Joh 14:1-12 | KingComments | STEP | The contrast between the subject or different subjects of this chapter and the last verses of the previous chapter is considerable. In those last verses the Lord Jesus foretold the denial by Peter. What Peter will do shows the impotence of the flesh to be faithful in any way, no matter how good the intentions. Opposite to this failure of the flesh, the Lord gives seven consolations in this chapter for the weak faith of impotent disciples: 1. When He is no longer with the disciples, they can turn to Him in faith just as they believe in God ( ). 2. He goes to prepare a place for them in the Father’s house ( ). 3. He Himself will come back to pick them up to be where He is ( ). 4. Until then, they will receive the full revelation of the Father in Him ( ). 5. Until then, they will be His representatives in the world, where they may pray with the authority of His Name and therefore be answered ( ). 6. In that time the Holy Spirit will come to be with them as Comforter and Teacher ( ). 7. He gives them His peace ( ). The Lord himself has been troubled several times by seeing sin in its consequences ( ). Now He tells His disciples that their heart needs not be troubled, that is, not moved intensely. He knows what He will do and what the consequences of His work will be and that they will be allowed to share in it. He has said to them that He will depart from them. That will sadden them, but He wants to direct their heart permanently to Himself. Although He will no longer be physically present with them, He will still be there in the same way as God is. They believe in Him, but they will have to believe in Him in a completely new way. Just as God has always been an object of faith without ever having been seen, He will also become an object of faith when they will no longer see Him. He will go away from them, but still He will be present, just as God is present. They will no longer see Him, but will continue to believe in Him and love Him ( ). With His going away, the era of faith will begin ( ; ).

‏ John 14:1-12

The Lord Jesus Object of Faith.

The contrast between the subject or different subjects of this chapter and the last verses of the previous chapter is considerable. In those last verses the Lord Jesus foretold the denial by Peter. What Peter will do shows the impotence of the flesh to be faithful in any way, no matter how good the intentions.

Opposite to this failure of the flesh, the Lord gives seven consolations in this chapter for the weak faith of impotent disciples:

1. When He is no longer with the disciples, they can turn to Him in faith just as they believe in God (Jn 14:1).

2. He goes to prepare a place for them in the Father’s house (Jn 14:2).

3. He Himself will come back to pick them up to be where He is (Jn 14:3).

4. Until then, they will receive the full revelation of the Father in Him (Jn 14:4-12).

5. Until then, they will be His representatives in the world, where they may pray with the authority of His Name and therefore be answered (Jn 14:13-14).

6. In that time the Holy Spirit will come to be with them as Comforter and Teacher (Jn 14:15-26).

7. He gives them His peace (Jn 14:27-31).

The Lord himself has been troubled several times by seeing sin in its consequences (Jn 11:33 ; Jn 12:27 ; Jn 13:21). Now He tells His disciples that their heart needs not be troubled, that is, not moved intensely. He knows what He will do and what the consequences of His work will be and that they will be allowed to share in it. He has said to them that He will depart from them. That will sadden them, but He wants to direct their heart permanently to Himself.

Although He will no longer be physically present with them, He will still be there in the same way as God is. They believe in Him, but they will have to believe in Him in a completely new way. Just as God has always been an object of faith without ever having been seen, He will also become an object of faith when they will no longer see Him. He will go away from them, but still He will be present, just as God is present. They will no longer see Him, but will continue to believe in Him and love Him (1Pet 1:8). With His going away, the era of faith will begin (Gal 2:20; 2Cor 5:7).

The Father’s House

The Lord Jesus tells His disciples that His going to the Father is for a purpose. That purpose is to prepare a place for them where the Father is, in order to be where He is. He tells them that He is going to “My Father’s house”. By this He does not mean the temple, which He also called “My Father’s house” (Jn 2:16). The temple, however, has been defiled by the people. They have turned it into a place of business. That is why God had to reject that house.

The Lord speaks here about the house of the Father in heaven. He says that it is a house with “many dwelling places”. And also the temple had multiple dwelling places. This is where the priests who served there lived (1Kgs 6:5; Eze 41:6 ; Eze 42:1-13). This shows that the temple was not only a place for God, but also for the priests. These were dwelling places for just a small part of the people.

The house of the Father has no limitations. The Lord presents it in its glorious spaciousness. Not only the Father and the Son live there, but there is room for all of His own, without distinction. The fact that the Father’s house has “dwelling places” shows the enduring stay of the believers in it. They do not just come there every now and then, but they are welcome to dwell there.

