[MUSIC PLAYING] God isn't really
something to worship. He's just waiting to
destroy all of us. I guess there's a god
out there somewhere. I hope there is a god. How is it really
something to worship? God is everywhere. [APPLAUSE] Good morning. Would you turn, in your Bibles,
please, to the Gospel of John in your New Testament,
John chapter 16? Some of us who grew up
with the Apostles' Creed, reciting it in churches--
any of you here did that? So those of us who did,
we remember, as kids-- if you remember the old
form of that-- how awkward it was when they came
to a certain part. The creed, as you
know, goes, I believe in God, the Father Almighty,
the maker of heaven and earth, and in Jesus Christ,
his only son, our Lord who conceived
by the Holy Ghost. Now, when a kid hears that-- he was? And then it goes on to
say, crucified, died, and was buried. And then it says, I
believe in the Holy Ghost. Now, when I was a kid, the
only ghost I was familiar with was a guy by the name of Casper. [LAUGHTER] And he was a friendly ghost. And other than that,
my parents basically said stay, away from ghosts. So as a kid, hearing in
church that she was conceived by the Holy Ghost,
a kid thinks, how can a ghost get Mary pregnant? I mean that, in the mind of a
child, was so disconnecting. I also think that
for people today, the idea of the Holy Spirit
Himself is disconnecting. That is, there's certain
parts of God we understand. For instance, the
Father part we get. A father is a leader,
is a provider. God is a father. God is a provider. It makes sense. The Son-- we don't have
too much problem with that. Some of us are sons. We grew up trying to please
dad, our fathers on earth. But the idea of
the Holy Spirit-- so what does he do? What is he up to? What's all that about? We already covered a whole
message on the Trinity some weeks ago. And we want to look
specifically at the Holy Spirit. Speaking of the Apostles'
Creed, though, there was a Sunday school class. And the assignment was to
memorize the Apostles' Creed. So the way they did it is
they assigned each student in the class a phrase. And they would come on Sunday
and give their recitation. So on that Sunday, the first
child stood up and said, I believe in God,
the Father Almighty, maker of heaven and earth. And he sat down. The next little girl
stood up and said, I believe in Jesus Christ,
his only son, our Lord. She sat down. And then there was a long
silence, a long pause. Finally a little girl
in the back of the room said, I'm sorry,
sir, but the boy who believes in the Holy
Ghost is absent today. And I wonder if that couldn't
be said of the church today, that those who
believe in the Holy Spirit are absent today. I wonder if it couldn't
be that our experience with the Holy Spirit, our
knowledge of what he does, what he is about is sort of
like what Paul encountered when he went to Ephesus
in the 19th chapter of the book of Acts. He went to that church
and asked them a question. Have you received the Holy
Spirit since you believed? And their response is,
we haven't even heard whether there is a Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit is fuzzy
to a lot of people, illusive to a lot of people. Oh, they grew up reciting the
creeds, hearing the sermons, hearing preachers speak about
Him, yet He seems elusive. While the New Testament
refers to the Holy Spirit-- just the New Testament-- refers to the Holy
Spirit 260 times-- 260 times by a number
of different names. The most common name is the
name we know, the Holy Spirit. So if He has
mentioned 260 times, He's certainly someone
we cannot neglect. And that's just
the New Testament. But He's all over the
scripture, from the first book to the last book, from
Genesis to Revelation, from cover to cover. Genesis chapter 1, verse 2-- the spirit of God was
hovering over the waters. Revelation 22, verse 17-- and the Spirit and
the bride say come. So we have the Holy
Spirit represented throughout the scripture. And in the next few
weeks, we're going to look at the Holy
Spirit-- who He is, what He does
in the world, what He does in the church for us,
how we are to respond to Him. The problem is,
where do you begin when you have 260 choices, 260
different scriptures in the New Testament? Where do you begin talking
about the Holy Spirit? I've chosen to begin with
the words of Jesus himself. It's as if we have
the second person of the Trinity introducing
to us the third person of the Trinity. We are in John chapter 16. What I want you to know is John
