The next subject which engaged the attention of Christ Jesus, the Savior the night of His agony, was the Holy Spirit. The prophet Ezekiel had long before foretold that a new Spirit would be given to the world:
I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you; I will take the heart of stone from your body and give you a heart of flesh. I will put mu spirit into you and make you conform to my statutes, keep my laws and live by them. - Ezekiel 36:26-27 -
Adam's body was made when God breathed the spirit of life into him. Israel's tabernacle and temple had to be built before the Shekinah and the glory of God came to take possession of it; so there had to be a renovation within man as the condition of God's own Spirit dwelling there. With the coming of Christ, the fulfillment of the prophecy of Ezekiel began to take place. The Spirit had played a very important role in His life. John the Baptist had foretold two things about Christ: first, that He was the Lamb of God and would take away the sins of the world: and the other, that He would baptize His disciples with the Holy Spirit and with fire. The shedding of the blood was for the sinful; the gift of the Spirit was for His obedient and loving followers. When Our Lord Jesus was baptized in the Jordan, the Holy Spirit came upon Him. He was baptized in the Spirit; but He must suffer before giving that Spirit to others. That is why, the night when His Passion began, He spoke most profoundly of the Spirit. In His conversation with the woman at the well, He said the time was come when true worshipers would worship:
God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and in truth. - John 4:23 -
His words "in Spirit" did not mean a contrast between an internal or sentimental religion as contrasted with external observances, but rather a contrast between worship inspired by the Spirit of God as opposed to a purely natural spirit. "In truth" did not mean "sincere and honest" but rather in Christ, who is the Word or Truth of God. later on, when Our Blessed Lord Jesus promised to give His Body and Blood under the appearance of bread and wine, He implied that He must first ascend to heaven before the Spirit would be given.
What if you see the Son of Man ascending to the place where he was before? The spirit alone gives life; the flesh is of no avail; the words which I have spoken to you are both spirit and life. - John 6:63-64 -
He began by telling them that His death would happen on the following day; they would see Him no longer with eyes of the flesh. A little more time must pass, that is to say, the interval between His death and His Resurrection when they would see Him glorified with their bodily eyes. His loss, he assured them, would be compensated for by a greater blessing than His presence in the flesh. The Apostles could not understand what Jesus was saying about the short interval between His death and Resurrection during which their eyes were to be dimmed.
A little while, and you see me no more, again a little while, and you will see me... Because I am going to my Father. - John 16:16 -
He was now down to the level of the Apostles' mentality, for their principal concern was what would happen to Him. But in two hours they would have a better understanding of these words, for within that time interval the Apostles would momentarily lose sight of their Master, after He was arrested. Because Our Lord Jesus said that He was going to the Father, the Apostles were extremely troubled, for that meant His absence from them, they said:
We do not know what he means. - John 16:18 -
Our Lord Jesus knew that they were eager to question Him further on this point. Their sorrow and wonderment was not just because He said that He was about to leave them, but also because of the disappointment of their hopes, for they had looked to the establishment of some kind of an earthly messianic kingdom. He assured them that while they were presently cast down with grief, the hour would be very brief, just long enough for Him to prove His power over death and to go to His Father. When He passed into the Hour, they would be sad, while His enemies or the world would rejoice. The world would believe that it had done away with Him fore ever. The grief of His chosen ones, however, would be transitory, for the Cross must come before the crown.
In very truth I tell you, you will weep and mourn, but the world will be glad. But though you will be plunged in grief, your grief will be turned to joy. - John 16:20 -
Their passage from sorrow into joy is symbolized by the analogy of the pains and the bliss of motherhood:
A woman in labor is in pain because her time has come; but when the child is born she forgets the anguish in her joy that a man has been born into the world. So it is with you: for the moment you are sad at heart; but I shall see you again, and then you will be joyful, and no one shall rob you of your joy. - John 16:21-22 -
Providence had wisely ordered that the pangs of the mother are compensated for by her joy in her child. So too, the Cross-pangs are the precursors of Resurrection-joys. There must be fellowship with His sufferings before there can be fellowship with His glory. At present, they had sadness because they would no longer see Him in the flesh, but their joy would come through a spiritual quickening, and that joy would have a permanent character about it which the world could not take away.
The nature of this ultimate joy that was to be theirs, the Savior explained in terms of the Comforter or Paraclete whom He send.
