John 16:5 • I Am Going

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(This transcript was prepared using software tools and has not been reviewed for complete accuracy.)

In the great power outage of 2003, a single tree falling on a power line in Ohio triggered a series of events that caused the loss of power for fifty-five million people through the Midwest, the Northeast and Canada.
A single tree on a power line in Ohio.
I mean, there was amazing power available, but because there was no, at that time, redundancy built into that part of the system, no matter how much power was available, it was denied to fifty-five million people.
In the chapter of scripture that we looked at last week, Jesus promises an amazing provision of power:  that He would be the Vine, possessing the power of God and that we could connect to Him as the branches.
A tremendous promise.
Except for this:  We week He says, "But I'm leaving."
What now?
Is there any redundancy built into the system that we might have power when He is gone?
How might we have such power?
That's John 16.
Let's stand as we honor God's Word and read the first 15 verses of John chapter 16.
Jesus is speaking, and He says, "'I have said all these things to you to keep you from falling away.
They will put you out of the synagogues.
Indeed, the hour is coming when whoever kills you will think he is offering service to God.
And they will do these things because they have not known the Father, nor me.
But I have said these things to you, that when their hour comes you may remember that I told them to you.
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, 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 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, 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 that he will take what is mine and declare it to you.'"
Let's pray together.
>>> Heavenly Father, here in this portion of Your Word inspired by Your Holy Spirit You tell us that work that the Spirit would do in behalf of Jesus come to us, convict the world of sin and righteousness and judgment and ultimately complete what is needed of Christ in us.
And so with humility, we would now bow before You and ask for that work which is beyond our fathoming, even the inner work of the Holy Spirit, by which You convict us and complete us in Christ's purposes.
Would You do that even now, by opening our hearts to the truths of Your Word and transforming us by Your Spirit, the Spirit who is even here with us now?
It is in His power and by His ability that we pray in Jesus' name.
Amen.
>>> Please be seated.
The account of a pastor.
Sarah was new in our city and had recently endured a hard breakup with her boyfriend.
She had no friends in our city, and she was under tremendous stress in her new job.
She began to spiral down into a serious depression.
She was in trouble, but even admitting that was terrifying, and she struggled to do it.
All the memory verses of her youth now failed her.
She couldn't muster the strength even to pray.
When she came and told me her story, it was clear that we were going into a dark place where the birds do not sing and the sun was not shining.
After listening patiently to Sarah, I said, "I know it feels as though someone has put a blanket over your soul and that God has turned His back on you.
I've been there too.
But God has not gone anywhere.
He is still with you."
She listened patiently, but with a slight nod and an expression that also said, "Yeah, yeah, I've heard all that before; it's just not working for me now."
So I introduced Sarah to a woman that I knew who would understand, someone who had been to the depths and back, someone with whom she could open up without fear of rejection or judgment, someone who would love her and pray with her and study the scriptures with her again, even though she was not a very pleasant person to be around at this time.
A few weeks ago, Sarah came forward for a communion service.
And there was something different in her.
The circumstances of her life had not changed much at all, but the touch of the Holy Spirit was evident in her life.
It's common for us to talk about the work of the Holy Spirit in church circles, but what does that mean?
Who is this Holy Spirit?
It's so much easier to identify with the Persons of the Godhead that are the Father and the Son, because we have images and relationships that communicate to us who that is.
But when you talk about the Holy Spirit, that seems something ethereal and neutral and strange.
We don't know if we're talking about Casper the Friendly Ghost or the Force in Star Wars.
I mean, what is this Holy Spirit that we're talking about?
Jesus is telling us in this passage that though He is going away, He will send the Holy Spirit to minister in His name as His very presence to us so that no matter where we are and what we struggle with it would be as though, by the voice of Jesus inside, ministering to our hearts by His heart with us, by His Spirit, Christ would be with us in every step of life.
This is not something impersonal.
It is the powerful presence of Christ made known by the Spirit of God.
And here in John 16, Jesus, who tells His disciples, "You are going to be going through some tough times, but I will be with you," is explaining how that is possible by telling us of the task and the person of the Holy Spirit.
What, after all, is the job of the Holy Spirit?
If you would just walk through this passage, you would see He's meant to come to us and to convict our world and, ultimately, to complete in us the work of Jesus Christ.
That job, as it were, is simple to express but dear to our understanding.
I mean, what would it mean to you if you actually understood the job of the Holy Spirit was to come to you, no matter where you were, what you were struggling with, with the presence of Christ?
