Saying farewell is never easy. To know that someone isn’t going to be around, for whatever reason, can be difficult to get used to. And yet, it happens all the time. Your neighbours who’ve been there next door for ages sell up and move away. Your colleague or boss is shifted to another branch. Your children or grandchildren move off to university. Your relatives up sticks and settle in another country.
At least with most of those moves, you don’t lose contact. You can still keep in touch. But there is another farewell which (for the meantime) is a firmer, more final kind of farewell. Whether a sudden shock or a long, drawn out, gradual decline, it’s hard to say farewell when a loved one dies.
For the disciples of Jesus, our reading tonight is the shocking type of farewell. Just before our reading, at the end of chapter 13, Jesus has told the disciples that he is going to be with them only a little longer. That where he is going, they can’t come. It takes them by surprise. They weren’t expecting this news.
It’s now Thursday evening - everything from John 13 through to John 17 happens in one night, and that’s before the arrest, trial and crucifixion. Jesus is preparing his disciples for all that’s going to happen in the next day, and then life after Good Friday. They’re saddened by the new that he’s leaving them - after all, he’s been with them for three years. They’ve seen and done so much together. And on Palm Sunday, Jesus had been welcomed into the city.
They thought this was the victory they had been longing for. They imagined Jesus was about to take his rightful throne. And Jesus says he is leaving them? Where is he going? What’s happening? What sort of farewell is this?
It’s no wonder Peter jumps in to say that he’ll follow Jesus now, that he’ll lay down his life for Jesus. Very shortly Peter will deny even knowing Jesus. Peter can’t die for Jesus - Jesus has to die for Peter. That’s why Jesus must go.
Jesus is leaving them. Their friend, guide, master, and Lord is leaving them. It’s no wonder that chapter 14 begins with those very familiar words from the funeral service. It’s obvious that their hearts were troubled by this news; that they were anxious about the future, worried about what would happen. It’s why Jesus says this:
‘Do not let your hearts be troubled. Trust in God; trust also in me.’ He doesn’t want them to be anxious, or to have troubled hearts. And the way to avoid troubled hearts is to trust God, and also trust Jesus - through all that is about to happen. Even when they don’t understand it.
Jesus says ‘trust me’ - I wonder if anyone has said those words to you recently. Maybe buying a car, and you’re not sure about it. Trust me. You’ve been let down by someone before. Trust me. They give you a promise, and you have to decide if you believe them, if they’ll actually do what they say they will do.
So what is it the disciples have to trust Jesus for? In verse 2 he gives them a promise - the reason why he is going away. ‘In my Father’s house are many rooms.’ Now, whether you’re used to hearing about mansions (dwelling places) or rooms, the point Jesus is making is that he’s making a home for us; a place prepared.
A while back we were doing an overnight stay in a hotel with friends. There was some confusion over the booking, and when I rang up the day we were due to go, it turned out that only one room had been booked. Our friends’ room. Thankfully they still had some left!
Worse, a friend of mine arrived at his hotel in London. He found that the hotel had double booked his room; there was definitely no room at the inn. So he had to traipse across London, wheeling his suitcase behind me, to go to another hotel from the same company.
But that won’t happen to any of Jesus’ disciples. Jesus is saying that our place is prepared; it’s certain. He is going to prepare a place for us. He goes to make everything ready. And not only that, he will personally come and take us to be with him.
This isn’t like the holidays that you might have been on. You arrive at the airport and you’re loaded onto a hot and sticky bus for the trip around half the hotels in the resort before you come to yours. No, this is more like Jesus personally escorting us, bringing us with him.
Now, when you think to yourself - Jesus has been preparing our place in glory for two thousand years, this will be some place! But it’s not that the preparation has taken so long. It’s the going that prepares the place. It’s by Jesus’ death on the cross that we are guaranteed our place, as we trust him.
As Jesus says ‘you know the way to the place where I am going’, Thomas jumps in and says, Lord, we don’t know where you are going, so how can we know the way?’
Isn’t that true? You need to know where you’re going, your end destination, before you know what way you’re going to get there. Do you see what Jesus says in verse 6? These are well-known words. Yet they tell us exactly who Jesus is.
‘I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.’
Jesus says ‘I am the way.’ He is the way, the route, the path. Notice that he doesn’t say ‘I am a way’, one option among many; he is the only way, the only way to get to the Father.
Jesus says ‘I am the truth.’ He doesn’t only speak true things; he is the truth. As you hear in court, the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. So we can depend on what Jesus says. We can trust his words. We can trust him.
Jesus says, ‘I am the life.’ Real life is found only in Jesus. He gives us life because he is the life. Remember that Jesus is about to go to the cross. He’s about to lay down his life, in order to bring us to God, in order to give us his life.
There is no other way, no other truth, no other life. Only Jesus can show us the Father. Only Jesus can reveal God to us. In his life, works, words and witness, Jesus shows us what God is like, because the Father is in Jesus.
Through the death of Jesus on the cross we have the promise of our place prepared; our room in God’s house. It’s there for us, as we trust in God, and trust also in Jesus. So are you depending on him today?
Jesus is the way. Are you going his way? Are you going with Jesus, or going on your own way? Do you need to turn around, get back on track, to go with Jesus?
Jesus is the truth. Are you living by his truth? Or are you believing someone else’s truth? Who are you listening to? What are you building your life on?
Jesus is the life. Are you experiencing his abundant life today?Are you certain of his everlasting life when the time of your own farewell comes?
Jesus says to us, and to all his disciples: ‘Let not your hearts be troubled. Trust in God; trust also in me.’
This sermon was preached in St Matthew's Church, Richhill on Monday 26th March 2018 in the 'Famous Last Words' Holy Week series.
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