Pastor: Rev. Craig Thomas
Office Phone: 303-670-1387, Home Phone: 303-679-1423, Cell Phone: 303-877-3043

From the Pastor:

"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 Counselor will not come to you; but if I go, I will send Him to you."  John 16: 5-7

How many times as a child did you hear these words from one or the other of your parents: "I am doing this for your own good."  Those words rand right up there with: "this is going to hurt me more than it's going to hurt you."  Of course, at the time you didn't believe it and whatever was being applied to you or your bottom sure hurt enough at that time.  It was probably years later when you had any appreciation of what your parents were saying to you.

The disciples who followed Jesus didn't want to hear these words either.  There were some tough times for them then, but they also experienced some wonderful things as well.  They saw Jesus raise Lazarus from the dead.  They saw Him feed thousands of people with some fish and bread.  They saw Him heal lepers and blind people and lame people.  They even saw Jesus walk on water.  Something special was going on here.

But now Jesus was telling them that He had to go away.  They couldn't comprehend all that He was saying or what He meant by it, but they were upset with it.  As our text records, Jesus said, "Because I have said these things, you are filled with grief."

And then comes that line: "It is for your good that I am going away".  Like little children, they just couldn't understand why this was so good for them.  They had Jesus with them now.  Sure, they weren't wealthy; they moved from place to place.  But they did have Jesus.  They witnessed wonderful things; they learned some wonderful lessons.  And now all this was going to be taken from them and it was all 'for their own good'. 

For their own good; for your own good.  words that echo in your mind for years until you can fully understand the significance of what you are told.  It was that way for the disciples; it is that way for you.

For who knows the mind of God?  Most of the time we don't even know what we are going to have for dinner.  How can we possibly know what is going to await us in eternity? 

Strangely enough, we can know.  We can know about our place in eternity with greater certainty than what is going to happen to us this evening.  We can know because of the event that we call 'Pentecost': when the Counselor, the Spirit of Truth, came just as Jesus said he would to testify about the One who died for the sins of the world, the One who died for your sins even before you were born.

When Jesus told His disciples, "I am going to Him who sent Me...I am going away."  He wasn't talking about packing His bags for some day trip.  Jesus was going away be way of the cross.  And although Scripture makes it clear that the disciples didn't understand the importance of this event, they certainly knew the horrors of the event.  Rome had made that form of execution very prominent so that nobody-nobody would mess with Rome.  An execution for the greatest traitor and for the lowliest criminal, the cross would not be a method of death embraced by anyone.  Not by anyone, except by Jesus. 

Jesus knew it was His Father's will that Jesus die this way and so He accepted it as the Servant He was.  Jesus also told His disciples that it was the Father's will that He die this way and so He continued to teach them as the Teacher He was.

But the disciples at the time didn't get it.  In fact, you know now better than the disciples did then why this had to be and the benefits you receive because this happened.  You know better than the disciples did because the Spirit of Truth came to testify about Jesus to the disciples and the disciples came to testify about Jesus to you. 

You see, that's what it was all about.  Jesus went to the cross in a very real and personal way and believe me, it hurt Him a lot more than it hurt you.  It happened at a very real point in time to a very real human being, like us in every way yet without sin, that the sacrificemay be perfect and complete and meet the demands of divine justice.

Jesus knew that the Good News of salvation in Him was not Good News unless it was proclaimed from the very rooftops.  So He went away and went back to the Father, and in doing this He multiplied Himself many times over through the person and power of the Holy Spirit. 

The work of the Holy Spirit is inextricably linked with the death of Jesus for the sins of the world.  If Jesus did not go to the cross, the Holy Spirit would not come and work.  This reinforces what we learn elsewhere in Scripture, and in the rest of our Gospel lesson: The work of the Holy Spirit, first and foremost, is to deliver the forgiveness of sins won by Christ, to proclaim the Good News that this wandering preacher in ancient Judea was the Son of God who died for the sins of the world, that who ever believed in Him would not perish but have eternal life.

That's good to know, and a real comfort when the things of this world have abandoned you and let you down, as they always will.  But Jesus never will, and you would not have known of the on-going work of our Lord if the Counselor were not sent to tell you that God has not abandoned you.

In Him you have a Comforter.  In Him you have a Counselor.  with the guidance of the Holy Spirit, you need never feel abandoned, empty, afraid, or lost again.  For your own good, Jesus sent the Counselor so you need never fear that things are not right with the Lord.  God provides the means, and the Holy Spirit provides the power, by which you may know that your sins are forgiven for the sake of Jesus Christ, and that in Him you have "an inheritance that can never perish, spoil or fade" (1 Peter 1:4)

To Him Be The Glory,

Pastor Thomas