I will ask the Father, and he will give you another to be your Advocate, who will be with you for ever - the Spirit of truth. The world cannot receive him, because the world neither sees nor knows him; but you know him, because he dwells with you and is in you... In a little while the world will see me no longer, but you will see me; because I live, you too will live; then you will know that I am in the Father, and you in me and I in you. - John 14:16-20 -
There would be another Comforter or "Another to befriend them." "Another" is not a difference in quality, but rather a distinction of persons. He had been their Comforter; He was at their side; He had been One with them and in His Presence they had gained strength and courage; but their trouble was that He was going. He now promised them another Comforter or Advocate. As He would be the Advocate with God in heaven, so the Spirit dwelling within them would plead the cause of God on earth and be their Advocate. The Divine secret that He gave was that their loss would now have the greater blessing of the coming of the Spirit. The Father had given a twofold revelation of Himself; the Son was His image walking among men, reminding them of the Divine original and also the Model to which they were to be restored. In the Spirit, the Father and the Son would send forth a Divine Power, Who would dwell within them and make of their bodies a temple.
It was better that He go away, for His return to the Father was the condition of the coming of the Spirit. If He remained among them, He would have been only an example to be copied; if He left and sent the Spirit, He would be a veritable life to be lived.
I tell you the truth: it is for your good that I am leaving you. If I do not go, your Advocate will not come, whereas if I go, I will send him to you. - John 16:7 -
The return of His human nature in glory to heaven was a necessary preliminary to the mission of the Spirit. His going would not be a loss but a gain. As the fall of the first man was the fall of his descendants, so the Ascension of the Son of Man would be the ascension of all who were grafted unto Him. His atoning death was the condition of receiving the Spirit of God. If He did not go away, that is to say, unless He died, nothing would be done; the Jews remain as they were, the heathens would remains in their blindness, and all would be under sin and death. The corporal presence had to be removed in order that the spiritual presence might take its place. His continued presence on earth would have meant a localized presence; the descending of the Spirit would mean that He could be in the midst of all men who would be incorporated unto Him.
The indwelling of the Spirit would mean more than His physical presence among them. So long as Our Lord Jesus was with them on earth, His influence was from without inward; but when He would send the Spirit, His influence would radiate from within outward; those who possessed it would have the Spirit of Christ Jesus on earth.
There would be a twofold glorification of Himself: the one by the Father; the other by the Spirit; the one would take place in heaven, and the other on earth. By the one, He is glorified in all who believe in Him:
He will glorify me, for everything that he makes known to you he will draw from what is mine. All that the Father has it mine, and that is why I said, Everything that he makes known to you he will draw from what is mine. - John 16:14-15 -
Jesus Christ would be glorified when His human nature would be seated at the right hand of the Father. But this heavenly spiritual glory could not be truly apprehended unless He sent the Spirit Who reveals the glory of Christ in them by dwelling and working within. Though they knew Christ by the flesh, they are now reassured that they would know Him so no longer.
Obedience was described as the necessary condition of receiving the Spirit:
If you love me you will obey my commands; and I will ask the Father and he will give you another to be your Advocate, who will be with you for ever - the Spirit of truth. - John 14:15-16 -
The Spirit came to Christ in the Jordan after His thirty years of obedience to His Heavenly Father and to His foster father Joseph and His mother. His second act of obedience was accepting the command of the Father to bear the Cross in response to the Divine "must." It was only after obedience that the Spirit would be given to the Apostles. As He sent His Spirit because of His obedience to His Father, so His believers would receive the Spirit through obedience to Him. God dwelt in the temple of Jerusalem because they obeyed His instruction in building it. In the last two chapters of Exodus, eighteen times the expression had been made that all was done as the Lord had commanded. So now as Our Blessed Lord Jesus prepared to make human bodies the temples of His Holy Spirit. He too laid down the same condition that they obey His commandments.
Peter himself would speak of this immediately after Pentecost:
Exalted thus with God's right hand. he received the Holy Spirit from the Father, as was promised, and all that you now see and hear flows from him. - Acts 2:33 -
He next explained that the Spirit would teach them new truths by recalling the old truths, and would recall the old truths in the teaching of the new. Christ had communicated a germinal form of truth, but not its fullness. When He sent His Spirit, there would be an extraordinary refreshment of memory and a conviction of truth which would surpass even the preparatory knowledge.
