Upper Room No.2 For your good

The reading is in John chapter 16, beginning at verse 5. It's the words of our Lord and it's part of his discourse to the disciples in the hours before his arrest and his trial and his crucifixion. John chapter 16, beginning at verse 5. Now I am going to him who sent me, yet none of you asks me, where are you going? Because I have said these things, you are filled with grief. But I tell you the truth, it is for your good that I am going away.

Unless I go away, the counsellor will not come to you. But if I go, I will send him to you. When he comes, he will convict the world of guilt in regard to sin and righteousness and judgment.

In regard to sin, because men do not believe in me. In regard to righteousness, because I am going to the father where you can see me no longer. And in regard to judgment, because the prince of this world now stands condemned.

I have much more to say to you, more than you can now bear. But when he, the spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all truth. He will not speak on his own, he will speak only what he hears.

And he will tell you what is yet to come. He will bring glory to me by taking from what is mine and making it known to you. All that belongs to the father is mine.

That is why I said, the spirit will take from what is mine and make it known to you. In a little while, you will see me no more. And then, after a little while, you will see me.

This is the word of the Lord. And let's turn together to that passage which Tony just read. From John's Gospel in chapter 16.

John's Gospel in chapter 16. For visiting friends, let me say that it's our practice at the tab to let the scripture, by the empowering of the spirit, dictate the syllabus, i.e. that is the subject matter which we follow every Sunday morning. And at present, we're in the middle of a series of addresses.

I'm not sure how long they will go on for. Once again, I look to the Holy Spirit to prompt us as to how much to take in on each session. But we're into halfway, at least, shall we say.

A series of addresses which really come from our Lord's final words to his disciples. And as I've mentioned before to regular attenders here at the tab on a Sunday morning, often one puts great stock on the last words of a man who's dying. And here is our Lord Jesus.

Not in the sense of a man who's dying in a weak and pathetic way, but rather someone who's bringing the whole of his life to its finale, knowing that in his death, in an unusual fashion, the very will of God the Heavenly Father shall be consummated. But there's problems, of course. There are those disciples, 11 men, true, true men, true in their affection for our Saviour.

And for them, there's a great deal of heartache in even contemplating the loss of the Lord Jesus. Imagine your best friend. In fact, I trust for many of you, if not for all of you, the Lord Jesus is your best friend.

But let's scale it down to the earthly level. Imagine the partner that you've been with all your life, your closest companion suddenly taken from you. Now, if you've had a very deep affection, very loyal relationship down the years, then that to you would be almost the worst thing that could conceivably happen.

And that's the situation that confronts the disciples. Now, our Saviour sometimes says very difficult things to grasp. There's always truth, of course, in what he's sharing.

But occasionally you come across a scripture and it hits you straight in the face. And you wonder, did you really mean that, Lord? That hurts, or that I can't understand. Well, here is one such comment of our Saviour's in this marvellous paschal discourse.

In the seventh verse of the 16th chapter of John's Gospel, speaking to the disciples, he astonishes them as he discloses this information. I tell you the truth, it is for your good that I am going away. Unless I go away, the counsellor will not come to you.

But if I go, I will send him to you. It is for your good that I go away. It's not always easy to submit to what God determines to be the good for you.

I think the NIV at least has done us a good service in its rendering of Romans 8, 28. I think it's better, I think it's clearer than the authorised version. All things work together for good to them that love God, is the authorised version.

The NIV makes this distinction between the things and the good. You see, there are things that happen in a person's life which you cannot in all honesty say are good at that moment. And what is good about being sick? What is good about being a paraplegic? What is good about advancing years and weakness encroaching as a result? Well, in and of themselves, those things are not necessarily good.

But what those things ultimately lead to, they can become the good. They can become the good. Let me read that verse to you in Romans 8, 28 from the NIV where we find the apostle saying, and we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him.

Jesus is going away. And that to the disciples is totally unpalatable, utterly unacceptable. And yet Jesus says that that thing which seems to them to be unacceptable ultimately in his sovereignty will work for their good.

Now the disciples' problem is basically your problem, my dear friend. That your distinguishing of what is good for you is often different from the way the heavenly Father works out what is best for you. And there is the tension.

