John 14

Jesus comforts his disciples
1 ‘Do not let your hearts be troubled. You believe in God[1]; believe also in me.
2 My Father’s house has many rooms; if that were not so, would I have told you that I am going there to prepare a place for you?
3 And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back and take you to be with me that you also may be where I am.
4 You know the way to the place where I am going.’

Jesus the way to the Father
5 Thomas said to him, ‘Lord, we don’t know where you are going, so how can we know the way?’
6 Jesus answered, ‘I am the way and the truth and the life. No-one comes to the Father except through me.
7 If you really know me, you will know[2] my Father as well. From now on, you do know him and have seen him.’
8 Philip said, ‘Lord, show us the Father and that will be enough for us.’
9 Jesus answered: ‘Don’t you know me, Philip, even after I have been among you such a long time? Anyone who has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say, “Show us the Father”?
10 Don’t you believe that I am in the Father, and that the Father is in me? The words I say to you I do not speak on my own authority. Rather, it is the Father, living in me, who is doing his work.
11 Believe me when I say that I am in the Father and the Father is in me; or at least believe on the evidence of the works themselves.
12 Very truly I tell you, whoever believes in me will do the works I have been doing, and they will do even greater things than these, because I am going to the Father.
13 And I will do whatever you ask in my name, so that the Father may be glorified in the Son.
14 You may ask me for anything in my name, and I will do it.

Jesus promises the Holy Spirit
15 ‘If you love me, keep my commands.
16 And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another advocate to help you and be with you for ever –
17 the Spirit of truth. The world cannot accept him, because it neither sees him nor knows him. But you know him, for he lives with you and will be[3] in you.
18 I will not leave you as orphans; I will come to you.
19 Before long, the world will not see me anymore, but you will see me. Because I live, you also will live.
20 On that day you will realise that I am in my Father, and you are in me, and I am in you.
21 Whoever has my commands and keeps them is the one who loves me. The one who loves me will be loved by my Father, and I too will love them and show myself to them.’
22 Then Judas (not Judas Iscariot) said, ‘But, Lord, why do you intend to show yourself to us and not to the world?’
23 Jesus replied, ‘Anyone who loves me will obey my teaching. My Father will love them, and we will come to them and make our home with them.
24 Anyone who does not love me will not obey my teaching. These words you hear are not my own; they belong to the Father who sent me.
25 ‘All this I have spoken while still with you.

26 But the Advocate, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you all things and will remind you of everything I have said to you.

27 Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid.
28 ‘You heard me say, “I am going away and I am coming back to you.” If you loved me, you would be glad that I am going to the Father, for the Father is greater than I.
29 I have told you now before it happens, so that when it does happen you will believe.
30 I will not say much more to you, for the prince of this world is coming. He has no hold over me,
31 but he comes so that the world may learn that I love the Father and do exactly what my Father has commanded me. ‘Come now; let us leave.

Hello everyone, I am kiki. Chinese name of our second phase of the program is “读经大讲堂”. The English name is “Bible study”.
We will adopt a relaxed also enjoyable learning mode to take you into a new learning world. Each time I will make a personal summary and analysis from the perspective of a learner, and then Sister Ingrid will help me conduct in-depth learning and problem discussions with everybody.
I hope that such an interesting and interactive process can bring new knowledge experience to you all. The following is my interview with my sister on related issues. Today is the twenty-four lecture on the Gospel of John.
Everyone is welcome to leave a message in the comment area for discussion!

2.My summary of John twenty-four-time study:

Well, everybody! Firstly, is still my today’s personal study summary.
In this passage, Jesus comforts His disciples as He prepares to leave the world and return to God, His Father.
He tells them not to worry, saying that He is going to prepare a place for them in His Father’s house, where there are many rooms. Jesus promises to return and take them with Him, assuring them that they know the way to where He is going.
When Thomas says they don’t know the way, Jesus responds, “I am the way, the truth, and the life,” meaning that the only way to God is through Him.
Philip then asks Jesus to show them the Father, and Jesus explains that anyone who has seen Him has also seen the Father.
He emphasizes that He and the Father are one, and the miracles He has done are proof of this unity.
Jesus promises that anyone who believes in Him will do even greater things and that whatever they ask in His name will be done.
He also tells His disciples that if they love Him, they should keep His commands. He promises to send the Holy Spirit, an advocate, to help them after He leaves. This Spirit will live with them forever and guide them in truth.
Jesus offers peace to His disciples, encouraging them not to be afraid. He tells them that though He must leave, He will come back and that they should be glad for Him because He is returning to His Father.
He also reminds them that He is doing all of this because He loves the Father and is following His command.

Now let Ingrid sister make a go further summary.

Hello sister, you have already mentioned the most important point in this text. I will write more in the questions list about each important point you mentioned.

4. Q list part: base on John 13th items:

Okay. Base on above bible study content, now let me ask sister some related questions.
We hope the following questions can be helpful to our brothers and sisters who have just become Christians.

