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If you would remain standing for
the reading of God's Word as we 

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continue in our study of the 
Gospel of John, we come to 

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chapter 14. 
We reading verses one through 12

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today. 
This is John 14 verses one 

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through 12. 
These are Jesus's words for you 

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today. 
Let's not your hearts be 

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troubled. believe in God, 
believe also in me and my 

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father's house are many rooms. 
If it were not so, what I have 

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told you that that I go to 
prepare a place for you. 

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And if I go and prepare a place 
for you, I will come again, and 

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we'll take you to myself, that 
where I am, you may be also, and

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you know the way to where I'm 
going. 

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Thomas said to him, Lord, we do 
not know where you are going. 

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How can we know the way? 
Jesus said to him, I am the way 

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and the truth and the life. 
No one comes to the Father 

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except through me. 
If you had known me, you would 

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have known my Father also. 
From now on You do know him and 

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have seen him. 
Philip said to him, Lord, show 

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us the Father and it is enough 
for us. 

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Jesus said to him, Have I been 
with you so long and you still 

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do not know me? 
Philip, whoever has seen me has 

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seen the Father. 
How can you say show us the 

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Father? 
Do you not believe that I am in 

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the Father and the Father is in 
me? 

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The words that I say to you, I 
do not speak on my own 

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authority, but the Father who 
dwells in me does. 

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His works believe me that I am 
in the Father and the Father is 

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in me, Or else I believe on 
account of the works themselves.

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Truly, truly, I say to you, 
whoever believes in me will also

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do the works that I do, and 
greater works than these will he

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do, because I am going to the 
Father. 

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This is the word of the Lord. 
Thanks be to God, you may be 

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seated before I get to the 
sermon. 

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I was greatly moved by Tommy's 
prayer for us this morning. 

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And even on a week where we have
seen great tragedy in the Middle

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East with what's happening, I 
was actually reminded by the 

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word of the hope of the gospel. 
And I don't know if you know 

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this fact or not, but this 
Chapel where you are sitting 

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right now in our denomination, 
the PCA was ordained the first 

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man in our in our presbytery, 
North Texas Presbytery, who came

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from a Farsi speaking background
originally. 

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His name is Hamid Hitami, he is 
a teaching elder, and our 

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presbytery and his ministry is a
trained man for the work of 

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ministry in Iran. 
He does it online, many 

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secretly, many very dangerously.
But even as we're praying for 

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the Iranian church in the midst 
of this conflict, you're sitting

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in a place where God has showed 
us his hope of redemption. 

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It happened right here, and it 
was very exciting to be a part 

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of it. 
And so let that just thought 

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encourage you and encourage you 
as you pray for that part of the

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world this week. 
One danger that can happen in 

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language is that because 
language is very social, often 

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phrases can become devoid of 
their original context. 

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You've done that before, right? 
You've heard a phrase and you 

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try to repeat it, and you kind 
of play the telephone game, 

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right? 
It's not quite the same version 

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that you heard that you're 
passing along. 

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It can take on a life that it 
was never meant to have. 

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We can lose a sense of its 
context. 

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And the results can be anything 
from kind of a loss of just 

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nuance or a loss of the fullness
of the meeting to actually a 

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phrase that becomes the opposite
of what it was meant to be in 

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the 1st place. 
I was reminded of an example of 

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this this week. 
I'm a I'm a big sports fan. 

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And so former UCLA Bruins 
football coach Red Sanders, he 

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was the one who coined the 
phrase with winning isn't 

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everything. 
It's used today, right? 

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All often. 
You probably used it yourself. 

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Winning isn't everything. 
We often use it as we console 

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perhaps a losing team. 
We remind them that, you know, 

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character and sportsmanship 
matter, and that there's 

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something more to life than just
the sports games that can come 

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so over encompassing, all 
consuming in the moment. 

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The problem is that he didn't 
actually say the phrase in that.

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In that way, his phrase actually
went winning isn't everything. 

