The Ministry of the Holy Spirit
At Heralds of Hope, Inc, we get lots of mail from people around the world. Some who write have questions about the Bible, and about living the Christian life. Some of the most frequent questions we receive are questions about the role and function of the Holy Spirit.
Because this subject is so large, there’s no way we can do justice to it in one brief message. But I want to give you some principles to help you discern the proper function of the Holy Spirit. Principles to help you answer the specific questions that arise about the Holy Spirit’s role and ministry in the church today.
Our text is John 16:7-15. Here, Jesus is instructing His disciples about the coming of the Comforter. The setting of this text is just prior to the crucifixion. It gives the most detailed information about the ministry of the Holy Spirit prior to Pentecost. Because He knows the coming events will be painful for the disciples, Jesus assures them His going away is necessary for the coming of the Holy Spirit. The Spirit’s coming would be the key to their doing greater works than He did.
Notice in verse seven, Jesus tells the disciples that it’s necessary for Him to go away. It is to their advantage that He go away, because, if he stays, the Holy Spirit cannot come. If He goes, He promises to send the Comforter, the intercessor, the consoler, to them. I’ve titled the message, “The Ministry of the Holy Spirit.”
In our text, we observe theministry of the Holy Spirit to Christians and non-Christians. In each of these relationships, we’re given three specific FUNCTIONS of the Spirit. I make the assumption that many of you listening today are Christians, so we will spend most of our time looking at the Holy Spirit’s ministry to the redeemed. But we do want to look briefly at His ministry to unbelievers as we begin.
1. The First Relationship is,
To Unbelievers (vv.8-11)
Notice the beginning of verse eight, “And when he is come, he will reprove the world…” Jesus had just finished warning the disciples about some of the things the “world” would do to them, in verse two. These are the ungodly, those who are part of the world’s system of doing things. All of us were part of the world. All of us were separated from God by our sin. We needed the Holy Spirit to bring us to a consciousness of our sin. This is the primary ministry of the Holy Spirit to unbelievers.
Let’s look at the three ways Jesus said the Holy Spirit would bring about that conviction.
A. Convince the world of sin
Jesus said the Holy Spirit will reprove, convict, or rebuke the world for their sin. What sin? Specifically, the sin of unbelief, according to verse 9. People refuse to acknowledge Jesus as the Son of God. That’s the sin of unbelief. In the immediate context of these verses, Jesus is referring to the Jews, but we also know this is true for the world at large; and especially for those who have heard and understood the Gospel. The Holy Spirit will convince unbelievers of the sins they’ve committed and of the guilt and condemnation that result from those sins.
B. Convince the world of righteousness
Jesus further stated that the Holy Spirit will reprove the world of His righteousness because He was going back to the Father. What do we make of this? The coming o...
