 "I Go to Prepare a
Place for You"
John 14:1-3
Rev.
James Lee
Introduction
“Let not your hearts be troubled. Believe in God; believe also
in me,” says Jesus to His disciples. He must have seen the look
on their faces when He said, “Where I am going you cannot come…”
(John 13:33, 36)--the look of utter shock, bewilderment and
disappointment. The disciples had left everything to follow Him.
Even when many of the disciples abandoned Jesus after the
feeding of the five thousand, the twelve did not. When asked
whether they too wanted to go away, Peter replied, “Lord, to
whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life, and we
have believed, and have come to know, that you are the Holy One
of God” (6:68, 69)! But now Jesus was telling them that He was
going away and they could not come. What were they to make of
that?
The look on their faces must have been pathetic beyond
description. It compelled Jesus to say, “Let not your hearts be
troubled…!” But did His words carry any weight? You know how it
is: when we see people in great distress, don’t we feel
obligated to say something nice and encouraging to bring relief
to their agony somehow, to assure them that everything will be OK? But our
words often sound hollow in the face of the gravity of the
trial. They are no more than words of wishful thinking, a
desperate hope without any solid basis. They know it. We know
it.
But what about Jesus’ words? Are they no different from our
words? Are they as hollow as our words are at times? He tells us
not to let our hearts be troubled. But who is He that we should
listen to Him? What is the use of His words when panic strikes
us; when the swelling waves of despair crash against us without
relenting; when we are scrambling frantically as we sink deeper
and deeper? Can He calm the raging storms of our hearts? If so,
how? On what basis? “Believe in God; believe also in Me,” says
Jesus! Believe in God, we understand. But believe in Jesus? Is
He putting Himself at the same level as God Himself?
Yes, He is, because He is God! When people tell you that Jesus
never claimed to be God, obviously they have never read the
Bible. Granted, this idea of believing in someone as one
believes in God is used of a man as well: after crossing the Red
Sea, “Israel saw the great power that the LORD used against the
Egyptians, so the people feared the LORD, and they believed in
the LORD and in his servant Moses” (Exodus 14:31). Do you see
the similarity between this statement and what Jesus says? But
you must also observe the dissimilarity. The people believed in
Moses as God’s servant, not as God. And their belief in Moses
was the result of seeing a great miracle that God performed
through Moses: Moses himself did not demand that they believe in
him as they believed in God. But Jesus demands and commands His
disciples to believe in Him as they believe in God. Why? Because
He is the way and the truth and the life (v. 6)! Who ever
claimed such a thing in the Old Testament? God alone is the
fountain of life!
In fact, there is no comparison between Moses and Jesus, is
there? Moses had to ask for the name of God and God answered, “I
am who I am…! Say this to the people of Israel, ‘I AM has sent
me to you’” (Ex. 3:14). Jesus said to the Pharisees, “Before
Abraham was, I AM” (8:58), thus taking the name of God upon
Himself! The Pharisees knew what Jesus meant and tried to stone
Him for the blasphemy of claiming to be God! And who ever
addressed God as “My Father” in the OT? Jesus does because He is
the eternal Son of God! In fact, it was about Him that Moses the
servant wrote and all Scriptures testify (1:45; 5:46; 5:39).
Do you see who it is that is saying, “Let not your hearts be
troubled”? It is none other than God Himself--God the Son, God’s
only begotten, eternal Son! Can His words ever be hollow and
vacuous as our words are at times? Can His words ever be empty
of meaning and substance? He spoke, and at His word all things
came into being. Nothingness could not resist His command; at
His command nothingness swarmed with galaxies and molecules and
with every living thing in heaven and earth and under the earth.
Not even death can defy His command. Then would He say, “Let
not your hearts be troubled,” and not have a legitimate reason
and firm basis for that command?
Indeed, Jesus follows that command with a reason. He already
said, “Believe in God; believe also in Me!” His divine authority
alone should be sufficient to dispel all our doubts and quell
all our anxiety. But He deigns to explain why we should not let
our hearts be troubled: “In my Father’s house are many rooms. If
it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a
place for you? And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will
come again and will take you to myself, that where I am you may
be also” (vv. 2, 3). Why shouldn’t His disciples let their
hearts be troubled? Because He was going away to His Father’s
house to prepare a place for them!