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It's the only thing. 
So if you're quoting him, 

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remember that the original 
meaning was actually to focus 

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his players to great intensity 
and tenacity on the field. 

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And that was the complete 
phrase. 

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In a similar way, I think we're 
kind of hitting at a similar 

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topic when we think about this 
passage of Scripture that we've 

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come to because there is a 
phrase in the Bible that many 

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people recognize from this 
passage. 

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John 14-6, right? 
I am the way, the truth and the 

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life. 
No one goes to the Father except

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through me. 
I can remember this first. 

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It's special to me because it's 
one of the first verses in the 

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Bible that I ever read. 
I remember reading it in the 

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Knowing God Personally booklet 
.3 in that booklets and it's a, 

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it's a great verse to pull from 
it. 

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It's it explains the gospel 
clearly and in one verse. 

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I can even remember memorizing 
this verse in my days of 

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everyday evangelism in Italy, 
'cause I was, I served as a 

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missionary in Italy. 
And you know, I, I had it 

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sketched into my memory. 
You have someone la via la 

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verita and la Vita and Zuno pull
Vienna al Padre senon palmezzo 

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de May kind of sounds fancy in 
Italian, right? 

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La villa, la Vita, la verita, 
the way, the truth and the life.

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And it's well applied in a 
gospel presentation. 

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But this morning, as you read 
it, I want to exhort you away 

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from the the danger of just 
making it about a gospel 

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outline. 
There's clarity in that gospel 

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outline, right? 
We need those clear moments, 

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especially as we're sharing our 
faith to no one who's ever heard

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it before. 
But I don't want you to miss the

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deep, deep theology that goes 
behind this verse. 

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And that is what the sermon 
title was meant to encapsulate 

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in one word. 
And that's in in the doctrine 

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that underlines this verse is 
the fact that we are in Christ, 

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our union with Christ 
undergirds. 

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It's a strong foundation in 
which Jesus says I am the way, 

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the truth and the life. 
And so this verse is kind of 

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emanating from this doctrine of 
our inness with Christ and which

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comes from, as the text tells 
us, Christ's inness with the 

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Father. 
Our catechism explains it this 

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way. 
This is question #30 from our 

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Shorter Catechism. 
You can write down question #30 

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in your notes and make sure you 
look it up later. 

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How does the Spirit apply to us,
the redemption purchased by 

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Christ? 
The answer The Spirit applies to

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us the redemption purchased by 
Christ by working faith in US 

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and thereby uniting us to Christ
in our effectual calling. 

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Calvin answers a similar 
question and that from his 

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institute, the 1st chapter of 
his first, the third book, that 

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as long as Christ remains 
outside of us and we are 

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separated from Him, all that He 
has suffered and done for the 

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salvation of the human race, it 
remains useless and of no value 

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to us. 
So we can only say that Jesus is

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the way and the truth and the 
life in a way that matters that 

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have significance for our life 
in as much as we are united to 

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Christ. 
And so in this this morning, as 

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we look at this in, in three 
movements, I pray that you would

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sense your unitedness to Christ,
your reunion with him in the 

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hearts of the Savior in the way 
of salvation and in the Triune 

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God. 
So in the hearts of the Savior, 

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verses one through 4, in the way
of salvation, verses 5 through 

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7, and in the Triune God verses 
8 to 11. 

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So this verse one opens up with 
a pretty stark transition from 

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where we're coming from from 
chapter 13. 

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Let not your hearts be troubled.
It lets us know that Jesus is 

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kind of beginning a new phase of
his upper room discourse with 

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the disciples. 
And as we think about this first

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point that we are in the heart 
of the Savior, this first verse 

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is is rather phenomenal to think
about. 

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It should really wow us that in 
light of Jesus own denial that 

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is coming, he just proclaimed it
right. 

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And at the end of chapter 13, 
his betrayal became before that 

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his eyes are focused on his 
disciples to say, let not your 

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hearts be troubled. 
And my first part of this is 

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that we are so focused on our 
own hearts, on our own troubles.

