John 13:36-14:29 (NLT)
36 Simon Peter said, “Lord, where are you going?”
And Jesus replied, “You can’t go with me now, but you will follow me later.”
37 “But why can’t I come now, Lord?” he asked. “I am ready to die for you.”
38 Jesus answered, “Die for me? No, before the rooster crows tomorrow morning, you will deny three times that you even know me.
14 “Don’t be troubled. You trust God, now trust in me. 2 There are many rooms in my Father’s home, and I am going to prepare a place for you. If this were not so, I would tell you plainly. 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 where I am going and how to get there.”
5 “No, we don’t know, Lord,” Thomas said. “We haven’t any 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 known who I am, then you would have known who my Father is. From now on you know him and have seen him!”
8 Philip said, “Lord, show us the Father and we will be satisfied.”
9 Jesus replied, “Philip, don’t you even yet know who I am, even after all the time I have been with you? Anyone who has seen me has seen the Father! So why are you asking to see him? 10 Don’t you believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in me? The words I say are not my own, but my Father who lives in me does his work through me. 11 Just believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in me. Or at least believe because of what you have seen me do…
19 In just a little while the world will not see me again, but you will. For I will live again, and you will, too. 20 When I am raised to life again, you will know that I am in my Father, and you are in me, and I am in you… 28 Remember what I told you: I am going away, but I will come back to you again. If you really love me, you will be very happy for me, because now I can go to the Father, who is greater than I am. 29 I have told you these things before they happen so that you will believe when they do happen.
A. Truth in a hospitable God
13 If you look for me in earnest, you will find me when you seek me. 14 I will be found by you,” says the LORD. Jer.29:13-14 (NLT)
Did you hear about the scandal at the NY Times that forced the resignation of their two top editors, Howell Raines and Gerald Boyd. It happened because on May 1, 2003. New York Times reporter Jayson Blair, 27, resigned after fabricating quotes, falsifying datelines and using material from other newspapers.
May 15. Editor Howell Raines accepts blame for breakdown in communications that allowed Blair’s fraud. He said he would not resign unless requested by publisher Arthur Sulzberger Jr. who said he would not accept his resignation if it were offered.
May 19. Blair’s picture appears on the cover of Newsweek.
May 21. The New York Observer publishes first extensive interview with Blair, in which he appears to take pride in his deceptions. "I fooled the most brilliant people in journalism," Blair says. He had been "drunk on assignment" and a "former total cokehead." Blair is looking for a book deal.
May 23. The newspaper suspends Pulitzer Prize winning writer Rick Bragg for two weeks after it determined that an article should have also carried the byline of a freelancer.
May 28. Bragg resigns.
June 5. Resignations of Raines and Gerald Boyd accepted by Sulzberger.
Source: USAToday.com, June 5, 2003.
What this story tells me, is that there is a world out there that wants to know the truth. people don’t like to be told lies. They want to know the truth. The lies told by Bill Clinton regarding his affair with Monica Lewinsky will forever dog the former president’s reputation. People knew he lied. So I am quite sure the public will snap up the new book Hilary Clinton wrote called “Living History” which tells all about how she was lied to by her husband. Sammy Sosa of the Chicago Cubs was caught using a corked bat in major league baseball this past week, and he cheated and now his reputation is tainted and the many of his homeruns are now questioned. Major league baseball sure did not like that. And even now the invasion of Iraq is being questioned, where is the massive dump of chemical/biological weapons, and there are folks who believe that all the so-called evidence was fabricated to justify an invasion. people don’t want to be told a fib, isn’t this true?
When it comes to the topic of getting to heaven, I believe we also want the truth and nothing but the truth. We don’t want to wake up one minute after we are dead and find out what we’ve been told to believe is a lie. Do we want to be duped? And It seems in our world today, people are seeking heaven. They need to know the truth. In our world, according to June 4, 2003 USA Today, there is an unprecedented number of songs reflecting spiritual themes right now in the country music scene: with at least 10 of the chart’s top 60. "I think you could safely say there hasn’t been [a time] where there’ve been this many" popular songs expressing religious faith, says Nashville music historian Robert Oermann. "I can’t recall one, and I’ve been listening to country music for 40 years. Maybe during World War II; that might be the closest parallel." Look here…
Spiritually themed songs account for 10 of the top 60 country songs this past week:
No. 5 Randy Travis Three Wooden Crosses (peaked at No. 1 in May). A dying preacher leaves a legacy of salvation.
