Open your Bibles now back to
the scripture we read, John 16. As I told you, these are among
the last words our Lord left with his disciples before he
went to the cross, before he ascended to the Father. If you
want to read them again, you begin with chapter 13. and read
through verse 6, chapter 16, and then 17 is when he prayed
that great high priestly prayer to the Father on behalf of his
people. You know, there's an old saying,
time changes everything. You've heard that all your life.
And it does change everything on this earth. But there are
some things that time does not change. God is the same. He said, I am the Lord. I change
not. God never changes. The Word never changes. It's
the same Word we're reading that Moses read, that David wrote,
that the disciples heard. This is the same Word. The Gospel
never changes. It's the same Gospel. Sin never
changes. It's the same sin, just a little
more open now than it has been in time past. And men never change. Men and women do not change in
their attitude toward the gospel, in their attitude toward those
who preach the gospel. And this is what our Lord is
preparing, the thing for which he's preparing his apostles.
They're going out into an unfriendly world to preach a message that
that world despises. They're going among religious
people who hate the gospel. And what he says to them applies
to us also in this day. You felt it, I felt it, experienced
it all the time. And back in chapter 15, which
Brother Frank read, verse 18, chapter 15, he said, now if the
world hates you, and it does, it hates the gospel, it hates
grace. You know it hated me before it
hated you. They crucified him. If you were
of the world, the world would love his own, but because you're
not of the world, But I've chosen you out of the world, therefore
the world will hate you. Now you remember the word I said
to you. The servant's not greater than
his Lord. If they persecuted me, they'll
persecute you also. And we may get along with the
world by compromising the gospel, but I refuse to do that. And
if you don't compromise the gospel, you're going to have enemies,
and Christ said the enemies oftentimes will be those in your own household
who hate the gospel. And if you uncompromisingly,
boldly, not antagonistically, not at all, but just boldly preach and teach the gospel,
they're going to respond to us just like they did to him. That's
what he's saying. If they kept your sayings, they'll
keep mine. That's the beauty about this
thing is those who love him love us and love our gospel. They
just love it. They delight in it. But all these
things, verse 21, will they do unto you for my name's sake?
Because they do not know him that sent me. That's the problem. They don't know God. And over here in chapter 16,
we have him repeating. Almost word for word, the same
thing, beginning with verse 1. These things have I spoken unto
you, that you should not be offended, discouraged, and that you not
stumble. You can expect this kind of treatment
from the religious world, mainly. He says in verse 2, they'll put
you out of the synagogues. They'll put you out of their
religious associations and denominations and churches. They'll put you
out. I remember I got them switched
sometimes, Brother Cecil Roach and Brother Armour Simpson were
both going to a church over in Ohio. And I believe, I believe
that Brother Armour was the first teacher of the men's class, and
they put him out for what he was preaching, teaching. And
so they made Cecil the teacher, and then they put him out for
what is preaching and teaching. They both came over here. I believe
that's the right order. It doesn't matter. Either way,
they both teach the same thing. And they put you out of the synagogue. And the time cometh. Now, here's
a shocking statement, but this is from the lips of our master,
that whosoever killeth you, puts you to death, will think that
he's doing God a service. They can put you to death. They
think they're doing God a favor, because that's how much they
hate your gospel. That's how much they hate grace. Like Barnard used to say, they
can't get their hands on God, but they can get their hands
on you, and you're representing God. You're speaking for God. That's what Paul said in 2 Corinthians. We beseech you. In the stead
of Christ, be ye reconciled to God. We're ambassadors of Christ,
be ye reconciled to God. So just expect this, that all
of the martyrs that were killed, burned at the stake and drowned
and murdered in England and under the rule of Bloody Mary, they
were all killed in the name of God. Religious people have shed
more martyr's blood than the world, by a long shot. And these things, verse 3, will
they do unto you, because they do not know the Father. They
have not known him, and they don't know me. Oh, they talk
about God, but it's not the true God. You see, Christ has come
and given us an understanding that we may know him, the true
God. and that we're in him, and in his son. This is the true
God, and this is eternal life. But they have a God. They use
that name, God, Jehovah, Jesus. But Christ said, they don't know
me. They don't know my Father. If they did, they wouldn't persecute
his people. If they did know him, they wouldn't
persecute anybody. Isn't that right? Christians
don't kill people that disagree with them, but religious people
do. That's how strong their hatred
is. But these things I've told you that when that time comes,
you may receive, you may remember what I, that I told you of them. You just remember these things.
