The Holy Spirit’s Threefold Conviction of Men

The Holy Spirit's Threefold Conviction of Men

(No. 1708)

DELIVERED ON LORD'S-DAY MORNING, FEBRUARY 25, 1883,

BY C. H. SPURGEON,

AT THE METROPOLITAN TABERNACLE, NEWINGTON.

"And when He is come, He wiil reprove the world of sin, and of
righteousness, and of judgment: of sin, because they believe not on Me;
of righteousness, because I go to My Father, and you see Me no more; of
judgment, because the prince of this world is judged." John 16:8-11.

THE Apostles had a stern task before them. They were to go into all
nations and proclaim the Gospel to every creature, beginning at
Jerusalem. Remember, only two or three years before they were simple
fishermen engaged upon the Galilean Lake–men of little or no
education, men of no rank or standing. At best they were but Jews and
that nation was despised everywhere, while these peasants were not even
men of repute among their own nation! Yet these men were to turn the
world upside down! They were told by their Lord that they would be
brought before rulers and kings for His sake and that they would be
persecuted wherever they went. They were to proclaim the Gospel in the
teeth of the imperial power of Rome, the ancient wisdom of Greece and
the fierce cruelties of barbaric lands. And they were to set up the
kingdom of peace and righteousness.

At the very time when they were about to receive their commission, they
were also to lose the bodily Presence of their great Leader. While He
was with them, they had felt no fear. If they were puzzled at any time
by the Scribes and Pharisees, they resorted to Jesus, and they were
rescued from bewilderment. Never man spoke like that Man! Never did
such wisdom and prudence dwell in any mind as dwelt in the mind of
Christ! His Presence was their protection, the broad shield behind
which they securely stood, whatever shafts might be shot at them by
their adversaries. But now that He was to depart out of the world unto
the Father, they would be deprived of their fortress and high
tower–they would be as children bereft of their father, or, at best,
as soldiers without a general. Here was a sad case. Work given and
power with-drawn–a battle beginning and the conquering Captain
leaving.

How happy it was for these disciples that our blessed Lord could tell
them that His going away would be for their gain rather than for their
loss! For when He was gone, the Spirit of God would come to be an
Advocate for them and with them, and by His power they would be able to
silence all their enemies and achieve their mission! The Holy Spirit
was to be their Comforter, that they might not be afraid, and their
Advocate, that they might not be baffled. When they spoke, there would
be a power within them suggesting their words, a power with those words
convincing their hearers, and a power in their hearers causing the word
spoken to abide in their memories–that power would be Divine, the
power of the Holy Spirit, who is One God with the Father and the Son.

It is one thing for men to speak, and quite another thing for God to
speak through men. The work of proclaiming the Gospel to the world was
far too great for the 12, but it was by no means too great for the
Spirit of God! Who can limit His power? Is anything too hard for the
Lord? The Holy Spirit being their Helper, these feeble men were equal
to the task which God had committed to their trust. The Presence of the
Holy Spirit was better for them than the bodily Presence of the Lord
Jesus. The Lord Jesus could only have been in one place as to His
corporeal Presence, but the Holy Spirit could be everywhere! The sight
of Jesus would but appeal to the senses, but the power of the Holy
Spirit touched the heart and worked spiritual life and saving faith!
Thus, by His own withdrawal and the sending of the Spirit, our Lord
furnished His servants for the conflict.

We will, at this time, observe what the Holy Spirit did as an Advocate.
The passage cannot be fully understood unless we give it three
renderings. But I do not pretend that even then, we shall have pressed
from this choice cluster, all the generous wine of its meaning! To my
mind, it is a compendium of all the work of the Spirit of God. By our
three readings we shall see much–first, the Spirit of God goes with
the preaching of the Gospel to reprove men of sin–and so to embarrass
them in the presence of the preacher of righteousness. Secondly (and
this is a much more blessed result), to

convict men of sin and so to lead them to repentance towards God and
faith in our Lord Jesus Christ. And, thirdly, the ultimate result of
the Holy Spirit's work will be to convict men before all intelligent
beings of having been guilty of the grossest sin–having opposed the
most perfect righteousness and of having defied the most glorious
judgment. We shall try to see the meaning of the passage through these
three windows.

