John 14:5-11
“Thomas said to him, ‘Lord, we don’t know where you are going, so how can we know the way?’
“Jesus answered, ‘I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. If you really know me, you will know my Father as well. From now on, you do know him and have seen him.’
“Philip said, ‘Lord, show us the Father and that will be enough for us.’
“Jesus answered: ‘Don’t you know me, Philip, even after I have been among you such a long time? Anyone who has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say, “Show us the Father”? Don’t you believe that I am in the Father, and that the Father is in me? The words I say to you I do not speak on my own authority. Rather, it is the Father, living in me, who is doing his work. Believe me when I say that I am in the Father and the Father is in me; or at least believe on the evidence of the works themselves.’”
Jesus is The Way
Jesus Christ is the ONLY way to God the Father and to
eternal life with God in glory. And HIS WAY is the ONLY WAY. No man-made gospel
will do. No religious performance or ritual will do. No man-made sacrifice to
God will do, either. Only through the cross of Christ can we be made right with
God.
And what is the way of the cross? For us, it is dying with
Christ to sin and living to Christ and to his righteousness. It is putting to
death our old lives of living to sin and self so that we can now live godly and
holy lives, pleasing to God, in God’s power and strength (Rom 6:1-23; Rom
8:1-17; Eph 4:17-24).
Who Jesus Really Is
Jesus Christ is not just the Son of God. He is God! He is
the second person of our triune God – Father, Son and Holy Spirit (Heb 1:3-9;
Jn 1:1-18; Jn 8:24, 58; Jn 10:30-33; Col 2:9; 2 Pet 1:1; Rom 9:5; Jn 20:28-29).
God the Father called him God. He was in the beginning with
God, and he is God. All things that were made were made through him. So, He is
our creator God. Jesus is the I AM. He said, “Before Abraham was born, I AM.”
The Jews wanted to kill him because he made himself out to be God. And he was
God incarnate when he walked this earth.
So, when Jesus said that anyone who has seen him has seen
the Father, he was speaking literally that he was God, as the Father is God.
Jesus is the exact representation (replica) of his being (Heb 1:3).
But Philip did not recognize Jesus as such, which then
prompted Jesus’ question, “Don’t you know me, Philip, even after I have been among
you such a long time?”
If You Really Know Me
I believe the Lord has this same question in mind for many
people today who profess to know him, but who don’t really know him. They think
they do. Someone told them they do because they prayed a prayer or they made a
public confession of faith, but they have the wrong concept of Jesus.
They have been fed and they have accepted a false Jesus and
a false gospel who/which conforms to their likeness, rather than the true Jesus
and his gospel which requires that they conform to Christ’s likeness. Thus, they
are following another Jesus and a different gospel than the ones of Scripture.
So, they are not receiving and choosing the Jesus and the
gospel of Jesus of the Holy Scriptures, but they are accepting and choosing a
Jesus and a gospel created in the minds of men (and women). For, the alternate
Jesus and the alternate gospel are more to their liking.
In fact, they feel they have all the information they need
about Jesus and they don’t need more of him. They don’t need more of his
character in their lives or submission to his will. They have their “religion”
and what they believe is their ticket into heaven, and they are content with
that.
They are content with the “Jesus” who forgives them their
sins and who they believe will never punish them for their sins, and who unconditionally
assures them of his heaven as their eternal destiny, even if they barely
acknowledge him, and even if they choose their own life path.
But they reject the Jesus of the Scriptures who demands that
they die with him to sin and live to him and to his righteousness. They say
they have enough. They don’t want or need more.
They don’t want to hear that his love and grace are
conditional, not that we do anything to earn our salvation, but that he saved
us to good works which he prepared in advance that we should walk in them, and
that we must walk according to the Spirit and not according to the flesh if we want
eternal life with God (Eph 2:8-10; Tit 2:11-14; Rom 8:1-17; Lu 9:23-6; Gal
6:7-8).
For, if we live according to the flesh, and if we obey sin,
and not God, and if we make sin our practice instead of righteousness, we will
die in our sins, not have eternal life with God. But this is what they don’t
want to hear (Rom 6:1-23; Rom 8:1-17; Gal 5:16-21; Eph 5:3-6; Rom 2:6-8; 1 Co
6:9-10).
Instead, they will gripe and complain that people are
telling them that they must repent of their sins, submit to Christ as Lord, and
walk in obedience to his commands. So, they will try to make them look bad and
themselves look good by comparison, for they want others to think evil of the
Lord’s servants and of the gospel of Christ.
And they will try to gain pity for themselves, trying to
convince others that the gospel of Jesus, in truth, is cruel, hateful,
intolerant, and legalistic, while the cheapened grace of God, they say, is
loving and kind because it makes no demands at all, and it offers forgiveness
of sin regardless of how one lives his or her life from that moment forward.
God in Us and Us in God
[Rom 8:9; Jn 14:20-23; 1 Jn 4:16; Eph 2:22; Eph 3:17; Col
1:27]
But when we come to genuine faith in Jesus Christ, we enter
into an intimate relationship with Jesus Christ. God/Christ, in the person of
the Holy Spirit, comes to live within us, and we live in him/them. So, our
lives should reflect Christ much like Jesus’ life reflected the Father.
But if we don’t turn away from our sins, and if we do not
obey the Lord, as a matter of practice in our lives, we are not truly in Christ
and he is not truly in us, and we don’t have eternal life with God no matter
what we profess with our lips. For, we should reflect Jesus’ character by how
we live.
Have
Thine Own Way, Lord
Words
by Adelaide A. Pollard, 1907
Music
by George C. Stebbins, 1907
Have Thine own way, Lord! Have Thine
own way!
Thou art the potter, I am the clay.
Mold me and make me after Thy will,
While I am waiting, yielded and still.
Have Thine own way, Lord! Have Thine
own way!
Search me and try me, Master, today!
Whiter than snow, Lord, wash me just
now,
As in Thy presence humbly I bow.
Have Thine own way, Lord! Have Thine
own way!
Wounded and weary, help me I pray!
Power, all power, surely is Thine!
Touch me and heal me, Savior divine!
Have Thine own way, Lord! Have Thine
own way!
Hold o'er my being absolute sway.
Fill with Thy Spirit till all shall see
Christ only, always, living in me!
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