Most of us have a romantic idea of what it means to follow
God or to heed His call that is completely unwarranted by all of
Scripture. We think that if we follow
Him, if we obey His call to us, that life will now make sense and move smoothly
towards the goal. Where would we get
that idea? It was twenty five years
after God's promise to Abraham that even one small piece of the promise was realized
and he died without seeing anything more than that one piece. Here, the people have left Egypt
"defiantly" according to verse eight and yet three verses later they
are asking Moses why he brought them out of Egypt at all. The expectation was surely that they would
now move with alacrity towards the Land where, probably, all the inhabitants
would have abandoned it. It isn't going
to be that easy, it never is. The same
God who says, "Follow me", is the same God who says, "Fear not!" Following Him means we will have opposition
and hardship and it means that things get done His way rather than our
own. Red Sea moments are inevitable in
our lives.
Thomas asks the question we all want to ask, the way to
where Jesus is leading. Follow me is a
call to trust. We chose knowledge over
trust in the garden. Why did we want to
know evil when all we knew to that point was good. If the categories are good or evil why do you
want to know evil? Thomas wants to know
the way and Jesus' response is that He is the way, the truth and the life. The way to the Father is the Son, if we follow
Him, we will arrive safely at the place He has gone to prepare for us. All we need to know to navigate this life is
follow me. We will know the way as we
follow, in relationship. We are to be in
constant communication with Him in prayer and like He led the Israelites in a
pillar of cloud and fire, so will He lead us to our destination.
John's writing of the epistle is to make Jesus as the way
known to all. He proclaims Him to be the
light, that there is no darkness in God, and calls us to walk in the
light. It is in the agreement of these
truths about the way that we also find life.
John's purpose is that his readers might agree with him concerning these
matters that they might have fellowship with him and the other apostles who
have fellowship with the Father and the Son and in that fellowship his joy may
be complete. We tend to take the
fellowship of believers for granted and fail to receive the benefits of life
together that we are intended to have.
The way is not meant for a solitary journey, it is meant to be shared
and there we find fullness of joy. We
have others to help us when we are weak and suffering and to share our joys,
and we are sometimes the ones who help the weak. Jesus is the way but He invites us all on the
journey together. Fear not, He is with
us to the end of the age.
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