I. First, we believe that a promise is here made to the servants of
Christ that when they go forth to preach the Gospel the Holy Spirit
will be with them TO REPROVE MEN. By this is meant, not so much to save
them as to silence them. When the minister of Christ stands up to plead
his Master's cause, another Advocate appears in court, whose pleadings
would make it hard for men to resist the Truth of God. Observe how this
reproof was given with regard to sin. On the day of Pentecost the
disciples spoke with many different tongues, as the Spirit gave them
utterance. Men from all countries under Heaven heard themselves
addressed in their native tongues! This was a great marvel and all
Jerusalem rang with it!

And when Peter stood up to preach to the assembled multitude and told
the Jews that they had crucified the Holy One and the Just, the signs
and wonders worked by the Spirit in the name of Jesus were a witness
which they could not refute. The very fact that the Spirit of God had
given to these unlettered men the gift of tongues was evidence that
Jesus of Nazareth, of whom they spoke, was no impostor! It was laid
down in the old Jewish Law that if a man prophesied and his prophecies
did not come to pass, he was to be condemned as a false prophet. But if
that which he said came to pass, then he was a true Prophet. Now, the
Lord Jesus Christ had promised the outpouring of the Spirit, which had
also been foretold in reference to the Messiah by the Prophet Joel.
When, therefore, that mark of the true Messiah was set upon Jesus of
Nazareth by the coming of the Holy Spirit and the working of miracles,
men were reproved for having refused to believe in Jesus.

The evidence was brought home to them that they had, with wicked hands,
crucified the Lord of Glory–and so they stood reproved. All the
subsequent miracles went to prove the same thing, for when the Apostles
worked miracles, the world was reproved of sin because it believed not
on Christ. It was not that a few disciples testified to the sin of the
race, but the Holy Spirit, Himself, made men tremble, as by His deeds
of power, He bore witness to the Lord Jesus and exhibited the fact that
in crucifying Jesus, the world had put to death the Incarnate Son of
God! Do you not see the terrible power with which the first disciples
were thus armed? It was more to them than the rod in the hand of Moses
with which he smote Pharaoh with so many plagues. It needed all the
willfulness of that stiff-necked generation to resist the Holy Spirit
and refuse to bow before Him whom they had pierced–they were full of
malice and obstinacy–but in their secret hearts they were sore put to
it and felt that they were fighting against God.

Do you not see, too, dear Friends, how the working of the Holy Spirit
with the Apostles and their immediate followers was a wonderful rebuke
to the world concerning the matter of righteousness? Jesus was gone and
His Divine example no longer stood out like clear light reproving their
darkness–but the Holy Spirit attested that righteousness and compelled
them to feel that Jesus was the Holy One and that His cause was
righteous. The teaching of the Apostles, sealed by the Holy Spirit,
made the world see what righteousness was as they had never seen it
before! A fresh standard of morals was set up in the world and it has
never been taken down–it stands in its place to rebuke, if not to
improve! The world was then sunk in the uttermost depths of vice–even
its good men were loathsome! But now another kind of righteousness was
exhibited in the teachings of the Lord Jesus and the Spirit came to set
the seal of Divine approval to it so that if men continued in sin, it
might be against light and knowledge, for they now knew what was
righteousness and could no longer be mistaken upon that point. God was
with the preachers of a new righteousness and by many different signs
and wonders He attested the cause of the Gospel.

Now, Brothers, we also rejoice in this, seeing that the witness of the
Truth of God is for all time and we know of a surety that the Kingdom
which our Lord Jesus has set up among men is Divinely sanctioned as the
Kingdom of Righteousness which, in the end, shall grind to powder the
powers of evil! We are the covenanted servants of a Lord whose
righteousness was declared among men by the personal witness of God the
Holy Spirit. Are you not glad to be enlisted in such a service? Oh,
world, are you not embarrassed for resisting such a kingdom? These 12
fishermen could not, of themselves, have exhibited a new standard of
righteousness among men! They could not, on their own, have set before
all nations a higher ideal of moral excellence! But when the eternal
power and majesty of the Godhead vouched for the righteousness of the
Lord Jesus, the course of the Apostolic Church became like that of the
sun in the heavens!

