2013 April 26 - way beyond ourselves

2013 April 26 - way beyond ourselves

“Master, we do not know where you are going;
how can we know the way?” 

We don't know exactly where he is going.  Eye has not seen and ear has not heard what God has prepared for those who love him.  We can't even see what is over the next rise in this temporal world in which we live.  But we need not see it.

Jesus said to him, “I am the way and the truth and the life. 

Jesus is here with us now if we open our hearts to him.  We don't have to climb the next mountain to find him.  He is here and we are not lost because he himself is our way. But he is also there, in the future, preparing a place for us.  He transcends time itself but he is always motivated by his love us.  He is there preparing a place for us but not simple for the sake of a place.  It isn't for abstract pearly gates and streets of gold amid the clouds. The place matters, not because it is in heaven, but because it is in the Father's house.  It is a place where we our spirit can abide with the Father even while we await the resurrection of our bodies.  We cannot come to the Father on our own.  We quickly get lost and give up.  We set our hearts on this temporary world and try to make it our home.  Only Jesus can get us safely to the Father's house.

No one comes to the Father except through me.”

If we set ourselves on anything but Jesus we quickly turn aside.  The "place" he really brings us is into his unique relationship with the Father.  There is no way to find it on our own but he delights to share it with us.

what God promised our fathers
he has brought to fulfillment for us, their children, by raising up Jesus,
as it is written in the second psalm,
You are my Son; this day I have begotten you.”

Jesus allows us to become sons and daughters of the Father by sharing in his resurrection.  He wants us to know the love of a Father who never wavers in his love for us, who never acts selfishly or in irritation with us.  Everything he does he does for us.

Jesus is the "word of salvation" which the Father speaks to us.  Let us not only hear this word.  Let us reecho it throughout the earth.  Let us join with Paul, saying that "[w]e ourselves are proclaiming this good news to you" that all may "with trembling rejoice."

And, since there is a song relevant to my bad pun: