The Crisis of Conviction In the Life of the Lost John 16:7-14 Before Reading the Passage: We have come to the eve of our Lord s crucifixion. It is 10:30 or 11:00 pm. on Thursday night. - Judas has already slipped out from the upper room and the Last Supper to go to the religious leaders to collect his thirty pieces of silver for betraying the Lord. - All the actors have taken their place. In just a few minutes Jesus will go to the Garden of Gethsemane to pray. A few minutes later Judas will kiss the cheek of Jesus and set in motion the whole cycle of events that lead to the crucifixion. - So these words of our Lord taken from John 16 are among the last words to His disciples. That gives them double importance. These are the final instructions of the Son of God before He goes to the cross. Read the Passage Notice again v. 7 - I tell you the truth. - Why would Jesus have to remind them that He is telling the truth? He always tells the truth. More than that, He is Truth! - He tells them that because it s hard to swallow something that somebody tells you that you think is bad when they say it is good for you. And that s what Jesus does. It is expedient (best, of profit to, to your advantage) for you that I go away. - How could that possibly be true? How could anything be better than the physical presence of the Son of God? - I m sure that if we took a vote and asked, Would you rather have the Holy Spirit inside you or have Jesus sitting next to you? all of us would vote to have Jesus, the Son of God, right here so we could see Him and talk to Him. That s understandable. - But Jesus said, No, it s better for you that I should go because if I don t go, I can t send the Holy Spirit to you. Why was it better for Jesus to leave so that He could send the Holy Spirit? (1) If Jesus had stayed with the disciples, He could not have died on the cross and be buried and resurrected on the third day and if He had not died for our sins and if He had not been risen for our justification, He could not have paid the price for our sins and become our only Savior. That would mean that we would all be in our sin with no hope of forgiveness and salvation. (2) He had to die on the cross and rise again to defeat the power of Satan and death. Jesus defeated Satan at the cross and gained the victory over Satan, death, the grave and hell. (3) Now in Heaven we have one seated at the right hand of the throne of God making intercession for us who is touched with the feelings of our infirmities, because He is touched with the feelings of our infirmities, because He was tempted in all points just as we are, yet without sin. (4)If He had not gone away, He could have been in only one place at one time. Now, the Holy Spirit is with and in every believer in every place. 223 Now Jesus tells His disciples one of the main ministries - jobs - of the Holy Spirit - to bring conviction of sin to sinful man. The word reprove (KJV) means both to convict and to convince a person.
We use the term being under conviction a lot. What does it mean? - Did you know that a lost man will never be saved until he is brought under conviction of his lost ness and sinfulness? - That is why we say, You can t get a man saved until you get him lost. If he never sees his need to be saved, he will never want to be saved. What does it mean to be under conviction? Under the Shadow of the Broad Brim is the life story of the great preacher, Charles Spurgeon. Spurgeon grew up in a Puritan background, with a Puritan preacher father and grandfather. He was taught the way of God even as an infant. At age six he was reading Pilgrim s Progress and theological books. But it wasn t until age sixteen there came a personal crisis of conviction which preceded his salvation. At age sixteen there came a burdened soul, as Spurgeon called it. He became terribly troubled about the fact that he was a sinner. There was a consciousness that he was lost and under the condemnation of the judgment of God. He wanted to get the matter settled and so on a cold winter Sunday he started out to go to a large, well-known church, but it was so cold he could not make it there. Instead, he found a small chapel and slipped in the back door. The weather was so bad that the pastor could not get there, but a layman stood to speak. Spurgeon sat on the back, but the man noticed that he was troubled. The man looked at Spurgeon and said, Young man, you are troubled in your spirit. Look to Jesus and live. That s all he said... Look to Jesus and live. And Spurgeon s testimony was that that day his burden was lifted and salvation came to his soul. - The truth is that every person who has been saved can tell that same story. Oh, the details will be different, but for every person who has been saved, there was that moment of personal crisis of conviction when you were brought to realize that you were a lost sinner and needed to be saved. Three things I want you to see: A. Conviction is an Awaking Experience I. The Pressing Nature of Conviction - 16:8 It is the Holy Spirit s job to both convict and convince. - This is a Greek word which comes from the drama of a courtroom trial. It is a word which refers to what the prosecuting attorney does when he argues his case. He puts the defendant on the witness stand and begins to pile up the evidence against the defendant. He piles up the evidence, fact upon fact, upon fact, upon fact, until finally, the enormity of the evidence is so overwhelming that the judge is forced to say, I find you guilty beyond any reasonable doubt. - It means to convict of guilt in a court of law. - More than that, it means to present the evidence in such an overwhelming fashion that even the defendant is compelled at the end of the trial to step up and say, I admit it. I confess I m guilty. The Holy Spirit brings things to light in the sinners life; both his actions and his thought life. - He exposes every sin in his life - the things he has done wrong and the things he failed to do right. He shows someone his or her faults. - Conviction goes beyond Accusing someone of wrong doing. The accusation must be proven. 224 - The Holy Spirit pricks a person s heart until he knows he s guilty. The Holy Spirit convicts and then He convinces. What does that mean? - The Holy Spirit will open a man s heart and lay it bare and reveal to that man his sin. When He does that, the Holy Spirit shows the sinner that he is condemned before God. God s condemnation exposes him to God s sentence upon his life - he is under God s judgment and wrath. His judgment of doom in hell.