"Their line is gone out through all the earth, and their words to the
end of the world." None could stand against them, for, as when the
morning breaks, the darkness flies and the bats and the night birds
hasten away, so when the messengers of mercy proclaimed the
Righteousness of God, man's hypocrisy and self-glorying fled away!
Then, too, they were made to feel that a judgment had come; that
somehow the life and the death of Jesus of Nazareth had made a crisis
in the world's history and condemned the way and manner of the ungodly.
All historians must confess that the turning point of the race is the
Cross of Christ. From that moment the power of evil received its mortal
wound! It dies hard, but from that hour it was doomed. At the death of
our Lord, the heathen oracles were struck dumb. There had been oracles
all over the world, either the product of evil spirits or of crafty
priests, but after the Christian era the world ceased to believe in
these voices and they were no more heard.

Systems of false worship, so firmly rooted in prejudice and custom that
it seemed impossible that they should ever be overthrown, were torn up
by their roots by the breath of the Lord. The Apostles might have said
to all the systems of falsehood, "as a bowing wall shall you be, and as
a tottering fence." Men could not help perceiving that the Prince of
Darkness had been cast down from his undivided power and that he spoke,
from then on, with bated breath. The Seed of the woman had met the old
serpent and, in the duel between them, He had gained such a victory
that the cause of evil was henceforth hopeless. Moreover, the thought
flashed upon humanity more clearly than ever–there would be a Day of
Judgment! Men heard and felt the truth of the warning that God would
judge the world, at the last, by the Man, Christ Jesus!

The dim forms of Rhadamanthus on a cloudy judgment seat and of the
assembly before his throne, and of the crowds divided according to
their lives, now began to assume another and far more definite shape.
It was written on the heart of mankind that there is a judgment to
come! Men will rise again! They shall stand before the Judgment Seat of
Christ to give an account of the things done in the body, whether good
or evil. The world heard this and the tidings have never been
forgotten! The Holy Spirit has reproved men by the prospect of
judgment! The Holy Spirit attested the life of Christ, the teaching of
the Apostles and all the grand Truths of God that were contained
therein, by what He did in the way of miracles and by what He did in
the way of enlightening, impressing and subduing human hearts.
Henceforth man is accused and rebuked by the great Advocate! And all
who remain in opposition to the Lord Jesus, remain so in defiance of
the clearest proofs of His mission. He who rejects human testimony when
it is true is foolish, but he who despises the witness of the Holy
Spirit is profane, for he calls the Spirit of Truth a liar! Let him
beware lest he so sin against the Holy Spirit as to come under the most
terrible of curses–for it is written of him that speaks against the
Holy Spirit–"he has no forgiveness."

Brothers and Sisters, does not that put the Apostles in quite a
different position from that in which they appeared to be? If we judge
according to sense and carnal reason, their adventure was Quixotic,
their success was impossible! Everybody would have said to them, "Go
back to your nets and to your boats. What can you do against the
established system of Judaism in your own country? And if that is too
hard for you, what will you be able to do in other lands? There are
nations that have been tutored in their own learning for thousands of
years and have become adept in all the arts and sciences! They have
brought all the charms of poetry, music and statuary to support their
idolatrous systems–you are fools to think that you unlearned and
ignorant men can ever overturn all this!"

Would not prudence agree with this? Yes, but if God is in these men–if
He that dwelt in the bush at Horeb and made it burn, though it was not
consumed–will dwell in them and each one of them shall be gifted with
a tongue of fire, this is a different business altogether! Surely, He
that made the world, could make it new! He that said, "Let there be
light, and there was light," could command light to shine upon the
moral and spiritual night. Thus much upon the first reading of the
text. Let us advance to that which will more interest you.

II. The Holy Spirit was to go with the preaching of the Word of God TO
CONVINCE MEN of three great prominent Truths of God. This was to be a
saving Word–they are to be so convinced as to repent of sin, to accept
of righteousness and yield themselves to the judgment of the Lord. Here
we see as in a map, the work of the Spirit upon the hearts of those who
are ordained unto eternal life! Those three effects are all necessary
and each one is, in the highest degree, important to true conversion.
First, the Holy Spirit is come to convince men of sin. It is absolutely
necessary that men should be convinced of sin.