Now when they come to pass, you remember I told you of them.
And these things I didn't tell you at the beginning because
I was with you. He took the persecution for them. They left the disciples
alone because Christ was at hand. They just ignored the disciples.
They questioned him and sought to kill him. But now he said,
I'm going away. And as my father sent me, I send
you into the world. I don't send you into a monastery
or a convent Christian commune, where nobody ever disagrees with
you, I send you to the world because you're the salt of the
earth. And the salt has to go on the meat to do it any good.
And you're the light of the world. And you don't take a candle and
put it into a butchel and hide it. You put it out there where
it gives light. And I send you into the world. And Paul said,
I suffer these things for the gospel's sake, that the elect
might hear the gospel. We don't go into all the world
and preach the gospel to every creature. The elect are not going
to hear, because we don't know who they are. Somebody said to
Spurgeon one time, said, if I can remember exactly what the
man said, he said, why do you preach the gospel to everybody?
Just preach it to the elect. But he said, if I knew who they
were, I would. If you go around and put a mark on them, I'll
just go preach to them, because they're the only ones going to
hear me. But since you don't know who they are and I don't
know who they are, I preach it to everybody. God knows who they
are. The Lord knoweth him. This is the foundation of God
that standeth sure. The Lord knoweth them that are
his. He knows. Christ said, I know my sheep.
And they know me. And they'll hear my voice. So
I preach it to everybody. Everybody. Now he says in verse
5, I go my way. I go my way. I go as the Lamb
of God to the cross to bear your sin, bear your guilt. I go to
die that you might have eternal life. I go my way. This is his
way. This is the ordained way. He was the Lamb slain from the
foundation of the world. I go the way ordered. I go the way ordained. I go my
way. I go my way. I go to the grave
as your scapegoat. I rise again as your justifier,
I go to the secret place of the Most High, as your High Priest,
with the atonement, the blood of sprinkling and cleansing.
I go to sit at the right hand of my Father as your intercessor.
I go my way to him that sent me. And none of you ask, Whither
goest thou? They didn't know enough to ask
him. I sympathize with them. I'm as dumb as they are. They
didn't know what to ask. I wish I knew what to ask, don't
you? Verse 6, he said, but because I've said these things to you,
your sorrow has filled your heart. They were sad, brokenhearted. But he gave them three reasons
why they should rejoice. He said, I'm leaving. I go back
to my father. Came from the father, I go back
to the father. He said on one occasion, I go to my father and
your father. And if you love me, you'll rejoice.
He said, if you love me, back there in chapter 14, turn back
there a minute. In chapter 14, he says in verse
28, you've heard how I said to you,
I'll go away and come again to you. If you love me, you'll rejoice
because I go to my Father. That's going to the Father. That's
a reason to rejoice. I'm going home, going to the
father who sent me. Going there as your representative.
But look back at verse, chapter 14, verse 1. Their hearts were
troubled. He said, let not your heart be
troubled. You believe in God, believe also in me. In my father's house are many
dwelling places. If it were not so, I would have
told you. Now you ought to rejoice because I could have prepared
a place for you. I go to prepare you for the place and the place
for you. And if I go and prepare for you
a place, I'll come back and receive you unto myself. You ought to
rejoice. I go to my Father, I go there
for you to prepare a place. And then the third reason he
gives is right here before us. Verse 7 of John 16. Now I've said these things and
your heart's filled with sorrow, but listen, I'll tell you the
truth. It's expedient. It's necessary for you that I
go away. For if I go not away, the Holy
Spirit will not come. The Comforter will not come unto
you. But if I depart, I'll send him
to you. I go to my Father. I go there
for you. I go to prepare a place for you. in order that I might come back
and receive you. But I go and I send the Holy
Spirit. And if I don't go, if I don't
go, there's no need for the Holy Spirit to come. If I don't go
to the Father, there's no gospel for him to reveal. If I don't
go down the cross and go to the Father, there's no blood to sprinkle.
