Word of Salvation – Vol. 22 No.48 – August 1976

 

The Way To God

 

Sermon by Rev. M. P. Geluk on John 14:6

Scripture Reading: John 14:1-11

Psalter Hymnal: 162:1,2; 251: all vs.; 137: all vs.; 383:1-4; 192:1,2

 

Congregation of our Lord Jesus Christ,

Sad to say, there are still many wrong ideas in the world today about Jesus Christ, the Son of God.

He has been around for a long time now, almost 2000 years, and there are not many people left who have never heard His Name mentioned somewhere.  If you were to take a census in your own neighbourhood, then you would probably discover that the Name Jesus is not all that strange to people.  In fact quite a few might even realise that the way to know God is linked somewhere with Christ His Son.

Yet, notwithstanding all that, there is still a great deal of misunderstanding about Him.  This may even be true of those who claim to know Him and believe in Him.  Knowing and believing in Jesus Christ doesn’t necessarily mean that there is nothing more to be learnt about Him.  After all, He is a very unique Person.  His birth, His life on earth, His death, resurrection and His ascension and so on, are all so special, so miraculous-like.  And there are those occasions during His time on earth that He appeared very human, much the same as anyone else; and other occasions that He did speak and do things that only God could say and do.

But how exactly He was the way to God was often a puzzle to those who met Him.  Take the disciples for example.  They had been close witnesses to what He said and did for about three years and yet there were times that even they were quite baffled.

On one such occasion Jesus told His disciples He was going the way of suffering and death and that only He could go that road.  But Simon Peter failed to understand and asked why he could not follow Christ.  Shortly after that Jesus told His disciples about Him going to the Father to prepare a place for them in heaven.  He added that they knew the way where He was going.  But Thomas, almost bluntly, replied, “Lord, we do not know where you are going; how do we know the way?” (14:5).  It was then that Jesus told them that He is the way, the truth and the life, and that no one can come to the Father except through Him.

If they had really known Christ then they would have known the Father too.  But then it was Philip’s turn to show lack of understanding and he said, “Lord, show us the Father, and it is enough for us.”  He completely missed the point and sorrowfully Jesus remarked, “Have I been so long with you and yet you have not come to know Me?” (vs.9).

In a sense, these sorrowful words of Christ have echoed down the corridors of time.  He has been with us for a long time, yet how many today really know Him?  But He has also said, “I am the way, the truth and the life; no one comes to the Father but through Me.”  Let us look at those words and try to understand what Jesus meant by them.  They speak about:

THE WAY TO GOD.

FIRSTLY we see how this way is revealed to us by God, and
SECONDLY how this way is opened to us by Christ.

First of all then we see that the Way to God is revealed to us by God.  This means that we need God to show us how to find the way to God.

Mankind has been wandering in great confusion ever since the fall into sin; the fall away from God, away from true righteousness, true holiness, and true knowledge.  And ever since that terrible tragedy which happened very early in history, soon after creation, people have been coming up with all kinds of theories and philosophies that were supposed to help humanity in its deepest need.  Many good things can be said about some of the teachings that have been tried.  Some of course have simply been disastrous, yes, even terrible and tragic.  But in the final analysis things in the world haven’t really changed all that much as far as human nature is concerned.

It is still man that we are worried about, his greed, his hate, his jealousy, the way he can grab for power and squash everything and everyone that gets in the way.  Oh yes, we may have walked on the moon, and landed on Mars, we may be able to do heart and other organ transplants, we have harnessed nuclear energy and we can with our technology just about invent anything at will.  But we still can’t change human nature, we still have our broken homes and our broken relationships.

We can appreciate the words of the wise man in Proverbs who said that he who can rule or control his own nature is mightier than he who captures a city (Prov.6:32).

So it is still very obvious that man today needs to find the way back to God from Whom he has wandered far.  Furthermore, it is also very obvious that man would be far better off to take it from God, as to how to get back to Him, because all of man’s efforts haven’t really been very successful.  And now the wonderful thing is that God has indeed shown the way back to Himself.  It is right there in His Word – that is where the way back to God is pointed out.  And many by the grace of God have found that way to God and they have been blessed tremendously.  They have been redeemed from the sinful power of their own human nature and have been made into a new kind of people, living a new, full life, with meaning and purpose.  They are the true church of God and daily God is adding those who are being saved.  God does it by showing people the way back to Him.  He reveals Himself, He shows people who He is, what He does, what He has done, and what He will do.

The purpose then of God revealing His own self is to redeem man, to bring fallen man back to Himself, so that man can have life, abundant life, eternal life.  That’s God’s goal.  His aim…!

