8.23.26 - I Am for the World - Pt. 6 – “I AM the Way, the Truth and the Life”
“Discover and Do the Servant in You”
Servants of Jesus know how to serve people … Jesus!
Knowing the “I AM” statements of Jesus equips us to speak “Jesus” into others deepest needs.
I AM the Bread of Life. Whoever comes to me will never go hungry, and whoever believes in me will never be thirsty.
John 6:35
I AM the Light of the world. Whoever follows Me will never walk in darkness but will have the light of life.”
John 8:12
I AM the Gate. Whoever enters through me will be saved. They will come in and go out and find pasture.
John 10:9
I AM the Good Shepherd. I know my sheep and my sheep know me… and I lay down my life for the sheep.
John 10:14-15
I AM the Resurrection and the Life. The one who believes in me will live, even though they die; and whoever lives by believing in me will never die.
John 11:25-26
I AM the Way and the Truth and the Life. No one comes to the Father except through Me.
John 14:6
Jesus is directly dealing with the age old and inherently common human quest “our search for God and the Life with Him we were designed for”. ..... It is as if every human has inherently woven into them a “homing device” offering subtle but consistent signals calling us home to God... in the words of Jesus “my Father’s house as many rooms” as if to say... here is where you belong.
“If I find in myself a desire which no experience in this world can satisfy. The most probable explanation. Is that I was made for another world.”
“Probably earthly pleasures were never meant to satisfy it. But only to arouse it to suggest the real thing”.
CS Lewis in Mere Christianity.
John 13:33-14:7
33 “My children, I will be with you only a little longer. You will look for me, and just as I told the Jews, so I tell you now: Where I am going, you cannot come.
34 “A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another.
35 By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.”
36 Simon Peter asked him, “Lord, where are you going?”
Jesus replied, “Where I am going, you cannot follow now, but you will follow later.”
37 Peter asked, “Lord, why can’t I follow you now? I will lay down my life for you.”
38 Then Jesus answered, “Will you really lay down your life for me? Very truly I tell you, before the rooster crows, you will disown me three times!
14 “Do not let your hearts be troubled. You believe in God; believe also in me. 2 My Father’s house has many rooms; if that were not so, would I have told you that I am going there to prepare a place for you? 3 And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back and take you to be with me that you also may be where I am. 4 You know the way to the place where I am going.”
5 Thomas said to him, “Lord, we don’t know where you are going, so how can we know the way?”
6 Jesus answered,
“I am the way and the truth and the life.
No one comes to the Father except through me.
7 If you really know me, you will know my Father as well. From now on, you do know him and have seen him.”
Can you imagine the confusion, hopelessness, doubt, fear and angst that has been ushered into that room with all this talk of “leaving, betrayal and denial” ...
John 14:1 “do not let your hearts be troubled. Believe in God, believe also in Me” should be read in the same breath as the verse before, 13:38 “Will you really lay down your life for me? Very truly I tell you, before the rooster crows, you will disown me three times!”
Jesus is bringing assurance that Life with God the Father (at home with Him) is still Real and True for the disciples even though over the next couple of days they will experience pain, heartache, shame, guilt, confusion, trauma, helplessness, hopelessness, like they can’t even imagine as Jesus “does what Jesus must do alone – the cross and resurrection.” These things He must do alone to become the Way for them (and us) to be with Him and the Father forever.
Jesus is consistently saying to them,
Focus on ME!
Trust ME!
Listen to ME!
Return to Me!
Center your thinking, living and feeling on ME!
““I AM the Way, the Truth, the Life... no one comes to the Father except through Me.”
The Way
Genesis 3:21-24
21 The Lord God made garments of skin for Adam and his wife and clothed them. 22 And the Lord God said, “The man has now become like one of us, knowing good and evil. He must not be allowed to reach out his hand and take also from the tree of life and eat, and live forever.” 23 So the Lord God banished him from the Garden of Eden to work the ground from which he had been taken. 24 After he drove the man out, he placed on the east side of the Garden of Eden cherubim and a flaming sword flashing back and forth to guard the way to the tree of life.
The Truth
“What comes into our minds when we think about God? Is the most important thing about us. The most concerning fact about any man is not what he may say or do. But what the He conceives God to be like in his heart? By a secret law of the soul, we tend to move toward our mental image of God.”
A. W. Tozer
John 14:7 “ If you really know me, you will know my Father as well. From now on, you do know him and have seen him.”
The Life
True Life is in a person ... the quest ends with a person who invites us in.
You study the Scriptures diligently because you think that in them you have eternal life. These are the very Scriptures that testify about me, yet you refuse to come to me to have life.
John 5:29-40
Might the quest end today
in refreshing surrendering
to the One who said,
“I AM the Way, the Truth, the Life... no one comes to the Father except through Me.”