John 14:16-31
John • Sermon • Submitted
0 ratings
· 3 viewsNotes
Transcript
Sermon Tone Analysis
A
D
F
J
S
Emotion
A
C
T
Language
O
C
E
A
E
Social
Solitary
Solitary
A pair of penniless down and outs inherited a share of a 4 billion GBP fortune after a bizarre twist in family fortunes. Brothers Zsolt and Geza Peladi were so poor they lived in a cave outside Budapest, Hungary, and sold scrap they found on the street for pennies. Now both of them and a sister who lives in America inherited their grandmother's massive fortune after a life of poverty. "We knew our mother came from a wealthy family but she was a difficult person and had severed ties with them, then later abandoned us and we lost touch with her and our father until she eventually died," said Geza, 43.
They learned of their good fortune after homelessness charity workers in Hungary were contacted by lawyers handling the estate of the brothers' maternal grandmother who died recently in Baden-Wurttenberg, Germany. Under German law direct descendents are automatically entitled to a share of any estate - that would pass from their dead mother to them.
“I will ask the Father, and He will give you another Helper, that He may be with you forever;
A Helper is coming.
Remember that Jesus is leaving. He is preparing them for his departure for the world.
This is a passage of comfort up unto this point and it isn’t changing now.
He loves these disciples and he will do all that is necessary to ensure their success in the world now that He is ascending to the Father to be their forever advocate.
So what does He say?
I will ask the Father.
He has just told them that if they ask the Father in His name that it will be done for them, but here, He goes so far to say that He will be the one asking the Father for their help.
And here we see again, Jesus is for them.
He has been for them in the past.
He is for them now.
He will be for them in the future.
Jesus is pleading with the Father for some help with these men.
Jesus has lived with them for 3 years. He knows that this group will need help.
and Jesus is confident that the Father will answer His prayer.
“and He will give you another Helper, that He may be with you forever.”
The Father has sent them the Son, but he has not sent the Son to do His work and leave those for whom the work was for. He is going to give them a Helper.
And that Helper will be a forever deposit into their lives.
In Him, you also, after listening to the message of truth, the gospel of your salvation—having also believed, you were sealed in Him with the Holy Spirit of promise,
In Him, you also, after listening to the message of truth, the gospel of your salvation—having also believed, you were sealed in Him with the Holy Spirit of promise, who is given as a pledge of our inheritance, with a view to the redemption of God’s own possession, to the praise of His glory.
God has claimed these disciples and He is giving them a forever indwelling Spirit that will empower them to continue the works of Christ in the world.
Who is this Helper though and who gets Him?
Look in verse 17.
that is the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it does not see Him or know Him, but you know Him because He abides with you and will be in you.
Jesus defines here for us the one to whom he is referring.
That is the Spirit of Truth.
Jesus has referred to the Spirit several times throughout the book so far.
Remember, the Spirit descending as a dove on Christ in .
Remember what Jesus told Nicodemus in .
“The wind blows where it wishes and you hear the sound of it, but do not know where it comes from and where it is going; so is everyone who is born of the Spirit.”
In , those who will worship God will be those who worship him in Spirit and Truth.
In , Jesus says:
“It is the Spirit who gives life; the flesh profits nothing; the words that I have spoken to you are spirit and are life.
In , Jesus says this of the Spirit.
John 7:
Now on the last day, the great day of the feast, Jesus stood and cried out, saying, “If anyone is thirsty, let him come to Me and drink. “He who believes in Me, as the Scripture said, ‘From his innermost being will flow rivers of living water.’ ” But this He spoke of the Spirit, whom those who believed in Him were to receive; for the Spirit was not yet given, because Jesus was not yet glorified.
Just in the book of John so far, the Spirit is the Christ exalting, the new birth giving, worship inspiring, life altering Spirit of God Himself who now Jesus says will become our helper forever.
That is who the Spirit is… but the question here is who gets him?
I
The first question Jesus answers who doesn’t get him.
The world doesn’t.
The world cannot receive him.
The Spirit is not given to those associated with the evil and sinfulness of the world.
The Spirit is not given to the unsaved
He is not given to those who reject Christ.
He tells us this here.
