December 11, 2011

The Joy No One Can Take Away (John 16:16-24)

Preacher: Bryce Morgan Series: Joy: The Gift of Heaven's Happiness Scripture: John 16:16–16:24

Joy: The Gift of Heaven’s Happiness

 

The Joy No One Can Take Away

John 16:16-24

December 11th, 2011

Way of Grace Church

 

 

I. A Joyful Review

 

This morning we are continuing the study we began last week, a study that I think is extremely timely given that this is the Christmas season, given that we are surrounded by both the word and the expectation of.... “joy”.

 

Joy. Just like in English, we saw last week that the Bible, in its original languages, contains a variety of terms that are used to describe the same inner reality: joy, happiness, delight, gladness, exultation.

 

Whatever word you use, joy is something of which all of us have some basic understanding. The French philosopher Blaise Pascal wrote, “…all men seek happiness. This is without exception. Whatever different means they employ they all tend to this end.” Pascal went on to write that even the person who commits suicide is ultimately looking for happiness.

 

Do you recognize that all of us, including you, are on a quest for happiness? But the human quest for happiness never seems to succeed. Our hunger for happiness never seems satisfied by the things of this world. Joy is something we long for, but it is often temporary and temperamental.

 

But last week we learned from Nehemiah 8 that true strength is found in a particular kind of joy: “the joy of the LORD”. The source of genuine joy is God, but the conduit, the channel of that joy is the Holy Spirit working through the truth of Scripture. Only the Bible can kindle the fire of genuine joy because only the Bible contains the flame of the knowledge of God and of His promises.

 

And according to God's word, when we experience this “joy of the LORD”, our lives, our hearts, our faces, our songs, our praises...they are marked by this kind of joy.

 

 

II. The Passage: “That Your Joy May Be Full” (16:16-24)

 

But this morning we need to dig deeper, and not only learn more about acquiring “the joy of the LORD”, but more so, about abiding in that joy.

 

To do that, turn with me this morning to John 16. We will be focusing this morning on verses 16-24. John 16:16-24. In this passage we discover three kinds of words: in verses 16-18, the disciples express words of confusion. In response in verses 19-22, Jesus gives them words of comfort. And in verses 23 and 24, Jesus goes on to reassure them with words of confidence.

 

Let's look at each of these sections and try to understand them better.

A. Words of Confusion (16:16-18)

 

Look with me first at verse 16-18. This is what Jesus tells His disciples....verse 16:

 

A little while, and you will see me no longer; and again a little while, and you will see me.” [17] So some of his disciples said to one another, “What is this that he says to us, ‘A little while, and you will not see me, and again a little while, and you will see me’; and, ‘because I am going to the Father’?” [18] So they were saying, “What does he mean by ‘a little while’? We do not know what he is talking about.”

 

So here they are, Jesus and His disciples on their last night together before the day of Jesus' death; the night before Good Friday.

 

Leonardo DaVinci painted “The Last Supper” according to His imagination, but the Apostle John paints this scene for us as an eyewitness and as one moved by the Spirit of God. Ever since chapter 13, Jesus has been teaching these men in light of His coming arrest, torture, and death. He's been trying to prepare them for what is to come and strengthen them in light of the radically new work God is doing.

 

But as we see here, the disciples are confused, both by the cryptic language Jesus is using in verse 16, and his mention of “going to the Father” back in verse 10. We need to remember that these men had no idea that this would be their last night with Jesus. They still expected Jesus to lead a military revolution against the Romans. Back in chapter 12 Jesus had entered Jerusalem to shouts of “Hosanna”. The city was buzzing with expectation. Why in the world would Jesus leave now, even if just for “a little while”?

 

So what is Jesus talking about?

 

Well, these chapter that describe that final night in the upper room, chapters 13-18, along with clues from earlier in the book, and the account of what happens later in the book, all of this makes it clear that when Jesus talks about not being seen in “a little while”, He is talking about his imminent death and burial. Furthermore, when he speaks about being seen again “a little while” after that, He is referring to His resurrection from the dead.

 

It would only be a matter of hours before Jesus would be taken away from them. And it would only be a matter of days before they saw Him again, risen from the dead. John chapters 18-21 record all these events.

