This morning we are looking at John 14:1-6. The passage is from Jesus’ departing words to the disciples. While he knows they are not his last words because he knows he will see them again after the resurrection, these are his last words to them in this life.
1 “Do not let your hearts be troubled. You believe in God[a]; believe also in me. 2 My Father’s house has many rooms; if that were not so, would I have told you that I am going there to prepare a place for you? 3 And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back and take you to be with me that you also may be where I am. 4 You know the way to the place where I am going.” 5 Thomas said to him, “Lord, we don’t know where you are going, so how can we know the way?” 6 Jesus answered, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.”
The journey to anywhere begins with your current location so we need to ask ourselves “What is our starting point? What is our current location?” For thousands of years, the Christian Church has been agreed that our starting point is what we’ve called “original sin” or the less palatable phrase, “the total depravity of man”. Where do we find that? It is in Romans 5:10: “There is no one righteous, not even one; there is no one who understands, no one who seeks God. All have turned away, they have together become worthless; there is no one who does good, not even one.”
The world is broken and completely separated from God. However, that is no longer the majority opinion. I want to read from some polls that are taken every year here in the US. “…three-quarters of adults (74%) agree that when people are born they are neither good nor evil – they make a choice between the two as they mature. In other words, the concept of original sin is rejected by most Americans in favor of a rational choice approach to human nature. At least seven out of ten members of every demographic segment examined accepts the notion of choice over that of original sin. Unexpectedly, the survey data reveal that a slight majority of evangelicals (52%) also buy this notion.”
This is an important change. Half the evangelical church would not agree that all men are separated from God because of Adam’s sin. Half the evangelical church would not agree with Paul when he says in Romans 5: “Therefore just as sin entered the world through one man, and death through sin, and in this way death came to all men, because all men have sinned…Consequently, just as the result of one trespass was condemnation for all men, so also the result of one act of righteousness was justification that brings life for all men. For just as through the disobedience of the one man the many were made sinners, so also through the obedience of the one man the many will be made righteous.”
The whole world was separated from God by the Sin of Adam – not just those who commit horrible sins. Over half the evangelical church no longer believes that. However, if we do not believe the world is completely incapable of overcoming the nature of Sin and separation from God, then from what are we saved? “Half of all adults (50%) argue that anyone who is generally good or does enough good things for others during their life will earn a place in Heaven. Four out of ten Protestants accept this view of salvation ensured by good deeds. Apparently, large numbers of born-again adults believe that people have a choice of means to salvation, either the grace-alone or the salvation-through-works approaches.” We may say we believe in grace alone but we believe that good works will get us into Heaven.
The Pew Research Center found that most American religious believers, including most Christians, say eternal life is not exclusively for those who accept Christ as their savior. “Of the 65% of people who held this open view of heaven’s gates, 80% named at least one non-Christian group – Jews, Muslims, Hindus, atheists or people with no religion at all – who may also be saved. This means 52% of Christians do not agree with the doctrines many religions teach, particularly conservative denominations. Christian believers who named at least one non-Christian faith that could lead to salvation included 34% of white evangelicals, even though evangelical doctrine stresses that salvation is possible only through Jesus. An overall majority (54%) of people who identified with a religion and who said they attend church weekly also said many religions can lead to eternal life. This majority included 37% of white evangelicals, 75% of mainline Protestants and 85% of non-Hispanic white Catholics. Pew’s new survey also found that many Christians (29%) say they are saved by their good actions; 30% say salvation is through belief in Jesus, God or a higher power alone.”
This is not universalism that says everyone will be saved. It is, instead, a distorted consequence of a good thing: pluralism. It’s one of the basic tenets of America…but it is affecting the core beliefs of the Christian church. We believe in diversity and the equality of all legitimate religions and, over time, that is making us think there is a pluralism of truth as well. Every religion contains some truth but none have a corner on the truth. If people believe there is no original sin and other religions lead to eternal life then what need is there for a savior?
