Lesson 84

Some, perhaps all, of the disciples still did not understand where Jesus was saying that He was going. He was telling them goodbye in the Upper Room and trying to comfort them. He knew that He was about to die and was trying to prepare the disciples for His death. Thomas voices the confusion of the others. "Lord, we don't know where you are going. How can we know the way?"

It is easy to be critical of the disciples looking back on their conversation from the corridors of time. We know how the story ends, but they are in the midst of it. The raising of Lazarus should have prepared them for what was to take place. But, that event was so closely connected to the power and awe that they felt for Jesus that it was inconceivable to them that He would be able to die and then be resurrected. How can a man with the power to raise the dead be slain? Why would He allow it to happen to Himself?

Jesus tries again to bring them closer to the truth. Thomas had said they did not know the way to where Jesus was going. Jesus responds by saying, "I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father, but by me." The way to follow where Jesus was going was to believe in Him. It was to have faith in what He had been saying about the Father and to believe that if Jesus went ahead of them, it was because He was preparing them a place with the Father.

Moreover, Jesus reminds them that they have seen the Father. He tells them once again, "If you have known me, you have known the Father also. From now on, you know him, and have seen him." Jesus had been telling them all along that the relationship of the Father and the Son was so complete and united that to see one is to see the other. "I and the Father are one," He had said.

But, such insights were still beyond their grasp for the moment. Philip asks, "Lord, show us the Father, and that will be enough for us."

Such is the chasm that Jesus must span. Men see things from a physical perspective. We desire concrete understanding. God speaks in spiritual words. The reality of spiritual things is concrete to God because God is Spirit. And so, in order to speak with us, God has used prophets and holy men to speak His words, but still we did not understand. And now, in the fullness of time, He sent His Son. His Son speaks both the words of the flesh and the words of the spirit. He told stories of everyday life, parables, which helped us to understand the ways of the spirit. And, He spoke the deep things of God that were impossible for us to understand if God Himself had not instructed us in His ways.

"The words that I tell you, I speak not for myself; but the Father living in me does his work. Believe me that I am in the Father, and the Father in me." Such unity is impossible for us to understand until we begin to experience it in Christ. As we grow in faith, the life of Christ that is within us begins to express itself more and more. We begin to experience life from a different perspective and we come to realize that this perspective is foreign to our fleshly nature. The difference resides in Christ, who lives in us.

The unity of the Father and the Son is inexpressibly wonderful. And, we are allowed to participate in that unity by becoming one with Christ. If we are willing to die with Him, He has promised to come and live with us. Are you willing to give up all that you are in order to comprehend this unity? For that is the only way. We must be willing to die to this life in order to experience the next. Experience this new life today! Jesus Christ is the way, the truth, and the life. And He offers us everything that He is. Believe that Christ is in the Father, and the Father is in Christ. And, Christ will be in you!