Grace and Peace to you from God our
Father and the Lord Jesus Christ and may our Lord and Savior sanctify you in
the truth, for His word is truth. Amen
Fifth Sunday of
Easter (2010)
Life in Jesus’ Little While (Living the
Christian Life)
John 16:12-22 (ESV)
"I
still have many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now. [13] When the Spirit of truth comes, he will
guide you into all the truth, for he will not speak on his own authority, but
whatever he hears he will speak, and he will declare to you the things that are
to come. [14] He will glorify me, for he
will take what is mine and declare it to you.
[15] All that the Father has is mine; therefore I said that he will take
what is mine and declare it to you.
[16]
"A little while, and you will see me no longer; and again a little while,
and you will see me." [17] So some
of his disciples said to one another, "What is this that he says to us, 'A
little while, and you will not see me, and again a little while, and you will
see me'; and, 'because I am going to the Father'?" [18] So they were saying, "What does he
mean by 'a little while'? We do not know what he is talking about." [19] Jesus knew that they wanted to ask him,
so he said to them, "Is this what you are asking yourselves, what I meant
by saying, 'A little while and you will not see me, and again a little while
and you will see me'? [20] Truly, truly,
I say to you, you will weep and lament, but the world will rejoice. You will be
sorrowful, but your sorrow will turn into joy.
[21] When a woman is giving birth, she has sorrow because her hour has
come, but when she has delivered the baby, she no longer remembers the anguish,
for joy that a human being has been born into the world. [22] So also you have sorrow now, but I will
see you again and your hearts will rejoice, and no one will take your joy from
you.
In an interview
with the Russian dissident, Alexander Solzhenitsyn, The Christian Activist in 1993 reported; “When Alexander
Solzhenitsyn was a boy growing up in
Solzhenitsyn spent
50 years of his life working on the history of
When looking at the
larger picture of what is happening in the rest of the world, Solzhenitsyn
says, “If I were called upon to identify briefly the principal trait of
the entire 20th century, here too I would be unable to find anything more
precise and pithy than to repeat again: ‘Men have forgotten
God.’ ”
Solzhenitsyn words
are an ominous warning to all men, for a world without God is a world without
hope. A world without God is the hopelessness the apostles felt when the Lord
is taken captive, beaten, is crucified, and dies. Although they had been warned
by Jesus that such was going to happen, they still failed to understand His
words. Much like the apostles in today’s Gospel Reading, we are often perplexed
by the words of our Lord Jesus and even more perplexed as to why the Church is
so often under assault from the world, Satan, and those who would call
themselves believers, but whose doctrine and theology are in direct conflict
with God’s revealed Word of Scripture. However, hopelessness and confusion are
not strangers to Christians as they live lives of faith in Jesus’ Little While.
On the night before
His crucifixion and death, our Lord Jesus prepares the apostles for His
impending departure by telling them, “A little while, and you will see me no
longer; and again a little while, and you will see me” (v. 16). He warns
the apostles that after He is gone they will be overcome with great sorrow and
their tears will flow easily. In fact He tells them, “Truly, truly, I say to you,
you will weep and lament” (v. 20). This is hardly what they had expected when
they dropped everything and followed Him. Some three years earlier, as He
called them to be His disciples, they had forsaken their homes, their friends,
their businesses, their hopes for material wealth and temporal prosperity, all
for His sake, all to obey His command to “Follow Me.” During the three years
spent with our Lord, not once did He promise them a life of ease, a life of joy
and happiness, or a life divorced from trouble or sorrow. Yet, throughout their time with Jesus the
apostles had somehow built a mistaken idea that as the Messiah, Jesus would
establish a glorious, worldly kingdom in which they would have positions of wealth,
honor, and ease. However, on this night, all their hopes for such luxuries were
about to be dashed. Rather than a future of wealth and fame, our Lord now
prepares them for a life of unhappiness, telling them; “You will be sorrowful” (v.
20).
Shortly, in fact the next day, great sorrow fills their hearts as they weep
for and mourn the suffering and death of our Lord Jesus. Filled with remorse
and fearful of becoming the next crucifixion victim, they go into hiding in the
upper room. Their world has been turned upside down as they wonder what kind of
world could kill the very Son of God. For the next three days the apostles are
immersed in prayer, seeking God’s help for themselves and the world; for surely
Satan and the world have crushed the very hope of the world.