Your Advocate, the Holy Spirit whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you everything, and will call to mind all that I have told you. - John 14:26 -
As a light shone on the Old Testament through the coming Christ, so a light would shine on the life of Christ through the Spirit. The strengthening office of the Spirit was thus brought into immediate connection with Christ's illuminating office of a Teacher. Those who would get back to the pure form of the Gospel forget that the Master of the Gospel, Christ Himself, spoke of the development, the evolution, the unfolding of His Truth through the Apostles. As the Son had made known the Father, so the Spirit would make known the Son; as the Son had glorified the Father, so the Spirit would glorify Christ. It was indeed only after the Resurrection and the Descent of the Holy Spirit that the Apostles remembered the things that He had said to them, and also came into full comprehension of the meaning of the Cross and Redemption.
There were two trees in the Garden of Paradise: the tree of Divine Life, and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. It was God's plan to have man remain with Him through communion with the tree of life which he should eat and thereby live for ever. Satan assured man that the way to peace was through the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. But man forgot that when evil is in him, it begins to take possession of him. By the false path of the knowledge of good and evil, man was led to destruction. Now the tree of life is erected on Calvary and given again to man. The tree of life then became the tree not of the knowledge of good and evil, but the tree of Truth itself through the Spirit.
When he comes who is the Spirit of truth, he will guide you into all the truth, for he will not speak on his own authority, but will tell only what hears; and he will make known to you the things that are coming. - John 16:13 -
He said that the Spirit of Truth that comes from the Father and Himself would cause truth to enter the soul in such a way as to make it a reality. Natural truth is on the surface of the soul, but Divine truth is in its depths. To know the Father one must know the Son; to know the Son, one must have the Spirit, for the Spirit will reveal the Son who said:
I am the truth. - John 14:6 -
If all mankind needed was a teacher, man would long ago have been holy, for he has had teaches from the Indian sages up to this very hour. But it takes more than the spirit of man to make a man holy, or to know the truth; it requires the Spirit of Truth. Human truths can be known only by living them and Divine truths can be lived only by living in the Spirit.
In His promise of the Spirit, Our Lord Jesus affirmed four truths concerning Himself. First, He said that He had "come out from the Father" in other words, He is generated from all eternity as the Word or the Son of God. Next He said, "I am come into the world" which referred to His Incarnation and the revelation of His Godhead to men.
Third, "I am leaving the world" which meant His rejection by the world, His sufferings, His Passion, and His death. Now He told His Apostles, "I go to the Father" which referred to His Resurrection from the dead, His Ascension to the Father and glory, and the Descent of His Spirit. What effect these basic truths would have on the world He now proceeded to elaborate.
When he comes, he will confute the world, and show where wrong and right and judgment lie. He will convict them of wrong, by their refusal to believe in me; he will convince them that right is on my side, by showing that I go to the Father when I pass from your sight; and he will convince them of divine judgment, by showing that the Prince of this world stands condemned. - John 16:8 -
This is the description of the triple victory which the Holy Spirit would gain over the world through the Apostles - a victory not physical, but moral. On the one side, there would be Divine truth, on the other, the false spirit of the world. The mission of the Spirit would be one of convicting and proving the world wrong in three areas: the world's view of sin, the world's view of righteousness, the world's view of judgment.
He will convict them of wrong, by their refusal to believe in me. - John 16:9 -
The first conviction of the Holy Spirit or demonstration would be the truth that man is sinful. Sin is never understood fully in terms of a law that is broken; evil is revealed when there is seen what it does to one who is loved. The unbelief which produced the Crucifixion was, therefore, sin in its essence. Sin in its fullness, is the rejection of Christ. The usual way to win men to truth is by some popular appeal. But the Spirit will win men to truth by convincing them of their sinfulness; in doing this, there would be revealed the fact that Christ was primarily a Redeemer or Savior from sin.
The ministry of the Spirit would convict the world of sin from another point of view, because it refused to believe in Him. By unbelief or by refusing to accept the deliverance from sin which Christ brought, antagonism to the Divine is affirmed. The very unbelief which men would show toward Him would unveil sin in its hiding place. Nothing but the Spirit could convince man of sin; conscience could not, for it can sometimes be smothered; public opinion cannot, for it sometimes justifies sin; but the gravest sin of all which the Spirit would reveal not be intemperance, avarice, or lust, but unbelief in Christ. It is this same Spirit of God which renders the sinner not merely conscious of his state, but also contrite and penitent, when he accepts Redemption.
To reject the Redeemer is to prefer evil to good. The crucifix is an an autobiography in which man can read the story of his own life, either to his own salvation or his own condemnation. So long as sin was regarded only from a psychological point of view, the Cross of Christ appeared as an exaggeration. The sand of the desert, the blood of a beast, or water could just as well purify man. But once sin was seen under the sight of Infinite Holiness, then the Cross of Christ alone could equal and satisfy for this tragic horror.
