What did the Holy Spirit do to save you? What is His role in redemption? Stay tuned, Renewing Your Mind Weekend Edition is next. Welcome to this weekend edition of Renewing Your Mind with author and teacher Dr. R.C. Sproul. Dr. Sproul is also the Senior Minister of Preaching and Teaching at St. Andrews, a Reformed congregation in Sanford, Florida. Salvation is a Trinitarian work. Often when Christians speak of God's provision of salvation for sinners, God the Father and God the Son are often at the center of the discussion, to the exclusion of the Holy Spirit. Or if not excluded, there is a vague understanding of what He actually does in the saving work of God. What is the Holy Spirit's role in redemption? What did He do to save you? Today on Renewing Your Mind, as we continue our study of the Gospel of John, Dr. Sproul will explain the Holy Spirit's role in the application of the benefits of Christ's atoning work. Here is Dr. Sproul. I'm reading from chapter 16 of John beginning at verse 1. These things I've spoken to you that you should not be made to stumble. They will put you out of the synagogues. And yes, the time is coming that whoever kills you will think that he offers God service. And these things they will do to you because they've not known the Father nor me. These things I've told you that when the time comes, you may remember that I told you of them. And these things I did not say to you at the beginning because I was with you. But now I go away to him who sent me. And none of you asked me, where are you going? But because I've 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. He who has ears to hear the Word of God, let them hear. Jesus continues the thought that we finished with last week about the coming persecution that the church will endure, and He reminds them that people who kill you will think they're doing God a service, and that goes on even to this day. But anyway, in verse 5 he says, but now I go away to him who sent me, and none of you asks me where are you going. Now this text may trouble you if you've been paying attention throughout our study of John. People say, oh, here's a clear example of a blatant contradiction. Because just a little bit before this, when Jesus talked earlier about His departure, and He said He was going away, Peter said the immortal words, they made a movie of it, quo vadis, where are you going? And Jesus had to explain where He was going and why He was going there and so on. And so now our Lord, after having answered Peter's question, says, I'm going away again and nobody's asking me where I'm going. Well, the tense of the verb is very important. He's not saying nobody has ever asked me that question, nobody asked me that two hours ago, nobody asked me that yesterday, or nobody asked me that last week. He's saying, now I'm telling you the time has come, the moment has come, and I'm leaving, and you're still not really concerned about where I'm going. And the reason our Lord knows that is because He sees that they're overcome by grief, which means they didn't get it. They disliked the contemporary church. They had no sense of the importance of ascension. Because they didn't get it when he said, it is expedient or necessary for you that I go away. I've talked about this before. The first time I really got a hold of this text, I really literally began to dance in the street. and jump over fire hydrants. I said, Eureka! I can't believe it. In all this time, I have felt like Abraham, living in the Old Testament, looking forward to the time of Christ's return, or wishing that I could have been alive during Jesus' earthly ministry. Because those people really had it made. If I only would have been an earthly eyewitness, disciple of Jesus, my Christian life would be so much better than it now is. And yet our Lord says, your situation now is better than when he was walking on the earth. That's one of the most difficult statements of Christ to deal with and really embrace. Even the disciples struggle with that. But I told you on another occasion that they turn from their despair when he announces his departure to the actual event of his departure on the Day of Ascension, that they return to Jerusalem rejoicing. Because in between time, in the meantime, they saw why. And they saw that when Jesus left them, that He was going to His coronation, that He was going to enter into the heavenly sanctuary to be their High Priest and to be the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords. It would be like at some of these victory celebrations every time we have a presidential election. They all gather together at night waiting for the opponent to give the concession speech. And when the concession speech happens, everybody throws their hat in the air and their confetti and the champagne is uncorked and so on. And then what if the winning candidate would say, hey, this is great. Let's stay here. I hope you won't mind if I don't ever go to Washington. Well, I said, wait a minute. That's why we elected you. We want you there. Jesus was going to a lot more than Washington. He was going to the right hand of God, which was of remarkable and extraordinary cosmic significance. But in addition to that, he makes a statement here that I frankly have to tell you I don't know what it means for sure. And yet it's so crucial to this discussion that it frustrates me that I don't know for sure what Jesus meant. And let me call your attention to it where he talks about the helper coming. He said, and when he has come, verse 8, he will convict the world of sin and of righteousness and of judgment. of sin because they don't 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. You see, when I go away, the Holy Spirit's going to come here and He's going to do three things to the world. He's going to convict the world of sin, and of righteousness, and of judgment. Now, is he talking about the ministry of the Holy Spirit by which He inwardly changes us and opens