Beth and I were up in Wisconsin last weekend to help her parents winterize their home. We had a very pleasant drive, especially after purchasing some squeaky cheese curds. When we arrived in Sturgeon Bay, I saw a sign announcing a roundabout ahead and became immediately nervous. If you’re not aware of this diabolical disturbance, a roundabout is a circular intersection in which traffic moves around a central island in a counterclockwise fashion with entrances and exits branching off in multiple directions.
I grabbed the steering wheel with both hands and slowed way down. As I entered the confusing maze, it felt like other vehicles were veering toward me. I didn’t know what lane to use in this labyrinth of mayhem, so I just straddled the white line. As my heart raced, I nearly hyperventilated. I missed my exit and had to take a different route to our destination. Unfortunately, that involved another roundabout.
When Beth heard me finally take a breath when we exited this circle of death, she remarked, “Wow, you really get uptight in those roundabouts! I guess we’ll never be able to move to Wisconsin.” Maybe they need to install stop lights to make it easier to navigate through these inventions. I just learned there’s something called, “National Roundabouts Week” coming up later this month. I won’t be celebrating even if they serve cheese curds. I’m certain we’ll never move to Carmel, Indiana because they have more roundabouts (140 and counting) than any other city in the U.S.
I realize there are “roundabout lovers” out there but count me a hater. I’d rather have a clear path ahead of me than just drive in circles trying to figure it out on my own.
Turn to John 14:1-6 where Jesus laid out a direct path by making four promises to His stressed-out followers. He had just announced His departure to the disciples and had told them they wouldn’t be able to follow Him until later. This stirred them up.
Let’s stand and read together: “‘Let not your hearts be troubled. Believe in God; believe also in me. 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? And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, that where I am you may be also. 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?’ Jesus said to him, ‘I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.’”
Here's the main point: Because Jesus is faithful to His promises, we must be ready for His return.
1. A promised rest (1). The disciples were upset at the news He would be leaving, so Jesus looked at them with tenderness and said in verse 1: “Let not your hearts be troubled.” “Troubled” literally means, “to be stirred up.” On this 9/11 weekend, my mind goes back to the fear and anxiety in our country after the terrorist attacks 21 years ago. I also remember how churches were filled with people, at least for a few days.
The tense here means to “stop letting your hearts be troubled,” indicating they were already falling apart. The word “your” is plural as Jesus moves from talking to Peter to the entire team.
According to a 60-Minutes segment last Sunday, there is an epidemic of anxiety along with increased mental health issues in our country. The Surgeon General has called it an “urgent public health crisis,” particularly among adolescents and teens. CDC numbers show that even before the pandemic, the number of adolescents saying they felt persistently sad or hopeless was up 40% since 2009.
I recognize this is a complicated issue and the solution involves a multi-faceted approach, but let’s make sure hurting people know true peace is first found through a relationship with Jesus Christ. Jesus offers His peace to those who give Him first place.
In the second half of verse 1, Jesus makes another claim to deity: “Believe in God; believe also in me.” He’s saying something like this: “You trust in God who is invisible; now it’s time to trust in me, even though I will be leaving you for a short time.” The only way to find rest during restless times is to trust in Christ.
2. A promised reservation (2). For those who know Jesus, death is not an eerie journey to an unknown destination. Believers are assured there is a place where all wrongs will be made right, where all imbalances will be balanced, where confusing roads will be straightened out. Look at verse 2: “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?”
The Greek word for “rooms” means to “abide” or “remain,” and refers to a permanent habitation. Our place here won’t last but if you have a room reservation in Heaven, you’re headed to a place which is everlasting. The word “prepare” is the idea of making a place ready. It was also used of someone opening their home for hospitality by preparing a huge banquet as in Matthew 22:4: “See, I have prepared my dinner, my oxen and my fat calves have been slaughtered, and everything is ready. Come to the wedding feast.”
