Home Is Wherever I'm With You

John 14: 1-12
‘Do not let your hearts be troubled. Believe in God, believe also in me. In my Father’s house there are many dwelling places. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you? And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, so that where I am, there you may be also. And you know the way to the place where I am going.’ Thomas said to him, ‘Lord, we do not know where you are going. How can we know the way?’ Jesus said to him, ‘I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. If you know me, you will know my Father also. From now on you do know him and have seen him.’
Philip said to him, ‘Lord, show us the Father and we will be satisfied.’ Jesus said to him, ‘Have I been with you all this time, Philip, and you still do not know me? Whoever has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say, “Show us the Father”? Do you not believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in me? The words that I say to you I do not speak on my own; but the Father who dwells in me does his works. Believe me that I am in the Father and the Father is in me; but if you do not, then believe me because of the works themselves. Very truly, I tell you, the one who believes in me will also do the works that I do and, in fact, will do greater works than these, because I am going to the Father.

Whenever I read this Gospel passage, I feel like I’m looking at an intricately woven tapestry, a tapestry where the threads are the Father, Jesus and us. To find the Father thread, you have to find the Jesus thread. Follow the Jesus thread and there is the Father. Follow the Father thread and there is Jesus. And then there are all the other threads weaving in, through and around the main threads. These threads are us and we are woven deeply into this tapestry called Kingdom Life.

What a nice picture. The only thing is, Jesus never tried to simply paint pretty pictures for us. Whatever he said and taught was the blood and guts of real life so when we come across a passage like this week’s gospel, we need to stop and ask, “Do I really understand what Jesus is saying here or am I as confused as Philip about what it all means?” No doubt, you accept what is said in this Gospel but accepting is not the same as walking moment by moment trying to grasp the dynamic meaning of the fact that we are in Christ, he is in the Father, the Father is in him and they are both within us.

Each one of us is someone who, through baptism, has a share in the ‘pleroma’ of Christ. The ‘pleroma’ is the fullness of the Godhead that dwells within Christ. In other words, we share in the fullness of the Godhead. Listen again. We have a share in the fullness of the Godhead. That’s difficult to take in and comprehend but in the second reading, Peter gives us a picture of what it looks like to share in the pleroma of Jesus. Instead of the picture of a tapestry, he gets down to earth and speaks of stones and a structure.

“Like living stones, let yourselves be built into a spiritual house, to be a holy priesthood, to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ.”  Then he goes on to talk about the cornerstone, which is Christ. A cornerstone isn’t much good unless it is the foundation for an actual building. We are that building. “But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s own people, in order that you may proclaim the mighty acts of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light.”

Every single one of us was created in order to be a vibrant home for God. The question is, can we be dwelling places by default without us really grasping what it means? Of course we can because God is gracious even when we don’t think we are big enough, smart enough, worthy enough or important enough to be a dwelling place for the most high God. But when we do grasp it, when we allow ourselves to believe that we have been incorporated into the pleroma of Christ and when we begin to walk in the grace and dignity of our calling, that’s when we become dynamic instead of static dwelling places for the Father and Jesus. That’s when we “in fact, will do greater works than these…” because Jesus went back to the Father in order that we could enter into the mind boggling mystery of living in God and having him live within us at the same time. 

“If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you?” I don’t believe Jesus was only speaking of a nice place we can go when we die although that’s part of it. Jesus was saying he was going home to the Father in order to establish a place for each of us within his pleroma – within his Godhead – right now. Through Christ’s death and resurrection, we who are baptized are given the right to live within the fullness of God as well as become dwelling places for the Father and Jesus just as he and the Father dwell in each other. 

John 6:56. Those who eat my flesh and drink my blood abide in me, and I in them.

John 14:20. On that day, you will know that I am in my Father, and you in me, and I in you.

1 John 2:24. Let what you heard from the beginning abide in you. If what you heard from the beginning abides in you, then you will abide in the Son and in the Father.

Colossians 2: 9,10. For in him the whole fullness of deity dwells bodily and you have come to fullness in him, who is the head of every ruler and authority.

Scripture is clear about who we are. If this is all true, then what are you doing about it? No, no, I don’t mean how are you serving the church. That’s certainly part of the picture but it’s a part that becomes much more effective after you have come to grips with your identity in the Kingdom. What I’m asking you in particular is what do you believe about who you really are and about your relationship to and with Jesus and the Father? It is so easy to lapse into seeing yourself simply as a scruffy child, a cynical onlooker, a befuddled disciple, a wandering sheep, a loose thread in the tapestry or a pebble stuck into a tiny chink of a grand building: not terribly important nor truly necessary to the complete structure and probably not someone God would be contented to dwell within.

It doesn't please the Father’s heart when we see ourselves that way. I’m not suggesting it’s an offense to him but it must be hard on his heart when he creates a phenomenal work of art and the art refuses to believe in its own beauty or when he creates a dwelling place for himself but the door keeps being shut in his face.

Jesus died and rose again and now not only does he dwell in the Father and the Father in him but both of them dwell in you. This is astounding. This is utterly amazing. This is the Good News of the Kingdom. It’s kind of like the Gospel of both “Being at Home” and “Being a Home”. 
 
In him the whole structure is joined together and grows into a holy temple in the Lord in whom you also are built together spiritually into a dwelling-place for God. (Ephesians 2:22)

Listen! I am standing at the door, knocking; if you hear my voice and open the door, I will come in to you and eat with you, and you with me. (Rev. 3:20)

We need to understand that each one of us was created to be a dynamic, effective, living spiritual structure, not a poor cold empty building but a rich family home full of life and ministry.

It’s time to throw open our doors.

For this reason I bow my knees before the Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth takes its name. I pray that, according to the riches of his glory, he may grant that you may be strengthened in your inner being with power through his Spirit, and that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith, as you are being rooted and grounded in love. I pray that you may have the power to comprehend, with all the saints, what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, so that you may be filled with all the fullness of God. (Ephesians 3: 14-19)