There's no atonement to reveal. There's no righteousness to impute,
if I go not away. If I do not die and rise again,
there's no salvation to reveal, there's no forgiveness, there's
no eternal life. If I go not away, there's no
need for a comforter because there's no comfort to give. Our
sole comfort is based on what he's done for us. For back in
Isaiah 40, The father said, comfort my people. Speak comfortably
to my people. Comfort them. What shall I say? Tell them that their work has
accomplished. The king has died. Tell them
their iniquity is pardoned. The lamb has suffered. Tell them
they have received of the Lord double for all their sins. It's
over. The battle is over. The victory
is won. You tell them that. So Christ
said, if I don't go away, the comforter will not come. There's
no gospel, there's no comfort to give. There's no hope, there's
no life, there's no salvation. But I'll send him to you, verse
8 now, and when he's come, this is what I want to look at for
a little while. And Christ called him the Spirit
of Truth, the Spirit of Truth. When he has come, he will reprove
the world. What's the word reprove mean? It means convince, convince. Now you're talking about the
world here now. The Holy Spirit's going to take your preaching,
your ministry, your evangelism, And he's going to convict and
convince, the better word is convince, convince the world,
people of the world, sinners of free faith. He's going to
convince them of sin. You know, this is a missing note
in present day preaching. Now listen to me. Conviction
of sin. The Holy Spirit taking hold of
a man, a woman. and convincing them that they're
sinners. A man will never be saved until
he's lost. And the only one who can get
him truly lost is the Spirit of God. A man will never come
to Christ for covering until he's stripped. And the only one
who can strip him is the Holy Ghost. A man will never come
to Christ for life until he's been slain. That's what the slain
of the Lord is. That's what the slain of the
Lord. You've got to die to live. You've got to be humble to be
exalted. You've got to be brought down
before you can go up. And that's neglected today. Conviction
of sin. A man's not going to sue for
mercy until, like the publican, he needs it desperately. God,
oh God, be merciful to me. Be sinner. B, definite article. If there's not another one, here's
one. The sinner, before a man will come to Christ for salvation,
he's got to realize he needs a Savior, desperately needs a
Savior, and has no ability on his own to save himself. Our Lord was eating with some
publicans and sinners, and these religious fellows were offended.
And they said to the disciples, why does your master eat with
those kind of people? Why does he associate with those
kind of people? Sinners, publicans, harlots. And our Lord turned. He knew
what they said. He turned. And he said, the well
don't need a doctor, but they that are sick. That's who needs
a doctor, a person that's sick. That's the only person that'll
go to a doctor is a man that's sick. I didn't come to call the righteous,
I came to call sinners. Now you go learn what that means. Paul said he came into the world
to save sinners, of whom I'm chief. He came to seek and to
save the lost. So the Holy Spirit has to convince
a man before he'll ever be, before he, he'll sit and listen to this
gospel with no interest. until he becomes a sinner. And then you listen. It's like
you don't attend a lecture on heart disease because you don't
have heart disease. It'd be a boring lecture for
you. But I tell you, if you had heart disease, it'd be an exciting
lecture. And that's what Christ said to
these fellas. The well have no interest in
what the doctor's got to say. But the man who's desperately
ill, he wants to hear how he can be healed. But if a man misses Holy Spirit
conviction, he's going to miss repentance, because that's what
we repent of, is sin. We repent of sin. And if he misses
repentance, he's going to miss faith, because Faith and repentance
are inseparable. Except a man repent, he'll perish.
And so he'll miss faith, and if he misses faith, he's going
to miss Christ. And if he misses Christ, he's going to miss life.
So this whole thing starts, and when the Holy Spirit is come,
He, not you, He will convince a man of sin. You can't do it.
You can argue with him until you're blue in the face. And
he's not, he says, I'm not any worse than anybody else. Well,
I'll buy that. You're not any worse than anybody
else. The only person that can do it,
he'll convince the world. And he'll convince the world
of three things. Now let's look at him here. He'll
convince the world, he'll convict them, he'll reprove them, he'll
persuade them, he'll teach them beyond a shadow of a doubt of
sinning. of righteousness, judgment. But I want you to watch this.
All of these things, sin, righteousness and judgment, all three of them,
are related to the person and work of Christ. Look at verse
9. He'll convince the world of sin
because they believe not on me. He'll convince the world of sin
because they believe not on me. Holy Spirit conviction. That's
the reason we preach Christ. Because a man, just the law alone
is not going to show a man he's a sinner, strip a man. It's got
to be the law in reference to Christ. And he'll convince him
of righteousness, because I go to my father. Has to do with
Christ. And he'll convince him of judgment,
verse 11, because the prince of this world is judged. Who
judged him? That's what he said over there,
I believe I was reading that in chapter 14, verse 30. Did you see that, chapter 14,
verse 30? Hereafter I will not talk much
with you, the prince of this world is coming. Christ is under
attack. Christ is not only suffering
under the wrath of the Father, and suffering under the flesh
that he bore and wore, man of sorrow is acquainted with grief.
was suffering under the attack of Satan. Satan, he tipped in
all points as we are, and the prince of this world is coming.
