Jesus said, 'I am the Way, the Truth and the Life; no-one comes to the Father except through me'.

John 14:6

This is the sixth of the 'I am' sayings in John's Gospel. Of them all, perhaps this is the most well known, and one of the most profound of all these statements. It brings us to the very heart and essence of the Gospel, of John's purpose in writing, and of Jesus' purpose in this world.

These words were spoken in the context of Jesus giving comfort to the disciples. This great chapter begins 'Let not your hearts be troubled'. That is a phrase which will recur in the chapter, and it is a theme that runs through this section of John's Gospel. We often refer to chapters 14-16 of John as the 'farewell' or 'valedictory' discourse of Jesus; like the Sermon on the Mount at the beginning of Jesus' ministry, which anticipated the great themes of his preaching, this comes at the close of his ministry under the shadow of Calvary. This 'sermon in the upper room' recapitulates much of what Jesus has already taught, but also anticipates the future, looking to the other side of the cross, the resurrection and the coming of the Holy Spirit.

The genius of John's writing is this. Both in chapters 12 and 13, John has told us about the trouble of Jesus' soul and heart. 12:27 -- 'now is my soul troubled ... for this purpose I have come to this hour'. 13:21 -- 'Jesus was troubled in his spirit...' It was not possible for Jesus to go to the cross without experiencing the troubling of his soul. For this he came, and now the realisation of the betrayal and of the cross troubles his heart.

Yet it is in this context -- when Jesus is conscious of his own soul beign troubled, that he turns to the disciples and says 'let not YOUR hearts be troubled'. The reason he brings such comfort to them is because he can look beyond the events that cause his own soul to be troubled: he is going to the Father, to the house of many rooms, and he is going to prepare a place for his people. They must look at the cross in the light of Heaven, as Jesus is doing.

It is when Jesus says to them that they know the way to that place that Thomas objects; 'how do we know the way to that place?' he asks. Jesus' answer is: 'I am the way, the truth and the life'.

These words are full of the deity of Jesus. We have already noted that the 'I am' sayings have some things in common, not least the phrase 'I am' itself. In 8:50 Jesus describes himself as the 'I am', with a designation that links back to the revelation of the LORD in Exodus 3. Every time Jesus describes himself in this way, we hear the echoes of the disclosure, so that the phrases disclose and reveal the deity of Jesus -- he is the God of the Old Testament. He is the Way, the Truth, the Life -- words that are full of the glory of Jesus, of the divine Jesus, the supernatural Jesus, the Jesus whom John declares to have been in the beginning.

They are full of the uniqueness of Jesus too. He does not say 'I am A way', or 'A truth', or A life. He uses the definite article- 'I am THE way, and THE truth, and THE life', and he emphasises the uniqueness and unprecedented and unparalleled nature of his work and ministry. He closes every other way; he is not a possible religious way among many possible religious ways. He does not say to us that we can take our pick of world religions, and choose him if we like. He says that if we do NOT choose him, we are not on the way to God at all. The choice is not between the religion Jesus offers and the religion others offer; the choice is between having him as the way to God, or not coming to God at all.

He is not a possible truth among many possible religious truths in the world. In this postmodern world of ours, absolute truth is not a welcome concept. We have to respect every kind of religious ideology; my 'truth' is no more valid than your 'truth', even if they are mutually contradictory. This world tries to hold as equally valid every religious idea and opinion; but Jesus doesn't come and offer his truth as one kind of truth among many; he says 'I am THE truth', absolutely stand alone truth, absolutely unique.

John Stott puts it like this: 'We talk about Alexander the Great, and Charles the Great and Napoleon the Great. But we cannot talk about Jesus the Great; we have to talk about Jesus the ONLY'. Never ever forget that -- it is Jesus the Only -- THE way, THE truth, THE life.

So these words are full of the deity of Jesus and the uniqueness of Jesus; they are also full of the unchangeableness of Jesus, as all these sayings are. He does not say 'I was the way,' or 'I will be the way', but 'I AM the way'. The truth is the truth NOW, not past and not future, but unchangeably present. He does not claim to have been the life, or to become the life, but to BE the life.

