Whatever You Ask, He Will Do

(John 14:12-14)

I. Introduction.
A. Orientation.
Jesus has been comforting His disciples
Since He told them that He was going to the Father.
He said He was going to prepare a place for them
And that He would come again to bring them home:
They would see heaven they were safe.

He reminded them how they to get there:

He was the way
They simply needed to continue to trust
That He had told them the truth
When He said He alone gives eternal life
Through faith in His name.

He also told them more about the Father

The One whose house He was about to bring them.
What was He like?
How would He receive them?
Would He love them like Jesus?
Jesus said His Father was just like Him
He had come to reveal His Father.

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In His loving them,
They were seeing the Fathers love.
They had nothing to fear from Him,
But every reason to look forward to seeing Him.

B. Preview.
Jesus now further encourages them
By revealing what provision
He has made for them once He was gone.

They must have been wondering with Jesus leaving

How the work was going to move forward;
How could they do it without Him;
What it was they could expect.

Jesus tells them something

Perhaps they werent ready to believe
Though He had been giving them glimpses of it
Things werent going to get worse, but better:
Not only would they be able to do what He had done
While He was with them,
They would do greater things,
Because He was going to the Father.

Lets consider two things this evening:

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1. Jesus promise that His disciples would do greater things.
2. What they had to do to gain these blessings.

II. Sermon.
A. First, the apostles would do greater things.
1. Jesus says in verse 12, Truly, truly, I say to you, he who believes in Me, the
works that I do, he will do also; and greater works than these he will do; because
I go to the Father.
He begins with the use of the double amen,
To confirm the truth of what He was about to say.
Even though He would be gone,
They would continue to do
The work Jesus had begun
In the way He was doing it.

What did Jesus do?

He healed the sick, cast out demons,
Opened the eyes of the blind and the ears of the deaf,
Raised the dead, and preached the Gospel
They would do the same.

This shouldnt have come as a surprise

Since He had commissioned them earlier
On more than one occasion
To teach, preach and perform miracles
In the towns and villages of Palestine.

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What they had done while He was on earth
They would continue to do now that He was going to heaven.

Not only would this be true of them,

But of everyone who believes in Him
There is a sense in which this applies to us
Which well consider in a moment.

2. But more,
They would do even greater works.
Theres a question here
As to what Jesus meant by greater.

a. He could have meant

That they would do things
That were even more extraordinary
Than what He had done
That certainly happened:
The woman with the hemorrhage
Was healed when she touched the fringe of Jesus cloak;
But we read in the book of Acts
That there were many healed
When Peters shadow fell on them.
Luke writes in Acts 5:14-16, And all the more believers in the Lord,
multitudes of men and women, were constantly added to their number, to
such an extent that they even carried the sick out into the streets and laid

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them on cots and pallets, so that when Peter came by at least his shadow
might fall on any one of them. Also the people from the cities in the
vicinity of Jerusalem were coming together, bringing people who were
sick or afflicted with unclean spirits, and they were all being healed.
Luke also writes of how others were healed
By articles of clothing that were taken from Paul.
We read in Acts 19:11-12, God was performing extraordinary miracles by
the hands of Paul, so that handkerchiefs or aprons were even carried from
his body to the sick, and the diseases left them and the evil spirits went
out (Acts 19:11-12).
Those were greater works.

When Jesus preached,

Some were converted,
But there doesnt appear to have been many.
When Pilate offered to release Jesus,
No one seems to have wanted Him,
Or they were so few in number
They were afraid to speak.

Before Jesus left for heaven,

When He told His disciples to wait
For the promise of the Father in Jerusalem
There appears only to have been
About a hundred and twenty disciples
Who had gathered in that Upper Room to pray (Acts 1:15).

But when Peter preached at Pentecost,

Three thousand were converted (Acts 2:41).

And when he preached again after healing the lame man,
Five thousand more were converted (4:4).
Many of those converted at Pentecost
Returned to their homes to plant new churches,
Such as what happened in Rome.
This appears to be something greater.

The disciples seemed to experience

Greater deliverances from God.
Peter was released by an angel from prison;
Paul and Silas could have walked free
After the earthquake had knocked off their chains
And opened the cell door in Philippi;
The Lord even raised Paul back to life
After he had been stoned by an angry mob.

b. The other thing Jesus could have meant

Was that they would do a greater number of works.
Their ministry would span a longer period of time,
And would be carried out by many more workers,
So the number of miracles and conversions would be greater.

