Introduction:
A. The story is told of a father who sat in his recliner trying to read his magazine, but he kept being interrupted by his little daughter.
1. Finally, in desperation, he tore a page out of his magazine, on which was printed the map of the world.
2. Tearing it into small pieces, he gave it to his daughter and said, “Go into the other room and put this map of the world together, when you finish it I’ll put my magazine aside and we can do whatever you want to do.”
3. After just a few minutes, the little girl returned and handed him the map correctly fitted together.
4. The father was very surprised and asked how she had finished so quickly.
5. “Oh,” the man’s young daughter said, “on the other side of the picture of the world is a picture of Jesus. When I got Jesus in His place, then the world came out all right.”
6. I wholeheartedly believe that to be true – When we properly understand Jesus and give Him His proper place, then everything in the world and in our lives falls into place.
B. English author Charles Lamb was once involved in a discussion about the greatest literary figures of all time when the names of William Shakespeare and Jesus Christ were mentioned.
1. Lamb said, “The major difference between these two is that if Shakespeare came into this room we would all stand in honor and respect. But if Jesus Christ entered, we would all humbly bow and worship him.”
2. That’s a good summary of the infinite difference between Jesus and every other person who has ever lived.
3. Do you know the truth about Jesus?
4. Do you accept and believe the truth about Jesus?
5. Are you willing to live and die for the truth about Jesus?
B. One of Satan’s favorite strategies over the centuries has been introducing false ideas about Jesus.
1. Satan knows he cannot erase Jesus from history, so he seeks to distort the truth about Jesus.
2. Here are just a few of the fallacies many have proposed concerning Jesus: Some have said…
a. Jesus did not come in the flesh, but was just a ghost.
b. Jesus is not really God, but just a god, with a little “g”.
c. Jesus was great man, and a great teacher, but he was just another man of God.
d. Jesus is a way to reach God, but there are many ways to reach God other than through Jesus.
3. J. Oswald Sanders expressed it well in when he wrote, “If Jesus is not God, then there is no Christianity, and we who worship him are nothing more than idolaters. Conversely, if he is God, those who say he was merely a good man, or even the best of men, are blasphemers. More serious still, if he is not God, then he is a blasphemer in the fullest sense of the word. If he is not God, he is not even good.”
C. So, the most important question of all time remains, “Who Is Jesus?”
1. Can you grasp the significance of the question, and the positive and negative ramifications of the possible answers?
2. We live in a world and a time that declares that any answer to the question, “who is Jesus?” is an acceptable one.
3. People say, “If you believe that Jesus is God, well good for you, but don’t make others agree with you.”
4. People say, “If you don’t believe that Jesus is God, then that’s okay, because you can believe whatever makes you happy.”
5. But what is the truth? Who is Jesus? What is the truth about Jesus?
D. Let’s look in the Bible and see what it says about him.
1. In John 14:6, Jesus says very clearly who he is. There he said, “I am the way, and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.”
2. In that declaration, Jesus took on the most pressing problems that are faced by humans: sin, ignorance and mortality.
3. Let’s spend the rest of our time trying to grasp what it means for Jesus to be the way and the truth and the life.
Jesus is the Way
A. Prior to Jesus, there was another way to the Father, it was through the Old Covenant, but when Jesus came, he fulfilled that covenant, and replaced it with the New Covenant.
1. The New Covenant continues to be the only covenant in place to bring mankind to God.
2. It is the only way to the Father.
3. Other ways we might try to get to the Father will not work.
a. We cannot make it to God through any form of legalism.
b. Human philosophy or other religious traditions will not bring us to God.
c. Moral attainment is not sufficient.
d. Upward evolution is a manmade hope that falls short.
4. None of these approaches can lead us to God, because none of them can deal with the problem of sin.
B. The sins of each of us individuals continue to be our own personal roadblock on our journey to God.
1. Most troublesome is our continued tendency to deny that we have a sin problem.
2. Every crime, however vicious, or indiscretion, however mild, is rationalized in our time.
3. The major thesis of humanism is that there is really nothing much wrong with man as he already is, and anything that holds him back can be easily shaken off with a little effort.
4. History has revealed that every attempt at a utopian society has been shipwrecked upon the submerged reef of sinful human nature.
5. The sin problem is solved only in Christ.
6. He alone reveals man’s sin, ransoms him from the tyranny of it, removes him from the practice of it, and forgives it.
7. All of this happens only when the sinner yields himself to the Lord, and walks in the Lord’s way.
C. Let’s look at some Scripture that proclaims the truth that Jesus is the only way to the Father.
1. 1 Corinthians 15:1-4, “Now, brothers, I want to remind you of the gospel I preached to you, which you received and on which you have taken your stand. By this gospel you are saved, if you hold firmly to the word I preached to you. Otherwise, you have believed in vain. For what I received I passed on to you as of first importance: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures...”
a. Did you notice that Paul stressed the gospel truths concerning Jesus? These truths include Jesus’ death for our sins, his burial, and his resurrection - all a fulfillment of Scripture.
b. Did you notice that Paul stressed that these gospel truths save a person, if and only if, they hold firmly to them?
c. Yes, Jesus is the way. He is the gospel, the good news.
2. Peter declared Jesus to be the only way to the Father in his sermon from Acts 4:12, when he said, “Salvation is found in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given to men by which we must be saved.”
3. In 1 Timothy 2:3-6, “This is good, and pleases God our Savior, who wants all men to be saved and to come to a knowledge of the truth. For there is one God and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus, who gave himself as a ransom for all men.”
D. I do not believe it is possible for the Bible to declare the truth that Jesus is the way any clearer than it does.
1. If there is no other name by which men can be saved than the name of Jesus, and if there is only one mediator between God and men, and he is Jesus Christ, this Jesus is the only way.
