The gospel for the fifth Sunday of Easter (John 14:1-14) is part of Jesus’ last supper discourse.  It contains both a promise of his resurrection and a theological statement.

Immediately before this gospel starts, Jesus had washed his disciples’ feet as a sign of his love and service, talked about the betrayal by Judas and Peter’s denial and his death. It was a sombre conversation.

Then the gospel began.

‘Do not let your hearts be troubled. Believe in God, believe also in me. In my Father’s house there are many dwelling-places. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to 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, there you may be also. And you know the way to the place where I am going.’

Thomas said to him, ‘Lord, we do not know where you are going. How can we know the way?’ 

Jesus said to him, ‘I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. If you know me, you will know my Father also. From now on you do know him and have seen him.’

Philip said to him, ‘Lord, show us the Father, and we will be satisfied.’ Jesus said to him, ‘Have I been with you all this time, Philip, and you still do not know me?

In a way, Jesus was telling his followers, ‘after death comes resurrection to a whole new life’.

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As this chapter opens, Jesus changed tone from the earlier sober words: Do not let your hearts be troubled. The basis for his calming words was the promise that he would host them in his Father’s house.

His disciples had never met or even seen the father... Philip said to him, ‘Lord, show us the Father…yet they knew from Jesus’ frequent references to him (almost 100 times in John’s gospel alone) that he was a significant person in Jesus’ life. 

Here is a small sample of Jesus’ references to his Father, spoken in their presence, that would have shaped their understanding of his significance as well as piqued their curiosity.

Stop making my Father’s house a market-place!’ (John 2:16)… when he drove the merchants from the temple.

Truly, I tell you, the Son can do nothing on his own, but only what he sees the Father doing; for whatever the Father does, the Son does likewise. (John 5:19) and just as the Father raises the dead and gives them life, so also the Son gives life to whomsoever he wishes (John 5:21)… in response to those who condemned him for speaking of God as his father.

Anyone who does not honour the Son does not honour the Father who sent him.(John 5:23)and I have come in my Father’s name, and you do not accept me; (John 5:43) …replying to those who criticized him for healing on the Sabbath. 

Truly, I tell you, it was not Moses who gave you the bread from heaven, but it is my Father who gives you the true bread from heaven. (John 6:23) and Just as the living Father sent me, and I live because of the Father, so whoever eats me will live because of me. (John 6:57) …after Jesus had fed the 5,000 and they wanted to make him king.

It is my Father who glorifies me, he of whom you say, “He is our God”, (John 8:54)… in response to those who accused him of having a demon. 

Jesus had called the temple in Jerusalem his father’s house, had attributed his miraculous works and his teaching to his father who had sent him. His disciples had heard him speak often of his father, and Jesus’ words probably shaped their impression of the father as someone who was kind, powerful and able to endow his son with similar attributes. Additionally, Jesus implied that his Father was wealthy… In my Father’s house there are many dwelling-places…and welcoming. 

In the opening verse of this gospel Jesus used God and Father as synonyms. This was not new but Jesus gave the relationship new emphasis. ‘I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me,” is more than a self-revelation. It declares what Jesus does: that he leads to the father. It states the unique role that Jesus plays in each person’s potential relationship to God.

Now, on to the major new theological statement.

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Whoever has seen me has seen the Father. How can you (Philip) say, “Show us the Father”? Do you not believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in me? The words that I say to you I do not speak on my own; but the Father who dwells in me does his works. Believe me that I am in the Father and the Father is in me;…  

Up to this point, Jesus had referred to the Father as distinct from himself, as the one who sent Jesus. Here, he declares a unity with the Father, who is also the eternal God. Each disciple could have wondered: how can one be distinct from, yet in. How can the mortal Jesus…who has talked about his death…be eternal? Isn’t the God of Abraham and Moses remote and unknowable, yet we know Jesus? How can both Jesus and the Father be one God? Or, possibly the confusion was such that they would have asked: what is he talking about? 

The disciples were not alone in their wondering. For more than two millennia, people have struggled to make sense of Jesus’ words and to harmonize them with other things we know about the one God from his self-revelation in Hebrew scripture. 

The unity of the human Jesus with his eternal Father goes beyond any earthly metaphor. Their oneness forms a single identity. The understanding of God as creator, judge, all-powerful, compassionate God from Hebrew scripture applies to Jesus. By the same token, the presence of Jesus in history as a human, reflects the Father’s care for, understanding of, and intimacy with us. 

This gospel from the last supper fits Eastertide because it articulates the relationship of Jesus with the Father as ever-present. Jesus’ death was neither the end of his life nor did it mean the end of his relationship with us. His resurrection demonstrated his ongoing presence, albeit in a transformed way. The next stage of his promise, I will come again and will take you to myself, was his appearance to them after he rose. He was still with them, even after he had died, and would ‘take them to himself’.

The reflexive pronoun, myself, defines the kingdom better than many dwelling places. It will be a place of relationship with the one God. It could be anywhere. It won’t matter, as long as it is with God. Jesus’ disciples had glimpsed that and came to understand it deeply in the post-resurrection and particularly in the post-Pentecost time.

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  •  Images shape our thoughts. What is your image of the Father? What if you substituted Mother as the word-image of God? Does the image emphasize different qualities, such as compassion and nurture? Try reading the references to Father above, substituting the word Mother.
  • What is your image of a house (with) many dwelling-places? Is it castle-like? A mansion? 
  • How do you imagine the disciples responded to Jesus’ words? Did they trust him so completely (except for Philip, perhaps) that they nodded agreement? Did they recall his words and discuss them in Jesus’ post-resurrection time, to fill in their comprehension of him not just as a prophet but as the Son of God? (After all, we have this account of the Last Supper and it seems likely that Jesus’ words were reviewed more than once.)

Peace
Michael