Jesus: The Only Way (John 14 Tim Robinson)

We're going to get started this morning. I just have a few announcements and then we're going to pray together.

Father, we just set our hearts before you. Lord, we thank you that your mercies are near every morning. We thank you, Lord, for the rain. We thank you, Lord, that you cause your rain to fall on the just and the unjust, that it is a blessing from you.

We thank you, Lord, for the blessing that we can come before you boldly, before your throne to worship you. We pray, Lord, for your anointing upon the teaching this morning, that you would wash us in the water of your word, sanctify us through your truth.

Your word is truth. Lord, in this crazy world where the government is putting fences around churches to keep people out and opening up borders to let illegal immigrants in, this world, Lord, can't tell from the left hand and the right hand.

We thank you that you have pulled us out from this world unto yourself, from darkness into light. We thank you for your faithfulness. We pray you for your anointing upon the worship and teaching this morning.

We thank you for your grace and mercy. In Jesus' name, amen.

Let's stand together.

Water you turned into wine. Eyes of the blind. There's no one like you. None like you. Tortured to die. There's no one like you. None like you. Our God is stronger. God, you are higher. Our God is healer.

If our God is for us, stop us.

I was thinking about, you know, we are commanded in God's Word to sing praises. That's probably the command that's throughout the scriptures. The most, is sing praises to our God. Sing praises. It's not a request.

One of the reasons that God commands us to do that is because Satan hates unity. And unity is us singing together. There are so many things. Chains can be dropped. Prison gates can be opened because of singing praises.

We have great power in singing praises to Jesus' name. Let's continue to sing together.

Give thanks to the Lord, our God and King. His love endures forever. For He is good, He is above all things. His love endures forever. Sing praises to the mighty hand and outstretched arm. His love endures forever.

Life has been reborn. Grace of God.

Lord Jesus, thank you so much that we can gather this morning in your presence and sing praises to your name. Thank you for the opportunity, the voice, the breath that you give us to sing praises to your name.

We know that Satan can be defeated by our unity and singing together. We are so thankful, Lord Jesus. We sing praises to.

Your name. I see the beauty of a sunset's glory. Amazing artistry across the evening sky. When I feel the mystery of a distant galaxy, it holds and humbles me to be loved by a God so high. What can I do but thank you?

What can I do but give my life to you? Hallelujah. What can I do every day? Hallelujah. Suffered by our side, lost they nailed to, that could not hold. Now you're making all things by the power I do.

Tim makes his way up here. Tim Robinson is our Director of Children's Ministries and Youth and he's only preached twice, right? Well, three times if you're counting today.

Well, okay. It was a double service before and now it's a double service again, so maybe.

Twice. So he's less nervous because he went through it once already. It was a practice run, right? But we're really excited to hear about your passion and your story, so thank.

You. Appreciate you, Michael. All right, so I'll be, sorry, I don't have a story that Jeff usually has. He's like, I don't know where he gets all his stories from, but they're amazing. I don't know if you noticed, but he starts his sermon off every time with a story.

I don't have one, I'm just going straight to the word. It's, yeah, I hope you guys like that. I actually love the stories, I just don't have one for today. So it's John 14 and we're going to be studying verses one through six.

And I'll read the passage for today. And this is Jesus talking to his disciples. Let not your hearts be troubled. Believe in God. Believe also in me. In my Father's house are many rooms. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go and 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, you may also be. And you know the way where I am going. Thomas said to him, Lord, we do not know the way you are going.

How can we know the way? Jesus said to him, I am the way, the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. Amazing words from Jesus. He just pretty much demolished every other religion, right?

By saying I am the way, the truth and the life. And then the shocker, no one comes to the Father except through me. So there might be people out there that tell you that there's another way to heaven.

But Jesus is actually the only way, believe it or not. I have a friend that always says, your truth is not my truth. Stop trying to force Jesus on me. And I'm like, I don't have a gun against your head.