The fashionable theology of the day is–"Convince men of the goodness
of God! Show them the universal fatherhood and assure them of unlimited
mercy. Win them by God's love, but never mention His wrath against sin,
or the need of an Atonement, or the possibility of there being a place
of punishment! Do not censure poor creatures for their failings. Do not
judge and condemn. Do not search the heart or lead men to be
low-spirited and sorrowful. Comfort and encourage, but never accuse and
threaten!" Yes, that is the way of man–but the way of the Spirit of
God is very different! He comes on purpose to convince men of sin, to
make them feel that they are guilty, greatly guilty–so guilty that
they are lost, ruined and undone! He comes to remind them not only of
God's loveliness, but of their own ^loveliness–of their own enmity and
hatred to this God of Love and, consequently, of their terrible sin in
thus ill-using One so infinitely kind.

The Holy Spirit does not come to make sinners comfortable in their
sins, but to cause them to grieve over their sins! He does not help
them to forget their sin, or think little of it, but He comes to
convince them of the horrible enormity of their iniquity! It is no work
of the Spirit to pipe to men's dancing–He does not bring forth flute,
harp, dulcimer and all kinds of music to charm the unbelieving into a
good opinion of themselves–He comes to make sin appear sin and to let
us see its fearful consequences! He comes to wound so that no human
balm can heal! He comes to kill so that no earthly power can make us
live! The flowers bedeck the meadows when the grass is green, but lo, a
burning wind comes from the desert and the grass withers and the
flowers fall away. What is it that makes the beauty and excellence of
human righteousness to wither as the green herb? Isaiah says it is
"because the Spirit of the Lord blows upon it."

There is a withering work of the Spirit of God which we must experience
or we shall never know His quickening and restoring power. This
withering is a most necessary experience and, just now, needs much to
be insisted on. Today we have so many built up who were never pulled
down; so many filled who were never emptied; so many exalted who were
never humbled that I, the more earnestly, remind you that the Holy
Spirit must convince us of sin or we cannot be saved! This work is most
necessary because without it there is no leading men to receive the
Gospel of the Grace of God. We cannot make headway with certain people
because they profess faith very readily, but they are not convinced of
anything. "Oh, yes, we are sinners, no doubt, and Christ died for
sinners"–that is the free-and-easy way with which they handle heavenly
mysteries–as if they were the nonsense verses of a boy's exercise, or
the stories of Mother Goose!

This is all mockery and we are weary of it. But get near a real sinner
and you have found a man you can deal with–I mean the man who is a
sinner and there is no mistake about it–he mourns in his inmost soul
that he is so. In such a man you find one who will welcome the Gospel,
welcome Grace and welcome a Savior. To him the news of pardon will be
as cold water to a thirsty soul–and the Doctrines of Grace will be as
honey dropping from the comb! "A sinner," says one of our songsters,
"is a sacred thing"–the Holy Spirit has made Him so. Your sham sinner
is a horrid creature, but a man truly convinced of sin by the Spirit of
God is a being to be sought after as a jewel that will adorn the crown
of the Redeemer!

Note here, that the Spirit of God comes to convince men of sin because
they never will be convinced of sin apart from His Divine advocacy. A
natural conscience touched by the Spirit of God may do a good deal in
the way of showing a man his faults. It may thus make him uneasy and
may bring about a reformation of life. But it is only the Spirit of God
that, to the full extent, convinces a man of sin so as to bring forth
repentance, self-despair and faith in Jesus. For what is the sin that
you and I are guilty of? Ah, Brothers and Sisters, it is not easy to
tell, but this I know, that the extent of sin is never known till the
Spirit of God reveals the secret chambers of the heart's abominations.
We do a thousand things that we do not know to be sin till the Spirit
of God enlightens us and pleads the cause of holiness in us.

What natural man, for instance, ever laments over evil thoughts or
desires, or the imaginations which flit across his mind? Yet all these
are sins and sins which cause a gracious heart the deepest distress! If
we were never actually to commit evil, yet if we desire to do so, we
have already sinned! And if we feel pleasure in thinking of evil, we
have already sinned. This poison is in our nature and shows itself in a
thousand ways. The fact that we not only sin, but are, by nature,
sinful, is one which our pride kicks against–and we will not learn it
till the Spirit of God teaches it to us. Neither does any man know the
exceeding sinfulness of sin till the Light of God falls upon the black
mass from the Holy Spirit. Every sin is, as it were, an assault upon
God's Throne, Glory and life. Sin would dethrone the Most High and
destroy Him if it could–but men do not see this. They talk of sin most
lightly and know not that it scatters firebrands and death.

