Resurrection Joy

Resurrection Joy

John 16:16–33

Think back with me almost ten years ago to Game 7 of the 2016 World Series. For a lifelong Cubs fan, it was one of the most stressful sporting events I have ever watched. The Cubs had not won a World Series since 1908. More than a century of losing. The Billy Goat Curse. Steve Bartman. Year after year of disappointment. And now we were one win away.

The Cubs took the lead, and for a while it looked like we might actually do it. Then in the bottom of the eighth inning, Rajai Davis hit a two-run home run off Aroldis Chapman to tie the game 6–6. I remember thinking, “Here we go again. The curse is going to strike one more time.”

At some point, Ellen had fallen asleep. When she woke up and saw the score tied, she looked at me and asked, “What happened?” I just gritted my teeth and said, “Don’t ask.” Then the game went into a rain delay before extra innings. Eventually the Cubs scored two runs in the top of the tenth and held on to win 8–7. After 108 years, the drought was finally over. 

That game was an emotional roller coaster because I did not know how it was going to end. Every pitch mattered. Every mistake felt disastrous. Every time Cleveland threatened, I wondered if this was where everything was going to fall apart.

Now imagine if I watched that exact same game today. Nothing about the game would change. Rajai Davis would still hit the home run. The game would still be tied. The rain would still fall. The tension would still be real. Yet I would experience every moment differently because I already know the final score. I know the Cubs win. Knowing the ending changes the way you understand everything that happens before it.

In John 16, Jesus is preparing His disciples for the darkest days of their lives, but they do not yet know how the story ends. He has told them that He is leaving. He has warned them that the world will hate them, cast them out, and even kill them. And within a matter of hours, Jesus will be arrested, beaten, and crucified. From their perspective, everything is about to fall apart, but Jesus knows the ending. Sunday is coming. So Jesus says in verse 20, “You will be sorrowful, but your sorrow will turn into joy.” The sorrow will be real, but it will not be final. The cross will not be the end of the story. Jesus Christ will walk out of the grave.

And knowing the ending changes the way you experience everything before it. It does not mean there is no stress, or grief, but it changes how deeply those things control you. We still hurt. We still weep. We still face disappointment, opposition, and death, but we do so knowing the final score. Jesus is alive. Death is defeated. Christ will return. And because we know how the story ends, we do not have to live with the same anxiety as people who believe the present moment is all there is.

The Christian life is lived on the other side of the empty tomb. We know the ending. And because we know the ending, we can have joy even in the middle of the game. I pray our text today will remind you that even in the midst of pain, we can have joy. 

The Resurrection Turns Sorrow into Joy (vv. 16-22)

Jesus now begins to explain what He means by telling them that their sorrow will turn to joy. Jesus says in verse 16, 

A little while, and you will see me no longer; and again a little while, and you will see me.” The disciples are understandably confused. Verses 17 and 18 tell us, “So some of his disciples said to one another, ‘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 am going to the Father”?’ So they were saying, ‘What does he mean by “a little while”? We do not know what he is talking about.’”

You can understand their confusion. Jesus has repeatedly told them that He is leaving. Now He tells them that in a little while they will not see Him, and then in a little while they will see Him again. They are trying to put all of these things together, and they cannot do it. From our perspective, the meaning is much clearer. In a little while, Jesus will die and they will no longer see Him. Then, in a little while, Jesus will rise from the dead and they will see Him again.

The disciples are about to live through events they will not know how to interpret while they are happening. They will see Jesus hanging on the cross, but nothing will be outside the plan of God. The problem is not that God has lost control. The problem is that the disciples cannot yet see the whole picture.

How true is this for us? We experience the providence of God one moment at a time. We see the moment, while God sees the whole story. There are times when we simply do not understand what God is doing. There may be things in your life right now that you do not understand. Maybe there is a prayer you have prayed for years that God has not answered the way you hoped. Maybe there is a child you have poured your life into who has wandered from Christ. Maybe a relationship has fallen apart. Maybe a door you were certain God would open has closed. And you find yourself asking the same basic question the disciples are asking here: What is God doing?