It's no big deal. I'm just preaching the word to you. But I'm like, how did you come to the conclusion that your truth is not my truth? If Jesus says he's the only way, that means he's the only way for me and the only way for you, right?

So we need to be able to think through these things. And when Jesus says he is the only way, I think he means it. That he is the only way to the Father. No one can enter by another way. But we'll get to that even more.

So to give some context, here we find Jesus near the end of his ministry. He has lived a full life, probably 33 years. The best life anyone has ever lived by far. If you're looking at God's standards, the man was perfect.

Never sinned once. Jesus Christ, amazing man. He is with the disciples that he's been training up for the past three years in the upper room. It's a Thursday night before he is to drink the full cup, every last drop of the full cup of divine wrath the Father is about to pour out on him on the cross.

It has been an amazing week. Passion week is always an amazing week, right? It starts off with Palm Sunday as he comes in on his triumphal entry, riding into the holy city of Jerusalem on a donkey, just as the scripture predicted he would.

And the people were shouting Hosanna and laying palm branches on the road and praising him as he was riding in on the donkey coming in on Palm Sunday. He got the full royal treatment. No doubt they accepted him as a king on Sunday.

And the very people who accepted him as a king, his very own people who he came to, who gave him the royal treatment, will be crying out for his blood by Friday. They'll be shouting, crucify him, crucify him.

The very people that welcomed him on Palm Sunday. And of course, if you came to church last week, you know that after Jesus died, he didn't stay dead. Hallelujah, right? Amen. Three days later, on Easter Sunday, the first Easter Sunday, he rose from the dead.

And that's how we get our hope, right? Jesus rose from the dead. And we said last week that as much as America thinks it runs on Duncan, it really should be running on hope, right? And that's what people really do run on is hope.

And Jesus rising from the dead provides us with extraordinary hope, the most hope that you can possibly be looking for to go with. I don't know how people go without hope, the hope of eternal life and having your sins forgiven and the hope that we would be with Jesus.

I just don't know how they do it. I just don't know how. It's so comforting to know that this life isn't all there is, right? And eventually Jesus would appear to some of his disciples and then ascend into heaven.

But here we are on Thursday night before the death of Jesus. This is John chapter 14, and it's kind of the beginning of Jesus' farewell discourse, meaning that Jesus is saying goodbye. He's saying goodbye to his disciples.

And this is extremely bad news for the disciples. As you know, the disciples have left everything to follow this man. And they've been with this man for three years now, giving their lives to him, following him, learning from him.

They mean everything to him. Some of them were fishermen. And Jesus said, follow me and become fishers of men. And they immediately dropped their nets and followed. One of them was a tax collector. And maybe Jesus said to him, hey, you tax collector, stop collecting taxes, and I'll make you a collector of men.

Maybe he said something along those lines. But the tax collector had to leave a lot behind. It was Matthew who wrote the Gospel of Matthew. He left everything. He left more than, because the fish were always there, they can go back to the fish, right?

But he had staked his life on being a tax collector. And he's kind of ripping people off. And tax collectors made a lot of money back then. But he left everything to follow Jesus. So you can see how some of the disciples, their hearts had to be really troubled by this.

Like Jesus is going away. What do you mean? Where are you going? And Jesus had been hinting at this for quite some time through his ministry, sometimes even plainly telling him, plainly telling them that he's going away, that he's going to be lifted up on the cross.

And they fully don't understand that. Or maybe they don't fully want to understand it because they're just loving the fame of Jesus' ministry. But they didn't fully understand that the Messiah is coming and he's going to suffer and die.

They don't understand where he's going and that's where he's going away to. But this is the reason why he came. So an example is in chapter 13, right before chapter 14, Jesus is talking to his disciples.

He says, little children, get a little while I am with you. You will seek me. And just as I said to the Jews, so now I say to you, where I'm going, you cannot come. And Simon Peter asked him, Lord, where are you going?

