Read John 14:1-12. This is the gospel for Easter 5 both in Christian Worship and in the Christian Worship Supplement. You can also read 1 Kings 18:16-45 which is the Christian Worship Supplement Old Testament reading for this Sunday.
“There was no sound. No one answered.” In the Mount Carmel show-down episode from 1 Kings the inspired writer twice states that “refrain” when the prophets of Baal are calling on that false god to send down fire from heaven to consume their offering. The second time that refrain is used, the additional sentence, “There was no response,” is added. It’s a subdued, haunting, brief review of their vacant state of affairs. Their invisible “god” was invisible because he was fake, a false, sham god sprung from their unbelieving minds and hearts to rationalize immoral behaviors.
In our gospel section for this devotion today which Jesus spoke to His disciples before His suffering and death, He was setting the stage for the change of circumstances coming with His death and resurrection, and He was also setting the stage for the seemingly, more permanent change of circumstances after His ascension.
The opening verses of this chapter are quite often used during devotions with those who are dying or as a reading at their funerals. Within the almost majestic-sounding description of His Father’s house in such brief words, Jesus’ introducing the thought that He would be leaving is almost unnoticeable. As the conversation continues in chapters 14-16, Jesus’ more clear statements to that effect become the reason why the disciples’ sadness grows.
So, how come this brief description of His Father’s heavenly estate, in which the Master announced that He would be going there but His disciples would not, right away, how it is that that brings comfort at the time of the losing or loss of a loved one? We won’t see that loved one for now. We don’t see Jesus now. To any outside observer–meaning someone who does not believe–it must look like we’re all just blind faith-edly trying to convince ourselves that the reality is not that from our “self-imagined” God “There is no sound. No one answers. There is no response.”
We have to admit, if we’re being truthful, that we see no evidence to the contrary than what the outside observer observes. In fact, in that circumstance the contrary-to-fact statement of the Apostle Paul in 1 Corinthians 15, the Bible’s resurrection chapter, would sound like it actually is the reality: “if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile; you are still in your sins. 18 Then it also follows that those who fell asleep in Christ perished. 19 If our hope in Christ applies only to this life, we are the most pitiful people of all.”
But the outside observer would also observe that often at those funerals we’re not the most pitiful people of all. In fact, often at those sad circumstances, in the midst of our tears, like cream, our faith rises to the top, holding on almost stubbornly to the truth of that which we do not see. How is that possible?
As is the case in God’s Word, it is not a blind-faith matter as if we’re giving birth to our believing out of pure self-generated gumption. It is based on God’s Word. And, yes, the unbelieving skeptics of that Word are myriad. But I’m inclined to believe that not many of those skeptics have actually read what they dismiss as just myth. Were they to do so, then perhaps they would discover what the Holy Spirit wants them to discover, that our beliefs are not blind, they’re based on “as it is written”.
Here in John the written down words of Jesus guide us almost unconsciously, or more accurately, they guide us spiritually, not physiologically, to that One who is the source of that faith in such a way that it has an impact on us also physiologically as those words breathe life into the soul.
Jesus informs His disciples in this section that that majestic heavenly Father’s home is waiting for them to occupy. He takes it a step further by telling them they’re not in the dark when it comes to how to get there. Does Thomas then ask with a forlorn tone or a frustrated tone that since they don’t know where Jesus is going then they cannot know the way? It certainly isn’t with a tone of joyful understanding. But Jesus gives the reason why they’re not in the dark a moment before when He said, ‘you believe in God; believe also in me.’ He points them to Himself, saying, “I am the way, and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father, except through me.” Here again, the skeptic would be quick to point out that Jesus is seemingly making such a claim based on no evidence, that He’s telling His disciples to take Him on blind faith.
But therein lies how God’s Word works. He speaks it and He doesn’t offer proof except that very Word. That may appear as a circular argument only if what He is saying is just something He’s saying and not true. Jesus guides us to this as He goes on, “If you know me, you would also know my Father. From now on you do know Him and have seen Him.”
Now, Philip observes what the skeptic would point out. “But, Jesus, we don’t see the Father. Just show Him to us, that will be enough.” To which Jesus replies with the Word which again doesn’t offer proof, He just declares: “9a Have I been with you so long and you still do not know me, Philip? The one who has seen me has seen the Father. 10Don’t you believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in me? The words that I am telling you I am not speaking on my own, but the Father who remains in me is doing His works.”
All exactly that Jesus means here is fodder for all sorts of comforting truths–He is the Way, the Truth, the Life and the works of miraculous signs that show it wasn’t just human power just underscore His words. But hand in hand with that, those miraculous signs being done for compassionate and not show-offish purpose point in the direction of Jesus and His main purpose for coming in the first place–to deal the death blow to death, to sin, and to skeptical, Satanic-sourced unbelieving lack of trust in the Creator as a God of love.
These words of John 14, as with the disciples of Jesus there at that time, are understood more clearly only in light of the greatest miracle Jesus ever did. Coming back from the dead Himself as proof that His death paid for all sins. That was the reason God sent His Son. That’s the reason the Son came. It, too, was a mission of compassion, to rescue fallen humankind from their fallen state of sinful mistrust of God. It was with Jesus there before them, God seemingly invisible in the mask of human flesh, that God was there all the time. It came down to believing what Jesus was saying about Himself and, as is the case with the Word when it comes from God, the Creator, it has power in itself to turn you to believe what your physical eyes do not see.
This explains, then, why this is a fitting text for later in the Easter season and why this Easter season the words might hit home all the more. In years past by now our month-ago annual celebration of our Savior’s resurrection would have lost most if not all of its luster. Our hearts, coinciding with coming out of the doldrums of winter and our repentant reflection during Lent at the same time, usually are uplifted by the Spring break(-out) of Easter.
But this year was not so. In fact, this year it may seem that the invisible One was even more not to be seen since we were unable to meet together and worship Him last month on Easter Sunday. But He is still risen. He’s still here! Even if no one would believe His Word, He still speaks and, as at the beginning’s “let there be,” His Word, living and active still creates faith. It creates trust-life in hearts. Israel’s cheer on Mount Carmel “The LORD, He is God! The LORD, He is God!” still rings true and it’s no less miraculous nor powerful that we say so with no fire falling from the sky.