Chapter 13, 14, 15, and 16-- all four chapters-- happen at one time. It is in a setting
called the Last Supper. It is the upper-room
discourse, it is called. In a few hours, Jesus
will be arrested. A few hours after that,
he will be crucified. So he has a few hours left
with his friends, with his men. And so he wants to prepare
them and instruct them about very important events that
are going to be on their radar screen in the coming hours,
days, weeks, months, and years. Today, we're going to look
at what the Holy Spirit does in the world with unbelievers. And I mentioned our text
is chapter 16 of John. What I'd like to do, just
to get the whole context, is have you go back
and see with me how Jesus introduces this
Holy Spirit to his disciples back in chapter 14. John chapter 14,
beginning in verse 15, is where He, Jesus, begins
the thread of that thought. He said, if you love Me,
keep My commandments. And I will pray the Father. And He will give you
another helper, that He may abide with you forever-- the Spirit of truth, whom the
world cannot receive because it neither sees Him nor knows Him. But you know Him, for He dwells
with you and will be in you. I will not leave you orphans. I will come to you. Go down to the 25th verse. These things I
have spoken to you while being present with you. But the Helper, the Holy
Spirit, whom the Father will send in My name, He
will teach you all things and bring into your remembrance
all things that I said to you. That's how we account
for the New Testament. Now go to chapter 15, toward
the very end, verse 26. When the Helper
comes, whom I shall send to you from the Father,
the Spirit of truth who proceeds from the Father,
He will testify of Me. And you also will bear
witness because you have been with Me from the beginning. Now go down to verse
5 of chapter 16. But now I go away
to Him who sent Me. But none of you asked
Me, where are You going? But because I have said
these things to you, sorrow has filled your heart. Nevertheless, I
tell you the truth. It is to your advantage
that I go away. For if I do not go away, the
Helper will not come to you. But if I depart, I
will send Him to you. And when He has come, He
will convict 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 My Father and you see me no more, of judgment
because the ruler of this world is judged. I still have many
things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now. However, when He, the
Spirit of truth, has come, 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 tell
you things to come. He will glorify Me, for He
will take of what is Mine and declare it to you. Now, I'm going to confine my
thoughts to the 16th chapter of John, verses 5 through 11. I'm going to show
you three aspects of the relationship
the Holy Spirit has to the world-- three aspects. They are His presence, His
pressure, and His people. His presence, His
pressure, and His people-- and in each case, I'm going
to make a simple statement. The first is His
presence is needful. Now in verse 5, where we began-- I really should have
began in verse 1. But I'll just explain
to you what went before that to get to this point. In verse 5, Jesus says, now
I go away to Him who sent Me. I'm going back to the Father. I'm going to ascend
back to heaven. And none of you asked
Me, where are You going? But because I have said
these things to you, sorrow has filled your heart. Nevertheless, I
tell you the truth. It is to your advantage
that I go away. For if I do not go away, the
Helper will not come to you. But if I depart, I
will send Him to you. Now, at this moment, in
the upper-room discourse in the Last Supper, the
disciples are shocked. They're disappointed,
to say the least. Jesus has been able to
watch their body language as they went from excited at
the beginning to very, very depressed at this moment. And here's why. What Jesus has told them
is not what they expected. What they have
expected all along is a kingdom to be
established on the earth. If this is the Messiah, He is
going to establish a kingdom. 2000 years ago, the Jews in
Israel, the Jews in Judea, had a pretty simple,
straightforward eschatology-- that is, belief in the
end-time events of the Messiah. Number one, there is going
to be a time of turmoil, national turmoil. And that's going to get
us all ready for desiring the Messiah to come. It's going to fuel
an expectation. So check-- that has happened. The Romans have come
and occupied the land. Everybody's oppressed. Everybody wants the