I’ve mentioned this before, but it bears repeating: We often think this is the land of the living, and when we die, we go the land of the dead. The opposite is true – this is the land of the dying. When our life here is over, we are transferred to the land of the living – either to a place of eternal joy or to a place of eternal torment. There are only two possible destinations.
When Jesus said He was going ahead to prepare a place for them, He was drawing on a very familiar image. In those days, it was customary for travelers to send someone in advance to make lodging reservations in a distant city – they didn’t have GPS or an app for that on their phones. That’s what happened on the night of the last supper when Jesus sent two of His disciples ahead to make preparations for the Passover.
It’s interesting how Jesus has prepared a room for us even though there was no room for Him when He was born. Jesus said there is a reserved place of rest for those who receive Him. He left the disciples to get this place ready for them, and for us.
3. A promised return (3). Notice how Jesus calms His frantic followers in verse 3, “And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, that where I am you may be also.” Jesus repeats this truth from verse 2 about how He is going to prepare a place for them. He’s saying something like this, “I’m not just going to show you the way to the place I’ve prepared, or just give you a map. I promise to come back and take you to that prepared place so that we can be together forever. Then you’ll finally be home.”
This literally reads, “I come again” or, “I will return back.” His coming is meant to serve as a comfort to the disciples. The One who said, “I go,” is the same One who said, “I will come back again.” I love how personal and tender this is: “…and I will take you to myself.” Notice how the focus shifts from a place to a Person! The idea here is “to bring or take into one’s possession.”
Jesus Himself will come again to personally take us to Himself: “…that where I am you may be also.” The word “you” is plural, meaning we will have a glorious reunion with the Lord and with the Lord’s people.
An understanding of first century Jewish wedding customs can help us appreciate the promise of the Lord’s return. While ancient weddings were not uniformly celebrated in the same way in each community, recent scholarship, confirmed by archaeology, suggests some fascinating wedding customs from Galilee, which was where Jesus lived and largely ministered.
It’s good to be reminded the first miracle Jesus performed was at a wedding in Cana of Galilee. In addition, Jesus relied on ancient Jewish wedding customs in much of His teaching, notably the Parable of the Wedding Feast in Matthew 22 and the Parable of the Virgins with their lamps in Matthew 25. It makes sense the promise of His return would have some parallels with ancient Galilean wedding practices. Here are some of them.
• The betrothal. Normally, the prospective bridegroom would take the initiative and negotiate the dowry price to pay the bride’s family. From that point, she was known as one who was “bought with a price,” distinguishing her as an engaged woman. According to 1 Corinthians 7:23, we too have been purchased by the blood of Jesus. Once the groom paid the purchase price, the marriage covenant was publicly acknowledged at the main gate of the village, though they did not live together while maintaining their purity.
• A cup of wine was shared. As a symbol of their covenant, and of the promise the groom was now willing to die for his bride, the groom would pour wine in a cup, take a sip, and offer it to her. If she accepted his proposal, she would drink from the cup and the groom would say, “I will not drink of the fruit of the vine until I drink it with you in my father’s house.” This sounds a lot like what Jesus said in Matthew 26:29 at the end of the Last Supper. The disciples would have immediately recognized this imagery of a marriage proposal.
• The groom returned to his father’s house. For approximately 12 months, the bride and groom were separated while he spent time constructing an attached addition to his father’s house for the new couple. This ties into what Jesus said in John 14:2-3 about leaving to prepare a room for us. The bride would spend this time preparing her white dress and keeping herself ready with oil in her lamp.
• The groom’s father decided when the wedding would take place. Only the father knew when the time was right because he had to be prepared to feed everyone at a week-long wedding reception. The wedding announcement by the father to the son was often made in the middle of the night (see Matthew 24:36).