It's actually what Jesus is saying.
If you take what the Spirit is to do, no place better than in verse 7.
Jesus says, "'I tell you the truth:  it's to your advantage that I go away, for if I do not go away, the Helper will not come.
But if I go away, I will send him to you.'"
Now, even the name is expressing to us something of the task of the Holy Spirit:  the Helper.
Different ones of you will have different Bible translations, and so you're taking a Greek word that is the word "Paraclete," which means "called alongside," and trying to find a way to translate that in a way that makes sense to us.
In the Greek language, it's actually a legal term for someone who would come alongside of you when you were on trial or in a court situation, in trouble in some way.
And so some of your Bibles will identify the Helper as the Advocate or the Counselor, not as in psychological counseling but like an attorney.
The Counselor will come to be with you.
Some of your bibles, if it's a King James Version, will identify the Holy Spirit as the Comforter, one who, when you're in trouble, comes to help you by giving you comfort.
And now, just to play on that for a moment, here's just an anecdote that has nothing to do with the sermon, but it was too good to pass up.
Okay, you ready?
[Laughter]
When one of you heard that I was going to be speaking on John 16 about the Holy Spirit, which in the King James Version is identified the Comforter, I was sent this account that there was a Bible teacher that had a student turn in a paper.
And the student who turned in the paper had the phrase in it, "Jesus came to take away our guilt."
But there was a typo in the paper, and so it said, "Jesus came to take away our quilt."
[Laughter]
And the sharp Bible teacher said, in the notes, "That's okay; He promised to send us His Comforter."
[Laughter]
See, wasn't that worth it?
[Laughter]
See?
[Laughter and clapping]
The notion of a cu--, helper truly is there.
And the reason for the help is expressed not just in the name but in the circumstances that Jesus is describing.
Why would we need such a helper?
Jesus is going.
Remember, He says that.
Verse 5, "'Now I am going to him who sent me, and none of you asks me, 'Where are you going?'
But because I have said these things, sorrow has filled your heart.'"
It's the time of Passover.
We're in the middle of a series of passages that are describing everything from the moment that Jesus washed His disciples feet, then celebrated the Last Supper with them and then finally utters a prayer for them before He is going.
This is to be a time of celebration.
This is the Jewish Christmas party.
This is the time in which we are to celebrate the release from slavery of the ancient people of Israel.
And, yet, Jesus is saying, "Though you are celebrating, I'm telling you something:  I'm going."
And He has already expressed to them, "I am going to where the chief priests and the scribes will cause my death, and the people of the city will spit on Me, flog Me, crucify Me."
And here in this celebration meal, He's saying it all again.
And they are so filled with sorrow they can't even speak.
And Jesus is saying, "But it's for your good, because though I am going, there is someone I am going to send to help you, even through this."
And the problem is not merely that Jesus is going but that troubles are coming.
Verses 2 and 3 of chapter 16.
Jesus is saying to these disciples, "'They, that is my enemies, will put you out of the synagogues.
Indeed, the hour is coming when whoever kills you will think that he is offering service to God.'"
It's so interesting that in the church today when we try to recruit disciples, it's so easy to talk about how easy life will be, how Jesus will make everything smooth and pleasant, and Jesus, when He tries to recruit disciples, say, "They're going to kill you.
They will cast you out of the synagogues.
You will be persecuted.
I promise you, that's what's going to happen.
But despite the persecution that you will face, I will send a Helper, and I will be present by the one who comes to help you, even in the worst of your trials."
And the nature of the trials is even discouraging to us if you think of what it's saying.
Who is going to be doing this?
All the persecution of Christ's disciples?
Those who think they are serving God.
Listen, some of you are here in this church today because you're just beginning to explore again the things of God.
And somewhere in your past, there was a church or a family, people who believing they were doing service to God hurt you.
And you're just finding your way back here, wondering if these people are any different and this place is any different.
And I cannot assure you that you will not experience hurt even here, even again.
But what I can assure you is what Jesus is promising:  that there may not be an absence of external pressure, persecution, force and unfairness, but inside will be the ministry of Jesus Himself, because He said in John 14, just getting to this, He said, "I will not leave you orphans; I will come to you."
And now He is explaining how that happens.
He will come to us in the Person of the Holy Spirit.