No. 11 Brooks & Dunn Red Dirt Road. Finding Jesus is one of the many rites of passage on the path to adulthood.
No. 22 Wynonna What the World Needs. Love and "a little help from up above" are parts of the prescription.
No. 25 Clay Walker A Few Questions. Poses Job-like quandaries to God.
No. 28 Buddy Jewell Help Pour Out the Rain (Lacey’s Song). Thoughts on heaven from a child’s perspective.
No. 37 Emerson Drive Only God (Could Stop Me Loving You). An expression of ultimate devotion to a loved one.
No. 50 Josh Turner Long Black Train. Old-fashioned gospel.
No. 51 Dixie Chicks Godspeed (Sweet Dreams). Lullaby for a cherished child from an absent parent.
No. 54 Sherrié Austin Streets of Heaven. A mother begs God to spare her gravely ill daughter.
No. 57 Jeff Carson I Can Only Imagine. Envisions meeting God in the afterlife.
Source: Nielsen Broadcast
Data Systems
One sixth, one in six, of the Top 60 songs, wow! It sounds like, people are asking questions about the ultimate, people are searching for some hope. They want to know about heaven in a world ravaged by war, AIDS, SARS, terrorism, economic uncertainty, natural disasters But is there a sure way for anyone to know God, to get to heaven?
Well, Christians do claim to have found a direct way to God, to heaven. Or rather, it is Jesus who claims to be the only way to God. If He is the Way, and it is true, it certainly excludes other claims. Truth by definition has to exclude, otherwise there is no such thing as truth. It’s like saying I am Filipino, my birth cert and passport says so. That’s truth claim, so it excludes that I am by definition cannot be from Mars, or Madagascar. No matter how u look it at it, use DNA testing or whatever, the result is the same. So when Jesus made the claim of Jn 14:6, that’s huge. That says He excludes other ways, views, no matter how u want to make it look like bad nightmare or not. Just to be sure he even says “No one can come to the Father except through me.” How clear can Jesus get?
If Jesus is right on the money, do u know the implication of this enormous outlandish claim?- No need to pass go, or collect $200 or go through several reincarnations to purify your life. No need to burn more offerings to hungry gods that cannot seem to feed themselves, which I did many years back. No need to pray to many gods just to cover all the bases! And if I die, there is no need to go to some cosmic jail or purgatory or torture chamber or hell because of my sins. No needs to get nervous about a bad karma, and in the next life find myself turn into a mosquito carrying the West Nile virus. If what Jesus says is true, that He is the Way, there is No need to go through rituals of self-mutilation, or buy your way through Chinese hell-bank notes that I burned for fun when I was a kid. No need to worry if that my good deeds outnumber the bad like the Muslims or learn to speak Arabic because that’s how God speaks in Islam. No need to wonder about if I can make it at all, because Jesus Christ has said: “I am the WAY…no one comes to the Father except through ME!” (Jn.14:6)
The Point Jesus is making here is there is no other way to God. God makes it easy for us, no need to be confused about it. He is open to us to know Him, and it’s not shrouded in some foggy mystery, waiting for us to brilliantly figure things out on our own. He does not want us to get confused and be overwhelmed by a Superstore of choices. He does not want us to get the wrong idea what He is like. Jim Carrey who stars in a recently released movie called Bruce Almighty -"We always tried to humanize him in some way. He’s probably, you know, just a shaft of light in a doorway," No Jim, he is not a shaft of light, he has been humanize already and Jesus said Believe in God, believe in me, see the Father, well see me, you’ll see God!
No need to be like those shoppers in Walmart, looking for soap and spending their time doing comparison shopping. Which is better Dove or Ivory or Lux, or Irish Spring, or no-name store brand, or etc. etc. Then which one is better priced, better value for the money. Then go do market research to and ask Consumer’s Report for their findings which soap is better and then go to store again and drive through grid-lock and then wait in line because they won’t open any more counters just to get one bar of soap. No need for self-effort, self-discovery, or go Mecca, Tibet or some holy land somewhere to find God, for Jesus gave us the Way. Can u see He is such a hospitable God, making it clear and easy to get a reservation for heaven. No need to go through a travel agent, Jesus is our travel agent, tour guide, and destination! So it matters very much that we know Jesus is the way to heaven.
The Bible reminds us if we sincerely go and look for God we can find Him, and He sure made it easy enuff. U don’t even have to be good enough for He died to make sure we can be as perfect.
