Jesus is the Bridegroom and the Church is the Bride...What About When They Were Dating?

 To You Who Are Beloved of our Lord Jesus Christ,                             

 This Sunday, our passage is John 14: 1-14, where Jesus speaks of the future that He will bring:

 “Do not let your hearts be troubled. Believe in God; believe also in me. ² In my Father’s house there are many dwelling places. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you? ³ And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, so that where I am, there you may be also. ⁴ And you know the way to the place where I am going.” ⁵ Thomas said to him, “Lord, we do not know where you are going. How can we know the way?” ⁶ Jesus said to him, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. ⁷ If you know me, you will know my Father also. From now on you do know him and have seen him.”

⁸ Philip said to him, “Lord, show us the Father, and we will be satisfied.” ⁹ Jesus said to him, “Have I been with you all this time, Philip, and you still do not know me? Whoever has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say, ‘Show us the Father’? ¹⁰ Do you not believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in me? The words that I say to you I do not speak on my own, but the Father who dwells in me does his works. ¹¹ Believe me that I am in the Father and the Father is in me, but if you do not, then believe because of the works themselves. ¹² Very truly, I tell you, the one who believes in me will also do the works that I do and, in fact, will do greater works than these, because I am going to the Father. ¹³ I will do whatever you ask in my name, so that the Father may be glorified in the Son. ¹⁴ If in my name you ask me for anything, I will do it.

           So, my usual focus for this passage, after Jesus shares with us this brilliant and comforting truth about what ‘comes next’, is to look at the reaction of Thomas.  It leads to that most beautiful phrase, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life” from our Lord Jesus.  But it can also cause Philip’s reaction to be undersold.

          Philip is like, “Show us the Father and we will be satisfied.”  According to their Bible, the bible of Jesus, that would have killed them.  Exodus 33:20, God’s warning to Moses on Mt. Sinai, “But you cannot see my face; for no one shall see me and live.”

          But that’s not the part that struck me.  What is Philip following up on here?   Well, “In my Father’s house, there are many dwelling places…”  So, maybe Philip is seeing a dating metaphor?  Jesus and the disciples are at that point in their relationship where Philip is telling Jesus to invite them home to meet this Dad that Jesus keeps going on about?

          Is this in anticipation of the marriage metaphor we get later in the New Testament?  Like in Revelation where the church is the bride adorned for her husband in chapter 19?  Paul talks about the marriage of Christ to the church as the basis for how husbands and wives ought to be married.  So, this is also a metaphoric ‘thing’… a dating metaphor?  Or maybe a formal engagement?

          Jesus is going to prepare a place for us.  In His Father’s house are many dwelling places.  So…like…when we get married, the church will move in with Jesus’ family?

          This is not interpretation based on Biblical or theological language.  This is interpretation based on how love functions in relationships for people.  We date, we get married.  It is no less true than to explore the meanings of what it is that Jesus is ‘the way, the truth, and the life’.  But it does add a dimension to human relationships beyond what we have in this life.

          One of the promises we make in the wedding ceremony is ‘till death do us part’.  And while, as an institution, marriages all too often implode before they close to that, in Jesus, we have a greater hope.  Because of what Jesus has done for us, by His death and resurrection, the marriage of the church to the Lamb, to the Lord, is something that is no longer parted by death. 

          And honestly, if we, the whole church, is (are?) to marry Jesus, it makes sense when He says, “In my Father’s house there are MANY dwelling places.”

 

Pastor Pete.