Here is Peter on the Mount of Transfiguration. A most remarkable thing has happened. You remember, you discover the incident in Mark's Gospel in chapter 9. With our Lord Jesus and these two great men from the Old Testament appearing alongside him, Peter says, speaking on behalf of the other two, Lord, it's good for us to be here.

Let's preserve what we now see. Let's build some booths for each of us and let life stop at that point. That will be good.

And Jesus, by his action, if not by his word, cancels out Peter's wish. It might seem good, but it's not the good. There's a man down at the bottom of the Mount whose son is demon-possessed.

We stay here. What happens to him? You see, the Lord allows the fallout of certain unpleasant things, certain things that you would not choose in preference to happen, so that an ultimate, a greater good that you cannot see at that moment might come about. Here's Mary Magdalene.

She loved the Lord Jesus. This woman for whom I have great, great respect and admiration. And she's encountering the Savior in the garden, the resurrection garden, you remember? And she makes to touch him, to hold on to him.

You know the reason? She's been without him for some three days and now her lover is back and she wants him as he is, but he says, no, don't touch me. Don't cling on to me. Because it will not be for the ultimate good if I remain as I am just with you.

Now, my friend, you may wonder what this has got to do with John 16, but you'll see in a moment or so. Our Lord is telling the disciples in effect, and then he's leading on to some of the most difficult teaching on the doctrine of the Spirit that I know of in the Scripture. But he's telling the disciples of what is the good in their life, in their lives.

I tell you the truth, it is for your good that I am going away, the last thing they wanted. Now, I'm aware that there's somebody, some people here in the tab, for whom at least my opening remarks, if not the explanation I'll give us to these difficult verses, will come as a great challenge and personal application from the Lord. You see, there are things that you are rejecting in your life as being the good.

Because like me, sometimes you feel that you know better than God knows. But God is challenging you as our Lord Jesus was challenging the disciples to accept that there can be a greater good that will emerge. And was, were the Lord to, to accept what you feel to be the right thing at this moment, ultimately it would not prove to be the best for you in your life.

The last thing the disciples wanted was for the Lord Jesus to go away. And yet he goes on, it is good that I'm going away. And yet when you think of what immediately lies in front of them, you wince at the thought of the Lord, even as far as his own personal well-being is concerned, opting that it's good for him to distance himself from the disciples.

Because down the road, remember that this is a peripatetic sermon, I mean by that people are walking alongside the Saviour with him. He's left the upper room, he's moving towards the garden of Gethsemane, they're clinging on to everything that he has to say. And he's saying it's good for me to go away.

But away means Gethsemane. Do you mean it's good for those bloody beads of sweat to appear on your surface, on your face? Is it good, Lord Jesus, for you to be handed over to the Roman soldiers? Is it good for your garment to be taken and for them to gamble for it? Is it good for your body to be placed on the cross? Is it good for you to know the torture of the experience of crucifixion? Is it good, Lord Jesus, for you to say, My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? And the shocking answer is yes. It's good, not in the immediate, but it's good in the long term.

For there is a joy that goes beyond the cross that our Lord Jesus sees. And as a result of this, he will acknowledge what is in the immediate, so the ultimate shall be secured. And there's a principle for the disciples, you see.

And there's a principle for you and for me. The last thing they wanted, he opts for. And for him, it will be the cross, and then the crown, the crucifixion, and then the coronation.

And maybe in principle, at any rate, that applies to you. The last thing they wanted. It's good that I go away.

You see, when I'm away from you, ultimately, when I'm back in my Father's house, then it will be possible for you to know me in a fashion that you have never known me before. You see, one of the things our Lord Jesus was not when he was on earth was omnipresent. I mean by that, he couldn't be everywhere at the same time, could he? When he's talking to the woman by Sychar's well, he can't be in Jerusalem.

He can't be conversing with his mother. But the day will come, says the Lord Jesus, that where two or three gather together in my name, there I will be in the midst. That can never happen.

If the disciple's wish is fulfilled, then the blessings of our Lord's spiritual presence around the world will never be realized. Now, do you notice this? That the disciples like you and me react against the teaching of our Savior. The last thing they wanted is for him to go.

