I heard about a pastor who left the pastorate after twenty years, and decided to become a funeral director. Somebody asked him, "Why did you do that?"
He said, "Well, I spent about twelve years trying to straighten out John. He never did get straightened out. I spent fourteen months trying to straighten out the marriage of the Smiths, and it never did get straightened out. I spent three years trying to straighten out Susan, and she never did get straightened out. Now when I straighten them out, they stay straight."
Well, contrary to what many may think, it is not the job of the preacher to straighten anybody out. The fact of the matter is, I can't straighten anybody out. In truth, that is the job of the Holy Spirit. I can preach the truth and get it into your head, but only the Holy Spirit can impart the truth and get it into your heart.
It is not my job to get anyone to accept anything I preach. When you get right down to it, I couldn't do that if I wanted to. You really cannot convince and persuade people to believe in spiritual truth.
A man convinced against his will,
is of the same opinion still.
The truth of the matter is, anything that I could talk you into, eventually somebody else can come along and talk you out of.
A natural man cannot receive spiritual truth without supernatural help. If you are a soul-winner, and every Christian ought to be, understand that it is not your job to get people to accept the gospel, nor even to understand the gospel. It is your job to get people to hear the gospel and leave the rest to the Holy Spirit.
Whenever Charles Haddon Spurgeon would approach his pulpit to preach the gospel, he would be muttering under his breath: "I believe in the ministry of the Holy Spirit." Spurgeon knew what we need to learn, and that is, everything we do for the Lord Jesus Christ is totally dependent upon the ministry of the Holy Spirit.
As the old song goes: "All is vain unless the Spirit of the Holy One come down." For there are three things that must happen in the life of every person if they are ever going to be born again and come into the kingdom of God, and those three things can only be accomplished by the Holy Spirit.
I. Only The Spirit Can Convict You Of The Reality Of Sin
Jesus said that when the Holy Spirit came "He will convict the world of sin and of righteousness and of judgment: of sin because they do not believe in Me." (vv.8-9) The word convict literally means "to reprove." It is a legal term that describes how a jury or a judge would bring in a verdict of guilty. It could be translated "pronounce a verdict."
The Holy Spirit has been sent to convict us of our sin, and to show us that we are guilty of sin and need the forgiveness of God.
Now the Holy Spirit has not been sent merely to accuse us, but to convict us. There is a difference between Holy Spirit conviction, and Satanic accusation. Satan will accuse you of sins God has already forgiven. The Holy Spirit will convict you of sin which God has not yet forgiven. The Holy Spirit will convict you of two aspects of sin:
a. The Concept Of Sin
Now you would think that everybody believes in sin. But that is really not true. In our society, and all around the world, sin is becoming a forgotten term and a ludicrous concept. The great psychologist, Carl Menninger, once wrote a book entitled, "Whatever Happened to Sin?"
82% of the population of France consider themselves to be Catholic, and yet 90% of the population no longer believe in sin, and only 4% accept the concept at all. France is simply typical of a world at large that scoffs and mocks the notion of sin.
But even those who do believe in sin do not understand it. The world sees sin as something that is external—what a man does. But God sees sin as something internal—what a man is. Man is not a sinner because he sins, he sins because he is a sinner. A man is not a thief because he steals, he steals because he is a thief.
We are not just sinners by choice, we are sinners by nature; and we sin by choice because that is our nature. We do what we do because we are what we are.
Notice carefully that the Holy Spirit has been sent to convict us of sin, not sins. Now the world thinks that man's problem is sins: murder, lying, rape, stealing, etc. These are not man's problems. They are just symptoms. The problem is S-I-N. Sins are the fruit of man's problem, sin is the root of man's problem. We do what we do on the outside because of what we are on the inside.
The heart of the human problem is indeed the problem of the human heart. Jesus said in Jn. 15:19, "If you were of the world, the world would love its own. Yet because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you." Have you ever bitten into an apple and found a worm inside of that apple? If you have, oftentimes you will notice there is no hole in the apple.
Do you know how the worm got there? The worm did not bore its way into that apple. Instead he is trying to bore his way out. How does that happen? Well, the egg was laid in the blossom of that apple, and because the egg was in the blossom the worm was in the core. The worm began on the inside, trying to make its way to the outside. That is the way sin works. But you won't believe that unless the Holy Spirit convicts you it is true.
b. The Character Of Sin
But even if you were to believe in the concept of sin, the Holy Spirit must also convict you of the nature of sin. The Lord Jesus boiled sin down to one word: unbelief—"of sin because they do not believe in me." (v.9) Unbelief is the mother sin, the father sin, the parent sin, of all other sins.
The sin that doomed the human race in the Garden of Eden was the sin of unbelief. If Adam and Eve had simply believed what God told them to do and not to do, we would not be in the mess that we are in today.
But unbelief is not only the parent sin of all sins, it is the preeminent sin. In a word, unbelief is the unpardonable sin. God can forgive a man of practically any sin; I do not care how horrible, hurtful, or heinous it might be. But if a man dies steadfastly refusing to believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, there is no hope for him.
