Calvary Road Baptist Church
“THOMAS’ DISPUTATION”
John 14.5-7
Imagine that you and ten other men are walking through Jerusalem with the Lord Jesus Christ in the cool of the evening. It is the end of a very eventful day, and also the conclusion of a very active week. You anticipate that at the end of your walk with the Savior, you will enjoy a restful night’s sleep and resume the course of a normal life. How wrong you are. Little do you know that your world, as you have known it, will shortly come to a violent end.
For 3½ years, you have followed this Man about the countryside, heard Him teach the multitudes, feed the thousands, cast out demons, cleanse lepers, give sight to the blind, heal the lame, and even raise the dead. You have seen Him happy, as well as sad. You watched Him sleep and have observed Him when He was well-rested, as well as taking note that over your time with Him, He has become physically drained.
Throughout His public ministry, you have been perplexed by the opposition of the religious establishment, the hatred of the Pharisees, the arrogance of the scribes, the hostility toward Him of His family members, and the unrelenting conspiracies against Him by the chief priests. Within the last week, He has given sight to two blind men, fulfilled the prophecy of Zechariah by riding into Jerusalem on the foal of an ass,[1] been approached and worshiped by Greeks,[2] and was spoken to in an audible voice in a public setting by God the Father.[3] And that was just through Tuesday.
You spent all day with Him yesterday, Wednesday, resting, and praying. Today began by celebrating Passover with Him. You noted with passing curiosity that He did not invite His mother, His siblings, or Mary, Martha, and Lazarus to the Upper Room, as was the custom for Passover. Once in the Upper Room, you were astonished that He washed your feet, were perplexed when He announced a betrayer in your midst, and were moved when He instituted what you later realized was the communion of the Lord’s Supper. All of this, again, in the Upper Room.
Judas Iscariot has left, presumably to run some kind of errand. And now, the Lord Jesus Christ stands to initiate what you will remember to be the most important conversation you have ever heard. John 14.1-7:
1 Let not your heart be troubled: ye believe in God, believe also in me.
2 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.
3 And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again, and receive you unto myself; that where I am, there ye may be also.
4 And whither I go ye know, and the way ye know.
5 Thomas saith unto him, Lord, we know not whither thou goest; and how can we know the way?
6 Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me.
7 If ye had known me, ye should have known my Father also: and from henceforth ye know him, and have seen him.
The most important conversation recorded in the Bible begins in John 14.1-4. The Lord Jesus Christ calmed your troubled hearts, impressed upon you the importance of believing in Him as you believed in God, and gave you hope about your future home in heaven, His return for you, and then He assured you of your future together. It is the final statement of your Lord’s opening remark that I want to bring to your attention. In verse four He stated,
“And whither I go ye know, and the way ye know.”
It is a clear statement of facts, containing no ambiguity. It is not a statement that is open to dispute or discussion. Neither is it a statement in the least bit arguable. It is a declaration of fact declared by the master teacher, the One who spoke as no man has ever spoken. Yet you are about to see a reaction from the most notorious skeptic of the group chosen to be apostles, Thomas. After Thomas spoke to the Savior, the Savior then spoke of Himself and then of you. Both of His responses are addressed to the entire group, suggesting that although Thomas said the words, his sentiments were your sentiments.
Focus your attention, if you would be so kind, on verses 5-7:
5 Thomas saith unto him, Lord, we know not whither thou goest; and how can we know the way?
6 Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me.
7 If ye had known me, ye should have known my Father also: and from henceforth ye know him, and have seen him.
Let us consider three main points: First, Thomas’s response. Second, the Lord Jesus Christ speaking to you of Himself. Finally, the Lord Jesus Christ speaking of you to you.
First, THOMAS’S RESPONSE TO CHRIST’S ASSERTION
Remember what the Lord Jesus Christ said in verse four:
“And whither I go ye know, and the way ye know.”
What the Lord Jesus Christ said to His men, in essence, was that you know where He is going, and you know how to get there. My message last Sunday morning addressed this verse, explaining from the summary of Old Testament Scriptures, as well as the Lord Jesus Christ’s earthly ministry teaching, that the Lord Jesus Christ was returning to His heavenly Father. Thus, those men certainly knew where He was going. As well, there can be no credible doubt that those eleven men, being Jewish men raised in synagogues, and apostles who sat at the Savior’s feet for 3½ years, should have understood God’s plan for reconciliation, and return. It had to be, and could only be, through faith.
Being well-schooled in Scripture, they knew of the frailty and failings of Adam, and Noah, and Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob, and Jacob’s sons, and Moses, and David, and Solomon, and Josiah, and Hezekiah, and so many more. Salvation cannot possibly be by works of righteousness which we have done. You understand that all have sinned, that none seek after God,[4] that your righteousnesses are as filthy rags,[5] and that from Genesis 3.5 God’s plan had been to send the seed of woman, born of a virgin in Bethlehem,[6] the substitutionary sacrifice predicted by the prophet Isaiah,[7] who is standing before you and speaking to you even now.