And Jesus said to him, where I am going, you cannot come and you cannot follow me now, but you will follow me afterward. And then Peter said to him, Lord, why can I not follow you now? I will lay down my life for you.

And Jesus probably looked at him and said, really, Simon? Will you lay down your life for me? Truly, truly, I say to you, the rooster will not crow. So you have denied me three times. And Peter may have really meant those words that he said to Jesus in that moment.

But we know that Jesus is the truth and that all of his prophecies come true and all the prophecies about him come true. And of course, Peter, no matter how much he thought he wasn't going to deny Jesus, he did deny Jesus and specifically three times, just as Jesus predicted.

And then even to be more specific, right before the rooster had crowed. So Jesus is always right and Jesus is always true and he's always trustworthy because he never lies. He's without sin. He's a perfect person.

And they recognize this. They recognize that he is completely different and they love him and they're following him. But after Jesus and Peter having this conversation, Peter and the rest of the disciples, I mean, their hearts had to be troubled, right?

Because he's going away, especially Peter, troubled that he's going away, troubled that they did not know what to do next. Every direction they need is coming from Jesus. They're following his lead the whole way.

Their whole lives for the past three years revolved completely around Jesus. And now he states that he's leaving. He's going away. His time has come. And Jesus, sensing that they don't like this news, I'm sure, and sensing that their hearts are really troubled, he says to them in verse one, let not your hearts be troubled.

So even Jesus knows Peter will deny him. Jesus knows he's about to drink the divine cup of wrath. And Jesus is the one who is going to suffer and die. He's the one in the predicament. He decides, Jesus being so cool and not worrying about himself, he decides he's going to comfort the disciples now, even though just in less than a day, he's going to be hung up on that cross and the wrath of God is going to be dumped out on him.

His love is just remarkable. Jesus' love. Jesus is the one who is going to suffer, yet he is so concerned with his friend's well-being. How humiliating that his closest friends could not even offer the slightest bit of comfort for him, but he didn't even care.

He still offered comfort for them. The disciples are still a little bit concerned with just themselves. They love Jesus and they're really upset that he's leaving, but it's kind of a little bit selfishness because Jesus is trying to tell them there's a reason he's leaving, but they're just not willing to accept it.

But their hearts are completely troubled and Jesus, concerned for them, basically says, stop being troubled. You have unholy turmoil within you and you don't need to have that. Stop being troubled. You can trust me.

And it just seems so far from Sunday. The ups and downs of the Passion Week are really just incredible. I mean, this same day, Judas would leave the table, the last supper, and just before this, Jesus had washed all their feet.

But we talked about Palm Sunday, and even now, like, Palm Sunday, when Palm Sunday comes around 2 ,000 years later, the last few Palm Sundays, I've been really happy just thinking about how Jesus came in and he came in on that donkey, just how it was prophesied.

And everybody loved him and they welcomed him as the king. And then, Palm Sunday is just always awesome, but then leading up to Good Friday, that's when you're kind of like, oh man, this is kind of getting heavy when you're thinking about Jesus on the cross.

But for me, my favorite day of the year really is Good Friday. And I think it's because it's just, for me, the most real day of the year. I'm just, the whole day, thinking about Jesus dying on the cross and how it should have been really anybody but him.

And I know that it should have been me. I'm the guilty sinner that Jesus took my place on that cross. And thinking about that all day, I'm happy in a sense, but I'm also like, I'm just seeing red all day, not because I'm mad, but just, I'm seeing the blood of Jesus.

And I know that that blood is able to wash all sins clean away. And I just am sometimes sad that the Lord that I've come to know is being punished by his own Father, and I just see blood all day. Thinking about Jesus, the one we've come to love, has been crushed by the almighty God, knowing that it should have been anyone else on the cross.

And then coming to the point where like, yeah, it really should have been me. Realizing that, yes, it should be you on the cross. Like, don't think that you're good enough. Jesus is the only good person.