But that is not pluralism in the sense of “e pluribus unum” or “out of many – one.” While that phrase on our great seal was originally intended to unite thirteen very different colonies and give them a common purpose, it has come to mean we live in a society of diversity – and we do. Diversity and pluralism are quite different from relativism for “pluribus” only works when there is “unum”. Instead, pluralism as a unifying force has too often been replaced by relativism and the claim that there is no such thing as truth. Relativism says that each person or group of people defines their own truth, establishes their own ethics, and chooses their own values, and none of those truths, ethics, or values are inherently any more true, ethical, or valuable than any others.
One of the greatest contributions our country has made to the world is “e pluribus unum” but when the goal of diversity is not a purposeful unity but freedom from standards altogether – or standards imposed without consent – then things fall apart.
When you turn 65 the insurance companies inundate you with offers for supplemental or gap insurance to cover what Medicaid will not. People are buying religious supplemental/gap insurance to cover the difference between their good works and the requirement to get into heaven and avoid hell. There are many carriers of insurance that will cover the gap. Just pick one. The product is the same. It’s just the packaging that is different. I am not saying this is true. I am saying this is what a large number of people believe. An increasing number of people have stopped believing in the exclusive claims of Christ because they do not believe in the universal fact of sin that requires a savior.
As Americans, we believe in choices and a free market of ideas and services. We believe deeply in pluralism and diversity. No one has a monopoly on the truth. All of us can get to God if we obey the rules and live a good life.
We have reshaped God in our own image to help us believe this. Holiness has become friendliness. A loving God has become a lovable god. Righteous has been given over to relevance. In our eyes, God is so anxious to get our vote to stay in office as our elected God that he accepts anyone. He sends good teachers and religious leaders to keep us on the right path. But we are not separated from him. We need improvement – not re-creating. We need to live a good life – not die to the nature of indelible Sin. We just need to do better and try harder…and purchase supplemental insurance for the unforeseen. We need forgiveness for the daily sins and indiscretions that are only natural but we do not need reconciliation through sacrifice because of the Sin of Adam. If we no longer believe in original sin and that the way to heaven is good behavior then what is the purpose of the cross?
That is the heart of the exclusive and uncomfortable claim Christians make. Let’s read again in Romans. “But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us. Since we have now been justified by his blood, how much more shall we be saved from God’s wrath through him! For if, when were God’s enemies, we were reconciled to him through the death of his Son, how much more, having been reconciled, shall we be saved through his life!” In 1 Corinthians, Paul makes his case for the centrality of the cross and not the teaching of Jesus. “For Christ did not send me to baptize, but to preach the gospel – not with words of human wisdom, lest the cross of Christ be emptied of its power…but we preach Christ crucified: a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles, but to those whom God has called…Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. He goes on in the second chapter to say, “For I resolved to know nothing while I was with you except Jesus Christ and him crucified.” That is the unique message of the Gospel. We are all concluded in Sin and we need a Savior from that separation from a holy God. Only through the cross can that salvation come. Not good works. Not a good life. Not trying harder and sinning less. Without the cross there is no reconciliation, no way to a relationship with God, no life, no truth, no re-creation. Without the cross there is no sacrifice for Sin, no resurrection, no Holy Spirit. All that’s left is the moral teaching of Jesus – a deluded man who believed he was God.
John Stott puts it this way in Basic Christianity, “There is a sense in which we may say that the teaching ministry of Jesus had proved a failure. Jesus taught them to be humble and loving; but neither quality appeared in their lives until the Holy Spirit entered their personality and began to change them from within. The inner presence of the Holy Spirit is the spiritual birthright of every Christian. Indeed, if the Holy Spirit has not taken up residence within us, we are not real Christians at all. ‘Any one who does not have the Spirit of Christ does not belong to him.’” There is an increasing hostility to this. It is not hostility to the teaching of Jesus (except the teaching about his being God) but to the claim of exclusivity for being the only way to God. It is not just disdain but a desire to reduce the claims of the cross to just another service provider of personal happiness. Why do we need the cross if we don’t need saving? Instead, we need coaching but not conviction of sin.