Yet, despite what the Lord Jesus Christ had just said, and despite your 3½ years-experience with Him, Thomas still presumed to dispute what He had just stated. Amazing. Would you ponder that with me for just a moment? Would you try to reconcile in your mind what kind of arrogant presumption might move someone like Thomas to dispute with the Indisputable, to question the Unquestionable, to refute the Irrefutable, and to disagree with this One who had been described to the chief priests and Pharisees by a Temple guard, who said, “Never man spake like this man”?[8]
Not that one of His men had not disputed with Him before. You may remember what Simon Peter said in Caesarea Philippi. Moments after confessing, “Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God,” when the Lord subsequently spoke of His crucifixion and resurrection,[9]
“Peter took him, and began to rebuke him, saying, Be it far from thee, Lord: this shall not be unto thee.”[10]
Recall, also, what Simon Peter said in that Upper Room minutes earlier in our narrative when the Lord stooped to wash his feet as He had washed others’ feet:
“Peter saith unto him, Thou shalt never wash my feet.”[11]
Then, of course, there was the back-and-forth moments earlier between the Lord Jesus Christ and Simon Peter, who questioned the Master’s declaration that they could not come with Him. Thus, you can see the pattern in the Gospel accounts exhibited by even the best of men, who seemed to be so easily provoked by this One they called their Lord, to dispute His claims and assertions of fact, even though they had never known Him to be wrong about anything. Again, let us read Thomas’s protest:
“Lord, we know not whither thou goest; and how can we know the way?”
To the Lord Jesus Christ’s insistence that His apostles know the where and the how, Thomas reacts as the spokesman for the rest, saying, “Lord, we do not know where or how.” Is it not interesting how he prefaces his dispute of the Lord with the word “Lord”? What inconsistency!
Let me suggest that you reflect on your responses to the explicit declarations of God’s will. How are you so much like Thomas? And remember, though only Thomas spoke the words, the Lord will answer them all, because Thomas was the spokesman for them all. How common it is for the Lord’s people to dispute Him.
Next, THE LORD JESUS CHRIST SPEAKING TO THEM OF HIMSELF
“Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me.”
Recognize that, although the Lord Jesus Christ speaks directly to Thomas in this verse (“Jesus said unto him”), the next verse leaves no doubt that the words He says here were meant for all of them. There are two features to grasp in this astonishing declaration:
First, recognize that this statement is a direct response to Thomas’s insistence that the Lord Jesus Christ’s original statement was incorrect as to where. A glance back to verse four, where the Lord Jesus Christ said, “And whither I go ye know.” Now, look at verse five, where Thomas said, “Lord, we know not whither thou goest.” The Lord Jesus Christ told his men that they knew where He was going. Yet Thomas quickly disputed that they knew where He was going. The Lord Jesus Christ was not going to let Thomas get away with that disreputable comment, so John 14.6 is all about where. The where is God the Father.
Remember that God the Father’s plan has always been to reconcile, to recover, and to restore that which was lost to Him in the Fall. That is not His plan in the angelic realm, only in the human realm. The Lord Jesus Christ is going back to the Father after concluding His mission of dying on the cross and rising from the dead to accomplish that goal. His plan is for His people, those who come to Him by faith, to join Him with the Father eventually. In God’s unfolding drama of redemption, it is about the reconciliation to Him, the recovery to Him, and the restoration to Him, what was lost when Adam sinned. For Thomas to deny any awareness of God’s ultimate plan and purpose was not to be permitted. Of course, they knew. They had to know. Therefore, the Lord Jesus Christ responded as He did.
Next, recognize that verse 6 is also a direct response to Thomas’s insistence that the Lord Jesus Christ’s original statement was incorrect as to how. Where the Lord Jesus Christ was going was back to His Father, after accomplishing His mission. Where Christ’s followers were going was to the place that He was preparing for them, which was also in the Father’s presence. The assertion initially made by the Lord Jesus Christ was that they knew how to get there. Thomas denied that they knew how to get there. I reviewed with you last Sunday morning’s message about how to get there being found throughout the Bible. How God has always accomplished reconciliation and restoration is by faith, faith in His Son Jesus Christ. It is to that, not so much the means of faith, but Himself as the Object of faith, that the Lord speaks in this verse of Himself:
“I am the way, the truth, and the life.”
Entire books have been written about this declaration of His uniqueness as the only Savior of sinful souls. No other so-called founder of any other belief system has made such a claim. Not the Buddha. The founder of the Sikhs. Not Mohammed. Not Zarathustra. Not Marx, or Lenin, or Mao. And certainly not Hitler. The Lord Jesus Christ stands as the unique Savior. And I would like to leave you with four thoughts in connection with this declaration.
First, this is a declaration of Christ’s deity, being the seventh in a series of “I am” declarations hearkening back to Exodus 3.14 and the LORD identifying Himself to Moses from the burning bush:
“I am the way, the truth, and the life.”
Next, by identifying Himself as “the way,” the Lord Jesus Christ refers not only to Himself as the way to God by man but also the way to man by God. He is, after all, the ladder in Jacob’s dream that reached all the way to heaven, Genesis 28.12 and John 1.51.