And Paul writes how he is chief sinner. And the great apostle Paul, who probably had all the spiritual gifts in the world, and had this amazing love, and he calls himself chief sinner. And sometimes even Jeff calls himself chief sinner.

Maybe you need to get to the point where you realize you're kind of chief sinner yourself, and that your sin is actually great, but Jesus' love is so much greater, and it's able to wash those guilty sins away.

Because when you realize you're such a big sinner, you realize like how big of a Savior Jesus really is. And that brings in more glory. When you realize you're an actual sinner, and you don't deserve heaven, it brings Jesus more glory, because he takes you there.

And then Jesus, of course, rose from the dead on Sunday, and all our hope is restored by that resurrection Sunday, and it's usually where everyone comes to church, right? Some of the people that have not been to church all year, you see them on Easter Sunday.

And it's amazing always hearing the Easter Sunday service, and then how he came and rose again, and he appeared to over 500 disciples, and then also to those two on the road to Emmaus, explaining to them how it was necessary for the Christ to come and die, and how it was God's plan from the beginning, and it was prophesied the whole thing, and even though the religious leaders and the devil were working towards this goal to kill Jesus, Jesus is working towards the same goal, and they don't know it, that he actually came to die.

But right now, it's Thursday, and the disciples are troubled, and Jesus knows it, or else he would not have said, let not your hearts be troubled. Jesus kind of knew their thoughts and said, okay, your guys' hearts are troubled, don't let that happen.

Jesus says, believe in God, believe also in me. Meaning, you guys believe in God, believe in me too. You can see God, I mean, you can't see God, but you can see me, and I am God, so if you can believe in that God, believe also in me.

It's a claim to deity, no doubt, but Jesus, we're learning on Friday nights, I'm the youth pastor for Friday nights, and I'm teaching through the gospel of Mark, and we're studying chapters one and two, and we are learning how Jesus is not just a mere man, and he is very different from all other men that's ever lived.

And the gospel opens up with John preparing the way, and he's really preparing the way for the way, and even John, who was the foreteller of Jesus, and the forerunner of the king, like every good king has, a forerunner, and John is the man preparing the way, and he's the foreteller, and even the foreteller was foretold about, but even John, the foreteller, knows that Jesus is different.

John's a prophet, and Jesus is a prophet, but John knows that the prophet that comes right after him is way different than he is. He even says that he's not even worthy to untie his sandals. He's talking about Jesus, that he's not worthy to untie Jesus' sandals, but yet Jesus asks him to baptize him.

It's an amazing thing. And something special happens on your baptism day, I think. Many of you probably remember getting baptized, and if you haven't got baptized, maybe you'll know what I'm talking about if you decide to follow Jesus, and put your faith in Jesus, and make a proclamation of identifying with the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus Christ.

But there's a problem here. John's baptism was for repentance, and Jesus had no repenting. Like, he didn't need to repent, because he's perfect, right? So, John comes to Jesus, and Jesus is like, I'm not worthy to baptize you, but Jesus says, no, John, this is to fulfill all righteousness.

And then, if you think your baptism was amazing, Jesus' was way more amazing. When Jesus came up out of the water, the heavens opened up, and the Spirit of God came descending like a dove, visibly on him.

And then, not just the visual, but the audible of God the Father announcing that he is pleased with his son, saying, you are my beloved son, in whom I am well pleased. So, this was a glorious baptism, and he didn't need to be baptized, but just like we identify with Jesus in the death, burial, and resurrection of him, when we get baptized, he was identifying with guilty sinners.

He didn't need to repent of anything, but he identified with that. So, Jesus is completely different, even his baptism was different. And, even his teaching, people knew that he was different. He taught with authority, not like anyone, anyone's ever heard before.

He taught with authority, and the people were amazed at his teaching. Like, this is a new teaching with authority. And then, he proved that authority when someone in the crowd at the synagogue he was teaching in had an unclean spirit, and he shouted out, Jesus, what are you doing here?