What is there about Christian belief that sets it apart from any other moral teaching? Why does Paul say in 1 Corinthians 15: “If there is no resurrection of the dead, then not even Christ has been raised. And if Christ has not been raised, our preaching is useless and so is your faith. More than that, we are then found to be false witnesses about God, for we have testified about God that he raised Christ from the dead. But he did not raise him if in fact the dead are not raised. For if the dead are not raised, then Christ has not been raised either. And if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile; you are still in your sins. Then those also who have fallen asleep in Christ are lost. If only for this life we have hope in Christ, we are of all people most to be pitied.”
Sometimes we fail to distinguish between resuscitated and resurrected. Lazarus was resuscitated. The widow’s son was resuscitated. Eutychus was resuscitated. They were brought back to life – but to this life. Their lives were extended but not changed. God did not merely raise Jesus from the dead to live again. He did not rise to resume his life. He took on a changed life. A changed body. A new creation. I don’t want to be resuscitated or have this life extended. Instead, I want the resurrected life on the other side of death.
Have we created a kind of ethical and political Christian code that to be followed needs neither the Holy Spirit or the fact of resurrection – a Christianity for unbelievers? A Christianity only for this life? If we are preaching the ethics of Christianity that can be lived without the Holy Spirit and the desire for resurrection then we are deluding people.
Finally, we read that Jesus has gone to prepare a place for us and we will join him there one day. In fact, he will return and take us there himself. As a boy and young man I sat through many a revival and crusade and heard the words at the end of the sermon. “If you were to die tonight do you know where you would spend eternity?” That always sounded like an implied threat to me and not an offer of life with God. In fact, the downside of the wrong choice was far more frightening than any interest in the right choice. For one, it completely ignored any value in this life. It was all focused on the next life. Everything was on hold waiting for eternity to come. All we had to do was not sin and, most importantly, keep away from “the unforgiveable sin”. Of course, none of us knew what that sin was but we suspected it was visiting the Methodist church. Whatever it was, it kept us in line as you never knew when this particular sin was IT. The gong would sound, the floor would open and you would go straight to hell.
As well, “spending eternity” sounded like “taking forever” or watching paint dry or waiting a long time for something to happen. Two things changed my mind about eternity and my interest in it. In fact, I saw a graph just yesterday that illustrates how others may feel exactly the same. It showed the frequency of the word “eternity” in public vocabulary starting in 1800 to the present. Here is what it looks like:
As you can see, it peaks around 1825 and is a consistent slide down after that. We no longer talk of eternity – and I think that is partly because of the way we have defined it. It has come to mean a measure of time without end when the original Latin word “aeternitas” means “what is fully real and permanent.”
I discovered this while reading “The Great Divorce” as a non-Christian. Heaven and eternity became a place I wanted to be. In the book, Lewis is having a conversation with one of the saints or as he calls them, the “solid ones”. “Hell is a state of mind – ye never said a truer word. And every state of mind, left to itself, every shutting up of the creature within the dungeon of its own mind – is, in the end, Hell. But Heaven is not a state of mind. Heaven is reality itself. All that is fully real is Heavenly. For all that can be shaken will be shaken and only the unshakable remains.” I wanted to know what was Real and Unshakable. I wanted to know what was Permanent and Lasting. That desire has only increased.
The second was a quote from Lewis. “If I find in myself a desire which no experience in this world can satisfy, the most probable explanation is that I was made for another world.” It was no longer the fear of spending eternity in hell but the desire of finding myself in a world that was not fear but love. The love of Christ. He is the Way, the Truth and the Life.
What is Easter about? It is not about a superior religion but about the promise of a resurrection life. That life is not about “forever” or “endless” but about being fully Real and Unshakable – and that can only be had through trust in Christ. We were made for another world – and it is coming.