Those three days were not the only time the apostles would weep,
lament, and be sorrowful. Mere weeks after the crucifixion, the apostles would
hear the Lord give them the Great Commission to go out into the world with the
Gospel message of His Cross and resurrection. Without hesitation, the apostles,
as in the past, followed the Lord’s instruction and began to proclaim the
Gospel to all who would listen. While Jesus promised to be with them always as
they carried out their task (Matt. 28:20) and gave them power to do miracles in
His name (Mark 16:17-18), He never granted them immunity from sorrow,
disappointment, persecution, prison, or martyrdom. The evidence of this is
clear, when not long after the ascension of the Lord, James was put to death by
the sword of Herod (Acts 12:2); or again, Stephen, a lay worker and, “a
man full of faith and of the Holy Spirit” (Acts 6:5 ESV), was stoned to
death by angry unbelievers (Acts 7:59). Furthermore, Holy Scripture declares
that the apostles were cast into prison and the followers of Christ were
persecuted because of their faith.
This persecution has been the experience of Christians and the
Christian Church since the apostolic age. Led by Satan, the world finds great
delight in making things miserable for true believers. Our Lord Jesus warned, “The
world will rejoice” (v. 20) at our sorrow and lamentations. Experience
shows us that the world delights in heaping ridicule upon Christians.
Even some who become members of the Christian Church develop the false
philosophy that since they are Christians, they are immune from sorrow.
However, we must ask, where and when did God ever promise that? In fact, Jesus
warns, “In the world you will have tribulation” (John 16:33 ESV).
In this life we will always have sorrow and we will always face trials
and tribulations, but we do not despair for we have a treasure which the world
does not have; we have the gift of faith to believe in the life, death, and
resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ who suffered and died for our
justification, for the forgiveness of our sins. St. Paul beautifully explains
this truth when he writes, “We are afflicted in every way, but not
crushed; perplexed, but not driven to despair;
persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed; always
carrying in the body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be
manifested in our bodies. For we who live are always being given over to death
for Jesus' sake, so that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our mortal
flesh” (2 Cor. 4:8-11 ESV). The true Christian remembers that in this
life they are promised affliction and therefore they will not blame God when in
life’s little while the sorrows of
life strike. The Christian will not say that God is not merciful, or a loving
Savior, or a comforting Holy Spirit. The Christian will realize that when such
thoughts come, they are nothing more than spiritual sorrows, which they must
suffer because they are still human and therefore, sinful.
If I was to end the sermon here then we would all have to conclude that
the outlook of being a Christian is somewhat gloomy, at least in the life we
live in Jesus’ Little While. However,
we should not forget that the words of the Gospel today are also words of
comfort and consolation. Our Lord Jesus prepares us not only for the coming
sorrow but also for the joy’s of life’s
little while. He assures us there will be joy: “You will be sorrowful, but your
sorrow will turn into joy” (v. 20) and again, “So also you have sorrow now, but
I will see you again and your hearts will rejoice, and no one will take your
joy from you” (v. 22).
Likening the apostle’s sorrow to a woman giving birth, our Lord tells us
their anguish shall pass away. As soon as the labor ceases and she has given
birth, a woman’s groaning changes to joy as she holds her newborn babe to her
breast. Filled with the joy of the moment, she no longer remembers her pain.
This will be the fate of the apostles when the see Jesus again; when they see
Him at the resurrection, at the ascension, and at His sitting at the right hand
of God in the heavenly places. Moreover, this is also the joy of every Christian
who believes in our Lord Jesus Christ and His atoning death on
The sorrow of our Lord’s death on
The Christian religion is a religion that begets true joy. It is not a
religion that causes Christians to go about with long faces, utterly consumed
by the goings on of the world or of even finding fault with all things earthly.
Rather, there are many things that delight the heart of a Christian in this
world, however, the highest joys of the Christian, are, of course, to be found
in Jesus our Savior; in faith, believing in the forgiveness of sin through
Christ our Savior, to be found in worship of this same Savior, and in
proclaiming the Gospel through Christian outreach and mission. It is to these
things that Jesus says; “So also you have sorrow now, but I will see
you again and your hearts will rejoice, and no one will take your joy from you”
(v. 22).
Each and everyday, Christians find themselves groaning and lamenting
for those who do not know the Lord Jesus as their Savior or for those who
reject Him as Lord. They lament the injuries inflicted upon them by the ungodly
and those who claim to be Christians but by their theology they lead people
away from Christ and toward the world. Everyday, faithful Christians seek the
shepherding of good, orthodox pastors who will lead them to the green pastures
of God’s Word while refuting the false doctrine of wolves in sheep’s clothing.
Yet they know that as long as this world exists there will always be those
false prophets who seek to lay waste to the Church. They will continue to rise
and fall bringing endless afflictions upon the Church. And although each
assault seems to last forever, Christians know that before God these
afflictions are of short duration. This truth gives us hope as we patiently put
up with these injuries brought about by those who would inflict them. Moreover,
our hope is not in vain as we wait but a little
while for all our “sorrow will turn into joy” (v. 20).
Amen.
May the Peace of God which passeth all understanding keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Amen.