It is so interesting that in this passage that is talking so much about who that Holy Spirit is, the Helper, the Comforter, the Advocate, that every time Jesus describes the Holy Spirit, the pronoun that He uses is a masculine singular.
He will help you.
He will come to you.
As Jesus is saying, "This is not some sort of abstract, ethereal, impersonal force.
This is somebody who is real, who is personal, who will come to you and will minister in My name, so much so that it will be as though I have come to you, not by the external expressions but by My Spirit ministering within you.
You will begin to know that I am with you, regardless of what you must face."
And that's a promise, not just because of bad things that may happen but because of things that are internal to us as well.
I wonder if some of you flinched when I read verse 5.
Verse 5, as Jesus is talking about Him going away, He concludes this way in verse 5:  "'I'm going away to him who sent me, and none of you ask me, 'Where are you going?''"
I mean, you may remember that a few weeks ago we read a passage of scripture in which somebody very explicitly asked Jesus at this very dinner, "Where are you doing?"
You want to see it?
It's in John 13.
If you look in John 13 and verse 36, Jesus has at this point, earlier in this meal, announced to His disciples that He's leaving.
And in verse 36 of John 13, Simon Peter said to Him, "'Lord, where are you going?'"
I mean, it's the very same question.
"Jesus answered him, 'Where I am going you cannot follow me, but you will follow afterward.'
Peter said to him, 'Lord, why can I not follow you now?
I will lay down my life for you.'
Jesus answered, 'Will you lay down your life for me?
Truly, truly, I say to you:  The rooster will not crow till you have denied me three times.'"
Now it's later in the meal.
And Jesus has said again, "I'm going away, and none of you ask me, 'Where are you going?'"
And you can just kind of hear the disciples, "Well, sure, we heard what happens when we ask, 'Where are you going?'"
[Laughter]
You know, I don't want to hear you say to me what you said to Peter.
[Laughter]
And so nobody answers.
But the reality is, they will all betray Him.
Every single one of them will abandon Him.
Every single one will turn their backs.
Every single one will let Him suffer alone.
And for these who will betray Him, what does Jesus promise?
"I will send a helper for you."
He knows who they are, and He knows what they will struggle with are not just bad times but difficulties within their own hearts, the betrayal that's in them as well.
And the wonderful thing that Jesus is saying to you and to me is He is not waiting for us to qualify to some level of spiritual hierarchy before the Holy Spirit will work in our hearts:  that what God is saying is, "I give the Holy Spirit for the bad times and the difficult people too, even those who would betray Me."
And, folks, that's all of us at times:  that God is promising His Holy Spirit not for those who have lea--, reached some level of perfection but for those who struggle, those whose lives are not right.
But He is saying, "Listen, I don't know what you're facing, and I don't know what's in you, but My Holy Spirit is coming to help you."
A number of you tease me for being a lifetime Cardinal fan.
But the reason for that, and some of you will know, I was raised in the South.
And for a long time before expansion, Saint Louis was the southernmost and the westernmost team before expansion.
And that means it broadcast across the South, and kind of my experience as a child was listening to Harry Caray and Jack Buck on the radio, in the kitchen as my father would listen to game at night.
And as I got a little older and I could remember a particular TV ad that went across the screen at some point, it was somebody who wonderfully captured kind of the experience of so many different people and so many different settings.
The TV screen showed firemen and a firehouse around a table listening to the voice of Jack Buck.
A plumber under a sink, radio going, listening to the voice of Jack Buck.
Family at a barbeque, radio turned up, listening to the voice of Jack Buck.
And the message was:  No matter what you're doing, no matter your circumstance, there is a voice that can reach you.
That was for the baseball Cardinals.
Jesus says it's from heaven itself:  that your circumstances may be awful and you may have failed God yourself, but regardless of those circumstance, there is the voice of the Holy Spirit in the amazing and in the mundane.
Where the mother is dealing with diapers and dishes; where the father is wondering whether or not he should stay any longer in a place that is so hard; where a business man is using profit to care for hurting people and it doesn't seem that anybody notices at all; that the promise of God through Jesus is that the Holy Spirit is whispering in our tears and shouting in our triumphs, "I am here for you; I am here, and I'm not waiting for you to get to some place or some level of spiritual hierarchy.
I am here for you.
I am sent to help you by Jesus Himself."
And when He comes, what then is His job?
That's verse 8 as Jesus in chapter 16 and verse 8 says what the Holy Spirit will do.
"'When he comes, this Holy Spirit will convict the world concerning sin and righteousness and judgment.'"