Messiah to come. They're crying for it. They're yearning for it. They're looking for it. Phase two-- after that
national expectation because of oppression, Elijah
is going to come, or an Elijah-like forerunner
is going to come and say, ladies and gentlemen,
here's the Messiah. Check-- John the Baptist came on
the scene and said about Jesus, behold the Lamb of God who
takes away the sin of the world. Follow Him. That's why people were so
interested in John the Baptist. Are you Elijah? Are you that prophet? Who exactly are you? Because they knew that. The third phase
that they expected is the Messiah will
set up his kingdom. So the disciples at
this point are thinking, one and two have
already happened. Number three is going
to happen at any moment. The only problem
is the Last Supper. Jesus brings him in a room. And beginning in chapter
13, He tells them the news-- I'm leaving. You're what? I'm leaving. And as the discourse goes
on-- chapter 13, 14, 15, 16-- the news goes from bad to worse. I'm leaving. I'm dying. And I'm going to suffer
greatly before I die. That is not what they expected. Now, sorrow is growing in
their hearts because of this. But that's not all. It actually gets worse. In chapter 16,
beginning in verse 1-- we haven't even read that part-- He says, not only am I dying,
not only am I going to suffer, you, because you believe in
me, will suffer and die also. Oh, great. That's not at all
what they expected. So He says, now I go
away to Him who sent me. And none of you asked
Me, where are You going? But because I have said
these things to you, sorrow has dominated your heart. That's the idea of
the word filled. It's the Greek word It
means to fill something up so completely that there's
room for nothing else. So emotionally, they are filled
to the brim with anxiety. That's what this means,
sorrow has filled your heart. Because I said, I'm leaving,
sorrow has filled your heart. You know, it's interesting
because Jesus says, none of you asked me where I'm going. Because you are so focused
on what you're losing, you're not even looking
at this from My side. I get to go back
home to My Father. But you're so consumed
about what you're losing, you're not thinking
about what I'm gaining. And look at verse 7. Here's really the crux of this. Nevertheless, I'm
telling you the truth. It is to your advantage
that I go away. What-- what? Now, if you're a disciple and
you hear that, you're thinking, I don't believe that. It's not to my advantage
that you go away. Here's a better translation. It's actually better
for you that I go away. Or the best thing that
could happen to you is that I leave you. That's a disconnect for them. They hear that and they
go, why would that be good? You're the guy who
calms storms on lakes. You're the guy who
heals our relatives. You're the guy who gives
lunch to a whole crowd at the Sea of Galilee. You're the one who
turns water into wine. And you're the guy who reached
into a fish's mouth on tax day and got enough tax
for all of us to pay. You are pretty handy
to have around. And now you're saying
it's better if you go? You see, they are so focused
on what they're about to lose, they're not even thinking about
what they're about to gain. What they're about to gain is
the Holy Spirit's presence. And here's why. They don't know how much
they're going to need the Holy Spirit in days ahead. So nothing could be better
than having Jesus around. So they don't know
what's coming. They don't know how much they're
going to need the Holy Spirit. What is coming? Why did they need him so much? In a word, because of the task. You know what the task
is-- the great commission. You know the great
commission, right? Go into all the world and preach
the gospel to every creature. Well, that's a pretty big task. In fact, that's an
impossible task to do alone. They're going to face
persecution in Judea. They're going to face
persecution in Greece. They're going to face
persecution in Asia Minor. They're going to face
persecution in Rome. And then all of them,
except for John, will die a martyr's
death because they believe in Jesus Christ. Well, that sounds pretty
impossible to me to do alone. Now, here's my segue. The task is still the same. And it is still as
impossible today for these present disciples
as it was for those disciples. And here's why. Because most people
do not believe. Most people are unsaved. The large majority of
people in the world do not believe in Jesus Christ
as the only means of salvation. This might help. It helped me visually. If you were to line up