The world can’t because its does not see or know him.
The Spirit cannot belong to those who do not belong to God.
but for those who do know Him, for those who do belong to God, we have the promise that not only will be abide with us, but he indwelling presence will forever be in us.
Jesus knows that the disciples cannot accomplish his work in the world without His presence.
These disciples definitely know this.
Up until this point they have relied fully on the power and presence of Christ to accomplish everything that they have done.
What Christ is saying now, is that none of that will change. They and we will forever be empowered by the indwelling presence of His Spirit.
He is with them always. He is with us always. Even to the end of the age.
Jesus desires they know this and trust Him.
“I will not leave you as orphans; I will come to you.
Jesus is here promising that they will always have the abiding presence of the Spirit.
however, Jesus promises that he Himself will come back to them as well.
I’m sure the disciples here are thinking, “What about you, though?”
We realize you are giving us the Spirit, but where are you going?
Where is he going? He is going to die. But unlike anyone else, he knows that his death is not for good, but isn’t it amazing that His death is for our good.
Jesus here reassures them that his departure will just be temporary. In fact, his departure will only last three days.
Jesus’s leaves to come back, and He is bringing with him the keys to our salvation.
As orphans, his coming to us from the grave to secure our adoptions as sons and daughters.
His coming to us will secure our salvation from sin.
His coming to us will guarantee our victory over death.
His coming back to life will give us hope in the middle of our misery when we deal with the worst this life and this world has to throw at us.
His coming back pushes us as adopted children to gather together Sunday after Sunday and worship the for whom we await.
His coming to us secures our forever dwelling place in a place where there are no tears, there is no pain, there is no sorrow. The resurrected Savior changes everything, and the victory of this statement cannot be overstated.
Sure for three days, these disciples will look around and feel like they have been abandoned, but in three days, he will raise to life, and they will realize that he meant what He said when he said that he would never leave them or forsake them.
The resurrection of Christ does all this for us.
He will not leave us as orphans.
Verse 20 is a further reassurance of what we can expect with Jesus.
“After a little while the world will no longer see Me, but you will see Me; because I live, you will live also.
The world will no longer see him after a little while.
For 33 years, those who were “of the world” of that time were privileged to be in the presence of God Himself, but Jesus reveals to them, that His gracious presence will soon be hidden from them forever.
Those in the world are those who reject Christ. Their opportunity to be in his presence is very quickly coming to an end, and they are the ones who will bring this blessed time to an end, all according to His sovereign plan.
But they, by His grace are given the promise of seeing Christ.
The promise that we have of life eternal is hinging upon the Savior living again.
The promise that we have of life eternal is hinging upon the Savior living again.
And if we are in Christ, because He lives, we will live also.
The language here in the Greek is so strong.
ὅτι ἐγὼ ζῶ καὶ ὑμεῖς ζήσετε.
Because I, even I, live, you also will live
Jesus is already declaring the life that He has before He even goes to the cross.
The basis of this promise is that Christ will rise again.
The application of this promise hinges upon our being united in Christ.
Look in verse 20
“In that day you will know that I am in My Father, and you in Me, and I in you.
In that day. What day?
The day where we by God’s grace will experience the life giving power of the resurrection.
I believe he is referring to the knowledge that only comes through the life giving power of Jesus.
It is the power and life giving knowledge that many of our members of this church have experience.
Right now, they know!!
They have a knowledge that we still long for, but the wonderful promise is that the day is coming when we will know.
In a sense, then we do look forward to our death or the coming of Christ in glory before we die.
Because then and only then will we truly know the life giving power of being united with Christ.
But what does that knowledge entail. What is awaiting us on that day? What kind of knowledge?
It is a knowledge that Christ is in the Father.
Christ has been telling them this.
Thomas claims to not know about.
Philip wants to see more.
But Christ assures them that the day is coming where they will know that all they needed was in Christ. That in Christ, they and we have knowledge of the Father.
It is a knowledge that we are in Christ.
This is the NT’s term for the believer, but the benefits that we have in Christ will be realized fully on that day.
Without our being in Christ, we have none of the spiritual blessing spoken of in , but in Christ, we experience every spiritual blessing and we will know on that day what we truly have in Him.