John 16:7-14 sits inside this longer paragraph.
1“I have said these things to you so that you wouldn’t be caused to stumble. 2They will put you out of the synagogues. Yes, the time comes that whoever kills you will think that he offers service to God. 3They will do these things because they have not known the Father, nor me. 4But I have told you these things, so that when the time comes, you may remember that I told you about them. I didn’t tell you these things from the beginning, because I was with you. 5But now I am going to him who sent me, and none of you asks me, ‘Where are you going?’ 6But because I have told you these things, sorrow has filled your heart. 7Nevertheless I tell you the truth: It is to your advantage that I go away, for if I don’t go away, the Counselor won’t come to you. But if I go, I will send him to you. 8When he has come, he will convict the world about sin, about righteousness, and about judgment; 9about sin, because they don’t believe in me; 10about righteousness, because I am going to my Father, and you won’t see me any more; 11about judgment, because the prince of this world has been judged.
12“I still have many things to tell you, but you can’t bear them now. 13However when he, the Spirit of truth, has come, he will guide you into all truth, for he will not speak from himself; but whatever he hears, he will speak. He will declare to you things that are coming. 14He will glorify me, for he will take from what is mine, and will declare it to you. 15All things that the Father has are mine; therefore I said that he takes of mine and will declare it to you. 16A little while, and you will not see me. Again a little while, and you will see me.”
John Calvin 1540 · Public Domain On vv7–14 7. Yet I tell you the truth. That they…
7. Yet I tell you the truth. That they may no longer wish to have him present before their eyes, he testifies that his absence will be advantageous, and makes use of a sort of oath; for we are carnal, and consequently nothing is more difficult than to tear from our minds this foolish inclination, by which we attempt to draw down Christ from heaven to us. He explains where the advantage lies, by saying that the Holy Spirit could not be given to them, if he did not leave the world. But far more advantageous and far more desirable is that presence of Christ, by which he communicates himself to us through the grace and power of his Spirit, than if he were present before our eyes. And here we must not put the question, “Could not Christ have drawn down the Holy Spirit while he dwelt on earth?” For Christ takes for granted all that had been decreed by the Father and, indeed, when the Lord has once pointed out what he wishes to be done, to dispute about what is possible would be foolish and pernicious.
John Calvin's Commentaries (1540-1563) — public domain. Text from the Calvin Translation Society English edition (1840s-50s) via the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (ccel.org). Calvin's coverage is partial (roughly two-thirds of the Bible); uncommented books and verses are honest gaps, never fabricated. The 19th-century editor's footnotes and remarks are omitted so the notes are faithfully Calvin's own voice.
Geneva Bible translators 1599 · Public Domain On vv7, 8, 10, 11, 12, 14 The absence of Christ, according to the flesh, is…
The absence of Christ, according to the flesh, is profitable to the Church, that we may wholly depend upon his spiritual power.
Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain.
John Trapp 1656 · Public Domain On vv7–14 7 Nevertheless I tell you the truth; It is…
7 Nevertheless I tell you the truth; It is expedient for you that I go away: for if I go not away, the Comforter will not come unto you; but if I depart, I will send him unto you.
Ver. 7. I will send him unto you] This our Saviour often repeats, that they might once take notice of it, as an inestimable favour, that God should pour forth his Spirit upon all flesh, Joe 2:28. What so precious as spirit? what so vile as flesh? It is received among the Turks, that when Christ said that though he departed, he would send them a Comforter, it was added in the text, And that shall be Mahomet; but that the Christians in malice toward them have razed out those words. Is not this the efficacy of error
John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Matthew Poole 1685 · Public Domain On vv7–14 He doth not say it was expedient for him,…
He doth not say it was expedient for him, though this was truth; for his human nature was not till his ascension glorified, as afterward, Joh 17:5; but he saith it was expedient for them. The saints may desire a dissolution, but it is for their own advantage, Phi 1:23. Christ desires it for their advantage; because the Holy Spirit could not come upon them (as in the days of Pentecost) until he by his death had made reconciliation for iniquity; and God had so ordered the counsels of eternity, that Christ should first die, rise again, and ascend into heaven, and then he would pour out his Spirit upon all flesh, as one eminent fruit of Christ’s meritorious death and passion, Act 2:32,33; Eph 4:11. We are not able to give certain reasons of the counsels of God; but the reasonableness of them in this very particular may easily be concluded: that the sending of the Spirit might appear to be the fruit of Christ’s death: that the Messiah’s influence upon the sending of him jointly with the Father, might appear; for he was to be sent from Christ glorified, Joh 7:39; that the Spirit might glorify Christ, as we have it, Joh 16:14; for (saith that verse) He shall receive of mine, and shall show it unto you: and that the world might better understand the mystery of the Trinity. The Father was by all owned to be in heaven. The Son ascended up to heaven in the presence of many witnesses. The Spirit descended from heaven with great majesty and glory, as may be read. Act 2:2,3.
Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
William Burkitt 1703 · Public Domain On vv7, 8, 12, 14 In these words our Saviour urges his disciples to…
In these words our Saviour urges his disciples to submit to his departure, as that which would make way for his sending the Comforter to them; which he assures them, would be of more advantage to them than his own stay and continuance amongst them.
Thence learn, that the presence of the Holy Spirit with us is a greater comfort and advantage to us than the presence of Christ in the flesh amongst us.
Read full note →
The benefit of Christ’s conversation was great; but the advantage of the Spirit’s renovation and holy inspiration is much greater; the one encourages and incites us to be holy, but the other quickens and enables us to be holy.
Therefore well might Christ say, It is expedient, or highly necessary and advantageous, for you, that I go away. He subjoins a reason: If I go not away, the Comforter will not come; but if I depart, I will send him to you.
Whence we learn, that Christ’s ascension was indispensibly necessary, in order to the Spirit’s mission; the Spirit could not have descended, if Christ had not first ascended; the Spirit could not come, but by the gift and mission of the Mediator.
Now the sending of the Spirit being a part of Christ’s royalty, as mediator, it was not convenient that the Spirit should be sent, till Christ was crowned, and sat down on his throne in his kingdom: then the Spirit was to make application to us, of the redemption purchased for us.
William Burkitt's Expository Notes on the New Testament (1700–1703) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Matthew Henry 1710 · Public Domain On v7 As it was usual with the Old Testament prophets…
As it was usual with the Old Testament prophets to comfort the church in its calamities with the promise of the Messiah (Isa 9:6; Mic 5:6; Zac 3:8); so, the Messiah being come, the promise of the Spirit was the great cordial, and is still.
Three things we have here concerning the Comforter's coming: -
Read full note →
I. That Christ's departure was absolutely necessary to the Comforter's coming, Joh 16:7. The disciples were so loth to believe this that Christ saw cause to assert it with a more than ordinary solemnity: I tell you the truth. We may be confident of the truth of everything that Christ told us; he has no design to impose upon us. Now, to make them easy, he here tells them,
1. In general, It was expedient for them that he should go away. This was strange doctrine, but if it was true it was comfortable enough, and showed them how absurd their sorrow was. It is expedient, not only for me, but for you also, that I go away; though they did not see it, and are loth to believe it, so it is. Note, (1.) Those things often seem grievous to us that are really expedient for us; and particularly our going away when we have finished our course. (2.) Our Lord Jesus is always for that which is most expedient for us, whether we think so or no. He deals not with us according to the folly of our own choice, but graciously over-rules it, and gives us the physic we are loth to take, because he knows it is good for us.
2. It was therefore expedient because it was in order to the sending of the Spirit. Now observe,
(1.) That Christ's going was in order to the Comforter's coming.
[1.] This is expressed negatively: If I go not away, the Comforter will not come. And why not? First, So it was settled in the divine counsels concerning this affair, and the measure must not be altered; shall the earth be forsaken for them? He that gives freely may recall one gift before he bestows another, while we would fondly hold all. Secondly, It is congruous enough that the ambassador extraordinary should be recalled, before the envoy come, that is constantly to reside. Thirdly, The sending of the Spirit was to be the fruit of Christ's purchase, and that purchase was to be made by his death, which was his going away. Fourthly, It was to be an answer to his intercession within the veil. See Joh 14:16. Thus must this gift be both paid for, and prayed for, by our Lord Jesus, that we might learn to put the greater value upon it. Fifthly, The great argument the Spirit was to use in convincing the world must be Christ's ascension into heaven, and his welcome here. See Joh 16:10, and Joh 7:39. Lastly, The disciples must be weaned from his bodily presence, which they were too apt to dote upon, before they were duly prepared to receive the spiritual aids and comforts of a new dispensation.
[2.] It is expressed positively: If I depart I will send him to you; as though he had said, "Trust me to provide effectually that you shall be no loser by my departure." The glorified Redeemer is not unmindful of his church on earth, nor will ever leave it without its necessary supports. Though he departs, he sends the Comforter, nay, he departs on purpose to send him. Thus still, though one generation of ministers and Christians depart, another is raised up in their room, for Christ will maintain his own cause.
(2.) That the presence of Christ's Spirit in his church is so much better, and more desirable, than his bodily presence, that it was really expedient for us that he should go away, to send the Comforter. His corporal presence could be put in one place at one time, but his Spirit is every where, in all places, at all times, wherever two or three are gathered in his name. Christ's bodily presence draws men's eyes, his Spirit draws their hearts; that was the letter which kills, his Spirit gives life.
II. That the coming of the Spirit was absolutely necessary to the carrying on of Christ's interests on earth (Joh 16:8): And when he is come, elthōn ekeinos. He that is sent is willing of himself to come, and at his first coming he will do this, he will reprove, or, as the margin reads it, he will convince the world, by your ministry, concerning sin, righteousness, and judgment.
1. See here what the office of the Spirit is, and on what errand he is sent. (1.) To reprove. The Spirit, by the word and conscience, is a reprover; ministers are reprovers by office, and by them the Spirit reproves. (2.) To convince. It is a law-term, and speaks the office of the judge in summing up the evidence, and setting a matter that has been long canvassed in a clear and true light. He shall convince, that is, "He shall put to silence the adversaries of Christ and his cause, by discovering and demonstrating the falsehood and fallacy of that which they have maintained, and the truth and certainty of that which they have opposed." Note, Convincing work is the Spirit's work; he can do it effectually, and none but he; man may open the cause, but it is the Spirit only that can open the heart. The Spirit is called the Comforter (Joh 16:7), and here it is said, He shall convince. One would think this were cold comfort, but it is the method the Spirit takes, first to convince, and then to comfort; first to lay open the wound, and then to apply healing medicines. Or, taking conviction more generally, for a demonstration of what is right, it intimates that the Spirit's comforts are solid, and grounded upon truth.
2. See who they are whom he is to reprove and convince: The world, both Jew and Gentile. (1.) He shall give the world the most powerful means of conviction, for the apostles shall go into all the world, backed by the Spirit, to preach the gospel, fully proved. (2.) He shall sufficiently provide for the taking off and silencing of the objections and prejudices of the world against the gospel. Many an infidel was convinced of all and judged of all, Co1 14:24. (3.) He shall effectually and savingly convince many in the world, some in every age, in every place, in order to their conversion to the faith of Christ. Now this was an encouragement to the disciples, in reference to the difficulties they were likely to meet with, [1.] That they should see good done, Satan's kingdom fall like lightning, which would be their joy, as it was his. Even this malignant world the Spirit shall work upon; and the conviction of sinners is the comfort of faithful ministers. [2.] That this would be the fruit of their services and sufferings, these should contribute very much to this good work.
3. See what the Spirit shall convince the world of.
(1.) Of sin (Joh 16:9), because they believe not on me. [1.] The Spirit is sent to convince sinners of sin, not barely to tell them of it; in conviction there is more than this; it is to prove it upon them, and force them to own it, as they (Joh 8:9) that were convicted of their own consciences. Make them to know their abominations. The Spirit convinces of the fact of sin, that we have done so and so; of the fault of sin, that we have done ill in doing so; of the folly of sin, that we have acted against right reason, and our true interest; of the filth of sin, that by it we are become odious to God; of the fountain of sin, the corrupt nature; and lastly, of the fruit of sin, that the end thereof is death. The Spirit demonstrates the depravity and degeneracy of the whole world, that all the world is guilty before God. [2.] The Spirit, in conviction, fastens especially upon the sin of unbelief, their not believing in Christ, First, As the great reigning sin. There was, and is, a world of people, that believe not in Jesus Christ, and they are not sensible that it is their sin. Natural conscience tells them that murder and theft are sin; but it is a supernatural work of the spirit to convince them that it is a sin to suspend their belief of the gospel, and to reject the salvation offered by it. Natural religion, after it has given us its best discoveries and directions, lays and leaves us under this further obligation, that whatever divine revelation shall be made to us at any time, with sufficient evidence to prove it divine, we accept it, and submit to it. This law those transgress who, when God speaketh to us by his Son, refuse him that speaketh; and therefore it is sin. Secondly, As the great ruining sin. Every sin is so in its own nature; no sin is so to them that believe in Christ; so that it is unbelief that damns sinners. It is because of this that they cannot enter into rest, that they cannot escape the wrath of God; it is a sin against the remedy. Thirdly, As that which is at the bottom of all sin; so Calvin takes it. The Spirit shall convince the world that the true reason why sin reigns among them is because they are not by faith united to Christ. Ne putimus vel guttam unam rectitudinis sine Christo nobis inesse - Let us not suppose that, apart from Christ, we have a drop of rectitude. - Calvin.
(2.) Of righteousness, because I go to my Father, and you see me no more, Joh 16:10. We may understand this, [1.] Of Christ's personal righteousness. He shall convince the world that Jesus of Nazareth was Christ the righteous (Jo1 2:1), as the centurion owned (Luk 23:47), Certainly this was a righteous man. His enemies put him under the worst of characters, and multitudes were not or would not be convinced but that he was a bad man, which strengthened their prejudices against his doctrine; but he is justified by the spirit (Ti1 3:16), he is proved to be a righteous man, and not, a deceiver; and then the point is in effect gained; for he is either the great Redeemer or a great cheat; but a cheat we are sure he is not. Now by what medium or argument will the Spirit convince men of the sincerity of the Lord Jesus? Why, First, Their seeing him no more will contribute something towards the removal of their prejudices; they shall see him no more in the likeness of sinful flesh, in the form of a servant, which made them slight him. Moses was more respected after his removal than before. But, Secondly, His going to the Father would be a full conviction of it. The coming of the Spirit, according to the promise, was a proof of Christ's exaltation to God's right hand (Act 2:33), and this was a demonstration of his righteousness; for the holy God would never set a deceiver at his right hand. [2.] Of Christ's righteousness communicated to us for our justification and salvation; that everlasting righteousness which Messiah was to bring in, Dan 9:24. Now, First, The Spirit shall convince men of this righteousness. Having by convictions of sin shown them their need of a righteousness, lest this should drive them to despair he will show them where it is to be had, and how they may, upon their believing, be acquitted from guilt, and accepted as righteous in God's sight. It was hard to convince those of this righteousness that went about to establish their own (Rom 10:3), but the Spirit will do it. Secondly, Christ's ascension is the great argument proper to convince men of this righteousness: I go to the Father, and, as an evidence of my welcome with him, you shall see me no more. If Christ had left any part of his undertaking unfinished, he had been sent back again; but now that we are sure he is at the right hand of God, we are sure of being justified through him.
(3.) Of judgment, because the prince of this world is judged, Joh 16:11. Observe here, [1.] The devil, the prince of this world, was judged, was discovered to be a great deceiver and destroyer, and as such judgment was entered against him, and execution in part done. He was cast out of the Gentile world when his oracles were silenced and his altars deserted, cast out of the bodies of many in Christ's name, which miraculous power continued long in the church; he was cast out of the souls of people by the grace of God working with the gospel of Christ; he fell as lightning from heaven. [2.] This is a good argument wherewith the Spirit convinces the world of judgment, that is, First, Of inherent holiness and sanctification, Mat 12:18. By the judgment of the prince of this world, it appears that Christ is stronger than Satan, and can disarm and dispossess him, and set up his throne upon the ruin of his. Secondly, Of a new and better dispensation of things. He shall show that Christ's errand into the world was to set things to right in it, and to introduce times of reformation and regeneration; and he proves it by this, that the prince of this world, the great master of misrule, is judged and expelled. All will be well when his power is broken who made the mischief. Thirdly, Of the power and dominion of the Lord Jesus. He shall convince the world that all judgment is committed to him, and that he is the Lord of all, which is evident by this, that he has judged the prince of this world, has broken the serpent's head, destroyed him that had the power of death, and spoiled principalities; if Satan be thus subdued by Christ, we may be sure no other power can stand before him. Fourthly, Of the final day of judgment: all the obstinate enemies of Christ's gospel and kingdom shall certainly be reckoned with at last, for the devil, their ringleader, is judged.
III. That the coming of the Spirit would be of unspeakable advantage to the disciples themselves. The Spirit has work to do, not only on the enemies of Christ, to convince and humble them, but upon his servants and agents, to instruct and comfort them; and therefore it was expedient for them that he should go away.
1. He intimates to them the tender sense he had of their present weakness (Joh 16:12): I have yet many things to say unto you (not which should have been said, but which he could and would have said), but you cannot bear them now. See what a teacher Christ is. (1.) None like him for copiousness; when he has said much, he has still many things more to say; treasures of wisdom and knowledge are hid in him, if we be not straitened in ourselves. (2.) None like him for compassion; he would have told them more of the things pertaining to the kingdom of God, particularly of the rejection of the Jews and the calling of the Gentiles, but they could not bear it, it would have confounded and stumbled them, rather than have given them any satisfaction. When, after his resurrection, they spoke to him of restoring the kingdom to Israel, he referred them to the coming of the Holy Ghost, by which they should receive power to bear those discoveries which were so contrary to the notions they had received that they could not bear them now.
2. He assures them of sufficient assistances, by the pouring out of the Spirit. They were now conscious to themselves of great dulness, and many mistakes; and what shall they do now their master is leaving them? "But when he, the Spirit of Truth, is come, you will be easy, and all will be well." Well indeed; for he shall undertake to guide the apostles, and glorify Christ.
(1.) To guide the apostles. He will take care,
[1.] That they do not miss their way: He will guide you; as the camp of Israel was guided through the wilderness by the pillar of cloud and fire. The Spirit guided their tongues in speaking, and their pens in writing, to secure them from mistakes. The Spirit is given us to be our guide (Rom 8:14), not only to show us the way, but to go along with us, by his continued aids and influences.
[2.] That they do not come short of their end: He will guide them into all truth, as the skilful pilot guides the ship into the port it is bound for. To be led into a truth is more than barely to know it; it is to be intimately and experimentally acquainted with it; to be piously and strongly affected with it; not only to have the notion of it in our heads, but the relish and savour and power of it in our hearts; it denotes a gradual discovery of truth shining more and more: "He shall lead you by those truths that are plain and easy to those that are more difficult." But how into all truth? The meaning is,
First, Into the whole truth relating to their embassy; whatever was needful or useful for them to know, in order to the due discharge of their office, they should be fully instructed in it; what truths they were to teach others the Spirit would teach them, would give them the understanding of, and enable them both to explain and to defend.
Secondly, Into nothing but the truth. All that he shall guide you into shall be truth (Jo1 2:27); the anointing is truth. In the following words he proves both these: - 1. "The Spirit shall teach nothing but the truth, for he shall not speak of himself any doctrine distinct from mine, but whatsoever he shall hear, and knows to be the mind of the Father, that, and that only, shall he speak." This intimates, (1.) That the testimony of the Spirit, in the word and by the apostles, is what we may rely upon. The Spirit knows and searches all things, even the deep things of God, and the apostles received that Spirit (Co1 2:10, Co1 2:11), so that we may venture our souls upon the Spirit's word. (2.) That the testimony of the Spirit always concurs with the word of Christ, for he does not speak of himself, has no separate interest or intention of his own, but, as in essence so in records, he is one with the Father and the Son, Jo1 5:7. Men's word and spirit often disagree, but the eternal Word and the eternal Spirit never do. 2. "He shall teach you all truth, and keep back nothing that is profitable for you, for he will show you things to come." The Spirit was in the apostles a Spirit of prophecy; it was foretold that he should be so (Joe 2:28), and he was so. The Spirit showed them things to come, as Act 11:28; Act 20:23; Act 21:11. The Spirit spoke of the apostasy of the latter times, Ti1 4:1. John, when he was in the Spirit had things to come shown him in vision. Now this was a great satisfaction to their own minds, and of use to them in their conduct, and was also a great confirmation of their mission. Jansenius has a pious note upon this: We should not grudge that the Spirit does not show us things to come in this world, as he did to the apostles; let it suffice that the Spirit in the word hath shown us things to come in the other world, which are our chief concern.