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But from verse one, we see a 
picture of a Saviour whose heart

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is focused on us. 
You see, in order to get us in, 

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Christ was immediately looking 
out out of the Godhead in order 

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to get us to see the peace, the 
freedom, the joy that comes from

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life with Him. 
He then immediately in verse 2, 

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sets our minds and hearts on 
belief. 

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I'm sorry, it's actually the 
second-half of verse one, not 

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verse 2. 
Believe in God, believe also in 

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me. 
This is kind of an interesting 

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context in the Greek language, 
those belief verbs, it's 

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actually the same verb. 
And it's been a little bit 

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debated because in the Greek 
language, the indicative and the

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imperative are they look the 
same in form. 

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So indicative, that's when you 
just stay, say a statement like 

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I believe in God, but the 
imperative, that's the commands,

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right? 
Like believe in God. 

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And you see that kind of here in
the text that this is actually a

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command of Jesus. 
But the way that he uses these 

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two commands right next to each 
other, we actually know that the

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second command is subordinates. 
It's under the first command. 

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It depends on the 1st command. 
So we must first believe in God.

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And Jesus does that because even
as he has spent time with his 

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disciples and as we go through 
the text, you'll see that their 

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belief in God is there. 
What is missing is sort of the 

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second part of that command. 
Believe also in me. 

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And so as he is trying to 
empathize with his disciples, he

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knows that even as he has 
announced his betrayal, his 

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denial that their hearts are 
troubled, that the cure to that 

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trouble is belief in the one who
can cure it, believe in God and 

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therefore also believe in me as 
his son. 

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And he goes on to say, my 
Father's house or many rooms, He

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shows us more of what the hearts
of the Savior is like. 

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Remember, they are around the 
table with Jesus. 

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They are in a room with him. 
And even as they're beginning to

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remember the images of the 
Tabernacle, that place where 

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God's presence was in the Old 
Testament, even though it was 

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the rather large place, the 
dimensions of the Tabernacle 

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were actually quite immense. 
They're they're huge. 

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He's actually kind of giving an 
image of a picture of a house 

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that doesn't have an ending. 
His heart is for his disciples. 

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00:14:04,400 --> 00:14:07,240
They're right there, but they 
get the picture of an ever 

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increasing scope of that heart. 
Something is about to change. 

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It's not finite. 
There are many rooms where He is

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00:14:15,520 --> 00:14:18,600
going to prepare a place for 
them. 

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00:14:22,400 --> 00:14:29,120
So the hearts of the Savior is 
to show them that they have need

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for Jesus, His presence there. 
His statement, let not your 

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00:14:32,760 --> 00:14:36,760
hearts be troubled. 
He's showing them that that need

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00:14:36,760 --> 00:14:40,280
is met in belief and that that 
that belief is met with the hope

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00:14:40,840 --> 00:14:46,600
of the future that goes on and 
on and on, and that there's room

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00:14:46,600 --> 00:14:49,240
for many who believe in that 
house. 

201
00:14:51,720 --> 00:14:54,160
My first question for you this 
morning is what troubles you 

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00:14:54,280 --> 00:14:59,560
this morning? 
Where do you find your hearts 

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being troubled? 
I was greatly humbled by this 

204
00:15:05,360 --> 00:15:09,600
thought because I think 
sometimes we see a picture here 

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00:15:09,600 --> 00:15:12,520
of the disciples being troubled 
in face of the betrayal of their

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00:15:12,520 --> 00:15:17,640
Savior. 
My troubles are so much less. 

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00:15:19,080 --> 00:15:22,880
The things I find my heart 
dwelling on are not often the 

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things of the Savior and where 
He is going and what that means 

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for me. 
It's often on earthly things, 

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what's going to happen next. 
But my mind was renewed. 

