It's Friday, but Sunday is Coming!

[This manuscript varies a bit more than usual from what I actually said on Sunday, so consider more of an explanation of what I was trying to say! SN]

It’s Friday, but Sunday is Coming!

John 16:16-24

Introduction: The clock was ticking, Calvary was approaching. Of course Jesus knows what lies ahead and He is preparing His disciples for a painful transition. Ironically He knew they wouldn’t understand His words until after the resurrection, but even so He taught them so that when the time came they would see that all of this was part of God’s plan. The journey is important to God – He is interested in every step, every bump, every obstacle, along the way.  It’s like the hand of the potter, gently pushing at the spinning lump of clay on the wheel, shaping it, slowly, intentionally, into what He wants it to be.  He promises that there is a plan that He will bring us through, and the end of this story is better than we can possibly imagine.  A thousand years earlier the Psalmist said: “Weeping may endure for a night, But joy comes in the morning” (Psalm 30:5).  The night was approaching, but hope would soon dawn! Jesus’ impending departure would bring grief, but God’s unfolding plan would turn that into rejoicing.

The Big Idea: Trouble will come, but take heart, Jesus is with you, and Jesus wins!

I. God isn’t surprised by suffering, so be encouraged, He has a plan! Jesus, once again, predicted His death and resurrection (16-18).

Jesus predicted his departure and promised his return. We read in John 16:16,  "A little while, and you will not see Me; and again a little while, and you will see Me, because I go to the Father." Repeatedly in John we see Jesus knowing what no mere man could know. He knows what people are thinking, what they are planning. He also knows what will happen, and when. Omniscience is an attribute of deity, and in John it’s one more evidence in John that Jesus is who He claimed to be: God the Son.

 It’s important to note that though Jesus knows what will happen, He is not interested in avoiding the Cross. He does not try to find another path, a way to evade the pain ahead.  He is confident that there will be a way not to substitute a joyful situation for a painful one, but rather to transform His approaching pain, his betrayal, rejection and crucifixion, into cause for rejoicing. “For the joy set before Him He endured the cross” (Heb 12:2).

The principle here, according to Wiersbe, is that “God brings joy in our lives, not by substitution, but by transformation.”      

The cross which was an act of unspeakable injustice and pain was transformed by God into something beautiful, a demonstration of God’s love for His sheep.

            Now the disciples are confused by Jesus’ answer, as we read,

“Then some of His disciples said among themselves, "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 go to the Father'?"  ¹⁸ They said therefore, "What is this that He says, 'A little while'? We do not know what He is saying” (John 16:17,18).

No big surprise there!   Repeatedly in John we see the disciples, along with Jesus’ other hearers, misunderstanding what He was saying. But we shouldn’t be too hard on them.  The main point seems pretty clear to me, but even after 2000 years, with the benefit of looking back on how the story actually unfolds, commentators still aren’t in full agreement about the details!  The first “little while” is almost surely referring to the cross, but some scholars think its talking about the cross in connection with the resurrection and ascension. So the disciples are to be saddened because soon Jesus will be gone. It’s the departure that is linked to the coming of the Comforter in the preceding context. The second “little while” would then be either His presence with the Spirit on the day of Pentecost or his return in glory.  I take it a little differently. I think first he is referring specifically to the Cross – that will surely bring confusion, mourning, even despair. The second “little while” is the resurrection – which, yes, is inseparably linked to his second coming and our future resurrection.  After all, Paul says in I Corinthians 15 “Now Christ is raised from the dead, the “first fruits” of those who sleep.”  The “first fruits” is part of the harvest, the eschatological harvest linked to the culmination of God’s plan.  You will sorrow, He tells them, but your sorrow will be turned into joy!

            The good news is that whatever we face, we can be assured of ultimate victory through faith in Christ. He was “a man of sorrows, acquainted with grief…”  He bore the sin of every human that would one day trust in Him. It seems to me that in Gethsemane, as He prayed to the Father, perspiration falling from his brow like drops of blood, the weight of our sin was already beginning to crush him. The night was approaching, but hope would soon dawn!  Weeping would last for the night, but joy comes in the morning (Ps 30:5)!  Jesus’ impending departure would bring grief, but God’s unfolding plan would turn that into rejoicing.  For those who would follow Him, trouble will come.  But take heart, Jesus is with you, and Jesus wins!

II. God knows our struggles and will help us on the path to joy (19-24).  Romans 8:28 is one of those oft quoted verses we can hardly understand: “God causes all things to work together for good…” All things?  Even the times of hardship and suffering, pain and confusion?  How can that be?