• The groom traveled to his bride’s house. As the son went to retrieve his bride, shofars (trumpets) would be blown by the father, and lamps would be lit. While the bride expected her groom’s arrival, she didn’t know the exact time of his coming, so she always had to be ready (see Matthew 25:6). Likewise, we must not fall asleep spiritually but always stay pure and prepared because Jesus could appear at any moment.
• The groom’s arrival was announced with a shout. This ties into 1 Thessalonians 4:16: “For the Lord himself will descend from heaven with a cry of command, with the voice of an archangel, and with the sound of the trumpet of God.”
• The bridesmaids were to be alert and prepared. According to Matthew 25, in the Parable of the 10 Bridesmaids, all the women get up, but only five have enough oil. Half are ready while half are left behind.
• The groom would pick up his bride and take her to the father’s house. The bride was then lifted into the air and escorted to her new home. This reminds us of the rapture as described in 1 Thessalonians 4:17: “Then we who are alive, who are left, will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so we will always be with the Lord.”
• After the wedding, the reception lasted seven days. Listen to these chilling words from Matthew 25:10-13 directed to the women who had to run to Walmart for more oil for their lamps: “And while they were going to buy, the bridegroom came, and those who were ready went in with him to the marriage feast, and the door was shut. Afterward the other virgins came also, saying, ‘Lord, lord, open to us.’ But he answered, ‘Truly, I say to you, I do not know you.’ Watch therefore, for you know neither the day nor the hour.” Once the door was shut, no one else was allowed in.
Let’s receive the promise of His rest, let’s focus on having the right reservation, let’s remember His promise to return, and finally let’s make sure we are in a right relationship with Him.
4. A promised relationship (4-6). In verse 4, Jesus said, “And you know the way to where I am going.” Thomas spoke up for the rest of the timid team: “Lord, we do not know where you are going. How can we know the way?” Thomas often gets a bad rap for doubting but I see him as one who was willing to dialogue with Jesus about His doubts. He wasn’t afraid to ask questions, and you shouldn’t be either.
In verse 6, Jesus answered, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.” Jesus is the only way, the only truth, and the only life. There is no other plan but the person of Jesus. There is no way to get to Heaven unless we go through Him. You can’t get there in a roundabout way.
Jesus is very inclusive in the sense that everyone is invited to a relationship with Him as John 6:37 states: “…and whoever comes to me I will never cast out.” But His claims are extremely exclusive in that there is no other way to Heaven except through Him.
How does this mesh in a pluralistic society like ours which values variety and excludes exclusive truth claims? Though Christianity still dominates by sheer numbers, the U.S. now has a greater diversity of religious groups than any country in recorded history. Are you aware there are now more Muslims in America than there are Methodists?
It’s helpful to remember the world of the biblical authors was filled with paganism and pluralism as well. Amid all this doctrinal diversity, the Bible makes some rather startling claims which run counter-cultural to the pluralistic mantra of religious tolerance.
This week, I was deeply saddened to read the just released American Worldview Inventory for 2022. According to this study, over a third of senior pastors believe “good people” can earn their way to Heaven. Almost 4 out of 10 evangelical pastors surveyed said there is no absolute moral truth so “each individual must determine their own truth.” George Barna concluded that a “loss of biblical belief is prevalent among pastors in all denominational groupings.”
Church, it’s critical we get this right, so let’s take a deeper dive into John 14:6: “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.”
• When Jesus used the phrase, “I AM,” He was claiming the name of Yahweh for Himself from Exodus 3:14. Jesus claimed to be God, a claim no other religious leader has made – not Mohammed, Buddha, or Confucius. No one else did the miracles He did, lived a sinless life like He did, died like he died as our substitute, and rose again on the third day.
• Notice this verse begins with the word “I.” In fact, eleven times in just six verses, Jesus used the personal pronoun – I, me, or my. We are not saved by a principle or a force but by a person. Jesus did not say He knew the way, the truth, and the life, or even that He taught these great principles. He declared Himself to be the embodiment of the way, the truth, and the life. While answering all of life’s questions, Jesus doesn’t offer a recipe, or a bunch of rules or rituals to follow; instead, He gives us a relationship with Himself. His plan is wrapped up in His Person.