all of the unsaved people in the world, roughly, and
put them shoulder-to-shoulder, lined him up
shoulder-to-shoulder, no social distancing,
you could form a line that would go all the
way around the Earth 30 times. And the line is growing 20
miles longer every single day. It's a pretty big task. But Jesus never said, go
at it, boys, do your best. You're on your own, hope you
don't get beat up too bad. What he did tell them is go,
but don't go until you are filled with power from on high. That's the Gospel
of Luke, chapter 24. We get to Acts, chapter 1. And Jesus said, when the
Holy Spirit has come, you will receive power. And you will be my witnesses
in Jerusalem, Judea, Sumeria, and the uttermost
parts of the earth. So go, but don't go on your own. Don't go without the
power of the Holy Spirit. DM Dawson wrote this-- without the power
of the Holy Spirit, all human efforts,
methods, and plans are as futile as
attempting to propel a boat by puffing at the
sails with our own breath. It's a good picture. You're in a sailboat in
Newport Beach, California. You want to get to
Catalina Island. It's 25 miles away. What do you do? [RAPID PUFFING] Well, that's kind of stupid. You're going to need a wind
much more powerful than [RAPID PUFFING]. And so to go into all
the world and share the gospel with every creature
on your own is [RAPID PUFFING].. So His presence is needful. It is to your advantage
that I go away. Because when I go, I'm going
to send the Holy Spirit. And boys, you're
going to need that. Let's look at His
pressure now, number two. The second aspect
is His pressure. His pressure is
unmistakable, verse 8. When He-- He who? The Holy Spirit. When He, the Holy Spirit, has
come, He, the Holy Spirit, will convict the world of
sin, and righteousness, and judgment-- of sin because they
do not believe in Me, of righteousness because
I go to my Father and you see Me no more, of judgment
because the ruler of this world is judged. In short, it's the
Holy Spirit that pursues people,
that chases people, that comes after people. We have a vision
statement in our church. And it says, we pursue the God
who passionately pursues a lost world. You know how God passionately
pursues the lost world? His Holy Spirit, by
sending His Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit has been
called the Hound of Heaven. I don't know if you've ever
heard that description of Him, the Hound of Heaven. It's a phrase that
comes from the 1800s. A man by the name
of Francis Thompson wrote a poem about
God, the Holy Spirit, called the Hound of Heaven. And his story,
Francis Thompson, he was a medical school
student in London. He dropped out of
medical school. He became addicted to opium. He attempted suicide. And all the while, he ran
from God, ran from God, ran from God till God
caught up with him. And so he wrote a poem. Here's some of the lyrics. I fled Him-- that's the old way
of saying, I ran away from Him. I fled Him down the
nights and down the days. I fled Him down the
arches of the years. I fled Him through
the labyrinthine ways of my own mind. But then, in the poem, he talks
about how God pursues him. And he writes this-- but with unhurrying chase
and unperturbed pace. I love that description,
the unrelenting conviction, chasing, pursuing
of the Holy Spirit. Did you happen to notice when
we read it in chapter 15, verse 26, Jesus says, concerning
the Holy Spirit, he will testify of Me? That is, He is going to come
and speak very plainly about Me. He, the Holy Spirit,
will be the one who will open up people's
understanding of who I am, open up their hearts to Jesus. You would not be here today
as a believer in Christ were it not for the pressure of
the Holy Spirit in your life. Some of you can still remember
vividly when that happened. I do. I remember the day I
gave my life to Christ. I remember the pressure. I remember feeling that
holy conviction of heart. I need to do this. So what will the Holy
Spirit do exactly? Jesus said He'll
do three things. In verse 8 through
11, he's going to convict the world of sin,
and righteousness, and judgment. The word convict could
be translated-- in fact, it is in some of your
translations-- as convince. He will convince the world. Or He will point out
the fault of the world. Or He will show the
world their need of me. In other words, it
is the Holy Spirit who convinces
people in the world that they are sinners
in need of a Savior. Before any person
can receive a Savior, they need to realize
they need to be saved. Unless you realize,
I need to be saved, you don't look for a Save-ior. That's the job of
a Savior, to save people who need to be saved. So it's the Holy
Spirit that does that. It's the Holy Spirit that
produces guilt in people. Now, I've heard psychologists
say, well, guilt is a very unhealthy emotion. Unless you're guilty--
if you're guilty, you need to get your
guilt alleviated. And you can try to talk it away
and pretend you don't have it. Or you can get
forgiven because it's something else that is causing
that guilt. Now, that's what the Holy Spirit does. He brings you to the place
where you can be forgiven and that guilt taken away. It is the Holy Spirit
that produces that. Now, I've discovered most
people need convincing. They need convincing. Most people don't
admit they're sinners. Most people I meet in
the world don't even believe in the idea of sin. They're out blaming everybody
else for the way they are. They want to blame
their environment. I am the way I am
because when I was a kid, my dad forced me to eat spinach. And I've hated him ever since. And now I've gotten an angry
attitude because of that. So they're the reason
I am the way I am. Or they want to blame
their genetic structure. I am biologically
prone and predisposed to a certain behavior. I have no choice at all. Listen, this game has
gone all the way back to the Garden of Eden. That's exactly what Adam did. When God busted him for his
choice, he blamed his wife. In fact, he blamed God. He said, it's the
woman You gave me! But the Holy Spirit
does have a way of convincing the human heart
of the need of the human heart, shining the bright light
of truth into that life. By the way, convicting,
convincing is not your job. It's the Holy Spirit's job. We get into trouble
when we try to take that job over because it usually
doesn't come out as conviction. It usually comes
out as condemnation. It just makes people
feel really bad. It's like the little girl
who sold Girl Scout cookies. She sold hundreds of boxes
of Girl Scout cookies. And so they asked
her, how were you successful in selling so many? She said, actually,
it's quite easy. You've got to look
people right in the eye and make them feel guilty. She said it works every time. It might work selling
Girl Scout cookies. It does not work in
sharing the gospel. Jesus said, no
one can come to Me unless the Father who
sent Me draws them. And the way He draws them
is by the Holy Spirit. So He's going to
convict the world. And notice in verse 9, the sin
is singular-- of sin, not sins. He's not going to
come along and say, you spoke badly
to your neighbor, or you were speeding--
like you are always speeding-- this morning,
or you stole something when you were younger. Your conscience usually does
a pretty good job of that. No, the Holy Spirit will
convict people of sin, singular. That is a very
particular type of sin that their conscience would
never convict them of-- ever. Now, what is that sin? It says unbelief of sin because
they do not believe in Me. That's the sin the Holy Spirit
convicts people of-- unbelief. People in the world on their own
do not see unbelief as a sin. Heck, it's a badge
of honor for them. It's a badge of honor. They'll say things like,
I don't believe in Jesus. I'm not as weak as you are. I don't need to believe in
something other than myself, outside of myself. I don't need to believe in God. I am much more enlightened
and intelligent than you are. They don't see unbelief as
the thing that separates them from God forever. But the Holy Spirit will
convince them of that. It's the worst sin
because it prevents forgiveness of all other sins. John, chapter 3-- he
who believes in the Son is not condemned. He who does not believe
is condemned already because he has not
believed in the name of the only Son of God. John, chapter 5-- Jesus
said, you do not believe. John, chapter 8-- you
do not believe in Me. John, chapter 14-- you
do not believe in Me. It's that sin. He'll convict the world
of sin because they don't believe in Me. The second thing
He'll do is convict the world of righteousness. Verse 10-- because I go to my
Father and you see Me no more. What on earth does that mean? Well, most people think if there
is a God, if there's a heaven, I'm probably good
enough to go there. I may not be perfect, I
may not be 100% righteous, but I have a righteousness. I'm better than a lot of people. And I believe that in
the end, my good deeds will outweigh my bad deeds. That's how most people