Michael Green (1984,p.128) writing in The Empty Cross of Jesus observed: “Comparative religion has come of age in the global village. It is partly because of the multiracial nature of much of the world. It is partly due to the current decline in absolutes in any area of life. But undeniably the common assumption in many minds is that there are countless roads up the mountain to God, and that it does not matter very much which one you take.” What Jesus did by His coming as a human, was to remove all doubt about which way to heaven.
On June 3 breakpoint.org article by Charles Colson, he pointed out an incident during this year’s commencement exercises at Georgetown University, which is a Catholic school. Because it is a Catholic school one would surely expect to hear a commencement address that took Catholic teaching seriously. That is precisely what happened and that was because the commencement speaker was Francis Cardinal Arinze, the head of the Vatican’s Pontifical Council for Interreligious Dialogue. As Colson reported “The dean who invited Arinze expected him to speak about the relationship between Christianity and Islam, especially in places like the Cardinal’s native Nigeria.”
He said that "in many parts of the world, the family is under siege" as a result of what he called "an anti-life mentality [that can be seen] in contraception, abortion, infanticide, and euthanasia." Instead of being honored, the family is "scorned and banalized by pornography, desecrated by fornication and adultery, mocked by homosexuality, sabotaged by irregular unions, and cut in two by divorce."
Colson noted: “Well, that’s a very Catholic message one might expect from a Catholic cardinal. But it proved too much for many in the audience. Teresa Sanders, a professor of theology, left the stage during Arinze’s remarks. Seventy other faculty members signed a letter to the dean protesting what one of them called Arinze’s "wildly inappropriate" remarks. Really? As a result, the dean apologized for the Cardinal’s remarks and the "hurt" they caused. “
Colson commented on this: “The response to the Cardinal shows just how phony all the rhetoric about "tolerance" really is. Tolerance originally meant allowing people whom you believed to be wrong to live according to their beliefs without fear of reprisal. It then mutated into the idea that all beliefs are equally valid. While this was mistaken, at least it allowed for the possibility that Christians might publicly express their beliefs. Now "tolerance" means that no one—other than Christians—should ever hear anything that contradicts what they think, or otherwise upsets them. This is especially true if the subject is human sexuality.” This whole Georgetown incident illustrates that there is no such thing as tolerance anymore. Tolerance is a myth, truth is folks tolerate those who agree with you. It is now a sin to say Jesus is the only way to God because of the mistaken idea that all beliefs are equally valid.
Now ,the majority of the people of the world have religion. They all claim to have the corner on the truth and to be able to find the way to heaven. But how can they all be true, all at the same time? If you’re done the research, every religion excludes, they cannot all be truthful. For instance, Islam rejects any faith that is not monotheistic, or the Koran in Arabic is the only sacred language. So immediately, they reject all other faiths. So how do we get to God, to heaven? Hinduism and its reincarnation teaching does not square with Islam, Judaism, so how can they al be right? Somebody must have got it all wrong somewhere? Every religion claims to be the way, wait a minute, it is not illogical to say all beliefs are valid.
“Religious pluralism doesn’t really exist at all. It’s a myth. (It is)…just as exclusivistic as a religion like Christianity. How so?
Exclusivists like the Christians claim that our way is true, and that a religion that rejects that is in error. But the pluralist believes that his claim is true and that the exclusivistic Christian is wrong.
The pluralist is just another person with an exclusive viewpoint. (Paul Copan, True for You, But Not for Me)
If we are open, The notion there is one road to heaven is not totally foreign in or culture. Some of you may be familiar with the movie the Matrix and now Matrix Reloaded. The tale is basically about a hero called “Neo” who is called “The One” the Messiah, the Savior of humanity from the world of the machines. There is the One not the Two or Three! That is there is one way to save the inhabitants of MiddleEarth in the Lord of the Rings – throw that One ring of power back into where it was forged into the fires of Mount Doom.
B. Jesus’ own opinion
a. Extreme claim God= me. trust God, now trust in me.
b. Exclusive claim: No one can come to the Father except through me
c. Equality with God: See Jesus = seeing the Father. “Anyone who has seen me has seen the Father”; “that I am in the Father and the Father is in me”
d. Enemy called death defeated: “When I am raised to life again, you will know that I am in my Father”
1. All That He Had Said about Oneness with the Father
Believe in God, believe in Me (14:1)
Seen Me, you’ve seen the Father (14:9, 12:45)
The Son is in the Father, Father in the Son (14:11; 10:38, 17:21)
Honor the Son, you honor the Father (5:23)
Father and Son are One (10:30)
Jesus is Son of God (10:36; 17:22)
Father and Son together before foundation of the world (17:24)
2. All That He Had Said about Relationship with the Father
Son speaks as the Father directs (12:49-50; 14:10)
Son does works of the Father (14:10; 5:19-20)
Father gives all judgment to Son (5:22)
Father sent His Son (5:23; 3:16, 10:36, 17:21)
Father gives sheep to His Son (10:29)
Father gives Son glory (17:22, 24)
Father loves Son (17:23)
“For unless you believe that I am He, you shall die in your sins” (John 8:24).