(2.) The Spirit undertook to glorify Christ, Joh 16:14, Joh 16:15. [1.] Even the sending of the Spirit was the glorifying of Christ. God the Father glorified him in heaven, and the Spirit glorified him on earth. It was the honour of the Redeemer that the Spirit was both sent in his name and sent on his errand, to carry on and perfect his undertaking. All the gifts and graces of the Spirit, all the preaching and all the writing of the apostles, under the influence of the Spirit, the tongues, and miracles, were to glorify Christ. [2.] The Spirit glorified Christ by leading his followers into the truth as it is in Jesus, Eph 4:21. He assures them, First, that the Spirit should communicate the things of Christ to them: He shall receive of mine, and shall show it unto you. As in essence he proceeded from the Son, so in influence and operation he derived from him. He shall take ek tou emou - of that which is mine. All that the Spirit shows us, that is, applies to us, for our instruction and comfort, all that he gives us for our strength and quickening, and all that he secures and seals to us, did all belong to Christ, and was had and received from him. All was his, for he bought it, and paid dearly for it, and therefore he had reason to call it his own; his, for he first received it; it was given him as the head of the church, to be communicated by him to all his members. The Spirit came not to erect a new kingdom, but to advance and establish the same kingdom that Christ had erected, to maintain the same interest and pursue the same design; those therefore that pretend to the Spirit, and vilify Christ, give themselves the lie, for he came to glorify Christ. Secondly, That herein the things of God should be communicated to us. Lest any should think that the receiving of this would not make them much the richer, he adds, All things that the Father hath are mine. As God, all that self-existent light and self-sufficient happiness which the Father has, he has; as Mediator, all things are delivered to him of the Father (Mat 11:27); all that grace and truth which God designed to show us he lodged in the hands of the Lord Jesus, Col 1:19. Spiritual blessings in heavenly things are given by the Father to the Son for us, and the Son entrusts the Spirit to convey them to us. Some apply it to that which goes just before: He shall show you things to come, and so it is explained by Rev 1:1. God gave it to Christ, and he signified it to John, who wrote what the Spirit said, Rev 1:1.
Matthew Henry's Commentary on the Whole Bible (1708–1710) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Gill 1763 · Public Domain On vv7–14 Nevertheless, I tell you the truth,.... Christ was truth…
Nevertheless, I tell you the truth,.... Christ was truth itself, and could say nothing else; but he makes use of this way of speaking, to raise the attention of his disciples, and to engage their belief of what he was about to say, and of which they were not easily persuaded; which was, that however overwhelmed they were with grief and sorrow, because of his going away from them, a greater truth he could not tell them, than that this would be to their real good and advantage:
it is expedient for you that I go away; Christ's death here, as in many other places in these discourses of his, is signified by going away, a departure, taking a sort of a journey, such an one as indeed is common to all mankind; death is the way of all the earth, and which Christ took by agreement with his Father; a dark way is the valley of the shadow of death, and so it was to Christ, who went away in the dark, under the hidings of his Father's face; it is a man's going to his long home, and a long journey it is, till he returns in the resurrection morn; though it was a short one to Christ, who rose again the third day. The phrase supposes the place and persons he went from, this world and his disciples; and the place and persons he went unto, the grave, heaven, his Father, the blessed Spirit, angels, and glorified saints; and is expressive of the voluntariness of his death; he was not fetched, or thrust, and forced away, but he went away of himself; and is a very easy and familiar way of expressing death by, and greatly takes off the dread and terror of it; it is only moving from one place to another, as from one house, city, or country, to another; and shows, that it is not an annihilation of a man, either in body or soul, only a translating of him from one place and state to another. Now the death of Christ was expedient, not only for himself, which he does not mention; he being concerned more for the happiness of his people than of himself; but for his disciples and all believers; for hereby a great many evils were prevented falling upon them, which otherwise would; as the heavy strokes of divine justice, the curses and condemnation of the law, the wrath and vengeance of God, and eternal death, ruin, and destruction; as well as many good things were hereby obtained for them; as the redemption of their souls from sin, law, hell, and death; peace; reconciliation, and atonement; the full and free forgiveness of all their sins, an everlasting righteousness, and eternal life. Moreover, Christ's going away was expedient for his people; since he went to open the way for them into the holiest of all, by his blood; to take possession of heaven in their name and stead; to prepare mansions of glory for them; to appear in the presence of God for them; to be their advocate, and make intercession for all good things for them; to transact all their business between God them; to take care of their affairs; to present their petitions; to remove all charges and accusations; and to ask for, and see applied every blessing of grace unto them. The particular instanced in, in the text, of the expediency of it, is the mission and coming of the Spirit:
Read full note →
for if I go not away, the Comforter will not come unto you; but if I depart, I will send him to you. The Spirit of God in some sense had come, before the death of Christ; he had appeared in the creation of all things out of nothing, as a joint Creator with the Father and Son; he was come as a spirit of prophecy upon the inspired writers, and others; the Old Testament saints had received him as a spirit of faith; he had been given to Christ as man, without measure, and the disciples had been partakers of his gifts and graces; but he was not come in so peculiar a manner as he afterwards did; as the promise of the Father, the glorifier of Christ, the comforter of his people, the spirit of truth, and the reprover of the world: there are reasons to be given, why the Spirit of God should not come in such a manner before, as after the death of Christ. The order of the three divine persons in the Trinity, and in the economy of man's salvation, required such a method to be observed; that the Father should first, and for a while, be more especially manifested; next the Son, and then the Spirit: besides, our Lord has given a reason himself, why the Spirit "was not yet given, because Jesus was not yet glorified", Joh 7:39; And the coming of the Spirit as a comforter, and the spirit of truth, was to be through the intercession, and by the mission of Christ; and therefore it was proper he should go away first, in order to send him; add to all this, that if Christ had not gone away or died, there would have been nothing for the Spirit to have done; no blood to sprinkle; no righteousness to reveal and bring near; no salvation to apply; or any of the things of Christ, and blessings of grace, to have taken and shown; all which are owing to the death of Christ, and which show the expediency of it: the expediency of Christ's death for the mission of the Spirit to his disciples, is very conspicuous; for hereby they were comforted and supported under a variety of troubles; were led into all truth, and so furnished for their ministerial work; and were made abundantly successful in it, that being attended with the demonstration of the Spirit and of power.
John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Wesley 1765 · Public Domain On vv7–13 It is expedient for you - In respect of…
It is expedient for you - In respect of the Comforter, ver. 7, &c., and of me, ver. 16, &c., and of the Father, ver. 23, &c.
John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.
Adam Clarke 1810 · Public Domain On vv7–13 Verse 7. It is expedient - that I go…
Verse 7. It is expedient - that I go away] In other places he had showed them the absolute necessity of his death for the salvation of men: see Mt 20:19; Mt 26:2; Mr 9:31; Mr 10:33, Lu 9:44; Lu 18:32. This he does not repeat here, but shows them that, by the order of God, the Holy Spirit cannot come to them, nor to the world, unless he first die; and consequently men cannot be saved but in this way.
Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Joseph Benson 1811 · Public Domain On vv7, 9, 12 Joh 16:7-8. Nevertheless, I tell you the truth —…
Joh 16:7-8. Nevertheless, I tell you the truth — I acquaint you with the case just as it is, and tell you the reasons of my going away, though you have not asked them. It is necessary even on your account that I should depart, because, if I go not away, and enter upon my mediatorial office, the Comforter — By whose assistance, as I told you, you are to convert the world, will not visit you: whereas, if I depart — And take possession of my kingdom; I will send him unto you — As the first-fruits of the exercise of my kingly power, to answer all the great and glorious purposes for which you and my church shall need him. And when he is come, he will reprove the world of sin, &c. — Greek, ελεγξει τον κοσμον περι αμαρτιας, &c.; rather, he will convince the world concerning sin, and concerning righteousness, and concerning judgment. So Dr. Campbell, who interprets the passage as follows: “Concerning sin — That is, their sin in rejecting me, whereof the Spirit will give incontestable evidence, in the miracles which he will enable my apostles to perform in my name, and the success with which he will crown their teaching. Concerning righteousness — That is, my righteousness, or innocence, the justice of my cause; of which the same miraculous power, exerted for me by my disciples, will be an irrefragable proof, convincing all the impartial that I had the sanction of Heaven for what I did and taught, and that, in removing me hence, God hath taken me to himself. Concerning judgment — That is, divine judgment, soon to be manifested in the punishment of an incredulous nation, and in defence of the truth.” Dr. Whitby gives nearly the same interpretation of this important paragraph; remarking that the original word, παρακλητος, here used, signifies both an advocate and a comforter; he observes, in explanation of the terms, “He performed the part of an advocate in respect of Christ and his gospel, by convincing the world of sin in their not believing on him, and of the righteousness [the innocence and holiness] of Christ; and by confirming the apostles’ testimony of him, by signs and miracles, and various gifts imparted to them, Heb 2:4; 1Jn 5:6-8; and by pleading their cause before kings and rulers, and against all their adversaries, Mat 10:18-19; Luk 21:15; Act 6:10. In respect of the apostles and the faithful he also did the part of a comforter, as being sent for their consolation and support in all their troubles, filling their hearts with joy and gladness, and giving them an inward testimony of God’s love to them, and an assurance of their future happiness, Rom 8:15-16.”
Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Albert Barnes 1834 · Public Domain On vv7–14 It is expedient for you ... - The reason…
It is expedient for you ... - The reason why it was expedient for them that he should go away, he states to be, that in this way only would the Comforter be granted to them. Still, it may be asked why the presence of the Holy Spirit was more valuable to them than that of the Saviour himself? To this it may be answered:
1. That by his departure, his death, and ascension - by having these great facts before their eyes they would be led by the Holy Spirit to see more fully the design of his coming than they would by his presence. While he was with them, notwithstanding the plainest teaching, their minds were filled with prejudice and error. They still adhered to the expectation of a temporal kingdom, and were unwilling to believe that he was to die. When he should have actually left them they could no longer doubt on this subject, and would be prepared to understand why he came. And this was done. See the Acts of the Apostles everywhere. It is often needful that God should visit us with severe affliction before our pride will be humbled and we are willing to understand the plainest truths.
Read full note →
2. While on the earth the Lord Jesus could be bodily present but in one place at one time. Yet, in order to secure the great design of saving men, it was needful that there should be some agent who could be in all places, who could attend all ministers, and who could, at the same time, apply the work of Christ to people in all parts of the earth.
3. It was an evident arrangement in the great plan of redemption that each of the persons of the Trinity should perform a part. As it was not the work of the Spirit to make an atonement, so it was not the work of the Saviour to apply it. And until the Lord Jesus had performed this great work, the way was not open for the Holy Spirit to descend to perform his part of the great plan; yet, when the Saviour had completed his portion of the work and had left the earth, the Spirit would carry forward the same plan and apply it to men.
4. It was to be expected that far more signal success would attend the preaching of the gospel when the atonement was actually made than before. It was the office of the Spirit to carry forward the work only when the Saviour had died and ascended; and this was actually the case. See Acts 2. Hence, it was expedient that the Lord Jesus should go away, that the Spirit might descend and apply the work to sinners. The departure of the Lord Jesus was to the apostles a source of deep affliction, but had they seen the whole case they would not have been thus afflicted. So God often takes away from us one blessing that he may bestow a greater. All affliction, if received in a proper manner, is of this description; and could the afflicted people of God always see the whole case as God sees it, they would think and feel, as he does, that it was best for them to be thus afflicted.
It is expedient - It is better for you.
The Comforter - See the notes at Joh 14:16.
Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary 1859 · Public Domain On vv7, 8, 13 I tell you ... it is expedient for you…
I tell you ... it is expedient for you that I go: that I leave you, as to my corporal presence: that I suffer death, for the redemption of all men. And if I go not, the Paraclete will not come, according to the order of the divine decrees: his coming to sanctify you with his gifts, and to teach you all things, is not to be till after my ascension. When I am gone, I will send him to you. The Father and I will send him, for he proceedeth from both. (Witham)
George Leo Haydock (1774–1849), Haydock's Catholic Family Bible and Commentary, 1859 edition — public domain. Excludes Psalms (Douay-Rheims chapter numbering differs from Protestant) and Deuterocanonical books (Catholic canon only).
Robert Jamieson, A. R. Fausset & David Brown 1871 · Public Domain On vv7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 14 It is expedient for you that I go away--
It is expedient for you that I go away--
My Saviour, can it ever be
Read full note →
That I should gain by losing thee?
KEBLE.
Yes.
for if I go not away, the Comforter will not come unto you, but if I depart, I will send him unto you--(See on Joh 7:39; Joh 14:15).
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown — Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
Daniel D. Whedon 1874 · Public Domain On vv7–14 The struggle of the Spirit with the world, Joh_16:7-15.
The struggle of the Spirit with the world, Joh_16:7-15.
At once as a consolation and as a prophecy of the future dispensation, our Lord now declares that it is expedient FOR THEM, that he should depart. Why? Because the Christian dispensation is, according to God’s plan, to be, not the dispensation of Christ’s bodily presence, but the dispensation of the Spirit. Christ came and gave that dispensation its start; but the Spirit must give it its development, its maturity, its consummation, until Christ come again and affix its judgment end. The bodily must give place to the spiritual. There must be an invisible Saviour, for the same reason that we have an invisible God; namely, that the souls of men may have room for faith and be developed into growth by faith. That invisible Saviour must be above, that men’s souls may be developed upward, and not downward, heavenward, and not earthward. Men, upon these low grounds of earthly nature, must grow up, and form their probationary character, not under a living present corporeal teacher, but under the impregnating power of a spiritual influence, rendering an elevating faith necessary, as shaping their personality to a firm and solid piety and fitness for heaven. Christ must therefore go, in order that the Spirit may come.
Read full note →
What was obscure to these apostles time has rendered plain to us of the present age. We can now understand that it was God’s great plan, that, once for all, Christ should come as a Saviour in a most miraculous manner; that then he should ascend and leave the world under the secret ministration of the Spirit, with the co-operation of mere human agency, even unto the end. Human agency, Christ being corporeally withdrawn, aided by the Spirit, must establish his Church, gather in the Gentiles, convert the world, and prepare for the consummation at the judgment day. Thus it accorded with the laws of human history that miracle should be limited to the least possible space, and that men, from the Ascension to the Advent, should be allowed to work out their own mission and probationary destiny while probation lasts.
7. I tell you the truth—The solemnity of the affirmation arises from the fact that in their present state of mind the information was difficult to believe. Our Lord solemnly assures them that there is no contingency or mistake in the idea that his departure, however sorrowful, was necessary in itself, and best even for them. Expedient for you… go away—This pregnant phrase, go away, included all the circumstances—the cross, the atonement, the resurrection, and the ascension, with the perpetual intercession at God’s right hand ensuing.
If… Comforter will not come—The epoch had arrived in God’s redemptive plan in which, by passing through his atoning death and glorification, the Son of God should purchase his right to have his elect and to establish his Church, endowing it with the blessed Spirit. God the Father would not grant that Spirit until his well-beloved Son had performed the condition. At the price of his life did the Redeemer purchase his glorious headship over his Church.
If I depart I will send—When the blessed Son ascended to the right hand of God he was fully entitled to send to his Church below, and through it to the world, the blessed Gift. If, therefore, Christ goes not, the Spirit comes not.
Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges 1878 · Public Domain On vv7–14 7. I tell you the truth] ‘I’ is again…
7. I tell you the truth] ‘I’ is again emphatic; ‘I who know, and who have never misled you.’ Comp. Joh_14:2.
It is expedient] So Caiaphas had said (Joh_11:50) with more truth than he knew; so also the taunt at the crucifixion, ‘Himself He cannot save.’ ‘That’ here = ‘in order that’ (S. John’s favourite particle, ἴνα). Comp. Joh_16:2 and Joh_12:43.
Read full note →
I go away] There are three different Greek verbs in Joh_16:5; Joh_16:7; Joh_16:10, and our translators have not been happy in distinguishing them. The verb in Joh_16:5; Joh_16:10 should be I go away: here for ‘I go away’ we should have I depart, and for ‘I depart’ we should have I go My way. In the first the primary idea is withdrawal; in the second, separation; in the third, going on to a goal.
the Comforter] The Advocate (see on Joh_14:16). The Spirit could not come until God and man had been made once more at one. In virtue of His glorified and ascended Manhood Christ sends the Paraclete. ‘Humanity was to ascend to heaven before the Spirit could be sent to humanity on earth.’
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers 1878 · Public Domain On vv7–14 (7) Nevertheless I tell you the truth.—The words He…
(7) Nevertheless I tell you the truth.—The words He is about to utter are words of strange sound for the ears of disciples, and He prefaces them by an appeal to His own knowledge and candour in dealing with them, as in Joh_14:2. The pronoun bears the weight of the emphasis, “I, who know all.”
It is expedient for you that I go away.—“There is no cause,” He would say, “for the deep sorrow which has filled your hearts. It is for your advantage that I, as distinct from the Paraclete, who is to come, should go away” (Joh_14:16). Yes; for those who had left all to follow Him; for those who had none to go to but Himself (Joh_6:68); for those whose hopes were all centred in Him, it was—hard and incomprehensible as the saying must have seemed—an advantage that He should go away.
Read full note →
For if I go not away, the Comforter will not come unto you.—Better, . . . the Advocate will not come unto you. (Comp. Excursus G.) For the connection between the departure of Christ and the coming of the Advocate, comp. Notes on Joh_7:39, and Act_2:33. We may not fathom the deep counsels of God in which the reason of these words is to be found; but the order fixed in these counsels was that the Son of Man should complete His work on earth, and offer the sacrifice of Himself for sin, and rise from the dead, and ascend to the Father’s throne, before the Advocate should come. The Son of Man was to be glorified before the Spirit was to be given. Humanity was to ascend to heaven before the Spirit could be sent to humanity on earth. The revelation of saving truth was to be complete before inspiration was to breathe it as the breath of life into man’s soul. The conviction of sin, righteousness, and judgment could only follow the finished work of Christ.
But if I depart, I will send him unto you.—Our translators have sought to show the distinction between the words used in the earlier clauses, “I go away,” and that used here, “I depart”; but probably few English readers will have observed it. The former word means, “I go away from you,” the latter, “I go away to the Father.” For the thought of this clause, comp. Note on Joh_14:16; Joh_15:25.
A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Pulpit Commentary 1880 · Public Domain On vv7–14 Vers. 7-33. (9) The promise of the Paraclete.
Vers. 7-33. (9) The promise of the Paraclete.
Vers. 7-11. (a) The threefold conviction of the world. The extraordinary fullness of suggestion in the following words, and the strong opinions entertained by different theological schools, render interpretation a difficult task.
Read full note →
Though you are crushed with a sense of your approaching bereavement, and so imperfectly apprehend the conditions of your future power and the method which it is incumbent upon me to adopt for your consolation and the completion of my earthly work, nevertheless I tell you the truth. It is wonderful that he who is the Truth itself should have needed, in such various forms, to have reiterated and affirmed the supreme right he possessed to claim their acceptance of his veracity. The truth, then, thus solemnly asserted, because in their then frame of mind it was so utterly unpalatable and incredible notwithstanding all that he had said the truth is, It is expedient for you that I go away. The ina apelyw clause simply defines that which is expedient, profitable to the disciples. Many commentators, holding everywhere the relic force of ina , say, with Meyer and Lange, that ina marks fact considered with regard to the purposes destined to be accomplished by it." Here, however, the profitableness to the disciples is the chief and solitary thought. "For you:" here lies the gist of the mystery. They might have accepted his own assurance that, bitter as the mode of his departure must be, yet they ought, to and would rejoice because he was going to the Father. How was it possible for them to rejoice so far as they were personally concerned? He answers the question, For if I go not away and surely this solemn departure meant, as he had recently told them, by the way of death and glorificationthe Paraclete, of whom I have spoken, the Spirit of truth, (Joh_15:26, Joh_15:27) will not come to you; but if I go (poreuyw , to my Father; observe the form of the two conditional sentences, the degree of uncertainty as to the issue, to be determined by the result), I will send him to you (see notes on Joh_7:39. "The Holy Spirit," as the Divine dispensation of grace to men bringing a renewed humanity into living incorporation with its great Head, was not yet, because Jesus was not yet glorified). Jesus could not become the Divine Life-center of the human family, radiating from himself the full glory of a universal harmony, until he had been taken up, until he had been glorified in God. Unspeakably precious as many of our earthly gifts and friendships are, we do not apprehend them, nor profit by them to the full, until they are taken from us. The youth, submitted to the condition of perfect dependence on a parent"s care and guidance, can scarcely ever reach the fullness of his manhood until he is thrown back upon the spirit of his father"s counsel, apart from that father"s presence, and brings into daily practice from a new standpoint the principles he has learned. So, without any hyperbole, nothing had ever been so wonderful and blessed to the human spirit as the fellowship which had prevailed between the Son of man and his disciples. They were with him, they sat at his feet, they watched his countenance, they experienced a continuous series of Divine surprises at his judgments and his mercies. They were walking by sight, as the children of Israel did, following the pillar of fire and cloud, and drinking of the living water; but they were nevertheless living by sight. Nevertheless, there was something more wonderful and gracious still, when, in his physical absence, they would have the sense of his spiritual presence. They would lose him as an earthly Friend, but they would regain him as a Divine Reality; they would discover more than his humanity in his God-Manhood. They would wield his Divine Word as their weapon, and would become the channels of his healing and convincing and judging powers. The promise, "I will send him," is the guarantee of something more than a "Christ after the flesh" could ever be.