And a failure to submit to the good that he has selected brings for them unnecessary sorrow. Verse six, because I have said these things, you are filled with grief. Now, don't you sometimes discover that, my friend? That when you wrestle against God, the net result is you feel unhappy.

You see, our Lord's whole discourse has been triggered off by the unhappy condition of his disciples. Look at the first verse of chapter 14. Do not let your hearts be troubled.

An amazing statement. You see, if anyone has any right, as I reminded you when I preached on this particular verse three or four months ago, if anyone has reason to be troubled at this point, it's the Lord Jesus. Why? Well, I've just explained.

Gethsemane and Calvary's in front of him. And yet, he so empathizes. He has such a compassion for other people.

He directs his remarks to the disciples. You're getting so troubled. Why are you so troubled? Why are you grief stricken? Because you won't submit to what I'm trying to teach you that it's for your benefit, ultimately, that I go away.

The failure to submit to the good that God opts for brings to us its own unnecessary sorrow. You see, the disciples just could not understand the drift of our Lord's thinking. You see, he goes on to say to them that if they did, then they would rejoice that he was going away.

Now I am going to him, verse five, who sent me, yet none of you asks me, where are you going? Some of you might think that that's a flat contradiction on the question that Peter puts up in the 37th verse of the 13th chapter. But you see, when Peter and another of the disciples cross-question the Lord Jesus and argue with the Lord Jesus as to what's just round the corner, they are arguing from the point of their own advantage. They're thinking just in terms of some physical place to which the Lord is going, but our Savior has given further information about his Father and the coming of the Holy Spirit, and their hearts at this point should be rejoicing.

They should be on the tiptoe of expectancy. They should be saying, Lord, where is it that you're going to? And in the very intonation of the question, there should be an anticipation, it's good for you to be away. It's good for you to go back to your Father because of the blessings that you will receive there.

But you see, the disciples are so self-centred at this point that they think only in terms of their own grief at his departure, not about what lies in the long-term future for him. None of you asks where I'm going. And because you've got an utter misunderstanding in rejecting what I'm saying, you can't enter into the joy that I know.

But look, my joy is this, verse 10, that I am going to the Father where you can see me no longer. But as a result of my going to the Father, you'll have blessings untold. So a couple of things I brought to your attention.

They're not in any homiletically selected fashion. I haven't been able to make them rhyme or start with the same letter or end with the same three letters because this is complicated teaching and yet it's wonderful teaching. Our Lord Jesus speaking for the good of the disciples.

First of all, it was the last thing they wanted and secondly, a failure to submit to the good that he'd selected brought for them unnecessary sorrow. But the third thing that I must just bring in at this point is this, that they would eventually have a rethink. They would eventually have a rethink.

You see, when our Lord has gone to the cross, when he's been raised from the dead, when he spent those 40 days intermittently at any rate in their company, you then discover their hearts are filled with joy. If you go to Luke's gospel in chapter 24, you will see the point that I'm trying to clinch at this moment. Our Savior is taking his leave from the disciples and as I say, he's been with them for over a month, intermittently revealing himself, teaching them further and they're beginning now to have an insight that they didn't have during the paschal discourse.

Verse 50 of Luke 24, when he had led them out to the vicinity of Bethany, he lifted up his hands and blessed them. While he was blessing them, he left them and was taken up into heaven. Then they worshipped him and returned to Jerusalem with great joy.

The sorrow has now dissipated, their mood has changed and they stayed continually at the temple praising God. You see, they were getting the first insight into the advantage that it would be for them, for the Lord Jesus in bodily fashion to be taken from them. Go into the whole world, says our Savior.

Go into the whole world and preach the gospel, the end of Matthew's account. And lo, I am with you always. You see the point? He couldn't have said that before.

He had to go away from them so that spiritually they might know his presence, so that his presence might circumnavigate the globe. Have you got the point? It's most interesting. It's most encouraging for us to realize that these disciples rethought ultimately and changed their initial reaction to the news that Jesus was going to leave them.

They began to agree later on it was for their good. My dear friend, the time will come in your life and for some of you may have come already, that you have rethought your initial reaction to what you have considered to be the unacceptable will of God in certain aspects. Now don't misunderstand me.

