Monday, September 23, 2024
Troubled
Let not your hearts be troubled. Believe in God; believe also in me. John 14:1
Please read John 13:1-14:11 today. The setting for the next “I AM” statement of Jesus is the night he was betrayed. It is spring. It is the time of Passover. The spring feasts have begun. These are the feasts that will be fulfilled in the first coming of Jesus into the world. John takes a great part of his gospel to tell what happened on the night Jesus was betrayed (John 13-18). As you read the passage today were you able to grasp the feeling that may have been in the room? As the time for Jesus’ crucifixion approaches, he is troubled. The word that is used for troubled in the original language (tarassō) is also used to describe the way that Jesus felt when he told of his coming crucifixion (12:27ff). It was also used to describe what he felt when he told the disciples of the coming betrayal by one of them (13:21). He was troubled in his spirit. The word means to be agitated, stirred, calmness removed. The scene John describes in chapter 13 is troubling. Jesus is going to the cross. He is going to leave them. He has told them this, he has also told them that one of them will betray him. They have traveled together and known each other well for some 3 years. This would be very unsettling. Additionally, they have been told that Peter will deny Jesus (13:38) that very night. Everything is about to change. While it does not seem the disciples knew at that time exactly what it meant, they do know that something does not feel right. They are troubled. Jesus tells them not to let their hearts be troubled. It seems much easier to say than to do. Perhaps you know what it is to be troubled. You know what it is to have uncertainty that stirs your soul and causes you to feel agitated. Perhaps your calmness is impacted. Jesus knows all about your trouble. He knows what it is to feel troubled.
Take some time today to think of what it may have been like to be one of the disciples in that room and imagine what they were feeling.
Tuesday, September 24, 2024
Believe
Let not your hearts be troubled. Believe in God; believe also in me. John 14:1
Please read John 14:1-11 today. How good it would be for the disciples to have Jesus continue his conversation. Imagine if he had just said, “Do not let your hearts be troubled.” Fortunately, for them and for us, Jesus continues and reveals how to walk through and move from being troubled. Belief in God. The word in the original language (pisteuō) is found more than 200 times in the New Testament, 98 of those times in the gospel of John. Remember that it is the reason John is recording his gospel (20:31). Some translations use the word trust instead of believe. This is appropriate. To truly believe is to trust. We trust in that in which we believe. Part of what brings trouble to our spirit is the uncertainty of this world. Anxiousness comes when we do not know what to trust or what to believe in. It comes when what we have trusted or believed in proves untrustworthy. How many times in your life have you experienced a troubling in your spirit? In what ways has your trust in God held you in those times? What do you believe in? The temporary situations of this world are held and directed by the eternal God who is sovereign over them all. It is not wrong to feel troubled. Jesus promised that in this world we would have tribulations (John 16:33). However, we can calm those feelings by believing in God and in Jesus. As we believe in him, the things that trouble us become less overwhelming because we trust that he is working his redemptive plan to restore and reconcile. The disciples would face many more times that could be overwhelming in their lives. I wonder how many times they reminded themselves of these words and how these words and the truth they contain held them in those hardest moments. Do you believe in God? Remind yourself often what it is you truly believe in.
Wednesday, September 25, 2024
Know
“And you know the way to where I am going.” Thomas said to him, “Lord, we do not know where you are going. How can we know the way?” John 14:4-5
Please read John 14:1-11 again today, looking for the words “know” and “believe” as you do. What do you notice? In his first epistle, John reveals that he writes it so that people can know that they have eternal life (1 John 5:13). Apparently for John it is important that people believe and know Jesus is the Savior of the world! It is possible to know. In fact, Jesus told his disciples that they knew the way to where he was going. They didn’t know they knew! Thomas asks the question they all had. Jesus has told them he was leaving. He is going to the Father. They know the way to the Father, but they haven’t yet put all the pieces together. They are thinking in earthly ways, he is speaking to them of the heavenly way (see John 3:12). They have designed in their minds the way the Messiah should come and impact the world they live in—the world that is causing them to feel troubled. They are longing for the setting right of earthly things. Jesus is helping them lift their eyes heavenward. These verses (John 14:1-11) are so important for followers of Jesus to hold on to. If you are a follower of Jesus, you know the way to the Father. You know that you have eternal life. You believe in God. You do not let your heart be troubled. You trust. True, there are times when that trust is shaken, but in those moments, you remember what you know and what you have believed in. Jesus. The way.