Notice where Jesus placed the source of their comfort and peace:
in the future! Jesus was about to go away. That was the reason
for the disciples’ grief. And that was the present. The
distressing condition of the present was not going to change:
Jesus must go away. But Jesus did not leave them there. He could
not. His disciples could not be helpless victims of the trials
and tribulations of life. For He is the eternal Son of God,
their Lord and Savior, and they were His disciples! His honor
was bound up with them and their wellbeing was His business. So
what did He do? He unveiled for them their inevitable
future--their reception into God’s heavenly home, where Jesus
was going in order to prepare a place for them. And Jesus was
calling His disciples to grab a hold of that future--to grab it
and to hold on to it in such a way that no troubles of the
present condition, no matter how big or how many, could shake
them up!
This could not be possible unless that future Jesus promised was
certain--certain beyond any possibility of failure. For what
good is the hope that is based on an illusion or a lie? It may
sustain us for a while but our life will come crashing down with
a greater fall when the moment of reckoning arrives. Can
anything in this world offer an infallible hope that will never,
ever disappoint? Even the hope that comes to fruition--what of
it? As long as it is anchored in the things of this world, the
joy it brings is far too brief and the resulting sense of void
is far greater. It is true that our life can take a turn for the
better far beyond our expectation! But what is all that
unexpected good fortune in the face of that one certain,
inevitable eventuality of this life--death? Jesus was pointing
His disciples to a hope that would never disappoint them--to a
living hope which is fixed on the other side of the grave, which
is anchored in the realm of eternal glory, where peace, joy,
love and all that is beautiful and noble would never pass away.
He was pointing them to heaven!
Of course, the source of the disciples’ present grief was not
just any trouble in life. Their hearts were not troubled because
they lost their health, their possessions or their loved ones.
They were troubled because Jesus was going away and they could
not go with Him! This observation makes the primacy of heaven
all the more poignant.
Here we are told, as Jesus nears the end of His life and
ministry, that He is going away. He must go away to prepare a
place for us, to prepare a place for us in His Father’s house.
He will come again. But He will come again not to dwell with us
here. He will come again, and when He comes again, He will take
us away to where He is about to go. He will receive us to
Himself, to where He is going, that where He is we may be also.
We cannot emphasize enough the significance of His going away,
especially when we remember how John began the gospel. There at
the beginning we were told of the coming of Jesus Christ into
this world: “And the Word became flesh and [tabernacled] among
us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from
the Father, full of grace and truth” (1:14). That the Word
became flesh means that He had been something else. That the
Word became flesh to dwell among us means that the Word had
dwelt somewhere else. So we read, “In the beginning was the
Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God” (1:1).
There is no doubt that the incarnation--the eternal Son of God
becoming flesh--is the mystery of mysteries. How can an infinite
and eternal God lock Himself in time and space? How can an
almighty God take on the body of human frailty? How can a
self-existing God be born of a woman? The more you think about
the incarnation, the deeper you sink in the fathomless ocean of
mystery. But we must not dismiss it as untrue and fictional just
because we can’t understand the mechanics of the incarnation.
But why the incarnation?
Simply put, the eternal Son of God came into this world as a man
to lay down His life as the atonement for our sins. But why did
He have to come? Because our sin, as it is an offense against
the infinite honor of God, is infinitely bad, requiring an
infinite payment--“an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth,” says
the law of God. No animal sacrifice can satisfy the justice God
demands. Not even angels can take our place because, though they
are sinless and glorified, they are still finite creatures. Only
the God of infinite value can make the proper payment for our
infinitely bad sin. And the Son of God had to come as a man
because He had to die--for God cannot die--and because He had to
die as our Representative. And this the God of eternal glory was
willing to do and did for our salvation: the Word became flesh
and tabernacled among us and suffered and died in our place.
But was that it? Is our salvation no more than forgiveness of
sins and escape from the punishment of hell? Granted, that alone
deserves our eternal and ceaseless praise! But Jesus had
something far greater in mind for our redemption. As He said in
our passage, “In my Father’s house are many rooms…. I go to
prepare a place for you” (v. 2).