I tell you, when the Spirit of God makes a man see sin in its naked
deformity, he is horrified! When I saw, or thought I saw, the
heinousness of sin, it was intolerable and I had no rest in my spirit.
Some such sight we must all have, or we shall never look to the Lord
Jesus to take away our sin. None but those whose wounds smart are
likely to apply for the heavenly balm. The Holy Spirit dwells upon one
point in particular–"of sin, because they believe not on Me." None see
the sin of unbelief except by His light. A man thinks, "Well, if I have
not believed in Christ, that is a pity, perhaps, but still, I was never
a thief, or a liar, or a drunk, or unchaste. Unbelief is a matter of
very little consequence. I can set that right at any time." But the
Holy Spirit makes a man see that not to believe in Christ is a
crowning, damning sin, since, "he that believes not has made God a
liar"–and what can be more atrocious than that?

He who believes not on Christ has rejected God's mercy and has done
despite to the grandest display of God's love! He has despised God's
unspeakable Gift and trampled on the blood of Christ! In this he has
dishonored God on a very tender point. He has insulted Him concerning
His only-begotten Son! How I wish that the Spirit of God would come
upon unbelievers, here, and make them see what they are and where they
are with regard to the one and only Savior! How shall they escape, who
neglect so great a salvation? It will not matter how feebly I speak
this morning if the Spirit of God will only work by the Truth of God on
you–you will perceive the greatness of your crime and you will never
rest until you have believed on the Lord Jesus–and found forgiveness
for your high offense against the bleeding Lamb!

So far, then, upon the first operation of the Holy Spirit. The next
work of the Spirit is to convince men of righteousness, that is to say,
in Gospel terms, to show them that they have no righteousness of their
own and no means of working righteousness–and that apart from Grace
they are condemned! Thus He leads them to value the righteousness of
God which is, upon all them that believe, a righteousness which covers
sin and renders them acceptable with God. Lend me your ears a moment
while I call your attention to a great wonder! Among men, if a person
is convicted of wrong-doing, the next step is judgment. A young man,
for instance, has been in the service of an employer and he has
embezzled money–he is convicted of the theft by process of law and
found guilty. What follows next?

Why, judgment is pronounced and he must suffer the penalty! But observe
how our gracious God interpolates another process. Truly, His ways are
not our ways! "He shall convince of sin." The next step would be
judgment, but no, the Lord inserts an up to now unknown middle term and
convinces "of righteousness." Be amazed at this! The Lord takes a man,
even when he is sinful and conscious of that sin, and makes him
righteous on the spot by putting away his sin and justifying him by the
righteousness of faith, a righteousness which comes to him by the
worthiness of Another who has worked out a righteousness for him! Can
that be? Brothers and Sisters, this seems to be unthinkable–so
impossible that it needs the Spirit of God to convince men of it!

I may now set forth the great plan whereby the Lord Jesus is made of
God unto us righteousness! I may show how the Son of God became Man
that He might fully keep the Law of God for us and, having done so, and
having added His passive obedience to His active service, He presented
to His Father a complete vindication of His injured Law so that every
man that believes on Him shall be delivered from condemnation and
accepted in the Beloved! I might also tell how Christ's righteousness
is set to our account so that faith is reckoned unto us for
righteousness, even as was the case with faithful Abraham. Yet all my
labor will be in vain till the Spirit shall make it plain! Many hear
the gladsome tidings, but they do not receive the Truth of God, for
they are not convinced of it. They need to be persuaded of it before
they will embrace it–and that persuasion is not in my power.