Have you come to destroy us before the time? We know who you are, the Holy One of God. And then, Jesus looks at that man and says, be quiet, come out of him. And then, the demon comes out of him right away, and he has even authority over the unclean spirit.

So, this guy is completely different. They never see anything like it. And then, we even learned about how Jesus can heal people, and one of the people he healed was Simon Peter's mother-in-law, and she was sick with a fever, bedridden, and Jesus came and healed her, and she got up right away and started serving Jesus right away.

And she even recognized, wow, Jesus is different. She healed me. This is miraculous. I'm going to serve him right away. And then, after that, his fame kind of became, it started to spread like wildfire, and they were bringing everyone to him that was demon-possessed, and everyone to him that was sick, and Jesus was healing them all.

And his fame was incredible. A lot of people say that Donald Trump is the most famous man that's ever lived. Some people say the most famous man in the world right now is Justin Bieber or Dwayne The Rock Johnson.

Can you smell what The Rock is cooking, that guy? And these people were all very famous, and even Donald Trump, when someone came up to him and said, Donald, you're the most famous man who ever lived, and Donald said to him, no, I'm not.

And they said, well, who is? And he said, Jesus Christ, and it's not even close. So, love him or hate him, Donald Trump even knew that Jesus was different, and Jesus was the Son of God, and he was much more popular than he was.

And then one of the other people he healed was a leper, someone who was hated by everyone in the community, and leprosy, it's a nasty disease, if you know what leprosy is. It's really just the walking dead.

Your skin is falling off, sometimes your toes are falling off, your fingers, your nose, it's just, you just look like the walking dead. If you want a better description, talk to Timmy Clearwater, he can tell you all about leprosy.

We've been studying it Friday night. And basically, this man, not just the physical appearance of this man was hurting, no one wanted to be around this man for so long. He's in the final stages of leprosy, and Jesus heals him with a touch.

Think about it, this man has probably not even been touched by anyone in so long. People are looking at him as an outcast, that he's unclean, but we see that Jesus heals him with a touch. And when Jesus touches you, you become clean.

It isn't the other way around, when they touch Jesus, he becomes unclean. No, Jesus is different. He's touching people, and they're becoming clean, and he's healed. And then Jesus' popularity got so big that he had to go out into desolate places, and even then, people were following him, and coming out to him, and hearing him preach, and being healed.

And then after it cooled down a little bit, he came back home to Capernaum, where his hometown, I guess his main base of ministry was, Capernaum. And he's so popular that word gets around that he's back home, and he might have been in James and John's dad's house, Zebedee.

That's how The Chosen presented, if you guys have ever seen The Chosen. And Jesus is in there, and he's sitting there preaching, and now crowds are coming, and filling up the room. And there could have been at least 50 or more people in the room, and then the room is so packed that no one can even fit in the room anymore, and then now the crowd is coming and gathering outside the house.

But there's a guy who is a paralytic, who has been carried by four friends. And they pull up, and they've heard Jesus was in town, and they're bringing their friend so he can get healed. And the crowd is too big, they can't get through.

Like maybe someone like Timmy Clearwater could kind of just make his way through to the people, and get all the way to Jesus. But four grown men carrying another four, or carrying another grown men, cannot make it through the crowd, right?

So what did they do? They said, oh, well Jesus is busy, we'll pack up and go home. No, they didn't say that. Jesus, they didn't see a way, so they made a way. And they climbed up the house, and ripped off the roof, and lowered the paralytic down into the room of Jesus.

And then Jesus looked at him and said, son, you better fix that hole in the roof. What are you interrupting my teaching for? No, he didn't say that. Jesus was so cool. He loved their faith. What he actually said was so amazing.

He said, son, your sins are forgiven to the paralytic. And I'm sure that the paralytic and the people who brought him there, that paralytic probably didn't walk that day, he didn't walk that week, and he probably didn't walk that month.

