‘I am the way and the truth and the life.’ ~ John 14:6
What does Jesus mean when he says he is the way? Context in John reveals Jesus is speaking about heaven and the way to God the Father. But you might be thinking: ‘how could a person be the way to heaven?’ Maybe ‘heaven’ also seems a bit far-fetched to you. Christians though, see heaven as God’s ‘new creation’. God didn’t make the world broken as it is now; it became broken by the rebellion of humans and Satan against God. Because of this, God has promised to remake a perfect world beyond death for him to live in perfectly with those who love him.
The first sense in which Jesus is the way is by faith. ‘Faith’ in the Bible is closely linked with the notion of trust. Jesus says in the gospels (Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John) that if we trust him, or have faith in him, as our representative, he can free us from sin by his own work and power. This makes sense as we think of Jesus being God himself become human on earth. There is no reason for Jesus, as God, to come to earth and suffer unless for some important purpose, like freeing us from sin. Philippians 2:5-8 puts it like this:
“Christ Jesus: (6) who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be used to his own advantage; (7) rather, he made himself nothing by taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. (8) And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to death – even death on a cross!” ~ Phil. 2:5-8
These verses says Jesus has always been God, but that on earth he didn’t ‘take advantage’ of being God. In other words, Jesus isn’t just heavenly royalty; he’s ‘The King’ of the universe (from the Bible’s perspective), and he humbly ‘made himself nothing’ by dying a criminal's death on a Roman cross in 33 AD. This was one of the most painful and humiliating deaths known to man. As God, he could have stopped time and climbed off the cross, but didn’t for our sake.
Jesus died as the representative of those who would trust in him by faith. Another word for representative is ‘substitute’. This is just like when you get injured in a soccer game and someone comes off the bench as a ‘sub’ in your place. Except Jesus is the substitute who plays perfectly, so-to-speak, and we get all the credit. Maybe then, instead, it’s more like working from home but making AI do all your work while you play video games, before you then get a promotion for a job well done. These illustrations might sound silly, even if they may help our understanding, but Jesus' death is no trivial thing.
Jesus' death is serious for us because, the Bible says, it's our only 'way' to escape the curse of sin. The consequences of sin are worse than any other. Sin leads to eternal spiritual death. Physical death is only one symptom of this. Spiritual death is a distance from God that cannot be otherwise overcome by our human power. It’s a vast chasm between us and God that we cannot bridge. It’s a ‘no hope’ situation. It's death we cannot resurrect ourselves from. From the Bible’s perspective, our sins demand payment—and I mean all of them, from wrong actions to evil thoughts—and the penalty is being put in an eternal state of judgement to respect our choice of rejecting God on earth and the painful death of his only son Jesus. Jesus is the way because he offers to pay the price of our sin for us, as our substitute or representative, through faith. He travelled the painful way of sinful consequence for those who trust in him. This allows us to gain new and positive relationship with God, and enter his new creation (heaven) beyond death.
Maybe in the next post I’ll continue to comment on what it means that Jesus is the way, which includes following him in response to his call, but without expectation that this makes us deserving of the gift of his work on the cross for us. Eventually I also hope to consider how Jesus is ‘the truth’ and ‘the life’. I also want to say that, while it’s not my desire to speak casually about judgement, it being a sensitive topic shouldn’t overshadow the hope and truth of the gospel being shared (see Romans 1:16). In the end, I respect the decision others make in how they respond to Jesus, even if I think the gospel does truly lead to life as God intended.
This post was written in advance and automatically published.