Jesus the Way to the Father

 

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 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.”

(John 14:5–14)

Christian faith is based on paradoxes: mystical wisdoms, supposed contradictions that reveal their amazing truths on much deeper levels.

One of these paradoxes is that the Lord Jesus is our Healer, our Sheperd, our Saviour and our Teacher, but he is so by being completely humble and serving to his sheep. Isaiah 52:13–53:13 shows us how we should understand Him. When Jesus speaks to us in the Gospels, He can be firm and strict, His rules can feel difficult to abide by, but this is all necessary within the bigger frame: His voluntary suffering and atoning for our sins, in order to fulfill Gods will. Jesus is the one who came to restore the relationship between humans and God; we can appreciate this a.o. in the portion of John 14 that I quoted, which also shows how humble Jesus is in fulfilling His mission.

We worship only God, it is in the Ten Commandments. Jesus clearly says: “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.” So we worship God through Jesus, because he is the gate for the sheep (John 10:7).