Good morning. If you have your Bibles this
morning, please turn to the book of John, chapter 14. It's a very familiar
piece of scripture. We're going to be reading from
verse 1, chapter 14, down through verse 11. And this is Christ speaking not
only to his disciples, but he's speaking to all the elect. He says here in verse 1, let
not your heart be troubled. You believe in God, believe also
in me. In my father's house are many
mansions. If it were not so, I would have
told you. I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place
for you, I will come again and receive you unto myself, that
where I am, there you may be also. And whither I go you know,
and the way you know. Thomas said unto him, Lord, we
know not whither thou goest, and how can we know the way? Jesus said unto him, I am the
way, the truth, and the life. No man cometh unto the Father
but by me. If ye had known me, ye should
have known my Father also. And from henceforth ye know him,
and have seen him. Philip said unto him, Lord, show
us the Father, and it suffice us. Jesus said unto him, Have
I been so long time with you, and yet have thou not known me,
Philip? He that hath seen me hath seen
the Father, and how sayest thou then, show us the Father? Believest
thou not that I am in the Father, and the Father in me? The words
that I speak unto you I speak not of myself, but the Father
that dwelleth in me. He doeth the works. Believe me
that I am in the Father, and the Father in me, or else believe
me for the very work's sake. The title of this message is
Comfort for a Crumbled Heart. In the preceding chapter, the
Lord had told the disciples many things that they could not understand. And it was hard for him to understand. You have to understand that they
had been with the Lord for three and a half years. They had followed
him. They had listened to him preach.
They'd listen to him do miracles, do great miracles,
bring people back from the life. And they truly have faith in
him. They loved him. And they'd left
their homes, as I said. They'd left their jobs. And they
wanted to follow him. And some of them even understood.
And they had a thinking that, He was going to be their king,
and that he was going to set up an earthly kingdom, and that
Israel one day would be back in their glory days like it was
when David was king, and when Solomon was king, and that they
would come out from under the Roman rule. But they find out
that that's not the case, but they had so much faith in him.
If you would keep your place here, but look at John 6 real
quick. Chapter 6. This is how much faith and how
much love they had for him. Chapter 6, verse 65. Chapter 6, verse 65-69. He had been preaching to a multitude
of people. And he said, Therefore say, I
come unto you, but no man can come unto me except it were given
unto him of my father. From that time, many of his disciples
went back and walked no more with him. Then said Jesus unto
the 12. He looked at them and he said,
well, will you all go away too? Look what Peter says right here.
He says, Lord, To whom shall we go? Thou hast the words of
eternal life. And we believe and are sure that
thou art the Christ, the son of a living God. If you will,
go back to your text. Then he tells them some things
that it brings grief to them, it brings pain to them, it brings
suffering to them. He tells them things that they
do not understand. Even though he had been teaching
to them for three and a half years, there was a lot of things
that he would say that they really didn't understand. He said, destroy
this temple and I'll build it back in three days. He was talking
about his crucifixion and resurrection. They didn't really understand
that. But he tells them that one of their own is going to
pray him. One that had been with him and
with them for three and a half years was actually going to turn
him in to the high priest. And they would come and get him.
And then he tells them that He tells them that all of you, in
the book of Matthew, he says, all of you will be offended of
me. And they couldn't understand
that. But Matthew 26, 31 says, Then said Jesus unto them, All
ye shall be offended because of me this night, for it is written,
I will smite the shepherd, he's talking about his crucifixion
there, and the sheep of the flock shall be scattered abroad. And then he told them that he
was leaving, and where he was going, they could not follow.
He was going back home. He was going back to his father.
He was going to heaven after the crucifixion. And then Peter,
being the person that he was, he said, Lord, I can't even follow
you where you're going? If you will, right there at chapter
14, look at the last two verses of chapter 13, just above 14. It's verse 37 and 38. And this had to break Peter's
heart. I mean, you know he was a big husky man, a fisherman,
and a strong will, outspoken, but Peter said unto him, Lord,
why cannot I follow you now? I will lay down my life for you,
for thou sake. Look what Jesus says to him.
Jesus answers him, with thou lay down thy life, For my sake,
verily, verily, I say unto thee, the cock shall not crow until
thou hast denied me three times. What he's saying before the rooster
crows, Peter, you're going to deny me to my face three times. Not once, not twice, but three
times you're going to deny me. And whenever Peter said that
he would lay down his life for him, I believe he really meant
it in his heart that he would. But he says, if you notice, he
says, verily, verily, I say unto you, that means for a surety
it's going to happen, you know. And then, you know, like I said,
he told them where he went that they could not follow. But, you
know, we all know that if we've been around for any length of
time, the book of Job, it says, hey, that is born of a woman.
