The Way of Real Life

Texts:  Acts 7:55-60 and John 14:1-14

 This Gospel lesson is very familiar because it is often read at funerals.

And because of that, most people assume Jesus is talking about dying and going to heaven.

But he is not.

This text comes from the Farewell Discourse — Jesus’ teaching to his disciples at the Last Supper, right before his betrayal, arrest, and crucifixion. He is preparing a community for how to live when the world seems to be falling apart and he is no longer physically with them.

That is why the text begins the way it does: “Do not let your hearts be troubled.”

That sounds gentle in English, even sentimental. But the word points to agitation in the face of death and evil. It is a rallying cry. Jesus is saying: do not surrender yourselves to fear, even when it looks like death and evil are having their way.

And then, immediately, Jesus gives the next imperative: Believe.

We hear “believe” and think: accept the doctrine, recite the creed, check the theological box.

But that is not what Jesus means.

To believe does not mean intellectual assent. It is commitment. It is entrusting yourself to a way of life. It is not about what you think. It is about how you live.

Jesus is saying: Do not let fear rule you. Commit yourself to the life I have been showing you.

Then Jesus says something else that has been badly misunderstood: “In my Father’s house there are many dwelling places.”

Most people hear that and think: heaven.

But in John’s Gospel, “place” is about relationship, not geography. “My Father’s house” is shorthand for the relationship Jesus shares with the Father — intimacy, communion, mutual indwelling — and Jesus is saying there is room in that relationship for others too.

So no, Jesus is not promising heavenly condos.

He is promising communion.

He is saying: the relationship with God that you have seen in me is open to you.

That is Easter. That is the good news.

Not that someday you may be admitted somewhere else, but that already now humanity is being drawn into deeper communion with God.

And then Philip asks his question.

And honestly, Philip is all of us.

Philip wants a simple answer. A clear revelation. Something definitive. Something that does not require the risk of relationship.

“Show us the Father, and we will be satisfied.”

In other words: give us certainty, proof, evidence that settles everything.

And Jesus’ answer is almost heartbreaking: Have I been with you all this time, Philip, and you still do not know me?

Philip, like us, still does not understand that the incarnation is the revelation.

We, too, keep looking for God outside life — anywhere but in the middle of actual life.

And Jesus says: if you have seen me, you have seen the Father.

Not because Jesus is offering abstract theology about God, but because in his way of being, loving, relating, and giving himself, God has been made visible.

That is why Jesus says: “I am the way, and the truth, and the life.”

Not a map.
Not a doctrinal statement.

The way.
The threshold.
The pattern.
The embodied path into communion with God.

In other words, Jesus is not saying, “I will tell you how to get to heaven.”

He is saying, my life is the way into the life of God.

And then he says something even more astonishing: “The one who believes in me will also do the works that I do, and, in fact, will do greater works than these.”

That line has been abused in all kinds of ways. Some hear it as spiritual hype. Some hear it as prosperity religion.

But that is not what Jesus means.

Jesus’ works are the works of revealing God. His life is the incarnation of divine love in the world. So for the disciples to do his works does not mean they become flashy spiritual superheroes. It means the community becomes the continuation of that revelation. They become the people through whom the life of Christ continues in the world.

That is what it means to be the Body of Christ.

And that is where Stephen comes in.

Stephen’s story is not about glorifying martyrdom. Stephen is an icon of what this kind of life looks like in the real world.

He is living in a fearful and violent world, and yet he is not ruled by fear. He entrusts himself to God. Even in the middle of violence, he refuses to become violence.

That is “do not let your hearts be troubled” embodied.
That is “believe” made flesh.

Stephen shows us that Easter faith is not escape from life. It is the courage to live from communion with God in the middle of a world that still wounds, threatens, and resists Love.

So perhaps that is the word for us:

Jesus does not offer his disciples escape from life.
He offers them a way to live it fully, fearlessly, and in communion with God.

A way of relationship.
A way of courage.
A way of making God visible through how we live.

So no — this is not a text about heaven.
It is a text about how to live now.
Without fear.
In communion.
As signs of God’s presence in the world.

That is the way of real life.