John 14 thoughts for troubled hearts

Been away for a while because of revision and other commitments! I half-knew I wouldn't keep up the Stay-At-Home posts with any regularity. But hopefully this week I'll find some time to continue more regularly! Staying at home has been good and comfortable, thankfully! Since my last post I've submitted my dissertation, which is such a relief.  I'm writing today because I'm just so excited to share from John 14, a chapter of John's account of Jesus's life, which I read again today. How timely is Jesus's repeated words, “Do not let your hearts be troubled.” Without further ado, diiiveee innn if you'd like to know more about this chapter, even if you've never read the Bible before! You can read the chapter itself here.

John 14 begins with Jesus’ words: “Do not let your hearts be troubled.” Near the end of the chapter, Jesus says again, “Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid.” In the shaky world we live in, wracked with uncertainty, these words rub like a balm. We know though—don’t we—that these words are only of worth if they are supported by some solid reason for not having to be afraid. They mean most, and the balm is sweetest, when they they are words that spring from an underlying positive hope about the world. Only then can troubled hearts really be stilled. In this chapter Jesus’s words really unpack what it is to live as a Christian, not just superficially (what it looks like) but what it really, essentially, is. And it is this account that underpins Jesus’s comforting words that we needn’t be troubled.

A home beyond // ‘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? 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.’ Jesus says we don’t need to be troubled because we look forward to a home with his Father. He is our Father too (John 20:17), and he is the One who made us, knitting us together in our mother’s wombs (Psalm 139:13). If you’ve watched Toy Story 2, remember why it was heart-warming: Woody knew he belonged to Andy; the sole of his shoe was inscribed with Andy’s very name. This belonging was his very identity, and the only good ending was for Woody to be home with Andy. On a far greater scale, we belong to our Maker. Every longing within myself reminds me this world isn’t home. Jesus tells the disciples here that he is going to prepare that home for us.

That’s the first layer to scale down from Jesus’s words of comfort: we needn’t be troubled because, however intensely the sorrows of this world rail against us, this isn’t home. The rooms of belonging we dream of are secured for eternity. And remember that these rooms aren’t just spaces to lease and occupy, but rooms in the presence of our Father. It is a home with our Maker. The Apostle Paul later in his letter to the Philippians writes of how much he desires this eternal homecoming: ‘I desire to depart and be with Christ, which is better by far’ than going on living. The gravity of Paul’s desire was not immortality and the transcendence of time for time’s own sake, but for a consummated belonging and union with God.

Through Jesus // Again, like with the instruction not to be troubled, the hope of this home is just a throwaway housing pamphlet on a windscreen wiper unless we understand how this home is secured. After all, didn’t we forfeit and lose this home when we sinned and turned away from God? In Genesis 3 after Adam and Eve had decided not to live under God’s authority, God’s just response was to banish them from the Garden of Eden (Genesis 3:23). Not only had we forfeited that home, but we rightly deserve no longer to live, having decided we didn’t want anything to do—ironically—with the One who sustains our very breath. The right return for sin is death (Romans 6:23). In view of all this, Thomas in John 14 can’t be faulted for his baffled words: ‘Lord, we don’t know where you are going, so how can we know the way?’

But Jesus answers outside the categories one would expect: ‘I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.’ You’d expect instructions for how to walk, where to go, when to move…what to do in order to get to this eternal home. But Jesus refers to Himself as the way: He is the way, the One who shows us the Father, who was previously shrouded in obscurity because of the distance fixed by our sin. ‘If you really know me, you will know my Father as well. From now on, you do know him and have seen him.’ The disciples don’t yet know how this even makes sense. But they will soon, when Jesus takes our sentence of death upon himself, dying on the Cross, and rising from the dead to bridge that distance between us and God forever. He is the way. So long as we stay with our eyes fixed on Jesus, having faith in what He has done for us, we are on the way home. Our hearts needn’t be troubled. 

The Holy Spirit // But we aren’t just people shivering on a cold conveyor belt waiting to be bundled up and off to heaven whenever that happens. Coming to our Father isn’t just something for after we die. It’s a reality to live in now. If we truly value our relationship with the Father, from the depths of our hearts we would want to keep his commands. That’s because we would know they’re good—far better than any wisdom you can whip up yourself or get from a song or a self-help shelf. Paul described this desire in Romans 7:22: ‘in my inner being I delight in God’s law’. And more personally, we would want to follow those commands because we love God: ‘If you love me, keep my commands. … Whoever has my commands and keeps them is the one who loves me.’ (John 14:15, 21).

To sustain us in this reality of knowing and following God even in the here and now, every day of our lives, Jesus promised the Holy Spirit: ‘I will ask the Father, and he will give you another advocate to help you and be with you forever—the Spirit of truth. … I will not leave you as orphans; I will come to you.’ So we have the companionship of the Holy Spirit, a third Person of the Trinity, who counsels us in our daily walk with God. He reminds us of the eternal promises that outshine the lacklustre jewels of this world: a glowing hustle, glittering social life, glistening relationship? The Holy Spirit keeps the promises of God big in your mind so they’re not crowded out by more immediate but temporary pleasures that compete for your heart's desires and worship.

Together, these glorious and comprehensive promises glow with a warm and genuine peace. Jesus goes on to say, ‘Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you. I do not give to you as the world gives.’ And finally, again, he reiterates his balming imperative: ‘Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid.’ Your greatest need is to know your Maker—your Father. Jesus has made that possible, by stepping down onto earth to show us the divine in flesh, and then being nailed to a Cross and rising from the dead to close the gap between us and the Father. And until that eternity is inaugurated, we live with the Holy Spirit within us, who gives us the grace and help to keep loving God, knowing truth, obeying his commands. All bases are covered. You’re going home. Jesus has won eternity. Live in these promises from now until forever!

Christ's College Fellow's Garden enjoying a quiet spring, hosting a family of foxes :)