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The "crucified ones" - Charles
Elliott Newbold, Jr. - www.charlesnewbold.org
Chapter 12 - The
Way, The Truth, And The Life
As recorded in
John 14:2-6, Jesus comforted His disciples regarding His going away by telling them that
if He goes, as He must, He will prepare a place for them in His Father's abode and will
come again to receive them saying, "that where I am, there you may be also."
He continues, saying, "And where I go you know, and the way
you know." But Thomas answered Him, "Lord, we do not know where you go;
and how can we know the way?" Jesus used the occasion to explain that He Himself
is "the way, and the truth, and the life."
He is the Way, the Truth, and the Life, and it occurs in that order.
The Way
First, Jesus is the Way, the way unto salvation. No man can come to the
Father except through Jesus (John 14:6b).
He clearly is the door of the sheep (John 10:7). Men try to enter the
kingdom of God by many other ways. But they are thieves and robbers (John 10:1). No man
can enter the Kingdom of God unless He is willing to humble himself in death and pass
through the door who is the person of Jesus: to be buried with Him in His baptism and
raised with Him in His resurrection (Rom 6:4).
This is the ministry of the outer court: the sacrifice of the Lamb of
God, the Savior of the world. "And you shall call His name Jesus: for He shall
save his people from their sins" (Matt. 1:21).
He is the way, the road, the narrow road that leads to life. "Enter
in at the strait gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way, that leads to
destruction, and many there are who go in thereat: because strait is the gate, and
narrow is the way, which leads to life, and few there are who find it"
(Matt. 7:13-14).
"There is a way that seems right to a man, but the end thereof
are the ways of death" (Prov. 14:12).
That Jesus is the indisputable way of God unto God is the debate of
carnal men to this day. It is an insult to the carnal mind of man which exalts itself
above the knowledge of God that God should be so narrow minded. It insults the
intellectual who wants either to believe that he has within himself the ability to save
himself or, at best, that all religions funnel up to a common God.
But the revelation of God has come through the only begotten of God,
Jesus, the Messiah of God. Jesus said, "He who has seen Me has seen the
Father" (John 14:9). Now this is the way of God unto salvation. "Whosoever
shall call on the name of the Lord shall be saved" (Acts 2:21). "If you
confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus, and shall believe in your heart that God raised
Him from the dead, you shall be saved" (Rom. 10:9).
The way is not a formula, a doctrine, a religion, or any such thing.
The Way is the person of Jesus Christ. Jesus as the Way is the outer court of Passover.
The Truth
Jesus not only is first and foremost the Way, but He is the Truth. On
numerous occasions He deliberately spoke to the Jews saying, "I tell you the
truth..." (See John 8:40-46).
This He did not only to show the contrast between the truth and the
hypocrisy of the religion of the Pharisees, but to declare who He Himself was.
He didn't just tell the truth. He didn't merely know the truth. He was
the Truth.
Jesus told the Jews who believed in Him to abide in His word. He didn't
say abide in His words, but in His word (John 8:31 NAS). This was just another way of His
saying "abide in Me" as He illustrated in John 15:1-8 (which speaks of
the true vine and the branches). For Jesus was the Word of God made flesh.
"In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and
the Word was God... And the Word was made flesh and dwelt among us..." (John
1:1, 14).
If you who believe abide in His word, that is, abide in Him, then three
things are promised:
( 1 ) you are indeed His disciple,
( 2 ) you shall know the truth, and
( 3 ) the truth shall make you free (John 8:31-32).
The Jews boasted to Jesus that they were descendants of Abraham and had
never been in bondage to anyone (John 8:33). How could He have the audacity to say He
could set them free?
Jesus explained that they were enslaved to sin (v. 34). This was
particularly hard for them to believe, being Jews who rigidly kept the Law and had made
many laws of their own. Yet, Jesus accused them of being in bondage to sin.
They had yet to understand that "the letter [law] kills, but
the Spirit gives life" (2 Cor. 3:6).
So we move from Jesus, the Savior, to Jesus, the Truth. Jesus is the
truth and He promised to send the Holy Spirit of truth.
Jesus instructed His disciples saying, "But when the Comforter
is come, whom I will send to you from the Father, even the Spirit of truth, which proceeds
from the Father, He will testify of Me" (John 15:26).
Later He said, "When He, the Spirit of truth is come, He will
guide you into all truth: for He shall not speak of Himself; but whatever He shall hear,
that shall He speak..." (John 16:13).