• Jesus didn’t say, “I am a way, and a truth and a life,” but rather, “I am the way (that is, the only way), I am the truth (that is, the only truth), and the life (that is, the only life).”
• All three concepts are active and dynamic. The way brings to God; the truth makes us free; and the life produces relationship. Without the way there is no going, without the truth there is no knowing, without the life there is no growing.
• The context indicates “the way” predominates. The word “way” is used three times in verses 4, 5 and 6. Jesus is saying: “I am the way that reveals the truth about God and gives life to those who believe.” Or more literally, “I am the way because I am the truth and the life.”
• There is only one avenue to salvation. With Christ removed there is no redemptive truth, no everlasting life, and no way to the Father. While other religions offer systems of thought that try to bridge the gap between man and God, Jesus is the only one who has succeeded in bridging the divide.
Application
I can think of a couple ways we can put this powerful passage into practice.
1. Tell others about Jesus. Brothers and sisters, we don’t have to make Jesus more palatable to people. Our job is to tell others about Him, without caving into the culture or watering down the way to heaven. Tell people Jesus came, and He’s coming again.
Many years ago, Beth and I gave the first book in the “Left Behind” series to my youngest sister. A few days later, she told me she hated the book. In fact, while she was reading it, she threw it across the room. When I asked her why she said because she realized she would be left behind if Jesus returned. God used this to draw her to Himself. What about you? Will you be left behind?
The truth that Jesus is the only way should make us bold…and it should also break us. We must hold to this tough truth…but it should tenderize us and put tears in our eyes about the fate of the lost who will be left behind if they don’t repent and receive Christ.
2. Place your faith in Jesus. He is the only way! Look again at the last part of verse 6: “…No one comes to the Father except through me.” That little word “except” means that apart from Jesus there is no way to be saved. You cannot get there by trusting yourself. And you cannot come to the Father by jumping through any religious hoops either. The only way to come is to go through Jesus, who is the only way, the only truth, and the only life.
Let’s go back to verse 1 where Jesus says, “Believe in me.” The word “believe” is an imperative. To “believe” means, “to lean on, to rely in, and to fully trust” Him.
Jesus is the way that must be followed; He is the truth that must be believed; and He is the life that must be lived. Be like Thomas and ask your questions and then when you’re face to face with Him, confess like he did in John 20:28: “My Lord and my God!”
Jesus is preparing a place for you, and He is coming again. Are you ready to come to Him and lay everything down at His feet before He does? You don’t want to be left behind to face judgment and then spend eternity in a hot place called Hell. Because Jesus is faithful to His promises, we must be ready for His return.
Let’s circle back to the last chapter of the Book of Revelation where we hear this urgent invitation from Christ in Revelation 22:17: “The Spirit and the bride say, ‘Come!’ And let him who hears say, ‘Come!’ Whoever is thirsty, let him come; and whoever wishes, let him take the free gift of the water of life.”
Shortly after we moved here, my daughter Megan and I went for a drive one Saturday because we were bored, and a bit bummed out. She asked where we were going, and I told her I didn’t know. We just got in the car and drove east on the Avenue of the Cities. As we meandered down roads we stopped at various destinations – one place was shady (a Pawn Shop), one was boring (a museum), another place was fun (an apple orchard), and one was a blast (we both got Autumn Chippers at Whitey’s).
But since we didn’t have a plan, we really weren’t sure of our destination.
It’s so easy in life to just start driving without any sense of where we’re headed. Without a plan, we move from shady, to boring, to fun, to exhilarating. Some of our experiences are exciting and others are excruciating. But we’re not really going anywhere.
If you’re going to take a trip, you better have a plan, you better be ready, and you need to have a sense of where you’re going…otherwise you’re just stuck on a roundabout.