Did I hear one remark, "I cannot see this way of righteousness"? I
answer, No, and you never will until the Spirit of God convinces you of
it! Note well the great point of the Spirit's argument–"Of
righteousness, because I go to My Father and you see Me no more." Our
Lord was sent into the world to work out a righteousness and here, He
says, "I go." But He would not go till He had done His work. He says,
also, "I go to My Father." But He would not go back to His Father till
He had fulfilled His Covenant engagements. "I go to My Father," that
is, I go to receive a reward and to sit upon My Father's Throne. But He
could not have received this Glory if He had not finished His appointed
work! Behold, then, Christ has finished a righteousness which is freely
given to all them that believe! And all those who trust in Christ are,
for His sake, rewarded as righteous before God–and are, in fact,
righteous, so that Paul says, "Who is he that condemns?"

His ground for asking that question is the same as that which the
Spirit uses in my text. Paul says, "It is Christ that died, yes,
rather, that is risen again, who is even at the right hand of God, who
also makes intercession for us." He

quotes, as the Holy Spirit does, the resurrection, ascension and
enthronement of the great Intercessor as the proof positive that there
is a perfect righteousness for all believing sinners! I know that many
will say, "This is making people righteous who are not righteous" and,
therefore, they will raise many objections. Just so! This is the Glory
of God, that He justifies the ungodly and saves sinners by Christ.
"Blessed is the man unto whom the Lord imputes not iniquity."

"I do not see it," cries one. And our answer is, "We know you do not!
We are not in the least surprised that you reject our testimony–we
never expected you to receive it unless the arm of the Lord should be
revealed and the Holy Spirit should convince you of righteousness." No
man comes to Christ who is not drawn of the Father and enlightened by
the Spirit! But if the Spirit convinces you, we shall soon hear you
sing–

"Jesus, Your blood and righteousness My beauty are, my glorious dress!
Midst flaming worlds, in these arrayed, With joy shall I lift up my
head." Dear people of God, pray hard that the Spirit of God may, even
now, convince unbelievers that the only true righteousness for mortal
men is that which comes not by the works of the Law, but by the hearing
of faith!

But then comes a third point, the Spirit of God is to convince men of
judgment. To whom is this judgment committed? "The Father has committed
all judgment unto the Son." The true penitent feels that if he had all
his sins forgiven him, yet it will not serve his turn so long as he
lies wallowing in sin. He feels that the great enemy of his soul must
be dethroned, or else forgiveness, itself, will afford him no rest of
heart. He must be rescued from the power as well as from the guilt of
sin, or else he abides in bondage. He must see the power of evil hewn
in pieces before the Lord, as Samuel hewed Agag of old. Listen, O
troubled one! You shall be set free, for, "the prince of this world is
judged." Jesus came to destroy the works of the devil–and on the
Cross, our Redeemer judged Satan, overcame him and cast him down!

Satan is now a condemned criminal, a vanquished rebel. His reigning
power over all Believers is broken. He has great wrath, knowing that
his time is short, but that wrath is held in check by his Conqueror! In
His passion, our Lord fought Satan foot to foot and overcame him,
spoiling principalities and powers and making a show of them openly,
triumphing over them in it. Do you believe this? May the Spirit of God
convince you of it! O tried Believer, the Lord Jesus overthrew the
devil for you! He crushed the powers of darkness for you! Believing in
Him, you shall find evil dethroned in you and all the forces of sin
hurled from their high places! You shall overcome through the blood of
the Lamb! Again, I ask, do you believe this? Christ is made of God unto
us sanctification–He saves His people from their sins–He makes them
holy and so breaks in pieces their enemy.

Though it will cost you many a conflict and the beaded sweat may, in
the hour of temptation, stand upon your brow as you fear that you will
fall from holiness, yet the Lord shall bruise Satan under your feet,
shortly, for He has already bruised him under His own feet on your
behalf! The Spirit of God is needed to convince our unbelieving hearts
that it is so. Most men dream that they must overcome sin by their own
strength. Alas, the strong armed man still keeps the house against our
feebleness. You have a pretty piece of work before you if, in your own
strength, you venture on this conflict. I can hear the devil laughing
at you even now! This leviathan is not to be tamed by you. Job would
say, "Will you play with him as with a bird?" Do you think the devil is
as easily managed as a woman carries her pet bird on her finger and
puts it to her lip to peck a seed?