He came to Adam and whipped him. He came to Job and stripped him. He came to Peter and embarrassed
him. He came to Christ, he met a wall. He got stripped. He came to Christ
and had his head broken, pretty out of business. The prince of
this world is coming, so the Holy Spirit is going to convict,
convince, persuade, reprove the world, people of sinners, of
sin, because they don't believe on me. That's there with me. And of righteousness, because
I go to the Father. I'll tell you about that in a
minute. And of judgment, because the
prince of this world is coming, and we're going to meet. And
I'm going to deal with him for you. You'll be convinced of judgment
in the light of my dealings with him. Now let's look at these
again. Now notice verse 9. He'll reprove the world of sin.
Notice that singular. He didn't say sins. He didn't
say sins. That's what everybody, I'm convicted
of my sins. That's second. Sins are the wrong
things that you do. S-I-N-S. Seeing is why you do
it. That's where conviction starts.
It's not what I do, it's why I do it. It's not what I did,
it's why I did it. It's not the way I'm acting,
it's who I am. That's my big problem. If water's running out
here and it's impure water, don't start mopping it up. Stop the
fountain. Change the fountain. Clean the
fountain. You're going to keep getting
rotten water until the fountain, until the root is dug up, until
the fountain is straightened out, until the corruption is
dug out of the fountain. A man is not a liar because he
lies. He lies because he's a liar. Isn't that true? I've never killed anybody, yet
you'd like to. So that makes you a murderer.
A man's not a murderer because he killed somebody. He killed
somebody because he was already a murderer. He was a murderer
when he thought about it. That's the reason Christ said,
you heard it said of old times, by them of old times, thou shalt
not commit adultery. I say unto you, to lust is to
commit adultery already in the sight of God. God looks on nigh.
So the Holy Spirit has got to convince us of three things in
regard to this sin business. What I am, that's original sin,
that's my nature. When you're a little baby born
into this world, and I tell you it's a hard thing for us to get
hold of, but that little infant is a little snake, just like
you're a big snake. All big snakes were once little
snakes. And the same venom in a big snake is in a little snake.
And that's what makes them mean. And that little boy had a friend,
his child was born, they named him Charles. And he said, I don't
know whether he'll be Charles Manson or Charles Spurgeon. Depends
on God. That's right. You don't either. You don't either. We've got to
be convinced of what we are. David said, My mama in sin conceived
me. I was brought forth from the
womb, speaking lies. The wicked are strained from
the womb, separated from God. What we are, what we've done,
sure, we've got to be persuaded of what we've done in word and
thought and deed. But I'll tell you something else,
what we haven't done. We're guilty of what we haven't
done. We haven't loved God with all our hearts. We haven't loved
our neighbors ourselves. This business of convincing a
person of sin and the rock bed foundation of it, Christ said,
is because they believe not on me. That's my problem. And if the Holy Spirit convinces
me of what I am and what I've done and what I haven't done,
and not only that, but the fourth place, What I've done religiously
is filthy rags too. My best deeds, Isaiah said, are
filthy rags. You've never prayed a prayer
that didn't have sin in it. You've never worshipped God in
a way in which God could receive it without Christ blessing it. That's right. To be accepted,
it's got to be perfect. You and I have never done anything
except from the cradle to the grave that was perfect. Never.
Not one thing. And God can't accept it unless
it's perfect. But in Christ it's perfect. We
believe on him. That makes it perfect. Convincible
sin. If a man ever gets lost, God
will save him. Let me make a shocking statement,
but it's true. First time I heard it was 50
years ago. And I had to think it over a long time before I
was ready to receive it. God's going to find every lost
person. He came to seek and to save the
lost. Every one of them is going to be saved. Why, brother, everybody's
lost. No, they're not. Ask them. I tell you, I'll give you an
assignment. Find one lost person in this town. Bring him to church
next Sunday. God will save him on the spot. I guarantee it.
If you can find one, just one. He's going to save every sinner.
