Work of the Spirit

[00:00:00] Speaker A: Foreign. [00:00:24] Speaker B: Hi, My name is Josh. [00:00:25] Speaker A: My name is Gabriel. [00:00:26] Speaker B: And today on reading the Gospel, we are studying the event, the work of the Holy Spirit. This is found in John, chapter 16. And we're going to read from verse five all the way through the end of the chapter. Follow along with us in your Bibles as we read. But now I am going to him who sent me. And none of you ask 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, concern. Because I go to the Father. And you will see me no longer concerning judgment because the ruler of this world is judged. I still have many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them. Now 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. He will glorify me, for he will take what is mine and declare it to you. All that the Father has is mine. Therefore I said, he will take what is mine and declare it to you. [00:02:03] Speaker A: A little while and you will see Me no longer. And again, a little while and you will see me. So some of his disciples said to one another, what is this that he says to us? A little while and you will not see me. And again, a little while and you will see me because I am going to the Father. So they were saying, what does he mean by a little while? We do not know what he is talking about. Jesus knew that they wanted to ask Him. So he said to them, is this what you are asking yourself? What I mean by saying, a little while and you will not see me? And again, a little while and you will see me. Truly, truly, I say to you. You will weep and lament, but the world will rejoice. You will be sorrowful, but your sorrow will turn into joy. When a woman is giving birth, she has sorrow because her hour has come. But when she has delivered the baby, she no longer remembers the anguish for joy that a human being has been born into the world. So also you have sorrow now. But I will see you again, and your hearts will rejoice and no one will take your joy from you. In that day you'll ask nothing of me. Truly. Truly. I say to you, whatever you ask of the Father in My name, he will give it to you. Until now you have asked nothing in My name. Ask and you will receive, that your joy may be full. [00:03:53] Speaker B: I have said these things to you in figures of speech. The hour is coming were when I will no longer speak to you in figures of speech, but will tell you plainly about the Father. In that day you will ask in My name. And I do not say to you that I will ask the Father on your behalf, for the Father himself loves you because you have loved me and have believed that I came from God. I came from the Father and have come into the world. And now I am leaving the world and going to the Father. His disciples said, ah, now you're speaking plainly and not using figurative speech. Now we know that you know all things and do not need anyone to question you. This is why we believe that you came from God. Jesus answered them. Do you now believe? Behold, the hour is coming and and indeed it has come when you will be scattered each to his own home and will leave me alone. Yet I am not alone, for the Father is with me. I have said these things to you that in me you may have peace in the world you will have tribulation. But take heart, I have overcome the world. So this section harkens back to an episode we did a little while ago where we talked about the Holy Spirit. And now we're coming back to this again. I believe it was parting counsel, the episode. Now we're coming back to the work of the Holy Spirit. How much do we know about the Holy Spirit? [00:05:39] Speaker A: As much as Jesus Christ has revealed it to us. And we have a reference about the coming of the Spirit in one of the previous episodes when we define the main ministry of the Holy Spirit based on the Greek word helper and intercessor and advocate are the main meanings of that word. And now here we have the work of the Holy Spirit that is broken down into different aspects and dimension of our relationship with God. [00:06:14] Speaker B: Now why is it that the Holy Spirit has to wait for Jesus to get to heaven before he can come? [00:06:23] Speaker A: This is a very interesting question, and it was discussed throughout centuries. And the great schism between the Church in the west and the east was practically triggered by this idea. Who sends the Holy Spirit? It is the Father or the Son, or both of them. What I would like to see in the reading for the episode today is this communion, this togetherness between the work of the Father of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Each one is promoting and representing someone else. Each one is glorifying not himself, but, but the other and the Holy Spirit, who is the greatest gift given, you know, to humanity after Jesus Christ was given only after Jesus Christ had that authority to give that gift. And that happened in the day of Pentecost, after Jesus was resurrected. He has ascended to heaven. He was enthroned on the day of Pentecost. And as soon as he received the authority, he gave gifts to his children. Because this is what Jesus likes to give gifts. And the first gift was the gift of the Spirit. [00:07:42] Speaker B: Yeah, better day than Christmas waking up. I wonder what that was like, you know, up in heaven. Okay, here's the gifts. And the Holy Spirit comes down and gives his church gifts, apostles and prophets and teachers and pastors and all these things, and then gives each Christian gifts, love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self control. That these are the gifts that God gives us. You did make an excellent point that the three have always worked. It's not that when Jesus was on the earth, the Holy Spirit wasn't around. I mean, we see at his baptism, as we've talked about, when Jesus goes under the water, the Spirit of God descends like a dove and the voice of God calls out from heaven, this is my Son, in whom I'm well pleased. Likewise, in the Old