“I am the way and the truth and
the life” is one of the seven “I Am” statements of Jesus. On the last night
before His betrayal and death, Jesus was preparing His disciples for the days
ahead. For over three years, these men had been following Jesus and learning
from His teaching and example. They had placed their hopes in Him as the
Messiah, the promised deliverer, yet they still didn’t understand how He was
going to accomplish that deliverance. After the Last Supper, Jesus began
speaking about His departure, which led to questions from His disciples.
In John 13:33, Jesus said, “My
children, I will be with you only a little longer. You will look for me, and
just as I told the Jews, so I tell you now: Where I am going, you cannot come.”
This prompted Peter to ask where He was going (verse 36). Peter and the others
did not understand that Jesus was speaking of His death and ascension to
heaven. Jesus’ response was, “Where I am going, you cannot follow now, but you
will follow later.” Peter was still misunderstanding and declared that he would
follow Jesus anywhere and even lay down His life if necessary. As Jesus
patiently continued to teach His disciples, He began speaking more plainly
about heaven, describing the place He was going to prepare for them (John
14:2–3). Then Jesus said, “You know the way to the place where I am going”
(verse 4). Speaking for the others, Thomas said they did not know where He was
going, so how could they know how to follow Him there? It was in answer to this
question that Jesus uttered one of the seven famous “I am” statements.
I am – In the Greek language, “I
am” is a very intense way of referring to oneself. It would be comparable to
saying, “I myself, and only I, am.” Several other times in the Gospels we find
Jesus using these words. In Matthew 22:32 Jesus quotes Exodus 3:6, where God
uses the same intensive form to say, “I am the God of Abraham, and the God of
Isaac, and the God of Jacob.” In John 8:58, Jesus said, “Truly, truly I say
unto you, before Abraham was, I am.” The Jews clearly understood Jesus to be
calling Himself God because they took up stones to stone Him for committing
blasphemy in equating Himself with God. In Matthew 28:20, as Jesus gave the
Great Commission, He gave it emphasis by saying, “I am with you always, to the
end of the age.” When the soldiers came seeking Jesus in the garden the night
before His crucifixion, He told them, “I am he,” and His words were so powerful
that the soldiers fell to the ground (John 18:4–6). These words reflect the
very name of God in Hebrew, Yahweh, which means “to be” or “the self-existing
one.” It is the name of power and authority, and Jesus claimed it as His own.
The truth – Again Jesus used the
definite article to emphasize Himself as “the only truth.” Psalm 119:142 says,
“Your law is the truth.” In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus reminded His
listeners of several points of the Law, then said, “But I say unto you . . .”
(Matthew 5:22, 28, 32, 34, 39, 44), thereby equating Himself with the Law of
God as the authoritative standard of righteousness. In fact, Jesus said that He
came to fulfill the Law and the prophets (Matthew 5:17). Jesus, as the
incarnate Word of God (John 1:1) is the source of all truth.
The life – Jesus had just been
telling His disciples about His impending death, and now He was claiming to be
the source of all life. In John 10:17–18, Jesus declared that He was going to
lay down His life for His sheep, and then take it back again. He spoke of His
authority over life and death as being granted to Him by the Father. In John
14:19, He gave the promise that “because I live, you also will live.” The
deliverance He was about to provide was not a political or social deliverance
(which most of the Jews were seeking), but a true deliverance from a life of
bondage to sin and death to a life of freedom in eternity.
In these words, Jesus was
declaring Himself the great “I Am,” the only path to heaven, the only true
measure of righteousness, and the source of both physical and spiritual life.
He was staking His claim as the very God of Creation, the Lord who blessed
Abraham, and the Holy One who inhabits eternity. He did this so the disciples
would be able to face the dark days ahead and carry on the mission of declaring
the gospel to the world. Of course, we know from Scripture that they still
didn’t understand, and it took several visits from their risen Lord to shake
them out of their disbelief. Once they understood the truth of His words, they
became changed people, and the world has never been the same.
So how do we follow Him today?
The same way the disciples did long ago. They heard the words of Jesus and
believed them. They took His words and obeyed them. They confessed their sins
to Jesus as their Lord and God. They believed that He died to take the
punishment of their sins and rose from the dead to give them new life. They
followed His example and command to tell others the truth about sin,
righteousness, and judgment. When we follow Him in “the way,” we can be assured
of following Him all the way to heaven.
Recommended Resource: Jesus: The
Greatest Life of All by Charles Swindoll
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