As Jesus was nearing the time of His propitiatory death, subsequent resurrection and ascension to Heaven, He told His disciples, “’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. And where I go you know, and the way you know.’ Thomas said to Him, ’Lord, we do not know where You are going, and how can we know the way?’” Jesus said to him, ’I am the way, the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me’” (John 14:3–6).
Jesus was going back to the Father, God, from where He had come to accomplish the will and plan of God for human salvation from sin and to make them suitable for Heaven. He was, from the beginning, with God in Heaven, and was God Himself, as we read, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God…And the Word became flesh, and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth” (John 1:1, 14). The last verse of chapter 5 in the epistle of 2 Corinthians reads, “For He made Him Who knew no sin to be sin for us, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.” Jesus had come to the earth to make man righteous. Only the righteous are fit to live in Heaven with the righteous God (Matthew 25:46).
As the Way, Jesus is the answer to man’s sin problem. Apart from Him, there is no solution for the problem of sin. He is not one of the ways, as some have thought, amongst many ways, but He is the Way. Scripture declares, “For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God” (Romans 3:23). Every man and every woman, as well as every accountable boy and girl, know that they have sinned. The sin problem of man is solved only in Jesus Christ. As the Bible says, “For when we were still without strength, in due time Christ died for the ungodly. For scarcely for a righteous man will one die; yet perhaps for a good man someone would even dare to die. But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us” (Romans 5:6–8). Christ just didn’t die, as all people die, but He died for our sins (1 Corinthians 15:1–4). He is the propitiation for our sins. As it says, “In this the love of God was manifested toward us, that God has sent His only begotten Son into the world, that we might live through Him. In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins” (1 John 4:9–10). He died instead of us (John 3:16). According to the Bible, when one believes in Christ with the whole heart, confesses Him to be the Son of God and repents from all sins and ignorance, when he is immersed (baptized) in water for the remission of sins, at that point, he is saved from all past sins; one becomes a Christian, a follower of Christ and the Lord adds that individual to His church, which is the body of all the saved ones on earth.
As the Truth, He is the answer to man’s ignorance. Man has been searching to know Who God is. Man’s vaunted knowledge has only multiplied his ignorance. In his pursuit of God, he “changed the glory of the incorruptible God into an image made like corruptible man, and birds, and four footed animals and creeping things” (Romans 1:23). Man’s sinful state was not due to lack of information but rather to an unwillingness to honor God as sovereign. God has made knowledge of Himself available to man through His creation, and so, man is without excuse. He is aware of a Divine Being. Psalm 19:1 says, “The heavens declare the glory of God; and the firmament shows His handiwork.” The inspired one wrote:
For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who suppress the truth in unrighteousness, because what may be known of God is manifest in them, for God has shown it to them. For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even His eternal power and Godhead, so that they are without excuse, because, although they knew God, they did not glorify Him as God, nor were thankful, but became futile in their thoughts and their foolish hearts were darkened. Professing to be wise they became fools. (Romans 1:18–22)
Human wisdom is foolishness with God (1 Corinthians 1:20). Apart from God, man is ignorant of his origin and the meaning of life. “God,” Jesus taught, “is Spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth” (John 4:24). Being Spirit, He does not live in buildings made with human hands, “Nor is He worshipped with men’s hands, as though He needed anything, since He gives to all life, breath, and all things” (Acts 17:25). Jesus taught that God is “our Father in heaven” (Matthew 6:9). Like a loving father loves his children, provides for them and saves them from all harm, Jesus said, “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life” (John 3:16).
As the Life, Jesus is the answer to man’s mortality. Death is a dreaded enemy of man. No one wants to die, but all know that they will die some day. In Christ only do men face up to the fact of death. Jesus said, “I am the resurrection and the life, He who believes in Me, though he may die, he shall live. And whoever lives and believes in Me shall never die” (John 11:25–26). It is an unspeakable comfort to all faithful followers of Christ that He is the resurrection and the life. We look for the resurrection of the dead and for the new, resurrected, spiritual, glorious body, which will be like the body of Christ in which He will appear, when He comes to receive His own to take them to live with Him forevermore. The apostle Paul said to Christians, “For our citizenship is in heaven, from which we also eagerly wait for the Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, Who will transform our lowly body that it may be conformed to His glorious body, according to the working by which He is able even to subdue all things to Himself” (Philippians 3:20–21). First Corinthians 15:22 says, “For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ all shall be made alive.” What man lost through the disobedience of Adam, the right to the spiritual eternal life, he gains back through the obedience to Jesus (Hebrews 5: 8–9). He is the answer to man’s mortality.