I'm not some sort of rosy spectacle preacher, at least that looks to the world with rosy spectacles. Some of the things that have happened are not pleasant. I'm not suggesting that they are.

To me it's absurd the way that some modern evangelical teaching comes along and tries to make the serious and savage things of life be ones that you can immediately react to with a sort of hallelujah, praise the Lord anyway. If you're at that point in your spiritual development, congratulations, I am miles behind. But what I do believe is that in those unpleasant things which I would not choose at this moment and would not have chosen yesteryear, God still works out his purpose and ultimately I am beginning to see or I will begin to see some of the reasons why he let certain constructions to form in my life.

So, the disciples come to a realization. Not during this discourse that they heard. Isn't it good to know? It encourages me as a preacher to know that here's a congregation who didn't follow the preacher at that point, but ultimately they did.

You know and I've lived long enough here in Worthing to have the experience of folk writing into my office and saying, you know, what you said years ago, I couldn't take. But now I've determined that what you taught from God's word was indeed God's word to me and there's been a justification of what you tried to explain from the word of the Lord. We've got a hymn that sums up what I'm trying to say at this point.

When we walk with the Lord in the light of his word, what a glory he sheds on our way. And it's got that chorus and if you don't like choruses, it's tough because you have to repeat it five times and that's unusual in hymns of faith because they squeeze most of the choruses out. Wasn't fashionable when that book was brought together.

Trust and obey for there's no other way to be happy in Jesus but to trust and obey. Now that's what the disciples were asked to do by the Lord and in a blind fashion they did and ultimately there was complete vindication. He was going away and through his removal there would be colossal advantages which at that point that they could not see.

So now we move into the most difficult part of these verses. I tell you the truth, verse seven. It's good for you that I'm going because if I don't go, the counsellor, the Holy Spirit will not come.

Now when the Spirit comes, he will do three things. Verse eight, he will convict the world of guilt in regard to sin and let me get that right. He will convict the world of guilt in regard to sin.

That was correct. And righteousness and judgment in regard to sin because men do not believe in me. In regard to righteousness because I am going to the Father where you can see me no longer and in regard to judgment because the prince of this world now stands condemned.

Now really shake your heads because this is difficult. It seems to me that the coming of the Holy Spirit into our world has a different response or a different ministry depending upon whether one is a believer or an unbeliever as was the coming of our Lord Jesus. You say, what do you mean? Well, take our Lord Jesus for a moment.

Why did he come into this world? Well, you say he came to bring peace, reconcile you to the Father and so on and so forth. And that is of course true. That was a direct reason why he came.

He came so that men might be reunited with God and their sins might be absolved. Right. But what about those who were present when Jesus was alive and rejected what he had to say? Or let's put it into the 20th century.

What about those who hear the gospel of Christ and yet they don't respond to the message of the gospel? Now the mission of Jesus is to save, not so? Yet one of the consequences of his mission is to split families in two. Here you've got a man who believes and his wife doesn't and spiritually they're split. Our Lord Jesus puts it in graphic language when he says, I have come to bring a sword on the earth.

You remember that statement? You never find that in a promise box, do you? Never find the weightiest statements of our Lord. You find all the happy ones. But you must balance the teaching of our Lord Jesus in your selection with the severe comments as well as with the more joyful ones that he makes.

See, when the Lord comes, there are those who respond and thank God for their salvation. There are those who reject and as a result of their rejection, of course, they're in an even worse condition. Now don't you understand, my friend, that's exactly the same with the Holy Spirit.

Will you take this from the pulpit that in one sense the Holy Spirit ought not to be in the world at all? You say, what heresy is this? 17 years and now he's revealing his hand. Well, hear me through. Why did the Holy Spirit come into our world? Because the Son removed himself from the world.

God so loved the world, he gave his only begotten Son that whosoever believeth in him should not perish but have everlasting life. Now that world, that world in which you live here in Worthing, the 20th century version, our little bit of it, does it respond to John 3.16? The Son comes, he comes with a message of salvation, but how do your neighbours react? How do your family friends react? How does your close colleague react? He came unto his own, but his own received him not, but to as many as received him. To them gave he power to become the sons of God.

You see, there's two categories of people. The Holy Spirit has a dual function, a dual ministry. The Lord was despised by the men that he came to save.

