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In order to moral improvement there must be a sense of sin and its degradation and misery, and there must be some apprehension of righteousness and holiness accompanied by both admiration and aspiration. It is an evidence of the divinely wise provision of the gospel of Christ, that there is secured for man, in the influences of the Spirit of God, not only a power which dissatisfies men with sin, but a power which impels men to righteousness.

I. THERE IS A CLOSE CONNECTION BETWEEN CONVICTION OF SIN AND CONVICTION OF RIGHTEOUSNESS. The knowledge of the Law gives the knowledge of sin. Obedience and disobedience are correlative. The good man by his goodness enforces the excellence of the Law he obeys, and at the same time suggests the flagrant enormity of defying and despising that Law. There is nothing inconsistent in the performance by the same Spirit of this twofold office. In a world where sin abounds the functions cannot be separated.

II. THE HOLY SPIRIT CONVINCES OF RIGHTEOUSNESS IN THE RECORD OF CHRIST'S JUST AND HOLY LIFE. The narratives of the evangelists are expressly attributed to the Spirit of Christ, who brought all that it concerned the Church and the world to know concerning Jesus to the minds of the inspired and sympathetic writers. What a record these memoirs constitute! Jesus fulfilled all righteousness, magnified the Law, was holy, harmless, and undefiled, was actively and benevolently good. It is one thing for righteousness to be expressed in the Law; another thing for it to be embodied in a life. Wherever the record of our Savior's ministry is read, there the Spirit testifies to the reader's heart of a righteousness faultless and peerless, fitted to command reverence and adoration.

III. THE DEPARTURE AND ASCENSION OF CHRIST WERE THE OCCASION OF THIS CONVINCING WITNESS OF THE SPIRIT. His going to the Father and his consequent concealment from the bodily eyes of men were mentioned by himself as thus connected with the conviction of the world. How this was so we, as a matter of fact and history, can see. A completed life was crowned by a sacrificial death and by a triumphant ascension; the Representative and Savior of man was accepted by the Father; his work was secured beyond all possibility of failure. The personal animosity which beset the Incarnate One came then to an end; the protest against sin, and the exhibition of righteousness, both of which were perfected in Christ, were now presented to men with a completeness which was impossible during his ministry. Righteousness had been resented and rejected when it conflicted with personal interests, when it visibly and audibly set itself against individual and national sins. It was necessary that this should be so for a season. But the time came when the protest of Christ was heard from heaven as the authoritative voice of God himself. The Holy Spirit works with this now historical and ideal exhibition of righteousness, in order to make it a mighty factor in the moral life of humanity.

IV. THE HOLY SPIRIT HAS BEEN DURING THIS DISPENSATION CONVICTING THE WORLD OF ITS SIN IN REJECTING THE SUPREMELY RIGHTEOUS. The Jews would not have this Man to reign over them; his justice, his truth, his purity, his spirituality, were an offence to them; they slew him whose presence was to them a perpetual rebuke. But to how many was the preaching of the gospel by the apostles a convincing of sin? When these fearless heralds, under the guidance of the Divine Spirit, charged upon the nation their sin and guilt, many were "pricked to the heart," feeling as if their own hands had slain the Prince of Life; many sought mercy for their unjust and fearful sin. They saw the righteousness of the Redeemer in a new light. The sick had slain their Physician, the enslaved their Liberator. Thus did the Spirit bring the enemies of righteousness to seek for themselves the righteousness they had despised when it had come to them in the Person of the Son of God. And in this the action of these aroused, repentant Israelites was an earnest of the turning unto God which should follow upon the preaching of Christ to the Gentiles also.

V. IT IS THE GRACIOUS OFFICE OF THE SPIRIT OF CHRIST TO LEAD THE WORLD TO SEEK AND TO APPROPRIATE THE RIGHTEOUSNESS IT HAS SCORNED. It would not have been in harmony with the character of our Redeemer to have laid stress upon righteousness as rejected, and to have lost sight of righteousness as acquired and appropriated. The Holy Spirit does indeed convince men that they have violated righteousness in their denial and contempt of Christ. But in this is no gospel. And Christ died, and the Holy Spirit was given, for the good of man, for the salvation and not for the condemnation of the sinner. Accordingly, it is by these heavenly influences exerted by the Spirit of God that men are led not only to lament their deficiency, but to seek that that deficiency may be supplied. Jesus becomes to us who believe "the Lord our Righteousness;" he is "made unto us of God Righteousness." And it is for the Spirit that we must give thanks for leading us into the possession and enjoyment of "the righteousness which is by faith." - T.

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KJV: And when he is come, he will reprove the world of sin, and of righteousness, and of judgment:

WEB: When he has come, he will convict the world about sin, about righteousness, and about judgment;