Ineffectual Reproof and Effectual Conviction of Sin
Archdeacon Hare. John 16:9 Of sin, because they believe not on me; We did not need that the Holy Spirit should come down from heaven to reprove the world of sin. The words and thoughts of men would have been sufficient to do this. Every preacher of righteousness from the days of Noah has gone about reproving the world of sin. Everybody who in any age has led a just, and holy life has reproved the world of sin, even though he may not have lifted up his voice against it. Nay, the unholy may do so, and the greatest sinners may be the loudest in reproof. Poetry had reproved the world of sin; indeed this is the special business of two of its branches — comedy and satire. Philosophy had reproved the world of sin; and at the time when the Spirit of God had begun His great work, the reproofs of philosophy had become severer and more clamorous than ever. But what is the world the better for all this laborious reproving? How much does the world heed it, or care for it? No more than the crater of Etna cares for the roaring and lashing of the waves at its feet. The smoke of sin will rise up and stain the face of heaven, the flames will still burst forth and spread desolation far and wide, although the waves of reproof should roll around it unceasingly century after century. In fact, the whole history of man has shown that reproof, when there is no gentler and more penetrative power working along with it, instead of producing conviction, rather provokes the heart to resist it. The office of the Spirit, then, was not to reprove but to convince, to teach mankind what sin is, to lay it bare under all its masks, to trace it through all the mazes of its web, and to light on it sitting in the midst thereof, to show it to man, not merely as it flashes forth in the overt actions of his neighbours, but as it lies smouldering inextinguishably within his own bosom, to give him a torch whereby he may explore the dark chambers of his own heart, to lead him into them, and to open his eyes so that he shall behold some of sin's countless brood crouching or gambolling in every corner. And to convince a man of sin in this way, by proving to him that it lies at the bottom of all his feelings, and blends with all his thoughts, that the bright coloured stones with which he is so fond of decking himself out, and which he takes such delight in gazing at, are only so many bits of brittle, worthless glass, and that what he deems to be stars are earthborn meteors, which merely glimmer for the moment they are falling; to convince the world of sin, by showing it how sin has tainted its heart, and flows through its veins, and is mixed up with its life-blood — this is a work which no earthly power can accomplish, and therefore was our Saviour mercifully pleased to send the Comforter to produce this conviction in mankind. (Archdeacon Hare.) Parallel Verses KJV: Of sin, because they believe not on me; WEB: about sin, because they don't believe in me;