Only Believe - A Calming Word For Troubled Hearts Series

Sermon: A Calming Word For Troubled Hearts

Scripture: John 14:1-8 “Don’t let your hearts be troubled. Trust in God, and trust also in me. 2 There is more than enough room in my Father’s home.[a] If this were not so, would I have told you that I am going to prepare a place for you?[b] 3 When everything is ready, I will come and get you, so that you will always be with me where I am. 4 And you know the way to where I am going.” 5 “No, we don’t know, Lord,” Thomas said. “We have no idea where you are going, so how can we know the way?” 6 Jesus told him, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one can come to the Father except through me. 7 If you had really known me, you would know who my Father is.[c] From now on, you do know him and have seen him!” 8 Philip said, “Lord, show us the Father, and we will be satisfied.”

Introduction: John 14 opens with Jesus and his faithful disciples gathered around a supper table. Judas has dismissed himself and now Jesus comforts the rest of his team. Even in the hard moment of life, God always provides a word of comfort. They are grieved to think that one of team will betray Christ, they could imagine Peter denying Christ and they could hardly imagine this being their last evening with Jesus. What would life be without the physical presence of Jesus? Who would lead them, feed them, protect them? So the departing Jesus using these moments to calm their troubled hearts with trust and hope in God.

It seems that are more than enough worries to go around. Each day we can hear 8 hours of bad news. All those negative reports are enough to trouble the heart. Yet the passage is a command, not a suggestion. A command to calm the troubled heart. “Let not your heart be troubled; you believe in God, believe also in Me.” Our only remedy for a troubled Heart is Faith in God and our relationship with Jesus.

1. (Believe)Trust In God and in Me. Let not your heart be troubled: The disciples had reason to be troubled. Jesus had just told them that one of them was a traitor, that all of them would deny Him, and that He would leave them that night. All of this would legitimately trouble the disciples, yet Jesus told them, let not your heart be troubled. Jesus never promised a life without trouble, but He promised that we could have an untroubled heart even in a troubled life. This was a command to ‘stop being troubled’ or to ‘Set your heart at ease.’ Jesus didn’t say, “I’m happy you men are troubled and filled with doubts. You’re doubts are wonderful.” “He takes no delight in the doubt and uneasiness of his people. When he saw that because of what he had said to them sorrow had filled the hearts of his apostles, he pleaded with them in great love, and besought them to be comforted.” His disciples felt His departure like a torture. And it was then that He consoled them with such simple and glorious message that all Christians will need. His remedy was “You believe in God, believe also in Me:” Instead of giving into a troubled heart, Jesus told them to firmly put their trust in God and in Jesus Himself. This was a radical call to trust in Jesus just as one would trust in God the Father, and a radical promise that doing so would bring comfort and peace to a troubled heart.

2. (Believe)Trust That the Situation is Under Control. Trouble, worry, and doubts seem to increase when there is uncertainty. Jesus wanted the disciples to know that he was in total control. “What distinguishes Jesus and separates Him from all other religious teachers was not only his clarity and tenderness with which He taught the truths about the Father’s love, morality, justice, truth, and goodness; but was His call to the world to ‘Believe in Me.’ The coming situations are down My control. You must believe in God, you must also believe in Me. I am on mission from God. And these things are happening according to a divine plan. “Jesus’ solution to perplexity is not a recipe; it is a relationship with him.” Reasons for calming the troubled heart is that these are leading a future reunion in the Father’s house.

3. (Believe)Trust that I am Going to My Father’s House to Prepare a Place for you. “In My Father’s house are many mansions; if it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and receive you to Myself; that where I am, there you may be also. And where I go you know, and the way you know.”