On Line Bible Study - For the Week June 24-30, 2013

Lesson 564 

Let’s look at two passages from John 16.

John 16:  ¹² “I have much more to say to you, more than you can now bear. ¹³ But when he, the Spirit of truth, comes, he will guide you into all the truth. He will not speak on his own; he will speak only what he hears, and he will tell you what is yet to come.

Remember in the previous lesson we pondered the question: How much of the future do we want to know in advance?  Is this line from John 16 suggesting that the Holy Spirit is going to open our eyes to some new revelation?  And are we going to know the future?

Scholars are more inclined to take Jesus’ words to mean that the experience of the truth of his message is going to be more clearly understood in the future – perhaps after the resurrection.  If Jesus is the fullness of God’s revelation to us, it is a fullness that we can only ingest in small increments.  “What is yet to come” refers not to some new information regarding Jesus, but some new and deeper understanding on our part of what following Jesus means in an ever-changing world.

Father Raymond Brown puts it this way: The best Christian preparation for what is coming to pass is not an exact foreknowledge of the future but a deep understanding of what Jesus means for one’s own time. (Raymond Brown – The Gospel According to John – The Anchor Bible.  Volume 29a, Yale University Press.  Page 716.)

John 16:  ¹⁶Jesus went on to say, “In a little while you will see me no more, and then after a little while you will see me … ²⁰Very truly I tell you, you will weep and mourn while the world rejoices.  You will grieve, but your grief will turn to joy.

What is the “little while” Jesus is referring to?  In the context of the last supper, it could be a reference to the fact that he would be arrested and executed in a matter of hours.  St. Augustine thought it might refer to the time between the resurrection of Jesus and his second coming.  But what does it mean when Jesus says the disciples will see me?  Is it referring exclusively to seeing him in a physical sense?  Or can we understand it to mean both the physical sighting, the way the disciples say him after he rose from the dead, and spiritual sighting – the way in which the reality and power of Jesus message and presence is conveyed by the Holy Spirit to those who come to believe in him?

There is a worship song that has been popular for a dozen years.  Open the eyes of my heart, Lord; open the eyes of my heart.  I want to see you.  What are the ways you see Jesus every day?  What are the ways others see Jesus in you?