John 16:7-11
7 Nevertheless I tell you the truth. It is to your advantage that I go away; for if I do not go away, the Helper will not come to you; but if I depart, I will send Him to you. 8 And when He has come, He will convict the world of sin, and of righteousness, and of judgment: 9 of sin, because they do not believe in Me; 10 of righteousness, because I go to My Father and you see Me no more; 11 of judgment, because the ruler of this world is judged.
These are some amazing verses. Jesus called the Holy Spirit the Comforter. A comforter makes you feel good. Many Christians do not think of the Holy Spirit this way. They think of him as the condemner. They think He shows them all the wrong they do and do not even think He is in the room unless they feel bad.
While the Holy Spirit does convict us of our sin, verse 9 tells us the sin for which He convicts. That sin is unbelief (or not trusting Jesus). When we sin by looking at pornography or yelling at our spouse, the Holy Spirit is not showing us everything we are doing wrong. He is saying, “Trust Jesus, you are better than that.”
Verse 10 goes on to say he reveals to us righteousness. In other words he shows us how righteous we are if we are in relationship with Jesus. He will also show us the right things to do, but He is not beating us up over every unrighteous thing we do.
I grew up in some churches where the constant focus was on getting all the sin out of your life. They taught the Holy Spirit as the one who was trying to show me everything that was wrong with me. All that did was push me from God and made my sin worse. When we learn the Holy Spirit is our comforter and not accuser changes everything and will help all us have a much purer walk.
I felt led to write this blog today because I believe this is for a specific person. I don’t know who. Whoever you are, I hope you are blessed. And I hope everyone else reading this is blessed too!