Now, for those of us longtime in the church, it's kind of easy to interpret those words a certain way.
When the Holy Spirit comes, His job is to convict the world of sin, what it's doing wrong; and righteousness, that is you haven't done enough right things, your lack of righteousness; and judgment, that is hell to come for those who have not claimed the name of Jesus.
And let me say while all of those things are true, it is too easy an interpretation of this passage.
That word "convict" is again a legal term.
Remember the Holy Spirit comes to be our Advocate?
He also comes to convict the world, first of sin.
That's easy.
We recognize the job of the Holy Spirit is to make us aware of how our lives are not right before God, that He is holy and we are not.
And that is something the church can sometimes be mistaken about:  that we believe, so we will not turn off people who we want to come to our church, that we can't talk about sin.
And we recognize, should recognize, that the very job of the Holy Spirit is to open peoples' hearts to the reality of sin so that they will long for and seek the grace of God and the gospel.
In fact, you just never have a time in which people who are being brought to an awareness of the grace of Jesus Christ are not saying, "I suddenly recognized I was a sinner before God; I needed Jesus, because I knew sin was in my life."
That is the actual job of the Holy Spirit.
And we can make a mistake of never touching on sin for the fake of, for the sake of offending people.
And we should just recognize that's what the Spirit uses to bring a reality of the understanding of grace.
But while one mistake is to never touch on the subject of sin, another mistake is to never get off of it, as though we think by our emotion or force of argument that somehow we are going to convince people of their sin.
I mean, I so much appreciated Mike Jackson's prayer earlier, urging us to pray for the young people to whom he's ministering by saying, "You know what?
We can't change people.
It's only the Holy Spirit who can do that."
And we must recognize that what we are asking the Spirit to do when we talk about sin is to convict people of things we cannot convict them of.
But then if they are experiencing that guilt for sin, we have this amazing privilege of saying, "You know what?
If you're worried about your guilt of sin, praise God.
You could not have experienced that guilt for sin if the Holy Spirit were not working in you.
It's the Spirit's job to convict you of sin."
So if you are feeling the weight of sin in your life in which we sometimes say, "I don--, I'm not sure I'm a Christian.
I'm not sure I should come to church.
I'm not sure I should be involved because I have sin in my life."
I want to say:  Are you concerned about sin in your life?
Yes.
Praise God!
That's the evidence of the Spirit in you.
You could not feel that were it not for the Spirit at work in you.
And so we have to tell people when they feel that conviction of sin, "You have to know that's the Holy Spirit directing you to the grace of God."
We don't stay on this theme if there's something the Spirit's needing to direct you toward.
Now, I'll tell you something:  Not all people feel that conviction of sin.
And so the job of the Holy Spirit is not only to convict of sin.
Remember, there was something next?
The Spirit's job is to convict of sin.
What was the next thing on the list?
Righteousness.
That's interesting.
Not your lack of righteousness:  The job of the Holy Spirit is to convict you of your righteousness, to bring to light, to expose for what it is, to prove the necessity of convicting your righteousness.
You know that.
Isaiah 64:6 says what?
All our righteousness is only what to God?
Filthy rags.
And, yet, our tendency is to say, "I'm okay with God because of what I've done; I'm righteous."
And what happens when God is truly at work among a people is we begin to repent of our righteousness, not just our sin.
We begin to recognize the great disproportion between our best works and God's true holiness.
And we say, "God, what I've been doing for so much of my life is I've been balancing the scales.
I've been saying, 'Well, I'm not terrible, but, you know, the good kind of outweighs the bad.'"
And we do not recognize that Jesus Himself would say when we've done all that we should do, we are still unworthy servants.
It is not our righteousness that makes us right before God.
It is Christ's righteousness that makes us right before God.
And the Spirit of God comes to condemn, to convict us of our righteousness.
It is always the way it happens when there is a great movement of the Spirit in the Church of Jesus Christ.
We think that revivals happen when somehow out there in the world people become aware of their sin and they turn to Christ.
Do you know the great revivals that we know about are when the people of God are convicted of their righteousness?
I am not, Father, worthy of You.
You must do something in my behalf.
I begin to recognize it is not what I do or could do that would make me right before You.
I stand convicted of my righteousness, not just of my sin.
And that's when we fall on our knees and are broken and begin to be humble with the people who so much need the work of the gospel in their lives too.
You want to see it?
Remember the last thing we would be judged for.