Notice that Jesus does not criticize them for not understanding. Instead, He gives them a promise. Verses 19–20 say, 

Jesus knew that they wanted to ask him, so he said to them, ‘Is this what you are asking yourselves, what I meant by saying, “A little while and you will not see me, and again a little while and you will see me”?’ Truly, truly, I say to you, you will weep and lament, but the world will rejoice.

Jesus does not minimize what is coming. He tells them plainly that they are going to weep and lament. While they are grieving, the world will rejoice. When Jesus is arrested, His enemies will believe they have finally won. When Jesus is condemned, the religious leaders will believe their problem has been solved. Rome will treat Jesus as another failed king. The disciples will look at the cross and see the destruction of everything they hoped for, while the world will celebrate.

The problem for all those groups is they do not understand what God is doing. Jesus continues, 20b,

“You will be sorrowful, but your sorrow will turn into joy.” 

Notice exactly what Jesus says. He says their sorrow itself will turn into joy. The very event producing their sorrow will become the ground of their joy.

On Friday, they will look at the cross and think everything is lost. After the resurrection, they will look back at the same cross and see their salvation. Their understanding of the cross changed when Jesus walked out of the grave. Jesus gives them His own illustration in verse 21, 

When a woman is giving birth, she has sorrow because her hour has come, but when she has delivered the baby, she no longer remembers the anguish, for joy that a human being has been born into the world.

Jesus chooses an experience in which anguish gives way to joy. A woman in labor experiences genuine pain. Nobody needs to stand beside her and tell her that the pain is not real. It is very real. When the child is born, the suffering is understood in light of the joy that has come through it. Jesus says in verse 22, 

So also you have sorrow now, but I will see you again, and your hearts will rejoice.

 I love those words: “I will see you again.” The disciples do not know exactly how that is going to happen, but we do. Mary Magdalene will go to the tomb and the stone will be rolled away. Peter and John will run to see it empty for themselves. Jesus will then appear to His disciples and  Thomas will see his wounds and confess Christ as Lord. They all will hear His voice and see Him alive. And their hearts will rejoice! Then Jesus adds, “and no one will take your joy from you.” That is resurrection joy. 

Christian joy is not ultimately based upon circumstances. If your joy depends upon everything in your life going well, someone or something can always take your joy. Money can disappear. Health can disappear. Relationships can change. Careers can end. Friends can betray you. If your joy is built upon circumstances, circumstances can take it away. Jesus says there is a joy that no one can take from His people because no one can put Jesus back in the grave. And therefore, no one can take away your sure hope of the resurrection. 

Jesus does not mean that Christians will have a life of ease. Even Paul says in 1 Thessalonians 4:13 that Christians will grieve, 

We do not want you to be uninformed, brothers, about those who are asleep, that you may not grieve as others do who have no hope.

Notice Paul does not say that Christians do not grieve. He says that we do not grieve as others do who have no hope. Christians cry at funerals. Christians hurt when marriages struggle. Christians ache when children wander. Christians experience disappointment, loneliness, and death, but Christian sorrow always exists alongside resurrection hope.

Beloved, I know many of you are walking through seasons of deep sorrow and disappointment right now. I do not want to minimize your pain, but want to point you to everlasting joy. Because in Christ, you have a joy that your circumstances cannot take away. You may not be able to see what God is doing right now, and you do not have to pretend that you do. When you cannot understand what God is doing, hold tightly to what God has already done. 

Jesus Christ has risen from the dead. The empty tomb tells you that suffering does not get the final word. Sin, death, and Satan do not get the final word. Christ does. And because Christ is risen, your sorrow will be real, but it will never be ultimate. Revelation 21:4 tells us where the whole story is going: 

He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away.