The advantages of Christ"s departure.
The world enjoyed many benefits by reason of Christ"s presence: he healed the sick, and taught the ignorant, and was a kind, wise, and faithful Friend to all men. How much more were the disciples of Jesus indebted to that presence! His intimate friends owed their all, their very selves, to him, and could not look forward to losing him without dismay. "My Savior, can it ever be, That I should gain by losing thee?
Yet our Lord taught that it was really for his people"s good that he should leave them, and the experience of the Christian centuries has proved the wisdom of his teaching.
I THE DISPENSATION OF PERSONAL PRESENCE WAS THUS SUCCEEDED BY THE DISPENSATION OF SPIRITUAL POWER. The ascension of Christ was the occasion of the descent of the Comforter. The Holy Spirit was indeed no stranger to our humanity even before our Lord"s coming, hut his influences were to be more widely diffused and more powerfully active than in the earlier ages. Why the coming of the Spirit was made, in the wise counsels of God, dependent upon the departure of Jesus, we can only partially understand. But the events of Pentecost are matter of Scripture history. The records of this dispensation reform us how the Spirit has convinced the world of sin, of righteousness, of judgment. The Church has never, since our Lord"s ascension, ceased to enjoy the enlightening, quickening, sanctifying influences of its Comforter.
II THE LIFE OF SIGHT WAS THUS REPLACED BY THE HIGHER LIFE OF FAITH. It was necessary that the Son of God and the Savior of mankind should dwell upon earth, and, by the deeds of his ministry and his death of Sacrifice, reveal God to his sinful children, and furnish a basis for the spiritual life of humanity. A revealed Object of faith was thus provided. But when the manifestation was complete, it was withdrawn. The special excellence of the Christian religion lies here: it is a religion which calls for, justifies, and encourages faith faith in an unseen, but mighty, ever-present, and ever-gracious Redeemer and Lord. "In him, though now we see him not, yet believing we rejoice.
III CHRISTIANITY WAS THUS MADE NO LOCAL RELIGION, BUT A RELIGION FOR HUMANITY. So far as we can see, the bodily presence of Jesus upon earth could not but limit his reign; it could not well, in such case, be other than partial, local, national. But the purposes of the Eternal were comprehensive in benevolence. It was designed that "all the ends of the earth should see the salvation of our God." The going away of Jesus assured to the new humanity a Divine and heavenly Head. By his Spirit the ascended and glorified Lord is equally present in every part of his dominions. Thus all local limitations are transcended, and provision is made for the extension to all mankind of the blessings of our Savior"s spiritual presence, authority, and grace.
IV THE HOPE OF CHRISTIANS IS THUS BEHOVED FROM EARTH TO HEAVEN. If Jesus were still on earth, who would not be content to live and loath to die? What prospect would have reconciled his friends to death? But our Divine Friend has gone on before us, and we can only join him upon the condition of the taking down of this perishable tent in which we dwell. It is the prospect of going to him who has gone away from earth which lends brightness to the Christian"s future. His prayer has secured that, where he is, there also his friends and disciples shall be. Accordingly an apostle could speak of removing hence as being "with Christ, which is far better." And there is no prospect so dear to the Christian"s heart as that of ever being with the Lord. T.
HOMILIES BY B. THOMAS Ver. 7. The expediency of Christs departure.
We shall elucidate the truths of the text by the following remarks.
I THAT THE MISSION OF THE HOLY SPIRIT WAS ESSENTIAL TO THE GREAT PLAN OF REDEMPTION. "The Comforter will not come," implying that his coming was essential to the carrying on of the good work in them and through them.
1. As the Divine Revealer. Christ revealed the Father; the Spirit was to reveal Christ. This revelation involves:
(1) Inward light. The illumination of the soul, the mind, the intellect, the heart, and conscience.
(2) Outward light. The great truths concerning Jesus and all the facts of redemption, would be presented in a new and clearer light by the ministry of the spirit.
(3) Inward application, He not only sheds fresh light upon the great facts of redemption, but specially and directly applies them to the soul. As the Spirit of truth, capable of inspiring and influencing directly the springs of action and choice, he is specially adapted for this inward application without which the revelation is incomplete.
2. As the Divine Regenerator. The Creator of the new life, the new heart, the new man, and the new world, and the Builder of the spiritual temple. This new creation is an essential part of the plan of redemption, and is the department of the Holy Spirit.
3. As the Divine Sanctifier. Carrying on the good work gradually unto perfection.
4. As the Divine Comforter. As such he is introduced by our Lord. This was their special need, as well as the special need of all believers in all ages.
II THAT THE DEPARTURE OF JESUS WAS ESSENTIAL TO THE COMING OF THE HOLY SPIRIT. "If I go not away," etc.
1. His departure was essential to the completion of his own work and the fulfillment of his mission. He could say with propriety, "If I go not away, I cannot finish the work given me to do." This involved:
(1) A perfect atonement for sin. It is true the atonement was begun in his life; for "he is the Atonement;" but completed by his voluntary and self-sacrificing death, and it was through death he was to depart and by death complete the atonement.
(2) His perfect example.
(3) His perfect and glorified life. Only in consequence of his departure by death these were attainable. He was made perfect through sufferings.
2. The completion of his work was essential to the coming of the Holy Spirit. "If I go not away, the Comforter," etc.
(1) The Holy Spirit could not come without a complete commission. In all the Divine proceedings there is perfect order. There is nothing done at random or by accident, but all according to the strictest laws of order and fitness. When Christ came, he came with a complete commission, in the fullness of time, and in the fullness of his Father"s love. The Spirit could only come in the same way.
(2) He could not obtain his full commission until the triumphant arrival of Jesus at home. Then iris commission would be complete in the completed work of Christ. Its conditions were then fulfilled and its substance then perfect, ready for use.
(3) The departure of Jesus was not only essential in relation to the commission of the Spirit, but also in relation to the disciples themselves. The remaining of Christ with them in the flesh was incompatible with the full enjoyment of the Spirit. He had to ascend on high, not only to receive the gift of the Spirit, but also to make room for him in their heart and faith. In a sense there was no room for both at the same time.
3. The completion of his work would result in the certain coming of the Spirit. "If I go away, I will send," etc. This certainty lies:
(1) In the finished work and glorified life of Christ. This deserved and even demanded the coming of the Spirit. The latter is the natural result of the former.
(2) In his personal and official influence with the Holy Spirit. This was the result of their oneness of nature, sympathy, will, and work. He was fully conscious of the Spirit"s readiness to come at his request.
(3) In the unerring fidelity of the Divine promises. The promise of the Father to Jesus and that of Jesus to his disciples: "I will send him," etc. He could not forget his promise, nor fail to send him. The struggles and agonies of the past would remind him, the infinite price paid and the importance of his coming would remind him, the tender and eternal love he bore them would make him careful to send him. They had the earnest when he breathed upon them. Let him go away, and the Spirit would come in his Divine fullness.
III THAT THE MINISTRY OF THE HOLY SPIRIT WOULD BE MORE BENEFICIAL TO THE DISCIPLES AND ALL BELIEVERS THAN THE PERSONAL MINISTRY OF JESUS. "It is expedient," etc.
1. The personal ministry of Jesus was local; that of the Spirit is universal. Christ could not be personally present in more than one place at the same time; the Spirit can be everywhere.
2. The personal ministry of Christ was outward; that of the Spirit is inward. Christ appealed, with words and voice, to man through his physical senses; but the ministry of the Spirit is inward, appealing directly to the human heart, will, and conscience.
3. The personal ministry of Christ had a tendency to keep alive and foster the material and temporal ideas of his reign; that of the Spirit had a direct tendency to foster and establish spiritual ideas of his kingdom. While he remained with his disciples, they tenaciously clung to the idea of a temporal king and a temporal kingdom, and this idea would last as long as his personal presence; but his departure by death, had a direct tendency to destroy this notion and blast this hope for ever, and prepare them for the advent of the Holy Spirit, who would, on the ruins of the temporal kingdom, establish a spiritual one, a kingdom of God within. So that to the advent of the Spirit, in consequence of the personal departure of Jesus, they were indebted for true notions of the nature of his kingdom.
4. The personal ministry of Jesus was essentially temporary; that of the Spirit is permanent. He came only for a time, and under human conditions was subject to persecutions and death, and would ever be so, therefore his ministry could only be temporary; but the Spirit came to remain with and in his people for ever, and was personally above any physical injury from the wicked world. Christ, like the Baptist, was only a temporary herald in the world. As soon as his mission was fulfilled, he disappeared; but the Spirit is a settled Minister, and his charge he will never relinquish.
5. Christ, by the Holy Spirit, was more really and efficiently present with his disciples than he would be by his continual personal presence. So that he went away in order to come nearer to them, and come in a higher and diviner form; not in weakness, but in power; not in shame, but in glory; not in the shadow of death, but in the halo of a" Divine and glorified life;" not in the flesh, but in the Spirit; not outside, but within them; so that his departure resulted to them in more of Christ and the ministry of the Spirit as well.
6. By the Spirit, not only he could be more to them, but they also could be more to him and to his purposes of grace. More to themselves in the progress and development of their spiritual nature and character. More to the human family in their conversion and progress in holiness. With Christ"s ministry of reconciliation, his perfect example, the inspiration of his devoted life, and self-sacrificing and atoning death, with the indwelling and accompanying influences of the Spirit, they could do infinitely more for Christ than if he were alone to remain personally with them. This was demonstratively proved after Pentecost. They were better missionaries, better heralds of the gospel of peace, and more heroic and enduring soldiers of the cross. In fact, in this way alone Christ could fulfill his purposes in them, and through them in the world.
LESSONS.
1. All the teaching of Jesus to his disciples was absolutely true. "I tell you the truth." He never told a falsehood; he was incapable of this. He knew the truth, so that he could not mistake. He was true the Truth, so that he would not deceive. It would be as easy for darkness to proceed from light as for falsehood to proceed from him who is the Truth.
2. He told them the truth, although he knew it to be at the time most unpalatable. "Nevertheless," etc. This truth concerning iris departure was so. Nothing could be more distasteful to their feelings and sentiments. Still he told them. He was most tenderly careful of their feelings. Still these were not the chief regulators of his revelations.
3. Some truths which at the time are most unpalatable prove at the end most beneficial and joyous when fully understood and realized. The departure of Jesus was such. It filled, at the moment, their heart with sorrow, but filled it afterwards with spiritual joy.
4. Christ, in all his sayings, deeds, and movements, was ever actuated by the supreme good of his disciples. "It is expedient for you," etc. Not what was best or most convenient for him, but what would best serve their spiritual interest and that of the world. B.T.
Absent in the body, present by the Spirit.
I THE NEED OF A STRONG ASSERTION. Jesus says, "I tell you the truth." Jesus never says anything but the truth, and yet we can see here clearly what need there was for the most solemn and emphatic mode of statement. For what an antecedent improbability there was that his absence could ever be better than his presence! For him to vanish from the natural sight of his disciples might well be reckoned the greatest of calamities, until actual and abundant experience showed it to be one of the greatest of blessings. Jesus had to make it clear that he meant exactly what he said, nothing else and nothing less. Until we become wiser, it is the natural, the inevitable view that to lose what we can see is a loss never to be made up from some unseen source. Not without reason did these disciples set value on the incarnate life of Jesus.
II LOOK AT THE ASSERTION IN THE LIGHT OF HISTORICAL CONFIRMATION. It is clear to us, looking at all the facts in their connections, that the departure of Jesus was an advantage to the disciples. If we had been numbered among them we should have said beforehand, "Impossible!" And now looking back on all in the light of history, it is plain that what caused at the time such exquisite grief opened wide the door to joys and blessings unspeakable. It is also plain what a boon the death of Jesus was to himself, delivering him, as it did, from all further exposure to pain of body and grief of heart. But what Jesus would ever have us comprehend is how his departure is distinctly an advantage to his people. He wants us to feel how much better the spiritual is than the natural; how much better it is to have the invisible Jesus doing good to our inner life than the visible Jesus doing good to our outward life. If ever the visible is to be made better, it will be through the invisible. He who made the outside made the inside also, and to get the inside thoroughly pure and strong is the only way to make the outside the same. We are but extending the great principle which Jesus laid before Nicodemus, when we say that flesh can only minister to flesh, spirit only to spirit. Even as the old dispensation was preparatory to the new, so the manifestation of Jesus in the flesh was preparatory to the manifestation of Jesus in the spirit.
III AS ILLUSTRATION OF HOW THE PLANS OF HEAVEN ARE BETTER THAN THE WISHES OF EARTH. Well was it that Jesus did not leave his disciples to decide. They would all have said, "Stop with us longer;" but who of them could have said how much longer? That would have sent their thoughts in a direction by no means pleasant to follow out. If Jesus must be more to humanity than any one else who ever trod the earth in human form, it can only be by having a different end to his life and a different result of it. Fancy Moses or Elijah (those two names which are so eminently coupled with Jesus) saying that it was expedient for the people they had to do with that they should go away. When we consider what we owe to the Paraclete, when we consider all his deep and abiding ministries, here is a fresh cause of profound thankfulness to Jesus that he accepted the sufferings of death that the Paraclete might come. The Day of Pentecost was not easily achieved; other days had to go before the day when he sweat as it were great drops of blood, the day when he stood among the soldiers with the thorny crown, and was afterwards nailed to the cross. Y.
The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Biblical Illustrator 1887 · Public Domain On vv7–14 It is expedient for you that I go away
Joh_16:7
It is expedient for you that I go away
Read full note →
The absenteeism of Christ
1.
The words must have been very startling to the apostles. They had doubtless come to consider the personal presence of Christ indispensable. He was the principle of cohesion among them, and His departure would be the signal for the dissolution of the brotherhood. He, moreover, gave them what influence they possessed in the nation; for without Him they were but a band of ignorant fishermen.
2. Now if these words were true in the case of the apostles, they are true for all time. The absenteeism of Christ is a help rather than a hindrance to the religious life.
I. It is, of course, true that THE DEATH OF ANY GOOD MAN IS SO FAR A LOSS TO THE WORLD. It is the withdrawal of a beneficent influence. How grand, then, it would have been, to have had Him, the worlds greatest blessing, making one everlasting pilgrimage round the globe. But
1. Such perpetual residence here would have limited His moral influence. No man is understood till he is dead. Absence is the condition of correct insight. Presence either blinds us to greatness, or produces flattery, or that familiarity which begets indifference. It is to be feared that, had Christ remained for ever on the earth, the blindness of the Jews who saw no beauty in Him to make Him desired, would have been repeated by each succeeding generation. We labour under an incapacity for seeing a hero in the man whose hand we can shake. The fault, no doubt, lies in us who live so much in our senses, and look only on the surface of the life. That the valet cannot see a hero in his master is more likely to be due to the valets blindness than to the masters defects. We might have gained in physical happiness from Christs perpetual presence, but that would have been but a poor compensation for the loss of reverence, and the inspiring lift our whole nature has received from the ascended and invisible Christ. Why, the physical boon itself would have been but parochial and temporary. And thereon would have arisen dissatisfactions and jealousies.
2. Christs perpetual residence here would have been against the growth of the religious life. Instead of living for Christ and God in our hearts, we should have lived for them only in our senses. We should never have hungered for the hour of religious meditation, but rather have complained that He had long delayed to appear in our streets. Newspapers would have been searched to learn His whereabouts; shiploads of the stricken would have travelled the deep, and longed impatiently for the port of their destination; and the rest would have lived on in the restless hope that He would pass their way before they died. Who would have thought of submitting with obedient heart to the afflictions of Providence, of seeking out their Divine purpose when one word from Christ would remove them all at once? Would men ever think of spiritual fellowship with Christ when physical fellowship might be had? Is it not far better that, instead of being the monopoly of a favoured few, He should be ever near to all who call upon Him; that, instead of gazing on Him as a man without, we should feel Him in the background of our hearts?
3. Had Christ dwelt for ever on the earth the good and the bad would have had equal experience and perception of Him. His absence from the earth was indispensable to His manifesting Himself to His people in another way than He could unto the world.
4. Christs perpetual residence here would have made impossible the expected distribution of His spirit in the hearts and lives of men, and through all the political, moral, and social organizations of the globe.
II. You will see the expediency of Christs departure from the earth, if you consider that HIS CONTINUED RESIDENCE HERE WOULD HAVE SECURED US NO ADDITIONAL BLESSING, except, indeed, relief from physical ills; and, if you admit that these are productive of moral good, and work in us a recompensing glory, it is questionable if their arbitrary removal would have been an unmixed blessing. All the good Christ could do for the world might be summed up under these points
1. In His sacrificing Himself for sin. And here it will be obvious that the satisfactoriness of His death could in but a small measure depend upon any condition of time. As soon as the hour had struck when He would be accepted as our Substitute, it would have availed nothing to have deferred the hour of His triumphal return to God.
2. In impressing on the worlds imagination an ideal of saintliness and nobleness of character that would make for righteousness and protest against evil through all generations. Into the doing of this the condition of time, in a greater measure, did enter; but when He had reached the age at which He spoke of the expediency of His departure, this end had been attained. He has left no more precious legacy behind Him than the memory of what He was. (J. Forfar.)
The departure of Christ
This departure
I. HAS SECURED TO THE CHURCH HIS CONSTANT PRESENCE. While dwelling here as our Saviour He was not ubiquitous. This was sometimes an apparent loss. Lord, if thou hadst been here, my brother had not died. How this wail would have extended itself had He remained. Europe would have cried for Him when He was teaching the millions of Asia, &c. No Church now mourns an absent Lord. When faith looks for Him it sees Him. When love yearns for Him it feels Him near. Only when these are feeble do we seem to be forsaken and alone. We have then one friend to whose memory no tablet will ever be erected, and no tear shed; for the strong arm will never cease to hold us securely, and the loving heart will not fail to keep alive our affection with the fire of its abiding love.
II. PREVENTED, TO A GREAT EXTENT, THE GROWTH OF A SPURIOUS AFFECTION FOR HIM. We have known Christ after the flesh. Many have an affection for His person without regard to His character and work. It is one thing to weep over Christs sufferings, and quite another thing to weep over our sins. Blessed are they who can say, Whom having not seen we love. Their affection is not less strong, while probably it is more spiritual than it would have been had He remained on earth.
III. ENABLES US TO UNDERSTAND HIM BETTER THAN WE COULD HAVE DONE HAD HE REMAINED. Why are we more ready to garnish the graves of dead saints than to praise the virtues of living ones? Not always because we are envious. Mainly, perhaps, because just as we may get too near a magnificent pile of architecture, and thus lose sight of the exquisite harmony of the whole. No man was more unknown than Christ. Even His attached friends misunderstood His plainest teachings. It was well that He went away. Things dimly seen before, shone with unclouded radiance after His departure.
IV. SECURED THE OUT-POURING OF THE HOLY SPIRIT. It is very probable that this was the chief cause of His departure. Their views of the Holy Spirit were very indistinct. Nevertheless, the language of Christ concerning Him had kindled a strong desire for His presence. Now they learn the price which must be paid for His advent. If I go not away, &c. How essential the Spirit was to them, and to the interests of the kingdom, all their subsequent history shows. And there never has been an age in which the Church could afford to dispense with His presence. If this were the only reason for the departure of Christ, we could not murmur. We have not lost our Lord. He takes of the things of Christ, and shows them unto us. He strengthens our faith in Him, deepens our love to Him, enlarges our desires after Him, sanctifies our communion with Him. (H. B. Robinson.)
Christs departure and Pauls abiding
(text, and Php_1:24):--Jesus thought that His disciples would gain by losing Him, and Paul thought that his friends could not do without him. A singular contrast--reverses what might have been expected. How strange it must have seemed to them that they, poor sheep in the midst of wolves, would be better without the Shepherd! And the strangeness is brought more home to us by that word of Pauls in which we recognize the familiar tone of love that cannot face the thought of leaving a lifes work half done and dear ones unhelped. The contrast rests on the absolute difference between the work of Christ and that of all other teachers, friends, and guides, and so may help us to grasp the unique relation which He and it sustain to the world. It was expedient that Christ should go away, for
I. CHRISTS DEATH IS HIS WORK. It was needful that Paul should abide, for Pauls death was the end of his. Pauls words show us how those speak who know that their departure will do nothing to advance the purposes to which they have given themselves. Christs are intelligible only in the light of the great truth that He came to give His life a ransom for the many, and that His death has a substantive value all its own.
