Truth and Confusion

Truth and Confusion
Truth and Confusion
John 14:1-3

1 Let [tarasso] not [me] your [humon] heart [kardia] be troubled [tarasso] : ye believe [pisteuo] in [eis] God [theos] , believe [pisteuo] also [kai] in [eis] me [eme] .
2 In [en] my [mou] Father's [pater] house [oikia] are [eisi] many [polus] mansions [mone] : if it were not [ei de me(ge)] so, I would have told [an] [epo] you [humin] . I go [poreuomai] to prepare [hetoimazo] a place [topos] for you [humin] .
3 And [kai] if [ean] I go [poreuomai] and [kai] prepare [hetoimazo] a place [topos] for you [humin] , I will come [erchomai] again [palin] , and [kai] receive [paralambano] you [humas] unto [pros] myself [emautou] ; that [hina] where [hopou] I [ego] am [eimi] , there ye [humeis] may be [o] also [kai] . KJV-Interlinear

1 'Let not your heart be troubled; believe in God, believe also in Me. 2 'In My Father's house are many dwelling places; if it were not so, I would have told you; for I go to prepare a place for you. 3 'And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again, and receive you to Myself; that where I am, there you may be also. NASB

Now return to the picture of the scene at the last supper. All the apostles are sitting around the table eating and engaged in casual conversation, then Jesus breaks the news that there was one among them who would betray Him. All the apostles are somewhat disturbed, looking around at each other but still not really paying attention to what was being said.

Then Jesus states that He was going away. They all perk up with more concern now. They have seemingly forgotten about the one who would betray Jesus. That tidbit just flew right out the window. Now Jesus, the one for whom they have left everything (their former occupations), to be with, and now have been with Him for over three years, has just told them that He was going to a place where they could not go.

Their faces probably told the story of their shock. They have been with someone, someone who is like no other person any of us could ever imagine meeting and spending our life with. And now the shock of hearing that, that person was going to leave.

Now what are they going to think? What are they going to do? Where are they going to live? Most of the disciples are married and with families. What about their welfare? Their whole life seems shattered right before their eyes, and ... It will only get worse as the hours of night and the next day pass by as Jesus is tried in six trials, brutalized before the public, and then executed in a dramatic finish of the life style that the apostles had known for quite a long time now.

We can only imagine their sorrow, feelings of forlorn, of being abandoned, their feelings of loss of something they desired desperately for their own lives and for the lives of their families.

Peter protests briefly, but you could probably cut the silence with a knife by now.

Jesus gives them comfort and consols their concerns, though they do not understand it at the moment, they will later. 'Do not be troubled.'

Though the world swirls all around us. Though we seemingly have great obstacles before us in employment, in maintaining a home, in keeping our business going, in caring for those whom we love, we should know that Christ is always a thought away. The knowledge we possess through our spiritual growth is always within us so long as we pursue His wisdom on a consistent and daily basis.

In heaven there are many 'mansions.' This is a word for a magnificent and permanent home. One in which we will never be evicted from. One which we will own totally and completely and without any form of encumbrance or threat of taxation. No one can take it from us. No one will ever take it from us. Our mansion is ours forever, and there is one for everyone who decides to pursue their spiritual life to the fullest.

Of course no mansion is complete without the best of furnishings, and God does not shop at the discount stores. Only the best of the best will decorate and fill our heavenly mansions. If these facts were not so, then God would have told us all, that there is something different, but He did not. The Bible tells us the truth concerning life and the afterlife.

In order to have the best available to us, Jesus went to the Cross to win the first phase of the angelic conflict, the strategic victory, and then on to heaven to prepare the world for the next increment of His victory in the angelic conflict, the tactical victory at the second advent.

During our dispensation, the Church Age, the stage is being set for the last and final confrontation with Satan and His demands for equality with God. We have advanced through our dispensation for 1973 years now (2003-30), if you assume that the Cross took place in 30 AD. Mankind has spread to the four corners of the world. The Royal Family has been constructed throughout all of these centuries, and at some point our number will be complete. Then the Rapture will occur and the last seven years of the Age of Israel will resume to their conclusion.

We have but only to believe in God, the concept of a higher power and therefore one to whom we can look to, to save us from the pressures of this world and this life. And, we are to look to Jesus Christ, the only path to God. For were it not for Christ then man would try to define his own path to God, and anything that man can do is full of arrogance and nothing more than following the pattern of Satan's original thought.

Jesus Christ promises here, that He will return to gather each and everyone of us up and bring us all to heaven and to a far better life than we could even gain for ourselves in a thousand life times.

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