Right?
The Holy Spirit comes to convict the world of sin and righteousness.
And what was number three?
Judgment.
Now, if you say, "Well, there will be a judgment down the road," yes, I understand that.
But that's not what this is saying.
The Holy Spirit will convict us of our judgment.
That what we are doing so often is we are making ourselves right before God by a process of comparison.
How do I know I'm right before God?
Well, I'm not perfect, I'm just better than you are.
[Laughter]
And so we establish our righteousness by our judgment of others.
Right?
I mean, it's got, you know, that old anecdote, you know?
The two guys running from the bear, right?
One slows down to put on the tennis shoes.
The other says, "You can't outrun a bear, right?"
What does he say?
"I don't have to outrun a bear."
What?
"I just have to outrun you."
[Laughter]
Well, I'm not holy, I know.
I'm just holier than you.
Or those people out there, the ones whose lifestyles we don't approve or dress we don't approve or relationships we don't approve.
I'm just not like that.
The Holy Spirit will convict us of our judgment.
I think of the things we talk about in this Comprehensive Calling and all these things that we would hope to happen as a church.
But I recognize it is just spit in the wind if our hearts have not been changed.
And what will change our hearts is when the Holy Spirit convicts us of our righteousness and ultimately shows us that we're depending on our righteousness by convicting us of our judgment.
Do you want to hear how it works?
Friend of mine, some of you may know, Trevin Wax, a pastor.
He writes a lot.
And he wrote recently an article simply entitled "I Weep for Miley."
In this, he talks about his movement from judgment to the compassion of Christ.
"Picking up a sandwich today, I saw a news report on CNN about Miley Cyrus' latest performance.
I was shocked."
And for the rest of the day, he fumed.
"What kind of people are we?
What kind of culture is this?"
But then as the Holy Spirit began to work in his heart, the judgment was broken by Christ's compassion.
"Tonight," he wrote, "I do not judge; I weep.
I weep for the little girl who gave us Hannah Montana and became a role model to millions of little girls across America.
I weep for the lostness of that girl who doesn't see herself stumbling about in the dark.
I weep for an entertainment culture that celebrates the breaking of every taboo, casting off every restraint, only then to mock the stars who follow suit.
I weep for women enslaved by a false view of sexual liberation.
I weep for the times that I've looked at women as objects and failed to see them as someone's sisters or daughters.
I weep for the fathers of Miley Cyrus and Katy Perry and Lady Gaga and Madonna and all the other women who feel that they have to sexualize themselves to have someone else really love them or care for them.
I weep for my 5-year-old daughter who twirls around like a princess and hugs me tight at night, and I think of the world that I will send her into.
I weep for the broken, the messed up world that we live in.
But, finally, I weep for the power of grace.
There's Jesus, lifting up the head of a woman of the night, whom others are ready to judge and stone and then sending her away into the light.
There's Jesus in a crowd, healing a woman desperately trying to cover her shame.
There's Jesus at the well, transforming a woman tossed aside by multiple men.
And then I weep.
I realize that weeping is no longer enough.
I must pray.
I must pray for the work of the Holy Spirit, to convict of sin but also of my righteousness that makes me stand apart and my judgment that condemns rather than shows compassion.
I must pray for the work of the Holy Spirit not just in others but in me.
When that happens, the presence of Christ is most powerful, because I know His compassion for me when I have failed and not lived up and balanced the scales the wrong way."
If the Holy Spirit is ultimately not only coming to us and convicting the world but having convicted left us alone, then there's no reason for Him.
But that's not what the Spirit does.
Having convicted of sin and righteousness and judgment, the final thing Jesus tells us the Spirit will do is complete us:  complete us in Him.
Look at the wonderful words, verse 12.
Jesus, speaking to the disciples, says, "'I still have many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now.'"
Don't you love that verse?
Jesus say, "I'm going to give you time to grow up."
Aren't you glad Jesus gives us time to grow up?
You know, that He's, you don't have to have it all straight right away.
I recognize that there are things; if I were just to tell you everything right now, it would break you.
Haven't you experienced that?
Some of you have been long in the faith.
You know, you kind of have the Spirit put a spotlight on one area of your life, and you recognize that repentance and obedience are called for.
And you begin to work and deal with that.
And you're just so thankful the Spirit gives you victory.
And then what does the Holy Spirit do?
He shifts the spotlight to another area of your life.
And while that's troubling, you say, "Thank You, Lord, for not doing it all at once."
