A Joy No Troubles Can Spoil (John 16:16-33)

Good morning! Eric, one of the pastors.^[1] Welcome to Garden City. 

As we get started, one of my favorite sports quotes of all time was coined by boxer and theologian Mike Tyson, who once said, “Everyone’s got a plan until they get punched in the face.” 

Now, if I’ve ever been punched in the face, I don’t remember it–that’s why I don’t rule it out–-but I do know I’ve experienced circumstances in this life that have felt like a punch to the face, and I wonder if you’ve ever had similar experiences too. 

Like, how do you respond when you find out you’ve just been diagnosed with cancer? Or that you’ve lost your job because your company’s going in a different direction? Or receive news about the unexpected loss of a loved one?  

Honestly, what do you do when your Worst happens? Sometimes there are sorrows in life that feel too great for words. But even in seasons of great sorrow, Jesus offers us a joy that no trouble can spoil and no sorrow can take away. 

If you have a Bible, open with me to the second half of John 16. If you remember, over the last several weeks Jesus has basically been preparing his disciples for their Worst. 

What’s about to unfold is quite literally the their worst case scenario. They’re leader’s going to be arrested and executed, and then they’re going to reject him and run away in fear.  

The fact that Jesus really died is a reminder to all of us, not only that it’s possible in this life for the Worst things to happen, but that sometimes they actually do. 

But see, not even the death of Jesus negates the joy we have in the Lord. In fact, just the opposite. What looks like defeat actually becomes our most enduring reason for joy, and Jesus says the world can never take that from you.  

Pick up with me in…[v. 16] Jesus says, “A little while, and you will see me no longer; and again a little while, and you will see me.” 17 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’?” 18 So they were saying, “What does he mean by ‘a little while’? We do not know what he is talking about.”

Of course, Jesus is talking about his death and resurrection—but his disciples don’t understand that yet. And that should comfort us, because even the future leaders of the Church didn’t always know what God was doing in their lives. They had plenty of questions and few answers. But one of the interesting things about Jesus’ ministry is that it actually makes more sense to us after his death than it did before he died.  

But you also have to remember, we have the benefit of reading this story in light of the Cross. These guys are experiencing the gut-punch of the crucifixion in real time. They didn’t have a category for a crucified Messiah, and they don’t have the Holy Spirit. But soon, everything would make sense. They would understand what God was doing and be empowered to live on mission for him. 

Jesus says, “a little while and you will see me no longer; and again a little while, and you will see me.” That means the joy Jesus promises through his resurrection is inevitable. 

But first, I want you to see that:  

1. Joy doesn’t negate the sorrows.

Jesus accounts for our pain, and so should we.  

One of the reasons I find the Bible so attractive is that it’s so real to life. I’ve heard people call the Bible outdated, corrupted, and filled with myths and fairytales. But if those are your conclusions, I’m honestly skeptical whether or not you’ve really read the Bible. Because the more I read it, the more I find a book that understands broken, sinful people living in a fallen world.  

The experiences described are just too on the nose. 

Wouldn’t it be great if the Bible said the reason you’re going to have so much joy in this life is because all of your sorrows will be gone? No more suffering, pain, or tears.  

And if it that were how it described the Christian life, then we’d either say there are no real Christians or the Bible messed up because that doesn’t match the experience of anyone. That would be fantasy. And in times of real suffering, it would just make us angry. God, if you’re real, why don’t you understand my pain? 

But listen to what Jesus tells his disciples in [v. 19] – 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’? 20 Truly, truly, I say to you, you will weep and lament, but the world will rejoice. You will be sorrowful, but your sorrow will turn into joy.  

Let me point out two things going on here. First, Jesus is saying you’re not immune to sorrows. He goes on to say in v. 33, “In the world you will have troubles.” You should expect pain and sorrow in this life.  

And what do most people do when troubles find them? They ask things like, What did I do to deserve this? What could I have done differently to avoid this? Is God angry with me? Is he punishing me?  