 

 

B. Words of Comfort (16:19-22)

 

But even though Matthew, Mark, and Luke's Gospels contain instances of Jesus telling the disciples exactly what was going to happen to Him (i.e. rejection and resurrection), look at how Jesus responds to their words of confusion here in the Gospel of John. Verse 19...

 

Jesus knew that they wanted to ask him, so he said to them, “Is this what you are asking yourselves, what I meant by saying, ‘A little while and you will not see me, and again a little while and you will see me’? [20] Truly, truly, I say to you, you will weep and lament, but the world will rejoice. You will be sorrowful, but your sorrow will turn into joy.

[21] When a woman is giving birth, she has sorrow because her hour has come, but when she has delivered the baby, she no longer remembers the anguish, for joy that a human being has been born into the world. [22] So also you have sorrow now, but I will see you again, and your hearts will rejoice, and no one will take your joy from you.

 

As the Son of God often did when He walked among us, Jesus knows exactly what these disciples are discussing. He knows they're confused about all this in “a little while” language. But notice that Jesus does not fill in the blanks in terms of details about his imminent departure and reappearance. He focuses not on what will happen, but on how they will respond to what happens.

 

His absence will produce in them sorrow. But this sorrow is not the kind of sorrow you have when the dog chews up your favorite slippers or when you scratch your favorite CD. No this sorrow produces (verse 20) weeping and lamenting. The sorrow-inspiring absence of Jesus will even be a source of rejoicing for “the world”, for those opposed to the truth of God that Jesus has been revealing.

 

You see, something devastating is going to happen very soon, and Jesus is trying to prepare these men for what is to come.

 

But in verse 20, Jesus also gives these men some good news: their fast approaching sorrow will quickly turn into joy. Notice what Jesus says here. Their sorrow will not be replaced by joy. Their sorrow will “TURN INTO” joy. But what does that mean? Well notice the illustration uses in verse 21. The sorrow of a woman in labor is not eventually replaced by some unrelated joy. No, her sorrow, her pain, is purposeful! The miracle of a baby, the miracle of new life puts everything, even her sorrow, into perspective.

 

In the same way, Jesus wants to encourage these men to hold on; not to give up hope when the darkness of His death covers them. They WILL see Jesus again, and His reappearance will mean rejoicing like they've never rejoiced before.

 

 

C. Words of Confidence (16:23, 24)

 

So not only does Jesus give them words of comfort in response to their confusion and in light of the coming events, but He also gives them words of confidence. Look at verses 23 and 24:

 

In that day you will ask nothing of me. Truly, truly, I say to you, whatever you ask of the Father in my name, he will give it to you. [24] Until now you have asked nothing in my name. Ask, and you will receive, that your joy may be full.”

 

Now, what exactly is Jesus saying in these verses? Well, notice the change that Jesus is describing in terms of the disciples' relationship to God. During His earthly ministry the disciples asked a lot of Jesus. They asked questions, they asked for provision, they even asked for places of honor at Jesus' side. And they did this because they recognized the very thing Jesus talked about so often: The Father loves the Son and has given all things into his hand. (John 3:35) For the Father loves the Son and shows him all that he himself is doing. (John 5:20) For as the Father has life in himself, so he has granted the Son also to have life in himself. (John 5:26)

But look at what Jesus is saying about the time that is coming, the time, after “a little while”, when they will see Jesus again. “In that day you will ask nothing of me.”

 

No, what they will do instead “in that day” is go directly to the Father in the name of Jesus. Up to this point, they have not been doing this. But something will be different “in that day”. Not only will they be able to go directly to the Father “in that day”, but they will also receive what they ask for “in that day”. “...he will give it to you.” (verse 23)

 

Jesus is not guaranteeing the disciples a 'blank check' here. He is guaranteeing an 'open door'. He is guaranteeing 'fatherly favor'. He is guaranteeing a 'full joy'.

 

 

III. A Secure Joy Produces a Confident Joy

 

Now let's think about what we've seen here. According to Jesus, the disciples’ confusion and sorrow will soon become confidence and joy. And look specifically at how Jesus describes the kind of joy that will soon fill the hearts of His disciples. Look again at verse 22:

 

So also you have sorrow now, but I will see you again, and your hearts will rejoice, and no one will take your joy from you.

 

Now consider this for a minute. Can you think of circumstances, and/or people, and/or memories, and/or worries, and/or feelings that can take your joy from you? If you’re honest with yourself, you can imagine that very thing because that experience is a normal part of our lives. There ARE circumstances and people and memories and worries and feelings that we do consider enemies of our joy.

