Category: John 16

The passage we have now read is a very remarkable portion of Scripture, for two reasons. On the one hand, it forms a suitable conclusion to our Lord’s long parting address to His disciples. It was meet and right that such a solemn sermon should have a solemn ending. On the other hand it contains the most general and unanimous profession of belief that we ever find the Apostles making:–“Now are we sure that Thou knowest all things: . . . by this we believe that Thou camest forth from God.”

That there are things hard to be understood in the passage it would be useless to deny. But there lie on its surface three plain and profitable lessons, to which we may usefully confine our attention.

Not all Christ’s sayings were understood by His disciples. We are told this distinctly in the passage we have now read.–“What is this that He saith? We cannot tell what He saith.”–None ever spoke so plainly as Jesus. None were so thoroughly accustomed to His style of teaching as the Apostles. Yet even the Apostles did not always take in their Master’s meaning. Surely we have no right to be surprised if we cannot interpret Christ’s words. There are many depths in those who we have no line to fathom. But let us thank God that there are many sayings of our Lord recorded which no honest mind can fail to understand. Let us use diligently the light that we have, and not doubt that “to him that hath more shall be given.”

We learn, for one thing, in these verses, that Christ’s absence from the earth will be a time of sorrow to believers, but of joy to the world. It is written, “Ye shall weep and lament, but the world shall rejoice.” To confine these words to the single point of Christ’s approaching death and burial, appears a narrow view of their meaning. Like many of our Lord’s sayings on the last evening of His earthly ministry, they seem to extend over the whole period of time between His first and second advents.

When our Lord in this passage speaks of the Holy Spirit “coming,” we must take care that we do not misunderstand His meaning. On the one hand, we must remember that the Holy Ghost was in all believers in the Old Testament days, from the very beginning. No man was ever saved from the power of sin, and made a saint, except by the renewing of the Holy Ghost. Abraham, and Isaac, and Samuel, and David, and the Prophets, were made what they were by the operation of the Holy Ghost. On the other hand, we must never forget that after Christ’s ascension the Holy Ghost was poured down on men, as individuals, with far greater energy, and on the nationals of the world at large, with far wider influence than He was ever poured out before. It is this increased energy and influence that our Lord has in view in the verses before us. He meant that after His own ascension the Holy Ghost would “come” down into the world with such a vastly increased power, that it would seem as if He had “come” for the first time, and had never been in the world before.

The opening verses of this chapter contain three important utterances of Christ, which deserve our special attention.

For one thing, we find our Lord delivering a remarkable prophecy. He tells His disciples that they will be cast out of the Jewish Church, and persecuted even to the death:–“They shall put you out of the synagogues: yea, the time cometh, that whosoever killeth you will think that he doeth God service.”