John 16:11 Of judgment, because the prince of this world is judged. The judgment of the world is the natural sequel to its being convinced of sin; and the statement in the text assures us that one day a distinction will be made between the good and the evil, the servants of God and the servants of the devil, and that the result of that distinction and separation will be the condemnation and destruction of the wicked. I. THE NECESSITY OF THE CONVICTION OF JUDGMENT. If men are to be so convinced of sin as to feel that the service of sin is a hopeless one, they must also be convinced of judgment. It is not enough to set forth the beauty of righteousness, and the deformity of sin. All law, whether human or divine, whether it points out a duty, or forbids a transgression, must have its sanctions. It must have something connected with it, in the shape of rewards, or of punishments, which shall make it to be respected. So it is with regard to righteousness and sin in general. Men must be convinced of more than the mere abstract wrongness of sin, of more than the mere deformity of vice, of more than the rightness, and beauty, of virtue and holiness. It is true that the beauty of holiness was illustrated in the life of our Lord Jesus Christ, and that sin was rebuked by the purity and glory of His character; by means of the righteousness of Christ the conviction of righteousness is worked in the hearts of men. Yet in vain would the Holy Ghost set before many men at least that glorious ideal, or show that sin was a departure from it; unless He could also show that righteousness must triumph, and that sin must be put down and overthrown. II. THIS NECESSITY GOD HAS BEEN MEETING IN THE PAST HISTORY OF THE WORLD. 1. The first chapters of the sacred history contain this lesson in the probation, fall, and expulsion from paradise of our first parents. Here righteousness and sin confronted each other in their simplest forms of obedience and disobedience. Adam and Eve were put upon trial to see whether they would obey or disobey the Divine command. There was discrimination, an examination of the moral character of their conduct; there was condemnation, and there was rejection, and consequently punishment. All this is involved in the idea of judgment. It was the first lesson given by God to man, the first of a long series by which He has sought to convince His creatures of judgment. 2. We find the same repeated in the Deluge. The sins of mankind waxed grosser and more heinous, and the long-suffering of God waited and warned His rebellious creatures, until, it may be, men ceased to believe in judgment, and thought that to-morrow should be as to-day, and the wicked even as the righteous. But their dream was broken in upon and their delusion dispelled. The Flood came and took them all away. 3. We might point next to the history of Sodom and Gomorrah, but we pass on to the illustration of the subject in the history of God's dealings with the Israelites. In that remarkable history we have not only law, we have not only guidance and direction, we have judgment also. If God revealed Himself to the Israelites as their Teacher and Ruler, He also manifested Himself as the Judge of them and of the whole earth. The Judge of all the earth does right, even when the evil has been committed and the penalty merited by the seed of Abraham. It would not be judgment, it would not be a help towards convincing men of judgment, unless it were the result of discrimination and the just consequence of the act which had been performed. The whole history of the Israelites illustrates these remarks. It abounds in what we should call especial Divine interpositions; and those interpositions are frequently acts of retribution consequent upon the disobedience of the Divine commands, or a refusal to comply with His requirements. When Israel came out of Egypt, the exodus was accomplished by means of a Divine judgment. 4. We dwell upon these illustrations of God's dealings with mankind, because we possess His own interpretation of them, and are not liable to the charge of presumption which is sometimes brought against us when we seek to trace the hand of God in secular history. But we must not therefore suppose that the same lesson is not taught, and clearly too, in the whole history of nations. The conviction of judgment, in a measure at least, is impressed upon the religious belief of the whole human race, and is reflected in all their mythologies. Its very distortion is often no mean proof of its reality. The foot-prints of the Avenger are never far separated from those of the evil doer. III. HOW THEN IS THE CONVICTION OF JUDGMENT WROUGHT BY THE COMFORTER? Let us endeavour to understand what our Lord means when He tells us that the Comforter shall convince the world of judgment, "because the prince of this world is judged." The two principles of good and evil have been contending from the beginning of the world; but since the Incarnation it may be said that the great leaders and representatives of these opposing powers have encountered each other face to face. "The Son of God was manifested, that He might destroy the works of the devil" (1 John 3:8). And His whole history tells us, that whenever they met in spiritual warfare, the prince of this world was judged. 1. It was so in the temptation of our Lord in the wilderness. The prince of this world was judged. In that contest from which he departed beaten, he had a pledge of the power and authority of Him who was to be his Conqueror. 2. The prince of this world was also judged in our blessed Lord's works of Divine power, and especially in His casting out devils. When the disciples of Christ returned with joy to their Master, saying: "Even the devils are subject unto us through Thy name," His answer was, "I beheld Satan as lightning fail from heaven" (Luke 10:17, 18). His empire was overthrown: the prince of this world was judged. 3. The same victory was won, the same act of judgment was performed upon the cross. It is clear that our blessed Lord looked forward to the death of the cross as the consummation of His victory. "Now," He said in prospect of that hour (John 12:27-31), "Now is My soul troubled; and what shall I say? Father, save Me from this hour: But for this cause came I unto this hour." And the cause He mentions distinctly directly afterwards, "Now is the judgment of this world: now shall the prince of the world be cast out." Blot out the propitiation from the work of Christ, and the judgment of the god of this world is incomplete. That was the great means whereby Satan was cast down; for when the blood of atonement was sprinkled upon the mercy-seat, he had no more claims upon sinful man, and no more hold upon the conscience. 4. And the victory was completed by our Lord's resurrection and ascension. If the Cross was the victory, this was the triumph. If Satan was defeated by the Conqueror on the cross, the resurrection declared His defeat. Nay more, it declared by the entrance of the Redeemer into the holy of holies that the curse was done away, that man could now enter into the presence of the Most High. This is what is meant by the accuser of the brethren being cast down, when the Man-child was caught up into heaven (Revelation 12:5, 9, 10). Satan falls as lightning from heaven. The prince of this world is judged. We have seen what is meant by the fact of which the Holy Ghost makes use in working the conviction of judgment, we have seen in what sense the prince of this world was judged: let us now ask what use the Comforter makes of this act in producing the conviction of judgment. Evidently the very descent of the Holy Ghost is a witness of the triumph of our Lord. He is the promise of the Father, the gift of the Son. But this not all. He produces this conviction by carrying on the work, by giving effect to the triumph of Christ. In the progress of the Church of Christ, a progress which has been the work of the Holy Ghost, in the triumph of the individual, or of the body over sin and over the opposition of the world, we have seen the conviction of judgment. But the judgment of the prince of this world, which is now being manifested in the overthrow of evil, is the pledge of a future and final judgment. I need not say that the pledge is adequate. The fact of the descent of the Holy Ghost, the mighty works which accompanied, and which since then have followed His descent, the power which He has put forth in human society, all these things are our pledge for the future. And the pledge will be redeemed. We know not when or how; but the time will come when there will be a separation of good and evil, of light and darkness. (W. R. Clark, M. A.) Parallel Verses KJV: Of judgment, because the prince of this world is judged.WEB: about judgment, because the prince of this world has been judged. |
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