II. HIS WORK GOES ON AFTER HIS DEATH, WHILE THAT OF OTHERS CEASES. When Paul dies he can no more help his brethren. True, he may leave a holy memory. The great personalities of the world may, in a certain figurative sense, be said to rule the nations from their urns. But that reverberation from the past prolonged into the present is but a poor shadowy thing. Christs work to-day is no mere influence flowing from activities long since terminated. It is real and continuous--a present putting forth of present power.
III. CHRISTS PERSONAL RELATION TO US IS WHOLLY INDEPENDENT OF HIS BODILY PRESENCE. His departure aided in the apprehension of His true character and nature. Like some star, that, as long as it is low on the horizon and shrouded by mist, may be mistaken for some earthborn light, but is known for what it is as it climbs the sky, He was discerned when unseen far better than when here. When He ascended to the Father, that withdrawal from the touch of sense gave Him to the touch of faith, and these desolate disciples were nearer Him when the cloud received Him out of their sight. The true personal bond that knits men to Christ is actually helped by His absence. Jesus Christ, whom having not seen ye love, is held in the inmost hearts of millions. That is a phenomenon in the history of human affections altogether unique, and standing in the strongest contrast to the feelings with which the most enthusiastic admirers regard the mightiest among the dead. For love, there must be, or must have been, personal intercourse. With earthly teachers and guides that is only possible whilst they live; so their abiding in the flesh is needful for us. With Jesus Christ, who died--yea, rather, who is risen again--it is possible now for us all; therefore it was our gain that He went away, departing for a season, that we might receive Him for ever. (A. Maclaren, D. D.)
Christ going away
Our Lord here represents the complex whole of His death and ascension as being His own voluntary act. He goes. He is neither taken away by death nor rapt up to heaven in a whirlwind, but He goes into the region of the grave and thence to the throne. Contrast His ascension with that of Elijah. One needed the chariot of fire and the horses of fire to bear him up into the sphere, all foreign to his mortal and earthly manhood; the other needed no outward power to lift Him, nor any vehicle to carry Him, but slowly, serenely, upborne by His own indwelling energy, and rising as to His native home, He ascended up on high, and went where the very manner of His going proclaimed that He had been before. (A. Maclaren, D. D.)
We need not lament Christs departure into heaven
Men long for Christ on earth. Christ in heaven is not only faint and dim, but they think a heavenly Being cannot have earthly love. There may be more purity, they think, in heavenly love than in earthly, but less heartiness, and heartiness is what they long for. Now, Christ returned to heaven that He might love more, not less. This was a part of the glory which He had laid aside and was to take again. On earth His soul stood but in the bud. He went to a fairer clime that He might blossom, and now the heavens and the earth are full of the fragrance of His love. Incarnation was limitation. Ascension was expansion. There was not room enough for such a heart while in the body. It came as a seed, and grew, but we saw only the sprouting and the leaves.
Death ripened it back again to the golden fulness of a heavenly state. (H. W.Beecher.)
The departed Christ
The Saviour declared to His disciples that He must leave them. On Him their whole souls had rested. He epitomized to them everything that was sacred; they had forsaken occupation, and had suffered contumely for following this man; and now He was about to be taken from them; and everything in their knowledge, affection, understanding, rebelled against it. They could not comprehend it either in its relations to Him or to themselves. And yet He said, It is for your own interest that I go away. That, I think, touches the universal feeling of wonder in men.
I. Is there one of you who has not pondered the question, WHY DID CHRIST LEAVE THE WORLD? Having once come into it, and brought life and immortality to light, why did He not abide here?
1. There are multitudes who think that if they could but once have seen Jesus, or laid their hand on His, or heard from Him the history of His life and His instructions, that it would have begotten in them a certainty, an enthusiasm, and a power which would have carried them through a thousand sloughs that otherwise must have engulphed them.
2. Then, again, men think that if once they could pour out their souls allegiance to Christ, in His very presence, they could go on all their lives long worshipping and rejoicing in Him. They think it would lay the foundations of piety so strong, that all doubts would flee from them for evermore.
3. Then there is a large number who feel that if Christ were enthroned in Jerusalem, around that sacred Centre would be formed the Church circle in an unbroken unity, and that all the shattered particles of shining truth would be gathered together.
4. Then, again, there is the feeling of certainty which men seek for. This leads men to feel that if they could have a determiner of controversies, it would be a great and desirable thing. They say, True, we have the Bible; but how can the Bible be a determiner of controversies, when there are a dozen different and warring sects that draw their proofs from it? There is the vicegerent in Rome; and men say, oftentimes: We do not believe in a great many things that are claimed in regard to the papacy; but, after all, it is a good thing to have somewhere a centre of faith--one that can determine and put an end to controversies. I cannot deny that, at the first blush, there is some justification for these fancies; but they will not bear examination. Gods way is always the best.
II. SUPPOSE OUR MASTER HAD REMAINED UPON EARTH, ABIDING IN JERUSALEM
1. How many of the race could have seen Him? The ocean may know ways of circulating its waters; the atmosphere may change and go from place to place without vehicle or expense; but there is no grand current by which the human race may be thus carried hither and thither. So the tribes of the earth would find it difficult to go to a certain place and see the Saviour if He were on earth. Moreover, the mere social and physical disturbances would be enormous. It would break up the household, destroy social intercourse, and subject men to untold perils, and toils, and wastes, and expenses, to say nothing of the destruction of vast multitudes of the human race--witness those fearful pilgrimages in the East, and their fatal results, in famines, slaughters, and the dreaded Asiatic cholera.
2. But let us rise above these considerations of mans physical circumstances, and go higher. Do you suppose that you would feel any better satisfied if you had seen Christ? When the disciples were with Christ were they more strong and more powerful than afterwards? You know they were not. The inspiration that lifted them above common humanity came by faith, and not by sight. There are realms of knowledge which cannot be reached by vision, and which must be reached by the Spirit. Therefore the Saviour says, It is expedient, &c.
3. But, again, would there be any more certainty of unity if Christ could yet be referred to? There are men who say: If we only had some one in Jerusalem who should be supreme over the Church throughout the world saying: This is the exact way--walk ye in it, how much better it would be! Would it be any better? Why, we do not want mere likeness, sameness, absence of conflict. We have that--in the graveyard; and the race would be but little better than dead men if such unity were to exist, and men did not need to think, to exert themselves, or to make mistakes, which are always incident to investigation and endeavour. Some people are all the time trying to set aside the Divine providence by doing for a man what it was designed that he should do for himself. A Church formed on such principles would be like Babbages calculating machine. All that would be necessary would be to turn a crank, the wheels being of just such a diameter, and with just such cogs, but having no volition, no life, individuality, Divinity! I cannot conceive how anybody who has an idea of how the providence of God is unfolding, and has unfolded the world, should stumble on that as the way in which he ought to unfold it. But it is thought that, at any rate, it would determine controversies to have one who could speak authoritatively. Did the disciples believe just what Christ told them? Did the most learned and educated men in the time of the Saviour believe what He taught them? Did not the mind act the same then as it does now? and was it not necessary for men to get at the truth by unfolding themselves, and by educating their inward nature to the thing taught them? And if Christ had lived two thousand years, He would down to this day have taught only those who were competent to understand, by reason of their growth. The earth would have always followed the same law that He pointed out to them then, and we should, have had to learn by stages, and rise accordingly. But we should not even then have come to unity. Even in the consideration of physical truths there is but very little absolute unity. And when you take social and moral truths, still more when you take spiritual truths, they are of such a nature that they report themselves to each individual according to his conformation.
III. CHRIST SAID that it was expedient that He should go away, and THAT IF HE DID NOT GO THE COMFORTER WOULD NOT COME. Blessed word! because if there is anything that we need in this world, it is comforting. There are gods of love, of wine, of war, of government and law, but the world needs a God to comfort it. The Holy Spirit; the One who stands over against those subtle elements in the human soul--which we call the spiritual instinct or sentiment--comes to take the place of Christ, and open the doors of the understanding through the highest intuitions, and give light and direction to our interior nature, and enable us to triumph over death, and crown us sons in the kingdom of God. And this is infinitely better than that Christ should have continued on the earth in His physical form. Now, how blessed it is to feel that the heaven is filled by one who is interpreted to our spirit by historical sympathies as he never could have been interpreted to us in Jerusalem, where He would have had to walk the streets, to eat and drink and sleep as men do. In the spiritland there is not a long days journey between us and Him. The distance is not even so great as that which must be gone over to send a letter from the post-office in New York to the post-office in Brooklyn. No thought emerges from your soul that does not go instantly to Him. There are no distances in spirituality. (H. W. Beecher.)
Jesus invisible
I. LET US SUPPOSE THAT THE SON OF MAN HAD CONSENTED TO REMAIN UPON THE EARTH. He could not thus remain except to die daily, or to be for ever triumphant. On which of these two alternatives must we fix? You know too well.
1. Jesus Christ always equally entitled to be loved, will always be equally hated; so that were Jesus Christ to appear successively in different countries, each of them would in its turn be moistened with His blood. If it accords with piety to believe that the Son of God died once, the just for the unjust, it is impious to believe that the blessed seed of the woman was more than once to allow His heel to be bruised by the angel of darkness.
2. Let us hasten then to reject this alternative, and conceive that He has to enjoy an everlasting triumph. He has conquered; He has put infidelity completely to flight. Jesus reigns King of all the earth. He has no more enemies or rivals. Still this kingdom, glorious as it appears, is but a place of exile. The subjects of this King have an advantage over Him. The servant is more than his Master. For Jesus Christ having suffered once, what can those around Him have to suffer? A single look from Him crowns them with glory. There is no longer either difficulty to be surmounted or struggle to be maintained. It is no longer by fire that men are saved, nor by much tribulation that they enter into glory. Religion is no longer a sacrifice; the blessing of the narrow way, and the kingdom of heaven taken by violence, are henceforth only empty sounds. It only remains to ask why earth is not already transformed into heaven?
II. LET US NOW LISTEN TO JESUS CHRIST. Let us see in what this expediency consists.
1. If I go not away, the Comforter will not come, &c. Remain with us, Lord, and we will be comforted. Such would perhaps have been our answer. Who can console better than Jesus? Jesus absent is only one misery more. Jesus might have answered, Are you consoled? does My presence suffice you? No; and yet I am in the midst of you. Thus it appears you still require the Comforter. Two consolations compose the whole new man.
(1) Faith. To believe is to repose entirely on the infallibility and faithfulness of God. It is, consequently, to go forward with unflinching eye, and meet coming events as we would meet God Himself; to live in the Spirit; to renounce the domination of the senses; to prefer the invisible, which is eternal, In regard to what specially concerns Jesus Christ, it is to bless God that the Word was made flesh, but not to regard Jesus Christ, although perfect man, as an ordinary individual, whose presence is indissolubly attached to the body. Now, such was the disposition of the disciples, and such is human nature, that had Jesus Christ remained upon the earth, faith would have remained for ever in an infant state. Its case would have been that of a young bird whose parent will not permit it to try its wings. Men would have reposed on the corporeal presence of Christ; not upon His spiritual, which is His real presence. The magnificent developments of the Christian Church would thus be strangled in the birth; or, to speak more properly, there would be no Christian Church; if by the Church we mean the assembly of those who walk by faith, and live in the Spirit.
(2) Love in the Spirit. To love spiritually is to love as God loves and wishes to be loved. All in love that is only nature, instinct, taste, self-complacency, disappears or is subordinate. Love, purified and made Divine, rises and attaches itself to what is invisible and immortal. Now almost all the world loves Jesus. How is it possible not to love Him! But no man of the world could have more love for Him than the son of Jonas; and do we not know that Jesus deserved to be loved otherwise? The affection of Peter was not spiritual; that of the world for Jesus is, if possible, still less so. It is a human attachment which Jesus does not count sufficient. But this attachment remained human so long as Jesus Himself remained in a human condition. The visible, corporeal, limited person, behoved to disappear, in order to make room for the idea which it represented, and at the same time concealed.
2. If faith and spiritual affection are the life of the Church, it was for the advantage of the Church that Jesus should go away. This has been well proved by fact. Where was the Church before the departure of Jesus? Nowhere; not even in the bosom of that college of apostles who we have reason to believe knew Jesus far less, and loved Him less completely than a poor Christian peasant now knows and loves Him. Why had His lessons less affect on the apostles than those of the apostles themselves afterwards had on others? The facts cannot be disputed. Before the departure of Jesus there was no Church, but there is one immediately after.
3. Could we venture to maintain that it was good for the disciples that Christ should go away, and yet bad for us? The situation, and wants, are still the same, and we cannot dispense with the painful privation. No Christian, however, consents to it willingly. The resolution to do so depends on the measure of his spirituality. But nothing is more universal or more natural than regret for not having seen Jesus Christ. Many imagine that they could do all with Jesus Christ were He to become visible, that there would then be neither doubt nor fear, that they would thenceforth be all ardour for the service of their great Master. But after reflection how can they continue to use this language?
(1) What is the human body? A living statue. An image of the presence of a moral being, to which through the body are addressed all the feelings which this being can inspire. This organization, however, does not constitute the man. This we all admit when we refuse to estimate a mans worth by his body, and make it wholly depend on his intellect and will. Moreover, in our attachments we rise superior to the impressions which body can produce upon body. An affection on which neither the external decay of the object loved, nor its absence, nor death, would have any power, would justly be entitled to the highest honour. If any being should be loved purely, it is undoubtedly the Son of God. If the Son of God appeared in the flesh, it was not to make us adore His corporeal presence, but to be man like us, and submit to death. He has given this as a support to our love; but our love should attach itself to that in Him which thinks, invites, and loves.
(2) But let us reply to those who exclaim, Oh how strong we would be if we could only see Jesus Christ! Alas! how many saw Him at full leisure, and remained weak! So would it be with you were Jesus Christ to communicate the Holy Spirit, which was given to the first disciples only under the condition of His own absence. The mere aspect of a great personage, the mere report of his presence, has sometimes, on grave emergencies, exercised a decisive influence. But however great the results might be, they were human. But spiritual effects demand a spiritual cause, and the fact of Christs corporeal presence, considered in itself, is not so. There is nothing spiritual in it. This absence of a visible Christ is regarded as a privation, a loss. But it is the flesh itself, it is the charm of the present life that makes us deem it so. Jesus Christ, though absent, is not absent. In giving us His Spirit He gives Himself.
4. Enough of this, you say, None of us have the idea of making Christ dwell a second time in the sad darkness of this life. But if you presume not to claim the visibility of Jesus Christs personal presence, you wish visible signs of His invisible presence. If the signs for which you call are only those fruits of the Spirit, which constitute and manifest Christianity, assuredly you are right; and it is these signs of the presence of Jesus Christ you ought in the first instance to ask from yourselves. But there is another desire less pure, Make us gods to walk before us. Anything which will give a tangible shape to the spiritual kingdom which Jesus Christ came to establish on the earth.
(1) In the first rank are the institutions and customs which time has consecrated in the bosom of the Christian Church. These circumstances, which are wholly external and are not the Church itself, we so overvalue that we mistake them for the Church; if certain barriers, words, sounds, happen to fail, we think it is the Church herself that fails, and our heart melts within us, and we can scarcely help exclaiming, They have taken away my Lord, &c.
(2) Sometimes we consider Jesus Christ to be represented by men who are devoted to His service. Every Christian, in a certain sense, represents Jesus Christ. The error lies in making a mere man the object of feelings which are due only to our Lord, and in regarding any instrument of whatever nature as necessary. And when the righteous hand of God throws down this idol and breaks it to pieces, when this man, supposed necessary, has disappeared, all has disappeared with him.
(3) The successes of Christianity are also a kind of visible Christ to us. We are willing not to believe Him absent so long as we see His religion honoured and multitudes thronging His churches. Our faith takes courage at the sight; but how readily it is shaken, when, in consequence of any great change in the condition of society, enmity grows bold. It seems as if this host of enemies had carried Jesus Christ away.
5. But Jesus Christ, who cannot permit us either to serve Him as an idol, or to put idols in His place, or to seek indubitable evidence of His presence anywhere but in ourselves, as of old, withdraws to a mountain. By this new retreat He extinguishes the bright light which He had kindled; He obliges us to seek Him on the mountain, in other words, in our faith, and constrains us to look at Him with other eyes than those of flesh. Let us with all the strength which God has given resist the dangerous temptations of that lust of the eye, which, from our carnal nature, we carry even into the purest of religions. (A. Vinet, D. D.)
Christs going away our gain
I. BY HIS DEPARTURE HIS LOCAL PRESENCE WAS CHANGED INTO AN UNIVERSAL PRESENCE. As God, He dwells with us through the Holy Ghost, by His essence, presence, and power. As Man He is always with us in all the truth of His Incarnation. His character--His pity, gentleness, patience, long-suffering, love, tenderness, compassion--is shed abroad throughout all His Church. The kingdom of Christ is the kingdom of the Man Christ Jesus; and the reign of His will, human as well as Divine, is His kingdom. And there are even deeper things than these. The mystery of the Incarnation is not a mere isolated fact, terminating in the personality of the Word made flesh, but the beginning and productive cause of a new creation of mankind. By the same omnipotence which wrought the union of the Godhead and the manhood in the womb of the blessed Virgin, the humanity of the Second Adam is the immediate and substantial instrument of our regeneration and renewal. The Church is Christ mystical--the presence of Christ, by the creative power of His Incarnation, produced and prolonged on earth.
II. HIS DEPARTURE CHANGED THEIR IMPERFECT KNOWLEDGE INTO THE FULL ILLUMINATION OF FAITH. While He was with them, and taught them by word of mouth, their hearts were slow of understanding. Their minds were earthly, and interpreted all things by the rules of earth and sense. But when the Comforter came all things were brought back to their remembrance. Old truths and perplexing memories received their true solution. Words they had mused upon in doubt were interpreted; sayings they had thought already clear were seen to have profounder meanings; a fountain of light sprung up within them, an illumination cast from an unseen teacher unfolded to their consciousness the deep things of God and of His Christ. Their very faculties were enlarged; they were no longer pent up by narrow senses and by the succession of time, but were lifted into a light where all things are boundless and eternal. A new power of insight was implanted in their spiritual being, and a new world rose up before it; for the Spirit of truth dwelt in them, and the world unseen was revealed.
III. HIS DEPARTURE CHANGED THE PARTIAL DISPENSATIONS OF GRACE INTO THE FULNESS OF THE REGENERATION. Our nature, which He had made sinless, deathless, and divine, from the time of His ascension into heaven was glorified. The Second Adam began to give of His own spiritual nature, to multiply the lineage of His elect, and to gather His mystical family into one universal body. The agent In this Divine work is the Holy Ghost dwelling in us. The Incarnation raised man to a higher life, and laid a higher law upon us: the coming of the Holy Ghost endowed man with power to walk in that higher and more perfect path. (Archdeacon Manning.)
Christs ascension the Churchs gain
I. THERE IS A NATURAL SENSE IN WHICH LOSSES OFTEN PROVE TO BE GAIN IN THE END. We gain wisdom and knowledge and experience by losses; and we unquestionably gain a very much clearer mental and spiritual vision. And so, perhaps, in this natural and human sense it would be in one way expedient for the disciples to lose their Lord--inasmuch as the loss of Him would tend to open their eyes to a juster and truer estimate of His Person and character. On this very night Philip gave sad evidence of how little he and the others even yet understood of Him. Have I been so long time with you and yet hast thou not known Me, Philip? was the Saviours reply to Philips request that He would show to them the Father. To the very end of His life it was still true of the disciples that they understood not what things they were that He sake unto them, and what He did they knew not either as yet--but should only know hereafter. Was this, then, what our Saviour meant in the text when He said It is expedient for you that I go away:--You will be able, after I am gone, to balance and weigh the things that I have said and done better than you can at present, and so, by the exercise of your calmer judgment, arrive at a juster estimate of Me? This would certainly be a consequence of His departure--but it was not this He meant by the words He used.
II. IF FAITH, HOPE, AND CHARITY ARE THE THREE GRACES WHICH MAKE UP THE SUM OF A CHRISTIAN CHARACTER, HOW VERY MUCH THAT CHARACTER MUST BE STRENGTHENED BY THE GREATER EXERCISE OF THESE SEVERAL GRACES. When the Lord they loved was taken away from them, then their faith would be called into action as it had never been before, for faith begins where sight ends; when they ceased to see the Lord with the natural eye then the spiritual vision--which is only another name for faith--would have to be entirely depended upon. And so, too, with their hope. No longer would they be looking for a temporal and earthly fulfilment of Gods promises. The hope they had been hitherto entertaining of earthly honour for their Lord, and the restoration of an earthly kingdom to His chosen people, would henceforth give place to a wider and better and further-reaching hope. Their treasure henceforth would be in heaven, and they would surely experience in their own case the truth that they had long since heard and learnt by rote--that where a mans treasure is there will his heart be also.
