Saturday, December 7, 2024

John 16:1-11

 John 16:1-11


How often do we develop a fantasy of Messianic bliss? How often do we portray discipleship in terms of “Happy ever after”?  With a misunderstanding and misapplication of ‘abundant life’ we set up those we teach and ourselves for disappointment.  Jesus tells His disciples that as a result of their loyalty to Him they will suffer dramatically.  He tells them not so they can avoid suffering but so that they will not be tripped up by it.  


I fear that “positive mental attitude”, ‘possibility thinking’, ‘prosperity gospel’ and such has infected Christianity to the point we are unaware, unwilling or afraid to address the high cost of being a disciple.  In the absence of presenting the cost of discipleship we set people up for a stumble.  Either when confronted by the cost of following they decided to walk away from Christ, or they modify orthodox Christianity into something less painful and decidedly more heretical.  


The costly discipleship, marked by suffering as it is, has the advantage of the Holy Spirit coming as our helper.  The Holy Spirit comes and He convicts the world.  To help understand this we can use the phrase “expose the world”.  He exposes that THE sin is unbelief in Jesus as God’s Son and Christ.  All the sins (works of darkness or acts of evil) are merely a product of or expression of the rejection of God’s Son.  He exposes the world’s standing in ‘righteousness’ or Divine justice because Jesus is shown by the Spirit to stand in God’s presence where Holy judgment and justice find their origin.  The Holy Spirit exposes the world’s failure in its commitment to the dark lord of this age, because the resurrection proves that Satan is defeated.  


The message that makes the disciple so much a subject of persecution is a message confirmed by the Holy Spirit, a message of Faith in Jesus as God’s Son.  It is the message that Satan and his system is void.  The source of our hardship works out to actually be our advantage. 

“Lord, help me to see hardship from an eternal perspective, the sign of victory it is.  AMEN”

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