Enter the Secret Place

In Sunday's discussion on John 14, we tried to understand the perspective of the disciples when they were receiving this final message from Jesus before His death.  For them, it was a hard concept to grasp--Jesus was declaring His deity and having a Father in heaven that He was about to return to, but both Thomas and Philip (and surely the majority of them) had a hard time understanding this truth (v. 5, 8).  Its easier for us to begin to understand as we have the hindsight of the Gospel, the letters, and have the gift of the Holy Spirit.  At the time of John 14, the Holy Spirit had not yet been given to the disciples (v. 16-18).  Sure, they had the living God as Christ "dwelling with them," but He was yet to "be in them" (v. 17). The words Jesus spoke must have been a challenge to understand without this "Helper."  Jesus pleads, "or else believe Me for the sake of the works themselves," (v. 11) because He knew that they would have trouble understanding His words, so He asks them to at least believe in His miracles.

It is incredible to think that Jesus promises us "the works that I do he will do also; greater works than these he will do, because I got to My Father." (v. 12) Jesus didn't come to make a bunch of converts by His miracles--He came to give His life for us.  Often when He performed miracles, He said, "do not tell anyone" ( Matt 8:4, Mark 5:43, Mark 7:36, Mark 8:26, Mark 9:9).  Thus Peter won more people for the Kingdom during his Spirit-filled message at Pentecost than Jesus did for His entire ministry on earth!  We believe that He has many more greater things yet to do (in our lives, in our community, in our world), but these require an abundance of faith.  Extreme faith is a spiritual gift listed in 1 Corinthians, and it is ours if we would ask for it!

We also wrestled with the statements of Christ when He says, "he who loves Me" (v. 15, 21, 23).  His love is unconditional, but with us, we like to tack on conditions for our love with God. He loves us despite our human limitation to love Him. I looked it up and every word translated "love" in chapter 14 is from agapao, or unconditional, selfless love. This means that Christ is demanding our unconditional love for Him! No strings attached. None of that, "I will follow You, but let me first..." (Luke 9:61).

Another point of focus was how Christ leaves us His peace, but that peace is distinct from the peace that the world has to give (v. 27).  With worldly peace, there will always be conditions: "I promise not to do this IF you promise not to do that."  Peace "agreements" can easily be broken.  Worldly peace also gives a false sense of security and a false idea of what a peaceful life should offer.  But the peace that Christ offers is one that removes fear of circumstances, because He is always in control. Jesus was NOT a "hippie" that simply offered smiles, hugs and a good speech; He was the most radical change this world has ever seen! When we have His true peace, there is nothing that can shake us!

Read ch. 15, keep praying and seeking Him in the secret place every day!

--Josh