April 19 We Will Study John 16:16-22

April 19 we will study John 16:16-22. Discussion questions are:

1. What symptoms have you noticed of culture clash in America?
2. What is the significance of the following statements: “Many Americans find themselves characterized by bitterness, envy and hostility. Those negative qualities are not created by stresses in our culture, they are merely revealed by those stresses.”
3. What is the appropriate Christian response to a world increasingly bitter, envious, and hostile?
4. How does the gospel bring us joy in the midst of a decaying world?
5. Do you ever think of God as “utterly joyful”?
6. How does Proverbs 8:30 help your understanding of that?

1. What was it that created the “glad hearts” among Christians in Acts 2:46?
2. What are we to learn from Jesus’ illustration of a woman giving birth?
3. What is the essential difference in the way the world handles pain and the Christian way of handling pain?
4. How do you understand the phrase in II Cor. 6:10, “always sorrowful yet full of joy”?
5. When thinks look gloomy do you tend to be a thermometer or a thermostat?
6. Of the 2 disciplines for maintaining your joy, keeping your conscience clear and meditation, which one do you most need to revive in your life?

What will it take to get you to revive it?

Sermon:Joy in the Mourning

John 16:16-22

There seems to be a growing clash of cultures in America. A few years ago it was some dissatisfied person going into a post office or a school or some other public place and just opening fire. Then there was the infamous subway shooter Bernard Goetz who decided he was not going to take it anymore and shot four men intent on robbing him on the subway train in Manhattan. He became a symbol of New Yorker’sfrustrations with high crime rates. More recently it has been the golden parachute syndrome of CEO’s and fat cat board members who take expensive vacations and then want the government to bail out their mismanaged businesses. Now many Americans find themselves characterized by bitterness, envy and hostility. Those negative qualities are not created by stresses in our culture, they are merely revealed by those stresses.The Bible says the troubles between human beings are actually due to already existing trouble within us. To put it another way - if you are arguing with yourself you will argue with other people. If you are accusing yourself, you will accuse other people. If you are lying to yourself, you will lie to others. If at your core you are unhappy, you will be unhappy with everyone else. Aren’t you aware of it when the opposite happens? When you are having a good day, when people appreciate you, when you get a promotion or a raise, when you lose weight and people notice, it’s somehow easy to forgive and go the extra mile. But when nothing is going right in your life you get down on others and become judgmental and critical.

What happens to a building if it’s foundation is too weak or too small to hold it up? It collapses. What causes one human being to collapse under the same stresses that another person handles satisfactorily? Human beings collapse when their foundation is too weak or too small. What’s that old message from the VBS song based on one of Jesus’ parables? “The wise man built his house upon the rock. The foolish man built his house upon the sand.” The Bible says that the only foundation that will absolutely stand in the face of any pressure is called the gospel. The gospel is the message about what Jesus Christ has done. Have you seen one of those movies where the bomb squad carefully approaches a bomb, defuses it, and carries it to a safe place? The gospel of Jesus Christ will take that part of you that is about to blow, defuse it, and gently place you in a safe place. If the gospel is in your heart you won’t need to carry an AK47 to handle one of those people who get your parking spot. If the gospel is in your heart you will find healthy ways to deal with the stresses at work. If the gospel is in your heart you will find more meaning in sharing your wealth with the poor than criticizing some CEO who is greedy. The gospel in your heart cleanses you of bitterness and envy and hostility and fills you with love and joy and peace.

In today’s text Jesus teaches us 4 characteristics of the joy that the gospel brings to our lives. Christian joy is…

1.Inevitable.

2.Continual.

3.Transcendent

4.Possible.

CHRISTIAN JOY IS INEVITABLE

“Now is your time of grief, but I will see you again and you will rejoice, and no one will take away your joy.” – John 16:22 In essence Jesus was saying, “I’m going away but I’ll be back and when you see me you will have joy.”

Joy is an inevitable characteristic of Christianity. It’s not always an immediate characteristic but at some point in your journey it becomes inevitable. If you could hang around with God for a day do you know what one of the overwhelming memories would be? It would be the sense of how utterly joyful He is. If you read “The Shack”you probably picked up on that. Joy is one of the main attributes of God. In the story of creation, God is shown to find great joy in the process. Even the stars sang at creation! Proverbs 8:30 says, “Every day as I was creating I was filled with delight….” The word “delight” means “to jump” or “to dance”.

Joy is an inevitable characteristic of Christianity because the message of the gospel is a message of joy. The Sunday School definition of “gospel” is “good news.” Literally the word means, “joy message”. Think of your heart as a stringed instrument with one string so large no one can pluck it except God himself. It’s the joy string in your life and God is in charge of it. You can’t create your own joy but God can and will infuse you with joy through the joy message called the gospel. Have you ever gone to a really inspiring movie and left the theatre feeling great only to watch that feeling slowly dissipate? Movies don’t produce joy. Good times don’t produce joy. Vacations don’t produce joy. God produces joy! Joy is a product of the work of the Holy Spirit, a fruit of the Holy Spirit. When you understand the gospel communicated by the Holy Spirit you understand that one day all the pain and suffering, all the grief and dying will be removed forever from our lives. Can you tell me any joy greater than that? Only the gospel message, only the joy news can pluck that string in your heart.

Do you remember the heart description of the very first Christians? Acts 2 says that when they ate together they did it with glad hearts. If you aren’t experiencing a joy filled life don’t ask God for more joy, ask, “Show me what I am doing to stifle my joy?”