- Here s what God will convince him of about himself, he s an ungodly sinner. - Look at Jude 14-15. Notice the word ungodly is used four times. The Holy Spirit will convince every lost person that he is an ungodly man who does ungodly deeds in an ungodly way for he is an ungodly sinner. As the sinner sees his ungodly heart exposed before a Holy God, he will sense his own Hopelessness, his own inevitable judgment, his own fear, his own lostness, his own vileness, corrupt to the core. B. Conviction is an Alarming Experience The Holy Spirit hammers and drives a person to see the tragedy of his soul without Christ. - Listen to how folks described what it s like to be convicted by the Spirit: (1) On the day of Pentecost a great crowd listens to Peter Preach. In the crowd there are many of those who had cried out for the blood of Christ and probably some who helped to put Him to death. But when the Holy Spirit falls upon them, they are convicted of sin and they see that Christ is the Son of God. And under deep conviction they cry out, What must we do? This same thing happens today. Men go on and on in their sins. They ignore Christ until one day the Holy Spirit convicts them. Then they see their sin and they acknowledge that Christ is the Son of God and that He was crucified by their sin. - Acts 2:37 - They were pricked in their heart. (2) Acts 5:33 Peter and the other apostles spoke to the Jewish supreme court, and we are told again they were cut to the heart. (3) Acts 7:54 When Steven, the first recorded Christian martyr, preached about Christ, those who heard him were cut to the quick. (4) Acts 9:5 When Saul was saved on the road to Damascus, Jesus spoke to him and said, It is hard for you to kick against the pricks. So it is today when the Holy Spirit convicts a sinner of his lost condition. His heart feels stirred, stung, crushed, heavy with a load of sin and you yearn for the load to be lifted, and for peace in the heart, and forgiveness of your sins, to be made right with God. C. Conviction is an Activating Experience The Spirits desire is to motivate you to do the only thing you can do to get rid of your sins - come to Jesus. - When you sense the Holy Spirit stirring your heart to repent of your sins, turn from your sins and turn to God, you must not delay in making that decision. If you have experienced the pull of the Holy Spirit to make a decision to get right with God and you failed to do it, do you remember what happened in your heart? 225 - His conviction left you. He spoke to you, convicted and pulled you to make your decision, but you pushed Him aside and said, Later. - Do you remember what happened when you pushed Him aside? He left you. The conviction and the desire to make the decision was soon gone. That s why we must respond and respond immediately when the Spirit of God works within us. We must make the decision. (Whittentown - Mr. Huddleston) The Indians use to describe the convicting of the Spirit like this: It is like a triangle with three sharp points on it, placed in your heart. When you do wrong, the triangle turns around and around in you heart. Each
time the sharp points wound the heart. But if you do not pay attention to the sharp points, they will become dull and the points will wear away until you can feel them no more. What does the Holy Spirit convict of? A. The Nature of Sin - 16:9 II. The Process of Conviction - 16:9-11 Did you notice that the Holy Spirit convicts us of SIN? Not SINS? - What is the greatest sin against God? Murder? Stealing? Adultery? Rape? Child abuse? - The greatest sin against God is failure to believe in Christ! To trust Him! It is refusing to believe in Jesus Christ. Most folks don t believe that refusing to believe in Jesus Christ is the greatest sin. It is the chief of ALL the sins. - Why? He is God s only begotten Son. He came from heaven to earth to die to pay the sin debt for man. He had no sin of His own, but He became sin for us. Sinful men crucified Him. Not just Herod or Pilate or the Jews of that day, but you and I crucified Him, too. - What sin does the Holy Spirit convict a lost person of? It is the sin of unbelief. - The Holy Spirit doesn t have to convict people of the sin of murder (or rape, or adultery, or lying, or cheating, ect.) because just about everybody knows it s wrong to commit murder. Even murderers themselves know that what they are doing is wrong. - You don t have to convict people that it s wrong to murder folks or rob banks or mug somebody in the park or rape some woman in her home. You don t have to convict people those things are wrong. They know they re wrong. Conscience convicts a lost person of those sins. - And, yet, the very folks who will admit it s wrong to rape and murder and rob and steal, the same people will say, Well, there s nothing wrong with not believing in Jesus. I tell you, it is the most horrible sin of all. Here s what the Holy Spirit does in the life of a lost person. He convicts and convinces by saying to the lost person, You ought to believe in Jesus. You ought to receive Him as your Savior. You ought to put your faith in Him. - Do you know what that is? That s the Holy Spirit convincing you of the sin of not believing in Christ. And if you continue to reject that, some day He ll convict of that sin finally and then it s too late. The great damning sin is to reject Jesus Christ - John 3:17-18, 36; 5:40, 43a;8:24; Rom. 10:9-10 -To say it another way, the greatest question between God and man is not primarily the sin question, but the Son question for the lost man. 226 Listen: Conviction is not a bad thing. It s a good thing. It is a demonstration of the love, mercy, and grace of God. If He didn t convict men of sin, none of us would be saved. B. The Need of Righteousness - 16:10 Righteousness is the opposite of sin. You see, this is the other side. - The Holy Spirit not only shows us how bad we are, but He shows us how pure and holy and righteous Jesus is. One of the greatest mistakes man makes is comparing himself with other men. Then he ll say, I don t need god. I m as good and even better than those folks down at the church. Romans 10:3; 3:23 - The Holy Spirit convinces the world of a new standard of righteousness, which is Christ!