Testament, we have all three of them working in creation together. And so it seems that they always work through each other to glorify each other, to lift up each other. In the Old Testament, the focus is more on God the Father, but we see Jesus and the Holy Spirit working. In the Gospels, we have a focus on Jesus, but we see the Father and the Holy Spirit working. And now in the new church and the early church and down to today, we see this focus on the Holy Spirit, that the Father and Jesus are working through the Holy Spirit here on this earth to bring humanity to salvation and in relationship with God. Is that fair to say? [00:09:23] Speaker A: Of course. [00:09:24] Speaker B: Okay, so again, we don't have the description, you know, up in heaven is the Holy Spirit a dove flying around or. Or what? We. We don't know. And we shouldn't speculate on things we don't know, but we do know a lot about what the Holy Spirit does. The Bible is very clear. And. And so we have this list here that the Holy Spirit is going to tell you truth. So this is a very first job we get in this chapter that the Holy Spirit reveals truth to us. And this is why we encourage our listeners to pray before they read the Bible. To ask for God's guidance, to ask for the Holy Spirit's guidance to give us wisdom, knowledge and understanding things that the Spirit promises to give us. And so what else? What is another thing that the helper gives to us? [00:10:24] Speaker A: When the Holy Spirit comes? Jesus Christ said in verse eight, he will convict the world concerning sin and righteousness and judgment. [00:10:40] Speaker B: Mm. [00:10:41] Speaker A: So this seems to be a work that starts in the heart or in the conscience, in the mind. It is something that is inside out. It is not a conviction of in a court of people that you know have to go to jail. It is an inner conviction. It is the work of the Holy Spirit with our conscience to show us that we've done something wrong. And we realize that we've done something wrong. When before our eyes, a perfect Jesus Christ, his life, his ministry, his service is presented and by comparison with this ideal, he is the man. As you know, the Gospel of John says, by comparing our lives, our actions, our motives with the life of Jesus Christ, we realize that something is wrong. We are misaligned. And this is the work of the Holy Spirit. [00:11:52] Speaker B: So when the Holy Spirit comes, he convicts us. Is that a good thing or a bad thing to be convicted? Is it good or bad? [00:12:04] Speaker A: So it depends of what is your goal. If you really want to align your life with God's will and his principles and the model demonstrated by Jesus Christ, that is something good. If you don't want to be transformed by the power of God, if you want to remain in darkness when light comes, you are going to be scared and you do not conceive with something like a positive experience, you are going to experience shame. When the Holy Spirit convicts us of sin, we experience guilt. But with the guilt comes the solution. Because Jesus Christ says, I have died for your sins. And this is the good news in the Gospel, the core of the gospel, that he died for us. And not only that we don't have to die, but we can live his life, a perfect life of righteousness. In the same way righteousness has been compared in the book of Job with a garment, you put on that garment the same way you put on the righteousness of Christ. And by doing this, God reveals not only the problem, but he provides a solution. [00:13:19] Speaker B: I think of conviction as God letting us know something's wrong. So we have conviction. Righteousness is Christ has gone back to heaven. He's enthroned. And now his righteousness, his death, he lived a perfect life. He did not die. And so he sat on the throne and he grants that righteousness to us. The Holy Spirit convicts us that we need that righteousness, and not our own righteousness, but his. And finally he convicts us that there's going to be a judgment and we need to stand ready for that judgment. [00:14:01] Speaker A: And if we receive the righteousness of Christ, it is the devil who will be judged, right, the ruler of this world. But if we do not receive the righteousness of Christ, and if we then want to be transformed by the power of the Holy Spirit, we are going to be judged together with Him. [00:14:20] Speaker B: Yeah. And so the rest of the chapter talks about how this work that the Holy Spirit does turns our sorrows into joy, that he fills our life. And this is the thing with the Christian life. We're drawn closer to God. We're filled with joy, with love, with hope. And I just want to end on this thought, that conviction should fill the Christian with hope and joy for forgiveness. That man, I messed up, but I'm so happy that Jesus has given me this gift of eternal life, that he's died on the cross, that I don't have to pay these sins. It should fill our lives when. When we're convicted that we did something wrong. It should fill our lives with joy that God has given us something better. Shame is what the devil uses to keep us down, to take us away, to make us scared of forgiveness, to make us scared of God. And so we need to not let Satan use shame to keep us from the joy of conviction and the joy of forgiveness and the joy of receiving the righteousness of Christ. Let's pray, Father God, the work of the Holy Spirit is an amazing work that you do within us to remove sin and create in us a clean heart, to create in us new desires and hopes and make us be like Christ here on earth and that we can serve others and lift up the lives of those around us. Father, I pray that your spirit will do that work in us, convicting us of sin and pointing us to the righteousness of Christ, so that on that day in the judgment when our names come up, Jesus will stand and say, they have accepted my death on the cross and my righteousness counts for theirs. Go with us now and draw us close to you each and every moment in Jesus name, Amen. [00:16:27] Speaker A: Amen.