Hello, my name is Pete Burak, and I’m the director of i.d.916. We are an outreach of Renewal Ministries trying to help young adults become intentional disciples of Jesus Christ. This is lesson six of module one of the online Basic Evangelization Training. The module is Introduction to Evangelization and the lesson is Introduction to a New Pentecost.
So, there’s a startling moment in the Gospel of John where Jesus is with His disciples, and he kind of drops a bomb on them a little bit, where He says this: “I tell you the truth: it is to your advantage that I go away, for if I do not go away, the Counselor will not come to you; but if I go, I will send him to you.” (John 16:7)
Obviously, what He’s talking about here is, at the time He ascends to the Father, He’s going to pour out the Holy Spirit, the Counselor, on His disciples. And this is what He says the Holy Spirit will do: “And when he comes [the counselor, the Holy Spirit], he will convince the world of sin and of righteousness and of judgment: of sin, because they do not believe in me; of righteousness, because I go to the Father, and you will see me no more; [and] of judgment, because the ruler of this world is judged.” (John 16:8-11)
He’s talking about the devil — you know, the world, the flesh, and the devil, that rules over the world in this time and place, but will not forever. And what he’s saying is that the Spirit, when the Spirit comes, He’s going to reveal the truth about who rules this world, but ultimately, who has the power over that ruler. And it’s going to convict the hearts of the believers and the hearts of those who do not. And then he says this: “When the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all 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. He will glorify me.” (John 16:13-14)
This is a really key phrase. One of the things the Spirit does, poured out into the hearts of disciples, is increase our capacity to glorify Jesus. He increases our understanding of who God is and, in some ways, even, as importantly, who we are in relation to God. And understanding that truth creates a space for us to recognize how much we need to worship God. And then, the beautiful part is that the Spirit then infuses our worship, and is a Spirit welling up within us to cry out praises to God. But we’ll talk more about that in a minute.
“…for he will take what is mine and he will declare it to you.” (John 16:14) So, in this moment, with His disciples, Jesus is saying, it’s actually better that — and, you know, He has foretold His death and He’s foretold His resurrection, and He’s saying, once these things happen, this is all part of the divine plan of God. For what purpose? Lots of purposes: freedom from sin, breaking the hold of sin and death over all humanity, taking the things that are rightfully ours through our sin, and taking them to the cross, and taking them to the grave, and then, through the power of the Holy Spirit, bringing them out of the grave, breaking the power of death so that all men now have hope in Jesus Christ for what is to come: a salvation that is now offered to us.
And part of what He’s teaching His disciples now is, this salvation is in the promise of the Father. This salvation is in the down payment of our inheritance. And what is that down payment? The Holy Spirit. The same Spirit that raised Jesus from the dead is now poured out on those who have faith, who repent, who believe, who are baptized, and then receive this living Life, this divine Life that the chains of death could not hold Jesus down because of this Spirit, Who’s now available to us. An incredibly radical, incredibly beautiful plan of God: it’s actually better for us that Jesus, in his physical form, in this scenario, ascends to the Father, so that the Spirit that draws Him into heaven, the Spirit that unites the Father and the Son, is now in us! Through faith, through baptism, through repentance, right?
And just so you know that this isn’t my idea, let’s turn to Romans. Romans 8:11: “If the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will give life to your mortal bodies also through his Spirit who dwells in you.” What does the Spirit do? The Spirit brings life. And this life is accessible to us because of the death and resurrection of Jesus. Through His death on the cross, through His resurrection, He has won for us the power to experience the same. That even though our mortal bodies will die, our souls will rise with Christ through faith. Because why? Because, through the Spirit, we are no longer slaves, but sons. Romans 8 goes a little farther: “But if you live by the Spirit of God you are sons of God. For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into [sin], but…[the] spirit [through] which we cry, ‘Abba! Father!’ ” And so the sons of God, just like the Son of God, Jesus Himself, through death, rises again. So what does the Holy Spirit do for us? Through the death and resurrection of Jesus, He gives us divine life.