Right now, immutably so, Jesus is the way, the truth and the life. For two thousand years those who have followed Jesus have staked their whole lives and deaths and future eternity on the fact that there is nothing that can change this from its present tense. He IS the same, yesterday, today and forever (Hebrews 13:8). The years have not modified his ability to say it, and the generations have not altered his ability to be the way, the truth and the life.

Why these three words? Why does Jesus use this particular combination of words at this point? I think we could emphasise, first of all, how IRONIC they are. After all, this Jesus who says 'I am the Truth' is about to be crucified on a miscarriage of justice. They are going to hire false witnesses to lie his way to the cross. This one who is truth, and speaks the truth, and bears witness to the truth, is going to be taken by wicked hands and condemned by lying tongues, and in the greatest act of injustice and untruth that the world has ever known he will be crucified.

But it has to be this way -- for him to be the truth he has to be crucified. For him to be the way, he has to go his way, the way God ordained for him. God has given him commandment. He cannot stay in the upper room -- he has to leave it precisely so that the world will know that he loves the Father (14:31). Tehre is a way he must follow; and if he is to be the way for his people he must go the way God directs him, all the way to Calvary. If he is to be the life for his people he must go all the way into death, and his body must lie lifeless behind the closed door of a borrowed grave. He must go the way of the cross in order to be the way; he must be sold by the lie into the hand of the ruler of the world in order to be the truth; he must taste death for every man to be the life for his people. Yet it is only through the cross that Jesus is the way, the truth and the life for us.

We could also comment on the way John has prepared us for this statement right through his Gospel. For example, the three words 'way', 'truth' and 'life' all appear in the opening chapter of John, in the great prelude to his Gospel. This is the very stuff of his message. In John 1, John quotes from Isaiah 40, where the prophet had spoken about the forerunner of the Messiah preparing the WAY of the Lord. We are also told in 1:14 that grace and TRUTH came by Christ. We are told in 1:3 that in him was LIFE, and his life was the light of men.

The way, the truth and the life -- they are the themes of John's Gospel. Indeed, one could argue that the concept of 'life' dominates the first twelve chapters of John's Gospel, and that the theme of 'truth' dominates the closing part of the Gospel. John tells us in chapter 20 that the reason he writes the Gospel is that we will believe that Jesus is the Son of God, and believing we will have life in him. In other words, the purpose John has in writing is to show us that there is a way to God, to testify to the truth of Jesus as the way to God, and to demonstrate that there is life through trusting in Jesus as the way to God.

So on a purely literary level we have been prepared for this. This is a summary statement of everything John says in the Gospel. Indeed, the first three encounters Jesus had with people in this Gospel pointed in this direction. Jesus met Nathanael in chapter 1 -- the Israelite in whom there was no guile. One day, Jesus told him, Nathanael would see angels ascending and descending on the Son of Man, a reference that goes back to Jacob's experience at Bethel in Genesis 28.

What is the significance of this? Simply this: it is the glory of Jesus as the Mediator. There is communion between Heaven and earth through him -- He, and only He, is the way by which angels can come from Heaven to earth and from earth to Heaven. If there is to be traffic at all between Heaven and earth, and communion between God and man, it can only be through the Mediator, through Jesus the WAY.

Then there was the meeting with Nicodemus, that Professor of Theology from Israel. He knew so much, yet knew so little. He wanted to discuss the great topics: the miracles of Jesus, the source of his power, the unique method of his teaching. Jesus says to him, 'You must be born again'. What did Nicodemus need? Not an all night discussion on miracles; it was simply the presentation of the truth he needed, and Jesus was the TRUTH Nicodemus needed to hear and to know.

