Sermon Tone Analysis

Intro

(NASB95)

1 “Do not let your heart be troubled; believe in God, believe also in Me. 2 “In My Father’s house are many dwelling places; if it were not so, I would have told you; for I go to prepare a place for you. 3 “If I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and receive you to Myself, that where I am, there you may be also.

4 “And you know the way where I am going.” 5 Thomas said to Him, “Lord, we do not know where You are going, how do we know the way?” 6 Jesus said to him, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life; no one comes to the Father but through Me.

1 “Do not let your heart be troubled; believe in God, believe also in Me. 2 “In My Father’s house are many dwelling places; if it were not so, I would have told you; for I go to prepare a place for you.

Jesus has a place that he wants to take you - > His Father’s House, to “dwell with Him forever”

Jesus has a place that he wants to take you - > His Father’s House, to “dwell with Him forever”

He says that there is plenty of room there.

I will go away to prepare this place for you and come back and get you so that you will be with me again.

You know the way where I am going

Thomas says, “No.”

We don’t know where you are going and we do not know the way

Jesus says, “I am the way, the truth and the life

I am the way - no one comes to the House/My Father w/o me.

I am the way to dwell with Him forever

I am the way, b/c I am the truth and the life

Why does this matter?

Because our understanding is like Thomas in verse 4 and we would answer in a similar way

Our response today need to be like Jesus’ in Verse 7 - “From now on you know Him and have seen Him.

But Thomas’ rebuttal is telling that prior to asking the question he and the others didn’t really understand.

Jesus is God.

If they had KNOWN that they would have understood what he was saying in v. 1-4, which was supposed to be comforting to them...”Do not let your hearts be troubled, trust in God and also in Me!”

“In this bold statement, he leaves no room at all for any other way, any other truth, or just any kind of life.

He, and he alone is the way.

In fact, that is why the first Christians were called “The Way” (; ).” - David Zadok

Despite the coordination of the three terms the Way, the Truth, and the Life, the emphasis clearly falls on the first, for the statement explains the assertion of v 4 (“You know the way”), and concludes with a deduction from the main clause: “no one comes to the Father except through me.”

To say this is not to denigrate the importance of the second and third terms, for they explain how it is that Jesus is the Way: he is the Way because he is the truth, i.e., the revelation of God, and because the life of God resides in him (in the context of the Gospel that includes life in creation and life in the new creation, 1:4, 12–13; 5:26).

Insofar as the saying is related to vv 2–3 it signifies that Jesus leads his own to the Father’s house, revealing the truth about the goal of existence and how it may be reached, and making its attainment possible by granting entrance on to life in the Father’s house.

But the second clause of v 6 goes beyond the eschatological goal of life in the Father’s house; “No one comes to the Father except through me” indicates that Jesus is the way to the Father, and therefore the way to the Father’s house; that means that Jesus is the way to God in the present.

De la Potterie points out that v 6 acts as a “hinge” in the section 14:1–11; while vv 1–6 look to the future opened up by Jesus, vv 6–11 have in view his present significance for faith; Jesus leads his own to the Father now because he is the Way, the Truth, and the Life in the present; “It is one of the many cases of anticipation of eschatological events in John” (“Je suis la voie, la vérité et la vie,” 927–28).

The saying, moreover, requires to be set in the context provided by this Gospel as a whole; it is as the Incarnate One who “goes” to the Father through the obedient offering of himself in death and through resurrection that he leads to the Father in the present and secures a place for his own in the Father’s house.

“I am the Way” accordingly depicts Jesus in his mediatorial role between God and man; as the Truth he is the mediator of the revelation of God, and as the Life he is the mediator of the salvation which is life in God; “these are two equally essential aspects of the person and work of the Christ and may not be separated” (de la Potterie, 938)

George R. Beasley-Murray, John, vol.

36, Word Biblical Commentary (Dallas: Word, Incorporated, 1999), 252.

Jesus is the way to God, precisely because he is the truth of God (cf.

notes on 1:14) and the life of God (cf.

notes on 1:4; 3:15; 11:25).

Jesus is the truth, because he embodies the supreme revelation of God—he himself ‘narrates’ God (1:18), says and does exclusively what the Father gives him to say and do (5:19ff; 8:29), indeed he is properly called ‘God’ (1:1, 18; 20:28).

He is God’s gracious self-disclosure, his ‘Word’, made flesh (1:14).

Jesus is the life (1:4), the one who has ‘life in himself’ (5:26), ‘the resurrection and the life’ (11:25), ‘the true God and eternal life’ ().

Only because he is the truth and the life can Jesus be the way for others to come to God, the way for his disciples to attain the many dwelling-places in the Father’s house (vv.

2–3), and therefore the answer to Thomas’ question (v.

5).

In this context Jesus does not simply blaze a trail, commanding others to take the way that he himself takes; rather, he is the way.

D. A. Carson, The Gospel according to John, The Pillar New Testament Commentary (Leicester, England; Grand Rapids, MI: Inter-Varsity Press; W.B. Eerdmans, 1991), 491.

The meditation of Thomas à Kempis is often quoted:

Follow thou me.

I am the way and the truth and the life.

Without the way there is no going; without the truth there is no knowing; without the life there is no living.

I am the way which thou must follow; the truth which thou must believe; the life for which thou must hope.

I am the inviolable way; the infallible truth, the never-ending life.

I am the straightest way; the sovereign truth; life true, life blessed, life uncreated.