us to the gospel and so on? We'll come to that in a moment. But not everybody takes that position, and I have a Reformation Study Bible in front of me. One of the remarkable things about this note, 16.8, it says, This is probably, notice it's couched in probability, this is probably not a reference to the conviction that leads to repentance and salvation, but to the exposure of humanity's inexcusable guilt. There are several views of what Jesus meant, and the two that war against each other. The first one is this, that Jesus is talking about something that the Holy Spirit's going to do to the world. And the first thing is, he says they're going to convict him of sin. and then of righteousness and then of judgment. And it may very well be that what Jesus has in view here is the resurrection. Because Paul tells us later that Christ is raised by the power of the Holy Spirit. And it is the Holy Ghost who in the resurrection of Christ vindicates Jesus' claims, proves that his enemies were in the wrong, that Jesus was in the right. And so he convicts Jesus' enemies, this world, of their sin, and he justifies Christ. We are also told in the New Testament that we are justified, and the word there is dikeiosune, we are justified through the resurrection of Christ. It's the same word that John uses here when he says he convicts the world of righteousness. that insofar as he vindicates Christ, proves Him to be the Son of God, that that's something that the Spirit does in His testimony. And that's a legitimate interpretation of this because, after all, Jesus is talking to His disciples about the coming persecution. Remember, when the Spirit comes, if this is what He means, He said, the Spirit is going to powerfully prove to the world their sin. in attacking me and attacking you, and in the rightness of my claim to be the Son of God through my resurrection. And this is the judgment that God will bring upon the world, just as Paul speaks of at Mars Hill to the Athenians. So that may very well be what Jesus meant. The other possibility that I favor, frankly, is that he's referring to the work of the Holy Ghost in his ministry of applying the work of Christ, in that there are people in the world who by nature, your worldly nature, is to sin boldly, is to sin without any real contrition. We can sit here in our natural constituent nature every Sunday and hear the reading of the law, and we may be disturbed by it for a second. But what drives the behavior of the world is the morality of the world. And if you'll excuse this little diversion, I've noticed something strange in our own day, is that people today tend to use the words ethics and morality as if they were synonyms. Use them interchangeably. When the word morality comes from the concept of the mores of a social group, that is their behavioral patterns, and morality describes simply how people behave, what they do, what is their customary form of behavior, what are their societal conventions. Whereas ethics from the word ethos has to do with the normative basis by which we determine whether our behavior is good behavior or bad behavior. But see, what has happened in our culture is the answer to ethics is found in our morality. Whatever we do, whatever is customary, whatever is acceptable in our culture is what is right. It doesn't matter what God says about marriage. It doesn't matter what God says about the sanctity of life. What's the political correct behavioral convention that we live by? Ladies and gentlemen, all of us, I don't care how pious you are, I don't care how sanctified you are, there's not a person in this room who isn't overwhelmingly influenced by the cultural customs and conventions of the society in which you live. It started mainly in junior high and in high school, where popularity meant being with it. And being with it in a secular culture is being with it in a worldly sense, because the world approves of what God does not approve of. That's what our innate struggle with sin is all about. And so I listen every day to the voices of the culture around me that tell me what's political correct and what isn't, what is socially acceptable and what isn't socially acceptable. And then for a few minutes on Sunday morning, I hear the law. And I know they don't match up. But I duck it. Unless or until the Holy Ghost takes that law and like a sword pierces my soul with it and convicts me of sin. Real conversion, beloved, is an experience of repentance and forgiveness before God. It's not joining the church. doing a sacrament, or any of those things, it's being brought to your knees by the conviction of God the Holy Spirit. That's what the Holy Spirit does. And He convinces me of what true righteousness is, and which I know I don't have, and I don't think it's by accident that our Lord uses the word dikaiosune there, where He talks about my only way of justification is through a righteousness that is not my own. It's like the child who says the emperor is naked. One of the meanings of the word here is to expose. He strips me of my self-righteousness. He shows me the utter inadequacy of my own behavior to satisfy the demands of God and drives me to that redemption that was accomplished by Jesus. and he brings me to a state of judgment. The Greek word there is krisos, crisis. It's the spirit who forces me to face what societal convention would have me avoid. We talk about the Protestant Reformation. The recovery of the light of the gospel in the 16th century, I've said to you many times that near the end of his life, Martin Luther was very concerned that the rediscovery of the gospel would be removed within one generation and be replaced by superstition. And I'd just like to take a moment, if I may, to read from you a portion of the last sermon that Martin Luther preached only a few days before he died in February of 1546, after he'd returned to his hometown. Listen to what the reformer said, his last sermon, dying breath. In times past, we would