Sermon for Easter 4 – Cantate
James 1:16-21 + John 16:5-15
Our Lord, Jesus Christ, on the same night on which He was betrayed, announced to His disciples that He was leaving them (in a sense), that He was going away to the Father, who had sent Him, the eternal Son of God, from heaven, into human flesh, to redeem mankind from sin, death, and the devil. Within 24 hours, He would shed the blood that would be the redemption price, and within 72 hours He would reappear to His disciples, risen from the dead. But He was already looking past all that, to the day of His ascension into heaven, six weeks, to the day, from that Maundy Thursday. Last week we talked about the sorrows Jesus’ disciples, and all Christians, would face after His ascension, and about Jesus’ promise that the temporary sorrows would be replaced by endless joy. In today’s Gospel, the focus is on the help Christ’s Church would receive after His ascension: the help of the Holy Spirit.
Now, in these troubled times in which we live, in these days when violence fills the earth, and is coming closer and closer to home, when wars are raging and anger is building, there are voices out there, tempting Christians to use force, to “take back our nation,” to take up the sword, to climb the ladders of power, to kill or otherwise get rid of the aggressors before they can kill us, or, if not to do it personally, then to angrily cheer on those who do the killing “to keep us safe.” It’s true that God has established the secular government to keep order in our sin-ravaged societies, to protect the innocent and to punish the evildoer within its own jurisdiction, even to use the sword to put to death the one who threatens the innocent or is guilty of great wickedness, and it’s good to acknowledge that fact and to give thanks to God for it, when the sword is actually wielded justly. But it’s vital to acknowledge that that is not a sword that the Lord has placed into the hands of His Christians, as Christians, nor does He call upon us to take pleasure in the death of the wicked, because He doesn’t. He hasn’t given His Church the responsibility or the right to take back our civilization, or to fight for our earthly way of life. He has given us only one sword to use, and that is the sword of the Spirit, which is the mighty Word of God, and it’s that powerful weapon about which Jesus speaks in today’s Gospel.
So. On to the Gospel. Jesus is going away to the Father, and that knowledge has made His disciples sorrowful. But, He says, I tell you the truth: It is to your advantage that I go away. For if I do not go away, the Advocate will not come to you. But if I go, I will send him to you. Jesus chose not to remain on this earth in person for the next two thousand years. He hadn’t come to set up an earthly kind of kingdom. He hadn’t come to wield the sword, to start a war, to force the nations to comply with justice or with His plans, nor had He come to teach His Church to do such things. He came to pay for our sins by giving Himself up to His enemies and allowing them to put Him to death. And His reign at the right hand of the Father, over the coming millennia, would be carried out on earth through the sword of the Spirit, who is called the Advocate, or the Helper, or the Counselor, or the Comforter—all valid meanings of this word “paraclete” in Greek. According to Jesus, it’s better, it’s more advantageous for His Church to have the help of the Holy Spirit than to have Jesus here in person.
Well, that means that the Spirit must truly be great, and powerful, and helpful. And, of course, He is, being the third Person of the Holy Trinity, as much “God” as is God the Father and God the Son. Here in our Gospel, Jesus outlines two main tasks that God the Holy Spirit would accomplish in the world. He will “convict the world,” and He will guide the Church in the truth.
When he comes, he will convict the world, or, show the world its fault concerning sin, and concerning righteousness, and concerning judgment. First of all, notice how the Spirit works. He shows fault. He convicts. And He does it, not through violence, not by the sword, but through words, through preaching, through the preaching of the apostles and those who have come after them. They would speak, but the Spirit would empower and work through their preaching to convict, to drive home to the unbelievers in the world their faulty way of thinking.
Concerning sin, because they do not believe in me. The unbelieving world doesn’t like to acknowledge its sin. People can justify just about any behavior, and any attitude. But the Spirit says, All have sinned against God. And the soul that sins shall die. But, the Spirit also says that not all are counted as sinners by God. Jesus came and paid for our sins. And now, where there is faith in Jesus, God no longer counts sin against a person. Instead, He counts righteousness to the believer in Christ. He justifies the believer. But since the world does not believe in Jesus, the world must still answer for its own sin, and that answering will be done forever in the fires of hell.