Third, by identifying Himself as “the truth,” the Lord Jesus Christ again identifies Himself as God, who is true, and as God’s Word, which is truth.[12]
Finally, by identifying Himself as the life, the Lord Jesus Christ hearkens back in the thinking of these men to the occasion of the raising of Lazarus from the dead, when He said to Martha,
“I am the resurrection, and the life: he that believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live: And whosoever liveth and believeth in me shall never die. Believest thou this?”
When you have Christ, you have eternal life. And when you do not have Christ, you are dead in trespasses and sins.[13]
These four realities clearly show that spiritual life eternal is not the result of facts believed, history accepted, or doctrines apprehended, but a relationship with God through His provision for reconciliation and restoration, which is His Son, Jesus Christ.
Third, THE LORD JESUS CHRIST SPEAKING TO THEM OF THEMSELVES
“If ye had known me, ye should have known my Father also: and from henceforth ye know him, and have seen him.”
Notice, if you will, that this 7th verse has to do with those men knowing Christ and knowing the Father in the past, and both knowing and seeing the Father in the future. Consider these time frames:
“If ye had known me, ye should have known my Father also”
has to do with the past. Please do not think that by this comment, the Lord Jesus Christ is calling into question the spiritual condition of these eleven apostles. I am not persuaded that is the case. Rather, the Lord Jesus Christ is hereby commenting on the experience of the apostles in their knowledge of the Father, not their relationship with Him as His children.
This can be illustrated by reflecting on the relationship a newborn child has with his father. That baby is as much his father’s child as he will ever be, despite the fact that the baby has virtually no experiential knowledge of his father. He is his father’s child but does not know his father well by experience. The Lord Jesus Christ is not in this verse referring to the relationship His eleven remaining apostles have with either Him or with God the father. Still, He is speaking to their ignorance by experience with Christ as providing for very little knowledge by experience of the Father. The Lord Jesus Christ is as much as saying here, “You are responsible for your ignorance of God the Father, which is the direct result of your failure to experience as much of Me as you might have because learning of Me by experience will provide for you knowledge of My Father.”
Concerning the future, the Lord Jesus Christ then said,
“and from henceforth ye know him, and have seen him.”
With this statement, the Lord Jesus Christ anticipates their future knowledge of God the Father. Anticipating the illuminating ministry of the Holy Spirit, perhaps, the Lord informs His men regarding their future knowledge of God the Father by the experience of their walk with the Lord Jesus in their Christian life and ministry. “Because they had seen Jesus, who is the Son of God, the Image of God, and like God (John 1:18). Hence God is like Jesus Christ. It is a bold and daring claim to deity. The only intelligible conception of God is precisely what Jesus here says. God is like Christ.”[14]
Is it not interesting to see one of the most famous verses in the Bible in its true context, seeing it as the Lord Jesus Christ’s response to a claim He had made that was disputed by His apostle Thomas? Most people who look at John 14.6, and even those who preach sermons using John 14.6 as a text, neglect to notice that the Lord Jesus Christ made a statement. It was immediately disputed. And John 14.6, along with verse 7, was stated to address doubting Thomas’s erroneous denial that what the Lord Jesus said about them was true.
They did know where He was going. And they knew how to get there themselves. He was returning to God the Father, and He would come for them so they could be with Him, and so we can be there with Him. And both they and we know how to get there, as well.
With Abraham as the prototype, the means God has employed has always been faith. Since men are sinful, and since God has promised a Redeemer, it cannot be otherwise. And the object of saving faith can only be, must always be, the Redeemer God has provided, His virgin-born Son, Jesus Christ.
My friend, the Lord Jesus Christ, is He. There is no other. As the Apostle Peter claimed in Acts 4.12,
“Neither is there salvation in any other: for there is none other name under heaven given among men, whereby we must be saved.”
If you would like to further investigate the claims of Christ, reach out to me by e-mail to Pastor@CalvaryRoadBaptist.Church
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[1] Zechariah 9.9; John 12.12-19
[2] John 12.20-26
[3] John 12.28
[4] Psalm 14.1-3
[5] Isaiah 64.6
[6] Isaiah 7.14; Micah 5.2
[7] Isaiah 53
[8] John 7.46
[9] Matthew 16.21
[10] Matthew 16.22
[11] John 13.8
[12] 2Sa 7:28; Ps 119:160; Jer 10:10; 42:5; Mt 22:16; Mr 12:14; Joh 1:9; 3:33; 7:28; 8:14, 16, 26; 15:1; 17:3; 19:35; 21:24; Ro 3:4; 2Co 1:18; 1Th 1:9; 1Jo 5:20; Re 3:7, 14; 6:10; 15:3; 16:7; 19:2, 9, 11; 21:5; 22:6
[13] Ephesians 2.1
[14] A. T. Robertson, Word Pictures In The New Testament, Vol V, (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Book House, 1932), page 250.
Would you like to contact Dr. Waldrip about this sermon? Please contact him by clicking on the link below. Please do not change the subject within your email message. Thank you.
Pastor@CalvaryRoadBaptist.Church