III. IF I GO NOT AWAY THE COMFORTER WILL NOT COME UNTO YOU--but if I depart I will send Him unto you. Do we understand this? Is it that the Holy Spirit is kinder, more loving, more powerful than He who sends Him? Ah no, we know that the Three Persons are at the same time One God--One in power, and in holiness, and in love. The meaning has already been partly stated. It is better for the Church--it is better for each one of us its members--to walk by faith than to walk by sight. It is better, and it is the work of God the Holy Ghost to lead us on to this higher life. So long as Jesus was present upon earth there could not fail to be something earthly and carnal in the attachment of His disciples to Him; but when He was departed the Holy Ghost would teach men a more spiritual attachment. (John Crofts.)
Expediency
I. THINGS ARE NOT OF NECESSITY AS THEY APPEAR AT FIRST SIGHT. We are very short-sighted, and we judge just by what is within range of our vision. How should human sight perceive that it ever could be expedient for the well-loved Jesus to depart? Surely nothing could compensate for that; and yet He says it is for their advantage. Let this be a lesson to us, not to be too hasty in taking things at first sight. Let us not say, when, perhaps, we are on the very road to blessing, all these things are against me. It is necessary that we keep our minds in a state of readiness to admit possibilities.
II. THE VALUE OF UNDERLYING AND DEFERRED BLESSINGS IS OFTEN FAR GREATER THAN THAT, OF WHAT WE HAVE LOST, OR ARE ABOUT TO LOSE. The full ear of corn is of much more value than the single grain from which it sprang, from whose death it took its life; but who would have believed as a theory, that it was only under this condition it could come. What I do thou knowest not now, but thou shalt know hereafter. God is continually sowing for us seed which we would never sow for ourselves, because we could not bear to see it die.
III. THINK OF GODS ACTION ON THE WHOLE MATTER. We can never deal with the whole of a matter. All human affairs are like spheres, they can be illumined only on one portion of their surface at a time. Some of them revolve so slowly, that it requires more than a lifetime for a man to see their whole surface. Events are happening to us now, which are the legitimate consequences of certain actions of our youth; or even of our parents; or of their parents; and God is engaged in the whole matter. Is it not an immense relief that we can leave God to deal with things as a whole--that we need not strain ourselves, in endeavouring to compass things beyond our grasp.
IV. CONNECT GOD DIRECTLY WITH EXPEDIENCY. Expediency implies suitability of action to circumstances, of means to accomplish an end--that end being what seemed meet unto Him. Man recognizes the meaning of the word, and thinks he acts upon it; but being evil, he often forgets moral principles; moreover, he is so ignorant, he often chooses wrong means; he thinks it is not expedient to do such and such a thing, whereas it is the very thing he should have done; and he does the very thing, which, as it turns out, he should not have done. But with God there are no mistakes; and so, there is no miscarrying; there is absolute righteousness in Him; and so, in His dealings towards us, and others, there can be no wrong. He does the right thing, with the right motive, in the right way, at the right time. There are two considerations, which will help us very much to fall in with Gods arrangements with faith and comfort.
1. The persuasion, that when He deems such and such a mode of action expedient, He sees the end from the beginning. We do not know in what a beginning will end, He does.
2. The belief that He sees the real suitability of operative causes--how certain things are calculated to bring about certain ends. We often think we see this. But all life is full of the history of sad mistakes in this respect. Unforeseen and disturbing influences have come in. The means we put in motion did not go far enough, or they went too far, or, perhaps, were beside the mark altogether. But when God is in action, all this is put far away; and if the causes which He sets in motion are in anyway trying to us, we maybe certain that they will produce the end He desires. And so, though we cannot see it at the time, our heaviest trials are for the best. They are only means to an end. They are expedient. (P. B. Power, M. A.)
Christ more useful within the veil
The high priest was more useful to them within the veil than outside of it; He was doing for them out of sight what He could not accomplish in their view. I delight to think that my Lord is with the Father. Sometimes I cannot get to God, my access seems blocked by my infirmity; but He is always with God to plead for me. Let us joy and rejoice that our covenant Head is now in the bosom of the Father, at the fountain-head of love and grace, and that He is there on our behalf.
Expedient absence
It is better for us that Christ should be in heaven than with us upon earth. A woman had rather have her husband live with her than go to the Indies; but she yieldeth to his absence when she considereth the profit of his traffic. (T. Manton.)
The expediency of Christs absence
All departures are painful and trying, e.g., the boy to business; the girl to marriage; the friend to sea; the relation over the river of death. Glad that this is true of Christ; that He felt the going away, and needed comforting. But, in His case, that was true which is so often true still--the one who went was the Comforter. His was no ordinary going. He was more to the disciples than they realised.
I. IT WOULD PROVE TO BE A PRESENT SPIRITUAL POWER. Our Lord comforted by giving a two-fold assurance:
1. He would really be always with them.
2. He would give His Spirit to be always with them. But this is confusing, until our hearts learn to hold both these forms of truth in harmony. Our Lord, while here, was always trying to glorify His spiritual relations; and so preparing for the time when His relations should be all spiritual. Is it not infinitely comforting to be assured that temporal relations shall, by and by, give place to those which are spiritual? The comparative value of the temporal and the spiritual we learn in the progress of life. The child-Christian wants a Christ of the flesh. The matured Christian wants a Christ of the spirit. And just that Christ gone away has become. He was outside us; He is in us now. We hear of the scene on Olivet, and we say, He is gone. We hear of the scene at Pentecost, and we say, He has come again to abide with us for ever.
II. IT LOCALISES OUR CONCEPTION OF HEAVEN. The human Christ went to a place, and prepares a place. This is enough, Jesus is there; and Jesus knows.
III. IT GIVES US GROUND FOR CHERISHING A HIGH HOPE. Resting upon the promise He has left. Our sorrow is the seeming separation; our everlasting joy shall yet be conscious union, under conditions that involve no separation. One day we shall be ever with the Lord. We may reverently fit the influence of Christs departed saints into Christs own words (as in text). Few of us but have dear friends, not lost, but gone before. And they seem to whisper in our souls, and say, It is expedient for you that I go away. We cannot see it. We are like the women at the sepulchre. And yet those who are gone away--1. Do become a present spiritual power to us. By going their characters get glorified, so as to be to us
(1) Holy example;
(2) call; and
(3) impulse.
They live ever in our souls. Among the very highest of the spiritual forces moving us in the godly life, we put the influence of the white-robed host, the sainted dead.
2. They localize heaven for us.
3. They keep alive in our souls a great hope. I shall go to Him, but He shall not return to me. The hope of reunion, where they go no more out for ever. (Weekly Pulpit.)
Expediency of the Ascension
The Ascension was expedient because
I. IT SECURED AN ADEQUATE SENSE OF THE TRUE PLACE AND DIGNITY OF MAN AMONG THE CREATURES OF GOD. There are great studies, which, as they are sometimes handled, tend to create a degraded idea of man.
1. Look, says the astronomer, at the North Star, the light which falls on your eye left that star some thirty years or more ago; and yet this light travels at a rate of 200,000 miles a second. Or, look at the Milky Way, a collection of worlds more numerous than the sands on the sea-shore, separated often from each other by distances which our figures cannot express, and among these are stars whose light must have taken even thousands of centuries in order to reach us on this earth. Or, look at that Dog Star, Sirius. When it was first known that our own sun was moving round some other centre, just as our earth moves round him, it was a shock to the thought; but this giant sun, Sirius, compared with which our own sun is but a pigmy, is himself in motion around some other central orb, the size and place and distance of which exhaust the capacities of imagination. And then our friend turns our thoughts upon this little home of ours. Astronomy has told man many things, and among others, his insignificance.
2. Comparative physiology takes us into its museums, and we see ranged before us the skeletons of apes. Look at the lower types (so it is said) of the human family; at the Aztecs and the Papuans; and then say how you can trace a sharp line of demarcation between this animal and that animal.
3. Or again, we picture to ourselves a scene which takes place inevitably after a great battle; and as our thought lingers over the ghastly ruin, chemistry passes by, and it suggests that after all all is well, and that these buried and disfigured forms will presently be resolved into their constituent elements; and that the value of man may be appreciated when we have discovered what remains after a human body has been submitted to the verdict of a chemical student. Certainly most of us do not readily acquiesce in these theories of human life. Our reason tells the astronomer that there is a moral as well as a material world, and that bulk and distance are not the main tests of greatness; and it tells the comparative anatomist that no similarity of his skeletons can possibly obliterate the vast interval which parts a being with self-reflecting consciousness, and free will from a being which is governed only by instinct; and as for the chemist, whether he is in the cemetery or in the laboratory, reason protests to him that his analysis begs the tremendous question, whether the most important and vital part of man has ever been before him to be analysed at all. But the Christian falls back upon a distinct fact, which enables him to listen with interest and with sympathy to all that the astronomer, &c., may have to tell him, and withal to preserve the robust faith in the dignity of man. He believes in the ascension of our Lord into heaven. Somewhere in space he knows there is at this moment, associated with the glories of the self-existing Diety, a human body and a human soul. Ay, it is on the throne of the universe. No other creature of God shares that incomparable dignity.
II.
IT MAKES ROOM FOR FAITH IS CHRIST.
It is, of course, conceivable that our Lord might have willed to prolong His life upon the earth through the centuries of Christian history.
Had He done so, there would have been no questions as to the seal and centre of authority in the Christian Church, or as to the true area and contents of the Christian creed; there would have been ever before the eyes of men a living example of what the Christian character was meant to be; and perhaps the conversion of the world would have been completed long ere this.
But one thing is certain, that if Christ had continued to be visibly present, there would have been no room for true faith in Him.
Trust in Christ there might have been; we trust our friends, our elders; but faith is the evidence of things not seen.
Think what this would have meant for Christendom.
Why is it that so great a place is assigned to faith in the New Testament? Because faith is the apprehension of an object with ever-increasing clearness on the part of the whole soul, of its thought, of its heart, of its determination.
And such an apprehension of a perfect object means vast moral leverage. We become, more or less, like that on which we continually fix our attention. If we look persistently downwards then we become earthly; if we look upwards then the light of heaven is reflected in oer souls. For this there would have been no room if our Lord had not ascended; the world would only have known Christ after the flesh, would have concerned itself with His outward and human form, rather than with His true and essential divinity, and it therefore was expedient that He should go away, as promoting the moral effect and power of faith.
III. IN THE INTERESTS OF WORSHIP. What is the idea of God which we gain from nature Courage, energy, and intelligence--nature certainly suggests these; but benevolence is in the back-ground of its suggestion respecting its author and its master. It is cold, thin, superficial; like the clear sunlight on a frosty day in January, there is no warmth, no colour, no character about it; it may provoke intellectual interest, admiration, wonder, but not passion of any kind, not devotion, not worship. But we Christians approach God not only through external, non-human nature, but through man. Man, unlike nature, has moral character. When the Old Testament would teach us the awful attributes of the self-existent, it draws upon the ordinary language of human passion and human experience, it describes a being with human feelings of anger, of pity, of jealousy, of love. The revelation through man is a higher revelation; it is one of moral character. The Lord is long-suffering, &c. But here, of course, human nature, as we know it, if taken on the average as a guide to the true character of God, may easily mislead us. It is expedient that perfect humanity should thus be associated on the throne of heaven with the infinite and the eternal. And thus, in the worship of the Church, inspired on the one hand, by an awful sense of the inaccessible majesty of God, and, on the other, by a trustful, tender passion, which has its roots in the consciousness of a human fellowship, with its awful object, we find that which we find nowhere else on earth, and we understand the words, It is expedient for you that I go away. And a last reason for the expediency
IV. IN CONNECTION WITH HIS WORK OF INTERCESSION. A question which Christians ought to ask themselves more often than they do is this--What is our Lord doing now? At His ascension He sat down at the right hand of God. It is the posture not merely of the enthroned Monarch of Heaven; it is the posture of the omnipotent Priest. He does not stand to plead; still less does He prostrate Himself, side by side with those highest beings who are ranged around the throne. He sits in His wounded but glorified humanity as the one permanent sacrifice which will for ever avail before the eyes of the All Holy. Therefore, if any man sin, we have an Advocate with the Father, &c. This uninterrupted action of our glorified Redeemer should surely be more in our minds. What was He doing when we were born? Interceding. What will He be doing at the moment when we shall be leaving it? Interceding. How was He engaged during the long hours of last night, or when we arose from sleep this morning? What will He be doing when we again lie down to rest? What is He doing now, while I am speaking for Him, and while you are listening? The answer is ever the same. Now, this intercession is the very strength of our Christian life. We claim its power in every prayer when we say, Through Jesus Christ our Lord. We associate our poor feeble prayers with His majestic pleading. It is the knowledge that this great work proceeds uninterruptedly, that makes hope and perseverance possible when hearts are failing, when temptation is strong, when the sky is dark and lurid. Surely it is expedient for you and me that He should go away. (Canon Liddon.)
Our Lords ascension the Churchs gain
1. Selfishness is never less attractive than when it would leave its imprint on theology. Yet we are not unfrequently confronted by systems in which the satisfaction of the believer is made the centre of a theological panorama, while the revealed nature or economies of God are banished to its circumference. In this way the self-sustaining, infinite, Supreme Being comes to be regarded as chiefly interesting on account of the satisfaction which He yields to the subjective yearnings of a finite and created soul But the manifested glory, the vindicated honour of Jesus Christ must take rank before all other considerations in regard to the Ascension: at length that life of humiliation is over, and the Bridegroom of the Church girds His sword upon His thigh, as becomes the Most Mighty, and according to His worship and renown.
2. This, then, is our first tribute of love and duty to the mystery of to-day, and we may now turn to that other and very different point of view which is sanctioned by our Lord in the text. No words that ever fell from the lips of Christ can have at first seemed to those faithful souls who heard them to verge more closely than these on the confines of paradox. Could it be expedient for men who are still pilgrims upon earth that their Guide should be taken from them? For pupils who are still ignorant that their great Teacher should desert them? For spiritual children, still so deficient in the Christian character, that they should be deprived of Him who taught by example even more persuasively than He taught by precept? He might have said expedient for the spirits of the just made perfect, to whom, after overcoming the sharpness of death, He was about to open the kingdom of heaven; for the angels who had for thirty-three years been ascending and descending upon the Son of Man, and who had now higher ministries in store for them: for Myself, who, after finishing the work that was given Me to do, am to be glorified by the Father with that glory which I had with Him before the world was. But He does say, for you. My brokenhearted, despairing disciples, it is expedient for yon, that I, your Teacher, Friend, Guide, Strength, should leave you. Wherein then, it may be asked, did this expediency lie?
I. THERE WAS A KIND OF NATURAL EXPEDIENCY IN THE ASCENSION, grounded on that law of the human mind which makes the appreciation of present blessings so very difficult. Most men look back with affection on the years of their childhood; and nations have always surrounded their early annals with an atmosphere of poetry. So limited are our powers, that generally speaking, observation must have ceased before reflection can begin to do its work. Had Christ continued to live visibly upon earth, the spiritual force of the Church might have been expended in an indefinitely prolonged observation. The strength even of saintly souls might have been fatally overtaxed. If Jesus is to be seen by His creatures in His relative and awful greatness, He must be withdrawn. Even on the night before the Passion, St. Philip asks a question, which proves that he does not yet know who Jesus really is. What I do thou knowest not now, but thou shalt know hereafter, was an announcement of the self-same principle. He was to be comprehended when He was gone. The life of Christ on earth had first to be brought to a close, ere it could be dropped as a seed that would spring up and bear fruit into the heart of redeemed humanity. And each teacher that has unfolded and enforced the meaning of that life, has, in adding to the illuminated thought of Christendom, attested the truth of our Masters words--It is expedient, &c.
II. THE LIFE OF THE SOULS OF THE APOSTLES JUST HAVE BEEN QUICKENED BY THE DEPARTURE OF THEIR LORD. Faith, hope, and charity are the threefold cord that links the living spirit with its God. These graces were dwarfed in the apostles. Their belief did not materially differ from the creed of the devout Jew. Their hopes were centred on an earthly throne. Their charity was discoloured by the presence of a subtle element of sense, which dimmed its spiritual lustre. Christ left them, and behold, they find springing up within themselves a new and vigorous life. By leaving them our Lord has made room for the full play and power of faith. (1Pe_1:8).
Hope, too, rivals in its growth the growth of faith. It reaches forth into an eternal future. And when Christ was seated at the right hand of God, love, as a matter of course, would seek simply and constantly those things that are above, and not the things upon the earth.
III. But if the apostles had been altogether left to their own resources, could they have formed so true an estimate of His life, as by their writings to rule the thought and kindle the enthusiasm of all ages? Were faith, hope, love, thrown out, as plants of native growth, from the rich soil of their natural hearts? Are the Epistles of St. Paul, or is the character of St. John to be explained by their natural gifts, educational antecedents, contact with the Redeemer, the circumstances and directions of their lives? Surely not. Even though the Pentecostal miracle had not been recorded, some supernatural interference must have been assumed, in order to account for the apostolic character, and the apostolic writings. Of itself the departure of our risen Lord would neither have permanently illuminated the reflections of the Church, nor yet have quickened the graces of its separate members. WE MUST WAIT UNTIL PENTECOST IF WE WOULD ENTER INTO THE FULL EXPEDIENCY OF THE ASCENSION. Pass the eye over that last great discourse, and mark how it bears with repeated effort and significance upon the statement of the text (chap. 14:3, 12, 16, 26; 15:26, 27; 16:7, 10, 13). While Christ tarried here, His apostles who saw and conversed with Him were further, immeasurably further, from Him than we may be, if we will. To them He was still an external example--voice, force. Christ in us is the hope of glory. Our ascended Lord has sent down upon us that promised and gracious Friend, whose office it is to unite us to Himself. Therefore, united to Christ, man is no longer an isolated unit; he is a member of that spiritual organization which is Christs Body. If we feel the expediency of the Ascension, we are men of prayer. In heart and mind we ascend thither where prayer is not an effort but an atmosphere. It is the instinctive breathing of an informing spirit, the voice of children, who, without doubt or questioning, throw themselves into their Fathers arms. Can we realize, each one for himself, what is involved in this expediency of our Lords ascension? Not if we forget the sharp distinction which exists, and which will exist for ever, between the very highest, noblest, purest, truest efforts of nature, and the heavenly action of the Spirit of grace. We shall never understand the expediency of the Ascension, if we forget that we are the subjects of a spiritual dispensation, in which forces more extraordinary are at work, and results more wonderful are produced than any which fall under the cognizance of sense (1Co_2:7-9). The Ascension reminds us of a life which is higher than this world. So much higher, so much more blessed and glorious is the life of grace, that One who loved us men with the truest and purest affection, yet withdrew Himself, as on this day, from our sight in order to enable us, if we will, to live it. (Cannon Liddon.)
Gain in the Saviours loss
1. The parting of friends is always a sad thing; for many things may come to prevent a meeting again. But partings sometimes are among the very saddest things: parting of those who are very dear: of the playmates of childhood: of those who hitherto have kept close together in the race and the warfare of life, but who are now to be severed by long years. And why is it then, that emigrants, e.g., are yet content to part? Because they feel it is better so; that they are leaving a country which will not yield bread, for another where there is work and bread for all. And the friends who remained behind knew all that too.
2. The thing to which people most naturally have recourse to blunt the pang of parting is some such thought as is suggested in the text. The dying wife tries to persuade the husband that it is far better as it is. The reckless and graceless young man, reclaimed by a kindness and a wisdom that were half angelic, as he feels life ebbing away, says: Perhaps it is as well I should go home pretty soon. And just with that simple and natural thought did the blessed Redeemer seek to console His disciples.
3. Now we often say and hear such words as these, when they express rather what is wished than what is felt and believed; when we could give no sufficient reason, save that one sheet-anchor of the weary and disappointed heart, the wise and kind decree of God. But it is not merely in this general view, and merely by way of saying a kind word that might cheer up somewhat in a trying hour, that Jesus said this. His departure was the condition of anothers coming, who would more than make up for His loss. Precious indeed, then, must that other be!
4. Now we must all feel that although it is our privilege to love each of the three Persons in the Trinity; still the Saviour we cannot choose but single out for special love. And we should hardly be able to persuade ourselves that even the coming of the Comforter could make up for His absence. But all that He declared was, that for believers so situated as the disciples He was addressing, it was advantageous that the Comforter should be present with them, even at the price of His own departure.
5. But the thought naturally suggests itself, Why might the Church not have had both? Now, we must just take Christs word for it, that this cannot be. For some good reason we cannot have both together. Note two or three considerations
I. THE CHOICE LAY BETWEEN CHRIST AS HE THEN WAS, A PERSON DWELLING IN A HUMAN BODY, AND A DIVINE SPIRIT CAPABLE OF BEING UNIVERSALLY PRESENT AT THE SAME TIME. Christ, dwelling in flesh, could be only in one place at a time; while the Comforter, unbound by fleshly trammels, could be in a thousand places, working on a million hearts all at once. And for the grand end of carrying on the government of a Church that is to overspread the world, it was better to have one Divine Being, equally present, working with equal energy everywhere, than even to have Christ Himself dwelling in visible form in some favoured spot, and by the very fact of His being visible there, making those disciples in distant countries who saw Him not, feel as though they were so far overlooked. It is the fancy of Popery, but it is not the purpose of the Redeemer, to have one fixed, localized, visible centre of the Christian Church. If sacred places can even yet warm the Christians heart, it is not that Christ is nearer us there than here. And when we call it to mind, how the cares and duties of life tie most of us to one little spot of this world; when we think how vainly most of us might wish to make a pilgrimage of thousands of miles, even though that pilgrimage should bring us into the visible presence of our God, shall we Rot be thankful for the presence here of a Sanctifier and Comforter, who can make our very soul His home.