2. Praise God that he has provided a way for us, and that Jesus is the Way!
3. But Jesus is not just the way, he is the truth.
Jesus the Truth
A. Truth is one of the rarest commodities in the world.
1. The quest for “truth” makes up a large portion of human history.
2. Unfortunately, mankind thinks it has found truth, wisdom and understanding in someone other than God.
3. Mankind has come to think of itself as pretty wise and sophisticated.
4. But the truth is, human wisdom is foolishness compared with God’s wisdom (1 Cor. 1:20), and only a little reflection will reveal that God is right.
5. Apart from God, mankind is ignorant: Ignorant of its origin, Ignorant of its destiny, And ignorant of the meaning of life.
6. Humans cannot see one split-second into the future.
7. Even in the areas of our greatest achievements, mankind is embarrassed by the fact that every truth we have ever discovered only raised a hundred other questions harder than the one we answered.
8. Humans are like infants crying in the night with no language but a cry, until they turn to Him who is the truth.
B. But in contrast to all that is Christ, who is the truth.
1. Truth is both reality and morality expressed in a Person: Jesus Christ.
2. Truth is unchanging and consistent, because Jesus is constantly the same. “Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever.” (Heb 13:8)
3. Jesus Christ is the perfect expression of “truth” because He is the perfect expression of God. “The Son is the radiance of God’s glory and the exact representation of his being…” (Heb 1:3)
C. Therefore, Christ is the answer to mankind’s ignorance.
1. In knowing and following Christ, we can know the truth and the truth will set us free (Jn 8:32).
2. John concludes and summaries his first letter in this way, “We know also that the Son of God has come and has given us understanding, so that we may know him who is true. And we are in him who is true--even in his Son Jesus Christ. He is the true God and eternal life.” (1 John 5:20)
3. So, Jesus is the way, Jesus is the truth, and finally, Jesus is the life.
Jesus is the Life
A. Jesus is the answer to mankind’s problem of mortality.
1. Death is a difficult and ugly problem for humans.
2. How do most people face into the problem of their inevitable death? They try to ignore it and avoid it. Many will not even speak of it.
3. Even when some people are moments away from their last breath, they will not allow the doctor to tell them the truth, or they will only allow loved ones to speak positively to them of what they will do when they get well.
4. What a tragic blindness it is that forces people, both the great and the small, to go on living as if death had no claim upon them.
5. One of the greatest falsehoods Satan has propagated is the allegation that Christianity is just a crutch or an escape hatch for fearful souls.
6. Nothing could be further from the truth. Christians are those who face into death, and go down to the grave shouting, “Thanks be to God who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.” (1 Cor. 15:57)
B. All of mankind’s efforts to negate the problem of morality come up short.
1. Mankind greets every new medicine and surgical breakthrough with rejoicing, and rightfully so, but we will never abolish the reality of death.
2. We may delay death. We may improve health and extend life, but death will eventually come.
C. The marvelous truth of the matter is that Jesus is the life.
1. Jesus said, “I am the bread of life. Your forefathers ate the manna in the desert, yet they died. But here is the bread that comes down from heaven, which a man may eat and not die. I am the living bread that came down from heaven. If anyone eats of this bread, he will live forever. This bread is my flesh, which I will give for the life of the world." (Jn 6:48-51)
2. Jesus said, “I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full.” (Jn 10:10)
3. Jesus said, “I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in me will live, even though he dies; and whoever lives and believes in me will never die.” (Jn. 11:25-26).
4. John writes, 1 John 5:11-12, “And this is the testimony: God has given us eternal life, and this life is in his Son. He who has the Son has life; he who does not have the Son of God does not have life.”
D. Only in Christ can we march forward with true life, both now and for eternity.
1. Jesus broke up every funeral He ever attended, promised to raise from the dead all who ever lived, and He taught His disciples not to fear them that can only kill the body.
2. Christianity teaches us how to live with all the facts of life and of death.
3. Jesus is the only name that means anything when spoken in the face of death.
4. And this sublime truth has caused the church for the past 2000 years to shout, “O death, where is your sting? O grave, where is your victory?” (1 Corinthians 15:55)
Conclusion:
A. And so here, we, humans, find ourselves. We are in desperate need of a way, of truth and of life.
1. Without the Way, there is no going. Devoid of the Truth, there is no knowing. Apart from the Life, there is no living.
2. Jesus is everything that we need.
3. Jesus doesn’t just know the way, he is the way.
4. Jesus doesn’t just teach the truth, he is the truth.
5. Jesus doesn’t just give the life, he is the life.
B. How do we know that these things regarding Jesus are true? We know they are true…
1. Because we know that the Bible is true.
2. Because we know that Jesus fulfilled prophesy.
3. Because we know that Jesus performed many miracles - He had power over spirits, elements, disease, and death.
4. Because we know that Jesus died, was buried, and three days later was resurrected - the tomb of Jesus remains empty.
5. Because Jesus is the only begotten Son of God given by the love of God for the salvation of mankind.
C. The church of Jesus Christ was built on these truths about Jesus, and it continues to exist and flourish because of these truths.
1. We must continue to proclaim the truth about Jesus, and everyone who believes and is baptized will be saved (Mark 16:16).
D. Some years back as you traveled along Interstate Highway 10 in Louisiana, there was a large billboard with this picture on it – A picture of Jesus hanging on a cross with his head bowed and the caption read “It’s Your Move!”
1. Jesus is our Savior and Lord. He died on the cross for our salvation and He was resurrected on the 3rd day.
2. God has made the first move in providing salvation for us through Jesus.
3. Now it’s your move.
4. Will you come to Jesus today? He is the only way, and He is the ultimate truth, and He is the abundant, eternal life.