1.What does Jesus mean when He says, “I am the way, the truth, and the life”?

It is normal, that we as human beings are searching for the way we shall go during our life, we are all longing for life since the death at the end of our life is not avoidable and it can happen every day and we want to know the truth and not hearing lies.

Jesus says, that we can find all these basial things of our research in him. When we believe in him, we get these three things in addition.

2.Why does Jesus tell His disciples not to let their hearts be troubled?

When they saw the crucification later on this Friday and later in the book of acts the persecution of the Jewish, who killed sisters of the first church, too, there was a lot of reason to be troubled.

But Jesus says: I have overcome the world. This should be our focus: Jesus has overcome the world and so we will overcome the world, too.

3.What is the significance of Jesus preparing a place for His disciples in His Father’s house?

After resurrection from the death, Jesus went to heaven to his father. Now he is in heaven and he prepares there a place for us, that we can live there forever. It is like parents, who prepare a new room for they baby even it still is not born.

4.How does Jesus describe His relationship with God the Father?

He says he and the father are one God. He is in the father and the father in him.

5.What promise does Jesus make about those who believe in Him?

He promises that those, who believe in him will live forever.

The works of the devil were, that human being will die, the works of Jesus are, that they will have life eternally and in overflow.

23 For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord. Romans 6,23

6.Who is the Holy Spirit, and what is His role according to Jesus?

The Holy Spirit is an councilor and a teacher. When the disciples were sad, because Jesus has left them, the Holy Spirit filled them with joy.

The Holy Spirit is a teacher, because he remains us of the words that Jesus has spoken while he was on earth and other parts of the Holy Scriptures. And he teaches us what to say, when we are accused for being a Christian and we have to defend us at courts and politicians.

Further in the Holy Scriptures we learn, that the Holy Spirit lives in every person that has accepted Jesus as his savior and that our body is temple of the Holy Spirit. That means, he is living with us and guiding us in case of difficult decisions or situations that are happening through the day.

And the Holy Spirit gives testimony to our Spirit that we are Gods children and helps us to pray.

7.How does Jesus say His peace is different from the world’s peace?

When the world makes a peace contract after a war, there is always a looser who has to pay for the peace. The peace of the world is depending on the circumstances and if there is a person that is difficult and does not want to have peace, there is no peace.

We see it at the moment in the wars around the world. The wars are going on, because the leaders don t want to be the losers.

But the peace that Jesus gives us, is in our heart, it does not depend of utter circumstances and if somebody treats you bad, you can still have peace in your heart.

8.Why does Jesus say that those who love Him will keep His commands?

It is a natural reaction. If you love somebody, it is normal, that you want to please him. You can compare it with your relationships on earth. If you love somebody, you would like only the best for him and demonstrate your love not only with love but with actions, too.

Here we have to be good observants: Jesus is not giving a new law. He describes what will happen if we love him.

We often meet in the church’s legalists, you tell you first about the commandments, but the first is knowing Jesus and fall in love with him. If this happen, then you are faithful to him and live in his commandments.

9.What does Jesus mean when He says He will come back for His disciples?

That Jesus is coming back one day is a fact.

For those who refused him during life time, he will come as a judge and they will arise from the death to be condemned and thrown into the lake of fire.

The disciples will arise from death, too. But it is a resurrection for life and they will live in all eternity with Jesus.

Many Christians talk about the rapture, but the word rapture is not mentioned in the bible, only that we will be taken away together with those who already had died in Christ before.

I think it will be a very interesting situation how this so-called rapture will happen in the end.

Jesus only says in other parts of the scripture that we are blessed when we are awake and are waiting for him. We know that it will happen soon but we don t know when.

So, we have to focus on Jesus in our daily life, give our daily needs and problems to him and wait for him.

10.What does Jesus say about the “prince of this world,” and why does he have no power over Him? And who is the “prince on earth”?

The prince of this world and the prince on earth are the same. He is the devil, who was the beauties angel Lucifer in heaven before and had the call to lead worship or something similar.

He committed the first sin – proudness – and wanted to be like God and sit on his throne. God punished him and he was thrown out of heaven and landed on the earth.

A third part of angels fall in revelation against God, too and they were thrown on the earth, too.

For God it must have been a horrible event, that the angels were in rebellion against him, so he decided to create a new creation, the human being, who had from the beginning an own will and can decide if he wanted to be with him or not.

For to express this option to say no, he planted a tree in the Garden Eden, where he put the human being and said, when you will eat from this tree, you will have to die.

Lucifer, which has got the name Satanas now was jealous and tempted the human beings to eat. He talked in a manner to them, that they got doubts about the goodness of God and obeyed the devil and no longer God.

With this act, they gave the earth, which was in position of the human beings over to Satanas, who was now the Prince over the earth, because human beings had a limited lifetime now and were forced to die.

Satanas was still a eternal living being and with the other fallen angels, he formed a network for to destroy the earth much more every day.