How do you typically respond to troubles?  

One option is you pretend the pain away. You probably know people like this. On the outside you act like everything’s fine, but on the inside you’re broken and hurting. And what that ultimately does is isolate you from the real care of other people. Because everyone around you thinks you’re fine when inwardly you’re falling apart.  

I worked with a guy like this years ago. He was the life of the party. Always had a smile on his face. Always making others laugh. Always in a good mood. But one night he called me to come over to his place in desperation, and when I went I was shocked to see a guy who was depressed, dejected, and so filled with despair. I couldn’t believe this was the same person. He didn’t know how to deal with his pain, so he just tried to pretend it away. 

Or, instead of pretending, maybe you try to forget your troubles by avoiding them. And there’s plenty of ways to do that. You distract yourself, you numb yourself, you go on vacation, or you throw yourself into your work. You think, if I can just stay busy long enough, maybe I won’t have to deal with what’s really going on. 

There’s a saying in the US that, “Time heals all wounds.” So if you’re feeling downcast and brokenhearted, just give it some time. But if you’ve ever experienced sorrow, you know that’s just not true. For example, if you break your arm and don’t do anything to make sure it heals properly, it can get even worse. Neglect can lead to chronic pain, loss of function. And besides, that’s not even what the Bible teaches. 

I don’t want to wait for time to heal me. I want to wait on the Lord. And we don’t have a God who sits idly by doing nothing, but One who’s able to comfort us in all our troubles.  

[Ps. 147:3] says, [The LORD] heals the brokenhearted     and binds up their wounds.

Troubles will find you, but it’s the Lord’s desire to heal you, if you’ll turn to him. See, troubles aren’t meant to turn you away from the Lord, they’re meant to draw you close to him.  

But if all we ever do is deny or pretend away our pain, it just shows we don’t have good ways of dealing with suffering in a broken world. And worse—it means we might miss why Jesus came in the first place. 

The second thing I want you to see is that your sorrows are momentary and an invitation to trust the Lord.  

Jesus tells his disciples they’re going to weep and mourn because he’s going to die for them. It’s going to feel like a punch to the face. It’s going to feel like the worst news in the world because it is. But Jesus’s death isn’t senseless sorrow. It’s actually healing; it’s what makes the joy possible.  

Jesus came into the world to die for sinners. He looked at us in all our troubles and was moved to compassion. He loved you so much he was moved to act on your behalf. Your suffering mattered so much to God that he sent his only Son into the world to be the man of sorrows who becomes acquainted with your grief.  

The very reason Jesus dies is to bring healing to the sin and sorrows in your life.  

The Son of Man had to die—not for his own sin, but for ours. That’s at the heart of the gospel. Your Savior lives. Because he lives, you have life in his name. Death is defeated, sin is forgiven, and there’s no condemnation left for you—only the righteousness of Christ. 

Yes, you’ll suffer—but only for a moment—if you’ll learn to trust him. Listen, do you have friends in your life right now who love you and love the gospel? If you don’t, then you’re probably not taking the sorrows that will inevitably come as seriously as you should. You don’t wait for the storm to come to forge those friendships.  

My advice would be to bury whatever excuse you have for not seeking these relationships, to trust the Lord’s provision of the people he’s put around you, and to start having some intentional conversations about growing as disciples together.  

I’ve been trying to do this with some friends more recently, but it seems like we each keep having storms hit us. Which makes me want to fight for it all the more because I want to be a gospel presence in their life.  

Ask yourself: Who do I want to speak the gospel into? And then for your joy and for theirs, start doing it. When you do, make sure you’re intentional in that time. Plan to talk about Jesus and the real things going on in your life. Encourage and pray for one another. That’s one way you take your sorrows seriously. You plan for ways to stay afloat when they do come. 

2. Joy is permanent, not circumstantial. 

Now, you might be wondering, what’s the difference between joy and happiness because they’re not the same thing.  