II. Each Person in the Trinity has His own share in the great task of preparing man for heaven; and A CERTAIN WORK HAS BEEN APPOINTED TO THE HOLY SPIRIT. Now, when we think of the things which it is the Spirits occupation to do, we see that this world is the place where they must be done. The Spirits work lies mainly with a suffering, struggling, sinful, tempted, imperfect Church. Placed and tried as we are, it is just the Holy Spirit we need; and so it is just the Holy Spirit that we get. We shall need Him less, with reverence be it said, when we shall have entered upon the immediate presence of our God. It is by the working of the Blessed Spirit that we are born again, sanctified, comforted, taught to pray. There is not a point in the souls better life, there is not an emergency in the Christians earthly pilgrimage, at which the Blessed Spirit does not come in, the very thing we need. (A. K. H. Boyd, D. D.)
Christ in heaven better than Christ on earth
Christ in heaven instead of on earth means
I. CHRISTS PERSON NEARER.
II. CHRISTS CHARACTER CLEARER. One is apt to think the men of Christs day were much more advantageously situated for judging of Christs Divinity than we are. Yet what were the facts of the case? Now if Christ had never gone away
1. We should want the highest proof, which we now have, of His divinity: viz., His resurrection and ascension.
2. We should feel, and that too increasingly, the difficulty of the Jews. They were acquainted with His parentage, with His upbringing, and with His daily life. Would we have round it easy to believe? The abundance of Christs miracles would make them cease to be miracles; the gracious words becoming so common would lose their power; the very character of Jesus would come to be regarded as a product of the earth. What were helps to the men of Christs day would become no inconsiderable hindrances to us.
3. Having Christ in our midst, we should have the difficulty, which is felt by every age, of judging of its great mens characters while they are yet alive. Great men are better appreciated by after generations than by their contemporaries. Sometimes, too, those who die beneath a cloud of shame have their names vindicated by posterity. Many examples might be given, but none more illustrious than that of Christ, who eighteen centuries ago was executed as a malefactor, but now is worshipped throughout the world as God.
III. CHRISTS WORK SURER. Of course Christ came to reveal the Father; to fulfil the law; to destroy the works of the devil; to bring life and immortality to light; to open heaven for believers. But while these are essential parts of the work of Christ, Scripture invariably assigns the central position to the Cross. All the others are rightly seen only when beheld as radiating from it; as thus--Christs sacrificial death upon the cross was the highest revelation of the Father (Joh_3:16; Ro 1Jn_3:16); the perfect pattern of duty (1Jn_3:16; 1Pe_2:21); the absolute destruction of death (Heb_2:14-15); the certain opening of heaven to believers (Heb_9:12). And all these because it was all expiation of the guilt of men (Eph_5:2, &c.).
Yet, of this work the surest evidence would have been wanting had Christ continued on the earth. Had He postponed His dying we should certainly have had the promise of the Father as our guarantee that the work would be accomplished: had He died and risen, but remained on earth, we should have had the double witness of His own word and of the testimony of those who had seen Him. But that evidence would have gradually become obscure by the passing years. His visible presence would always be felt to be a difficulty in assenting to the truth of His decease. But now, Christ having gone away to His Fathers throne, we have, so to speak, been supplied with a sublime public certificate that His great redeeming work has been accomplished.
IV. CHRISTS CHURCH RICHER; that is, by the presence of the Holy Spirit. In Christs view the dispensation of the Spirit was a higher gift than the mission of the Son; higher relatively, as being an onward step in the development of redemption and the enjoyment of salvation. What the materials of a building are to the building and the architect; what the light is to the vision which we have by means of the light; what the wisdom in a book is to the same wisdom when apprehended by the mind; what the external revelation of nature is to the intelligent appreciation of it; what the Mosaic economy, with its code of precepts and system of sacrifice, was to the spiritual interpretations and applications thereof, which were given by the prophets; that was the work of Christ to the work of the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit takes of the things that are Christs and shows them to the soul. Christ revealed the Father to men; the Spirit reveals the Father in men. Christ gave to men a pattern of life; the Holy Ghost enables men to imitate as well as understand. Christ gave Himself to be a sacrifice for human sin; the Spirit helps men to believe in, and rest upon, that sacrifice. See also Joh_16:8.
V. CHRISTS HEAVEN DEARER. To bring to light the reality of a future life was one of the specific objects of Christs mission. He came to speak of it in His teachings; to purchase it by His sufferings; to reveal it by His resurrection; to open it and take possession of it for His people by His triumphant ascension. Obviously, then, Christs departure into heaven has given the world the surest proof that a heaven exists, and invested it with the strongest and sweetest charm for His people. Christ would not be long absent from the sorrowing disciples before they would come to feel in this respect the benefit of His departure. It would humanize heaven for them. It would no longer seem to them a strange place. Those who have Christian friends there know how that blessed home is all the dearer on that account.
How much, then, should heaven be enhanced by the presence of Christ. Conclusion: What should be the souls attitude towards this absent Saviour? Whom having not seen we love, &c. Faith. Love. Joy. (T. Whitelaw, D. D.)
The greatest trials leading to the greatest blessings
I. THE GREATEST TRIAL MAY PROVE THE GREATEST BLESSING.
1. The departure of Christ was felt to be a most grievous trial. Sorrow hath filled your heart. The Sun of their souls was sinking beneath the horizon and their world left in darkness and desolation.
2. The advent of His Spirit would be the greatest blessing. He was the Comforter, the Spirit of Truth, &c. He would enter the inner temple of their nature, reproduce all the impressions that Christ had made, and abide with them for ever. Thus it is and ever will be with the good. Our light affliction, &c.
II. THE GREATEST TRIAL MAY BE NECESSARY TO THE GREATEST BLESSING. It seemed expedient in order
1. To give a more real meaning to the life of Christ. Never does the life of a loved friend come with such meaning and might as when death has removed him. He then assumes lovelier forms, and wields a more potent influence. So with Christ. When He ceased to be seen without, He became formed within them the Hope of Glory.
2. To dissipate all their material and local perceptions of Him. His departure tended at once to spiritualize and universalize their conceptions of Him.
3. To stimulate them to study the eternal principles of duty. So long as our teacher is with us we are contented to have our duty pointed out to us. Like children, we shall be controlled by verbal rulers and voices from without. But when he is gone there is a sphere and stimulus for the use of our faculties. How inferior is the mind moving by prescriptive rules to one ruled by universal principles.
4. To throw the soul upon the help of its own faculties. Man only grows as he works his own faculties and becomes self-reliant. Up to a certain point parental watchfulness is indispensable; beyond that it becomes an evil. It is a kind law, though painful, which requires the child to withdraw from the parental roof, and rely upon himself. So with the disciples. What a marked change occurred in them after the Ascension. The principle before us admits of a wide application. It may be necessary for a man to lose friends, property, health, liberty to prepare him for eternal life.
III. THE GREATEST TRIALS AND THE GREATEST BLESSINGS ARE ALIKE UNDER THE DIRECTION OF CHRIST.
1. The greatest trial. I go away. No compulsion; Christ was free. I have power to lay down My life.
2. The greatest blessing. I will send, &c. Him, not It--a Person, not an influence. Our destiny is in the hands of Christ. Let us trust in Him. The whole of our life is made up of loss and gain; but if we are His, He takes away a good thing to give a better. (D. Thomas, D. D.)
The work of the Holy Spirit
I. THE EXPEDIENCY OF CHRISTS DEPARTURE. How could they, poor sheep, be better off in the midst of wolves without a shepherd? A few things remembered may make it a little clearer.
1. The Master has a work to do for us in heaven. His work was not all done on Calvary. His intercession is the sequel and continuation of redemption.
2. His departure prepared the way for the coming of the Holy Spirit.
3. Be could not be with them in the fullest sense unless He left them.
4. His departure raised and spiritualized their conceptions.
5. His departure made them better men. Even after three years with Jesus they were but children in understanding and power. We have their portraits before and after His departure, and so changed are they that one could hardly believe them the same men.
II. THE WORK OF THE HOLY SPIRIT. This is twofold.
1. Upon the world (Joh_16:8-11). The Master mentions three distinct points as to which the Spirit will reprove or convict the world: sin, righteousness, judgment. Then, resuming each point separately, He shows more particularly what the Spirit will do. The first work of the Holy Spirit is to convince of sin--of all sins, but chiefly of the sin of rejecting Christ. All sin has its root in unbelief, and the most aggravating form of unbelief is the rejection of Jesus Christ. This is the one great, comprehensive, all-inclusive sin of ungodly men. He next convinces the world of the righteousness of Gods whole dispensation, but especially of Christs personal righteousness. The world accounted Jesus guilty. It would also be the special function of the Spirit to keep alive the idea of judgment. He teaches the world moral and spiritual discernment, and vivifies their views of the final judgment.
2. The mission of the Holy Spirit among believers. As He turns to His disciples Jesus says: I have yet many things to say unto you, but ye cannot bear them now. But they are told of a Guide who shall lead them into all truth. (G. W. Brown.)
Death the interpreter
The advantage to a great cause in the death of its great leader. This is a paradox, but there are many paradoxes that are true.
1. In the first place we never come to know any man while he is with us. The worlds best judgments of men are formed after their death. Christ Himself was not known while He lived. His twelve disciples, while they were in fellowship and companionship with Him and walking by His side, resting even on His bosom, never realized that He was the Son of God. You know that the mother always loves best the child that is dead. It is not because the child that is dead was better than all the children that are living, but because death brings the loved ones nearer to us than life ever brings them. You will never know your wife till she has gone from you. We never realize the meaning of Good-morning until we have said Good-bye.
2. The great truths are never apprehended while the great teachers of those truths are living to expound them. The death of a great teacher deepens and disseminates the knowledge of the truth. It was so with the death of Christ. It has been so with the death of every great teacher since Christ died. And the death of a great leader not only deepens the knowledge of the truth, it disseminates that knowledge. The Reformation is a great deal broader than Luther; and Calvinism is a great deal larger than John Calvin; Methodism is immeasurably more than Wesley; and, in a true sense, Christianity is more than Jesus of Nazareth--not more than Christ, but more than Jesus of Nazareth. There are some persons who look forward with hope to a second coming, in fleshly and visible presence, of Christ. They want to see Jesus of Nazareth descend again to earth, enthroned and crowned, sitting at Jerusalem. This would limit Christianity instead of broadening it, weaken instead of strengthening it, decrease instead of adding to its power. No great truth can be fully made manifest in a single narrow life; and every individual life is narrow. So long as the great leader lives the truth is caged; when the cage is destroyed has the bird liberty to fly out to carry its song everywhither?
3. But, yet more than that, as truth is greater than the teacher, so life and spirit is greater than any manifestation of that life and spirit. Life is more than truth. It is truth vitalized. The life of piety is more than any mans piety. The life of love is more than any one love. Mother-love? It is infinitely more than the love of any one mother. Patriotism? It is immeasurably broader than the service of any one patriot. The history of the Christian Church is the history of the unfoldings of successive developments of Christian truth, Christian experience, in and through Christian lives. (Lyman Abbott, D. D.)
The gift of Pentecost
I. THE GREAT DOCTRINE WE COMMEMORATE. The disciples, as yet, knew only the foundation truth of the unity of the Godhead. Doubtless the All-wise, who has evermore proportioned His revelations to the needs and capacity of His creatures, knew that this great truth was all that they as yet were fitted profitably to receive. For this master-truth, when mans corruptions had multiplied false gods, the Jewish Church was to enshrine and to transmit; and it may be that the full knowledge of the Trinity might have weakened their special witness for the indivisible Unity of God. Now to men trained up to view this as the key-stone of their whole religious system, the trial of faith required to receive the doctrine of the Trinity must have been so great, that nothing but the direct illumination of the Holy One could make them able to receive it. They had indeed been accustomed to hear of the Spirit of God (Gen_1:2; Exo_31:3; Nu 1Sa_10:10; 1Sa_19:20; 2Ch_15:1). And yet they were amongst those who did not so much as know whether there were any Holy Ghost. They doubtless thought of Gods Spirit as of His inward being, or as the breath of His mouth; it was with them but another name for His essence, power, or influence. But the truth, as it was revealed by the Spirit, was
1. That in the Unity of the indivisible Godhead there were not only the Persons of the Father and the Son, but also that of the Holy Ghost.
2. That though the Holy Ghost is One God with the Father and the Son, yet is He not either the Father or the Son.
3. That this was no mere revelation to man of the one Godhead under a threefold aspect, but that it was an eternal and necessary condition of the Godhead itself.
4. That whilst as touching time there was neither before nor after in relation to the three blessed Persons, there was between themselves a priority of order; in that the everlasting Father was the fountain of being; for that the Son was from the Father, whilst the Father was not from the Son; and that the Holy Ghost was from the Father and the Son.
5. His special office in the work of mans salvation. They now learned
(1) That whilst every Person in the Godhead contributed to that salvation, yet that the Father is the Creator; the Son the Redeemer, the Holy Ghost, the Paraclete, the Advocate, the Comforter, is the Sanctifier of all the elect.
(2) That although the work of the Redeemer, so far as it depended upon His personal presence upon earth, was perfectly accomplished, yet that still He had much to do for those whom He had died to save. For He had to ascend into the highest heaven, that there He might plead the sacrifice He had once for all offered, and administer from the Fathers right hand the rule of the mediatorial kingdom.
(3) That as the first-fruits of that rule, there was poured out upon the Church on earth the gift of the Holy Ghost.
II. THIS GREAT DOCTRINE IS FULL OF PRACTICAL CONSEQUENCES.
1. It is this which makes the Church of Christ to be what it is. All the attributes, powers, and blessings of the Church are the consequence of this presence of the Holy Ghost. It is through this that Christ the Lord is ever with it; that it has gifts of light, and understanding, and power, and holiness; that its members are a true living unity; that its prayers mount up acceptably to God; that the Sacraments and means of grace are made real. It is of the utmost moment that again and again we remind ourselves of these great truths, for everything around us tends to rob us of their reality.
(1) The world, though it bears the Christian name, has no real belief in any special presence of the Holy Ghost; and we cannot mix with it without being tempted to take up even unawares its tone of unbelieving thought.
(2) Even within the Church itself this temptation re-appears in the most subtle forms. Formality creeps over us even as we worship, and then we rest in the outward and visible as if it had some virtue of its own. Nor is the reaction from this less common or less dangerous. We meet daily with those who seek to get rid of formalism by decrying the forms through which God the Holy Ghost acts. Hence it happens that even whilst seeking for spirituality, men come to deny the reality of that spiritual Presence which alone can make them spiritual.
2. Its light colours the whole of those lives which each one of us is leading in the Church of the redeemed. It is in this presence and under these influences that our lives are being spent. And see how it must affect them.
(1) What a character does it give to our sins ! How deadly is the defilement which keeps men unclean though surrounded by such a cleansing power! Think what your life has been, and remember that in all its innumerable incidents you have been acting under the very pressure of the hand of the Holy Ghost. Through all those hours of youth and tenderness, by all the hallowing agencies of Christian homes, the Sanctifier has co-operated for your salvation. By all the secret avenues of your soul have His blessed influences acted on you. By hopes and fears, by aspirations and depressions, in sorrow and in joy, in the hour of pain and in the bounding glow of health, He who for Christs sake is in Christs Church present with us, has been dealing with your inmost spirit. What are you, and what ought you to be? All has been done for you which could be done without destroying that mysterious power of will with which the Almighty has endowed you. What must allowed impurity, malignity, envy, harshness, evil imaginings, evil speakings, be in us with whom the Paraclete is present! Yea, and what must mere earthliness, coldness in devotion, the unbelieving eye, the careless touch of heavenly mysteries, the absence of contrition, the lack of faith, dulness of soul beneath the Saviours Cross, dulness of heart and affection in the sight of Bethlehem, Gethsemane, and Calvary,--what must these things be in those who even here are in Gods very temple, and under the hand of the Eternal Spirit.
(2) But further, whilst Whitsuntide is so eminently a humbling time, yet what season is fuller of thoughts of hope and comfort. For though here, if anywhere, we see the true evil of an earthly life, yet we see also how we may escape from it. Only let us strive to realize His special presence who is the Lord and Giver of life; only, using humbly, faithfully, and simply the instruments of His presence. (Bp. S. Wilberforce.)
The Paraclete
Just as we have sometimes seen the setting sun, surrounded by dark and gloomy clouds, and about to plunge into still darker and gloomier, break out for a moment and pour a final flood of light over mountain and sea, so this Sun of the World, about to set amid sombre clouds, sheds upon His Church a glorious beam of light to enlighten and comfort for ever. Notice
I. THE DESCRIPTION HERE GIVEN OF THE HOLY SPIRIT. Comforter is a word peculiar to St. John (Joh_14:16; Joh_14:26; Joh_15:26; Joh_16:7; 1Jn_2:1), and means one called to be beside another. In Greek and Roman courts of law it was the custom for an accused person to be accompanied by influential friends. These were not advocates in our sense of the term, paid professionals, but men who out of friendship came to stand by their friend in his time of need, to help him by encouragements and suggestions, and if necessary to take his place. Jesus had hitherto been all this. Now He was going away in order that another Paraclete might take His place, and
1. As the paraclete stood by his friend in the hour of trial, so does the Spirit by us. We are not left alone to face our difficulties and afflictions. I will not leave your orphans. The Church is not left alone to face her trials and dangers. The Lord will help her, and that right early.
2. As the paraclete suggested to his friend what was best for his defence, so does the Holy Spirit to us. Take no thought what ye shall speak, &c. So these fishermen went everywhere, standing before kings, meeting the defenders of deeply-rooted religions and overthrowing them. So also with ourselves. We are not left to go a warfare at our own charges. Ye have an unction from the Holy One.
3. As the paraclete pleaded for his friend, so does the Holy Spirit for us. Christ pleads for us in heaven; the Spirit pleads in our hearts (Rom_8:1-39.).
II. THE CONNECTION BETWEEN THE DEPARTURE OF JESUS AND THE COMING OF THE HOLY SPIRIT. It is the atonement of Christ that gives His Church a right to the Spirits presence and the Spirits grace. The atonement was not completed till Christ had gone away. In accordance with this we read Joh_7:39) that the Spirit was not given because Jesus was not glorified. Not, however, that the Spirit was entirely absent from the Old Testament Church. He strove before the flood, inspired the prophets, &c.; but in His plenitude and power, He did not come till Jesus had gone. Conclusion: Let us
1. Be encouraged by this word of the Master.
2. Realize the blessedness here conveyed. (T. Hamilton, D. D.)
The ministry of the Comforter
1. The teaching of Christ respecting the ministry of the Holy Ghost is so peculiar as to raise the inquiry, Where was the Holy Ghost during the earthly ministry of the Son of Man? Throughout the Old Testament there are the clearest testimonies as to His personal service, and yet Christ speaks of the descent of the Spirit as a new and special gift. Was His ministry suspended? It may be suggested that the fulness of the Spirit had not been realized in the ancient church, which is undoubtedly true; yet it is sufficient to account for the treatment of His descent as a new visitation. The answer would seem rather to be, that the Holy Ghost was in Jesus Christ himself, and could not be given to the Church as a distinctively Christian gift until the first period of the Incarnation had been consummated in the Ascension if I depart I will send Him unto you.
2. Christ gives a specific definition of the work of the Holy Ghost. That His work admitted of definition is itself significant; and that the Son of Mary should have presumed to define it is a marvellous instance of His spiritual dominion, if it be not a covert yet daring blasphemy. Let us now see with what simplicity and decisiveness Christ defines and limits the functions of the Holy Ghost.
I. HE SHALL NOT SPEAK OF HIMSELF. Why not? Because He would be speaking an unknown tongue. We cannot understand the purely spiritual. Whatever we know of it must come through mediums which lie nearer our own nature. The whole ministry of God is an accommodation to human weakness. When He would teach truth He must needs set it in the form of fact: when He would show Himself, it must be through the tabernacle of our own flesh; when He would reveal heaven, He must illustrate His meaning by the fragments of light and beauty which are scattered on the higher side of our own inferior world. The Holy Ghost does not speak of Himself, because there must be a common ground upon which He can invite the attention of mankind.