To underline the certainty of His words to the disciples, the Lord says that He would not have said so if it had not been true. He would not create hope if He were unable to fulfill that hope for His own. In order to provide them with that place He is already going there. It is necessary, because without His preparation they will not be able to get there.

In this Gospel, the Lord speaks about the future for His own in a quite different way than in the other Gospels. There He speaks about the future just before His being surrendered. There it always refers to the earth and His return to earth. He also speaks there about a reward for faithfulness during His absence. Of that we find nothing in this Gospel.

It is about the Father’s house and not about crowns, cities or a place in the kingdom. There is also no distinction between a larger or a nicer room here. There are many dwelling places, there is a dwelling place for every believer. This is the result of the love of the Father and the Son, a love that can never ever disappoint.

The disciples have given up everything to be with the Messiah on earth and to receive everything from Him. Now He will leave them. Will they all lose that when He will leave? No, on the contrary. They will get much more. He will go away and prepare an even more profound relationship and a much more superior dwelling place where death has no access. In order to make that wonderful place accessible to them, He must go to the cross. Through His work on the cross and His resurrection He will open the Father’s house for people who otherwise could never come there because of their sins.

Something else is also needed to prepare a place for people in the Father’s house. No one has ever been in the Father’s house. To open up the possibility for men to come there, it is necessary that He enters the Father’s house as Man. Since His ascension there is a Man in the Father’ s house. The magnificent consequence of His presence there as Man is that this guarantees that men can enter the Father’s house.

Once the Lord has prepared a place for His own, He can then make the promise that He will come back to receive them to Himself, so that they too may be where He is. The tremendous blessing of the Father’s house is not just a beautiful dwelling place, but it is the place of which He says: “Where I am.” It is also the great blessing of paradise where the fallen asleep believers are (Phil 1:23).

It is remarkable that the Lord does not speak of a certain time that would elapse between His going to prepare a place and His coming back to receive His own to Himself. He says it, as it were, in one breath, so without pause: “When I have gone and prepared your place, I will come back.”

In the same sense, Paul also spoke about the coming of the Lord when he says: “We who are alive and remain until the coming of the Lord” (1Thes 4:15). The fact that in the meantime almost two thousand years have passed without Him coming back has to do with His “patience toward you, not wishing for any to perish” (2Pet 3:9).

The moment will come when the believers will enter there. This is not when a believer dies. In that case the angels will come and bring him into paradise (Lk 16:22). But here He promises that He will personally come to take up the believers and receive them to Himself (1Thes 4:14-18; 1Cor 15:51-52; Phil 3:20-21), while the living unbelievers remain on earth and the unbelievers who have died will not rise from the dead, but will remain in the tomb.

The Only Way to the Father

The Lord has told them about the Father in all His teaching. After all, that is the purpose of His entire service. They know that He is going to the Father. They also know that both He and His work on the cross are the way to the Father. Although the disciples have heard all this teaching, they have not really understood it. The reason is that they still only think of an earthly Messiah and of a government in which they will participate. They don’t think about the Lord Jesus’ going to the Father at all.

That is why Thomas expresses the incomprehension present in all the disciples by asking Him what He means by ‘knowing the way’. His question gives the Lord the opportunity to unfold the truth. He does so in words that are so simple that a child can understand them, while at the same time they have a depth that no one can fathom.

He points to Himself as “the way and the truth and the life” in order to come to the Father. That He is “the way” means that people can only come to the Father through Him and His work on the cross. That He is “the truth” means that everything people want to know about the Father can only be found in Him. He is the only possible way for people to rejoice in the Father and have fellowship with the Father. That He is “the life” means that people must have Him as their life in order to be with the Father, because He has the life of the Father. He is the life because He is the Son. It is impossible to just have Him as the way and the truth, without also having Him as the life.

There is no other way to come to the Father and to know Him and enjoy fellowship with the Father than only through Him, the Son of the Father. Only He knows Him as His Father and only He can tell others about the Father and show them Who He is. That is exclusive. No prophet, no matter how great, has ever said or could say that. But it is open to everyone to get to know the Father through the Lord Jesus. Those who know the Son also know the Father. This means that the knowledge of the Father is inextricably linked to knowing the Son. The Son is the image of the invisible God (Col 1:15; Heb 1:3). Only in the Son the Father is known.

He Who Sees the Son Sees the Father

Now it is Philip’s turn to express his ignorance of the Lord Jesus. After all that the Lord has said and shown what so abundantly points to the Father, Philip’s request almost testifies of unbelief. Just like the question of Thomas, the question of Philip is the question of all. He speaks about “us”. His question shows that in the Lord Jesus he sees only a Man and no more than a Man, although a special Man in Whom he sees much of God. His question also shows that he has not yet really discovered God in Him. He has not yet understood who He really is.