Happiness is circumstantial but joy isn’t. That’s why happiness and sorrows can’t co-exist but joy and sorrows can. I love how Tim Keller puts it. He says, “Joy is the buoyancy that results from the enjoyment of the unchanging privileges we have in God.”

Give a kid an ice cream cone, and they’re thrilled. They couldn’t be happier. Drop that cone on the ground, and their happiness melts away. But joy isn’t like that.  

Joy is: Give a kid an ice cream cone and he recognizes that the Giver is also his Father who loves him and who is the source of all goodness and has plans for him to prosper far beyond what he could ever imagine. He drops his ice cream cone. He’s sad, but hopeful that his good Father will make it right somehow, whether now or later.  

That’s what it means to be buoyant. Whatever troubles come, joy keeps you afloat. The sorrows don’t sink the joy. The Christian can have joy even in suffering because we see life through the lens of the resurrection. Whatever pain we face now is momentary compared to eternity. And the world can’t steal our joy because Christ has overcome the world—and if you’re in Christ, you will too. 

Jesus gives the perfect illustration of this in [v. 21]. He says, 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.  

I remember being with Sarah during labor with our first child. Guys, sometimes you have thoughts you just don’t say out loud. I remember thinking, “I know how this is supposed to work conceptually, but I don’t know if her body can actually do this. I don’t know if I can do this.” Anguish is the right word. And remember—Jesus is talking about childbirth long before hospitals or epidurals! 

[teenagers need to go hug their moms] 

My mom once told me she wished everyone could experience the joys of childbirth. I told her, no, I trust God’s wisdom in limiting that experience. 

But isn’t it crazy that that’s the description. Joy in the labor pains. How often do you view your suffering with such hope?  

See, if you know anything about childbearing, you know the pain doesn’t end for the mother once the child’s born. Recovery takes time. But the mother’s joy isn’t dependent on her circumstances. There’s both pain and joy—but it’s not the pain that swallows the joy. It’s the joy that swallows the pain. 

[v. 22] – Jesus says, So also you have sorrow now, but I will see you again, and your hearts will rejoice, and no one will take your joy from you.

Jesus connects the anguish of childbirth to the joy of his resurrection. Resurrection joy makes every other burden in this life bearable. It means our sins are forgiven and our hope is secure, which guarantees our suffering will never be wasted. 

But that doesn’t mean the joy will come automatically. Sometimes you’ll need to fight for joy. Maybe you’ll need to: 

• Preach the gospel to yourself instead of listening to yourself. 
• Or acknowledge that sometimes you don’t want to pray and read the Bible. And then using that as an excuse, you pursue intimacy with the Lord all the more.   
• Cling to a promise of God: Some that I’ve been holding onto during this season is his promise that his mercies are new every morning and that he will never leave nor forsake me.  

Fight for the joy that’s yours in Christ. Have confidence in the fight because: 

3. Joy is rooted in life with Jesus. 

If you look back through our passage again, Jesus keeps pointing us to the reason for our joy. In verses 16-18 he keeps saying, “you will see me. You will see me.” [v. 22] – “I will see you again.” Jesus even applies the joy to himself as he walks through his own sorrows.  

He tells his disciples in verse 32, you think you understand what I’m saying now, but you’re all going to reject and abandon me. “Yet I am not alone, for the Father is with me.”

The point is that the fullness of our joy is found in life with God—and we can’t experience that apart from Jesus dying on the cross for us. 

That’s also why Jesus’ words, “You will see me again,” carry so much weight. Even when everyone abandoned him, he still had joy that comes from knowing and being known by the Father.  

Paul describes our life with God in [Rom. 14:17] like this – For the kingdom of God is not a matter of eating and drinking but of righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit. 

Joy in the Spirit is a gift from God—and the gift is God himself. The Holy Spirit is the guarantee that we have life with the Father. That’s why [Matt. 28:20 promises that Jesus will always be with us. And why [Heb. 13:5] assures us that “The Lord will never leave us nor forsake us.”