The second indictment of the Spirit had to do with righteousness.
He will convince them that right is on my side, by showing that I go to the Father when I pass from your sight. - John 16:10 -
At first it seemed far fetched to see how Christ could say that His Ascension to the Father would have anything to do with uprightness of heart. But He here added to what was said about sin. As the world sometimes sees sin only in acts of transgressions and not in unbelief, so it often sees righteousness in acts of philanthropy but not in the justification which man has at the right hand of the Father through Christ. Once Our Lord Jesus ascended into heaven, the Spirit would show how wrong the world was in regarding Him as a criminal and as a malefactor. The Ascension upset all the world's standards of right and wrong. The fact that the Father exalted Him at His right hand would prove that all the charges against Him were false. It was the world that was unrighteous in rejecting Him.
Once man is convinced of his own sinfulness, he cannot be convinced of his own righteousness; once a man is convinced that Christ has saved him from sin, then he is convinced that Christ is his righteousness. But one cannot talk righteousness to one who is not a sinner. The Pharisee in front of the temple was convinced of his own righteousness; the temple leaders put Jesus to death were convinced of their own righteousness. Good Friday seemed to ascribe sin to Christ and righteousness to His judges, but Pentecost and the coming of the Spirit would assign righteousness to the Crucified and sin to His judges. To those who rejected Him, righteousness would one day appear as a terrible justice; to the sinful men who accepted Him and allied themselves to His life, righteousness would show itself as mercy.
He will convince them of divine judgment, by showing that the Prince of this world stands condemned. - John 16:11 -
The last of the three convictions had to do with judgment. When sin and righteousness collide, there will be judgment in which sin will be destroyed. The one who is judged here is the "one who rules the world" or Satan, the prince of the world. The judgment of the prince of the world was effected by the Cross and the Resurrection, for evil could never do anything mightier than slay the Son of God in the flesh. Defeated in that, it could never be victorious again. Adam and Eve, after their sin, were confronted with the righteousness of God, and the judgment was exile from paradise; in the Deluge, the sins of mankind were confronted with the holiness of God, and the flood came as judgment; when Israel came out of Egypt, the Exodus was accomplished by a Divine judgment; so now when the Spirit of Truth is come, He will bring home to the hearts and minds of men the judgment that was inherent in Our Lord Jesus's life and death and His ultimate victory over evil. The world would not be convicted in its own eyes, but it would be convicted in the eyes of those whose vision has been purged by the Cross. The Holy Spirit would reveal to men the true nature of the great drama that was consummated on the Cross.
BY ARCHBISHOP FULTON J. SHEEN ( 1895 to 1979 )
Page 2
If you wish to donate. Thank You. God bless.
By bank transfer/cheque deposit:
Name: Alex Chan Kok Wah
Bank: Public Bank Berhad account no: 4076577113
Country: Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.
Sunday, May 24, 2009
I have through years of reading, pondering, reflecting and contemplating, the 3 things that last; FAITH . HOPE . LOVE and I would like to made available my sharing from the many thinkers, authors, scholars and theologians whose ideas and thoughts I have borrowed. God be with them always. Amen!
I STILL HAVE MANY THINGS TO SAY TO YOU BUT THEY WOULD BE TOO MUCH FOR YOU NOW. BUT WHEN THE SPIRIT OF TRUTH COMES, HE WILL LEAD YOU TO THE COMPLETE TRUTH, SINCE HE WILL NOT BE SPEAKING AS FROM HIMSELF, BUT WILL SAY ONLY WHAT HE HAS LEARNT; AND HE WILL TELL YOU OF THE THINGS TO COME.
HE WILL GLORIFY ME, SINCE ALL HE TELLS YOU WILL BE TAKEN FROM WHAT IS MINE. EVERYTHING THE FATHER HAS IS MINE; THAT IS WHY I SAID: ALL HE TELLS YOU WILL BE TAKEN FROM WHAT IS MINE. - JOHN 16:12-15 -
Friday, April 5, 2013
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
5. - That there are many things which reason cannot account for, and which are nevertheless true - Nevertheless, when we declare the mir...
-
Indeed, when an account of a person's life written by that person [autobiography] or when the record of any human life is set down, the...
-
Christianity is unique among all the religions of the world. Most of them or if not all non-Christian emphasize the life of the founder, but...
-
- IMMANUEL - GOD IS WITH US - E MMANUEL - GOD WITH US - "WISHING YOU A BLESS...
No comments:
Post a Comment