The ignorance of Philip is answered by the Lord with a stream of light for the confused disciples. He does not blame Philip that He has been with Him for so long and still has not seen anything of the Father. He only says that Philip does not know Him yet.

In saying this in this way, He says that it is that simple: Looking at Him and seeing Him is the same as seeing the Father. He who sees Him and still asks Him to show the Father, does not look properly or looks with different expectations. The Father cannot be seen in any other way than through the Son only. It is impossible to see anything of God outside of Him, “for in Him all the fullness of Deity dwells in bodily form” (Col 2:9).

It comes down to faith. Only faith discovers and sees that the Lord Jesus is in the Father and that the Father is in Him and that therefore there is complete unity between the Father and the Son. When the Lord says: ”I am in the Father”, it indicates His perfect equality with the Father in His Being and nature. When He says: ”The Father is in Me”, it indicates that the Father is revealed and presented in Him. The fact that He is Man does not in any way prevent or diminish His unity of being with the Father. His unity with the Father makes that the words He speaks are entirely those of the Father and likewise the works that arise out of His words. Words and works are a perfect unity with the Lord Jesus and the Father.

The Lord encourages His disciples to believe that He is in the Father and the Father is in Him. If that is too difficult for them to believe, He offers them in His grace another opportunity to believe Him. They have seen His works, haven’t they? He also pointed this out to the unbelieving Jews (Jn 10:37-38).

What the Jews reject should convince the disciples concerning His Person. After all, they are much more familiar with Him and His daily words and works than the Jews. Yet they understand little that these are words and works for eternity. Because of their high earthly expectations of Him as the Messiah, they still have so little understanding of His greater glory as the Son of God Who is one with the Father and Who declares God as Father.

Greater Works

Now that the Lord has drawn attention to His works, He returns to the beginning of this chapter where He tells His disciples that He will be an object of faith (Jn 14:1). He will leave them and no longer be visible to them. However, this will not affect His works. Those works will no longer be done by Him, but by them. There is even more. When He has gone to the Father, they will not only do the works He has done, but they will do “greater” works than He has done. This is all related to His going to the Father. They will do that “because” He goes to the Father. This particular result of His going to the Father is again preceded by the double and therefore powerful “truly” followed by the authoritative “I say to you”.

The greater works of which He speaks, are therefore in the first place connected with faith in Him Whom they will no longer see and in the second place with His going to the Father. As a result of His going to the Father, He will send the Holy Spirit. By the Spirit Who will come when He has gone, greater works will happen than during His presence on earth. To see some of those greater works we have to read the book of Acts. There we read about the conversion of three thousand people in one day (Acts 2:41). We do not read that such a thing ever happened during the Lord’s life on earth.

The works may be greater, but no one is equal to Him, let alone greater, in His Self-sacrificing love, dependence and obedience. He is and will remain the source of those greater works. He emphasizes this by speaking about praying in His Name. He gives the comforting promise that His going to the Father will in no way dry up the mighty stream of grace in which He has worked when He was on earth.

Whoever believes in Him will be able to do what He did and even greater things, but it will never become a demonstration of a man’s power. Those greater works will always be the result of His will. It must therefore be sought in prayer. The disciples may count on a power that will not fail if it is sought in His Name.

This seeking of Him in prayer and counting on His power is the proof that the Lord Jesus is not just a special Man. If that were so, all the wonders He was accustomed to do would cease with His departure. The works that will happen on the basis of prayer to Him will be proof that He is God. His physical absence does not mean that He is less interested in their prayers nor that He has become powerless to work mightily through His disciples.

Above all, nothing will change His seeking the honor of His Father. In everything He will do on the basis of a prayer in His Name, He seeks the glorification of the Father, as He always did when He was on earth. He may not be on earth, but His activities in honor of the Father are unchanged and undiminished now that He is in heaven.

To pray in His Name is to pray with the authority of His Name. Just as the Father is glorified in the Son in His life and death, so the Father is now glorified in the believers who stand in His will and pray according to His will. In answering their prayers, the Lord Jesus continues to glorify the Father as the Son. That this is what it is all about when a prayer is answered, the Lord confirms by saying again that He will do what is prayed for in His Name. In this affirmation He makes it even more specific and at the same time more general by speaking of “anything”, in the sense of “whatever”.