             First of we can be encouraged that He knows our confusion when life doesn’t make sense (19). The text says, “Now Jesus knew that they desired to ask Him…” This is another example of Jesus knowing what his disciples were thinking.   From the first chapter and his encounter with Nathanael: “How do you know me?” and the second chapter when the gospel writer John tells us “He knew what was in men…” and repeatedly through the Gospel we’ve seen the omniscience of Jesus revealed. He knows us, intimately, which means He knows where we are struggling.

            He also understands our pain when life hurts and promises that better times are coming (20-22). “I tell you the truth: you will weep and mourn while the world rejoices. You will grieve…”  Great! Just what we wanted to hear right?  He’ll repeat it again at the end of this chapter, v.33, “In this world you will have trouble…”  He told them the truth. He had already warned them to expect hatred from the world if they chose to follow him.  Now he is explicit: that means trouble is coming for you, along with weeping, mourning, grieving. If you have been a Christ follower for more than five minutes you already know that is true (if perchance you don’t know it yet, take heart, a reality check is surely on the way!).  When I came to Christ the time I had the most difficulty in trusting that God was present and had a plan, was in the midst of tragedy, when loved ones were critically sick and dying.  A younger brother, my five year old nephew, my mother, my dear sister, all died too quickly, too young.  Why God? Why? We all experience those moments. Whether its bad news from the doctor, or the death of a loved one, or struggles in a relationship, Jesus understands our pain.  It is essential that we learn our theology in the light, so that we can trust Him in the darkness. He is there with us, and somehow he promises to do something amazing. He did it in the cross.

            Jesus says to them “You will grieve, but your sorrow will be turned into joy…” Pay attention to what He says and what He doesn’t say.  He doesn’t promise to replace our sorrow with joy, He promises to transform it. Jesus uses the illustration of child birth in this passage. We’ve had a few babies born around here over the last couple of years, by the time we get to see them, it’s all joy!  But that same baby just hours before was giving mama quite a bit of pain! One of our moms who just gave birth had advice for me to pass on to our daughter before she delivered: “I highly recommend an epidural!”  Another dad, shortly after the delivery explained to us, “It really wasn’t that bad.”  His wife looked at him and said “It was bad.”  But the source of that pain is transformed into a source of great joy.  Soon, the joy of a new life is all the matters!

            The disciples were about to pass through a time of confusion, pain, uncertainty, mourning. The cross was coming. Though Jesus had explained it and prophesied it’s coming, they did not understand. But it was through the Cross that God was going to do something glorious!

            One of my favorite quotes from the Lord of the Rings trilogy was actually not in the book. It’s a scene when Sam is talking to Frodo, expressing faith that somehow this story was going to have a great ending:  

Sam: It's like in the great stories Mr. Frodo, the ones that really mattered. Full of darkness and danger they were, and sometimes you didn't want to know the end because how could the end be happy? How could the world go back to the way it was when so much bad had happened? But in the end it's only a passing thing this shadow, even darkness must pass. A new day will come, and when the sun shines it'll shine out the clearer. Those were the stories that stayed with you, that meant something even if you were too small to understand why. But I think Mr. Frodo, I do understand, I know now folk in those stories had lots of chances of turning back, only they didn't. They kept going because they were holding on to something…

Frodo: What are we holding onto, Sam?  

Sam: That there's some good in the world, Mr. Frodo, and it's worth fighting for.”

Because of Jesus we know that God has an amazing story He is writing on the stage of human history. It can seem dark and discouraging at times but we can hold onto Him, because He is good, and He promises that the end is going to be better than we can imagine!       

He wants us to learn the principle of prayer and promises that He will answer (23-24).  He wants joy for us! Pray teaches us to acknowledge His sovereignty, to rest in His goodness, to trust in His omniscience. We’ll talk more about this next week, but as we pray we acknowledge

What is God saying to me in this passage? Trouble will come, but take heart, Jesus is with you, and Jesus wins!

What would God have me to do in response to this passage? What is the pressure that you are passing through right now?  Nothing touches us that hasn’t first passed through the hands of our loving heavenly father, nothing. He will transform your suffering into joy. He did it on the Cross. He bore our sorrows and carried our griefs. All of our sin was laid upon Him. In a few minutes we’ll celebrate the Lord’s Table together. The focus is on the cross, on his purposeful, intentional, self-sacrifice. For us!  God spared not His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all – how will He not also with Him freely give us all things? Whatever we face, whatever our sorrow, He can transform our sorrows into joy. The sufferings of this present world (can be great, but they…) are not worthy to be compared to the glory that shall be revealed in us.  “It’s Friday… but Sunday is coming!”    AMEN.