'Jesus said, “Do not let your hearts be troubled. Believe in God, believe also in me. In my Father’s house there are many dwelling places. 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, so that where I am, there you may be also. And you know the way to the place where I am going.” Thomas said to him, “Lord, we do not know where you are going. How can we know the way?” Jesus said to him, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. If you know me, you will know my Father also. From now on you do know him and have seen him.”
Philip said to him, “Lord, show us the Father, and we will be satisfied.” Jesus said to him, “Have I been with you all this time, Philip, and you still do not know me? Whoever has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say, ‘Show us the Father’? Do you not believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in me? The words that I say to you I do not speak on my own; but the Father who dwells in me does his works. Believe me that I am in the Father and the Father is in me; but if you do not, then believe me because of the works themselves. Very truly, I tell you, the one who believes in me will also do the works that I do and, in fact, will do greater works than these, because I am going to the Father. I will do whatever you ask in my name, so that the Father may be glorified in the Son. If in my name you ask me for anything, I will do it.”'
--John 14: 1-14
An icon of Saint John the Divine (or John the Evangelist, or John the Revelator, or just John).
It’s confession time for this priest. I have had a very—how shall I say—complicated relationship with the Gospel of John. It is often elevated by Christians above all the other Gospels, but also it contains some sayings from Jesus that are, at least for me, very difficult to hear, ones in which I find it hard to find good news.
One such example is John 14: 6: “I am the way, the truth, and the life, no one comes to the Father except through me.” This passage has caused me—and others—such fits, largely because it has been used to promote something we call exclusivism; that is to say that the message of God’s love, of peace and hope for the world is exclusive to the biblical life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. In other words, everyone else is out, and only Christians are in because—the exclusivist argument goes—Jesus said so, it’s right there in black and white—or red, depending on your Bible. Jesus said it, I believe it, that settles it. This is an exclusivist mindset, and for much of my life whenever the question about the validity of other religions comes up, someone inevitably cites John 14: 6,
I have been troubled by folks who preach such a message, and so for years I would often overlook the Gospel of John because of this and other passages that seemed to be to be exclusivist in nature. But when I got to seminary and had the chance to finally dig into not only the words of the Gospel but the community that produced it I began to see that, rather than being exclusivist, the Gospel of John is meant to be a message of hope to a beleaguered community. And it’s here that we find our good news.
Jesus says “I am the way, the truth, and the life.” Let’s break down each of those three words: way, truth, and life, and see what’s going on in this text.
Jesus is the way. At the time the Gospel was written the followers of Jesus were not called Christians, but rather the people of the Way. They were called this because the way implies a journey of faith. And that journey is one that stretches far back into the history of Jesus’ people: Abraham journeyed to Canaan; the children of Israel journeyed from bondage in Egypt to freedom in the Promised Land; Jesus himself journeyed from his home in Nazareth into the wilderness where he faced temptation, and then to Galilee for his ministry, and finally to the cross; and his followers journeyed from the empty tomb to every corner of the world to spread his message of love. The way implies a journey, and faith of any kind requires a journey.
Jesus is the truth. Here is where it’s easy to think that John is saying everything and everyone else is false. But one of the main themes of the whole Gospel is found in the very first chapter, when John says that Jesus is full of grace and truth, meaning that he is full of the very same qualities that were associated with the Jewish Torah, the revelation of God’s goodness and mercy for the world. He is the embodiment of those qualities. This is truth that is not exclusive to Jesus—as we see in the Torah and later the Muslim Quran –but it is truth that Jesus certainly embodies, as Jesus is the truth incarnate.
Jesus is the life. One of the tenants that the community of John’s Gospel preached excessively was the notion of eternal life. But what did they mean by this? They weren’t talking about heaven, but instead about right now—the way we think of heaven today was not part of their thinking back then. To participate in the active movement of God’s kingdom here on earth is to have eternal life. Instead of implying that those who follow him will inherit some reward after this life, Jesus is instead saying that this is what happens when a person follows the way of love, they are already engaging in eternal life, an understanding that’s not exclusive to Christianity.
Those are the ways we can break down the first half of John 14: 6 to see that an exclusivist message is not the point, but the second half is also troublesome: no one comes to the father except through me. We need to take a moment to understand the context here. The Gospel of John was written roughly 70 years after Jesus’ death and resurrection. By this time the Jewish revolt against the Romans had been lost, the Temple was destroyed, and the kind of Judaism that Jesus himself practiced no longer existed, as the center for worship now became the local synagogue and the traditions kept alive by the rabbis—we call this rabbinic Judaism. It is during this time of great fear that the message of Jesus really began to take hold, so much so that by the time John’s gospel gets written—30 years after the temple was destroyed—there is a great deal of tension between those who are trying to keep the old traditions of Judaism alive and those who are embracing Jesus as something of a successor to the old ways. These tensions boil over to the point that synagogues erupt in violence and people declaring Jesus’ messiahship are thrown out. It is in this context, the context of a people living in fear, isolated from their worship communities, and uncertain about the future, that this gospel gets written.
Rather than a condemnation of another religion, it is instead meant to be a message of hope for a particular community. The words of the Gospel of John, then, act as something of a two-level drama, where the life of Jesus is actually meant to be a reflection of what’s going on in the gospel community, and the words of Jesus to his disciples are heard as words meant for the community. This means that when they heard Jesus say to the disciples, no one comes to the father except through me, they heard Jesus’ reassurance to them that, yes, in fact, they’re right, despite the hardships they’ve faced. It’s hard for us to remember this, but these folks were marginalized, and it is very common for anyone in a marginalized group to write their story in such a way that vindicates their group while putting down the other. But in no way was John’s community trying to say those who had cast them out were never going to get into heaven. This passage, and the gospel as a whole, is an apology for the faith of one particularly unique community, not a condemnation of every other one.
What, then, does this have to do with us here and now? What kind of good news can we gleam from this relatively short bible study this morning? First, I would suggest that it is so very important for us to understand that the gospel of Jesus was never, ever meant to be exclusive, and those who today would use Jesus’ words to condemn the genuine faith of others are doing a grave disservice to the ministry of Jesus and the intention of those who wrote about him. John 14: 6 is not the final arbiter in the discussion of the merits of different religions or understandings of God, and in a time where we are so entrenched in our divisions across cultural and religious lines, we need to remember that. We can also use this Gospel to help us remember that it is entirely possible to affirm one's own experiences without totally condemning the experiences of others.
Secondly, while we are not facing any kind of persecution like John's community was, we are all in the midst of great fear and concern for what our future holds. We do not know when we will return to our houses of worship and what they will look like when we do. We can easily fall into the trap of scapegoating or lashing out in our frustrations Or we can take a cue from the Gospel of John, whose entire message, I think, lies in the very first sentence of this reading: do not let your hearts be troubled. When we are at our lowest points, Jesus comes to us with that message, the very message that the community of John’s Gospel clung to. It is the message that love is the way, that God’s goodness and mercy are the truth, and that to abide in them is to have eternal life. This is the hope of John’s community, and it is our hope even now.