II. HE SHALL GLORIFY ME. The common ground is the work of the Man Christ Jesus.
1. What is meant by glorifying Christ? We know what is meant by the sun glorifying the earth. The sun does not create the landscape. Yet how wonderful is its work! Everything was there before, yet how transfigured by the ministry of light! In this respect, what light is to the earth, the Holy Ghost is to Christ. The work of the Spirit is revelation, not creation. He does not make Christ, He explains Him. The sun in doing all his wonderful work does not speak of himself; he will not, indeed, allow us to look at him. The Holy Ghost, in like manner, does not speak of himself. He will not answer all our inquiries respecting His personality. We cannot venture with impunity beyond a well-defined line. Yet whilst He Himself is the eternal secret, His work is open and glorious. His text is Christ. From that He never strays. The Christian student sees a Christ which he did not see twenty years ago. This increasing revelation is the work of the Holy Ghost, and is the fulfilment of Jesus Christs own promise. This is an incidental contribution towards the completeness and harmony of the mystery that is embodied in Christ Jesus. The beginning and the end are the same--equal in mystery, in condescension, in solemn grandeur. Thus: That which is conceived in her is of the Holy Ghost--this is the beginning; He shall not speak of Himself, He shall glorify Me; this is the end. The incarnation of the Son of God was the work of the Holy Ghost: how natural that the explanation of the Son of God should be the work of the same minister! As He was before the visible Christ, so He was to be after Him, and thus the whole mystery never passed from His own control.
2. The life of the Son of Man, as written in the Gospels, needs to be glorified! He was despised and rejected of men, a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief: He made Himself of no reputation: upon all this chasm we need a light above the brightness of the sun. When that light comes, the root out of a dry ground will be as the flower of Jesse and the plant of renown, and the face marred more than any mans will be the fairest among ten thousand and altogether lovely. Such is the wizardry of light!
3. This claim to be glorified by the Holy Ghost is without precedent in human history. That is a fact which ought to have some value attached to it. It is the kind of claim which an imposter would have avoided. Besides, for such a man, or for any man indeed, to have had such an idea is most marvellous. Had He merely committed His case to the care of time and the judgment of posterity, He would have taken the course of ordinary sagacity; but instead of that He expressly stated that the Holy Ghost would glorify His person, and complete His meditation on the earth. The work of the Holy Ghost was to be infinitely more than a work of mere explanation: it was to move forward to the very point of glory, even the glory which the Son of Man had with His Father before the world began. Having spoken of the ministry of the Holy Ghost in relation to Himself, our Lord proceeds to speak of it in relation to His disciples.
III. HE WILL GUIDE YOU INTO ALL TRUTH.
1. Not He will add to the number of miracles which you have seen at My hands, but I am the Truth; He will glorify Me, He will show you all My riches. Our Lord Himself did not guide His disciples into all truth, nor have men even yet been so far guided. Truth is an infinite quantity. At first it may seem to be compassable, but it recedes as it is approached; yet it throws the warm rays of promise upon every honest and loving pilgrim to its shrine. Our Lords expression is comprehensive,--not only into truth that is distinctively theological, but into all truth,--scientific, political, social, religious. Is truth not larger than the formal church? Our Lord does not open one department of truth and refuse the key of others. It is not to be supposed that any one man is to be guided into all truth. Some possessions are put into the custody of the whole race. No single star holds all the light. No single flower is endowed with all the beauty. What man is there who knows all things? Every honest student has some portion of truth that is in a sense his own, and every eye sees at least a tint which no other vision has seen so clearly as itself. Men make up man, churches make up the Church, truths makes up Truth, and it is only by a complete combination of the parts that the majesty and lustre of the whole can be secured.
2. The Spirit of Truth as such is to guide into all truth. The quantity is unlimited; the method assumes consent and co-operation on the part of man. A reference to Old Testament history will show how grave is the error which limits it to thinking and service which are supposed to be purely theological. It may indeed show that theology is the all-inclusive term, holding within its meaning all the highest aspects and suggestions both of speculative and practical science. Can anything be farther from theology, as popularly understood, than stone-cutting or wood-carving? Can any two spheres be much more widely sundered than those of the preacher of the gospel and the artificer in iron and brass? Apparently not. But the biblical testimony sets the inquiry at rest (Exo_31:2-5). Bezaleel was an inspired theologian. More than this, and apparently still farther away from the theological line: I have created the smith that bloweth the coals in the fire, &c. Then, intermediately at least, may stand the agriculturalist, of whose treatment of the earth is said: This also cometh forth from the Lord of hosts, who is wonderful in counsel and excellent in working. The rulers and soldiers of Israel were qualified for their work by the Spirit of the Lord. The ministration of the Spirit is various: by it Moses was made wise, Bezaleel was made skilful, and Samson was made strong (1Co_12:11).
3. Upon the Church itself this promise of guidance into all truth should exert a healthful influence, especially in the direction of enlarging and refining its charity. The danger is that the Church should be content with a limited range of dogma and purpose when it is invited to the mastery and enjoyment of a kingdom that cannot be measured. Men of the most inquisitive mind should be encouraged by the Church to lead the van of inquiry, and subject every doctrine and every spirit to a cross-examination which to minds of an opposite type may become wearisome and even vexatious. The Church should extend to its adventurous sons who go out to shores far away and to lands unmapped and unclaimed, the most ardent and loving recognition. Even when they return with hopes unfulfilled and with banners torn by angry winds, proving the abortiveness of their chivalry, or the mistake of their method, they should be hailed with a still tenderer love. To such men the promise of being guided into all truth becomes a personal torture. They yearn for its fulfilment: they are straitened until it be accomplished.
IV. HE WILL SHOW YOU THINGS TO COME. Such a promise would seem to imply that secret communications about the future will be made to the Church; yet this construction must be admitted with extreme caution, for men would in some cases mistake prejudices and frenzies for inspiration, and in others they would inflict needless trouble upon themselves and upon society at large. Limited to the immediate hearers of our Lord, of course the promise is exhausted and the results are to some extent recorded in apostolic history; but it cannot be so limited. Merely to show things to come in the sense of prevision is a blessing greater in appearance than in reality; but to prepare the mind for things to come--to show the mind how to deal with new and perplexing circumstances is an advantage which cannot be expressed in human terms. Whatever the premised announcement may include, it must involve this supernatural preparedness of mind and heart, or it will merely excite and bewilder the Church. Whatever may come, and with what violence soever its coming may be attended, the Church will be prepared to withstand every shock and surmount every difficulty. Out of this assurance comes rest; the future is no longer a trouble; the clouds that lie upon the remote horizon will be scattered by the brightness of the image of God.
V. HE SHALL BRING ALL THINGS TO YOUR REMEMBRANCE, WHATSOEVER I HAVE SAID UNTO YOU. There is an inspiration of memory. Readers of the Gospels must have been surprised by the minuteness of recollection which is shown in their pages. Conversations are reported; little turns of dialogue, which seem to be merely artistic, are not omitted; records of occasions on which the disciples were actually not present, and of which they could only have heard from the lips of the Lord Himself, are presented with much particularity and vividness: how, then, was this done, and especially done by men who certainly were not conspicuous for the kind of learning which is needful for the making of literary statements? The explanation of this artless art, and this tenacious memory, is in this promise. (J. Parker, D. D.)
Of the sending of the Holy Ghost
1. He did go, and He did send, and on this day, so between the text and our feast there is the reciprocation that is between the promise of the sending and the sending of the promise.
2. There seems to be a question here, whether best the Comforter come or not come? This question grew out of whether Christ best go or not. But Christ resolves this: if they were against the Ascension they were also against a feast which they might not miss out of their calendar, and persuades them to accept the Ascension in hope of Whitsun-tide: one to make amends for the other. This is usual. After Christmas, the poor estate of Christs birth, there comes Epiphany with a star and great mens oblations as by way of compensation; after Good Friday Easter, &c.
3. But Ascension Day, though to Christ a day of glory, could not but be a day of sorrow for the disciples. For
(1) To part with any friend is a grief--even though he be a Demas.
(2) And if any friend, how much more such a one as Christ!
(3) And if such a friend at any time, much more now (Joh_16:2)!
4. Men often grieve, however, at what is for their good. Therefore Christ says, I tell you the truth. Your hearts are full of sorrow because your heads are full of error. Your loss will be your gain.
I. THE INCONVENIENCE OF THE SPIRIT NOT COMING.
1. The absolute necessity for His advent. In both the main works of the Deity all three Persons co-operate. As in creation not only the Word of
God was required, but the motion of the Spirit to give life; and as in the genesis so in the palingenesis. It was necessary not only that the Word should take flesh, but flesh also receive the Spirit to give the life of grace to the new creature. So we baptize into all Three.
2. Most expedient is it that the work of our salvation should be brought to full perfection. If the Holy Ghost came not, Christs coming can do us no good. Christ said It is finished, but only in respect of the work itself. In regard of us and making it ours it is not finished if the Spirit come not too. For
(1) A word is of no force, though written, (i.e., a deed)
till the seal be added: that makes it authentic. Christ is the Word, the Spirit, the Seal.
(2) The will of the testator even when sealed is still in suspense till administration be granted. Christ is the Testator of the New Testament; the administration is the Spirit.
(3) The purchase is made, the price paid, yet is not the state perfect unless there be investiture. Christ has purchased, but the investiture is by the Spirit.
3. As nothing is done for us, so nothing is done by us if He come not. The means avail nothing.
(1) Not baptism; no laver of regeneration, without renewing of the Holy Ghost.
(2) No preaching neither; for that is but a letter that killeth, except the Spirit come and quicken it.
(3) No Lords Supper; for the flesh profiteth nothing, if the Lord and Giver of Life be away.
(4) No prayer; for unless the Spirit helps our infirmity and make intercession within us, we neither know how nor what to pray.
II. THE NECESSITY OF CHRISTS GOING. But why not Christ stay and the Holy Spirit come? Or if He go, come again with Him. Surely He and Christ are not incompatible. Christ was conceived by the Holy Ghost. At His baptism the Spirit rested upon Him. We shall enjoy both together by and by: Why not now? It was necessary that Christ should go.
1. On the Holy Ghosts part. Otherwise He could not come as He should. The stay of Christ would have been a hindrance of the manifestation of His
Godhead. His signs and wonders would not well have been distinguished from Christs, and would probably have been ascribed to Christ.
2. On Christs part. Otherwise it had been an impeachment to Christs equality with the Father. For He not going to send Him, but staying here, the sending of the Spirit would have been ascribed to the Father alone.
3. On the apostles part.
(1) For His bodily presence. It is often good for some that their meat be taken, and yet meat is the stay of their life; or for their blood to be taken, yet blood is natures treasure and holds us in life; or for light to be taken, in some disease of the eyes, yet light is the comfort of life. The loving mother withdraws herself from her child when the child grows foolishly fond of her. For the same reason Christ withdrew. So strangely fond the disciples grew of Him that nothing but His carnal presence would quiet them Joh_11:21). And a tabernacle they must needs build Him to keep Him on earth still; and ever and anon they dreamed of a temporal kingdom and chief seats there. These feelings were by no means to be cherished. They were not to continue children but to grow to mans estate, and so they had to be weaned from the presence of Christs flesh, and to say, If we have known Christ after the flesh, &c. (2Co_5:16).
(2) For His spiritual presence. This is expedient
(a) When men grow faint in seeking, and careless in keeping Him Son_3:1). It was meet that Christ should go to teach them to rise and seek, to watch and keep Him better.
(b) When men grow conceited and overweening of themselves and their own strength, and say with David, I shall never be moved, as if they had Christ pinned to them; and with Peter (Mat_26:33). Christ goes to teach them to see and know themselves better, that we may be humble, and being humble receive the Holy Ghost who comes to give grace to none but the humble (Bp. Andrewes.)
The superlative excellence of the Holy Spirit
I. THE BODILY PRESENCE OF CHRIST MUST HAVE BEEN EXCEEDINGLY PRECIOUS. How precious those alone can tell who love Christ much. Love always desires to be in the company of the thing beloved, and absence causes grief. Have we not some of us been looking for years for the personal advent of Christ. Think of the advantage it would be in the instruction of His people. No mystery need puzzle us if we could refer all to Him. There would be no discouragement to the Church henceforth in her work of faith and labour of love. Christ would take the personal supervision of His universal Church. He would create unity. Schism would cease to be, and heresy would be rooted out. But I question whether the pleasure of this thought may not have had a leaven of carnality in it, and whether the Church is yet prepared to enjoy the corporeal presence of her Saviour, without falling into the error of knowing Him after the flesh. It may be it shall need centuries of education before the Church is fit to see Him.
II. THE PRESENCE OF THE COMFORTER IS VERY MUCH BETTER THAN THE BODILY PRESENCE OF CHRIST.
1. The bodily presence of Christ would involve many inconveniences which are avoided by His presence through the Holy Spirit.
(1) Christ, being most truly man, must inhabit a certain place; but the Holy Spirit is everywhere, and through that Holy Spirit Christ keeps His promise, Where two or three are met together in My name, &c.
(2) Access to Christ, if He were here in His corporeal personality, would not be very easy to all believers. Even at the present moment there are some millions of true saints upon earth--what could one man do, even though that one man were incarnate Deity, in our day for the comfort of all of these? Why, we could scarcely expect to have our turn once in the year. But we can now see Jesus every hour and every moment of every hour.
(3) Christs presence in the flesh would involve another difficulty. Busy scribes would be always taking down Christs words; and, if in the short course of three years our Saviour managed to do and to say so much that if all had been written the world itself could not have contained the books which would have been written, I ask you to imagine what a mass of literature the Christian Church would have acquired if she had preserved the words of Christ throughout these 1800 years. But now we have a book which is finished within a narrow compass, and the poorest man in England believing in Christ, who is present through His Spirit may, in a short time, understand with all saints what are the heights and depths, and know the love of Christ which passeth knowledge.
2. If Christ were still present in the flesh, the life of faith would not have such room for its display as it now has. The least faith the most show. The Romish Church, which has little enough of true faith, provides everything to work upon the senses. The presence of Christ Jesus here would be the bringing back of the saints to a life of sight, and in a measure spoil the simplicity of naked trust. Happy day will it be for us when faith enjoys the full fruition of her hopes in the triumphant advent of her Lord; but His absence alone can train and educate her to the needed point of spiritual refinement.
3. The presence of Christ would materially affect the character of Gods great battle against error and sin. Suppose that all men who would oppose Christ were suddenly devoured, why then it would be rather a battle between physical greatness and moral evil, than a warfare in which only spiritual force is employed on the side of right. But now that Christ has gone the fight is all between spirit and spirit; between the Holy Spirit and Satan; between truth and error; between the earnestness of believing men and the infatuation of unbelieving men. Now the fight is fair. Physical force is left to our enemies, we ask it not. Why? Because by the Divine working we can vanquish error without it.
4. Christ must be here in one of two ways--suffering, or not suffering. If He be a suffering Christ, then we should suspect that He had not finished His work; and, if He be an unsuffering Christ, then it would look as if He were not a faithful High Priest made like unto His brethren.
III. THE PRESENCE OF THE COMFORTER IS SUPERLATIVELY VALUABLE.
1. We may gather this first from the effects which were seen upon the day of Pentecost. Here was an omen of what the Spirit of God is to be to the Church.
(1) When He comes like the wind, it is to purge the moral atmosphere, and to quicken the pulse of all who spiritually breathe.
(2) Then the Spirit came as fire. The Church wants fire to quicken her ministers, to give zeal and energy to all her members. Having this fire she burns her way to success.
(3) Then there came from the fire-shower a descent of tongues. Though we can no longer speak with every man in his own tongue, yet we have the keys of the whole world swinging at our girdle if we have the Spirit of God with us. There is no reason in the nature of the gospel, or the power of the Spirit, why a whole congregation should not be converted under one sermon. There is no reason in Gods nature why a nation should not be born in a day. The great prophetic event occurred on the day of Pentecost.
The success given was only the first fruits--Pentecost is not the harvest. You must expect and pray for greater things.
2. Without the Holy Spirit no good thing ever did or ever can come into any of your hearts--no sigh of penitence--no cry of faith--no glance of love--no tear of hallowed sorrow.
3. No good thing can come out of you apart from the Spirit. Do you desire to preach?--how can you unless the Holy Ghost teaches your tongue? Do you desire to pray? Alas! what dull work it is unless the Spirit maketh intercession for you! Do you desire to subdue sin? Would you be holy?--you cannot without the Spirit! Conclusion: If these things be sol. Let us, who are believers in Christ, so reverence the Spirit as not to grieve Him or provoke Him. You who are unconverted--never despise Him. Remember, there is a special honour put upon Him in Scripture--All manner of sin and of blasphemy, &c.
2. Let us, viewing the might of the Spirit, take courage to-day. Our fathers bore their testimony in the stocks and in the prison, but they feared not for the good old cause, because they knew that the Spirit of God is mighty and will prevail. (C. H. Spurgeon.)
The preference due to the Holy Spirit
I. THE RELATION BETWEEN CHRISTS BODILY PRESENCE AND THE SPIRITS INFLUENCE WITH THE CHURCH.
1. Before Christ came the Spirit was little known. In all ages it is true that while Christ is the only foundation, the Spirit is the only architect of religion. But if before the Incarnation Christ was dimly seen, can we wonder that the Spirit was not clearly known? Yet as many received salvation by a Messiah whom they scarcely descried in the distance, they received Him by the grace of that Spirit whose operations they felt rather than understood.
2. While Christ was on the earth the Spirit was better known, but known as resting on the Head rather than descending on the body of the Church. Nothing, in all the preceding ages, could be compared with this for clearness. How natural, after the manifestation of the Spirit at Christs baptism, was it for Christ to begin His ministry by selecting this text--The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, &c. The very name, Messiah--Christ--is derived from the sacred unction which Christ here claims to Himself. What a display of the Spirits influence was given in the person and ministry of Christ! Still, this was in the Head rather than in the body of the Church, for the Spirit was not yet received, because Jesus was not yet glorified, For what do we see of the work of the Spirit on man in general during the ministry of Christ on earth? It is true that we read of above five hundred brethren. But what are a few hundreds, or even thousands, as the fruit of such a ministry as that of Jesus Christ? But, alas t we read of no grand effusions of the Spirit accompanying the preaching of our Saviour. Though Christ spake as never man spake, His audience never cried--What shall we do to be saved? And when the unbelieving multitude vociferated, Away with Him, crucify Him! there was no counter-cry from an opposing mass who had received life at His lips. No; it was necessary first to show what the Spirit does in the Person of Him from whom the grace descends to us; that the anointing should flow from the Head to the members.
3. But when Christ departed to heaven, then the Spirit descended on the whole Church. For there were sufficient reasons why the Spirit of grace should not descend before.
(1) It was not fit that the choicest blessing which heaven can shed on men should be granted while the guilt of their sins remained unatoned for. But now He hath redeemed us from the curse of the law,… that we might receive the promise of the Spirit through faith.
(2) It was fit that Christ should go away to heaven, and from thence should bestow this best of blessings. As our kings date their highest royal acts, and issue their proclamations of grace, from our royal palace at St. Jamess, it behoved the King of grace to ascend up on high, in order to give from His heavenly throne gifts to the rebellious.
(3) While Christ was as our king, it should be remembered that He was to be a priest on His throne, and from His throne Christ, our priest and king, has shed forth that influence which has shown the fulfilment of this promise.
II. THE PREFERENCE DUE TO THE SPIRITS INFLUENCE
1. The value of Christs bodily presence is implied when it is said to be expedient for us that He should go away. While He was on earth He was its treasure and its joy. Christ Himself said, Blessed are your eyes that they see, &c. The hope of seeing Christ after death makes even that bitter thing sweet. Can we wonder, then, that the disciples who saw Him on earth were reluctant to part with this grateful sight? Nor do we wonder that the hope of His speedy re-appearance should prove a fascinating lure to many who are as much mistaken as the disciples were.
2. The superior value of the Spirits presence.
(1) The bodily presence of Christ was confined to one spot--the presence of the Spirit is universal.
(2) The bodily presence of Christ belongs to the order of means that strike the senses, but the presence of the Spirit is that of an agent who affects the heart and attains the end. If Christ were to appear on earth, He must either come in His glory or lay it aside. Were He to come in His glory could we endure it? Paul could not see for the glory of that Light, and John fell at His feet as dead. Must He, then, lay aside His glory and become again of no reputation? What! has He not had enough of this? But on any supposition Christs bodily presence might act on our bodies, whereas His Spirit operates upon our spirits. Many, therefore, saw Christ while on earth, only to their more aggravated condemnation. Even those who repented because they saw Christ were told not to glory but to blush. Had Christ continued on earth our imperfect religion would regard Him with a mixture of debasing carnal emotions from which we are, by His absence, kept free, saying, Henceforth know we no man after the flesh, &c. Now we are no longer in danger of intruding upon Him with unseemly familiarity, nor are we exposed to the repulse, Touch me not; but by the Spirits pure and heavenly influences we are elevated towards the Saviours throne by a flight altogether spiritual and Divine.
(3) It is more honourable, both to Christ and to His Spirit, that the Son should depart and send His Spirit down. If this can be shown, it will follow that it is expedient for us.