But it is not the end goal or the final aim of God revealing Himself.  That’s even more beautiful.  No, the end-goal is God Himself.  It is not the creature but the Creator.  The Bible makes clear that God reveals Himself so as to fully enjoy the glory of His own virtues and His own perfection.  But to achieve this self-glorification, which only God may do because He is perfect and complete, God redeems the creature He has made.  God recreates fallen, sinful man and renews him after His own likeness and image, so that God’s own virtues and perfections are reflected in His work of redemption.  So the purpose of God revealing Himself to man is to save and redeem him whilst the final purpose is to glorify His own Name in this.

This means then that God’s purpose in showing man the way back to God is not first of all to enlighten man’s mind and to merely teach man a few things.  No, the purpose is redemption, salvation.

Many people think that God is only there to help man help himself, to give him understanding, to merely enable man to apply his mind, his wisdom to his lot on the face of the earth.  This type of thinking is referred to as rationalism.  Man by his own reason and insight must better himself, and if God can help him with a clear mind and enable man to see things properly, then man can come a long way.

It’s the way of education.  We often hear it said today that in order to improve society, have better marriages, less crime, and so on, we need to educate more.

But is that God’s purpose in revealing Himself?  To merely enlighten the mind of man?  Is that the way?  The way back to God?  Did not Jesus say: “I am the way, the truth, and the life, no one comes to the Father, but through Me”?

Others think that God’s purpose in revealing Himself and so bring man back to God is to make man a truly virtuous person.  God is to help man better his life by setting a good example Himself.  This type of thinking is called moralism.  We have plenty of immorality, so if God can help man improve his morals then he will be a fine person and society will benefit much.  And indeed, many look to Christ as the good example.  They will rush to Jesus’ teaching in the Sermon on the Mount and they love statements like “whatever you want others to do for you, do so for them” (Mt.7:12).

But is it merely a matter of following Jesus’ good example?  Is that then the way back to God?  That not Jesus, but merely His teaching, His example, is the way.

But let’s hear the text again: Jesus said, “I am the way, the truth and the life, no one comes to the Father but through Me.”

Then again there are those who say that God’s purpose in revealing Himself is to awaken in man religious feelings.  Man’s way back to God is by way of meditation and contemplation.  You sit down somewhere and fix yourself into a certain position and then you must just relax and let the feeling of God simply come over you.  It is called mysticism and it is dished up to us in such a mild form as yoga, which for some strange reason seems to attract many housewives, to extreme forms found in Hare Krishna and other eastern religions.

But is the way back to God to be found in the mystical way of floating up into a God-consciousness, being absorbed into God?  Will that save society?  Here it is again, Jesus said, I am the way, the truth and the life, no one comes to the Father but through Me.”

We must firmly reject all those false ways back to God.  They don’t get us anywhere near to God.  They are dangerous ways because they are dressed up in the mantle of truth but underneath is the lie.  No, God showed the way back to Him by redeeming all of man, body and soul, the total person, and not just individuals, separate and loose from each other, but organically.  He redeems His people, His elect, the church.  In fact, not only His people but much more.  God’s purpose is to redeem the whole world, to set it free from sin and its destructive powers.  He aims to renew heaven and earth and then the end-goal is that the glory of God will shine over all of God’s creation.

Now to achieve this mighty purpose, this wonderful aim, God revealed Himself in a historical process that finds its climax in the Person and work of Jesus Christ.  He is the way, the truth and the life.  That is, God entered into the world of man, into our world of space and time, in man’s history, and finally and completely in Jesus Christ, His Son.  And to this revealing of God Himself, man answers with his religion.

This religion can only be true and meaningful when man listens to God and sees God as a Person who is very much unique.  And as a Personal being God reveals Himself in words and deeds.  This needs to be stressed, for people tend to look for God only in nature where God is supposed to be found in everything, from a tiny blade of grass to the human being (Pantheism).

Of course God is in nature because He made it all, but He is also separate from it.  When people look for God only in nature, or only in reason or only in morals, or only in contemplation, then God becomes an impersonal being, which He is not.

God is very much a personal being; we speak of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit as Persons in the God-head.  Man cannot respond to an impersonal God but he can to God as a person who has spoken to man in human words and divine actions

And so in the Old Testament times God as a Person revealed Himself in the covenant which He had drawn up with His people.  The Ten Commandments are the commandments of the covenant, they show to man what God required of him, so as to bring man back to God.  Thus you find in the O.T. the instructions of God, His precepts, His statutes and ordinances, His judgements and His ways.