It’s a joy that runs deeper than our circumstances. It’s a settled attitude of the heart—a commitment to keep doing good and trusting God no matter what comes, because our strength is in him. 

And it’s rooted in faith and hope in Jesus. The Spirit gives us a deep trust in Jesus’s presence and purpose for our lives. 

See, here’s the beauty of Christian joy: when sorrows come, they don’t push you away from God; they pull you closer to him. So, in some mysterious way, sorrow can actually produce greater joy because it draws you deeper into fellowship with the Father. 

That’s the heart of the gospel: what looked like a devastating defeat—the cross—actually brought life and victory. So when life grows bitter, the Holy Spirit makes the sweetness of the gospel even more real and necessary. And that preserves you amid any sorrow.  

King David says in [Ps. 16:11] – You make known to me the path of life;     in your presence there is fullness of joy;

    at your right hand are pleasures forevermore.

This is the joy Jesus died to give you—life with the Father. In his presence is fullness of joy. And we stay in his presence by abiding in the Son through the power of the Spirit. 

Later, Jesus talks about the role of prayer in our joy—and how it reveals the kind of relationship we now have with the Father, which makes total sense when you think about it, because joy is rooted in our relationship with Jesus and prayer is a way for us to learn to wait on the Lord and to speak back to him what he’s first spoken to us in his Word.  

Have you ever noticed how deep and rich prayer becomes when we not only ask God the things we want, but we pray for the things he’s revealed to us in his Word?  

Jesus says in [v. 23] – 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. 24 Until now you have asked nothing in my name. Ask, and you will receive, that your joy may be full.

Think about this: We can ask the Father directly with the full authority of Jesus’s name. We can pray for him to bring redemption to the broken things in our lives, to bring healing where there’s brokenness, to overcome sin and sorrow, to wipe away tears, to redeem what seems lost, to restore what feels hopeless. 

If the resurrection is true, then nothing’s too hard for our God. 

But Jesus clarifies even further. [v. 26] – 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; 27 for the Father himself loves you, because you have loved me and have believed that I came from God. 28 I came from the Father and have come into the world, and now I am leaving the world and going to the Father.” That means the Father loves you with the same love he has for his Son Jesus. And he doesn’t need Jesus to convince him to listen to us because it was the Father’s love that sent Jesus to die for us in the first place. 

That’s why Jesus said in John 15 that he no longer calls us servants, but friends—because he’s made known to us the Father’s plans. And that invitation didn’t end with the disciples; it’s true for his Church today. 

So we ask for God’s plans to be done in Jesus’s name: 

God, give victory over this sin. 

Let your Word dwell richly in me. 

Build your church. 

Draw the lost to yourself. 

Wipe away every tear. 

Don’t waste our suffering, but make all the wrong things right. 

That means we come to God not as servants trying to earn his favor, but as sons and daughters loved perfectly by the Father. He delights to answer these prayers, and when we receive from him, our joy is made full. 

4. Joy gives us lasting purpose.  

[v. 30] – Jesus’s disciples say, “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.” 31 Jesus answered them, “Do you now believe? 32 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 iswith me. 33 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.”

The disciples think they finally understand what’s going on, but they still don’t have a clue. But the truthfulness of Jesus’s words isn’t dictated by his disciples understanding. And every word Jesus spoke happens. He gets arrested and killed. His disciples lose heart. He sees them again, and his disciples are exceedingly joyful. 

The Spirit comes, the Church is born, and the disciples finally understand God’s mission and the call to disciple-making. But troubles will continue to come and God will continue to be faithful in overcoming all of them.  

That’s the pattern we see throughout the book of Acts. The early church didn’t let suffering steal their joy—it deepened it which gave them a compelling witness. There’s something about a broken person who still has their joy that surprises us. Because deep down, we all know we’re broken, and some of us decided a long time ago that we’d never experience joy again.  

But see, what made the early Church so joyful is that they were changed by the gospel, and good news always produces joyful people.  