They hated him. Without charge, they put him on the cross. They did not want God's ambassador.

He knew this. He thought through their reactions in terms of a vineyard and the vineyard owner who sends his son to get the fruit, but the servants will not give the fruit, nor the allegiance or obedience to the son or the owner, the father of the vineyard. Our Lord Jesus spells it all out.

You remember in that somber parable. They don't want him, and so he goes. Ah, but there are some who do want him.

To as many as received him, this little group of men, 11 of them, who're wandering down towards the brook Kidron, they want him, they love him. They do not want him to be away from them. And so what does he do? Well, he sends the Holy Spirit.

I will not leave you as orphans. I will go to my father. And as a result of my going to my father and establishing the work that I have done on earth for the salvation ministry of Jesus is attested in heaven, I will release into this world the Holy Spirit.

And he will take up residence in your life. And there will be certain positive things that will follow as far as this little group of men, the embryonic church, standing, if you please, for you and for me. But there are other things that follow, don't you see? And the eighth verse and onwards through to the 12th makes it very plain.

That the fact the Holy Spirit is in our world works in one sense to the disadvantage of the unbeliever. The world into which the Spirit came was a world which largely rejected our Lord Jesus Christ. So what does the Holy Spirit do? Look at the eighth verse, will you? He convicts the world of guilt in regard to sin and righteousness.

Someone slip out, please, to that dear lady. He convicts the world of sin of guilt in regard to sin and righteousness. What is meant by that? Well, what does a lawyer do? Let's imagine a court case.

Let's take the Moore's murderers. Take Myra Hindley. No, I've got no reason to suppose that that lady is not now penitent for the terrific crime that she and her accomplice engaged in just south of Manchester.

But you see, when a lawyer comes along in a court, very often the man in the dark, though he's proven to be guilty, never confesses his guilt at all. In other words, there's no real sense of wrongdoing and sorrow. And the Holy Spirit, He comes into the world and He is in effect the advocate who establishes the guilt of all those who do not respond to the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ.

That's what's being shown here in the eighth verse. Those of you with the NIV, read the margin down, or read the comment down at the bottom. He will expose the guilt of the world.

He wouldn't be here had men and women universally accepted the Lord Jesus Christ. And what's more, not only does He expose the guilt of the world, He reveals the righteousness of the Lord Jesus Christ. You see, if the Holy Spirit here is just dealing, if you like, in a subconscious fashion in the minds of the unbeliever, then the very use of the word righteousness would be incorrect.

There is no righteousness in this world. All our righteousnesses are as filthy rags. The only righteousness that there is, is that of our Lord Jesus Christ.

And the Holy Spirit attests to it. The finished work of our Lord, the cross of Calvary, He's received back to the Father. He has the right to dispense salvation blessing to those who believe.

The presence of the Holy Spirit attests to this and He convicts the world of its unrighteousness over against the righteousness of Christ. And what's more, the Spirit is there to remind us ultimately, verse 11, that judgment will come to ordinary men and women who, like the prince of this world, are condemned, having refused to submit to the authority of God in their lives. So, you see my teaching there, it's, well it's not my teaching, it's a clear teaching of our Lord Jesus.

The presence of the Holy Spirit, when He comes into the world, will confirm its perilous condition. But as far as the disciples are concerned, look at verse 12, the Spirit who comes along will continue to instruct them as the Savior has instructed them. I have much more to say to you, more than you can now bear, but when He, the Spirit of truth, comes, He will guide you into all truth.

He'll not speak on His own. You see, there's an inner ministry of the Spirit to those who have taken the company of the Lord Jesus. There's an external ministry of the Spirit to those who reject the Lord Jesus Christ.

He works for the spiritual well-being of the former and to the detriment of the latter. And so, and now we come full circle and I conclude. So we begin to appreciate how our Lord Jesus is right when in the seventh verse He tells the disciples it's for their good that He will go away.

Why so? Well, because the Holy Spirit will come and He will minister to them. He will bring to their mind those things that they've already received. Oh yes, but there are certain things as yet that they couldn't bear, certain weighty teachings that they still have to receive by the Lord Jesus Christ.

