Comfort for Troubled Hearts
John 14:1-6
Is there anything more comforting than being the presence of someone who truly loves you? Sometimes even when you have to be alone, just thinking about that person again in the future brings comfort. How often that thought has eased the pain of soldiers wounded in battle. They would be going home and would be with their loved ones again. And even for those facing death, comfort can be found in the promise of being with their loved ones again in eternity.
The promise of heaven is an important one. It has brought comfort to multitudes as they have faced death. The promise of heaven has also brought comfort to those left behind that death is not the final separation.
Beginning in John 13 the apostle records the dialogue that Jesus had with His disciples in the Upper Room on the night before He was crucified. There Jesus washed the disciple’s feet in an act of love and humility and told them to follow this example of humble service with one another.
A little later during the meal, Jesus was troubled in spirit and warned them that one of them would betray Him. Jesus identified Judas to be the traitor, but the other disciples did not recognize it. They were left perplexed (John 13:22) and uneasy.
After Judas left, Jesus began to speak of His departure. He is going away and they cannot follow Him. These are men who had left their jobs and families to follow Jesus in the hope that He was the promised Messiah. They were ecstatic a few days before when He rode into Jerusalem to the cheers of the crowd. But now He was talking about His death, not about His messianic kingdom. He was going; they are going to be left. That was their trouble. And to top it off, He had just told Peter that before daybreak, he would deny Jesus three times. So these men were anxious and troubled!
So in John 14:1 Jesus replies to Peter and the other disciples, “Let not your heart be troubled…” It is a command that Jesus gives to them, “Stop letting your heart be troubled.” Jesus knew they were troubled, they were fearful. His words are not a rebuke. He is not chiding them for their anxiety. Jesus is not saying that Christians should never feel troubled. Jesus Himself was troubled in spirit (John 11:33; 12:27; 13:21). What the Lord means by “Let not your heart be troubled…” is that, when trouble comes He has comfort for our hearts. The Lord’s emphasis in of all of John 14-16 is to comfort their troubled hearts. And if we take His words to heart they will also comfort you.
1 “Let not your heart be troubled; you believe in God, believe also in Me.
2 “In My Father’s house are many mansions; if [it were] not [so], I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you.
3 “And 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 where I go you know, and the way you know.”
5 Thomas said to Him, “Lord, we do not know where You are going, and how can we know the way?”
6 Jesus said to him, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me.
What are the things that will comfort our hearts?
1. Belief in the person of Jesus – (John 14:1)
Jesus says to them (John 14:1), “Let not your heart be troubled; you believe in God, believe also in Me.” Believing in the person of Jesus will comfort your hearts. In the Greek, the verb “believe” could be either indicative or imperative; both forms are the same word. In other words, Jesus might be saying, “You believe in God, and you believe in Me” (indicative); or, “You must believe in God and also in Me” (imperative).
The disciples had been with Jesus for over two years. They had heard His teaching and seen His multiple miracles proving His authority over nature, demons, sickness, disease, and death. They understood His claim to be God’s Son and saw the predictions of the prophets fulfilled in Him. They recognized that Jesus was sinless and that even Jesus’ enemies could not bring a legitimate charge against Him. They heard Him forgive sins and teach the way to God with authority. They believed in Him.
But He is leaving. He would not be with them in the flesh in the future. They would no longer see Him. So Jesus is saying, “You believe in God, even though you can’t see Him. You also believe in Me. Keep believing. Your faith in Me must not be diminished just because you will not see Me.” In other words, they must believe in Him just as they believe in God.
Jesus is claiming to be on exactly the same level as God when it comes to faith in Him! What mere man could claim, “You need to trust in God, and to the same degree, you need to trust in Me”? This is another claim to deity. You cannot separate faith in God from faith in Jesus. Jesus will go on to affirm (John 14:9), “He who has seen Me has seen the Father.”
These men were troubled of heart, but they could take comfort in the words of Jesus because they were as sure as the words of God Himself for Jesus is God. Peter writes about Christ (1 Peter 1:8), “whom having not seen you love. Though now you do not see Him, yet believing, you rejoice with joy inexpressible and full of glory.” I have never seen Jesus Christ with my eyes, but I believe in Him. He is real; He is alive; I know Him. The Spirit of God witnesses in my heart continually that Jesus Christ lives. And even in the midst of troubles and heartache, I rejoice with joy inexpressible and full of glory! Although I can’t see Him, I trust Him. Believing in Jesus is always a source of comfort to those with troubled hearts. Only those of us who believe, who trust in Jesus have this comfort.
So the first source of comfort for troubled hearts is belief in Jesus. The second thing that comforts our hearts in trouble is that,
2. Jesus goes to prepare a place for us (John 14:2)
Jesus said, (John 14:2) “In My Father’s house are many mansions; if it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you.”
Jesus is describing something that was a common practice in their culture. When a son was married, he often would not move to a new home of his own, he would add on to his father’s house. He would attach a new wing to the father’s house for his new family. The new wings would enclose a patio in the center, with the related families living around it. There would often be many apartments like this in one house.