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It was focused on what our 
hearts really should be troubled

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00:15:39,680 --> 00:15:41,960
on. 
And that is, how is Jesus going 

213
00:15:41,960 --> 00:15:44,720
to make this all work? 
Now we know what that's 

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00:15:44,720 --> 00:15:46,920
happening, right? 
We have the end of the story, 

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00:15:47,520 --> 00:15:49,920
but that's what He's first kind 
of telling us is really we're 

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00:15:49,920 --> 00:15:54,440
supposed to interact with Him. 
So verses 5 through 7, in the 

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00:15:54,440 --> 00:15:59,760
way of salvation. 
Even though Jesus has told us 

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00:15:59,760 --> 00:16:04,280
that we are going with him to 
our Father's house, we sometimes

219
00:16:04,280 --> 00:16:10,680
aren't sure and thus don't know 
where we are going and therefore

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00:16:10,680 --> 00:16:16,120
don't know how to get there. 
But Jesus shows us Thomas's 

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00:16:16,120 --> 00:16:21,080
doubt in verse 5. 
He wants an unambiguous 

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00:16:21,080 --> 00:16:25,320
destination, something he can 
touch and feel. 

223
00:16:25,320 --> 00:16:28,200
Remember Thomas's story later on
in the Gospel? 

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00:16:28,480 --> 00:16:34,560
He wants something unambiguous. 
But we see this pointed out that

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really Jesus has already said 
this in the text, right? 

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He said that they don't know in 
verse four that they don't know 

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where Jesus is going, even 
though He's already told them 

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that, right? 
He's going to prepare a place 

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for them. 
He's told them about the 

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destination, but now he's 
telling us in verse 6 the way to

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get there, and that is through 
him. 

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Jesus does not simply blaze a 
trail, commanding others to take

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the way that he himself takes. 
Rather, he shows them that he is

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the way. 
You see, I think that's a big 

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difference between religion and 
relationship. 

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In this text, religion tries to 
imitate what Jesus did, trying 

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to prove that in that imitation 
in itself that you can be the 

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way and therefore the truth and 
the light. 

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But Jesus is ultimately saying 
only I can be the way, the 

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ultimate truth, the ultimate 
light, life rather. 

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And so I think in the frailty of
our lives we try to set set our 

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our surety on other things, 
lesser things than Jesus. 

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But He is exhorting his 
disciples to see that it can 

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only be found in him, there's 
powerful significance, and that 

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we can only know the Father 
through Jesus. 

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It's Father's Day, we have 
examples of earthly fathers 

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among us, some great. 
Maybe some of you today have 

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pain in your memories of your 
earthly fathers. 

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And yet even the best Father, 
the most faithful Father, 

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they're only meant to be a 
fragrant aroma of the love of 

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our heavenly Father. 
And Jesus's relationship to his 

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Father is meant to show us that 
only He can be the way to 

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knowing God personally. 
So celebrate your Father's well 

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and celebrate where they have 
shown you the aroma of Christ 

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and the love of God poured out 
through the love in the hearts 

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of the sun. 
So lastly in the Triune God 

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verses 8 through 11, if Thomas's
doubt in that he wanted to have 

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an unambiguous destination. 
Philips doubt is more that he 

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wants assurance in the objects 
of his faith. 

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In one sense, Philip and the 
others truly do know Jesus. 

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He calls him Lord, but yet he 
also exclaims Show us the 

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Father. 
So they don't fully recognizes 

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recognize it yet Jesus's 
response to Philip's question. 

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Show us the Father. 
It picks up in verse 10. 

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It's sort of tinged with a bit 
of sadness. 

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Those who have been closest to 
him, those who he is at table 

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with, still have yet to see him 
for who he truly is. 

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There's a bit of a spiritual 
blindness to who he is. 

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It would make sense for those 
who are distant to him, those 

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who are his enemies, to not yet 
understand. 

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But these are those who are 
closest to him, and yet they 

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still have questions. 
So I think there's a temptation 

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here to think that the spiritual
blindness might only be reserved

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for the disciples. 
And I'll get to why I believe 

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that there have the spiritual 
blindness in a second as I 

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finish. 
But don't miss the this 

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temptation of thinking that just
being close enough to Jesus 

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allows you to see him for who he
truly is. 