Can you draw out leviathan with a hook? Will he speak soft words unto
you? Will you take him to be a servant forever? Your arrows cannot come
at him, nor your sword wound him! "Lay your hand upon him, remember the
battle, do no more." A Divine power is needed and that power is ready
to display itself if it is humbly sought! Many who are convinced of the
righteousness of Christ are not yet fully convinced that evil is
judged, condemned and cast down. They are haunted with the dread that
they may yet perish by the hand of the enemy. Oh, my Brothers and
Sisters, see the need of the Holy Spirit to advocate in your heart the
cause of and Truth of God–and make you believe that the Lord Jesus has
supreme power over every enemy!

I sometimes meet with a Christian who tells me the world is all going
to the bad, the Gospel is being utterly defeated, Christ is routed, the
devil is waving the black flag and shouting victory. I know how
terrible is the conflict, but I believe that my Lord Jesus has judged
the whole kingdom of evil and, in that fact I see Satan fall like
lightning from Heaven! Our Lord must reign! His enemies must lick the
dust! We shall judge the fallen angels at the Last Great Day and,
meanwhile, a believing life is a life of triumph over the arch enemy!
In the power of the Spirit it shall be proven that truth is

mightier than error, love is stronger than hate and holiness is higher
than sin, for the Lord's right hand and His holy arm have gotten Him
the victory! Behold how the ascended Savior leads captivity captive!
See how He comes from Edom with dyed garments from Bozrah, for He has
trodden sin and Hell in the winepress and now He travels in the
greatness of His strength, speaking in righteousness, mighty to save!

Let me run again over this ground, that we may not overlook anything.
Dear Friends, those of us who are saved still need the Holy Spirit with
us every day to convince us of sin! Good men do, at this hour, most
complacently, things which, in clearer light, they would never think of
doing! May the Holy Spirit continually show us layer after layer of
sin, that we may remove it. May He reveal to us rank after rank of sin,
that we may conquer all its forces. May He especially make known to us
the sin of not believing in Christ, for even we have our doubts and
fears. After a sermon concerning sin, the poor child of God cries out,
"I dare not believe! I am afraid I shall be lost, after all." This
unbelief is another sin. Strange way of escaping from sin by plunging
into it!

To doubt the Lord is to add sin to sin! No sin is more pernicious than
the sin of not believing. Whenever our heart distrusts the Lord, we
grieve His Spirit–therefore we always need the Holy Spirit to convince
us of this evil and bitter thing–and to lead us to trust after a
child-like fashion. Any mistrust of God's promise; any fear of failure
on God's part; any thought of His unfaithfulness is a crime against the
honor of the Divine majesty! Oh, convincing Spirit, dwell with me from
day to day convincing me of sin and especially making me to feel that
the worst of all evils is to question my faithful Friend. So, also, may
you always have the Spirit of God dwelling with you, convincing you of
righteousness.

May those of you who are, indeed, Believers, never question but what
you are righteous before God. We who believe are made the righteousness
of God in Christ Jesus! Are we assured of this? If so, do not think and
talk as if you were still under the curse of the Law, for you are no
longer in any such condition. "Therefore being justified by faith, we
have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ." "There is,
therefore, now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus." Oh,
may the Spirit of God convince you of that every day–and convince you
of it on the ground that Jesus is reigning yonder at the Father's right
hand!. The interest of each Believer in His Lord is clear and sure. If
Jesus is there, I am there. If the Father has accepted Him, He has
accepted me!

Do you catch the logic of it? You are in Christ, you are one with
Him–as He is, so are you in Him! Hold fast to the fact that you are
not condemned. How can you be? You are at the right hand of God in
Christ. You, condemned? Why, you are "accepted in the Beloved," for
your Representative is accepted by God and made to sit upon His Throne!
Jesus is exalted, not for Himself, alone, but for all those who believe
in Him! May the blessed Spirit fully convince you of this grand Truth
of God!

And, next, may He convince you of judgment–namely, that you have been
judged and your enemy has been judged and condemned. The Day of
Judgment is not a thing to be dreaded by a Believer. We have stood our
trial, and have been acquitted. Our Representative has borne the
penalty of our sin. Our chastisement is passed, for Jesus has borne
it–He was numbered with transgressors. There is, now, no curse for us!
There can be none–Heaven, earth, Hell cannot find a curse for those
whom God has blessed–since the Lord Jesus "was made a curse for us."
May the Spirit of God come on you afresh, my dearly Beloved, and make
you confident and joyful in Him who is the Lord our righteousness, by
whom evil has been judged, once and for all!