He will convict the world concerning righteousness, because I go to my Father and you will see me no longer. It’s a somewhat cryptic statement, as many of Jesus’ last-minute teachings to His disciples were. The world is wrong about righteousness. People think they can be righteous enough to earn God’s favor, by living a decent life, by doing enough good deeds. For that matter, people think they can worship any god, however they want, however their own unique culture or belief system has chosen to worship him (or them!). They call themselves righteous. But the Spirit of truth reveals the truth: The only righteousness that counts before God is the righteousness of Jesus Himself. There is no one righteous, says the Spirit, except for Jesus Christ, the Righteous One. Where He is, there is righteousness. But He has gone to His Father and cannot be seen in this world anymore. How can anyone have access to His righteousness? Only by faith in Him, which, again, comes only by the ministry of His Gospel, which is the power of God, the sword of the Spirit, which both slays the unbeliever and brings some of those unbelievers to faith in the Son of God.
And He will convict the world concerning judgment, because the prince of this world is judged. Notice, once more, no swords flashing, no political ambitions, no improving of society. No, the sword of the Spirit alone will be unleashed on the world as the Spirit, through the preaching of the Word of God, shows the world its fault concerning judgment. The world thinks it will escape judgment. The world judges Christians to be the problem, the intolerant, hateful, unscientific, hypocritical troublers of this world. But the Spirit pushes back through the word of God and exposes the world for its fraud, and announces the coming judgment against every unbeliever, because the prince of this world is already judged. The devil has been tried and convicted in God’s courtroom. He’s been defeated by Jesus’ resurrection from the dead. Whoever is found to be on Jesus’ side on the Last Day will be safe from judgment. But whoever remains on the devil’s side will share in the devil’s judgment
And so the work of the Spirit will be to work through the apostles’ preaching in this world, right up until the Last Day, as the Church of God wields the sword of the Spirit, the powerful word of God. Of course, if the Spirit is to work through our preaching, then we’d better make sure we’re preaching nothing but the Word of God—not the traditions of men, not the ideas of philosophers, not the made-up doctrines that tragically fill the earth. That’s the devil’s doing, when the Church, that is supposed to be wielding the sword of the Spirit, ends up wielding manmade lies that conform to this world instead of exposing the world’s sin, and instead of highlighting the salvation that is found in Christ alone.
The other work of the Spirit that Jesus talks about in today’s Gospel is the guidance He would provide for the apostles, and for the Church after them.
When he, the Spirit of truth, comes, he will guide you into all truth. Jesus’ disciples didn’t understand so many of His sayings. As we heard last week, they were confused and full of questions, and there wasn’t time for Jesus to explain everything, nor was that ever the plan anyway. The plan was for always for the Holy Spirit to come and to guide them, to guide them, not, for the most part, to new revelations, but chiefly to the understanding of old revelations, the understanding of the Spirit’s inspired words in the Old Testament, the understanding of Jesus’ words, and of the significance of all of it for the Church and for the world.
The apostles were the direct recipients of the Spirit’s guidance. Throughout their lifetimes, the Spirit formed and guided the Christian Church, laying the foundation that would remain in place until Jesus returns. But after the foundation is laid, no new foundation can be laid. No new doctrines can be added. No new practices can be instituted as binding or as necessary. The apostles wielded the sword of the Spirit by teaching the Church, as the Spirit guided them.
Now we, too, wield the Spirit’s sword as we are guided by the Holy Spirit, the Advocate who still lives within and among us Christians. Even as He guided the apostles to understand the Old Testament Scriptures, so He guides us to understand both the Old and the New Testament Scriptures, so that we know the truth, stand on the truth, and wield the truth of God’s Word as our only weapon in the world.
The only sword God has given to the Church is the sword of the Spirit, the Word of God. And it is a mighty weapon, a weapon whose purpose is not to force this world into compliance with Christianity, but to serve as a witness against the unbelieving, and as the Holy Spirit’s tool for bringing some of those unbelieving to repentance, to the Holy Christian Church, until the day when Jesus returns from the Father’s side to bring us into the presence of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, into the true home of righteousness. Amen.