And He uses the medium of the Spirit to instruct them. All that belongs to the Father, verse 15, is mine. That is why I said the Spirit will take from what is mine and make it known to you.

And He concludes with what seems like a conundrum but actually is easily understood with the context that I've just expounded. In a little while, you'll see me no more. And then He repeats, yet in a little while, you will see me.

In a little while, the first one, well, He's removed. Three days, He's removed from them, is He not? The time of the crucifixion and the immediate aftermath, you'll not see me. And yet, after that little while, you'll see me again.

And I did, for 40 days, not so. And then, another little while, and He's no longer with them. He's ascended into heaven.

But the day of Pentecost is round the corner. In another little while, you'll see me again. And I did spiritually, with great perception.

He came in all the power of the Holy Ghost. He came as a tutor. He came as an inspirer.

He came as a comfort. He came as a guardian. And He's with us now.

Not just the 11, but with us who've trusted Him. The Holy Spirit ministering to us. And at the same time as He ministers to us, His very presence confirms the guilt of the world, the sin of the world, and ultimately indicates that all unbelievers shall be brought to the judgment bar of God.

But for you, what the Savior planned was for your good, is for your good. Thank you, Lord, for that. Let's stand and sing.

Just sing a spiritual song for a moment, and then we'll come on to our main hymn. Let's all stand, and we're going to sing, Breathe on Me, Breath of God. We'll sing it to the new tune.

Let's sing with feeling. Breathe on Me, Breath of God. Fill me with life anew.

I'm sorry, I've got the wrong one. Spirit of the Living God. Spirit of the Living God, fall afresh on me.

Sing this softly and gently. Spirit of the Living God, fall afresh on me. Let's hear that theme played.

Our Lord Jesus said that the world could not receive the Spirit. It wasn't on the same wavelength as you and I are on. Only the disciples could receive the Spirit in the sense of Him ministering to their hearts and enlivening and encouraging them.

This is what they were to know on the day of Pentecost and in subsequent years. This is what we want more and more. Let's sing it through.

Spirit of the Living God, fall afresh on me. Spirit of the Living God, fall afresh on me. For those here who've been struggling against what is the good in their life, we pray that they may be enabled to submit to it and discover that all the things that are leading up, though unpleasant, really were justified in your sovereignty because you had a greater purpose to fulfil.

We thank you for the disciples. We thank you, Lord, that at times they found it hard to understand the teaching of our Savior and yet ultimately it became clear and they basked in the good of what He had predicted. Our Lord, some of us haven't got to that stage yet and we're struggling and we really do need your help and we pray for it.

We thank you that the Holy Spirit's ministry to us is positive. It's not condemnatory. It's consoling.

He has not come to silence us. He's come to silence the world. He's come to affirm the salvation that we have in our Lord Jesus.

And we open our hearts to that more so that we might know the divine assurance that we belong to you through our Lord Jesus and by the imparting of the Spirit. Lord, just come upon us. All the friends who are finding life difficult to cope with, Lord, help them to submit to the all things in order to discover the good.

We pray for each one of us, perhaps some from broken homes, some whose heart breaks because of their partner right now. Lord, the all things are very difficult for them to accept, but may they discover that still they're working for the good. Lord, some folk here you reveal are resisting your will.

Make them like clay as we reminded ourselves earlier. Grey Potter, just take us and mold us as our Lord Jesus molded those disciples and ultimately let us experience the good of all that you have in store and make us more effective in our discipleship. For the Saviour's sake.

Amen. Let's sing that final hymn, 254, shall we? And then we're through. 254 in hymns of faith.

All breath of life comes sweeping through us. Don't we need that? Don't we need that? Amen. Glad one or two of you do.

254, all breath of life comes sweeping through us. Revive thy church with life and power. All breath of life comes sweeping through us.

All breath of life. Visions that you make through the Lord Jesus for your children such as us. We thank you that though men callously dismissed our Lord Jesus Christ, he returned to the Father, his righteousness having been, remained intact, established before all.

And we thank you for the gift of the Spirit who mediates his presence to us, who confirms that we belong to him and equips us for service, and yet confirms the judgment that comes upon all those who reject his gospel. Now send us out as men and women of the Spirit to live for you, electing for and basking in the good of God in our lives. Amen.

God bless you. Amen.