And that when you're a candidate for salvation is when you realize
you're a sinner. Because God's the one that convinces
you of sin. The one who calls you by his
spirit is the one who convinces you you're a sinner. The one
who saves you by his grace and tells you the good news, he's
the one who has to tell you the bad news. You're not going to hear the
good news until you hear the bad news, because it won't be good
news to you. It's only good news to the lost. The gospel is good
news to sinners. But when God's going to give
you the good news, the first thing he tells you is he gives
you the bad news so you'll be glad to hear the good news. That's
right. You rejoice in the good news. He's going to convince them of
righteousness. Look at verse 10, of righteousness. Now let
me tell you a story. This will illustrate what I'm
talking about. He's going to convince you of
where the centers of righteousness, because I go to my father. What's
that got to do with me going to my father? You're being convinced
of righteousness. What's it got to do with him
going to the father? Everything. Adam was in the garden. God made him holy and upright.
Upright means righteous. But he failed. He sinned. Adam
sinned. And make themselves aprons to
cover their nakedness. And he felt a little better about
it. She wasn't staring and he wasn't staring either. They were
both covered. But he heard the voice of God.
He wasn't covered enough to meet God. That apron wasn't sufficient
to stand before God. He realized it wouldn't do, so
he ran and hid. And God came and slew a lamb and took away his fig leaves
and covered him with the skin, the blood to atone and the skin
to cover his nakedness. And then he stood before God
and they talked. And this will happen to everybody
here whom the Lord saves, this preacher and you too. We discover
we're naked. We're just bare before God. We're
ashamed. We fear, we're ashamed, we're
troubled. So what's the first thing we
do? We go find the church and we join. And then we start tithing,
and doing some good things, and reading our daily Bible readings,
and going to Sunday school, and doing all these good works, and
it kind of helps us with one another. We quit drinking, and
swearing, and cussing, and swerting around, and all this other stuff,
you know, and it makes us feel pretty good about people. I'm good as you are. But then
God comes along. And this homemade righteousness
won't do. Not to stand before God. Because
he looks plumb through the fig leaf into the hive, and that's
where we're unclean. And so then we have to realize
we need a righteousness that we can't provide, that we can't
fix ourselves up to meet God, stand before him here, let alone
there. So God kills a lamb, he names
Jesus Christ, sheds his blood, and takes his righteousness and
covers us. and puts his peace in our hearts,
his blood to put away our sin. Now I can say, Our Father which
art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Because God can't see my
sin through the blood of Christ. He can't see my sin when I'm
clothed in the righteousness of Christ. I don't have any sin. You see, the righteousness of
the fig leaf aprons is pasted on. It's an external sort of
thing, an external holiness. an external behavior, an external
work. But when God deals with a sinner
in righteousness, what's that got to do because I go to my
father? Well, as a man who fulfilled all that God required of me and
by his blood cleansed me, justified me and sanctified me, he went
to the father as my representative and the father received him.
And sat him down in his right hand and sat me down with him.
And accepted me in the beloved. based on his righteousness. So
he convinces us of sin, nakedness. And then we go to trying to fix
it up. We go find this preacher and
that preacher. Somebody tell us what we want
to hear. Tell us what we can do instead of what we can't do. What God wants us to do instead
of what God alone can do and must do. We hear all this stuff
about barning ourselves again and joining and accepting Jesus,
our personal Savior, I don't need to accept him. He needs
to accept me. I'm the one in trouble. He's not in trouble. He's not
lost. I didn't find him. He found me.
He gave me a righteousness. I tried to fix up one for all
that time. You did too. Convince the world
of righteousness because I go to my Father. That's how come
I have a righteousness. There's a man in glory. If there
can be one there, there can be another one, and another one,
and another one, and another one. That's right, because he's
there. Because I go to my Father. And
he's going to convince this world of judgment. And that judgment,
first of all, has to do with Satan, the prince of this world. That's what he called him, verse
11, of judgment because the prince of this world. He's the prince
of this world. He's the prince of the power of the air. Spirit
that worketh in the children of disobedience, he's called
principalities, powers, rulers of the darkness, spiritual wickedness
in high places, that's Satan. But he came to Christ, he met
our Lord, and our Lord conquered him. The prince of this world
is judged, cast out. Satan has nothing to do with
you or me either. No, he has nothing to do with
us. He's defeated. The Lord may allow him, like
he did with Peter, but he can't touch you without God's permission.
