Sermon - Easter 5 - John 14:1-6

Fifth Sunday of Easter
John 14:1-6
“Jesus the Way, Truth and Life”

First of all a happy mothers day to all of you, whether moms or honoring or remembering our moms today, we give thanks to God for this special vocation of motherhood.  It’s not a church holiday, but the Scriptures certainly afford great honor to motherhood.  It is through our mother that God brings each of us into this world, and provides us with so much nurturing and care.  Fathers are of course important, too, but there really is nothing quite like the maternal bond.  Thanks be to God for our mothers.

Today we observe the Fifth Sunday of Easter, and the shape of the Easter season takes on a bit of a new character in these last few weeks.  The early few Sundays focused intently on Jesus’ resurrection, his appearances, and the events surrounding all that.  Then last Sunday we had the emphasis on Jesus as Good Shepherd who lays down his life for his sheep.  But now it’s as if our Gospel readings have turned a bit of a corner, and we are gearing toward Christ’s ascension and bodily departure from this world.  We come back to the discourse of Jesus earlier in John’s Gospel where he is preparing his disciples for his inevitable departure – meaning both the cross and grave, but also after that, his ascension.

The thought of Jesus going away could well be very upsetting to any of his disciples.  It’s been difficult for us to be absent from church even these 6 weeks or so, absent from participation in the Sacrament of the Altar.  But at least we expected this to be only temporary.  For the disciples, Jesus was going away in a way they didn’t understand, and they wouldn’t see him again until their own death.  To have Jesus in their midst these three years, and then to have him taken away – only to come back again – and then depart again… it could have all been so troubling.

But Jesus knows this.  And so he prepares them.  He begins his going away speech with these words, “Do not let your hearts be troubled.  Trust in God, trust also in me”.  There is no place for fear in the life of disciple of Jesus.  There is, however, great room and cause for trust.  Trust God, the Father, who sent his son.  And trust Jesus, the one who does all things for us. 

To believe in God the Father is really the same as believing in Jesus, for he too is Lord and God (as Thomas would confess).  John’s Gospel is marvelous in showing the continuity between God the Father and God the Son, their unity and oneness of purpose.

He departs, but not without lavishing promises upon us.  He goes to heaven, not to get away, but to reign and rule all things for us.  And, as he teaches them here, to prepare a place for us.
In the Father’s house are many rooms.  And Jesus goes to prepare a place for us.  There are many rooms because there is a place for each and everyone one of his many disciples.  All who believe in Jesus have claim to this promise.  A place in heaven.  A home in eternity, in the very house of God.  Or as one translation puts it, the “mansions of heaven”.  I remember one dear older lady who made me promise to use that translation at her funeral – “pastor don’t you say many rooms.  I want the one that says ‘mansions’ in heaven”.  And what a beautiful confession of faith in this promise of Jesus.  For his promises are always better than we can dream or imagine.

He fleshes out this promise even more:  That he will come back for us, and take us to be with him.  He will return, personally, to make sure we get there.  This is no probable or possible place for us he’s preparing.  It’s not a maybe mansion.  It’s a definite destination.  Oh, it will happen, because his promise is strong and trustworthy and true.  You have a future, a home, an eternity with God and with Jesus.

Eternity at home doesn’t sound so good to so many of who’ve been stuck under a lockdown.  But eternity in the Father’s house, and with Jesus, will be nothing but good.  No more sin or death.  No more suffering or pain.  God himself wiping every tear from our eyes.

And you know the way to get there.

Now, some might say the way to get there is to be a good person.  To have a positive balance of karma.  Or at least to mind your own business, live and let live.  Others might say follow the commandments, or even just give it your best shot.  Others will say it’s an act of will, or a decision, or that God will give you a leg up but you just need to work with him.  Oh the many ways and means we invent and imagine.  The many angles and attempts of humans to make their own way.  But there is only one way to the Father, there is only one way to heaven, there is only one escape from this body of death, this world of evil and the just condemnation of our own sins.  You know the way.
The way is Jesus.  The way, the truth, the life.  No one comes to the Father but by him.

But by him, we can, and we do!

Jesus is the means and the destination. 

Phillip asks to see the Father.  But Jesus tells him he already has, since he has seen Jesus.  So here is the principle:  if you want to know the Father, know Jesus.  If you want to see the Father, see Jesus.  What the Father does and wills, so does Jesus.  As the Father is, so is Jesus.  While the Father and Son are distinct persons, yet there is a oneness of substance and will.  They share fully in the Divine Unity.  This is all so very “Gospel of John”

And so the disciples were looking for the way to the Father, but they’d known him all along.  They were looking for something to do, but it was already done in Jesus Christ.  The way, the one way, the only way, but way a blessed way he is.

As I mentioned earlier, this begins a shift in the Easter Season, as Jesus begins to prepare his disciples for his departure – both his death and resurrection – and then his Ascension.  Jesus leads the way for us – both into death, and out of death.  He leads the way back to the Father also in his ascension to heaven.  Where he goes, we will also go.  Where he is, we will be.

But in the meantime, do not let your hearts be troubled.  For though he is away, he is also with us.  Though he has bodily ascended, he is present in the bread and wine.  Though we cannot see him with our eyes, our faith is focused on him, and on his promise to be with us always, and also to come back.
We Christians live with a sort of a dual reality in so many ways.  Sinners and saints.  Old Adam and New.  Body and Spirit.  But we also live in the now and the not yet.  We live here an earthly life in a vale of sorrows, but our life is also hidden with God in Christ.  So that whoever lives and believes in Jesus, the way, the truth and the life, will live even though he dies.  And whoever lives and believes in him will never truly die.  We have hope in Christ for his life, but also for a life to come, a paradise that is being prepared and will one day be revealed to us.

The future is already ours.  We already know the way. The way is always by grace through faith in Christ. We rest in the truth.  Everything that Jesus says is trustworthy and true, even what has not yet come to pass. And we have been given the life – the life that he won by his glorious resurrection – the resurrection which opens the way out of the grave for each of us.

There are many things that could lead your heart to be troubled, here, and now.  But Jesus says don’t.  And he gives us cause.  He calls us to trust, and makes us beautiful promises of brighter days.  Do not let sin and sorrow, guilt and death or any other trouble have sway.  For Jesus is the way, the truth and the life.