“And if I go and prepare a place for you, I am coming again and will receive you to Myself” (v. 3). The meaning of the Greek words translated as I am coming again is difficult to render accurately. “If I go...I am coming” means “My going is My coming.” Indeed, the Lord’s going was His coming. In other words, the Lord’s going to die was His going to be resurrected. From the perspective of death, it was His going; from the perspective of resurrection, it was His coming. Brothers and sisters, I do not know if you understand what I am saying. His going was His coming. Please keep this word in mind.
What the Lord was saying was, “My going is My coming.” For what was His coming? He was coming to “receive you to Myself.” He did not say to “receive you to where I am,” that is, to a place. Rather, He said, “receive you to Myself,” that is, into a person. Therefore, it is not a matter of going to a place but a matter of entering into a person. The Lord did not at all intend to receive us to a place, but rather to receive us into Himself.
Then the Lord said that “where I am you also may be.” Where is the Lord? Is He in heaven? You will be clear after reading verse 20. There the Lord said, “I am in My Father.” Therefore, what the Lord intends is to bring us into the Father. He is in the Father that we also may be in the Father. Since the Lord’s going into death was to remove the barriers between us and God, to pave a way that we may be connected to God, joined to God, and also dwell in God, after the Lord went and finished the preparation, He came to receive us into Himself. In that day He was in the Father, and we also are in the Father, thus fulfilling His word, “Where I am you also may be.”
Verse 4 says, “And where I am going you know the way.” Where was the Lord going? Many would say, “He was going to heaven.” However, it is a marvelous fact that the Gospel of John does not tell us that the Lord ascended to heaven. Brothers, do you see where the Lord was going? By now we should realize that He was going to the Father. In His incarnation He came out of the Father; now He was going into death and resurrection to go back into the Father. That is why I have repeatedly said that in John there is not the matter of place but only the matter of person.
The Lord said, “And where I am going you know the way.” What is the way? Among the disciples there was Thomas, a doubtful person, who asked the Lord, “Lord, we do not know where You are going; how can we know the way?” Do you think that Thomas asked a foolish question? The strange thing is that today many people seem to be smarter than Thomas and are sure that the Lord was going to heaven. Today everyone seems to know what Thomas did not know back then! Regrettably, though, this presumptuous knowing prevents them from knowing what the Lord really meant.
What exactly is the way? The Lord Jesus said, “I am the way” (v. 6). So you see that this is altogether a matter of person. It is not that there is a physical way; the way is this One who is both God and man. There is not an actual place; the “place” is God Himself.
“I am the way and the reality and the life; no one comes to the Father except through Me” (v. 6). The Lord did not say, “No one comes to where the Father is”; rather, He said, “No one comes to the Father.” What the Lord meant was, “No one can enter into the Father except through Me, the incarnated One.” The Lord was not talking about going to where the Father is but going into the Father Himself. This going is not to a place but into a person.
Therefore, you can see that in the Gospel of John both the way and the place are a person. The way is the Son of God, and the place is God Himself. No man comes to God except through the Son of God. This was what the Lord meant. You may ask how we know that this was what the Lord meant. This is clear when we come to verse 20. Verse 20 says, “In that day you will know that I am in My Father, and you in Me, and I in you.” Is this clear? What He accomplished in that day was not that He brought us to heaven but that He brought us into God. He Himself is the way that He might give us a passage into God. He saves us who are outside of God into God that we might have a union with God and dwell in Him. This is the meaning of John 14.
“If you had known Me, you would have known My Father also; and henceforth you know Him and have seen Him. Philip said to Him, Lord, show us the Father and it is sufficient for us” (vv. 7-8). A person is quite foolish before his inner eyes are opened by God. Philip did not know that the Lord with whom he was talking was the Father. Therefore, the Lord said to him, “Have I been so long a time with you, and you have not known Me, Philip? He who has seen Me has seen the Father; how is it that you say, Show us the Father? Do you not believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in Me?” (vv. 9-10). Brothers and sisters, where is the Lord? He clearly said that He is in the Father. But when the Lord spoke these words, He had not yet removed the barriers between us and God, solved the problems between us and God, or opened the way to God. Therefore, at that time the disciples were not yet able to enter into the Father. For this reason the Lord went to die that we might be together with Him in the Father. Then the word of the Lord would be fulfilled: “I am in My Father, and you in Me, and I in you.”