From Sorrow to Joy
Published by Stanley Pouw in 2022 · 9 January 2022
Jesus desire, His purpose and His ministry is to comfort us. And when He sent the Holy Spirit, He sent the Comforter. God is the God of all comfort; the Holy Spirit is the Comforter; and Christ is our sympathetic, compassionate High Priest. We understand that theologically and doctrinally. And when we follow the life of Christ, we see one of His characteristics in a dramatic way.
We all live with challenges that are seemingly insurmountable. We’re always looking for some light at the end of the tunnel. People can actually endure almost any trial if they could see an end that is good. Proverbs puts it this way, “Hope deferred makes the heart sick.” Lack of hope is the ultimate agony in suffering. Our Lord however, seeks our joy, and so always gives us hope.
This section of Scripture this evening should be a source of hope because here we find the Lord Jesus Christ desiring with all His heart to give to His disciples a hope, and even joy, in the midst of a horrific trial. And what is so amazing about our Lord’s concern here, is that He knows the eleven disciples are distraught. They cannot see the light at the end of the tunnel.
He has been talking now for a long time about dying. It goes all the way back over a year in His ministry to when they were in Galilee in Mark 9, when Jesus said He was going to die, and He was going to rise. And even then, they did not understand,” Mark 9 says, “and they did not want to ask about it.” They did not want any more information because it was against their expectations.
The closer they got to the cross, the deeper their sorrow grew. This is Thursday night of our Lord’s final week in Jerusalem, because on Friday He will be crucified. Several times in that upper room, in John 13-16, He says to them, “Stop being troubled.” Another time He says, “I want you to be at peace.” Not only has He said He’s going to die, but He has said He’s going to rise from the dead.
Jesus wants to give joy to these men in the midst of their sorrow. By Sunday night, their joy will return. By Sunday night, He will show up in the upper room, and He will come through the door, and they will explode in joy. But the sympathy of Christ for His own children is so great that even a few hours of sorrow He desires to eliminate. And so the text is intended to give them hope and joy.
John 16:16-22, “A little while, and you will not see Me; and again a little while, and you will see Me, because I go to the Father.” 17 Then some of His disciples said among themselves, “What is this that He says to us, ‘A little while, and you will not see Me; and again a little while, and you will see Me’; and, ‘because I go to the Father’?” 18 They said therefore, “What is this that He says, ‘A little while’?”
“We do not know what He is saying. 19 Now Jesus knew that they desired to ask Him, and He said to them, “Are you inquiring among yourselves about what I said, ‘A little while, and you will not see Me; and again a little while, and you will see Me’? 20 Most assuredly, I say to you that you will weep and lament, but the world will rejoice; and you will be sorrowful, but your sorrow will be turned into joy.”
“21 A woman, when she is in labor, has sorrow because her hour has come; but as soon as she has given birth to the child, she no longer remembers the anguish, for joy that a baby has been born into the world. 22 Therefore you now have sorrow; but I will see you again and your heart will rejoice, and your joy no one will take from you.” The point of these words is to turn their sorrow into joy.
And He’s concerned about that just in the immediate hours, because all of that sorrow will be dispelled by Sunday night. He makes a prediction in verse 16, “‘A little while, and you will no longer see Me; and again a little while, and you will see Me.’” Here is our sympathetic Lord introducing the opportunity to give a hope and joy to these sorrowful disciples.
Now what does Jesus mean, “A little while and you will no longer see Me; and again a little while and you will see Me’”? Some people say He’s talking about the resurrection. That is incorrect. He’s talking about the fact that, in a few hours from then, He’ll be taken to trial, He’ll go out of their presence. They actually flee. Only Peter hangs around to see things, and John is at the cross.
But what is He talking about that “‘you will then see Me’”? Look at verse 17, “Then some of His disciples said among themselves, “What is this that He says to us, ‘A little while, and you will not see Me; and again a little while, and you will see Me’; and, ‘because I go to the Father’?” But when You go to the Father, You’re going to be invisible, that’s Your ascension.
Look again to John 16:5, “But now I’m going to Him who sent Me. I’m going to the Father.’” And then in verse 7, “‘But I tell you the truth, it is to your advantage that I go away; for if I do not go away, the Helper – the Holy Spirit, the Comforter – will not come to you; but if I go, I will send Him to you.’” Are you following that? “If I go, I will send the Holy Spirit to you.”
So what He means here is, “In a little while and you will no longer see Me, because I will ascend to My Father. And a little while after that you will see Me again, because I will come in the form of the Holy Spirit that is going to live in you, as a believer, forever.” That is the only possible interpretation, because of His words at the end of verse 17, “because I go to the Father.”
John 14:17 clarifies it, “The Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it doesn’t see Him or know Him, but you know Him because He abides with you and will be in you.’” Then in verses 18-19, “‘I will not leave you as orphans; I will come to you. 19 After a little while the world will no longer see Me, but you will see Me; and because I live in you, you will live also.’”
Jesus means, I will come to you in the form of the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of truth. I will not leave you as orphans. The purpose of the Holy Spirit is to make Christ present and resident in the life of every believer. This is a great Trinitarian statement: the Son, the Father, and the Spirit - three in one. So He is talking about the dispensation of the Holy Spirit which displays the promises and glories of Christ.
So the Holy Spirit shows us Christ, not only spiritually and internally, but He also shows us Christ externally through the written Word. The Holy Spirit says, “I come to reveal Christ.” So our Lord is saying in verse 16, “In a little while, and you will not see Me.” But a little while after that, on the Day of Pentecost - I’m coming back in the form of the Holy Spirit.” So that is the pledge.
