And if I go to prepare
a place for you, I will come again and take you to myself, that where I am you
may be also.” (John 14:3)
Familiarity with the Scriptures, distraction with the world,
and degraded attention spans may lead us to read and be unaffected by passages
of Scripture that should rattle our teeth. It’s takes discipline to slow down and really think about
what we’re reading and how significant it is.
Consider briefly the magnitude of John 14:3 for conveying
the love of Christ for sinners.
Jesus doesn’t regard the mass of sinners whom He rescued at the cross a
large group of cattle owned to be kept somewhere out back, so to speak,
although He has every right to regard them that way. There is nothing inherent in us that makes us lovely to the
eternal Son. Election is all of
grace according to His divine prerogative (Deut 7:6-8; Rom 9:10-13, 11:6). He chose us not because we were lovely,
but because He is gracious.
So there is no obligation imposed on Him that He would treat
us as more than cattle. Saving us
from our sins was far beyond the call of duty. But passages like John 14 (John 13-16, in fact) expose to us
that Christ genuinely delights in those whom He has saved. Far from considering them a nameless
and faceless throng of sinners, a herd of cattle, or a band of barely reformed
delinquents, He loves them as a young
husband loves his bride.
The language of John 14:3 shows a Savior who longs to be
with His bride. I will take you to Myself. Consider the other ways this could have
been said. “I will take you to
heaven.” “I will remove you from
that horrible place.” “I’ll prevent
you from being alone.” Those would
all be sentiments no doubt cherished by the church, but none so precious as
what the Lord actually said – I will take
you to Myself. Again this is the kind of language you’d
expect of a lover to his bride. It’s
not merely that Christ wants to give us heaven. But He wants to give us Himself and He wants us for
Himself.
Some of us may conceive of Jesus holding His nose as He
kisses His bride. But this is a
dreadfully wrong understanding of how thoroughly His blood cleanses us from all
unrighteousness. He has never
loved us because of what we were or what we offered but because of who He
is. And that is why noticing this
kind of statement in John 14:3 doesn’t make much of man, but much of
Christ. It demonstrates the purely
unconditional nature of His love toward the church.
Behold, the great love of Christ! Saving us was not enough to satisfy Him. Revealing Himself was not enough. Revealing the Father was not
enough. But He goes to prepare a
place for us that we might be with Him…and be His for eternity.
Comments