This verse is certainly a promise of heaven. The Bible affirms that heaven is a real place, not just an immaterial state of being. But it is not the physical aspect of heaven Jesus stresses here. His emphasis is on who’s house it is and who is preparing it.
Heaven is like going home to the Father’s house. It’s not like traveling to a foreign country, where you don’t know the language, geography, people, or customs. It’s like going to a familiar, comfortable place where you are welcomed by a Father who loves you and by brothers and sisters whom you know.
Certainly there is truth in the idea that heaven is a beautiful and rich place. Revelation 21 and 22 give us a picture of heaven in terms of it’s vastness, it’s richness, and it’s beauty. Jesus’ description here that in His Father’s house are “many dwelling places” is also attractive. The KJV / NKJV translates this as “mansions,” but the word here, means a place to abide or a room. The comfort of the verse is not in having “a mansion just over the hill top” as the old hymn goes, but that this mansion is in the Father’s house and that Jesus is making it ready for us.
I like what John MacArthur wrote about heaven:
Sometimes heaven is called a country because of its vastness. Sometimes heaven is called a city because of its inhabitants. Sometimes it’s called a kingdom because of its ruler and order. Sometimes it’s called a paradise because of its beauty. Sometimes it’s called a house because of its family. It’s the Father’s house.
The comfort of Heaven is the fact that it is the house of God the Father and that Jesus is preparing a place there for you if you believe in Him. Jesus says, “I go to prepare a place for you.” How does He prepare a place for us by His going?
A. Jesus goes to the cross to prepare redemption for us.
Over and over again Jesus has prophesied of His death on the cross. He has spoken of the hour when He would be lifted up, dying on the cross. His death would be His glorification. Speaking of Himself, Jesus said that “the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give His life a ransom for many,” (Matthew 20:28).
Ephesians 1:7 says, “In Him we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of His grace.”
B. Jesus goes to be raised from the dead to prepare a new life for us.
Later in John 14 Jesus will say to His disciples (John 14:19) “A little while longer and the world will see Me no more, but you will see Me. Because I live, you will live also.”
Jesus will not only die for our sins upon the cross, He will be raised to life. The good news about His resurrection is that because He lives, we will live also. Paul writes (Romans 6:4-5), “Therefore we were buried with Him through baptism into death, that just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life. 5 For if we have been united together in the likeness of His death, certainly we also shall be in the likeness of His resurrection.”
C. Jesus goes to ascend into heaven to prepare access to God for us.
We can “come boldly to the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy and find grace in time of need,” (Heb.4:16), because as Hebrews 10:19-22 says,
19 Therefore, brethren, having boldness to enter the Holiest by the blood of Jesus, 20 by a new and living way which He consecrated for us, through the veil, that is, His flesh, 21 and [having] a High Priest over the house of God, 22 let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water.
So what brings comfort to our troubled hearts? First, believing in Jesus, second that Jesus goes to prepare a place for us, and third,
3. Jesus is coming again (John 14:3)
Jesus comforts His disciples by saying (John 14:3), “And 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.” Jesus promises that He will come again. He promises that He will receive them to Himself and that they will be where He is.
The best part of heaven is being with Jesus. Of what value is it to live in a beautiful place if Jesus is not there and it is populated by the ungodly? The comfort that Paul brought to the grieving Thessalonians concerning fellow Christians that had already died was that all of them, those who had already “fallen asleep in Jesus” and those which “were alive and remained.” would all be “caught up together in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and thus we shall always be with the Lord” (1 Thessalonians 4:13-17). If you have been adopted into God’s family by faith in Jesus Christ, then He is preparing a place for you in His Father’s house, and He has promised to come again to take you there to be with Him forever. But you have to know the way to the Father.
4. We know the way to the Father (John 14:4-6)
Jesus reminded His disciples (John 14:4), “And where I go you know, and the way you know.” What Jesus was telling them was not something new, but as in any teaching situation, there are always those do not understand. In this case, it is Thomas that expresses the confusion (John 14:5), “Thomas said to Him, “Lord, we do not know where You are going, and how can we know the way?””
In every group there is usually at least one person that will ask the question everyone else is too afraid to ask. In that sense, Thomas is probably expressing the confusion that some of the other disciples also had. Remember, Peter had already asked Jesus where He was going (John 13:36). Just like Peter, Thomas is also devoted to Jesus and does not want to be separated from Him. If Jesus is going somewhere else physically, Thomas wants to make sure he knows the way to go there too. If Jesus is talking about the departure of His death, then how were they to follow?