That He came into this world is a mystery too deep for our
comprehension, a grace too great for our grasp. But we must not
forget the ultimate purpose for His coming: it was not to dwell
here forever, to make this world His and our eternal abode. He
came into this world with a view to returning back to His
eternal home, heaven. He came into this world in order to bring
us to where He had been, His heavenly home, that we might dwell
there with Him forever. So He had to go away: having come,
having accomplished what He had come to do, He had to go away;
He had to go back up to His Father’s house.
Seeing the direction of this movement is crucial to
understanding the true nature and goal of our salvation in
Christ Jesus. I dare say that, if we ignore this direction--this
upward direction, this heavenward orientation--we have denied
the very essence, the very soul of Christianity. For
Christianity is not about improving our lot in this world
through better time management and financial stewardship. Come
to think of it, how can we understand anything about
Christianity without Christ and how can we understand anything
about Christ without heaven?
It is from heaven Jesus came. It is to heaven He returned. And
it is to heaven He will bring us. He performed many signs and
wonders (20:30). What were these miracles but a demonstration of
the power and life of the kingdom of heaven--not of this world,
not of Nature, but of God in heaven? But Jesus chided those who
came just for the miracles. For the miracles are but sparks of
the heavenly power, sputtered from the eternal flame of heaven,
shining brightly for a moment and gone the next. Therefore, we cannot be
infatuated with the miracles, for they were designed
to draw us to their source, the eternal Flame of heaven. So,
after the miraculous feeding of the five thousand Jesus said,
“Do not labor for the food that perishes, but for the food that
endures to eternal life, which the Son of Man will give to you”
(6:27). Indeed, Jesus came to give eternal life (3:16), that
abundant life of heaven (10:10). And He told us that we must be
born again, born from above; we must be born of the water and
the Spirit, the Spirit of heaven. Why? Just to live a better
life in this world? No! To enter into the kingdom of God, which
is heaven! The world hated Jesus because He was not of this
world but of heaven. So His disciples, too, are hated by the
world because they too are not of the world.
Having been born of the Spirit, the Spirit of heaven, we have
God as our Father and heaven as our home; this world is no
longer our home. This world certainly has its charms. After all,
God created it. Though fallen and marred, it still reflects the
glory, power, wisdom and beauty of God. There are many
breathtaking seascapes and awe-inspiring landscapes. People
still experience tender moments of friendship and camaraderie of
kindred spirits--but far too rare and too far in between. Who
can pass through this world unscathed, without being jaded--this
world of cut-throat competition, unscrupulous opportunism, lies,
spins and half-truths, injustice, discrimination, manipulation,
abuse, apathy, false accusation, resentment, excuses, and on and
on? And who in this world is without the constant threat
of jealousy, mean gossip, betrayal, disappointment, unexpected
accidents, illnesses and ultimately death?
How do you deal with all the tragedies and injustices in the
world? Think of all the criminals that go scot-free. Think of
the innocent people that have been falsely accused and put into
jail, even executed. What about all the children who have died
and are dying of the AIDS epidemic and starvation? Who knows how
many Beethovens and Einsteins, Shakespeares and Monets have had
their lives cut short before their potentials saw the light of
the day? How do you handle it when you are the victim of a
senseless crime or unfair treatment? And how can God claim to be
sovereign and just when all these things are going on in the
world all the time?
What is worse, how can God command us to turn the other cheek,
go the extra mile, pray for those who persecute us and bless
those who curse us? How can He call us to give up our comfort,
our possessions, our relationships, our reputation and even our
life itself? Is it not all because He has eternity in view,
not just this temporary life of ours in this temporal world?
Turning the other cheek is but an act of cowardice if it is not
heaven manifesting itself in us as we consider the worldly
reputation, and competing for it, as rubbish for the surpassing
value of being honored and accepted in the sight of God! For
Christian ethics, Christian spirituality is summed up in this
simple phrase: heavenly-mindedness!