His days is few and full of trouble. What we have a tendency to do
as human beings is, you know, the pride that is in us, and
things come our way, things that we don't understand. We face
sickness, we face pain, we face grief, and too many times we
don't look. That's where we can get the comfort.
Jesus said, come unto me, all ye that labor and heavy laden,
and I'll give you rest. Learn of me, and I will give
you rest for your souls. He says in everything, my prayer
and supplication with thanksgiving, let your request be made known
unto God. But all too often, we tried to
fix it ourselves. But we need to know that He loves
us. He could see the pain on these
disciples. He was God in the flesh. He was
Almighty God in the flesh. He knew what was in their hearts.
He knew what they were going through. And He wanted to assure
them and give them assurance that everything's gonna be all
right. And that's what he begins to
do here. He knew that their faith was
so weak, and he sets out to strongly encourage them to exercise their
faith in him. He says, let not your heart be
troubled. If you believe in God, believe
in me, you know. And then he says here in John
10.30, he flat outs and says, me and my father, I and my father,
we were one. We were one. And then in Galatians
1.19, the Lord says, For it pleased the Father that in him, talking
about Christ Jesus our Lord, should all the fullness dwell.
And then in Galatians 2.9, the Father says, for in him dwell
all the fullness of the Godhead body. In other words, he's saying,
if you've seen me, you've seen the Father. Verse 2, it says
right here in verse 2 of the text, in my father's house, you
could say there, in my father's house, you could say in heaven,
or many mansions or dwelling places. If it were not so, I
would have told you. And look here, he promises them,
I go to prepare a place for you. But where I am, you will be also."
And so he's letting them know it's not a permanent separation. This life right here, it's just
for a while. It says that life is like a vapor.
It appears for a little while and it's gone. And the things
that we go through and the things that we face, it's nothing that
our Lord and our Savior didn't face. You know, that's one of
the greatest blessings that we have. We have so many, all spiritual
blessings and all good gifts come from God from above. But
you know, we have a king, we have a prophet, and we have a
high priest, Jesus Christ our Lord. But what blesses my heart
is that I have a high priest. that knows the feelings of our
infirmities. They ain't a thing that we go
through that he hasn't experienced himself, you know. And that blesses
our heart. But he says it's not a permanent
situation. And he says there's many dwelling
places. In other words, All the people
that God placed in Christ Jesus before the world began, He's
telling them, there's plenty of room for everyone. Well, you
know, how many is everyone? If you will hold your place here,
but turn to Revelation 7. And we talk about, what we're
talking about here is God's elect. What we're talking about here
is the bride of Christ. Revelation 7. And this is hard for me to imagine,
but Revelation 7, verses 9 and 10, listen to what he says. After
this, I beheld and lo, a great multitude, which no man can number. No man. Our Lord Jesus Christ
will have the preeminence in all things. But it says, no man
can number, of all nations and kindreds and people and tongues,
stood before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed with white
robes and palms in their hands, and cried with a loud voice,
saying, salvation to our God, which sat upon the throne. And it's going to be a place
of love. It's going to be a place of joy.
It's going to be a place of no sin. That's something that blesses
my heart. You know, as we live in this
world that we live in, we see not only the sin that is without,
but for The elect of God, it's a sin that is within that really
bothers us. And as long as we have this body,
we've got two natures within us and we have to deal with it.
But the Bible says greater is he that is in you than he that
is of the world. But the Lord here, there are
going to be enough. His blood is sufficient to save
all who comes. His name shall be called Wonderful,
Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, the Prince of Peace.
If any says of His government and peace there shall be no end. That's beyond our imagination.
And he says, I go to prepare a place for you. And what he's
doing, he's getting ready. He's getting ready to go to Calvary.
And you know, he's getting ready to go to Calvary. He knows exactly
what he's going to face. He knows the torture he's going
to face. He knows the crucifixion. He's
going to have to hang on that tree for nine hours. The pain
he's going to go through, and he could come down at any moment
because he is God in the flesh. And yet, is he concerned about
that? No. He's concerned about his disciples. He's concerned
about the apostles. He's concerned about his elect. But peace of heart comes from
whenever we truly put our trust in Christ Jesus our Lord. Whenever
things get, when things in this life, when they come our way,
unexpected, you know, we don't realize sometimes how fragile
we are. Every one of us, we think we're
going to hear some sermons here today and then we're going to
leave and go get us something good to eat and maybe go home
and rest a while or eat something at the house and come back this
evening and hear a good sermon from Gabe. But not a person in
this room has a guarantee of that, but God does. He knows. And he is in absolute control
of everything. Nothing happens without his permissive
and his directive will. Redemption is through Christ.
