Finding My Way

Thomas said to him, Lord, we do not know where you are going. How can we know the way?

Jesus said to him, I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. -- John 14:5-6

Thomas is my favorite disciple.  Peter and John are great.  We love Paul, the one born out of time.  All of them deserve admiration, but Thomas just resonates with me.  He's this hard-headed, practical guy.  When Jesus told the disciples in John 11 that they were going back into the environs of Jerusalem, where the religious leaders were threatening to kill the Lord, Thomas responded:  So Thomas, called the Twin, said to his fellow disciples, Let us also go, that we may die with him (John 11:16).  He has no faith.  I've been there. We're all going to die.  Shoot, man, let's just go die with Him and get it over with.

Thomas had happened to be out when Jesus appeared to the others on one occasion after His resurrection.  These are his best friends in the world, and he says, "You boys have lost it. I understand the stress and everything, but He's dead!  I'll believe it when I can put my fingers in the nail holes in His hands and put my hand into the wound in His side."  Yet when he does see the risen Christ, he falls to his knees crying, "My Lord and My God!"

How can you not love a person like that?

In this passage, as Jesus is speaking with His disciples immediately before His crucifixion, He tells them that He is going to leave them, but they know the way to where He is going.  Thomas is incredulous.  How can we know the way when we don't even know where You are headed?

Jesus replies that He is going to the Father, and that the only way to the Father is through Him.  They know Him, thus they know the way.  The destination and the road to that destination are one.  If we get on the right road, we cannot help getting to the right destination.

I am not capable of fully comprehending God.  The good thing is that I don't have to.  I don't have to become a monk or a hermit.  I appreciate that there are those called to the life of an anchorite.  I appreciate the theologians and the philosophers and all who delve deeply into the nature of existence and of the Divine.  Thank God for them.  But my lack of understanding, the limitations of my intellect, and my calling to a more mundane vocation will not prevent me, in the end, from reaching the heavenly goal.  For I know the Way.

Passing Through the Valley of Baca

Blessed are those whose strength is in you,

in whose heart are the highways to Zion.   

As they go through the Valley of Baca

they make it a place of springs;

the early rain also covers it with pools.

-- Psalm 84:5-6

This has been a busy week.  I have to burn a bunch of vacation time before the end of the year.  I can only carry over forty hours.  It would have been hard to imagine on some jobs I have had that I would have trouble finding time to take time off.  I am working extra hours this week, trying to get everything done so I won’t have to work on my vacation days over Christmas.  It seems kind of stupid, but such is my world these days. 

As much, sometimes, as life may seem to be a drudge, it is a pilgrimage with a glorious terminus.  The way to that destination lies within each of us.  In John 14:5, Thomas asks, “Lord, we do not know where you are going. How can we know the way?”  Jesus insisted that they did indeed know the way – not only the Way, but the Truth and the Life as well (v. 6). 

The highway that leads to Zion is in our hearts, and though the path is close at hand, the journey is not an easy one for it passes through the Valley of Baca – the vale of tears.  Weeping comes with the territory, true enough; nevertheless, our tears do not fall in vain.  As they soak into the thirsty ground, they seek the like that lies below.  Where you have had to stop and sob, a spring bubbles forth.  The dry road you trod is, behind you, well-watered and lush. 

I think that family and friends can lead us by the known paths to a point.  There are plenty of waterholes until we get to where we must go on alone.  We may find the way on easier because we are sustained by springs where others have suffered.  Perhaps the same will be true of those who follow us.