I could not have borne it if You had done it all.
And here is Jesus saying, "Here's the role of the Holy Spirit:  I'm going to bring My light into your life, but right now, I've got more to say than you can bear.
So I'm not going to do it all at once."
What does the Holy Spirit do as He brings more into our life from Jesus over time?
Verse 13, "'When the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all the truth, for he will not speak on his own authority.'"
This is further expansion of what Jesus was saying in John 14, where He says, "When the Holy Spirit comes, He will bring to remembrance everything I have said to you."
Have some of you had that experience?
That you're going through some difficult trial, some awful thing in life, and the witness of the Holy Spirit, in ways that you cannot quite explain, brings to your heart and mind dear truths out of scripture, maybe things that you'd thought about in a certain way long ago, but now they come with fresh meaning to you.
It's why our worship plans are sometimes so difficult as they shift a little bit.
We've been taught the truths and the words of scripture in certain hymns or tunes or ways of expressing, and now when things shift, we feel not, we're just changing preference:  We're changing our connection.
And we have to learn to be gentle with each other and understand that that shift that's occurring.
I can remember in a particular pastoral situation where a person very dear in our church, a young woman, was struck and killed by a drunk driver.
And my having to go speak to her parents to talk about that and announce it to them.
And just so desperate in my own heart:  What will I say; what will I do?
And all that I could think of in those moments were "He leadeth me, oh precious thought, oh words with heavenly comfort wrought.
He leadeth me, wherever I go, whatever I do.
Still 'tis God's Word that leadeth me."
I recognized that just the hymn of my youth was coming in, speaking the truth of scripture to me as I was being reminded:  Jesus would lead me; He would help me.
And I needed it in that moment.
And that's what the Holy Spirit will do.
He'll, He'll guide us into truth.
And there will be moments that we don't even know how it happens, that God will bring to mind, to reference again, the things that are of Christ, the worship of the church, the worship of your youth, the verse that was so meaningful once upon a time has gone out of your memory, and now it comes back, as God, by His Spirit, is completing us in the work of Jesus.
But the best thing is really the last that is said, this work of the Holy Spirit, verse 14.
"'He will glorify me,' says Jesus, '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.'"
What is ultimately the role of the Holy Spirit?
It is to glorify Jesus, to make Jesus known, evident and praised by His people, so that whatever we're facing, the difficulty, the hard thing, that the Spirit's job is to bring to mind and heart and relevance the glory of Jesus.
You know, there are sometimes entire movements that get caught up in focus upon the Holy Spirit, and you have trouble finding a particular verse that says, "You know, that just seems off somehow," until you recognize what Jesus is saying is the role of the Holy Spirit is never to focus on the Spirit.
The role of the Holy Spirit is to focus our eyes on Christ.
And while there be wonderful ways, miraculous ways the Spirit does, the Spirit is not bringing attention to Himself.
He's focusing us on Christ.
But even more, the notion that what Jesus has is being declared.
What does Jesus have?
You know.
John himself tells us:  "Behold what manner of love I have lavished upon you, that you should be called," the what?
The children of God and that is what you are.
Jesus says, "You are mine.
That's what the Holy Spirit will declare to you.
That you are My precious possession.
And no matter the hard things, or the failed things in your life, My Spirit can still be the witness of My presence within you, claiming you for heaven as you trust in Him."
Some of you will know the author Flannery O'Connor who in one of the short stories of young people struggling with the things of God speaks about some young girls in a parochial school who are told by their teacher one day, trying to keep them away from boys and temptation, "Remember, your bodies are the temple of the Holy Spirit."
And leaving class, the girls just begun to chortle and jeer.
"Ha, can you believe it?!
She says we're the temple of the Holy Spirit?"
And they call each other Temple 1 and Temple 2.
[Laughter]
But a younger girl who was with them who is struggling with all the issues the teacher talked about marvels that despite the difficulty in her heart and life that the Holy Spirit of God would make her His temple, that she despite all the difficulties is God's treasured possession by the work of Jesus Christ.
And that's the ministry of the Holy Spirit.
It's His ministry to you too, as you would this day recognize:  What's He doing?
Convicting me of sin.
Listen if He is.
Listen.
But don't let it take you down.
Let it take you to the one to whom the Spirit gives glory.
He calls you His own.
And as you trust in Him, you are His forever.
This is the ministry of the Holy Spirit to your heart this day.

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