Thursday, September 26, 2024
Father
Jesus said to him, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. John 14:6
Please read John 14:1-11 again today. This time notice how many times “Father” is mentioned. Jesus is the way to the Father. When the eternal Son appears in human form, he begins to point to the Father. God is not referred to as Father very often in the Old Testament, however, it has been noted that it is found over 100 times in John’s gospel. Jesus is the way to the Father. In that way, the Father is the destination. To go to the Father is to go to the Father’s house. The Father’s house refers to Heaven. Heaven is described in various ways. Father’s house, a country (Hebrews 11:16), a kingdom (Matthew 5:20), a city (Hebrews 12:22), paradise (Revelation 2:20), and a place of rest (Hebrews 4:1ff). The ache in each of our hearts is to be with the Father in his house. He has designed us with that longing. We long to go home. Like the prodigal son who wandered, our hearts stir for the Father and his love and care. This world and our sinful nature try to suppress that longing and try to find satisfaction and comfort in things that are created rather than the Creator and yet, deep within, we know the longing. In many ways, the separation from the Father is what brings the feeling of trouble into our lives. We are unsettled because of the distance between us and the Father. Jesus came to make the Father known. He is the exact representation and the expression of the thoughts of God. He is the way to the Father and to the Father’s house. Have you turned to the Father? Has that aching in your soul found the peace of returning to him?
Friday, September 27, 2024
Way
But Saul, still breathing threats and murder against the disciples of the Lord, went to the high priest and asked him for letters to the synagogues at Damascus, so that if he found any belonging to the Way, men or women, he might bring them bound to Jerusalem. Acts 9:1-2
Please read John 14:1-11 again today. Jesus declares that he is the way, and the truth, and the life and that no one comes to the Father except through him. Jesus is the way because he alone is the truth (Revelation 3:7) about God and he alone is the one who possesses the life of God (John 1:4). He is the giver of life, and he is life. He is the giver of truth, and he is truth. He is the giver of the way, and he is the way. There is only one way to the Father’s house. Jesus. That can seem too restrictive and prohibitive, when it actuality it is amazingly gracious on the part of God to provide a way to himself. We have chosen to reject him and in our autonomy we can think that we should get to choose the way to the Father. As the good Shepherd, Jesus calls his own to follow him. Followers of Jesus are actually followers of the Way. In fact, as Luke records the early movement of the Church, he records for us that those who followed Jesus were referred to as followers of the Way. Those are the people Paul was pursuing. Followers of the Way were considered by the religious rulers of the day to be a sect (Acts 24:14). Seeing that Jesus is the Way allows us to see that if we are followers of Jesus, we are followers of the Way ourselves. It is not the path we are followers of, it is Jesus. He is the Way. In our hearts, it is not that we seek the direction, it is that we seek the One who directs us. We don’t seek to know about the Way, we seek to know the Way in our lives and in so doing, know the Father on our journey to his house. Are you a follower of the Way? What meaning does that have for you now that you have looked at it a little more closely?
Saturday, September 28, 2024
Rooms
In my Father’s house are many rooms. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you? John 14:2
Please read John 14:1-15:11 today. As Jesus guides his disciples in how not to be troubled, he promises a place prepared for them. It is a place in the Father’s house. A room. The word used here for room is found in only two places in the New Testament. Here and in John 14:23. There Jesus says that he and the Father will come and make their home with the person who loves Jesus and keeps his word. Older translations used the word mansion. But it is not that we will all be living in separate enormous dwellings, it is that we will be dwelling in the house of the Lord forever (Psalm 23:6)! And even now, he will be dwelling with us. The Father’s house has many, many, many rooms! The disciples would have understood this as there were many homes at that time that housed many family members and they each had a room. They dwelt together. There is a future promise involved here. Jesus will come and take us to the room that he has prepared for us. There is a moment in the future when the Messiah will return to rapture his church and take us to that place. At the same time, there is the more immediate promise that to be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord, so in that way, each follower of the Way who passes from this world goes to the Father. Additionally, there is the presence of the Father with us right here and now. He has chosen to make his abode in us. Jesus will expand this even further in chapter 15 with the call to abide. Are you anticipating being with the Father? What does that look like in your life? Are you keenly aware of the Father and Son abiding in you?