II. Last of all, let us read our text by rendering it, "convict"–"The
Spirit of God will CONVICT the world of sin, of righteousness, and of
judgment." There is the world. It stands a prisoner at the bar and the
charge is that it is and has been full of sin. In courts of law you are
often surprised with what comes out. You look at the prisoner and he
seems to be a quiet, respectable person. And you say, "I should not
think he is guilty." But the advocate who has engaged to plead the
cause of righteousness stands up and gives an outline of the case–and
you speedily change your mind, until, as the evidence proceeds, you say
to yourself, "That is a villain if ever there was one."

Now hear the Spirit of God! The Spirit came into the world to make all
men know that Jesus is the Christ. And He attested to that fact by
miracles that could not be questioned, miracles without number! He has,
moreover, attested the truth of the Gospel by the conversion of
myriads, whose happy and holy lives have been a proof that Jesus Christ
was, indeed, sent forth from God. But what did this wicked world do
with Christ? They gave Him a felon's death! They nailed Him to a cross!
By this, the world is condemned! We need no further evidence. The world
is convicted–self-condemned

by the slaughter of Him who was Incarnate Goodness and unbounded Love!
The world is base enough to desire to slay its God even when He comes
on an errand of love!

Take the accused away! The world's guilt is proven beyond question. The
wrath of God abides on it. What follows upon this? The trial is viewed
from another point. The world has declared that the Gospel is not
righteous, that the system which our Lord has come to establish is not
true. Up to this day the world is continually raising objections,
trying to confuse Believers and, if possible, to defeat our most holy
cause. But the Spirit of God, by His teaching, proves that the Gospel
is full of righteousness and, by all His operations through the Word of
God, He proves that the Gospel is holy, just, good and tends to make
men pure, godly, peaceable and holy. By sanctifying men through the
Gospel so that they lead gracious lives, the Holy Spirit proves that
the Gospel is righteous!

This process grows more and more complete as time rolls on. Were not
the world unrighteous, it would, long ago, have yielded to the holy
message and its holy Messenger. But it will be forced to acknowledge
the Truth one day. The Holy Spirit makes the world know that Christ is
righteous by flashing into its face the fact that Christ has gone–gone
up to Glory, at the right hand of God–and this could not have been had
He not been the Righteous One. When the world shall see Jesus
enthroned, at the last, and all mankind shall behold the Son of Man on
the clouds of Heaven, what conviction will seize on every mind! There
will be no agnostics, then! Not a skeptic will be found in that day!
Christ seen at the Father's right hand will end all unbelief!

And then the Spirit of God shall make men see the judgment. Before the
day actually comes, they shall perceive that since Christ has judged
the devil; since Christ has cast him down from his high places and his
power over the world is already broken, assuredly He will smite all
that are in the dominion of Satan and will not allow one of them to
escape. The cause of evil is judged and its case is desperate. Oh, how
the Spirit of God will convict men at that last day when they hear the
Judge say, "Come, you blessed of My Father," or, "Depart, you cursed,
into everlasting fire." Brothers and Sisters, will you be convinced by
the Holy Spirit, now, or will you wait till then? Shall it be the
convincement of Grace or the conviction of wrath? The Spirit still
bears witness with us who preach the Gospel–will you yield to that
Gospel and believe it, now? Or will you wait until the blaze of the
last tremendous day? Which shall it be?

I think I hear you say, "The Gospel is true." Why, then, do you not
believe it? If you confess "sin," why are you not washed from it? If
there is "righteousness," why do you not seek it? If there is
"judgment," why do you not ask to be so cleansed that you need not be
afraid of it? Oh, Sirs, the most of men act as if they were born fools!
If they were sick and we had a sure medicine for them, they would rush
to us for it! If they were poor and we brought them gold, they would
trample us down in their vehemence to snatch at wealth!

But when there is Christ to be had, the Divine remedy for sin–Christ
to be had as a perfect Righteousness, Christ to make them stand
securely at the last dread day–they turn their backs upon the heavenly
Gift! Oh, Spirit of God, win these madmen! Bring back these fools and
make them sane and wise, for Christ Jesus' sake! Amen.