CHRISTIAN JOY IS CONTINUAL

Jesus’ illustration is of a woman in labor having a baby. “A woman giving birth to a child has pain because her time has come; but when her baby is born she forgets the anguish because of her joy that a child is born into the world.” – John 16:21 When her baby is born she forgets the anguish because a child is born into the world. So it is with us! How are we like a woman in labor? He didn’t say, “When the baby is born the pain is over.” He said, “When the baby is born she forgets the anguish.” In the world joy and sorrow cannot overlap. They are mutually exclusive. In the world if you have sorrow and want joy you have to eliminate the pain. So you might try to forget pain through drugs or alcohol or some pursuit of pleasure. Or you might try to avoid pain by just leaving a relationship. Or you might deny that you have any pain at all. “I’m O.K. I don’t feel stressed or worried or depressed. Pain doesn’t bother me.” In every case you have to turn your brain off and avoid reality to manage your pain. We are so used to that form of denial we make up little platitudes and quote them as if they were from the Bible itself: “Every cloud has a silver lining.” “It’s always darkest before the dawn.” “This too shall pass.” “No pain, no gain.” The essence of Christian joy is it overshadows the pain. We don’t forget, avoid, or deny pain. We have joy in the midst of pain, just like a woman experiencing the joy of childbirth in the midst of great pain. A Christianfocuseson joy like a mother focuses on her newborn baby. The Christian says, “The world is a bad place. There are people who abuse children. Drugs and alcohol are devastating our nation. Greed has almost collapsed our entire economy. But I will not collapse under the weight of all that. I have the joy message of what Jesus death accomplished. He now reigns at the right hand of God and is in control of the last chapter of this world. One day all these world problems will vanish and life will be eternally as God originally intended it to be.

Are Christians more optimistic or pessimistic than the world? Yes! Christians are far more pessimistic and far more optimistic at the same time. Christians are vigorously pessimistic about the spread of sin in this world. We are deeply bothered by it and sense that the devil is winning way too many battles in the ongoing war. At the same time Christians are absolutely convinced that the outcome of the war has already been decided. In the end, Jesus wins! If you want to know what real Christian joy is, attend the funeral of a Christian conducted by a joy filled Christian. Right in the midst of all that mourning there is enormous joy! Paul expressed it this way, “always sorrowful yet full of joy” – II Corinthians 6:10

CHRISTIAN JOY IS TRANSCENDENT

Sorrow and pain not only do not eliminate Christian joy, they almost enhance it. The difference in the world’s view of pain and that of the Christian is the difference in thermometers and thermostats. The world responds to pain like a thermometer. The world can always tell you how bad things are but they can’t do anything about it. The Christian responds to pain like a thermostat. Thermostats know the same thing thermometers know - the temperature. The difference is, thermostats do something about it. They kick on the heater or the air conditioner. Thermostats don’t just acknowledge the temperature, they do something about it. Sorrow almost increases Christian joy because Christians respond to sorrow by switching on joy. I remember standing at my mother’s casket and feeling, “I never hated anything so bad as her death.” At the same time I felt, “I never wanted to go to heaven as much as I do now.” Sorrow and joy at the same time. Joy in the midst of mourning. The world’s joy is based on circumstances. If your circumstances are good you feel joyful. If your circumstances are bad you don’t feel joyful. Christian joy is based on faith in the work of Jesus on the cross. That’s why Jesus says; “No one can take your joy from you.”

Worldly joy is based on not thinking too deeply nor too far into the future. The fact is you are going to die one day. What will become of you then? Christian joy is based on the answer to that question. The world’s lack of joy is based on their refusal to think about that question. Some of you are very busy and very successful but you have no idea what you are doing all those things for. You are making money and buying lots of nice things for yourself, but why are you doing it? Why is it you have this nagging guilt that just won’t ever completely leave you alone? Could it be because you are looking for joy in all the wrong places?

CHRISTIAN JOY IS POSSIBLE

Some of you may be saying to yourselves, “O.K. I get what you are saying about Christian joy being inevitable and continual because it transcends anything that can happen to you in this life. What’s wrong with me that I don’t have this joy?” There are 2 disciplines you have to co-operate with and if you don’t you will stifle the joy in your life. The first is you have to keep your conscience clear. There was a British author who lived about 100 years ago who, as a joke, one day sent an anonymous note to 3 of his friends. The note said, “Flee at once. All is discovered.” To his absolute shock all 3 people within 24 hours left town. They had bad consciences. A bad conscience will shut down your joy. That’s what the Bible is talking about when it says, “If anyone does something and it is not of faith, for you it is sin.” The second discipline is you have to meditate.Meditation doesn’t mean you have to go sit on a mountaintop and chant some weird noise. It means you think about something until the fire awakens deep in your soul. Some of you read your Bible and pray. That’s a great start but when you finish you need to sit quietly and rejoice. Rejoicing is like learning to play a musical instrument. If you want to learn to play the piano you can’t just sit on the piano bench and wait for something to infuse you with ability. You have to practice. At the same time you have to start with learning to play a few chords and a few scales. You don’t start off with “The Flight of the Bumblebee”. Experienced, disciplined Christians have greater joy than novices. It has been my good pleasure to stand at the bedside of aged Christians who have meditated for a lifetime. They die with a joy that is beyond anything the world can imagine. How in the world did Stephen die praying, “Lay not this sin to their charge.”? How in the world did Jesus die praying, “Father, forgive them for they know not what they do.”? How in the world can it be true that Jesus “for the joy set before him endure the cross”? It’s called joy!

The Bible says, “Weeping may tarry for the night but joy comes in the morning.” – Psalms 30:5 You will die without this joy. Come get it. Joy is not an abstraction. It is not a concept. It is not an emotion. Joy is a person. “When you see me you will have joy and no one will take it from you.”