Jesus said: “A little while, and you will see Me no longer; and again a little while, and you will see Me” (John 16:16).
Are you confused by these words of Jesus? If you thought Jesus only spoke in parables, you would be mistaken. Today, we hear Him saying three riddles. So, what is Jesus saying? What are we to understand?
As you may be perplexed by these words of Jesus, His apostles are certainly befuddled. So, they say to each other, “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’” (John 16:17).
They are perplexed. What is Jesus talking about? Was Jesus going to leave them? Then come back to them? But they just couldn’t ask Jesus what He meant.
Just think of this riddle: No matter how smart you are, there is one thing you will always overlook. What is it? The answer: your nose.
Yes, riddles can be fun, but they can also leave us confounded. The apostles reacted with puzzlement to the words Jesus spoke to them, “A little while, and you will see Me no longer; and again a little while, and you will see Me” (John 16:16).
As for us, we live on the other side of the “little while” of Christ’s atoning death and bodily resurrection and ascension, so we know the answer for Christ’s first “little while” riddle.
We all have our own “little whiles.” Some are long; some are short. What are your thoughts when you have to wait in line at the grocery store? What are your thoughts when you wait in line at an amusement park? What are your thoughts when you are caught in traffic? We all treat our “little whiles” differently.
Today, on this Fifth Sunday of Easter, we find ourselves back in the upper room on Maundy Thursday.
The apostles were uneasy. The Jewish authorities’ hatred toward Jesus was reaching a boiling point. Later that night Judas Iscariot would betray Jesus with a kiss setting into motion Jesus’ arrest, trial and death.
Again, we know what Jesus was talking about. He was talking to His apostles about in “a little while” His coming suffering and death and in “a little while” His coming resurrection from death.
But Jesus isn’t done with speaking riddles. Jesus says to them, “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” (John 16:20).
Jesus says, “You will weep.” Well, this is not surprising. When Lazarus died, even Jesus wept. “You will weep and lament,” Jesus says, “but the world will rejoice.”
This is the world that hates God, its Maker. This is the world that wants nothing to do with Jesus, its Redeemer.
Now, there are reasons why the apostles would weep. First, they did not know what would happen in just “a little while.” They didn’t get it. Yes, they were told several times. But just like us, we don’t always listen and ultimately understand what has been said. Second, the death of Jesus was a good reason for the apostles to weep and lament, because Jesus is killed. The Lamb takes the sin of the world upon Himself and sin kills Him. They don’t see Him, since He’s dead and buried in a tomb. Their sin, the world sin, yours and my sin killed Him. Everyone, the apostles, the disciples, the Jewish authorities and the Roman soldiers all believe that Jesus is dead and gone.
But in this second riddle, Jesus concludes saying, “You will be sorrowful, but your sorrow will turn into joy.” So, what would happen? Easter would happen. The bodily resurrection of our Lord would happen. Alleluia! Christ is risen! He is risen, indeed! Alleluia!
They saw Jesus again! He appeared in the barred-shut upper room on Easter evening and a week later saying, “Peace be with you” (John 20:19) and immediately showed them His hands and His side. They were glad when they saw the Lord!
Then, sometime later, Jesus revealed Himself again by the Sea of Tiberias. Despite catching no fish on their own, Jesus’ voice leads them to another miraculous catch of fish and to eating breakfast with Him and Peter receiving the certainty of his forgiveness from Him after he denied Him three times on Maundy Thursday.
This sorrow that turned into joy was not manufactured by anything within them. They rejoiced “when they saw the Lord” (John 20:20). Their joy came from outside of them. It came from without. Their joy came from the crucified and risen Jesus! He turned their sorrow into joy!
“In a little while” Jesus would bring redemption, life, and salvation. But wait, there’s more!
Forty days after His bodily resurrection from the dead, Jesus would return to God the Father as He bodily ascended into heaven. So, again, “in a little while,” His apostles would not see Him. But “in a little while,” the Holy Spirit would make it clear to the disciples all the things that had happened. And the Holy Spirit would also point them to things yet to come, and many, including you and me, will come to faith in Jesus as Lord through their apostolic testimony recorded in the Scriptures.
But what about you and me? Well, Jesus gives us a third riddle: “So also you will have sorrow now, but I will see you again, and your hearts will rejoice, and no one will take your joy from you”(John 16:22).
We are also living “in a little while.” I bet there have been times when you have not been particularly joyful. In our “little while,” we struggle. We struggle with weeping and lament. We mourn while the world is rejoicing. And just like when Jesus died nailed to a cross, the world today is rejoicing. The world is rejoicing because it has pushed God into a corner. Now, God cannot be shoved away, but the fallen world has pushed God away from so much public consciousness. Why?
Well, the world hates God and His only begotten Son, who has come as the Redeemer of the world. You see, the fallen world hates God and rejoices when we worship money and possessions, falsehood over God’s truth. The fallen world rejoices when love grows cold and when we live in echo chambers by only interacting with others who share your same beliefs.
So, where is the joy? Even when we live in a time of intense pain, we are living a time akin to a woman giving birth. For when the birth occurs, she no longer remembers the anguish, for joy that a child has been born into the world. For when a child is born, all the pain is quickly forgotten. All that remains is joy. Alleluia! Christ is risen! He is risen, indeed! Alleluia!
Today, Jesus comes to us offering forgiveness for your sins in hidden means through His written and preached Word, through the word of absolution, and given to us under bread and wine in the Lord’s Supper for the forgiveness of our sins, the strength for our faith. But besides the mystery of the Means of Grace, we have not seen Jesus. We have not seen His scarred hands and feet with our own eyes, but we have seen Him by faith. And as Christ says, “Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed” (John 20:29).
But we will see Him fully. Right now, we all experience various crosses and trials, but “in a little while,” Jesus “will wipe away every tear from [your] eyes, and death will be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away”(Revelation 21:4). So, be patient. God will get you through your trials.
Right now, we see a world growing increasingly out of control, but “in a little while” Jesus will return and set all things right. On that Last Day, Jesus will destroy our last enemy: death.
“In a little while” we will see the glorified, risen, ascended, all-powerful Jesus with our own eyes. On that day, we will rejoice, and no one can take that joy away from you. Until that day, let us always look for the resurrection of the dead and the life of the world to come! Amen. Come, Lord Jesus!
The peace of God, which surpasses all understanding,
keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus, our Lord. Amen.
+ SOLI DEO GLORIA +
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