There is coming a day when every sorrow of every Christian will finally give way to joy. Until then, we live between sorrow and glory. We still live in the middle of the game with all its ups and downs, but we do so knowing that the tomb is empty. That is resurrection joy.

The Resurrection Opens the Way to the Father (vv. 23-28)

Jesus now shows them that the joy of the resurrection will also change the way we approach God. Verses 23–24 say, 

In that day you will ask nothing of me. Truly, truly, I say to you, whatever you ask of the Father in my name, he will give it to you. Until now you have asked nothing in my name. Ask, and you will receive, that your joy may be full.”

Something is changing. Jesus says they will now approach the Father in His name. We see here something of the normal pattern of Christian prayer. We pray to the Father, through the Son, by the Spirit.

Most of us regularly finish our prayers by saying, “In Jesus' name, amen.” That is a good practice, but praying in Jesus' name means much more than simply attaching those words to the end of a prayer. “In Jesus' name” is not a formula that obligates God to give us whatever we want. To pray in Jesus' name means that our entire access to God rests upon Jesus Christ.

One day I was invited to play golf at a really nice country club outside of Washington, D.C. I was not a member, and there was no way I was getting in on my own. My name meant nothing there. But my friend was a member, and when we arrived, all he had to say was, “He’s with me.” And because of his name and his standing, I had access to the course.

That is a small picture of something infinitely greater that happens when Christians come to God in prayer. We do not come before the Father with our credentials. No. We come in another’s name. We come in the name of Jesus Christ. Our access to the Father rests on His standing. In effect, Jesus says, “He is with me. She is with me.” And because we belong to Christ, we have access to the Father. Hebrews 4:14–16 says, 

Since then we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus, the Son of God, let us hold fast our confession. For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin. Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.

How can sinful people approach a holy God with confidence? Not because of what we have done. We approach with confidence because we have a perfect High Priest. Remember what we have learned already in this gospel, John 1:12,

But to all who did receive him, who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God

We have become God’s children through faith in Jesus Christ. Tim Keller once said, “The only person who dares wake up a king at 3:00 a.m. for a glass of water is a child. We have that kind of access.” That is what Christ has given us. We do not come to God as strangers hoping to be admitted. We come as children to a Father because we belong to the Son.

Jesus says something in this passage that I think we can easily read past, and I want us to slow down and hear it. Verses 25-27 say, 

I have said these things to you in figures of speech. The hour is coming when I will no longer speak to you in figures of speech but will tell you plainly about the Father. In that day you will ask in my name, and I do not say to you that I will ask the Father on your behalf; for the Father himself loves you, because you have loved me and have believed that I came from God.” 

“The Father himself loves you.” Christian, do you believe that? Sometimes we can have a distorted understanding of the relationship between the Father and the Son. We can begin to think of the Father as angry and distant and Jesus as loving and compassionate, as though Jesus has to persuade the Father to be gracious toward us. Jesus does not die in order to convince an unwilling Father to love His people. The Father sent the Son because He loves. John already told us in John 3:16, 

For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.

The cross is not Jesus overcoming the Father's reluctance to love sinners. The cross is the demonstration of the Father's love for sinners. And now Jesus looks at these disciples and says, “The Father himself loves you.” Not merely that God tolerates you. Not merely that God has decided not to punish you. Not merely that God puts up with you because Jesus convinced Him to do so. The Father Himself loves you.

In a few weeks, Elizabeth will come home from college. When she gets to the door, she is not going to stand on the porch wondering whether she has done enough to come inside. She is not going to knock and say, “Dad, I have had a pretty good semester so far. I went to class. I worked hard. I tried to make good decisions. Can I come in?” She is going to open the door and walk into her home.

Why? Because she is our daughter. She does not belong there because she paid the mortgage or earned her place in the family that week. She belongs because she is our child. And we love her. And every earthly father is imperfect, but our heavenly Father is not. Romans 8:15 says, 

You have received the Spirit of adoption as sons, by whom we cry, ‘Abba! Father!’”

