts through the Word even today.
Finally, the role of the Holy Spirit is for us today, just as much as it was for the disciples, to shine a floodlight on Jesus. So, super practically, when you think about Jesus, it’s the Spirit at work in you. Any time you remember a Scripture, it’s the Spirit at work in you. Any time you remember to pray, it’s the Spirit at work in you. Any time you feel a tug in your heart to encourage someone in the gospel, it’s the Spirit at work in you. Any time you obey the Scriptures, it’s the Spirit at work in you. So, for example, if you are a Christian, and over the last few weeks you’ve heard us announce baptisms on Easter Sunday, and you haven’t been baptized, maybe you’ve felt this tug in your conscience like “I know Jesus commands us to be baptized and I haven’t, and I don’t know… I’m scared to give my testimony in front of people… but I feel like I’m supposed to be baptized…” it’s most likely the Spirit at work in you, prompting you to follow Jesus in obedience through baptism! All that to say, I have talked to a lot of people that get so anxious and worried because they don’t know if the Spirit is at work in their life. And I want you to be encouraged, any even miniscule desire you have for Christian growth is in itself a work of the Spirit! You wondering if the Spirit is at work in your life is evidence that he is. If the Spirit were not at work in your life, you wouldn’t care! We would be utterly lost without the Spirit, and on our own we could not even want God apart from the power of the Spirit. Christian, take heart, the Spirit is at work in your life. It is to your advantage that the Spirit has come.
CONCLUSION
Well, where do we go from here? I mentioned earlier that because this passage talks about the way the Spirit interacts with the world and with followers of Jesus, there is something here for everyone today, and I firmly believe that. The work of the Spirit, for the Christian and for the non-Christian, is to shine a floodlight on the truth. Most especially, the Spirit causes us to see the person and work of Jesus Christ. So here is the encouragement to everyone here this morning: turn to Christ. The good news of Jesus is that those who put their faith in him will never be alone, because the Spirit of Truth will always be within you, ministering to your heart. As we turn from the greatest wrong of unbelief, we see the greatest victory of Christ’s cross and resurrection, where what appeared to be his defeat was actually his coronation as the King of the Universe. And now he sits down at the right hand of God, his work finished, giving his Spirit to his people without measure, so that we may see him clearly, look on him in his glory, and rest assured beyond a shadow of a doubt that one day we will be with him forever, enjoying his power and his presence in full.
Let’s pray . . .
[1] Keller makes this comment in his sermon, “He Will Glorify Me”
[2] This illustration is based off of one used by Tim Keller in his sermon, “He Will Glorify Me”
[3] This is found in Tim Chaddick’s sermon, “The Spirit of Truth”
