Jesus, The Life
December 8, 2002
Rev. William Huegel
Sermon taken from John 1:1-4 and John 14:1-6
“In Him was life and the Life was the Light of Men.” John 1:4
“Jesus answered, ‘I am the way the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.’” John 14:6
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Billy Graham knows where he is going, because of his life in Christ. In January 2000, leaders of Charlotte, North Carolina, invited their favorite son, Billy Graham, to a luncheon. Billy initially hesitated to accept the invitation because he struggles with Parkinson’s disease. But the Charlotte leaders said, “We don’t expect a major address. Just come and let us honor you.” So he agreed.
After wonderful things were said about him, Graham stepped to the rostrum, looked at the crowd, and said, “I’m reminded today of Albert Einstein, the great physicist who this month has been honored by Time magazine as the Man of the Century.
Einstein was once traveling from Princeton on a train when the conductor came down the aisle, punching the tickets of each passenger. When he came to Einstein, Einstein reached in his vest pocket. He couldn’t find his ticket, so he reached in his other pocket. It wasn’t there, so he looked in his briefcase but couldn’t find it. Then he looked in the seat by him. He couldn’t find it. The conductor said, ‘Dr. Einstein, I know who you are. We all know who you are. I’m sure you bought a ticket. Don’t worry about it.’ Einstein nodded appreciatively.
“The conductor continued down the aisle punching tickets. As he was ready to move to the next car, he turned around and saw the great physicist down on his hands and knees looking under his seat for his ticket. The conductor rushed back and said, ‘Dr. Einstein, Dr. Einstein, don’t worry. I know who you are. No problem. You don’t need a ticket. I’m sure you bought one.’
Einstein looked at him and said, ‘Young man, I too know who I am. What I don’t know is where I’m going.’”
Billy Graham continued, “See the suit I’m wearing? It’s a brand new suit. My wife, my children, and my grandchildren are telling me I’ve gotten a little slovenly in my old age. I used to be a bit more fastidious. So I went out and bought a new suit for this luncheon and one more occasion. You know what that occasion is? This is the suit in which I’ll be buried. But when you hear I’m dead, I don’t want you to immediately remember the suit I’m wearing. I want you to remember this: I not only know who I am, I also know where I’m going.” Billy Graham knows that he has eternal life in Jesus.
“In Him was life!” In Him – in Jesus - who is the eternal Word, who was with God in the beginning and who was God, who made everything that ever existed – in Him, was life! This is a major theme of the Gospel of John. For example, notice these familiar passages from the book of John.
“Just as Moses lifted up the snake in the desert, so the Son of Man must be lifted up, that everyone who believes in him may have eternal life. For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.” John 3:14-16
“Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life , but whoever rejects the Son will not see life, for God’s wrath remains on him.” John 3:36
In John 4 there is the wonderful story about Jesus going through Samaria and stopping to talk to a very needy woman at Jacob’s well. This woman did not seem to have a good reputation in town. She had been married and divorced many times. The man with whom she was now living was not her husband. It was a hot day and Jesus was thirsty, and so He asked her for a drink. During the course of the conversation with this woman, Jesus offers her a drink of spiritual water from which she will never thirst again. Jesus says, in John 4:14 “but whoever drinks the water I give him will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life.”
This theme is brought up again in John 10, which is the Good Shepherd passage. “Therefore Jesus said again, ‘I tell you the truth, I am the gate for the sheep. All who ever came before me were thieves and robbers, but the sheep did not listen to them. I am the gate; whoever enters through me will be saved. He will come in and go out, and find pasture. The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full.” (John 10:7-10) The only thing that Jesus, the Good Shepherd wants for us, His sheep, is that we might have life to its very fullest.
Queen Victoria once attended a service in St. Paul’s Cathedral and listened to a sermon that interested her greatly. Afterwards she asked her chaplain, “Can one be absolutely sure in this life of eternal safety?” His answer was that he knew no way that one could be absolutely sure.