That is the access Christ has given us.  We do not approach God trying to prove that we deserve to be there. In Christ, we come as sons and daughters to our Father. That should radically reshape the way we pray. The Father loves us and wants us to come to him. 

Notice where Jesus connects prayer back to the central theme of this passage. In verse 24 says, “Ask, and you will receive, that your joy may be full.” Prayer and resurrection joy belong together. Prayer reminds us that we are not alone. Prayer reminds us that we are not ultimately in control. Prayer reminds us that our Father loves us. Prayer takes burdens that we were never designed to carry alone and brings them before the God who rules over all things.

Of course, this does not mean God promises to give us everything we ask for exactly as we ask for it. Prayer in Jesus' name increasingly brings our desires under the desires and purposes of Jesus. 1John 5:14 says, 

And this is the confidence that we have toward him, that if we ask anything according to his will he hears us.

Christian prayer is not asking God to accomplish my will in heaven. Christian prayer is asking our Father to accomplish His will on earth.

The resurrection means we can bring those prayers confidently before Him. Christ has risen. Christ has gone to the Father. Christ has opened the way. And now the Father Himself loves us and welcomes us into His presence. And if you are lacking joy, it may be because you have forgotten the access you have. You have access to the King of the universe. You can come to Him at any hour, with any burden, with any fear, with any need. You are not trying to get His attention from a distance. In Christ, you have been brought near. That should give us resurrection joy that can never be taken away. 

The Resurrection Gives Courage in the World

The disciples now think they finally understand what Jesus has been saying. Verses 29–32 say:

“His disciples said, ‘Ah, now you are speaking plainly and not using figurative speech! Now we know that you know all things and do not need anyone to question you; this is why we believe that you came from God.’ Jesus answered them, ‘Do you now believe? Behold, the hour is coming, indeed it has come, when you will be scattered, each to his own home, and will leave me alone. Yet I am not alone, for the Father is with me.’”

The disciples will fail, but Jesus will not. Their courage will collapse before the resurrection. They will scatter, but Jesus will continue faithfully toward the cross.

Our ultimate confidence cannot be in how tightly we hold onto Jesus. Our confidence must be in that Christ who holds onto us. Earlier in John's Gospel, Jesus said in John 10:27–29, 

My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me. I give them eternal life, and they will never perish, and no one will snatch them out of my hand. My Father, who has given them to me, is greater than all, and no one is able to snatch them out of the Father's hand.

These disciples are about to stumble terribly, but Jesus will restore them. Peter will deny Jesus, but after the resurrection Jesus will meet Peter on the shore. Three times Peter denied Him, and three times Jesus will ask him, “Do you love me?” Then Jesus will tell him, “Feed my sheep.” The resurrection means that Peter's failure will not be the end of Peter's story.

Maybe you have failed badly. You knew what was right and did what was wrong. You have fallen into the same temptation again. You have said something you wish you could take back. You have damaged a relationship. Maybe there was a season when you wandered from Christ, and you still carry shame over what you did. Look at these disciples. Jesus knows exactly what they are about to do, and He is still speaking words of peace to them. That does not make sin insignificant. It makes grace magnificent. The answer to our failure is not to minimize our sin but to run again to the risen Christ.

And if you have never trusted Jesus, hear the good news of the gospel: no matter how badly you have failed, no matter how sinful you think you are, Jesus welcomes all who come to Him. You do not have to make yourself worthy. Come honestly, come repentantly, come trusting the Savior who died for sinners and rose again. He does not turn away those who come to Him. He forgives, restores, and gives peace to all who trust in Him.

Jesus brings this whole section to its great conclusion in verse 33. It is his concluding words of the entire discourse. : 

I have said these things to you, that in me you may have peace. In the world you will have tribulation. But take heart; I have overcome the world.