3. But why would they do greater works?

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Notice, it wouldnt happen if Jesus remained with them,
But if He left if He went to the Father.

Far from being despondent that Jesus was leaving

They should have been encouraged
Because His leaving would actually bring
Greater blessings to them in the person of the Spirit:
He would give them the ability to do greater miracles;
And He would bring about the conversion of more people.

4. Application:
Has this day of greater things ended?
Was what Jesus promised here only for the apostles?

There is a certain sense in which it was only for them

Particularly in the miracle department.
The time of charismatic gifts has ended.
Not only do we see them trail off in Scripture,
The early church saw them end as well
Along with the age of the apostles.

The Lord still gives gifts for service,

But not the miraculous gifts.
He still does miracles,
But He doesnt give anyone the ability

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To do them at will.
Once His Word was complete,
He withdrew the gifts He used to authenticate them.

But what about His greatest work: the work of conversion?

What about the resurrection of the soul from death to life?
The Lord still grants the new birth
The fact that were here proves it.

What about converting large numbers of people at one time?

We only need to read the history of revival
To see that the Lord has done
Even greater things than He did at Pentecost.

Jesus is in heaven,
But He is still doing greater things on earth
Because He has gone to the Father.

B. But what would the disciples have to do to gain His blessings?

Jesus said He would grant them in answer to prayer.
He continues in verses 13 and 14, Whatever you ask in My name, that will I do, so
that the Father may be glorified in the Son. If you ask Me anything in My name, I
will do it.
1. If they wanted these things
The power to heal the sick,
To cast out demons,

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The strength and courage to preach the Gospel,
And see people converted by that Gospel
All they had to do was ask.

The word here means

To request with urgency,
Almost to the point of demanding.
If they would receive any of these things,
They must really want them.

2. They had to ask in His name.

They couldnt come in their own.
Theres no reason the Father or Jesus
Should listen to them or any of us.
They must come pleading His merits,
His worthiness,
Not their own.

3. What they asked for had to be something

That would glorify Jesus and His Father
Their requests couldnt be self-centered:
Such as asking to be rich like Solomon,
Or to have a condo on the Sea of Galilee,
Or to be the most famous evangelist in all of Palestine.
Their requests had to be God-centered

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Things He wanted,
That were according to His will,
That would bring glory to Him.

If they asked for these things

Which they would
Because they were being conformed to Jesus image
As we saw this morning
Then Jesus Himself would answer their prayer,
He says, If you ask Me anything in My name, I will do it (v. 14).

This reminds us
That Jesus is as much divine as His Father.
He has the power, not only to hear,
But also to answer, prayer;
And He will answer it, if we come in the right way.

4. Application:
And so where are we going to find the resources we need
To do what the Lord has called us to do
In reaching this dark world
With the light of His Gospel?
Where will we find the energy?
Where will we find the courage?

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How can we expect anyone to be converted
Through our efforts?

Jesus said we would do greater things

Because He goes to the Father,
Because He has sent His Spirit.
Its true that there will be times
When He gives more
And times when He gives less of this help,
But the work will continue
It will move forward,
Even more powerfully
Than when Jesus was on earth
Because He now reigns in heaven.

All we have to do is pray

Pray with urgency;
We need to take hold of Him by faith
And not let Him go until He answers.

We need to pray
With His glory in mind
Not our own.
The Lord has already given us
The heart we need to pray in this way

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Because He has given us His Spirit

If we have trusted Him.
We might still want to be rich and famous,
But knowing these things are self-centered,
Well set them aside
To ask the Lord for those things
We know He wants,
The things that will honor Him
And advance His kingdom.

We can know
That when we pray for these things
Because we really want them,
Because we really want to see the Lord glorified
When we ask for them in His name
On the grounds of His merits
Jesus not only hears us,
But He will do whatever we ask
Because in answering our prayer,
He is accomplishing His Fathers will.

In closing, lets examine our prayer life.

Do our prayers center on ourselves
On what we want

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Or on the Lord and what we know He wants?

If its the first,
Lets reorient our prayers
And begin seeking after what the Lord wants.
Theres nothing wrong with asking
For the things we need,
Or even some things we want
As long as we want them
So that we may better serve Him.

If we want things for any other reason,

Then may the Lord give us
More of His Spirit,
That we might have more of His heart,
That we might ask for more of what He wants,
And that we might see more answers to our prayers. Amen.
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