Then in John 4 Jesus met the woman of Samaria. She had come to a well to draw water, but Jesus uncovered her true, personal, spiritual thirst. Nothing in the world could satisfy it. Her lifestyle hadn't satisfied her -- it had left her more empty and thirsty than she had ever been. 'Come to this well,' said Jesus, 'and drink and you will thirst again'. That was true literally, but it was also true morally -- she had tasted all kinds of wells, and tried to find happiness in many kinds of relationships, but her soul was empty and dissatisfied. Jesus offered a well of water springing up to everlasting life. Jesus was the LIFE she needed.

So in these encounters -- Jesus and Nathanael, Jesus and Nicodemus, Jesus and the woman -- John has been preparing us for this. Jesus is the way -- that's what Nathanael discovered; he is the truth -- that's what Nicodemus discovered; and he is the life -- that is what the Samaritan woman discovered.

I also think there is a reference here to the offices of Jesus. It's not explicit in John's Gospel, but running through the teaching of the Bible is the answer to the question -- 'What is Jesus for us?'. He is our PRIEST. What is the function of the priest? It is to make a way into the presence of God. The Latin for priest is 'pontifex', literally a bridge-builder. The priest opened a way of communion; his office was one of bridge-building. Here is our priest -- he is our way.

He is our PROPHET. They said that in chapter 6, after he had fed five thousand people: 'this is the prophet'. What does the prophet do? He brings the truth from God. He tells us what we could otherwise never know. As our prophet, the last, great, eschatological prophet -- the one who fulfils the prophecy of Moses in Deuteronomy 18 that a prophet like Moses would ultimately appear -- Jesus tells us truth that we could otherwise never have known. He tells us about himself. He is the truth. He reveals to us the will of God for our salvation. We could never know that apart from him.

He is our KING -- and as our king he conquers death. That is part of what John wants to emphasise in this Gospel -- he leads us to the cross, but then to the empty grave -- this Jesus has victory over death and over the grave. He rises with the power of an endless life, king of his people. He is the way, because he is the priest. He is the truth, because he is the prophet. And he is the life, because he is the king who has conquered.

So these words, which draw together the strands of teaching that have been dominant in Jesus' ministry and example, bring me to the heart of the Gospel message. Jesus has made the way, because he is the way, he reveals the truth, because he is the truth, and he triumphs, because he is the life.

But there is another way in which we could interpret this unique combination of words. Jesus is the Mediator, but he is Mediator of a COVENANT. The Lord's Supper, for example, is inaugurated by Jesus as the sign and seal of that covenant; he says that the cup is the cup of the new covenant in his blood. Behind the Supper lies the idea of the covenant of God's grace.

That theme runs through the Scriptures. Everyone who is saved is saved because they are bound to God in an everlasting covenant, of which Jesus is the Mediator. This was David's hope at the end of his life; there was much pain and regret as he reviewed the past, but he had one great hope -- God had made an everlasting covenant with him that was ordered in all things and sure (2 Samuel 23:5). That was all his desire. It must be all our desire also. The Lord's Supper is for those who can say 'He has made with me an everlasting covenant', for those who know that there is nothing they can bring before God for their salvation -- it is not their righteousness or good works that saves them, but only the blood of the everlasting covenant. Generations come and go. Our experiences come and go. Our lives rise and fall, but inside the everlasting covenant, ordered in all things and sure, I am safe for time and for all eternity.

As Jesus unfolds the farewell discourse, I think he is bringing us into the heart of the covenant -- he is dwelling on his position as Mediator of the covenant and the blessings he secures for his people as their prophet, priest and king. The prospect of Heaven itself hinges on the covenant. That is why the discourse concludes with the Lord's Prayer -- 'I have finished the work'.

But what does this have to do with the great statement of our text, 'I am the way, the truth and the life'? Let's remind ourselves of what the prophet Jeremiah teaches us about the nature of God's covenant with us. Jeremiah was given a vision of good figs and bad figs (chapter 24), good fruit that could be eaten and bad fruit which could not. God applied that in a remarkable way, as he thought about his people in exile in Babylon. Like good figs, God said, 'I am going to gather my people, and bring them back to the land. They will be planted there, and they will be safe -- no more exile, no more Babylon, no more captivity'. God was going to restore the fortunes of his people (Psalm 126:1). God was going to turn back the bondage of his people. God turned the captivity of his people around. He showed his covenant faithfulness and mercy in three ways.

