01 February 2023

John 14:1-9

Let not your heart be troubled: ye 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 ye may be also. And whither I go ye know, and the way ye know. Thomas saith unto Him, Lord, we know not whither Thou goest; and how can we know the way? Jesus saith 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 saith unto Him, Lord, show us the Father, and it sufficeth us. Jesus saith unto him, Have I been so long time with you, and yet hast thou not known Me, Philip? he that hath seen Me hath seen the Father; and how sayest thou then, Show us the Father?

Thomas and Philip are there with Jesus at the final hour.  

They have been with Jesus for upwards of three years.

And here, at the end of Jesus' mission, they (and doubtless the other disciples, as well), have no clue what He is talking about. . .

They have no idea who He is.  They have no idea where to go.  They have no idea what to do.  And this is made painfully clear by their (in)action after the crucifixion.

The only one who thought He knew what to do was Judas. . .

They have been with Jesus upwards of three years, and are utterly clueless.

As clueless as me, 2000 years later.

Here I am, 2000 years later stranded in the Satanic World Order, and I am supposed to know where to go and what to do?

I'll tell you where I won't go, and what I won't do:

I won't go and listen to a self-proclaimed Christian 'minister' who speaks with absolute confidence and certainty about how other people ought to live their lives.  For I am pretty certain they don't know a God damned thing more about it than Thomas or Philip or me.  As the Apostle Paul said:

Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling. For it is God which worketh in you both to will and to do of His good pleasure. . .

Thomas and Philip (and the other disciples) didn't know what to do until Jesus came back from the dead, appeared to them, and told them what to do.

What am I supposed to do, 2000 years later?

I am as clueless as Thomas and Philip were.

What do I do?

Trust Jesus has a plan to drag my sorry ass out of this Satanic World Order and into His kingdom.  

I can judge my life to this point the same as I would judge the lives of Thomas and Philip and the other disciples in the period between the Last Supper and the Resurrection.  My behaviors have certainly been different.  But the judgment would be the same: unrighteous.  

Jesus got Thomas and Philip and the other disciples into the Kingdom, even though they had no idea how it would happen.

In the midst of the Satanic World Order, even though I have fallen, as Thomas and Philip and the other disciples fell, though from different temptation, I look to what Thomas and Philip and the other disciples saw, the resurrected Jesus.  Jesus has overcome the World, and even from the pit I am in, I see Him.  That's all I need.