live their lives, by a relative righteousness. But then Jesus came
into the world. And suddenly, you have
the perfect standard of righteousness. Suddenly, no matter who you are,
next to Jesus, you ain't much. Imperfection next to
perfection simply accentuates imperfection. That's why Isaiah the prophet--
though he was a prophet-- when he saw God, said,
woe is me, I'm undone. I'm not that
special next to God. Years ago, I had the opportunity
to speak at the Billy Graham training center at The Cove. I've spoken there
for many times. But on one particular
occasion, I got really nervous. Because I happened to
be at lunch that day with Dr. Billy
Graham at his house. And he smiled. And he said, I'm going to come
to hear you speak tonight. And I'm hoping that something
happens where he's busy and he doesn't come
because it's not easy to give a message
in front of Billy Graham. To make it worse,
the topic I was assigned to speak on that
night was evangelism. [LAUGHTER] Yeah. This Skip's going to tell Billy
Graham how to do evangelism. This is not good. [LAUGHTER] You see, when you know a
little bit about evangelism but you're speaking
to the world's most effective evangelist
ever born, who has led more people to Christ
in history than anyone else, It's a little daunting. So you have a perfect
standard of righteousness in Jesus Christ. So yeah, you've
got people saying, you know, I think I'm
going to go to heaven. If there's a God, I'll
be there because I think my good deeds will
outweigh my bad deeds. No. This is what Jesus said-- He's going to convict the
world of righteousness because I go to My Father
and you see Me no more. Let me explain that. There's only one person who
ever walked this earth who, at the end of his
life, had the right to go directly,
on his own merit, into the presence of God-- only one person-- and
that's Jesus Christ. He died. He ascended into heaven. God highly exalted Him
and gave Him the name Lord above all other names. So unless you possess the
righteousness of Jesus Christ, you will never see God. You will never see God unless
you are that righteous. Didn't Jesus say, unless
your righteousness exceeds that of the
scribes and the Pharisees, you will by no means
enter the Kingdom of God? Unless you possess the
righteousness of Jesus, you will never see God. So the sin that condemns
you is unbelief. The righteousness that saves
you is the righteousness that only Jesus possesses. And folks, that happens
to be the gospel. The gospel is, you come
convicted of your sin, admit that you're
a sinner, ask Jesus to save you by simple belief. And then God gives to you
the righteousness of his son, imputes that to your account. 2 Corinthians 5:21,
God made Him who knew no sin to be
sin for us, that we might become the
righteousness of God in Him. It's the exchange. So now God, if you
believe, will see you as if you are as
perfect as Jesus was. That's righteousness. And He'll convict the world
of judgment-- verse 11-- because the ruler of
this world is judged. The Holy Spirit
will convince people that there is, indeed,
a coming judgment, a time of accountability,
and that if you reject Jesus Christ, you
will face that judgment. But he says this-- of judgment
because the ruler of this world is judged. When Jesus died on the
cross, Satan's kingdom was effectively over. I know he's had a lot
of free time since then. And that chain is pretty long,
and he's done a lot of damage. But his fate is sealed. The cross ruined him. That's Genesis
chapter 3, verse 15. There's coming a
seed, a male child who will be born and
crush the head of Satan. It's Colossians, chapter 2-- at the cross, he disarmed
principalities and powers. It's Hebrews, chapter 2-- he
destroyed him who had the power of death-- that is, the devil. So when Jesus says, of judgment
because the ruler of this world is judged, He is arguing
from greater to lesser. He's saying that
if God destroyed the most powerful evil
force in the universe, you will not escape. You will not escape. If he judged the
devil, then anyone less than the devil who rejects
Christ will face judgment. You know, I've always seen it as
a healthy sign when people are thinking about future judgment. I've always seen it as good. A few years ago,
I had an FBI agent who wanted to come
and meet with me. And he sat in my office. And he was kind of
shuffling his feet. He was really embarrassed. He said, you know, I was on
the airplane the other day, and I'm flying. And I started
thinking, what happens if this plane goes down? And he thought,
