What disturbs you about our culture and the way decisions are made? When horrific events destroy people’s lives, what is your reaction? For me, Jesus’s statement “In this world you will have trouble” is profound. I used to mistakenly believe that if I believe the right stuff, everything would be okay. I’d avoid so many problems and life would be awesome. That may be partly true, but the reality of what Jesus taught is that we do not live in a perfect world, despite our beliefs. Following Christ is seeking the kingdom in a fallen world, searching where He is moving, even in the moral dilemmas and chaos of 2025. He is present and He will NEVER leave us or abandon us.
“Suffering reminds us that we are not as righteous as we’ve thought and not as faithful as we’ve confessed to be. Suffering brings you and me to the end of ourselves. It exposes and confronts us. It makes it harder and harder to hold on to the delusion of our righteousness. This is why it is so important to remember that God is faithful to us, not because we are righteous, but because he is. He continues to love us, not because we perfectly love him, but because his love for us remains perfect. He remains near, not because we’ve never thought of running away, but because he would never turn his back on the promises he’s made to us.” - Paul David Tripp, Suffering: Gospel Hope When Life Doesn't Make Sense
“This heavy talk gave the disciples a heavy heart. Jesus saw their sorrow. “It is to your advantage that I go away; for if I do not go away, the Helper will not come to you” (v. 7). Why was that best?
Jesus’ purpose in coming to this world was to die and “give His life a ransom for many” (see Mark 10:45). Once that was accomplished, He went back to the Father.
When Jesus became a man, He limited himself to being in one place at a time. The Holy Spirit can be in all places at once.
The Holy Spirit will be the Comforter, and He’ll come alongside us to perform several unique ministries:
* He convicts us of sin. Like a prosecuting attorney, the Spirit of God presents evidence in your heart that helps you turn from sin and leads you to faith in Jesus Christ.
* He convicts us of righteousness. Jesus’ resurrection not only subtracted our sins, it added our righteousness.
* He convicts us of judgment. The world is like a man waiting on death row.
The Holy Spirit, our teacher, guides us into truth. He takes the deep things of God and shows them to us—something He alone can do. (See 1 Corinthians 2:9, 10.)” - J Vernon McGee
“For each of us, God is calling us increasingly into an area of fellowship with Him, in which He doesn't have to tell us what to do. That's one of the things that is wrong with the, what would Jesus do idea. One of the things He would do is not have to be told what to do.”
From The Dallas Willard Podcast: 18. Streams In the Desert and Wells of Living Water: Christ's Congregations as Fountains of Light and Life (2004), Jan 13, 2025
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