 

But Jesus has told His followers here that “no one will take your joy from you”. So where’s the breakdown? So if like these men we are disciples of Christ, then either Jesus is not telling us the truth OR the joy that is so often taken away from us, the joy that is temporary and temperamental, is not the same joy Jesus is talking about here.

 

Well, we know the first option is not possible. Jesus was and is the spotless lamb of God. (I Peter 1:19) He is the “Word” made flesh. (John 1:14) As “God with us”, He cannot lie (Matthew 1:23).

 

No, the problem lies with our experience. You see, the joy Jesus is speaking of here is the same Joy Nehemiah and Ezra spoke about hundreds of years before this in Nehemiah 8. Jesus is talking about the “joy of the LORD”. And as we see here, the “joy of the LORD” is a secure joy. It is a joy firmly fixed. It is bolted down. It is cemented. It is sure. No one…NO ONE…is taking that joy from us.

 

If and when that joy SEEMS to be taken from us, the problem is not that we have truly LOST it, but that we have truly LOST SIGHT of it.

 

But how can I speak about this joy with such certainty? More importantly, how can Jesus speak about this joy with such certainty? Well, look at what the passage itself tells us about why this secure joy is so secure. Let me give you three reasons I see here in John 16.

 

First, Secure joy is secured by the certainty of victory through His Cross.

 

As we’ve already talked about, when Jesus speaks in verse 16 about how “in a little while…you will see me no longer”, we know that He is most likely referring to His imminent arrest, torture, and death. In a matter of hours, Jesus will be taken from them.

 

But as Jesus explains here, these sorrow-producing events are ultimately the ‘labor pains’ that will result in new life. And that’s exactly what happened! The cross of Jesus Christ is the very place where the true enemies of joy were defeated, once and for all. When from that bloody Roman cross Jesus cried “it is finished” in John 19:30, He wasn’t saying “I am finished”. No, He was declaring that His work of substitution, atonement, and reconciliation was finished.

 

On that cross Jesus made sure nothing could rob us of our joy by robbing sin, the world, and the Devil of their power over us. As Jesus declared in John 12:31, “Now is the judgment of this world; now will the ruler of this world [the devil, he will] be cast out.” Paul put it this way in Galatians 6:14, But far be it from me to boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world.

 

The very reason the people were weeping back in Nehemiah 8 was a clear recognition of their sin. And even though that day of recommitment to God’s covenant was a day to rejoice in God’s forgiveness, the shadow of sin still hung over God’s people. The covenant would still ultimately condemn them because they could not, we cannot, keep God’s law. We are stubborn, selfish, and ignorant as slaves of sin. But Jesus died to defeat the power of sin!

 

The rejection and death of Jesus on the cross might have been an occasion for the world system to rejoice as Jesus affirms in John 16:20, to rejoice in their apparent victory over God. But in fact, Christ’s death, when seen through the ‘big picture’ of God’s plan, Christ’s death is an occasion for hope and for great rejoicing.

 

On the cross, Jesus freed us from our slavery to all those false, empty joys. He freed us from the power of sin. That victory is certain, thus our, our joy is secured.

 

But there’s more. Number two: Secure joy is secured by the certainty of newness through His resurrection.

 

When Jesus talks about a new mother’s joy in verse 21, He describes how the reality of that new baby, the reality of new life, is the very thing that turns sorrow into joy. And in the context, in light of verse 22, the illustration of new birth is connected to the fact that the disciples WILL see Jesus again. And they will see Him after just “a little while”.

 

This is the ‘big picture’ that makes sense of everything, isn’t it? Yes, Jesus was betrayed, arrested, rejected, tortured, and killed. But on the third day, He also rose from the dead; and the Resurrection of Christ confirms that God was working in all these things to accomplish His agenda of joy. This is why Hebrews 12:2 tells us that “for the joy that was set before him [Jesus] endured the cross”.

 

And if Jesus rose again, if He did what no one could do before him, if He beat death, then that reality is an immovable foundation for genuine joy.

Because of God’s grace, through faith, the certainty of the Resurrection is the certainty of newness, of new life for us. A prisoner has joy in being set free from captivity. But that joy is complete and made full when he or she puts the walls of the prison far behind them and in righteousness and confidence, really enjoys a life of freedom.