I'm going to die. And he goes, suddenly, I was
overcome with a fear of death. And he looked at me and
goes, that's weird, huh? I said, that's not
weird, that's smart. That's a healthy
thing to be afraid of. He said, no. No, you don't understand. I'm an FBI agent. I've faced death many times. I've had guns pointed at me. I've shot people. They've shot me. I've been on SWAT teams. I've learned to deal with fear. I said, let me ask
you a question. Are you right with God? Do you have a personal
relationship with God through Jesus Christ, his Son? I explained what that meant. He said no. And I said, you should
be very afraid-- very afraid. Because there is a coming
judgment, a coming reckoning. If you think you're going to
approach God in that condition, you ought to be afraid to die. I said, you want to
be unafraid to die? You want to be unafraid
of bullets, and viruses, and anything else? Receive Christ right now. Let him clothe you
with His righteousness and walk out of here a
bold, saved human being. And he did. He prayed right there
to receive Christ. His life changed forever. That's the Holy Spirit's
job, to do that, convict the world of sin,
righteousness, and judgment. But there's a third component-- not only His presence, not
only His pressure, but also His people. And my statement is this-- His people are instrumental. So what I mean by that
is the Spirit of God and the people of God
work in tandem together. They work in tandem together. Again, look at verse
7-- nevertheless, I tell you the truth. It's to your advantage
that I go away. For if I do not go away,
the Helper will not come. What are the next two words? To you, disciples, to you-- He's coming to you. But if I depart, I will
send Him to you, disciples. Verse 8-- and when He has come--
implied in that is when He has come to you-- He will convict the world of
sin, and of righteousness, and of judgment. He is coming to you
so that when you are involved in this
process, He will be behind the scenes working. But you are very
much a part of it. So if you don't mind,
look back in chapter 15 at verse 26 and 27 again. When the Helper comes, whom
I will send from the Father, the Spirit of truth who
proceeds from the Father-- look at this. He will testify of Me. But wait. Look at the next verse. And you also will bear
witness because you have been with Me from the beginning. Who's going to testify? The Holy Spirit and Me, together
in tandem, working together. Yes, it's the Holy Spirit
who does the convicting. But He always does it
through human channels. He works through people. We are God's instruments. Virtually every conversion
in the book of Acts was the Holy Spirit working
through a Christian witness. Who preached a sermon
on the day of Pentecost? Peter. Peter preached-- Peter! Peter wasn't a seasoned
sermon-izer, sermon-ator. [LAUGHTER] Peter's up there preaching. And you know what it says? The people were
cut to the heart. Cut to the heart--
that's conviction. How did they get convicted? It wasn't Peter. But God used Peter,
the Holy Spirit through the message of
Peter, both together-- both together. You say, well, what
about Saul of Tarsus? He didn't have a
Christian witness. He was on the road to Damascus. Oh, he did. Yeah, the Lord spoke to
him on the Damascus road. But do remember what
the Lord said to him? He said, Saul, why are
you persecuting me? It's hard for you to kick
against the goads, prods. That's the conviction. Something in his heart was
goading him, prodding him, convicting him, convincing him. He had just watched Stephan
die a martyr's death with joy in his heart. And ever since he saw that and
heard him testify of Jesus, that has been eating
away at his soul. And so the Lord said,
it's hard for you to kick against those
goads, that conviction that the Holy Spirit placed
through the martyrdom of Stephen. Then there was Cornelius
in the book of Acts. And Cornelius had an
angel appear to him. So you've got an unbelieving
Roman soldier having a conversation with an angel. That ought to be interesting. And you would think once the
angel has the unbeliever's attention, he's going to preach
the gospel to the unbeliever. He doesn't do it. He doesn't do it! The angel says to Cornelius,
go call for Peter. And when he has
come, he is going to tell you and your
family how to get saved. Well, why don't you just do it? Because God always
uses human instruments. So if you look in
God's tool box, it's pretty unimpressive tools-- us. Now, I hope that
didn't offend you. Because that's right
