“Room at the Top”
Ephesians 2:1-10
John 14:1-14
By: Ken Sauer, Pastor of East Ridge United Methodist Church, Chattanooga, TN eastridgeumc.org
In our Gospel Lesson from John 14 Jesus is speaking to the disciples in the Upper Room.
The end of Jesus’ earthly ministry is approaching, the Cross is looming before Him, Jesus gathered His disciples around Him and to help them understand His life and work, His approaching death, Resurrection and Ascension, He spoke to them these words: “Do not let your hearts be troubled. Trust in God; trust also in me.
In my Father’s house are many rooms; if it were not so, I would have told you.
I am going to prepare a place for you.
And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back and take you to be with me that you also may be where I am.”
We live in a day when the competition for the most prestigious and well paying jobs is fierce!
There is less room at the top than there was a decade ago.
So many highly educated and skilled people have to take jobs for which they are overqualified…
…that is, if they can find a job at all!
But Jesus assures us that no matter how tough life becomes, there is always room at the top—the Real Top—in the heavenly dwelling place, for those who love Him.
And what is this heavenly dwelling place?
And how do we get there?
Notice how, in verse 10 Jesus asks, “Don’t you believe that I am in the Father, and that the Father is in me?”...
…and then, “The words I say to you are not just my own. Rather, it is the Father, living in me, who is doing his work.
Believe me when I say that I am in the Father and the Father is in me.”
So, first of all, it is important that we see that Jesus’ reference to His “Father’s house” should be read in the context of what Jesus says about He and the Father.
The Father’s house is not just a location it is also a relationship!!!
Even though Jesus lived on earth before the Resurrection and Ascension, He was always in relationship—constant unbroken communion with God the Father.
Jesus never gave in to the “ways of this world and of the ruler of the kingdom of the air.”
Jesus never strayed.
The relationship of God the Father and God the Son is a form of residence that has been stressed from the very beginning of the Gospel of John.
For instance, in John 1:18 we are told: “No one has ever seen God, but God the One and Only, who is at the Father’s side, has made him known.”
Jesus and the Father are indeed—One!!!
We are told that Jesus was “with God in the beginning…”
…and “Through him all things were made…”
So, location is a symbol for relationship.
And God’s house is about relationship, not just location!!!
Are we in relationship with God through Jesus Christ?
If so, our lesson from Ephesians informs us that “God has raised us up with Christ and seated us with him in the heavenly realms in Christ Jesus…”
Jesus is in God the Father and God the Father is in Jesus and if we are in Christ—we are there too!!!
We have died to this life, Paul insists, and our “real life is hidden with Christ in God.”
Therefore, while we are still on earth, through the Holy Spirit we’re “there” in heaven with Jesus.
Jesus’ prayer, “Father, I want these whom you have given me to be with me where I am,” is already fulfilled in part this morning!!!
Biblical scholar and evangelist Dennis Kinlaw writes, “Through his grace, God has made it possible for me to live in His presence every moment, so that heaven actually begins for me right now in time and space.”
Just think of it…
…let’s try and wrap our brains around it: even now, while we are here we are also there with God!!!
And what’s more, because Christ is in heaven, He’s also here—at all times and in all places—on earth with us.
Remember when Jesus commissioned His disciples in Matthew 28 He said, “And be sure of this: I am with you always, even to the end of the age.”
This means we can live every moment of our lives in the presence of God!!!
We don’t have to wonder where Christ is.
We don’t have to beg Jesus to come on the scene!
Jesus is with us even when He seems most absent.
No matter how unholy the situation we may seem to be in, we can be confident that Jesus is with us!
Imagine if we could really grab a hold of this truth and reality!!!
We are with Christ and Christ is with us!
Should this not completely transform our lives, our ministries and our congregation?
St. Patrick used to pray, “Christ be with me, Christ within me, Christ behind me, Christ before me, Christ beside me, Christ beneath me, Christ above me.”
Let’s keep that in mind…in the forefront of our minds at all times!!!
For that is indeed the REALITY in which we live.
And that is LIFE, LIFE to the FULL!!!
We need not be defeated by the world, nor by the “ruler of the kingdom of the air.”
For Christ has won the victory and we are in Christ!!!
It’s interesting, when Jesus says, “You know the way to the place where I am going.”
“Thomas said to him, ‘Lord, we don’t know where you are going, so how can we know the way?’”
