Tuesday, January 10, 2017

PT-2 Introduction to John 16:1-11


SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 1/10/2017 10:43 AM

My Worship Time                                                                     Focus:  PT-2 Intro to John 16:1-11

Bible Reading & Meditation                                                 Reference:  John 16:1-11

            Message of the verses:  “1 "These things I have spoken to you so that you may be kept from stumbling. 2 “They will make you outcasts from the synagogue, but an hour is coming for everyone who kills you to think that he is offering service to God. 3 “These things they will do because they have not known the Father or Me. 4 “But these things I have spoken to you, so that when their hour comes, you may remember that I told you of them. These things I did not say to you at the beginning, because I was with you. 5 “But now I am going to Him who sent Me; and none of you asks Me, ’Where are You going?’ 6 “But because I have said these things to you, sorrow has filled your heart.  7 "But 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. 8  "And He, when He comes, will convict the world concerning sin and righteousness and judgment; 9  concerning sin, because they do not believe in Me; 10  and concerning righteousness, because I go to the Father and you no longer see Me; 11 and concerning judgment, because the ruler of this world has been judged.”

            We have been talking about the prophecy that Jesus makes in this section, a prophecy that has been and continues to be fulfilled even today, especially in this 21st century.  I want to quote John 3:36 a verse that was spoken by John the Baptist “"He who believes in the Son has eternal life; but he who does not obey the Son will not see life, but the wrath of God abides on him."”  This verse tells us that there are two types of people in this world we live in, the ones who believe that Jesus Christ died for their sins and have accepted His forgiveness, and the ones who do not believe this truth.  There was and continues to be war between these two groups of people.  Man is born with an emptiness in his soul, an emptiness to worship and so if man does not find the right Person to worship then he will worship the wrong thing and that wrong thing is headed up by Satan as he takes advantage of man’s desire to worship.  Jesus says in John 16:2b “but an hour is coming for everyone who kills you to think that he is offering service to God.”  This fits perfectly in with those who are worshiping the wrong thing as their “religion” tells them that what true believers believe is wrong and so they desire to kill them in service to their religion.  Saul of Tarsus is a perfect example of this as he had killed believers because he thought that his Jewish religion was right and the believers were wrong, but later on wrote about this as we have talked about.

            You only have to look at the news to find that ISIS is killing many people who are not Muslims and are purposely targeting true believers, so this continues the killings that were started by the Jews when the church began, followed by the Romans, and then the Roman Church.  The Communists also had an active role in killing believers in the last century as many true believers were killed under Communists leaders, and even today in China the last of these Communists regimes it is not safe to actively live out your faith.

            John MacArthur writes “The theme of persecution, which Jesus introduced in 15:18-25, continues into the opening section of chapter 16.  But as He had done in 15:26-27, the Lord was quick to remind His disciples that they would not face the world’s hostility alone.  Their witness to the world would accompanied and empowered by the witness of the Holy Spirit.  The Spirit would confront the world, not only by testifying to Jesus, but also by convicting sinners of their true heart condition.  Because the Helper was coming to them, the disciples, could remain confident, knowing that though the world system would always oppose them, many within that system would be delivered from its darkness and transferred into the kingdom of light (cf. Col. 1:13).”  On my study of the book of Colossians I am looking at Colossians 1:13 at this time.

            Much of what we learned in chapter 15 is similar to what we are learning in chapter 16, although there are subtle differences in emphasis as John MacArthur points out:  “In chapter 15, Jesus instructed the disciples as to what they were to do (e. g., vv. 4, 9, 10, 12, 14, 17-20).  But in chapter 16 He focused on what God would do for them through the indwelling power of the Holy Spirit (e. g., vv. 1-4, 7, 13-15).  He would comfort, strengthen, and aid the disciples in the midst of their conflict with the world.  As Leon Morris writes, ‘The work of the Holy Spirit in the church is done in the context of persecution.  The Spirit is not a guide and a helper for those on a straight way perfectly able to manage on their own.  He comes to assist men caught in the thick of battle, and tried beyond their strength.  Jesus makes it quite plain that the way before His followers is a hard and a difficult way.’”

            The Holy Spirit’s mission along with the believers is to bear witness to Jesus Christ as we saw in John 15:26-27.  Though God uses Christians to proclaim the gospel, only the Holy Spirit is able to redeem lost sinners as seen in Titus 3:5 “He saved us, not on the basis of deeds which we have done in righteousness, but according to His mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewing by the Holy Spirit.”  The Holy Spirit is the only One who can take a spiritually dead person of which we all are born and bring about new life to them, a miracle that takes place every day.

            The following quote from John MacArthur tells us how this section can be divided up and how we will study it:  “the passage can be outlined around three distinct but related section:  the conflict with the world, the comforting of the disciples, and the convicting by the Spirit.”  We look forward to studying this section beginning in our next SD.

            Spiritual meaning for my life today:  Living all of my life in the United States I have  read about how people have died for the cause of Christ in other lands, and yet God has blessed our country from the effects of this persecution.  I believe that is because our country has always supported the Jewish people and the state of Israel which was established in May of 1948.  We have always given people freedom to worship the Lord in our churches and not persecuted them if the gospel was brought up in the schools, that is up until a few years ago when prayer was outlawed in the schools.  Satan is working hard to divide this country and because our President did not veto a resolution in the United Nations a few weeks ago that went directly against Israel Satan has won another battle.  I am praying that the Lord will continue to have mercy on our country and use our new President to reverse things that have gone wrong like getting out of the United Nations all together, like putting the right judges on our Supreme court so the awful practice of killing babies in the womb will end, giving rights to the unborn as God does.  Continue to pray that God will have mercy on our nation and we as believers will make our requests known to the Lord to stop the killing of unborn babies, and continue to support Israel.

My Steps of Faith for Today:  Pray for our nation.

Memory verse for the week:  (Romans 6:12) “Therefore do not let sin reign in your mortal body so that you obey its lusts;

Answer to yesterday’s Bible question:  “Nebuchadnezzar” (2 Kings 24:10-16).

Today’s Bible question:  “What is the fifth book of the Pentateuch?”

Answer in our next SD.

1/10/2017 11:27 AM   

No comments:

Post a Comment