And to this the believing covenant people responded with a fear of the Lord.  That is, they respected God and delighted in knowing Him.  God had spoken to them, shown the way back to God, and His people answered with faith in Him.  Their trust, hope, love, and expectation was directed to God whom they got to know personally.  They took refuge in Him and were comforted.

And then in the New Testament we have God revealing Himself in Jesus Christ, His only begotten Son.  For even the O.T. people of God could not respond in a perfect way.  The way back to God was out of reach, they could not succeed in it because of their backsliding brought about by sin, failures and acts of disobedience.  So they too needed a Mediator.  One to actually help bring them back to God.  This was of course the Messiah, known in the N.T. as Jesus Christ.

For all people and for all time He is the way, and the truth and the life, no one comes to the Father but through Him.  And people in O.T. times, as well as N.T. times, were saved by faith in Him.

So SECONDLY then, we see that the way to God is opened to us by Christ.  Firstly we saw how God Himself shows us the way back to Him, and now we see how He actually does it by Christ.  And straight away we must realise that Jesus himself is God.  Our Mediator to bring us to God cannot be reason, or education, or good morals, or religious feelings, or whatever else, for they fail to redeem the whole person.  We need God Himself as Mediator and it is Jesus Christ.

“No one comes to the Father but through Me”, He said.

To return to the Father, therefore, we must know Jesus Christ.  And we can know Him, for He revealed Himself, as God who opens the way to God.  In this ch.14 Jesus said, “believe in God, believe also in Me.” (vs.1).  He is very much the way to the Father.  Elsewhere in John’s Gospel, He repeatedly puts Himself on the same level as the Father.

“If you knew me, you would know the Father also.” (8:19).

At one time He said, “…..believe the works (I do), that you may know and understand that the Father is in me, and I in the Father.” (10:38).  To believe in Christ is to believe in the Father who sent Him (12:44), and to behold Christ is to behold the Father who sent Him (12:45).  Christ does not speak on His own initiative, but the Father who sent Him has given Him commandment what to say and what to speak.  (12:49).

We said earlier that in the O.T.  God revealed Himself by way of His commandments, His statutes, His precepts and ordinances.  All that is the Word of God, God speaking to His people.  And now, as we read in Jn.1:14, the Word became flesh.  Yes, the spoken Word of God became Christ in the flesh and He was among His people and they saw His glory and realised it was the glory from the Father, full of grace and truth.  Later John came to write that Christ is the true God (1Jn.5:20).

Jesus Himself said, “I and the Father are one”. (Jn.10:30).  “All things have been handed over to Me by my Father; nor does anyone know the Father, except the Son, and anyone to whom the Son wills to reveal Him.” (Mt.11:27).  So no one comes to the Father, but through or by Jesus Christ.  As He said, “I am the way, the truth, and the life”.  We are not brought back to God by a force or a principle but by a person.  Being set free from our sinful human nature, from lust, greed, hate, disobedience, pride, yes from all sinful works, is by the Person of Christ.  If we do not know Christ as a Person, if man has no knowledge of the words He spoke and the things He did then such a person stands outside salvation.

We may find it hard to think of Christ as person, seeing that He is not with us in the body.  If He were actually here in the flesh then it might be easier to have personal contact.  That of course was the wish of the doubting Thomas.  He had heard the words of the resurrection but that wasn’t enough for Thomas, He very much wanted to see the resurrection.  But somehow God deems it sufficient for us to hear the words of Christ, and to believe them.  “Blessed are they who did not see and yet believed.” (Jn.20:29).

He comes to us today as a Person and although we cannot see Him we hear His Words: I am the way, the truth, and the life, no one comes to the Father but by me,” We may believe this and rejoice in Him who is for us the way to God.  In prayer too, we speak to the invisible God but it is not an unknown quantity for we speak to the Way, the Truth, and the Life.  He is the living Truth, that sets us free; He is Truth and He imparts truth.  He has life within Himself, and He is the source and giver of life.  He has the light of life, and has the words of life, and He came to give us life, abundant life.

There is need then to go back to God.  The many evils in society and in our own human nature bring out that need.  God, in His wonderful goodness shows us the way back, and through Jesus Christ has actually opened the way.  Through Christ we may have a very meaningful and purposeful personal relationship with God.  It is He who has redeemed us from all what is evil, inside of us, and outside of us.  And God will go on to redeem the whole world, so that in the end His great and wonderful Name is glorified by all His works.  Let us then believe again and rejoice in Him who is for us the Way, and the Truth, and the Life.

Amen