But Jesus says they already know where He is going and the way. Jesus has talked to them about this before. In John 8:19 Jesus declared that “if you knew Me, you would know My Father.” In John 10 Jesus talked about His being the good shepherd who was the door into the sheepfold and who would lay down His life for His sheep. In John 11 Jesus said He was the resurrection and the life. In John 12:26 Jesus talked about His coming death saying, “If anyone serves Me, let him follow Me; and where I am, there shall My servant also be; if anyone serves Me, the Father will honor him.” He added in verse 36, “While you have the light, believe in the light, in order that you may become sons of light.” Jesus went on to say in verses 44-50 that those who believed in Him believed in the Father who had sent Him and that He had come as the light into the world that everyone who believes in Him may not remain in darkness.
Jesus had just been talking about preparing a place in His Father’s house and that He would return to bring them there that they might be with Him. Jesus was going to His Father. They would come later through believing in Him. Jesus now responds with a statement that makes this very clear.
John 14:6, “Jesus said to him, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me.””
Jesus makes three statements about Himself and then makes the conclusion based on those assertions. Jesus uses the personal pronoun to emphasize Himself and then in each of the statements He uses the article to distinguish Himself from all others. He is THE Way; THE Truth; THE Life. It is based on the exclusiveness of who He is that the conclusion is drawn that there is no other means by which to reach the Father.
A. Jesus is The Way.
The word “way” is used for a road or a journey. Metaphorically it represents a manner of life or the means to a destination or goal. That is the sense it is used here. Jesus is the way, the means to a destination. For the vast majority of the world, Jesus is viewed as “a way,” but not “the way.” People often think of Jesus as a great teacher, or a good example of moral behavior, or even as the founder of a major world religion. But all of these fall short of what it means for Jesus to be “the way.”
Jesus is much more than someone who teaches the way, or guides in the way, or shows the way to live. Jesus says that He is The Way. The way to God the Father is not reached through having particular knowledge, or through walking a certain path of life, or by following the manner in which Jesus lived. It is not principle, force or example that brings us to God, but the person of Jesus Christ.
Jesus is the way to the Father. He is the door for the sheep. He is the resurrection and the life. The only way to heaven is to be cleansed of your sin by Jesus Christ first and given His righteousness by faith (Romans 3:21-26). Jesus is The Way. He is the only way.
B. Jesus is The Truth
Much of what has been said about Jesus being the way also fits with Him being the truth. He is not a truth, but THE Truth. Truth is that which conforms to actual reality, and Jesus is the final reality (Colossians 1:16-17), “. . . For by Him all things were created that are in heaven and that are on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or principalities or powers. All things were created through Him and for Him. And He is before all things, and in Him all things consist.” Jesus is the revelation of God the Father. He alone is the manifestation of the eternal God of truth. We can only know ultimate reality through knowing Jesus as Savior and Lord.
We live in an age when people no longer believe they can know the truth. Many think that there are no black and white absolutes. Truth has become relative in our day, but this is nothing new. Pilate asked that question in John 18:30 nearly 2,000 years ago – “What is truth?” The answer is here in John 14:6. Jesus Christ is the truth. He is the truth that sanctifies us, guides us and sets us free (John 8:32; 17:17).
C. Jesus is The Life
The word “life” here refers to the principle of life, eternal life. Jesus is the life because this life is in Him (John 1:4; 5:26). He is the source and giver of this life to those that believe in Him (John 3:16; 10:28;11:25). In John 5:26, Jesus claimed, “For as the Father has life in Himself, so He has granted the Son to have life in Himself.” Having life in Himself, Jesus “gives life to whom He will” (John 5:21). Because of sin, the entire human race is under the curse of eternal death, or separation from God. We can have eternal life only in Christ. Eternal life means knowing the only true God and Jesus Christ, whom He sent (John 17:3).
D. Jesus is the Only Way to God the Father.
Jesus is the way, the truth and the life, and because of that, His proclamation that “no one comes to the Father but through Me” is absolute. Jesus is the only way to God the Father. There is no other means by which you can be reconciled with God and forgiven. There is no other path by which you can avoid being judged and condemned for your sin and cast into eternal hell. Anything that is not in Jesus Christ is a lie. Anything outside of Him is death.
It is an absolute truth that NO ONE comes to the Father except through Jesus. You either come to God through the person of Jesus Christ, the Messiah, the Son of God, or you do not come at all. You cannot be brought to Him through the false gods of other religions. You cannot reach God through religious rituals or good works no matter how diligent and pious you may be in performing them. You cannot come to God because of a religious heritage received from your ancestors or society. The only way to God the Father is through God the Son.
Here’s how Jesus’ claim in verse 6 can comfort you when you’re troubled: Believing that Jesus is the way will comfort your troubled heart because you have access to the gracious Father through Him. Through Jesus you can bring all your troubles into the very presence of the God who spoke the universe into existence. Believing that Jesus is the truth will comfort your troubled heart because all else is subjective, shifting, and uncertain. You can stand securely in the truth of who Jesus is. Believing that Jesus is the life will comfort your troubled heart because trusting in Him gives assurance of eternal life and escape from the second death.
Do you have that comfort for your heart today? In other words, do you have Jesus?