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I might say for those who just 
think coming to church, being 

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close to the church is enough. 
Checking the box and a rhythm. 

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It's not even about being in the
in crowd or being associated 

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with the right things. 
It's about accepting that only 

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in Christ do we have the 
sufficiency from his path, from 

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his death and his resurrection, 
the power that comes from that, 

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to have relationship with the 
Father. 

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Verse 10 shows us what the 
disciples ought to have 

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believed, that Jesus is in the 
Father and the Father is in Him.

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The Father and Son are distinct,
and yet they are also unified in

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the Godhead. 
And so thus, as we are in 

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Christ, we have that imputed to 
us, transferred to us. 

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Jesus is not a mere envoy or an 
ambassador. 

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He is the Son. 
Jesus is highlighting this deep 

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theological principle in the 
context of a relationship around

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the table with his disciples. 
We will get a chance to remember

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that here today as we take the 
Lord's Supper. 

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But let me get back to why about
the spiritual blindness of the 

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disciples. 
The spiritual blindness happens 

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because the Holy Spirit has not 
come yet in this part of the 

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story, in the fullness of what 
He will. 

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We just celebrated Pentecost 
Sunday. 

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The coming of the Holy Spirit 
and the gift of the Holy Spirit 

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will finally enable Jesus 
disciples to grasp the truth 

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that they are dimly aware of in 
this moment. 

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But let me conclude with 
thinking about verse 12, because

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there's an interesting phrase 
there about greater works, 

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Maisona tutan in the Greek. 
It's confusing because the 

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disciples had just seen Jesus 
raise Lazarus from the dead. 

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They've seen many healings. 
They're sitting in the presence 

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of the Savior, and yet he says 
greater works. 

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And why do they happen? 
The text tells us because Jesus 

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is going to the Father. 
So what is the difference 

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between the miracles that Jesus 
has performed to this point and 

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what the disciples will do when 
Jesus has gone to the Father? 

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What is the difference between 
those two things that makes 

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those works greater than the 
other? 

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And the answer is actually a 
simple Sunday school answer. 

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It's the cross. 
It's the death and resurrection 

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of Jesus. 
When Jesus goes to the Father in

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the power of his death and 
resurrection, he is inaugurating

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a new age, a new age of 
salvation, a new Kingdom through

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which greater works are done, 
not because of the works of the 

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disciples themselves, because, 
but because Jesus has now been 

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glorified. 
And that in this has a complete 

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presence of the Godhead in 
eternity. 

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Together, united in the Godhead,
Father, Son and Holy Spirit, 

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Jesus is able to judge the 
disciples acts as greater 

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because of the work he is about 
to do on the cross. 

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And everything the disciples 
will do after the cross are 

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empowered by the spirits, and 
they give glory to the Son. 

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So just as verse 12 asks, I ask 
you, do you believe in Christ? 

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Can we enter the works that He 
has done by faith being in 

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Christ? 
And because of the sun's glory, 

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made known by the Spirit, by 
faith, we can claim the greater 

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things that Christ has claimed 
for us. 

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Because we are in Christ, we are
part of a far greater story, one

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that He has been writing since 
before creation, and He has 

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invited us into it. 
Do you see it? 

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Do you believe it? 
Let me pray, God, as we have 

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caught a glimpse of Your word 
and how you sat around the table

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explaining to disciples who You 
were, even in light of their 

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spiritual blindness, even in 
light of their hearts who are 

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thinking about themselves. 
Your heart has always been 

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towards Your people, and now we 
ask for Your spiritual presence 

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to be here and Your heart to be 
on us as we come to Your table 

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yet again proclaiming what it is
that we believe in the power of 

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the death and resurrection of 
your Son Jesus. 

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Use your word to speak and 
minister. 

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Minister to us now, this day. 
And it's in your name that we 

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pray. 
Amen.