“When the Spirit comes,” John 16:8, “he will convict the world of guilt in regard to sin and righteousness and judgment. In regard to sin (first of all, verse 9), it’s because the world does not believe in me.”
So Jesus sent the Holy Spirit to show the world it’s a sin to not believe in him. But why is not believing in Jesus a sin? Because it’s a criminal offence against oneself. Jesus put it in those terms too, that “whoever does not believe stands condemned already,” John 3:18. The Greek word for “condemned” is a legal term for being judged or sentenced – as in a court case. So not believing in Jesus is like pronouncing a guilty sentence on yourself.
And that gets serious when Jesus also ‘stands up in court’ so to speak and announces what you’ve sentenced yourself to. He prefaces it in verse 16 with, “You know what I was sent by God to you for, right? – that whoever believes in me shall not perish but have eternal life.” In other words, “I’m here, sent by a God who loves you, to save you from self-destructing into nothingness. To not believe that, then, is a criminal offence against yourself. You’ve sentenced yourself to a life of self-destruction, when what I came for was to rescue you from that so you can have eternal life – enjoying a loving God and his world – instead.”
So Jesus then announces in verse 19: “This is the verdict: Light has come into the world” – illuminating in Jesus what God wants for his beloved humans – “but (weirdly) people loved darkness instead of light, resulting in their actions being evil” wrecking other people’s lives too.
Which again shows why not believing in Jesus is a sin, because it’s not only a criminal offence against oneself, it creates a horrible world where billions upon billions of criminal offences are being committed every day against other people too. The verdict, therefore, is obvious: that not believing in Jesus is a criminal offence – because of the destructive harm done to oneself and to others.
And it gets worse, verse 20, because once a person is hooked on doing evil he “hates the light” and will do anything to hide from it. He’ll try to cover up his evil deeds by lies, blaming anyone but himself, and silencing anyone who dares to expose what he’s up to. And we know what that’s like because we live in such a world. But Jesus has his disciples all over this planet “Providing a contrast”….(next blog)