God would be a cruel prankster if He demanded our sacrifices for
nothing. No, if He calls us to give up anything for Him--even
our life on this earth--it is only because He has something far
more precious in store for us! And yes, criminals may go scot-free in this world--but not at the final judgment of God. In
fact, according to this (eternal) perspective, there is no such
thing as going scot-free: it is just that their final execution
is stayed for a time. What is a “lucky break” here if the
eternal punishment awaits? And if our sufferings here are repaid
with eternal blessings, would you not consider it all joy to
suffer for Christ’s sake?
God has always offered heaven as the ultimate destination and
reward for His people. For God, being good, cannot offer
anything less than what is best. Heaven has always been the true
home for the people of God. Moses delivered Israel out of Egypt
to lead them to the promised land. Yet it was he who said,
“Lord, you have been our dwelling place in all generations” (Ps.
90:1). And we are told of Abraham: “By faith he went to live in
the land of promise, as in a foreign land, living in tents with
Isaac and Jacob, heirs with him of the same promise. For he was
looking forward to the city that has foundations, whose designer
and builder is God” (Heb. 11:9, 10)--a heavenly city!
So then, even what you see in the first chapters of Genesis was
not God’s ultimate provision for us! The Garden of Eden was
certainly a paradise. But it was still vulnerable to Satan’s
attack. Anything that is constantly exposed to the threat of
satanic invasion could not be a true paradise! Yes, Adam was
created in glory and beauty, with righteousness, holiness and
true knowledge, with dominion over other created things. But he
was not perfect. Though sinless and righteous, he was still
capable of sinning--hence the test concerning the tree of the
knowledge of good and evil. And he was naked. He did not have to
be ashamed or embarrassed because of his pristine innocence.
Being naked, however, was not the ideal state, as some nudists
believe: his nakedness showed his need to be clothed with the
robe of righteousness someday; to enter into the state where he
would not be capable of sinning.
God intended something so much better for man than even the
Garden of Eden. We only need to look at the end of the Bible to
confirm this idea. There in the last chapters of Revelation, we
see the glorified saints of God--not naked but clothed in the
robe of righteousness, washed in the blood of Jesus Christ the
Lamb of God. There in the new paradise, the new Jerusalem, the
tree of life reappears, but this time without the tree of the
knowledge of good and evil, the tree of probation--our probation
is over once for all because Christ, the last Adam, passed the
test as our Representative! This new paradise is completely free
of sin and curse, death and sorrow because Jesus bore them away
once for all. The serpent of old cannot invade there because
Christ crushed his head and bound him with the chains of hell.
And there in heaven we shall be free at last not only from the
punishment and power of sin but also from the presence and even
the possibility of sin--all through Jesus Christ and His work of
perfect atonement and perfect righteousness.
Conclusion
This glorious picture of heaven in Revelation cannot be altered:
it will be fully realized even beyond the description we see in
the Bible! Do you believe this? Then shouldn’t heaven be your
all consuming passion, desire, longing and motivation? But are
you afraid that when you are too heavenly minded you will be of
no earthly good? But to be heavenly-minded is not a cowardly,
impotent escapism. Into the troubled hearts of His disciples
Jesus says, “Let not your hearts be troubled!” With these words
Jesus is breathing upon us, into our here and now, the very life
and power, peace and joy of heaven! For in heaven our hearts
will never be troubled because Jesus took our trouble upon
Himself (11:33, 12:27; 13:21)! Jesus is demanding that our
heavenly hope take effect in our here and now. And isn’t that
only natural? Living the way you do, think about how you will
feel on that final day, when you see that everything God said
and promised has indeed come true. Wouldn’t you say with a
profound sense of regret, “Why did I love the world so much? Why
was I so anxious, so worried, so fearful, so full of doubt and
complaint? Why didn’t I trust God more? Why was I so timid in my
faith and witness? Why did I hold back so much from God? Why
didn’t I work harder and give more for the kingdom of God?” May
the Lord spare us from living a life of regrets! May the
infallible promise of Christ assure us that we have our home in
heaven with God! May this assurance drive us to live with
heavenly-mindedness all the days of our life until that glorious
day when we shall dwell in the house of the Lord forever and
ever!
Rev.
James Lee
Pastor
New Life La Jolla
Disclaimer:
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