Jesus, the Way, is clearly pointing beyond Passover to Jesus, the
Truth, in the person of the Holy Spirit who is the promise of the Father: The Spirit of
truth.
"But the anointing which you have received of Him abides in
you, and you need not that any man teach you: but as the same anointing teaches you of all
things, and is truth, and is no lie, and even as it has taught you, you shall abide
in Him" (1 John 2:27).
While Jesus and His Spirit are inseparable, He, nevertheless, explains
Himself in these various manifestations: first He is the Way, then He is the Truth. The
only way we can know the truth is to have the Holy Spirit reveal it to us. Thus we move
from the outer court of Passover to the Holy Place of Pentecost.
The Life
But the Spirit of truth is always going to point back to Jesus.
"He [the Spirit] shall glorify Me: for He shall receive of
Mine, and shall show it to you" (John 16:14).
The Spirit of truth is always going to bring us back to Jesus, the
Savior--back to the cross. But the irony is this: that the pointing back to Jesus is
always a going on in Him, a pressing onward and upward. It is a going on from Passover to
Pentecost to Tabernacles, even the tabernacle of David. For the tabernacle of David is
that which is promised for the end, not the tabernacle of Moses.
"After this I will return, and will build again the tabernacle
of David, which is fallen down; and I will build again the ruins thereof, and I will set
it up" (Acts 15:16, 17).
The tabernacle of Moses had the Holy of Holies behind the great veil in
which was the ark of the covenant, the mercy seat on top of the ark, and the cherubim
resting at the ends of the mercy seat (Ex. 25). Only the high priest was permitted to
enter the Holy of Holies, once a year, to atone for his sins first and for all the sins of
the people (Lev. 16; Heb. 9:2-7).
By contrast, the tabernacle of David was merely a tent stretched out on
Mount Zion and the only article in it was the ark of the covenant (1 Chron. 16:1).
The ark of the covenant was made of acacia wood overlaid with gold and
originally had within it the tablets of stone upon which was written the ten commandments,
the jar with manna, and the budding rod of Aaron (Heb. 9:4).
The ark itself speaks of Jesus Christ. The acacia wood represented His
humanity, and the gold overlay represented His deity.
The tablets with the Ten Commandments represented the Word of God.
Jesus is the Word. So in this, the tablets of stone represented Jesus.
The manna was likened unto Jesus who is that living bread of life that
comes down out of heaven (John 6:49-51).
The budding rod of Aaron (Num. 17) represented the authority of the
Lord Jesus Christ as the great High Priest who entered the Holy of Holies once for all to
atone for the sins of the world. "We have such a high priest, who is set on the
right hand of the throne of the Majesty on the heavens; a minister of the sanctuary, and
of the true tabernacle, which the Lord pitched, and not man" (Heb. 8:1-2).
This leads us to say that when it comes to the tabernacle of David,
Jesus is all in all.
There is coming that time when the Spirit of truth will bring us to
that resting place in Jesus where, by revelation, we grasp the reality that Jesus has
finished the works of God, that He is all in all, that He is the only thing there is.
Once the true believer grasps hold of this reality, it will set him
free. "If the Son therefore shall make you free, you shall be free indeed"
(John 8:36).
So, He who is the Way leads to the Truth; and He who is the Truth leads
onward, upward to the Life.
Having arrived at Bethany to raise Lazarus from the dead (John
11:17-40), Jesus said of Himself to Martha, "I am the resurrection and the life.
He who believes in Me, though he was dead, yet shall he live."
Mary ran out to where Jesus was. Weeping, she said, "Lord, if
you had been here, my brother would not have died."
Jesus groaned in His spirit and later wept. They thought He wept over
Lazarus because of His love for him. But I believe He wept over their lack of
perception--not just their unbelief, but over their failure to recognize Him as the
life-giver from God.
Jesus said to Martha, "Did I not say to you, that, if you
would believe, you should see the glory of God?"
The life-giver, Jesus, has now put all of this in the reference of
glory. Thus, we have moved from Jesus, the Way, the outer court of Passover, that
which redeems and justifies, to Jesus, the Truth, the Holy Place of Pentecost, that
which sanctifies (separates) and empowers us, onward to Jesus the Life, the Holy of
Holies of Tabernacles, that which glorifies both the Father and His sons.
Therefore, let us go into Him who has gone before us into the Holy of
Holies, that we might truly abide in Him and He abide in us.
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