He might not have even walked his whole life. But they were counting on him to be walking out of that room. But Jesus doesn't say, take up your bed and walk. He says, son, your sins are forgiven. Jesus looked at the deeper issue.

No matter who you are in life, if you're a paralytic, or if you're blind, or you have big needs, your biggest need is that you're a sinner, and you need your sins forgiven. And Jesus has the power to do that, because he is God.

And some of the scribes were there, listening in, and questioning in their hearts, like, this man is blaspheming. He has the power to forgive sins. He's not God. He's blaspheming. But what the Pharisees and scribes didn't understand is that, actually, they're the blasphemers, because that actually is God healing them.

So Jesus knows that they're questioning in his hearts, knows that their hearts are troubled, and says to him, what's easier to say, take up your bed and walk, or, son, your sins are forgiven? And to be honest, both are really hard to say for any people, but not for Jesus.

It's easy for him to say either or. But because he wanted to prove that he has the power to forgive sins, he said to the paralytic, after he said your sins are forgiven, get up and walk. And he did. So Jesus is different.

He is God. And that's what I'm trying to get at. Back to John 14, Jesus is like no other man. He's not a mere man. He is God. So, but he is saying that you guys believe in the invisible God, he's telling the disciples.

Believe also in me. I'm God too, and I'm standing right in front of you. He is highlighting that the need to believe in Jesus is just as important as the need to believe in God the Father. And they're going to have a continuing, they're going to have to continue to believe in him because Jesus is going away, right?

And when Jesus is not physically in front of them, they're still going to have to be able to believe in him and put their faith in him when he becomes invisible too. They need to believe in God, even though they cannot see him, just as they need to believe in Jesus when he becomes invisible.

After all, this is eternal life, that they know you, the one true God, and the one whom you've sent, Jesus Christ, the Son of God. So that is eternal life, to know both of them. If you believe in God rightly, you'll believe in Jesus.

If you interpret the scriptures rightly and search for eternal life through the scriptures, you will find that the scriptures bear witness about Jesus, and you will come to him and find life. If you believe in Jesus rightly, you'll also believe in the one true God.

There is no one, there is no one or the other. They're both God. Both are God. Also, the Holy Spirit is God. All God, different persons, one God. It's hard to wrap your head around, but that's what it is.

And the Holy Spirit is going to be promised later on in this chapter. He's God too, and he's also a comforter, just like Jesus. He's indeed the Spirit of Jesus. In verse 2, Jesus will offer even more comfort to the disciples.

He says, In my Father's house are many rooms. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go and prepare a place for you? Now, I love this verse, and it's really close to my heart, because when I first read it, it brought me so much joy, because I'm reading it, and I'm like, wow, there is a place for me in heaven.

There's a room for me. I think I'm one of those people that have a room. So I ran over and told my friend who I was with, I said, look at this verse. There's many rooms in the Father's house, but he's a KJV only guy.

So he said, no, there's many mansions, and I'm like, okay, and he wanted to argue me about mansions or rooms, and I'm like, after a while of arguing, I'm like, who cares? Who cares? Mansion, room, I just have a spot in there.

That's the amazing thing, and he still wanted to argue with me about mansions and rooms and which one it is, and I'm like, you're missing the point. There's a spot for us, and we're not supposed to be there, but yet Jesus is rescuing us and bringing us to himself.

So there's many rooms in the Father's house, and I've come to know that I do have one of those rooms. If it's a mansion, great. If it's a city, great, but it's only great because Jesus is there, and he knows our every need, and he knows what heaven's going to be like and what we want, and we're going to be without sin, so we'll know that the one thing we want is Jesus.