Jesus says, “in me you have peace.” If you want peace in this life, you have to go to Jesus. One of the reasons you don’t have peace is because you have been looking for it in other things. 

Beloved, we need peace because we will have tribulation. Not might, but will. Jesus never hides the cost of following Him. There will be suffering, and rejection, and days when following Jesus will be costly. People may turn on you. You may lose worldly benefits. It is going to happen. And when it does, we must have this truth anchor us, “Take heart; I have overcome the world.”

We take heart because Jesus Christ has overcome the world. And notice the tense. At this point  Jesus has not yet been crucified, buried, or raised, yet He says, “I have overcome the world.” His victory is so certain that He speaks of it as already accomplished.

The cross and the grave are coming, but resurrection morning is coming too. Remember, when you know the final score, every moment feels different. You may still watch the momentum shift, the other team comeback, and the tension rises, but, beloved, you know how the game ends. We do not know how every circumstance in our lives will turn out. We do not know whether the medicine will kill the cancer, or if your child will talk to you again, or if that thing you have been desperately praying for happens. Yet, we do know how the story ends. For the Christian we will be in glory.  1Corinthians 15:54-55; 57 says, 

Death is swallowed up in victory. O death, where is your victory? O death, where is your sting?...But thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.”

The world’s greatest weapon is death, and Jesus walked out of the grave. The world may mock Christ’s people, reject us, persecute us, or even kill our bodies, but it cannot take Christ from us. It cannot undo the resurrection. It cannot overturn God’s declaration of the Son. It cannot put Jesus back in the tomb. Christ has overcome the world.

That is why Christians can have courage in every circumstance. Our confidence is not, “Look how strong I am.” It is, “Look at the victory of Christ.” Maybe you are tired or discouraged. You look at the world and worry about the future. You look at your own weakness and wonder whether you can remain faithful. Jesus does not say, “Take heart because you can handle this.” He says, “Take heart; I have overcome the world.” Our joy must be rooted in Christ’ finished work. 

In just a few hours, these disciples will watch Jesus arrested, beaten, and crucified. They will scatter and hide. For a moment, it will look as though everything has been lost. Then Sunday morning comes. The stone is rolled away. The tomb is empty. The angel announces, “He is not here, for he has risen, as he said.” In a moment, everything Jesus has told them will make sense. Their sorrow will turn to joy. The way to the Father will be opened. The world has been overcome. Jesus is alive.

Church, that resurrection should put a deep and durable joy into the people of God. Not a shallow happiness that pretends life does not hurt. Not a forced smile that ignores grief. Christian joy can cry at a graveside. Christian joy can ache over a wandering child. Christian joy can live through disappointment, sickness, and loss. For underneath the sorrow there is something the world cannot take away: Jesus Christ is alive.

That should make Christians different. There ought to be a joy about the people of God that causes the world to wonder, “What do they know that we do not know? How can they be at peace when their world is falling apart?” Because we know the tomb is empty. We know death has been defeated. We know the Father loves us. We know Christ reigns. We know how the story ends.

I don’t know why God allows certain trials in your life. It grieves me to see so many of you walking through the valley. I pray you will hold on to the words of our Lord Jesus: “In the world you will have tribulation. But take heart; I have overcome the world.” Your sorrow will not have the final word. The tomb is empty. Jesus Christ is alive. Therefore, let us live with a resurrection joy. 

There is hope in every trial

For I can trust the Lord

He will turn my heart towards Him

And help me bear the thorn

So in faith I follow Jesus

On the road not understood

For I know that He is working

For His glory and my good

Would I gladly be made nothing

That Christ would be made more

Would I seek the only kingdom

That far outweighs them all

I will stand before my Father

Where the faithful saints have stood

And with joy my heart shall praise Him

For His glory and my good

To our God be the glory

To our God be praise

He alone, the name above all names

I will boast ever only in the Lord my God

For I know His glory is my good