First, HE BROUGHT THEM BACK TO THEIR LAND (Jeremiah 24:6). He made a way for them. He was the way. The covenant restored them and brought them home. That is what God does for sinners in the gospel. It is what happened to the wasteful, prodigal son, who turned his back on home. What a relief that was to him at first -- no more bondage, no more rules, no more praying, no more of the yoke and burden of home. He was his own man at last.

But he squandered everything. Then he came home, and there was a welcome which went way beyond anything he expected and anything he deserved. He found a way home. The restlessness, the wastefulness, the emptiness of these prodigal years were now met by a taste of home. That is what it is like for someone to be converted. To become a Christian is to have an entirely new beginning. If anyone is in Christ he is a new creation (2 Corinthians 5:17), she is a new person -- everything is different -- the world is different.

But to be born again is just to come home. It is to return to the God against whom we sinned. That is why the Lord's Table is a family affair -- it is for those who have come home and have discovered the Jesus of the covenant to be the way back to God. So when he says 'I am the way', Jesus is echoing the teaching of the prophet -- God will bring his people back. The years that the locusts ate, and that sin ran away with and that were lived without God, don't matter any more. Now that you are home, God casts the sins of his people into the sea. He covers all the sins of his people with the perfect righteousness of Christ. The father of the prodigal doesn't ask him to account for the money he gave him, doesn't ask for receipts or explanations -- he just welcomes him back.

Jesus does the same. He is the way. This is the essence of the covenant -- we have come back to God.

But in the covenant God also said this -- 'I WILL GIVE THEM A HEART TO KNOW THAT I AM THE LORD' (Jeremiah 24:7). Isn't that beautiful? Or, as Jeremiah 31 puts it, following the promise that God would bring them back and make them walk in a good way in which they would not fall, 'they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest' (31:34). Nicodemus had so much knowledge in his head about theology and religion and the Bible, but he did not know God, because the truth had not set him free.

Do we know God? John will tell us in 17:3 that eternal life means that we know God. It is not a quantity of life that matters; it is a quality of life, in which we know God intimately and personally. Jesus who is the truth comes to us and gives us knowledge of God.

To be saved means to know God. He has come with the power of his truth to give a new life and a new heart, which warms to Christ, and which beats to the rhythym of the Gospel, a heart that loves everyhthing to do with Jesus Christ.

The Jesus who is the truth is the Jesus who gives the knowledge of God that is eternal life. To be in the covenant is to know him, bound to him as the one who brings us back, and the one who enables us to know him.

Finally, in the covenant God said this -- 'I WILL PLANT THEM AND NOT UPROOT THEM' (Jeremiah 24:6). It is a beautiful image that runs through the prophet Jeremiah. Hosea uses it too; when he talks about the blessings of the covenant he says 'I will be like the dew to Israel, and from me your fruit will be found' (Hosea 14:5,8).

Psalm 92 describes those who have been planted by God's grace in God's house as having supernatural life running through them. Others fade in old age, but God's people still bear fruit. Paul says it this way -- the outer nature is wasting away (2 Corinthians 4:16). We are getting old. We are fading away; every breath is taking us closer to the grave, back to the dust. But the inner man, in the covenant of grace, where God himself is the life of his people, is being renewed. The soul of God's people is like a watered garden. The inward man is being renewed.

He is the life of his people. Without him we are dead. Without him we cannot grow and develop in holiness; but in him there is life. In the embrace of the covenant God is my way -- he brings me home. In the embrace of the covenant God is the truth -- he enables me to know him. And within the embrace of the covenant God is the life -- he plants me, and waters me, and gives me life that will not end.

So do we know him? Is he for us the way, the truth and the life? Is he the mediator for me, securing for me the blessings of God's covenant and all my salvation.

Who are you Jesus?

I am the way, the truth and the life -- no-one comes to the Father but my me.