The sin of unbelief is actually a twofold sin. It is a sin of commission and it is a sin of omission. It is the sin of rejecting Jesus, and therefore the sin of refusing to receive the Lord Jesus.
Do you understand today that the only sin that will send a man to hell is unbelief? A man is not lost, without God doomed because he gambles, drinks, cheats, lies, or steals. Jesus died for everyone of those sins, can forgive everyone of those sins. But the one sin that kills eternally is the sin of refusing to believe in the Lord Jesus Christ.
Jesus himself said in Jn. 3:17-18, "For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through Him might be saved. He who believes in Him is not condemned; but he who does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God." Now a courtroom can convict you of crime, your conscience can convict you of guilt, but only the Holy Spirit can convict you of sin.
Many of you will remember the first sermon ever preached in the book of Acts on the day of Pentecost, when the Apostle Peter preached on repentance and faith in Christ, and 3,000 people were saved in one day. But do you understand that if Peter had preached that the day before, which is the day before the Holy Spirit had come, no one would have been saved.
Those 3,000 people were not saved because of Peter's brilliance, eloquence, or intelligence. It was not the witness of Peter that saved them, it was the work of the Holy Spirit.
The worst sin on planet earth today is the sin of unbelief. It is the only sin that dooms a man, and damns a man, and spiritually separates a man from God. You show me a person who does not believe in Jesus Christ, and I do not care how morally he lives, or how much he gives, he is the most vile sinner on this earth.
You show me a person who does not believe in sin, and I will show you a person who cannot believe in Jesus Christ, because the essence of sin is unbelief.
The Lord Jesus Christ died between two thieves hanging on two crosses. One died a saved thief, one died a lost thief; one is in hell today cursing God, one is in heaven today praising God. The only difference between those two thieves was unbelief.
The greatest sin in the world is the sin of refusing to belief in Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior. But only the Holy Spirit can convict you of that truth.
II. Only The Spirit Can Convey To You The Remedy For Sin
Jesus goes on to say in v.10 that the Holy Spirit has come to show us the concept "of righteousness." Obviously, if the world does not understand sin, it cannot understand righteous-ness. For the world thinks that men are sinners if they do bad, and they are righteous if they do good.
But a man is not righteous because of what he does. A man is righteous because of what he is. Righteousness is not an external act primarily. Righteousness is an internal condition. You see, because man is a sinner he is presented with a great problem that Job put succinctly in Job 9:2, "But how can a man be righteous before God?" You see, the problem is God is righteous, but we are not. If we are going to be right with God, we must have a God-kind of righteousness.
There are actually two kinds of righteousness: There is man's righteousness and there is God's righteousness. The reason why the Jewish nation today is so hardened against the Lord Jesus Christ, and refuses to be saved, is because they insist on having a human righteousness as opposed to heaven's righteousness.
Paul said of them in Rom. 10:3, "For they being ignorant of God's righteousness, and seeking to establish their own righteousness, have not submitted to the righteousness of God." The world spells righteousness D-O. The Philippian jailer came to Paul and said, "What must I do to be saved?" (Acts 16:30)
The rich young ruler came to Jesus and said, "What shall I do that I may inherit eternal life?" (Mark 10:7) The world thinks that being good, doing good, living good, acting good, is all that matters. If a man acts good on the outside and does his best, it will all turn out for good in the end.
There are two problems with that. First of all, our righteousness is totally unacceptable to God. Is. 64:6 says, "Our righteousnesses are like filthy rags." Those filthy rags referred to the vile bandages that would be taken from the sores of a leper.
Now you think about taking bandages with blood and mucus and all kinds of human infection, and offering those up as a sacrifice to God. That is exactly what your righteousness is to the Lord. As a matter of fact, the worst form of human badness is human goodness when you try to substitute that human goodness for the grace of God.
You see, our best righteousness is actually the worst kind of unrighteousness when compared to God's perfect righteousness. Oftentimes unrighteousness in the Bible is described in terms of our not being straight. In other words, we are crooked. It is not by accident that we often refer to criminals as "crooks." We call them crooks because they are crooked, they are not straight. Well, in one sense we are all crooked compared to the straightness of God, who alone is straight.
If you took a cup and lined every human being who has ever lived on this earth, and you passed that cup from one hand to the next, and each person was allowed to put his very best righteousness, all of his best goodness in that cup, and you passed that from one human being to the next one, and gave it to every human being who ever lived, when that cup reached the end of the line, there would not be enough righteousness in that cup to save a little baby. But only the Holy Spirit can prove that to you.
Now the other problem is this: God does spell righteousness D-O, he spells it D-O-N-E. Jesus said in v.10, "of righteousness, because I go to My Father." Jesus had come from the Father, so He could now go to the Father. Now only a righteous man can go to a righteous God. Jesus had said earlier in Jn. 14:6, "No man can come to the Father but through Me."
