This Holy Story: Forward

John 16:12-15

16:12 "I still have many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now.
16:13 When the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all the truth; for he will not speak on his own, but will speak whatever he hears, and he will declare to you the things that are to come.
16:14 He will glorify me, because he will take what is mine and declare it to you.
16:15 All that the Father has is mine. For this reason I said that he will take what is mine and declare it to you.

• Today’s Father’s Day
• • I remember before I was a dad. I was convinced about certain ways that I could do things. I was going to be a super dad. No TV, no shoving screens in front of their faces. They were going to be particularly well behaved at dinner.
  • But the truth is I was of course a better parent before I was one. Over time I realized that some of those things when done well we’re necessarily bad things. Sometimes it’s okay to have the kids watch PBSKids.
  • Of course, you could have told me these things back then. But it wouldn’t have mattered. I wouldn’t have understood them the way I do now.
• I think that’s 16:12 for us today.
• • “Bear” felt like such a strange word. As if like somehow Jesus was saying we weren’t strong enough for something. A “you can’t handle the truth” kind of moment.
  • But it’s not that way. The way the word is translated throughout the New Testament is more like “tolerate, put up with, carry, hold”… so it seems less about some internal defect, but more about the experiences in our lives.
  • When I saw Abraham for the first time, I knew I had crossed over some path. Was different because of it. I understood some things differently.
• Isn’t that faith? Isn’t that the Spirit? To be our guide as we walk thorough paths without Jesus but to know what he calls us to?
• • Seems apropos on the Sunday before VBS and the Sunday we send out the Work Camp. These kids and youth with experience something new. They’ll bear new things. The Spirit will guide them.
  • But we should all keep in mind that what we bear isn’t a function of age but of experience, and there are things that our kids and youth are experiencing and will experience that we never will.
  • And the learning on bearing what the Spirt will teach doesn’t end at a particular point. The times our anger wells up might be times that we need to consider how we are being invited to bear new things.
• Our call walking forward in our faith is not always to know but to experience.