(a) The Head cannot be glorified without shedding lustre on the members; nor can the members see the Head exalted, without feeling a sense of exaltation and delight. While Christ dwelt here He was the Fathers servant. So much humiliation and infirmity entered into His sojourn here, that He might well chide His friends for wishing to detain Him in it, saying, If ye loved Me ye would rejoice, &c. But now He has prayed, and has been heard, Father, glorify Thou Me with Thine own self, &c. When He quitted earth for heaven, He exchanged the condition of a servant for that of a king. From the seat of glory He sent down His Spirit as His advocate, as well to glorify Christ as to call and sanctify us. The Paraclete should be regarded as conveying the idea of a patron and counsellor, to vindicate
Christs rights, and display His glory, and animate the spirits of men to rise to lofty and delightful ideas of the Saviour.
(b) This is more honourable to the Spirit too. Would not the splendour of the glorified Redeemer take off mens attention from the operations of the Spirit of grace? But should the Spirit be robbed of his honours? Is it not, then, fit that He should work by means less splendid and fascinating--by the ordinary preaching of the Word--by those who have the treasure in earthen vessels, that the excellency of the power may be seen to be of God, and not of man?
III. THE NECESSITY OF ENFORCING THE PREFERENCE DUE TO THE DIVINE SPIRIT.
1. We are exceedingly prone to dote on that which strikes the senses in preference to that which affects the heart. Has not the fatal apostasy of Rome originated in this infirmity of our nature? Perhaps there is scarcely one unconverted person here that does not fancy he would behove if he saw Christ in the flesh. Even the infidel says, If I saw Jesus Christ as you represent Him, I would hail Him as my Saviour. But did that sight convert the Jews?
2. We as much undervalue the Spirits influence. You have something better than that which you so fondly fancy would vanquish all your love of sin, and triumph over your unbelief. There are more mighty resources provided for us than if the Son of God were to come down. For the Holy Ghost is now sent to be an advocate to plead His cause with the world, and convince it of Christs righteousness, and grace, and dominion, and saving power. Conclusion:
1. Beware, lest having lost Christs presence, you live without the Spirits influence.
2. Aspire to join the spirits of just men made perfect, who, enjoying both these blessings, are at the summit of bliss. (J. Bennett, D. D.)
The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
B. W. Johnson 1891 · Public Domain On vv7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 13, 14 7. It is expedient for you that I go…
7. It is expedient for you that I go away. What seemed then a crushing sorrow was a real blessing. His mission could never be accomplished unless he went away. For if I go not away, the Comforter will not come. While Christ was present in person, in bodily form, the Holy Spirit, the representative of the Godhead, could not come. Christ, as King, must send him, and on the day of Pentecost Peter declared, “He hath shed forth the things ye do see and hear.”
B. W. Johnson's The People's New Testament with Notes (1889–1891) — public domain. Electronic text from the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (CCEL) ThML edition.
Alexander MacLaren 1905 · Public Domain On vv7, 9, 12 Joh 16:7 - Joh 16:8.
John
THE DEPARTING CHRIST AND THE COMING SPIRIT
Read full note →
Joh 16:7 - Joh 16:8.
We read these words in the light of all that has gone after, and to us they are familiar and almost thread-bare. But if we would appreciate their sublimity, we must think away nineteen centuries, and all Christendom, and recall these eleven poor men and their peasant Leader in the upper room. They were not very wise, nor very strong, and outside these four walls there was scarcely a creature in the whole world that had the least belief either in Him or in them. They had everything against them, and most of all their own hearts. They had nothing for them but their Master’s promise. Their eyes had been dimmed by their sorrowful hearts, so that they could not see the truth which He had been trying to reveal to them; and His departure had presented itself to them only as it affected themselves, and therefore had brought a sense of loss and desolation.
And now He bids them think of that departure, as it affects themselves, as pure gain. ‘It is for your profit that I go away.’ He explains that staggering statement by the thought which He has already presented to them, in varying aspects, of His departure as the occasion for the coming of that Great Comforter, who, when He is come, will through them work upon the world, which knows neither them nor Him. They are to go forth ‘as sheep in the midst of wolves,’ but in this promise He tells them that they will become the judges and accusers of the world, which, by the Spirit dwelling in them, they will be able to overcome, and convict of error and of fault.
We must remember that the whole purpose of the words which we are considering now is the strengthening of the disciples in their conflict with the world, and that, therefore, the operations of that divine Spirit which are here spoken of are operations carried on by their instrumentality and through the word which they spake. With that explanation we can consider the great words before us.
I. The first thing that strikes me about them is that wonderful thought of the gain to Christ’s servants from Christ’s departure. ‘It is expedient for you that I go away.’
I need not enlarge here upon what we have had frequent occasion to remark, the manner in which our Lord here represents the complex whole of His death and ascension as being His own voluntary act. He ‘goes.’ He is neither taken away by death nor rapt up to heaven in a whirlwind, but of His own exuberant power and by His own will He goes into the region of the grave and thence to the throne. Contrast the story of His ascension with that Old Testament story of the ascension of Elijah. One needed the chariot of fire and the horses of fire to bear him up into the sphere, all foreign to his mortal and earthly manhood; the Other needed no outward power to lift Him, nor any vehicle to carry Him from this dim spot which men call earth, but slowly, serenely, upborne by His own indwelling energy, and rising as to His native home, He ascended up on high, and went where the very manner of His going proclaimed that He had been before. ‘If I go away, I will send Him.’
But that is a digression. What we are concerned with now is the thought of Christ’s departure as being a step in advance, and a positive gain, even to those poor, bewildered men who were clustering round Him, depending absolutely upon Himself, and feeling themselves orphaned and helpless without Him.
Now if we would feel the full force and singularity of this saying of our Lord’s, let us put side by side with it that other one, ‘I have a desire to depart and to be with Christ, which is far better. Nevertheless, to abide in the flesh is more needful for you.’ Why is it that the Apostle says, ‘Though I want to go I am bound to stay?’ and why is it that the Master says, ‘It is for your good that I am going,’ but because of the essential difference in the relation of the two to the people who are to be left, and in the continuance of the work of the two after they had departed? Paul knew that when he went, whatever befell those whom he loved and would fain help, he could not stretch a hand to do anything for them. He knew that death dropped the portcullis between him and them, and, whatever their sore need on the one side of the iron gate, he on the other could not succour or save. Jesus Christ said, ‘It is better for you that I should go,’ because He knew that all His influences would flow through the grated door unchecked, and that, departed, He would still be the life of them that trusted in Him; and, having left them, would come near them, by the very act of leaving them.
And so there is here indicated for us-as we shall have occasion to see more fully, presently,-in that one singular and anomalous fact of Christ’s departure being a positive gain to those that trust in Him, the singularity and uniqueness of His work for them and His relation to them.
The words mean a great deal more than the analogies of our relation to dear ones or great ones, loves or teachers, who have departed, might suggest. Of course we all know that it is quite true that death reveals to the heart the sweetness and the preciousness of the departed ones, and that its refining touch manifests to our blind eyes what we did not see so clearly when they were beside us. We all know that it needs distance to measure men, and the dropping away of the commonplace and the familiar ere we can see ‘the likeness’ of our contemporaries ‘to the great of old.’ We have to travel across the plains before we can measure the relative height of the clustered mountains, and discern which is manifestly the loftiest. And all this is true in reference to Jesus Christ and His relation to us. But that does not go half-way towards the understanding of such words as these of my text, which tell us that so singular and solitary is His relation to us that the thing which ends the work of all other men, and begins the decay of their influence, begins for Him a higher form of work and a wider sweep of sway. He is nearer us when He leaves us, and works with us and in us more mightily from the throne than He did upon the earth. Who is He of whom this is true? And what kind of work is it of which it is true that death continues and perfects it?
So let me note, before I pass on, that there is a great truth here for us. We are accustomed to look back to our Lord’s earthly ministry, and to fancy that those who gathered round Him, and heard Him speak, and saw His deeds, were in a better position for loving Him and trusting Him than you and I are. It is all a mistake. We have lost nothing that they had which was worth the keeping; and we have gained a great deal which they had not. We have not to compare our relation to Christ with theirs, as we might do our relation to some great thinker or poet, with that of his contemporaries, but we have Christ in a better form, if I may so speak; and we, on whom the ends of the world are come, may have a deeper and a fuller and a closer intimacy with Him than was possible for men whose perceptions were disturbed by sense, and who had to pierce through ‘the veil, that is to say, His flesh,’ before they reached the Holy of Holies of His spirit.
II. Note, secondly, the coming for which Christ’s going was needful, and which makes that going a gain.
‘If I go not away the Comforter will not come unto you, but if I depart I will send Him unto you.’ Now we have already, in former sermons, touched upon many of the themes which would naturally be suggested by these words, and therefore I do not propose to dwell upon them at any length. There is only one point to which I desire to refer briefly here, and that is the necessity which here seems to be laid down by our Lord for His departure, in order that that divine Spirit may come and dwell with men. That necessity goes down deeper into the mysteries of the divinity and of the processes and order of divine revelation than it is given to us to follow. But though we can only speak superficially and fragmentarily about such a matter, let me just remind you, in the briefest possible words, of what Scripture plainly declares to us with regard to this high and, in its fullness, ineffable matter. It tells us that the complete work of Jesus Christ-not merely His coming upon earth, or His life amongst men, but also His sacrificial death upon the Cross-was the necessary preliminary, and in some sense procuring cause, of the gift of that divine Spirit. It tells us-and there we are upon ground on which we can more fully verify the statement-that His work must be completed ere that Spirit can be sent, because the word is the Spirit’s weapon for the world, and the revelation of God in Jesus must be ended, ere the application of that revelation, which is the Spirit’s work, can be begun in its full energy.
It tells us, further, {and there our eyesight fails, and we have to accept what we are told}, that Jesus Christ must ascend on high and be at the right hand of God, ere He can pour down upon men the fullness of the Spirit which dwelt uncommunicated in Him in the time of His earthly humiliation. ‘Thou hast ascended up on high,’ and therefore ‘Thou hast given gifts to men.’ We accept the declaration, not knowing all the deep necessity in the divine Nature on which it rests, but believing it, because He in whom we have confidence has declared it to us.
And we are further told-and there our experience may, in some degree, verify the statement,-that only those, in whose hearts there is union to Jesus Christ by faith in His completed work and ascended glory, are capable of receiving that divine gift. So every way, both as regards the depths of Deity and the processes of revelation, and as regards the power of the humanity of Christ to impart His Spirit, and as regards the capacity of us poor recipients to receive it, the words of my text seem to be confirmed, and we can, though not with full insight, at any rate with full faith, accept the statement, ‘If I go not away, the Comforter will not come to you.’
That coming is gain. It teaches a deeper knowledge of Him. It teaches and gives a fuller possession of the life of righteousness which is like His own. It draws us into the fellowship of the Son.
III. Lastly, note here the threefold conflict of the Spirit through the Church with the world.
‘When He is come He will convict the world’ in respect ‘of sin and of righteousness and of judgment.’ By the ‘reproof,’ or rather ‘conviction,’ which is spoken about here, is meant the process by which certain facts are borne in upon men’s understanding and consciences, and, along with these facts, the conviction of error and fault in reference to them. It is no mere process of demonstration of an intellectual truth, but it is a process of conviction of error in respect to great moral and religious truth, and of manifestation of the truths in regard to which the error and the sin have been committed. So we have here the triple division of the great work which the divine Spirit does, through Christian men and women, in the world.
‘He shall convict the world of sin.’ The outstanding first characteristic of the whole Gospel message is the new gravity which it attaches to the fact of sin, the deeper meaning which it gives to the word, and the larger scope which it shows its blighting influences to have had in humanity. Apart from the conviction of sin by the Spirit using the word proclaimed by disciples, the world has scarcely a notion of what sin is, its inwardness, its universality, the awfulness of it as a fact affecting man’s whole being and all his relations to God. All these conceptions are especially the product of Christian truth. Without it, what does the world know about the poison of sin? And what does it care about the poison until the conviction has been driven home to the reluctant consciousness of mankind by the Spirit wielding the word? This conviction comes first in the divine order. I do not say that the process of turning a man of the world into a member of Christ’s Church always begins, as a matter of fact, with the conviction of sin. I believe it most generally does so; but without insisting upon a pedantic adherence to a sequence, and without saying a word about the depth and intensity of such a conviction, I am here to assert that a Christianity which is not based upon the conviction of sin is an impotent Christianity, and will be of very little use to the men who profess it, and will have no power to propagate itself in the world. Everything in our conception of the Gospel of Jesus Christ and of His work for us depends upon what we think about this primary fact of man’s condition, that he is a sinful man. The root of all heresy lies there. Every error that has led away men from Jesus Christ and His Cross may be traced up to defective notions of sin and a defective realisation of it. If I do not feel as the Bible would have me feel, that I am a sinful man, I shall think differently of Jesus Christ and of my need of Him, and of what He is to me. Christianity may be to me a system of beautiful ethics, a guide for life, a revelation of much precious truth, but it will not be the redemptive power without which I am lost. And Jesus Christ will be shorn of His brightest beams, unless I see Him as the Redeemer of my soul from sin, which else would destroy and is destroying it. Is Christianity merely a better morality? Is it merely a higher revelation of the divine Nature? Or does it do something as well as say something, and what does it do? Is Jesus Christ only a Teacher, a Wise Man, an Example, a Prophet, or is He the Sacrifice for the sins of the world? Oh, brethren, we must begin where this text begins; and our whole conception of Him and of His work for us must be based upon this fact, that we are sinful and lost, and that Jesus Christ, by His sweet and infinite love and all-powerful sacrifice, is our soul’s Redeemer and our only Hope. The world has to be convicted and convinced of sin as the first step to its becoming a Church.
The next step of this divine Spirit’s conviction is that which corresponds to the consciousness of sin, the dawning upon the darkened soul of the blessed sunrise of righteousness. The triple subjects of conviction must necessarily belong to the world of which our Lord is speaking. It must be the world that is convinced, and it must be the world’s sin and the world’s righteousness and the world’s judgment of which my text speaks. How, then, can there follow on the conviction of sin as mine a conviction of righteousness as mine? I know but one way, ‘Not having mine own righteousness, which is of the law, but that which is of God through faith.’ When a man is convinced of sin, there will dawn upon the heart the wondrous thought that a righteousness may be his, given to him from above, which will sweep away all his sin and make him righteous as Christ is righteous. That conviction will never awake in its blessed and hope-giving power unless it be preceded by the other. It is of no use to exhibit medicine to a man who does not know himself diseased. It is of no use to talk about righteousness to a man who has not found himself to be a sinner. And it is of as little use to talk to a man of sin unless you are ready to tell him of a righteousness that will cover all his sin. The one conviction without the other is misery, the second without the first is irrelevant and far away.
The world as a world has but dim and inadequate conceptions of what righteousness is. A Pharisee is its type, or a man that keeps a clean life in regard to great transgressions; a whited sepulchre of some sort or other. The world apart from Christ has but languid desires after even the poor righteousness that it understands, and the world apart from Christ is afflicted by a despairing scepticism as to the possibility of ever being righteous at all. And there are men listening to me now in every one of these three conditions-not caring to be righteous, not understanding what it is to be righteous, and cynically disbelieving that it is possible to be so. My brother, here comes the message to you-first, Thou art sinful; second, God’s righteousness lies at thy side to take and wear if thou wilt.
The last of these triple convictions is ‘judgment.’ If there be in the world these two things both operating, sin and righteousness, and if the two come together, what then? If there is to be a collision, as there must be, which will go down? Christ tells us that this divine Spirit will teach us that righteousness will triumph over sin, and that there will be a judgment which will destroy that which is the weaker, though it seems the stronger. Now I take it that the judgment which is spoken about here is not merely a future retribution beyond the grave, but that, whilst that is included, and is the principal part of the idea, we are always to regard the judgment of the hereafter as being prepared for by the continual judgment here.
And so there are two thoughts, a blessed one and a terrible one, wrapped up in that word-a blessed thought for us sinful men, inasmuch as we may be sure that the divine righteousness, which is given to us, will judge us and separate us day by day from our sins; and a terrible thought, inasmuch as if I, a sinful man, do not make friends with and ally myself to the divine righteousness which is proffered to me, I shall one day have to front it on the other side of the flood, when the contact must necessarily be to me destruction.
Time does not allow me to dwell upon these solemn matters as I fain would, but let me gather all I have been feebly trying to say to you now into one sentence. This threefold conviction, in conscience, understanding, and heart, of sin which is mine, of righteousness which may be mine, and of judgment which must be mine-this threefold conviction is that which makes the world into a Church. It is the message of Christianity to each of us. How do you stand to it? Do you hearken to the Spirit who is striving to convince you of these? Or do you gather yourselves together into an obstinate, close-knit unbelief, or a loose-knit indifference which is as impenetrable? Beware that you resist not the Spirit of God!
Alexander MacLaren, Expositions of Holy Scripture (1904–1910) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
C. I. Scofield 1917 · Public Domain On vv8, 11, 12, 13 world kosmos = mankind. (See Scofield "Mat 4:8").
world kosmos = mankind. (See Scofield "Mat 4:8").
sin Sin. (See Scofield "Rom 3:23").
The Scofield Reference Bible (1917 edition), notes by C. I. Scofield — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Paul E. Kretzmann 1924 · Public Domain On vv8, 12 The reproof of the world:
The reproof of the world:
v. 8. And when He is come, He will reprove the world of sin and of righteousness and of judgment:
Read full note →
v. 9. of sin, because they believe not on Me;
v. 10. of righteousness, because I go to My Father, and ye see Me no more;
v. 11. of judgment, because the prince of this world is judged.
And that Person, the Holy Spirit, coming into the world, will convict the world. That is one special function and activity of the Spirit, to convict the unbelieving world on three counts, with regard to sin, justice, and judgment. This the Lord explains. Of sin the world stands accused and unable to deny the charge that they do not believe on Christ, because they willfully choose unbelief. That is the chief sin of the world, of the unbelievers, that they reject Christ and His Gospel. All other sins do not come into consideration if a person but believes in the forgiveness of sins. And therefore unbelief, which refuses to accept the forgiveness of sins, deliberately cuts itself off from salvation. This fact the Spirit impresses upon the minds and hearts of the unbelievers. "The world will not hear such preaching that they should all be sinners before God, and that their pious works have no value before Him, but that they rather through this crucified Christ must obtain mercy and salvation. Such unbelief against Christ becomes the sum and substance of all sins that lead a person into damnation, so that there is no help for him. " In close connection with this fact is the further truth that the Spirit convicts the unbelieving world of righteousness, since Jesus was going to the Father and would no longer be with them according to His visible presence. The true righteousness consists in this, that Christ, by His going to the Father, by His suffering, death, and resurrection, earned and prepared the righteousness which is acceptable with God. But the world wants nothing of Christ’s blood and righteousness, preferring its own self-righteousness. And so both righteousness and salvation are lost to them by unbelief, as the Spirit will impress upon them. And He will finally convict them of the judgment, because the ruler of this world is judged and condemned. The redemption of Christ sealed the devil’s doom; he has lost might and right with regard to mankind since sin was conquered by Jesus. This the Holy Ghost testifies to the hearts of the unbelievers, showing them that because of their unbelief they will have to share the doom of the devil, that they are condemned for rejecting the Conqueror of Satan. This also serves for the comfort of the believers, since they know that the world is even now convicted.
Paul E. Kretzmann, Popular Commentary of the Bible (1921–1924) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
unfoldingWord translationNotes 2017 · CC BY-SA 4.0 On vv8, 12 the Comforter will prove the world to be wrong…
the Comforter will prove the world to be wrong about sin ... righteousness ... I am going to the Father
When the Holy Spirit came, he began to show people that they are sinners.
Read full note →
Comforter
This refers to the Holy Spirit. See how you translated this in John 14:16.
world
This is a metonym that refers to the people in the world.(See: Metonymy)
about sin, because they do not believe in me
"they are guilty of sin because they do not trust in me"
about righteousness, because I am going to the Father, and you will no longer see me
"when I return to God, and they see me no more, they will know that I did the right things"
Father
This is an important title for God. (See: Translating Son and Father)
about judgment, because the ruler of this world has been judged
"God will hold them accountable and will punish them for their sins, just as he will punish Satan, the one who rules this world"
the ruler of this world
Here "ruler" refers to Satan. See how you translated this in John 12:31. AT: "Satan who rules this world"
translationWords
world
sin
righteous
judge
believe
God the Father
rule
unfoldingWord translationNotes — © Distant Shores Media and the Door43 World Missions Community, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Source: git.door43.org/Door43/en_tn.
Tyndale Open Study Notes 2022 · CC BY-SA 4.0 On vv7, 8, 11, 13 16:7 the Advocate: The Spirit was a gift awaiting…
16:7 the Advocate: The Spirit was a gift awaiting Jesus’ departure and glorification (7:37-39; 14:16, 26; 15:26; 16:12-14).
Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.