have run to the ends of the world if we had found a place where we could have heard God speak. But now that we hear it every day in sermons, and our books are full of it, nobody bothers. You hear it home in your house, father and mother and children sing and speak of it. The preacher speaks of it in the parish church. You ought to lift up your hands and rejoice that we've been given the honor of hearing God speaking to us through His Word. But the people say, what's that? After all, there's preaching every day, many times a day in some places, so we get weary of it. What do we get out of it? All right, go ahead, dear brother, if you don't want God to speak to you every day at home in your house and in your church, then look for something else. All sarcasm drips from the pen of Luther. Entrail is our Lord God's coat. In Achan are Joseph's pants. and our blessed lady Shemis. Go there, squander your money, buy indulgences in the Pope's second-hand junk." What's he referring to here? He's talking about the practice that was still going on, of going on lengthy pilgrimages to visit the relics in the local church, where one would find a hair from the beard of John the Baptist, a vial of milk from the breast of Mary, a piece of the cross. People would go over land and sea to search for the indulgences that would be granted by making a pilgrimage to these relics, which were regarded as little less than magical talisman. Now, let me ask you this question. Why do you suppose it ever happened in the medieval church that this kind of stuff happened? Frederick the Wise would collect like 18,000 relics for the church at Wittenberg. Why? Why would pilgrims flock all over the place in huge masses of congregation to view a bone of St. Augustine? Well, the answer is simple, beloved, because the people really believed that that's where the power was. and the people were suffering from the impotency of their spiritual life. They wanted the wonder working power. They wanted the heavens to open with miracles and showers of divine demonstrative power and they looked for it in the bones of the dead. We're far too sophisticated for that now, aren't we? Luther says, aren't we stupid and crazy? Yes, he says, and blinded. There sits the decoy duck with his bag of tricks, luring the whole world with money and goods, while all of the time anybody can go to baptism, to the Lord's Supper, and to the pulpit. What? Baptism? The Lord's Supper? The Word of God? Joseph's pants, that's what does it. Turn on your television. Watch the people, their hands in the air. Televangelists walking around. slaying them in the spirit, knocking them on the ground, just like they did in the New Testament, right? No. And myriads of people are overcome with this. Or they'll travel to Toronto and engage in hysterical laughter looking for the Toronto blessing. What are they looking for? You're looking for the power of God. In that prayer handkerchief that a little donation will get you, the healer, the slayer, whoever, that's not where God put the power. That's not where Jesus put the power. The power that will change your life The power that transformed you from what you were at birth to what you will be in heaven is the power, the dunamis, the dynamic power of God the Holy Spirit. And God promises to attend the preaching of His Word with that power. These words don't have any power unless God the Holy Spirit takes that Word and penetrates your heart with it. There's no power in the water, there's no power in the bread, there's no power in the wine. They are of the earth earthy, they're human elements that can't do a thing for you. Until or unless God and the Holy Spirit takes these means of grace. as Christ sends Him to do, indeed as the Holy Spirit Himself makes Christ present for you at this table. That's where the power is, if you believe the Word of God. You're listening to Renewing Your Mind, Weekend Edition, with R. C. Sproul, explaining the Holy Spirit's role in the application of the benefits of Christ's atonement. Do you truly desire to live a life of righteousness and holiness? what drives or motivates you. The only way for us to desire to be holy is to desire our holy God, and that takes effort on our part. We can't desire what we don't know. To help Christians understand this need, we're offering a DVD series entitled Light and Heat, A Passion for the Holiness of God. This series was recorded at the Ligonier Ministries 2011 National Conference this past March. Today, we're offering the entire 19-part DVD series for a donation of any amount. To get your copy, give us a call using our toll-free number 1-800-435-4343. Again, that's 800-435-4343 or visit rymoffer.com. That's R-Y-M as in renewing your mind and the word offer.com. That web address is for this week's special offer only. Essential doctrines of the Christian faith are under attack, even from within the Church, and it's important that we be well-grounded in biblical truths so that we may have a deep affection for our Holy Triune God. Featuring conference lectures by Sinclair Ferguson, Robert Godfrey, Stephen Lawson, John Piper and R.C. Sproul, Jr. This collection also includes a special session with Dr. Piper and Dr. Sproul as they reflected on what they've learned in their many decades of ministry. Again, the 19-part DVD series, Light and Heat, A Passion for the Holiness of God, is available for your donation of any amount today. To get your copy, call 1-800-435-4343. Again, that's 800-435-4343. Or visit rymoffer.com. That's R-Y-M as in renewing your mind, and the word offer.com. That will wrap up this Weekend Edition of Renewing Your Mind. Thank you for listening. Join us again next weekend as Dr. Sproul continues to take us through the Gospel of John. Until then, you can keep up with us at our Facebook page at Facebook.com slash Ligonier. You're listening to Renewing Your Mind Weekend Edition, the listener-supported radio outreach of Ligonier Ministries in Orlando, Florida.