out of scripture, right? 1 Corinthians, 1-- you
see your calling brethren, not many mighty, not many
noble, now many wiser called, for God has chosen the
foolish things of this world. That's my life
verse, by the way. That's my life verse. When people ask, that's it. God has chosen the foolish
things of this world to confound the wise. So you open up God's tool box-- not brilliant, not
impressive, just us. But us filled with
the Holy Spirit, us empowered by the Holy Spirit,
us used by the Holy Spirit, us instruments of the
Holy Spirit-- that's a winning combo. And that's how the Holy
Spirit works in the world. Now, as we close this and
we get back to the task-- same task, different
generations. It's 2020. Some of us are wearing masks. We've got a COVID
thing going on. So it's not 2000 years ago. But it's the same task--
go into all the world, and preach the gospel
to every creature. When you hear that, you
might immediately think, too big of a task, too hard,
too many unsaved people. I want to give you
a few takeaways. Number one, you and I are called
not to be manufacturers, just distributors. You know the difference? You're not called
to save anybody. You can't manufacture
their salvation. I've had people say
to me, I remember two years ago, you saved me. I didn't save anybody. I'm just a distributor. I may have said something
that the Lord used, but it's His message. It's His gospel. I didn't make this up. I'm not the manufacturer. I'm just the distributor. You plant the seed. You give the message. And God takes it and does
great things with it. So that's number one. Number two, I think the
enormity of this task is what keeps us going, not
the smallness of the task. Fact check-- it's called
the Great Commission. It's not called a
mediocre commission or the small commission. It's called the
Great Commission. It's a great task. The communist party
in Soviet Russia, years ago, learned that they
could recruit more people to their endeavor
by telling them that the task is huge, almost
impossible, but worth them giving their lives for. They said, we had more
young people sign on because we discovered people
want to be a part of something bigger than themselves. There's nothing
bigger than this. Go into all the world,
and preach the gospel to every creature, and whoever
believes will be saved. And number three--
I want to close with this last little tidbit. Great works are done by the
combination of smaller parts. Great works are done by the
combination of smaller parts. You can't do it all. I can't do it all. But together, we put
our parts together-- great things can happen. You say, well, I can't
go into all the world, I'm raising kids at home. That's your part. You are depositing truth
into those little hearts so they will grow up
and be able to withstand the onslaught of
weirdness and falseness that will be their culture. You think it's bad now? Wait till they grow up. That's a great, noble task. We just need to see that
whatever we do, it's worth it. A man was at a
construction site, and there were a group of stone
masons all working on stone. They were all doing
exactly the same task. The man asked one of
them, what are you doing? And the reply was,
I'm chipping stone. He said it like that. He was just, like,
I hate my job-- I'm chipping stone. He asked a second man,
what are you doing? He said, I'm making a wall. He was doing the same thing. One's chipping stone. The other's making a wall. He asked a third,
what are you doing? He said, I'm
building a cathedral. Guess what? We're building a Kingdom. The Holy Spirit and us,
together on this earth, we are building a Kingdom. How's that for a noble task? [APPLAUSE] Father, thank you that your
Holy Spirit is in this world, convicting the world of the sin
of unbelief, of a righteousness that can only be the
righteousness of Jesus to get somebody into heaven, and of the
guarantee of future judgment. Oh, how we need Him
at work in our lives, at work in the world around us,
in our relatives or friends, at work, neighbors. I pray, Lord, that we would
be faithful to distribute what only You can manufacture. By Your grace, help us. In Jesus' name, Amen. Let's all stand and
we'll sing together. We hope you enjoyed this special
service from Calvary Church. We'd love to know how
this message impacted you. Email us at
mystory@calvarynm.church. And just a reminder, you can
support this ministry with a financial gift at
calvarynm.church/give. Thank you for joining us for
this teaching from Calvary Church.
