5th Sunday of Easter
John 14:1-12
‘Let not your hearts be troubled,’ Jesus said to his disciples. There are many things that can trouble our hearts. And there is only one effective remedy for this: Believe in God and believe in Jesus Christ.
Our hearts can become troubled when we are confronted with death. When a loved one dies, or when we ourselves draw near to death. When we are in grief, fear or despair. ‘Believe in God and believe in me!’ Jesus says to us too. He himself is the Life. And in the house his Father, there are many rooms. Heaven is our home. Christ has gone before us there. He died, rose again and ascended into heaven. He is preparing a place for us and will come again to take us to himself. Let us believe! Let not our hearts be troubled.
Our hearts can become troubled when we are confronted with lies. When we hear that God does not exist and that life has no deeper meaning. When we hear that the main thing in life is to earn as much money as possible. When the purchase of expensive consumer goods is promoted as a fulfilling life. When the living out of all kinds of sexual fantasies is declared to be the most important thing in life. When an unborn child is regarded as a disturbance and abortion as a human right. When we are bombarded with the most absurd ideologies and conspiracy theories on the internet. When the horrors of all the world’s wars simultaneously are played out before us on video and we can no longer distinguish reality from propaganda. When artificial intelligence is used to manipulate us.
‘Believe in God and believe in me!’ says Jesus. He is not only the Life, but also the Truth. Let us follow what He taught His Apostles, what they passed on, and what the Church has preserved in its teaching, unfolding it, and understanding it ever more deeply!
Let us believe! Let not our hearts be troubled.
Our hearts can become troubled when we are confronted with an overwhelming multitude of spiritual, moral and religious options. When we hear that we should follow Mohammed. Or Buddha. Or some shaman or teacher of wisdom. When we are told that we can only be saved through a specific meditation technique. Or through the exact observance of certain rules. When people tell us that, unfortunately, we are not yet as far advanced as they are and that we must make much greater spiritual efforts.
‘Believe in God and believe in me!’ says Jesus. He is not only the Life and the Truth; he is also the Way. He is the way to God. ‘No one comes to the Father except through me,’ he says. And: ‘Whoever has seen me has seen the Father.’ And: ‘I am in the Father, and the Father is in me.’
Jesus Christ is the only way to God, because only he is both true man and true God. If we were to follow a mere human being, say some teacher of wisdom, how could we be sure that this teacher is not wrong or even deliberately seeking to lead us astray? And if we were to devote all our human strength to meditation techniques and the observance of strict rules, how could we reach God — who is eternal and dwells in inaccessible light — by these purely human means?
It is only because the eternal, ever good and all-knowing God Himself sent His Son to us, clothed in our human nature, that we can hear and understand the Word of God in human words and that we can recognise the works of God in the works that Jesus did on earth.
St Augustine explains it thus: ‘The Son of God, which in the Father is always Truth and Life, by taking upon Him human nature, is made the Way. Walk by the man, and you will arrive at God. If you walk by Him, you walk towards Him.’
And he continues: ‘I am not telling you: Seek the Way! The Way itself comes to you: Rise up and walk!’
Christ is both God and man. And that is precisely why he is the Way. The only way to the Father. The way lies open before us. We need not seek it, only walk upon it. Let us believe! Let not our hearts be troubled.
Our hearts can become troubled when we are confronted with our own sins and imperfections. When we seem unable to make much progress. When we see others who are not Christians yet lead a better life than we do.
‘Believe in God and believe in me,’ says Jesus. We simply have to stick to the Way. We have to stick to Christ. Not let us be led astray, even when we feel weak and when it is challenging.
Saint Augustine comforts us with these words:
‘You will indeed find people who live well yet are not Christians. They run well; yet they do not run on the way. The more they run, the further they go astray; for they have strayed from the way. […] For it is better to stumble on the way than to walk strongly but off track.’
Jesus says: ‘Whoever believes in me will also do the works that I do, and greater works than these will he do.’ The Church continues to perform the works of Christ. We are strengthened on our way by the sacraments, in which we encounter Christ himself.
Let us therefore believe in God and believe in Jesus Christ, who is the Way, the Truth, and the Life! Let not our hearts be troubled.