A sinner cannot go to a righteous God alone. But he can go to a righteous God through His righteous Son, the Lord Jesus Christ. You see, we are not righteous, but Jesus is righteous. He gives to us the God-kind of righteousness that we need to be righteous before God. The reason Jesus died on the cross for our sins is to give us that kind of righteousness. "For He made Him who knew no sin to be sin for us, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him." (II Cor. 5:21)
A righteous God can only allow a righteous man into heaven. But a man can only be righteous by accepting the righteousness of the Lord Jesus Christ.
My hope is built on nothing less
than Jesus' blood and righteousness;
Dressed in his righteousness alone
faultless to stand before the throne.
Get it down in your heart. Sin is not doing bad, and righteousness is not doing good. Sin is the rejection of Jesus, righteousness is the reception of Jesus. But only the Holy Spirit can convey that truth to you.
III. Only The Holy Spirit Can Convince You Of The Result Of Sin
The Holy Spirit finally came to convince us "of judgment because the ruler of this world is judged." (v.11) Now we are not told that Satan is going to be judged, but rather he has been judged.
If you are on Satan's side, I just want you to understand you are sailing a sinking ship. Even as Satan fastened his evil fangs onto the heel of the Savior as He died on that cross, that foot came out of that tomb and crushed his head. What the Holy Spirit wants to tell you is that Satan is a loser, and sin cannot win.
Now why does Jesus bring in the devil? You see, the devil is the father of all sin. Therefore he is the father of all sinners. Now if the father has been judged, so will his children. If you have never received Jesus, as a child of the devil you are going to receive the judgment he would receive. If Satan, the king of sin, has not escaped judgment, neither will his subjects. But only the Holy Spirit can convince you that that is true.
Dr. R. A. Torrey, a great preacher, was traveling one time through the countryside, and he stopped at a little family hotel. He asked the proprietor if it would be all right if he gave a devotion to the family since it was kind of a family hotel? The proprietor said, "All right."
Well, Dr. Torrey gathered everybody together, and being a great man of God just opened up the Bible and began to teach it. After it was over, Dr. Torrey, just on a spiritual hunch, looked around and said, "Was everyone here?" The owner said, "Well, almost everyone. There's a little maid back in the kitchen." They called her a scullery maid. In other words, she washed the pots and pans. She refused to come in because she was so dirty and did not feel presentable.
Well, that great preacher went back in the kitchen and sat down by her and looked at her and said, "Young lady, are you a Christian?" She bowed her head and started to weep. She said, "No sir, I am not." He said, "Well, do you want to be a Christian?" She said, "Well, I don't know how to." This is what Dr. Torrey felt impressed to tell her to do.
Dr. Torrey said, "Would you just take the New Testament and begin to read it, and say as you read: ‘Lord, show me myself?'" She said, "I will." Dr. Torrey left that night.
A few months later he came back, and the proprietor of that hotel said, "What did you do to that young lady?" He said, "What do you mean?" He said, "Ever since you have been here she has been moaning and crying, she will hardly eat, she is losing weight, she looks terrible."
Dr. Torrey went in to see her. He said, "Lady, tell me what has happened to you." "Oh," she said, "You told me to read the Bible and say, ‘Show me myself.'" She said, "Dr. Torrey, I have been reading the Bible over and over and God has shown me what a wretched sinner I am. God has shown me that I am lost, and God has shown me that I am doomed for hell."
Dr. Torrey said, "Now young lady, I want you to continue to read the New Testament. But this time as you read it, I want you to pray before you read, ‘Lord, show me Thyself.'" Three years later Dr. Torrey was in that same area. After he preached at a certain church a well dressed, beautiful, cultured, elegant young lady came up and took him by the hand and said, "Dr. Torrey, do you remember me?" He said, "No, I do not believe I do."
She said, "I was a scullery maid just a few years ago. You stayed in our hotel a couple of times and you talked to me. You gave me a Bible and told me to read it and say, ‘Show me myself.' God showed me what a sinner I was." She said, "But then I read the Scripture again and said, ‘Lord, show me Thyself.' He showed Himself to me to be gracious and loving, ready to forgive me of my sins. He showed me how He died for my sins, and I repented of my sin and trusted Christ as my personal Savior."
Now the question is this: Who convicted her of her sinfulness? Who conveyed to her real righteousness? Who convinced her of certain judgment? It wasn't Dr. R. A. Torrey. It was the Holy Spirit of God. Now the Holy Spirit can convict you of sin. The Holy Spirit can convey to you righteousness. The Holy Spirit can convince you of judgment.
But you can still refuse to accept the verdict. If you do, you have no one to blame but yourself. I want you to imagine that a man goes to a doctor. He has a deadly disease. Now the doctor has the remedy and the cure for that disease. But assume that the patient, for whatever reason, refuses to take the cure, and he dies.
Here is the question: What killed that patient? Was it the disease? Not really. It was the rejection of the cure. This moment God's Holy Spirit is speaking to many of you, convicting you of your sin of rejecting Jesus, conveying to you the righteousness that Jesus alone has and can give, and convincing you of the judgment that will surely come if you refuse Jesus. Listen to the Spirit. Allow His ministry to become real in your life. Follow His leading and come to Jesus.