Do Not Let Your Hearts Be Troubled

Read John 14:1-7  

These verses follow Jesus telling His disciples that He’s going away and the disciples are troubled. In John 14:1 Jesus says “do not let your hearts be troubled.  You believe in God, believe also in Me.” He then tells them that He is going to prepare a place for them. My brother, sister and I were getting a room ready in assisted living—first for my father, and several years later for my mother. We said to each other “this must be how Jesus is preparing a place for us in heaven!”  The room that we got ready for my father was very different than the room for my mother. God is creative, and I believe the room that He’s preparing for me is going to be just for me and the room He prepares for you, will be just for you!

Thomas then asks “Lord, we don’t know where you are going, so how can we know the way?” Jesus replies with the well- known verse “I Am the Way, the Truth and the Life, no one comes to the Father except through me.”   

My husband and I have been studying Jonah, and God prepares many things for Jonah—He prepares a fish, a plant and a worm among other things. God is always at work preparing things/events/people in our lives.  May we become more mindful of this! Lord, help us to KNOW that You are the Way, the Truth and the Life! Jesus says in verse 7 “If you really know Me, you will know My Father as well.  From now on, you do know Him and have seen Him.” Jesus, thank You for showing us the Father! Help us to realize that we do, in fact, know You—the God Who is preparing a place for us and is coming back to take us to be with You, so we may be where You are.

Our response so often is to be troubled, when You, God, tell us things in Your Word, or by events in our lives. God doesn’t want this for us! He tells us: Don’t LET (allow) your hearts to be troubled. Help us, Jesus, to respond by trusting You and Your way! Help us to be mindful of Your preparations for us and to hear Your words of comfort, truth and life in Your Word. AMEN

FOR REFLECTION:

• What piece of this passage brings you the most comfort as you consider Jesus’ words?  

by Bonnie Satorius