So please don't think that the word room is to convey any idea of small spaces. It's not that big a deal. It's really just to continue with the metaphor that heaven is one house, and it's the Father's house, but if you were a Jewish person at the time and you're hearing Jesus' teaching, you would have known that the word is rooms, but if I do think rooms is the right translation, and here's why I think it is, because if you looked at a Jewish wedding back then, people in Jesus' day had a betrothal time period, which is kind of like an engagement today, and the betrothal was just as binding as marriage itself, so if you signed a paper for a betrothal, you would have had to get a divorce, even though you weren't officially married yet, and if one or both parties wanted the betrothal to be done with, they did have to get a divorce, and we see that as an example when Joseph and Mary are together, and Joseph finds out that Mary's pregnant with Jesus, and Joseph decides that he's going to divorce Mary quietly.

We know that they were still in that betrothal period. They haven't gotten married yet, but then, of course, Joseph was reassured that he can take Mary as his wife, and Jesus was impregnated by the Holy Spirit, not any other man, so even Jesus' birth was divine and different than anyone else.

This man is just different, and it was common for the bride to join the groom's father's household. It's not like today, where if you get married, you and your wife or you and your husband go, and you started your own life together in a different house.

Back then, you actually, after the betrothal period, the groom would leave the bride, go back to his father's house, and what he would do is start preparing a room for his bride to move in. This process could have took up to a year or more.

After this process was over, the groom was to go fetch his bride after he has prepared the place for her, but the only thing was, neither the groom or the bride knew when the groom was actually going to come.

It was actually only the Father in Heaven who knew the day or the hour. Does that sound familiar? Only the Father knew the day or the hour. Eventually, the son would get the okay from the father, and he and his friends would parade around the streets to go pick up the bride so that the bride and her maidens could join in the parade to go back to the father's house and live there.

They would go return back to the father's house for the wedding feast, and after the guests were there, the door would be shut. So, if you weren't invited to the wedding, or if you missed it, or you weren't ready when the wedding was going on and the doors closed, you weren't able to get in.

Now, maybe the bride would not be ready because the groom may have came on a day or hour that she may not have expected, or maybe the groom would never come after saying that he's going to marry her, and maybe he would never show up to pick up his bride, but when Jesus says that he's going to prepare a place for us, we know that it's true.

He is going to do it. Jesus is the truth. He's not a liar. When Jesus says something, we know it's going to happen, and don't miss that the main preparation he had to do was on that cross because there wouldn't have been a way to get there without him taking the punishment of our sin.

So, we look at verse 3, and if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, that where I am, you may also be. Heaven is really just great because Jesus is there. It is not because the streets of gold, it's not because of the pearly white gates that you might have heard of, or any other thing that you can imagine.

Heaven is great because you're with God. For some reason, God has chosen to dwell with man. I'm not really sure why, because we don't really measure up to his standards, but yet he still loves us. I don't even know, like, who is God that he's even mindful of us, right?

This big God who threw the furthest star in the sky and created the heavens and the earth, yet is mindful of us and loves us and saves us individually. And then, in verse 4, Jesus says to his disciples that they do know the way to get to this place called heaven and to get to the Father's house.

In verse 4, it says, and you know the way where I am going, but, and then Thomas asks this amazing question that makes me want to, like, maybe name my first son Thomas. He asks this, anyone who's searching the kingdom of God should ask this question.

He says, Thomas said to him, Lord, we do not know where you are going, how can we know the way? So this was big for me because my friend had just, when I was reading this scripture for the first time, my friend had just told me about the narrow gate and how the pathway is wide and broad that leads to destruction, and many are entering through that way, and the pathway is small and narrow and hard that leads to life, and only few find it.

So that kind of flipped my whole worldview upside down because I thought that, like, only, like, really, really bad people went to hell and most people just went to heaven, but that verse kind of, like, flipped everything all the way around, and I'm just thinking, like, wait a minute, if only few make it, am I part of that few?

And what is this way? How do I know the way? And I'm trying to look in crowds, like, maybe 100 people, and I'm just like, am I better than 97 of the crowd? And then I realized, like, what if I'm not?