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John 16 "The Work of the Spirit"
These things I have spoken to you, that you should not be made to stumble. They will put you out of the synagogues; yes, the time is coming that whoever kills you will think that he offers God service. And these things they will do to you because they have not known the Father nor Me. But these things I have told you, that when the time comes, you may remember that I told you of them. And these things I did not say to you at the beginning, because I was with you. But now I go away 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 depart, I will send Him to you. And when he has come, He will convict the world of sin, and of righteousness and of judgment: of sin, because they do not believe in Me; of righteousness, because I go to My Father and you see me no more; of judgment, because the ruler of this world is judged. I still have many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now. "However when He, the Spirit of truth, has come, He will guide you into all truth; for He will not speak on His own authority, but whatever he hears He will speak; and He will tell you things to come. He will glorify Me, for He will take of what is Mine and declare it to you. All things that the Father has are Mine. Therefore I said that He will take of Mine and declare it to you. (John 16:1-15)
The Work of the Holy Spirit
One of my passions is writing music. I almost constantly
have a song in my heart. As I ride the train to work, drive my car,
sit at my desk or play with my kids I usually am humming some kind of
tune. Once in a while a song will form around an idea or text from the
Bible and then until I finish it I can’t get it out of my head.
I thank God that He allows me to use these songs in ministry and that
others are blessed by them. Well, last Christmas I wrote a song about
the wise men coming to see the baby Jesus and some people encouraged
me to seek publication for it. Now this is both flattering and frightening
at the same time. Anybody creative knows that while we all long for
people to appreciate our work, but we are also afraid that the critics
will tell us that our work is no good. It is much easier to stay with
the approval of a few friends than expose myself to the world. So as
yet I still have not done anything. I stand at the edge waiting to take
the plunge but cannot seem to do it. In the meantime I have researched
and studied how to publish a song. What an amazing amount of work is
involved! You see, it is not enough just to send your song in to a publisher,
because there are thousands of people writing songs doing the same thing.
You have to first record a high quality demo of the song. Well that
costs money. That settled it, if I am to get anywhere with this I need
to do it myself. So the next thing I started to research and study is
how to make a good recording. What an amazing amount of work is involved!
It is not enough to have good lyrics and a melody, it must be arranged.
What instruments, how many voices, what harmonies should be used. Then
each part and instrument has to be recorded by a sound engineer. But
that is just the beginning. After the sound is recorded all those parts
have to be mixed together in the right way. The more I looked at the
steps involved the more I realized that I was out of my league. I can
write a song, do a fair arrangement, but beyond that I am playing with
the unknown. It just isn’t as simple as singing into a microphone.
It is not a "do-it-yourself" job.
I am an incorrigible do-it-yourselfer. I inherited it from my father
who does everything himself. But there some things that we cannot do
ourselves. There are some things that are best left to the professionals.
Religion is one of them! In Christianity there are some things that
we are commanded to do. That is our job description. But there are other
things that we must not do, that if we tried to do we would only make
a terrible mess. There is some work that is better left to a professional.
Jesus told His disciples that He was going away. But He also told them
that this was better for them because He was going to send them a professional.
That professional is the Holy Spirit. When I say that religion is better
left to a professional I am not talking about pastors or priests, monks
or nuns. I consider myself to be just as much an amateur as anyone else
when it comes to God’s work. There is not really much difference
between pastor and people, we are all ministers, we are all called to
serve each other, we all have gifts, we are all under the same commandments
of Christ. The real professional is the Holy Spirit. And there is some
work that is best left to Him.
Jesus here tells us three things that the Holy Spirit does in this world.
He will convict the world of sin, and of righteousness and of judgment.
What is so important for us to know is that because the Holy Spirit
is on the job, we do not need to do any of these three things. It is
not our job. It is the Spirit’s. Most of the problems in the church
come from normal people like you and me trying to the Spirit’s
job for Him. But that is not our job description. What did Jesus command
us to do? "Love one another as I have loved you." Let’s
take a look at these three things that the Spirit does for us, so that
we will never be tempted to "Do-it-ourself" again.