- Look again at 16:10 and get ready to be blessed. Notice that little phrase, because I go to my Father and you see me no more. - Do you know what the greatest proof is that Jesus is totally righteous? It is the fact that God the Father accepted Him into His presence. - Jesus was on the cross and what did the Father lay on Him? Our sin. He became sin for us. - But watch this: And Jesus bore that sin away, came out of the grave, and the Father said, Come on up. And Jesus says, I can prove my righteousness because the Father accepted me into His presence. - Can God accept anything in His presence that isn t righteous? No! Habakkuk 1:13a When Jesus entered into the presence of the Father, that was God saying, You are righteous. Well, if we have to be totally perfect, totally righteous, totally right to enter into God s presence, I ll never get there! - I want to show you something wonderful. When we receive Jesus Christ as our Savior, His righteousness is imputed to us and we enter into God s presence just as perfect as Jesus. - 2 Cor. 5:21 The old hymn says, I need no other argument, I need no other plea. It is enough that Jesus died, and that He died for me. C. The Nearness of Judgment - 16:11 Who is the prince of this world? Satan. When was he judged? At the cross. Jesus is not talking about future judgment. He s talking about past judgment. - The Greek word is a perfect passive and it means, Satan has been judged in the past, he continues to be judged and he will be judged in the future. He stands condemned and will one day be condemned to the lake of fire. Calvary and the resurrection was God s blow on Satan, crushing Him. His judgment was guaranteed. But Satan s judgment is a kind of judgment on every sinner. Every person who follows him will receive the same judgment as him. III. The Purpose of Conviction The Holy Spirit wants to convince us to trust Jesus so God won t have to convict us in the final judgment. Let me remind you again that the Spirit s conviction is a sign of God s mercy and grace toward us. 227 But just being under conviction is not salvation. - Godly sorrow leads to repentance. Repentance is an action word. It means to turn from your sin and to turn to Jesus. - What must I do to be saved? Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and you shall be saved. - John 1:12; Isa. 55:6-7 Acts 7:51 If you re lost, God wants you to feel uneasy with your rejection of Christ. There is no sin worse than that. There is a time, I know not when, A place, I know not where, Which marks the destiny of men To heaven or despair. There is a line, by us not seen, Which crosses every path; Beyond which God Himself has sworn That he who goes is lost. One from heaven is sent
To you who from God would depart, While it is called today, repent, And harden not your heart. Don t step over the line! Your destiny is at stake. A boy left home to work in the city. He promised his mom he would go to church on Sundays. The first Sunday his new friends invited him to go horseback riding. Remembering his promise, he refused at first. But then he relented at their insistence. Sunday morning came. As he began his horseback ride with his new friends, he remembered church back home. He could see his parents heading to the home church and remembered his promise. As he approached the middle of town on horseback, church bells invited him to the services. He continued to ride. As he reached the outskirts of town, the bells grew fainter and fainter. He stopped. He said, Guys, I come from a Christian home. I promised my mom I would go to church today. I noticed the bells are getting fainter the farther we go. A little more and I ll ride beyond the sound of the bells. Excuse me, but I m going back while I can still hear the bells. The bells of the Holy Spirit are ringing in your ears. Perhaps you heard them in childhood. The bells are ringing. As a young person, you heard the bells ringing----- Come to Jesus, come to Jesus. Now you re older and wiser. You can still hear the bells, but they are getting weaker. You may be getting close to the point where you ll never hear the bells again. Come to Jesus while you can still hear the bells! Let God s holy jealousy envelop you today.