C.Is His Statements Reliable?
a. Death and resurrection 1 cor.15
Now let me remind you, dear brothers and sisters, of the Good News I preached to you before. You welcomed it then and still do now, for your faith is built on this wonderful message. 2 And it is this Good News that saves you if you firmly believe it—unless, of course, you believed something that was never true in the first place.
3 I passed on to you what was most important and what had also been passed on to me—that Christ died for our sins, just as the Scriptures said. 4 He was buried, and he was raised from the dead on the third day, as the Scriptures said. 5 He was seen by Peter and then by the twelve apostles. 6 After that, he was seen by more than five hundred of his followers at one time, most of whom are still alive, though some have died by now. 7 Then he was seen by James and later by all the apostles…
14 And if Christ was not raised, then all our preaching is useless, and your trust in God is useless. 15 And we apostles would all be lying about God, for we have said that God raised Christ from the grave, but that can’t be true if there is no resurrection of the dead. 16 If there is no resurrection of the dead, then Christ has not been raised. 17 And if Christ has not been raised, then your faith is useless, and you are still under condemnation for your sins. 18 In that case, all who have died believing in Christ have perished! 19 And if we have hope in Christ only for this life, we are the most miserable people in the world.
I.e. Christ = God is not true if resurrection is fake!
b. Decision of Christ’s Disciples
In just a little while the world will not see me again, but you will. For I will live again, and you will, too. When I am raised to life again, you will know that I am in my Father, and you are in me, and I am in you… I have told you these things before they happen so that you will believe when they do happen. - John 14
D. The Witness of the New Testament
The Apostle Peter echoed these words when he said, “Neither is there salvation in any other: for there is none other name under heaven given among men whereby we must be saved” (Acts 4:12, KJV).
St. Paul concurred, “There is one God, and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus …” (1 Timothy 2:5, KJV). In fact, it is the UNITED TESTIMONY of the New Testament that no one can know God the Father except through the person of Jesus Christ.”
“If mankind could have reached God any other way, then Jesus would not have had to die. His death illustrates the fact that there is no other way. Therefore, no other religion or religious leader can bring someone to the knowledge of the one true God.
But the story doesn’t end at the cross and with Jesus’ death. Jesus came back from the dead, demonstrating that He was and is the one whom He claimed to be (Romans 1:4), the unique Son of God and the only way by which a person can have a personal relationship with the true and living God.” - from “Answers,” Josh McDowell and Don Stewart. (1980).
Conclusion:
People really want the truth, if you want it sincerely enough to seek after God, you will find Him. Jesus made it awfully easy, He showed it by his death and resurrection. How easy? Remember Peter36 Simon Peter said, “Lord, where are you going?”
And Jesus replied, “You can’t go with me now, but you will follow me later.”
37 “But why can’t I come now, Lord?” he asked. “I am ready to die for you.”
38 Jesus answered, “Die for me? No, before the rooster crows tomorrow morning, you will deny three times that you even know me.
14 “Don’t be troubled. You trust God, now trust in me. 2 There are many rooms in my Father’s home, and I am going to prepare a place for you. If this were not so, I would tell you plainly. 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 where I am going and how to get there.”
5 “No, we don’t know, Lord,” Thomas said. “We haven’t any 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 known who I am, then you would have known who my Father is. From now on you know him and have seen him!
This speaks of failure of people but also it speaks of forgiveness Read v.1 don’t’ be troubled! TRUST!
This is one of the real objections people have about the Christian faith. This is not to say that the other religions of the world do not have some truth in their teachings. But what is good is also good with Christ. But the question is, are these other religions the way to God? Are they the true cure for our sin and separation from God? Having some truth is like holding the tail of an elephant and believing you know all about it. When humans try to figure God out, it is like blind men reaching for an elephant. But the Christian faith is not about people reaching for God, it is about God reaching for us, revealing himself to us, giving us the Scriptures, coming to us, giving himself for us.
When he said, “No one comes to the Father except through me,” he was stating a truth or a lie. There is no in between here. It is now up to u!
