John 16,5-15. Cantate

 John 16,5-15           2921 

Cantate 039

Athanasius, Patriarch of Alexandria, Confessor, ✠ 373

2. Mai 2021

1. O Lord God, Heavenly Father, who did through Your Son promise us Your Holy Spirit, so that He should convince the world of sin, of righteousness and of judgment: We beseech You, enlighten our hearts, so that we may confess our sins, through faith in Christ obtain everlasting righteousness and in all our trials and temptations retain this consolation, that Christ is Lord over the Devil and Death, and all things, and that He will graciously deliver us out of all our afflictions, and make us forever partakers of eternal salvation.  Amen. (Veit Dietrich) 

2. »When the Spirit of truth arrives, He will guide you into all the truth, for He will not speak on His own authority, but whatever He hears He will speak, and He will declare to you the things that are to be. He will glorify Me, for He will take what is Mine and declare it to you. All that the Father has is Mine; therefore I said that He will take what is Mine and declare it to you.« 

3. Forty-some days before His ascension, Jesus told His apostles that when He returns to heaven then the Holy Spirit will arrive. The Spirit will convict the world of sin, righteousness and judgment: concerning sin, because they do not believe in Jesus; concerning righteousness, because Jesus went to the Father, and they will see Him no longer; concerning judgment, because the ruler of this world is judged.  

4. Jesus says it is a grievous act to sin against the Holy Spirit, for to sin against the Holy Spirit is to reject Jesus as Savior because the work of the Spirit is to create faith in Jesus. The Bible constantly reminds us that humans have plenty of experience in rejecting the Holy Spirit. The reason the priests and the Pharisees hand Jesus over to Pilate for execution was because they had rejected the Holy Spirit who was creating faith in the Jews that Jesus is their Messiah. To reject Jesus is to remain in your sins. The preliminary task of the Holy Spirit then is to convince people that they are sinners and need a savior.  

5. The Holy spirit also convicts the world of righteousness. Men and women have an innate compunction to self righteousness. We think we can appease God without good works. The Pharisees were experts at this: they kept the Mosaic covenant and many other traditions, and in doing so they believe this merited them in good standing before God; they were righteous because they had the works to prove it. In contrast to this, the Apostle Paul told the Roman Christians: »No one is righteous, for all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God« (Romans 3,23.10). The Holy Spirit teaches the world that it cannot save itself, and it doesn’t need to, because Christ has declared the world righteous; He is seated at the right hand of His Father as a testimony to the righteousness that He has secured on behalf of all people.   

6. Finally, The Holy Spirit convicts the world of judgment. To those who think they have no sin, the Spirit convince them that they are a sinner. Those who think they can merit righteousness, the Spirit convinces them that they remain unrighteous. Those who think God will not judge them, the Spirit convinces them that without Christ they will be harshly judged. Jesus says that the ruler of this world, the Devil, is judged.  

7. The gospel that the Holy Spirit promotes to the world is this: »All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified by His grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God put forward as a propitiation by His blood, to be received by faith. This was to show God’s righteousness, because in His Divine forbearance He had passed over former sins« (Romans 3,23-25). Sin is paid for, righteousness is given as a gift and Jesus has born our judgment. The Father has glorified Jesus’ crucifixion and resurrection, and He gives to us what is His Son’s. In Christ we have life and righteousness. »We sing to the Yahweh a new song, for He has done marvelous things!« (Psalm 98,1).  Amen. 

8. Let us pray. O Lord Jesus Christ, the Glory of the Heavenly Father; we sing for joy and praise Your Name, so that in singing we confess that You are our eternal salvation.  Amen. 

To God alone be the Glory 

Gode ealdore sy se cyneþrymm

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All Scriptural quotations are translations done by The Rev. Peter A. Bauernfeind using the Biblia Hebraica Stuttgartensia, 4. Edition © 1990 by the Deutsche Bibelgesellschaft, Stuttgart, and the Novum Testamentum Graece, Nestle-Aland 28. Revised Edition © 2012 by Deutsch Bibelgesellschaft, Stuttgart. 

ELKB. Evangelisch-Lutherische Kirche in Bayern. www.bayern-evangelisch.de/www/index.php. Copyright © 2019 Evangelisch-Lutherische Kirche in Bayern. 

VELKD. Vereinigte Evangelisch-Lutherische Kirche Deutschlands. www.velkd.de. Copyright © 2020 Vereinigte Evangelisch-Lutherische Kirche Deutschlands.