He can't touch you. Job, Satan appeared before God
Almighty in the book of Job. I don't understand all this,
but I just know what it says. He appeared before, when the
sons of God came to present themselves to the Lord, Satan came among
them. And the Lord said, Have you considered my servant Job,
a righteous man? There's none like him on the
earth. And Satan began to, he's the accuser of the brethren.
He's the adversary. He began to accuse Job. He says,
I tell you why Job loves you is because you blessed him. I
tell you why Job loves you because you've hedged about everything
he has and I can't touch him. Nobody can touch him. You let me touch him, and he'll
crush you to your face." The Lord, God said, all right, he's
in your hands for now. Now, I don't want that. That's
the reason our Lord taught us to pray, deliver us from the
evil one. That's in the Lord's prayer for
the disciples, deliver us from evil, that's the evil one. Don't turn me over to him. Peter,
he said the same thing to Peter, Satan has desired you just like
he did Job. He wants to hurt you. He wants
to expose you. But you can't be exposed if you
belong to him. You can't deceive the elect.
Or if it were possible, but it's not possible. But Satan can't
touch you. You don't deal with him. When
Satan came to Michael, the archangel, to dispute over the body of Moses,
you know what Michael said to him? Now, you're going back to
hell where you came from. No, he didn't either. Well, I'm
going to resist you. No, he didn't. He said, Lucifer,
Satan, the Lord will deal with you. And you better leave it
that way too. You'll be like the sons of Seba
who tried to cast out the demon. You know what the demon says?
We know Jesus and we know Paul, but we don't know who you are
and beat up on them. You remember that story? Sent
them out stripped naked. scarred and wounded. So Jesus,
the devil, knows. He knows, and he conquers him. Judgment, because the prince
of this world is Jud. My Lord takes care of him. As
far as I'm concerned, that's his office, not mine. And then it talks about Second,
judgment of believers. There's no judgment to the believer.
There's no judgment to them who are in Christ. And then the judgment
of the world. Christ will be the judge of the
world. The Father judges no man. He's committed all judgment to
the Son. And he said over in Acts 17,
verse 31, let me just read it to you. God has appointed a day. God has appointed a day in which
he's going to judge the world. The world. Now you may be a spectator
to judgment, but you won't be a participator, because there's
no judgment to them who are in Christ. We have no sin. We may
be spectators, I expect that, but we'll not be participators.
He's going to judge the world. And he's going to judge the world
by that man whom he hath ordained, and he hath given assurance unto
all men in that he raised him from the dead. conviction of sin has to do with
Christ. They believe not on me. If they
ever do, sin's gone. Of righteousness, I go to my
Father, and I went there to perfect a perfect righteousness and impute
it to those for whom I'm that. And if they ever come to that
place where they know that and love that and receive that, then
I represent them. The prince of this world is judged,
the world is judged, unbelievers are judged, and the believer's
judgment is put away. That's a happy, wonderful thought.
Now verse 12, and I've got to quit. Verse 12, he turns to his
disciples and says, I've many things to say to you, but you
can't bear them now. If you live to be as old as Bethuselah,
that'll still be true. I have many things to say to
you. You'll only bear them as I'm pleased to reveal them to
you." And he's saying that to these disciples here. You know
in part, you preach in part, you see through a glass dimly,
and that your whole life will be spent searching, seeking the
truth, the truth of God, the word of God. But now watch this. I have many things. How be it
when he comes, the spirit of truth is come. He'll guide you
into all truth. How will he guide us? By emotionalism,
and revelations, and visions, and dreams? No, sir. He'll guide
you into truth. Where is truth? The truth of
the Word. Who is truth? Is Christ the Word? He'll guide you into... We've
read almost three chapters here tonight. That's what we're supposed
to do. We're not supposed to tell our
experiences and dreams up here. And what we think and what our
denomination thinks, the Holy Spirit guides us into truth of
the Word. There are three that bear record
in heaven, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, and these
three are one. There are three that bear record on earth, the
Spirit, the Word, and the blood. The Spirit is the teacher. He
teaches the Word. and the blood. The Word of God and Christ crucified.
Scriptures and Christ crucified. That's why Paul said, I preach
determined to know nothing but Christ crucified. We preach Christ
crucified. We preach not ourselves, but
Christ. The Spirit, the Word, the blood. The Holy Ghost guides
us into the truth. If you sit and listen as a believer,
Listen, the Spirit of God reveals the Word, and you reveal it. You might take a crash course
in computer science and finish it in six months, but you won't
take a crash course in spiritual truth and finish it in six millenniums. That's right. You never exhaust
this treasure house. You never mine out this mine.