Trials and persecution didn’t make the Church weak and fearful. It made them stand out. It showed the world what it looks like to have joy in chaos and peace that makes no sense. A person who experiences joy amid sorrow becomes a compelling witness to the presence of God at work.  

They lived this way because: 

1. They had the Holy Spirit, so they knew they belonged to God. 
2. They trusted God’s plan for salvation and believed he would use them in it. 
3. They hoped in the resurrection, and they knew one day God would make all things new. 

So if there’s suffering now, that means it’s ultimately temporary—and it’s producing an even greater joy. 

That’s why, in Acts 5, when some of the apostles get arrested, beaten, and warned to stop preaching Christ. They don’t leave in fear. They leave in joy.  [Acts 5:41] – …they left the presence of the council, rejoicing that they were counted worthy to suffer dishonor for the name. 42 And every day, in the temple and from house to house, they did not cease teaching and preaching that the Christ is Jesus.

And then, in Acts 14, as Paul and Barnabas are on one of their missionary journey’s, at one point Paul gets stoned, dragged out of the city, and left for dead. Which, for most people, would be a reason to call it a day. Maybe head back home.  

But Paul keeps going. [Acts 14:22] says he even goes back into the city he got stoned in—strengthening the souls of the disciples, encouraging them to continue in the faith, and saying that through many tribulations we must enter the kingdom of God.

Jesus teaches us that our joy’s secure in him. It’s not circumstantial—no one can take it away. And it only grows deeper as we live out our purpose in him. 

See, the apostles had a joy that came from knowing that Jesus had an eternal purpose and that God had included them in it. And the same is true for us.  

This same joyful calling is ours today. See, to take heart means to live from a place of victory, even when life feels like defeat. 

• So, in sorrow, we remember the worst things don’t defeat us, and we ask God not to waste our suffering.  
• In sin, we don’t give in to despair because we know our Savior lives—and he lives in me—so we boldly ask for victory. 
• And in trials, we don’t grow weary; but hopeful as we learn to wait on the Lord. 

Our joy increases as we live out our calling as the Church. Our joy increases as the Spirit makes God’s presence and promises more real to us. It increases when we keep having hard conversations with coworkers, friends, and family who don’t yet know Christ. 

In the world, there will be trouble. People will wrong us. Sorrow will come. But the gospel will advance. The Spirit will convict. People will repent and believe. We’ll see lives transformed and baptisms celebrated. We’ll run the race set before us until his kingdom comes. 

So yes—weep and mourn, because the sorrow’s real. But rejoice always because the gospel is true.  

Sometimes sorrows come in this life because of sin. And sometimes sorrows come and the only explanation we can give is that we live in a world that’s deeply broken.  

But the hope of the resurrection gives us courage to press on with joy because we have a God who not only sympathizes with us but who actually came down to heal all the brokenness caused by sin.  

It reminds me of a moment at the end of The Lord of the Rings. After a long battle with evil and all the scars to show for it, Sam Gamgee wakes up after the ring of power’s been destroyed. 

The journey had been so hard on them that Sam and Frodo had accepted it would likely cost them their lives; a life well spent.  

So when Sam opens his eyes, he’s shocked not only to be alive, but to see his friend Gandalf—who he also thought was dead—standing beside him. Overwhelmed, Sam cries out to Gandalf, “I thought you were dead! But then I thought I was dead myself! Is everything sad going to come untrue?” 

For the Christian, the answer is yes. One day, Jesus will make everything sad come untrue. He’ll wipe away every tear, heal every pain, and we’ll see the Father face to face without fear. 

And the reason we believe that is because 2,000 years ago God sent his Son Jesus into the world to die on the Cross in our place so that we could experience life with God again. And if he can defeat death by the power of his love, is anything impossible for our God? 

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^[1] Works Consulted:  

–     The Gospel According to John – Carson; “Infallible Joy” – Keller; “The King’s Mission” – Greear; “Joy–Overcoming Boredom” – Keller; “The Helper” – Martin