We understand that now, but they didn’t understand it then. Jesus is saying, Crucifixion, yes; resurrection, yes. But, I’m telling you about the coming of the Holy Spirit, which happens when I go back to the Father. If I don’t go to the Father, the Spirit can’t come. If I do, He will. I will be taken from you. You will not see Me, but I will return in the form of the Holy Spirit, who will live in you.
This incredible prophecy was fulfilled on the Day of Pentecost, as recorded in Acts 2. Now, they’re left confused. Let’s look at it in verse 17. They can’t put it all together. So they were saying, not only thinking and mumbling to each other, but having a conversation about what this all meant. Verse 18, “What is this little while? We don’t know what He is talking about.”
Verse 19 says, “Now Jesus knew that they desired to ask Him, and He said to them, “Are you inquiring among yourselves about what I said, ‘A little while, and you will not see Me; and again a little while, and you will see Me’?” He knew what they wished. He knew their minds. For the first time since John 14:22, the silence of the sorrowing disciples is broken, and they begin to talk.
And, by Sunday night they’re going to be full of joy when they meet the risen Christ, and then they’re going to have forty days of instruction about the kingdom with Him before He ascends into heaven and the Spirit comes. But even this brief time of sadness and sorrow our Lord sees as a burden, and so He wants to give them reason for hope, and that hope produces joy.
He is omniscient - He knows their mind; He knows their pain. And even though their joy will come on Sunday night, their sadness in that moment is a burden in His heart. That is divine compassion. You will not find that kind of divine compassion associated with any other deity in all the religions. They were saying, “How can you go away and come back? How can you die and rise?
Well, Lazarus died and was raised. And there were other people that Jesus raised who died for a little while. What is Christ talking about?” So He moves to comfort them. So you go from a prediction of His leaving, and yet they’ll see Him, referring to the coming of the Holy Spirit. These men are perplexed trying to sort this out against the grain of their own expectations.
Then our Lord offers an illustration to help them, in verse 20, “Truly, truly, I say to you, you will weep and lament, but the world will rejoice; you will grieve, but your grief will be turned into joy.’” This is very important that He say this, because it’s true. That is exactly what will take place in a matter of a few hours. When He is arrested, they flee at the highest level of their fears.
They do weep; they do lament. Even Mary, in John 20:11, at the tomb is weeping the same tears that the disciples of our Lord had been shedding. The sadness is palpable in Luke 24 on the road to Emmaus, when our Lord runs into a couple of disciples who are just literally shattered in sorrow and grief because they thought Jesus was the Messiah before He was crucified.
They’re going to be in sorrow. The body of Jesus will be a bloody corpse. The world has done its murderous will on Him and rejoices in unholy glee. And the disciples are weeping, devastated and heartbroken, and our Lord knows that is going to happen. “But,” He says, at end of verse 20, “your grief will be turned into joy.” Joy is the goal for them, and joy is the objective of our life.
That is how every Christian should live every day of their life. Joy should mark our lives. The very thing that plunged them into grief will cause them to rejoice. It is that the very event that brought the grief will be the very event that brings the joy; and that will be true, going forward, in all of redemptive history. After the resurrection, when they look back, it will be the source of joy.
We have no hymns of hopeless, dead-end grief; but we have endless hymns of joy that go back to the cross. The cause of the greatest grief to the disciples became the source of highest joy. The resurrection of Christ, the exaltation of Christ to the right hand of the Father in the ascension, the sending of the Holy Spirit, all of that is because of the cross which is the focal point of Christian joy.
Joy that began at the resurrection. First Thessalonians 1:6 says, “You received the word in much tribulation with the joy of the Holy Spirit.” The Holy Spirit comes to bring us joy. The fruit of the Spirit again is joy. So our Lord is saying, “Look, you’re going to go through a brief time of sorrow, but you’re going to come out the other side, and your grief will be turned into joy.” That’s His promise.
To clarify it, He tells them an illustration in verse 21, “Whenever a woman is in labor she has pain, because her hour has come.” And that was part of the curse. “But when she gives birth to the child, she no longer remembers the anguish because of the joy that a child has been born into the world.” The result of that suffering is the greatest human joy possible. Our Lord always uses the best illustration.
The very event that will cause you the deepest grief will become the event that brings you the greatest joy; for out of that will come your salvation.” Verse 22, “Therefore you now have sorrow; but I will see you again and your heart will rejoice, and your joy no one will take from you.” ‘I will see you again’, which means that the Spirit of Christ who comes in us has communion with us.
Paul says in Galatians 2:20, “I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me.” You’ll see Me in the Spirit, in the work of the Spirit in your life subjectively. And the Spirit will reveal Me internally. The Spirit in us becomes the teacher and interpreter of Scripture, who teaches us what the Scripture means. And that is the subjective ministry of the Spirit, and that is Christ in us.
I will be in charge of your life, watching you, as it were, from the inside. That is the key characteristic of Christian salvation, joy. “Your heart will rejoice with a joy that no one will take from you.” You’re secure in Christ and the Father, Listen: “Therefore, no one can take your joy, because your permanent joy is connected to the hope that you have in that final promise of eternal life.”
And the Lord says, “I want your joy to be as full as your sorrow has been, as dominating as your sorrow has been. A joy related to the fact that I’m there; I’m with you; I’m living in you; I’m revealed on the pages of Scripture externally; and I dwell in you internally; and I have a place for you in heaven; and you will be there; and nothing can ever change that. And what is heaven? It is eternal joy.”
Well, I cannot rejoice in everything that goes on around me in my life. But I can rejoice in my eternal salvation that will never be taken away. I can rejoice in the presence of Christ who will never leave me. Joy has nothing to do with my physical circumstances, and everything to do with my spiritual circumstances, which are unchanging and everlasting. Our Lord is concerned with their joy and our joy forever. Let us pray.