“Jesus answered, ‘I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. If you really knew me, you would know my Father as well. From now on, you do know him and have seen him.”
To “know the way” is the same as knowing Jesus Himself.
To recognize Jesus as the “truth” is to say “Yes, Jesus is God made flesh. Jesus makes the truth of God available to the those who believe.”
It is to acknowledge that our relationship with Jesus Christ is our relationship with the liberating truth of God, and that Jesus’ life and ministry are the ultimate witness and example of God’s truth.
Jesus is “the way” is the promise of our unity with God, because in Jesus we meet God!
Jesus is “the life” in that Jesus brings God’s gift of eternal life to all who believe.
Jesus is “the way” because Jesus is the bridge to God.
“No one comes to the Father except through” Jesus.
And when we come to God the Father through the shed blood of Jesus on the Cross, we are in the Father and the Father is in us.
In other words, we are already in one of the “many rooms” in the “Father’s house.”
I know this is a lot to swallow, but I think it is imperative to get this into our minds if we are going to be able to confront and live into what Jesus tells us in John 14:12: “I tell you the truth, anyone who has faith in me will do what I have been doing. He will do even greater things than these, because I am going to the Father.”
How can this possibly be?
Does this mean we will be able to walk on water?
Does it mean that we will be able to raise the dead, cause the blind to see, and change water into wine?
Well, not necessarily, but “Yes.”
Jesus certainly is not saying that we will become gods.
But Jesus is saying that our works will be Jesus’ works in a similar way that Jesus’ works are God’s works.
For us to share in Jesus’ works, for us to do what God created us in Christ Jesus to do is to be a part of revealing God to a lost and broken world!
And this is better than walking on water!
And it is raising the dead and bringing sight to the blind!!!
Because Jesus’ salvific work has now been completed, and the Holy Spirit has been sent to live in those who believe, we are able to reveal the completed story of Jesus’ life, death and Resurrection, and thus to tell the world about the fullness of God’s incredible love!!!
And if they are receptive to the message, they will be able to understand, repent, believe the Gospel and thus be saved!!!
And this is what we are called to do—share Christ with the world.
But, you know, when we say, “called to do,” we kind of make it sound like it’s an option when it is not.
Over and over again in the Gospels Jesus talks of the worthlessness of a tree which bears no fruit.
Or of a person who hides their talent in the ground.
David Platt addresses this in his book Radical: Taking Back Your Faith from the American Dream.
“Where in the Bible is missions ever identified as an optional program?” he asks.
“we were all created by God, saved from our sins, and blessed by God to make [God’s] glory known in all the world.
Indeed, Jesus himself has not merely called us to go to all nations; he has created us and commanded us to go to all nations.”
Platt continues, “We have taken this command [to make disciples], and reduced it to a calling—something that only a few people receive.
…we don’t do that with other words from Jesus.
We take Jesus’ command in Matthew 28 to make disciples of all nations, and we say, ‘That means other people.’
But we look at Jesus command in Matthew 11:28, “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest,’ and we say, ‘Now that means me.’
We take Jesus’ promise in Acts 1:8 that the Spirit will lead us to the ends of the earth, and we say, ‘That means some people.’
But we take Jesus’ promise in John 10:10 that we will have abundant life, and we say, ‘That means me.’”
It’s an easy thing to do.
It’s an easy way ‘out’.
But truth be told, we cannot have abundant life and rest, if we do not do the work of Christ!!!
In Romans 1:14-15, the Apostle Paul talks about being a debtor to the nations.
He literally says, “I am in debt to Jews and Gentiles.”
This is profound!!!
For Paul is saying that he owes a debt to every lost person on the face of this planet!
Because he is owned by Christ, he owes Christ to the world.
We owe Christ to the world—to the least person to the so-called greatest person, to the best person to the so-called worst person!
We are in debt to all people.
There are no excuses for not sharing the Gospel with those we come in contact with.
For Jesus has prepared a place for us in His Father’s house.
And we are in Christ as Christ is in the Father.
And we know God the Father if we know Jesus.
And “anyone who has faith in” Jesus “will do what” Jesus has been doing.
In fact, we will do even greater things…
Do we believe this?
Will we live into this?
Can we commit to this?
On into John 14:15 Jesus says, “If you love me, you will obey what I command.”
May it be so.
Amen.