It's never been mined out yet. He'll not speak of himself. You
remember back there I was reading while I was going, Christ said
the words that I speak are not mine, they're the words of the
Father. Now I know a lot of preachers say here he'll not speak of himself,
that is he'll not magnify his name, and that's true. But that's
not what he's saying here. He's saying the Holy Spirit will
not speak of himself. He's not going to decide what
he's going to tell you. He's not going to conjure up
a dream for you, an experience especially for you, or something
just... Whatsoever he shall hear, that's
what he'll speak. What did he hear? He heard the
word of God. What the Father speaks, I speak. What the Father ordains, the
Holy Spirit will not reveal anything to you if it's not in this book.
If it's not in the word of God, it's not so. That's true now. He'll not speak of himself. Yeah,
but he's going to give me something nobody else has ever had. Don't
you bet on it now. Don't you bet on it. Because
this word, this canon is finished. If anybody adds to the words
of this book, God said I'll add to him the plagues that are in
this book. I don't want any part of that now. It's a new day,
it's a new life, it's a new way, it's a new revelation. No, it's
not. It's the ancient gospel. It's the gospel Moses believed
and Abraham believed. It's the gospel of the blood
of the cross. He'll not speak of himself. Whatever
he hears, that's what he speaks. And he'll show you things to
come. The return of our Lord, the redemption of our Lord, everlasting
life. Oh, he'll show you things to
come. He'll show you things that have happened and things to come.
You believe just as strongly in what you've never seen as
what you have seen. Maybe stronger. Expectation. Now here's where
we talk about something here. He'll glorify me. He shall glorify
me. He'll glorify Christ. I tell
you, when you hear preachers preach all the time the Holy
Spirit, the Holy Spirit, the Holy Spirit, that man does not
have the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit does not exalt
himself. He does not call attention to
himself. And he's not going to call attention to you. If somebody
jumps up tonight, starts screaming, running around the building,
he gets all the attention. Well, let me tell you this, that's
not the Holy Spirit, because the Holy Spirit would never call
attention to somebody acting that way. The Holy Spirit glorifies
Christ, exalts Christ, magnifies Christ. I'm telling you the truth
now. He'll not magnify himself, his
gifts. Don't seek the gifts, seek the
giver. People talk about wanting the
fruits. If you've got the tree, you've got the fruits. Get you an apple tree. That's
right. Christ is the fruit, is the vine. And the fruit is the fruit of
the vine, not the branch. So the Holy Spirit doesn't magnify
himself, he doesn't magnify the preacher, he doesn't magnify
the gifts, he glorifies Christ. Verse 14, he shall receive of
mine and show it to you. Who Christ is, what Christ did,
why he did it, where is he now? Priestly work of Christ. All
things that the Father hath of mine, the heirs thereof, the
whole fullness of the Godhead bottle is in Christ. In Christ,
if pleased God, then Christ should all fullness dwell. That's where
it dwells. That's where it abides, in Christ.
If you have Christ, you have all fullness, all grace, all
mercy, all truth, all hope, all life, everything you have in
him. It's in him, and we're complete
in him. You don't feed off of me. You
feed off of Christ. He's the bread. He's the water. He's the life. He'll receive
of mine, show it to you, all things that the Father hath of
mine. Therefore, I said, he'll take of mine, and he'll show
it to you." That's the reason the Apostle Paul in Philippians
chapter 3 said, Oh, that I may win Christ and be found in him,
not having mine own righteousness, which is of the law, but the
righteousness which is by the faith of the Son of God. that
I may know him and the power of his resurrected life, that
I may by any means attain to the resurrection of the dead.
It's all Christ, all in him." That's the gospel, and that's
good news. And I know that's what our old
forefathers preached, and that's what they believed. That's the
foundation of the church. He said, Peter, whom do you say
that I am? Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God. Blessed
art thou. Upon this rock I build my church. On Peter? No. He's no rock. Christ is the rock. And that
confession, Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God. I
build my church, and the gates of hell will never prevail against
what I'm preaching here tonight. And I'll tell you this, the gates
of hell is what we've got to deal with if we don't know Him. But it'll never prevail against
my church.