 

The same should be true of us! The true joy of Christmas is inseparable from Easter’s triumph!

 

The Apostle Paul put it this way in Romans 6: We were buried therefore with him by baptism into death [that’s the spiritual baptism that water only symbolizes], in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life…if we have died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with him. [9] We know that Christ, being raised from the dead, will never die again; death no longer has dominion over him. (Romans 6:4, 8, 9) That sounds like a very certain, a very decisive victory over death!

 

But we have not yet fully painted this ‘big picture’. There’s more. Number three: Secure joy is secured by the certainty of access to His Father.

 

Jesus told His disciples in verse 24: “Ask, and you will receive, that your joy may be full.” What Jesus is teaching us here, what the rest of the Bible confirms, is that genuine joy, “the joy of the LORD”, springs up and flows from the well of the gospel.

 

But the gospel is not simply about substitution and atonement and forgiveness and new life. All of those things are true and wonderful, but all of those things are ultimately about God. The gospel, the Good News of Christ’s death and resurrection is ultimately about God.

 

Peter summed this up beautifully in I Peter 3:18: For Christ also suffered once for sins, the righteous for the unrighteous, that he might bring us to God… Paul taught that, Through him [through Jesus] we have also obtained access by faith into this grace in which we stand… (Romans 5:2).

 

God is the true source of joy, and when we are reconciled to Him, when we have peace with Him through Jesus, then our joy is “full” because God will graciously and generously give us everything we need. Ask God to help you. He will! Ask God to provide for you. He will! Ask God to strengthen you, to guide you, to forgive you, to be with you. “Ask [in Jesus’ name], and you will receive!” What could be more joyful than the reality of God as your Father?

 

God wants to pour out the happiness of heaven into your life! And that access to God, THAT JOY, is secured by the work of Jesus! Therefore, what kind of people ought we to be if all this is true? Shouldn’t this change our lives?

 

James Hudson Taylor, the well-known missionary to China once wrote: It is the consciousness of the threefold joy of the Lord, (1) His joy in ransoming us, (2) His joy in dwelling within us as our Saviour and Power for fruitbearing and (3) His joy in possessing us, as His Bride and His delight; it is the consciousness of this joy which is our real strength. Our joy in Him may be a fluctuating thing: His joy in us knows no change.

The 19th century Baptist preacher Octavius Winslow summed up all of this so well when he declared:

 

The religion of Christ is the religion of joy. Christ came to take away our sins, to roll off our curse, to unbind our chains, to open our prisonhouse, to cancel our debt; in a word, to give us the oil of joy for mourning, the garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness. Is not this joy? Where can we find a joy so real, so deep, so pure, so lasting? There is every element of joy - deep, ecstatic, satisfying, sanctifying joy - in the gospel of Christ. The believer in Jesus is essentially a happy man. The child of God is, from necessity, a joyful man. His sins are forgiven, his soul is justified, his person is adopted, his trials are blessings, his conflicts are victories, his death is immortality, his future is a heaven of inconceivable, unthought-of, untold, and endless blessedness. With such a God, such a Saviour, and such a hope, is he not, ought he not, to be a joyful man?

Brothers and sisters, friends, where has your quest for joy taken you? Are you looking for ultimate joy in your marriage, in your career, in a life free of pain, free of worry, free of struggle? Are you looking for ultimate joy in feeling ‘in control’, in the approval of others, in sports, entertainment, vacations, recreation; in realizing an ideal of yourself as the best this or that?

 

Listen, there can be joy in all those things. But that joy is fickle and fleeting. It is temporary and temperamental. At their worst, those joys are obstacles to God and reasons for His judgment. But at their best, those joys should point us to the Giver of genuine joy. Barnabas and Paul expressed it this way in Acts 14:17… Yet [God] did not leave himself without witness, for he did good by giving you rains from heaven and fruitful seasons, satisfying your hearts with food and gladness.”

 

Jesus died in order to give you a joy that cannot be taken away. Have you received that joy? Are you walking in that joy? Or have you lost sight of it? The secure joy for which Jesus died should be the confident joy in which we live.

 

So also you have sorrow now, but I will see you again, and your hearts will rejoice, and no one will take your joy from you.

 

Amen? Let’s pray.

 

other sermons in this series

Dec 18

2011

Dec 4

2011