The Holy Spirit convicts the world of sin. People do not need Christians
pointing the finger at them telling them that they are sinners. They
do not need our persuasion. They already know in their hearts that they
are missing the mark. On the same streetcorner in Roppongi where we
were telling people about Jesus Christ and handing out invitations to
church, there was a man from Jordan handing out flyers for a topless
bar. When we talked with him, he told us that he didn’t want to
be doing that kind of work but he had to support his wife and children.
Most people in this world are well aware of sin but don’t know
any way to escape it. The last thing they need is someone self-righteously
pointing out their faults. What should we do? We should love them as
Jesus did. When Jesus met sinners He sat down and ate with them, forgave
them and pointed them to the kingdom of God. The only difference between
them and us is that we believe in Jesus. We are still sinners, but we
have been forgiven by Jesus Christ.
The Holy Spirit also convicts the world of righteousness. We do not
need to persuade the world about how good we are. We don’t have
to blow our own horn or take out advertisements about our goodness.
I heard an announcement on the radio sponsored by the largest Buddhist
group in Japan telling about their humanitarian efforts and charity
work. For us Christians this is unnecessary. The Holy Spirit will make
sure that those people who need to will see what true righteousness
is. Our job is not publicity. It is to love as Jesus loves. Jesus taught
that when you give to the poor, do it in secret so that not even your
right hand knows what your left hand is doing. Jesus taught that when
we pray we should do it in our prayer closet and not up on stage so
that people will think we are spiritual. Jesus taught that when you
fast dress up nicely and put on a happy face and don’t even give
people a clue that you are sacrificing something for God. If you do
your good deeds to be seen by men then you have already gotten your
reward and you receive nothing more. Jesus is the only one who is truly
righteous and He has gone to the Father. Whenever we point out our good
deeds we are only drawing attention to ourselves. But what we really
need to do is draw people to Jesus. The Spirit does this perfectly,
so that when people see our good deeds, they give glory to the Father
who is in heaven. I never want people to talk about how good I am. Instead
what I long for is for people to see me and talk about the goodness
of Jesus Christ.
The Holy Spirit also convicts the world of judgment. The greek word
for this is "krisis" from which we get our word, "Crisis".
The biggest crisis possible in life is to be separated from God and
that is what this word means, to separate. The ruler of this world,
Satan, was separated from God and so will everyone who won’t receive
Jesus Christ, God’s Son Every good and perfect gift comes down
from above. Everything good and beautiful and true in this world comes
from God. If we separate ourselves from everything that is good the
ultimate result is hell. Many people wonder how a loving God could torment
people in hell, but God does not torment anyone. God patiently offers
again and again to bring us back to Him, to forgive our sins, to restore
the relationship that was lost. But if you continue to push God away,
finally God will leave you alone. Believe me, you never want God to
leave you alone. Never ask Him to leave you alone. Because that is truly
hell, total separation from God the source of everything that is good.
There are many reasons why a Christian should never tell anyone that
they are going to hell. First, if we judge another person we will be
judged the same way. If we judge others we forget that we were forgiven
and saved by grace. Second, Jesus taught that if you call someone a
fool, you are in danger of hellfire yourself, and finally Jesus told
His disciples that even though there are wheat and other less desirable
grass in the same field, to wait till the harvest to separate the two
lest you end up damaging the wheat with the rest.
Unlike us the Holy Spirit does a perfect job of these three difficult
tasks. If we try to convict people of sin, we only end up appearing
self-righteous and condemning. The Spirit does it perfectly drawing
people to the realization that they need a Savior. If we try to convict
people of our own righteousness, we end up as hypocrites seeking the
approval of men instead of God. The Spirit does it perfectly, drawing
people to see how good God is do His wonderful work through normal people.
If we try to judge who is saved and who is not we end up back under
the law and soon end up twice as much a sinner as those we sought to
condemn. The Spirit does it perfectly, seeing into the very heart of
man, persistently calling out to the lost until the very last moment.
Christians we must not try to do the work of the Spirit ourselves. If
we insist on trying to do His job, it can only be because we do not
believe that He can or will. He is more than able to do it and far more
able than us. We cannot take this work upon ourselves. Instead, we must
do what Jesus has commanded us. We must love as Jesus loves. We must
forgive those who sin against us and befriend the lost. We must be humble
in service and quick to give God the glory. We must seek and save the
lost. This is our work.
Copyright 2000 Jonathan Wilson
All Rights Reserved
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