This incident was published in the Court News and came to the notice of a minister named John Townsend. After reading of Queen Victoria’s question and the answer she received, he prayed and then sent the following note to the queen.
To Her Gracious Majesty, our beloved Queen Victoria, from one of her most humble subjects:
With trembling hands, but heart-filled love, and because I know that we can be absolutely sure now for our eternal life in the home that Jesus went to prepare, may I ask Your Most Gracious Majesty to read the following passages of Scripture: John 3:16; Romans 10:9–10.
I sign myself, your servant for Jesus’ sake,
John Townsend
John Townsend was not alone in praying about his letter to the queen. He took others into his confidence, and they offered up prayer to God in Her Majesty’s behalf. About two weeks later he received the following letter.
To John Townsend:
I have carefully and prayerfully read the portions of Scripture referred to. I believe in the finished work of Christ for me, and trust by God’s grace to meet you in that home of which he said, “I go to prepare a place for you.”
Victoria Guelph
After Queen Victoria’s discovery of Christian assurance, she used to carry a small booklet to give away. It’s title was Safety, Certainty, and Enjoyment. This is what she found in Christ.
Regarding his sheep, Jesus says in John 10:28: “I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish; no one can snatch them out of my hand.”
In John chapter 11 we have the incredible story of the death of Jesus’ good friend, Lazarus. Mary and Martha, Lazarus’ sisters, are weeping. Jesus assures them that Lazarus will rise again. They know he will rise in the resurrection, but Jesus said to Martha in John 11: 25-26 “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. Do you believe this?” Then Jesus goes to the tomb and calls Lazarus to life, and he comes alive right before their eyes. How could this happen? Because Jesus is the resurrection and the life!
For his first sermon in an elementary preaching class, Lawrence, an African student, chose a text describing the joys we’ll share when Christ returns and ushers us to our heavenly home.
“I’ve been in the United States for several months now,” he began. “I’ve seen the great wealth that is here - the fine homes and cars and clothes. I’ve listened to many sermons in churches here, too. But I’ve yet to hear one sermon about heaven. Because everyone has so much in this country, no one preaches about heaven. People here don’t seem to need it. In my country most people have very little, so we preach on heaven all the time. We know how much we need it.”
Citation: Bryan Chapell, The Wonder of It All (Crossway, 1999); quoted in Men of Integrity
In John chapter 17 we have the High Priestly prayer of Jesus. It’s wonderful.
After Jesus said this, he looked toward heaven and prayed: “Father, the time has come. Glorify your Son, that your Son may glorify you. For you granted him authority over all people that he might give eternal life to all those you have given him. Now this is eternal life: that they may know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom you have sent.” John 17:1-3
Finally, the book of John comes to an end. There are 21 chapters, and in John 20:31 he writes the whole purpose of this Gospel: “But these are written that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in his name.”
On the final page of the final book of The Chronicles of Narnia series, some of the children who have been to Narnia lament that they once again must return to their homeland - the Shadow-Lands. But Aslan (the lion who represents Jesus) has the best news of all for them:
[Aslan spoke to the children,] “You do not yet look so happy as I mean you to be.”
Lucy said, “We’re so afraid of being sent away, Aslan. And you have sent us back into our own world so often.”
“No fear of that,” said Aslan. “Have you not guessed?”
Their hearts leaped and a wild hope rose within them.
“There was a real railway accident,” said Aslan softly. “Your father and mother and all of you are - as you used to call it in the Shadow-Lands - dead. The term is over; the holidays have begun. The dream has ended; this is morning.”
And as he spoke he no longer looked to them like a lion; but the things that began to happen after that were so great and beautiful that I cannot write them. And for us this is the end of all the stories, and we can most truly say that they all lived happily ever after. But for them it was only the beginning of the real story.
All their life in this world and all their adventures in Narnia had only been the cover and the title page. Now at last they were beginning Chapter One of the Great Story, which no one on earth has read; which goes on forever, in which every chapter is better than the one before.
“In Him was life and the Life was the Light of Men.” John 1:4
“Jesus answered, ‘I am the way the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.’” John 14:6
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