Salvation is in Christ. And heaven, heaven is to be with
Christ. It says here that God was in
Christ, reconciling the world unto himself. And when you think
of the Godhead, the three persons of God, God is a spirit, and
the revelation of God is Christ. All the revelation that God gives
a man is Christ, and all that a man needs is Christ, because
Christ is Almighty God. In the flesh, the Bible says
in John 1, in the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with
God, and the Word was God. It'd be in verse 14, and it says,
then the word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld
its glory. The glory as of the only begotten
of the Father, full of grace and truth. That's wonderful. And then you don't have to turn,
but I want to turn over here. Here's something that every Christian,
every believer, they think about. Or I know I do, and I know you
all do too. It's in the book of Titus. Sometimes
I have a time finding it. It's just right after Timothy.
But I love the second chapter there. It says, listen to this,
it says, And we do that out of love. Everything is out of love. But look at this, looking for
that blessed hope. He's coming back, looking for
that blessed hope and the glorious appearing of the great God and
our Savior, Jesus Christ. We have so much to look forward
to. That's why he tells us to set our expectations on things
above and not on things of this world. For we are dead and our
life is hid with Christ and God. who gave himself for us that
he might redeem us from all iniquity and purify unto himself a peculiar
people, zealous, zealous of good works. And then verse four and
five, it says here in our text, and wherever I go, you know,
in the way you know. Thomas said to him, Lord, we
don't know wherever they'll go, and how can we know the way?
You know, the Lord had spoke to them again and again, that
he was going to die, he must be buried, he must go to the
tomb, and he'd be raised again, but by faith, that they would
inherit eternal life. And he often spoke to them, but
their knowledge was imperfect. But we must realize, though,
they didn't have this right here. We've got the full revelation
in our hands. They didn't. But we've got the
full revelation of our hands. And we know exactly, Lord, that
this is the absolute truth of God. And in verse 6, we read,
Jesus said unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life. No man cometh unto the Father
but by me. For me personally, that's one
of the most beautiful verses in the Bible. Jesus didn't say,
I'm away. I hear a movie star say, there's
many ways to God. Jesus said, I am the way. I am
the only way. There is no other way. There
is no other way to God. We've been through Jesus Christ,
our Lord. And as we look at these right
here, there are seven great I am's that are in John's gospel. And
real quickly, like I like to read them, they're speaking of
Jesus Christ, our Lord. Our Lord said, I am the bread
of life. He said, I'm the light of the world. I'm the door. I'm
the great shepherd. Not only that, he's the great
shepherd and the good shepherd. He said that I am the resurrection
and the life. He said, I am the way, the truth,
and the life. He said, I am the true vine. And what that's saying is Christ
is all and in all. And if his people are in Christ,
we have it all. We have it all. But he is the
way, and he is the only way. In Acts 14, 12 says, neither
is there any salvation in any other, for there is none other
name under heaven given among men where we must be saved. But the way to God says, blessed
be the God and the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has
blessed us with all spiritual blessings and heavenly places
in Christ. It is by his person, his work,
his sacrifice, and his blood that he honored the law of God
and he enabled God to be just and justifier to those that believe
in him. There's something that I would
like to read before I quit. There's some verses that blesses
my heart so much because there's a lot of times out at my mouth
there and there's things that happens to me and I can repeat
the words of God. I can repeat the promises because
I know they're true and I know they're going to happen. and
they bring me peace in my heart. But he says, be careful, in Philippians
4, 6, he says, be careful, but that word careful, it means anxious
or troubled. But he says, be anxious for nothing,
but in everything by prayer and supplication, make a request
made knowing unto God. And then I like what Joshua said
over there. He said, be strong and be of
good courage. Be not afraid, for thy God is with thee wherever
thou go. And a verse that describes our
Lord so well, and listen to this real close, this one verse, it
has so much in it that describes our Lord. It says, but thou,
O Lord, are a God that is faithful. is he's full of compassion, he's
gracious, he's long-suffering, and he's plenteous in mercy and
truth. And we are so blessed. God has
placed us in Christ. You know, the Bible says that
life, this is a record that God has given us, life is in his
Son. And we have to believe that God's
word is absolute truth. He said that life is in his son,
and he that hath the son hath life, and he that hath not the
son of God hath not life. And he says, these things have
I written unto you, that you may know that you have eternal
life, if you believe on the name of the son of God. I thank him
for that. You're dismissed.