Bible Reading: John 14:1-6
Jesus told [Thomas], “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one can come to the Father except through me.” John 14:6
YOU’RE SITTING IN school, listening to your teacher talk. You’re listening, but you’re not understanding. It’s as if the teacher was speaking a foreign language. You feel like raising your hand and saying, “Could you please repeat that? I don’t understand a thing you’re saying.”
But you don’t do that, of course. You’d never do that. You would sooner smear your hair with bacon grease and jump into the grizzly bear pit at the zoo. After all, nobody wants to ask a silly question in school, right?
Well, no matter how silly your question might be, it wouldn’t be the silliest question ever asked. That honor would go to a politician (who else?) named Pilate, who lived nearly two thousand years ago. He stood in an elaborate palace, dressed in regal clothes, and asked, “What is truth?”
“What’s so silly about that question?” you might ask. Just this: At that very moment the answer to his question was standing right in front of him! It would have been like walking into class on the first day of school, watching your new teacher write her name on the chalkboard, and then asking her, “What’s your name?”
Because, you see, the prisoner who stood before Pilate was Jesus Christ, who said of himself, “I am the way, the truth, and the life” (John 14:6). When Pilate asked, “What is truth?” Jesus could have answered, “He’s standing right in front of you.”
You see, we generally think of truth as a concept or idea. It exists in our mind as a principle or a quality. But truth isn’t just an idea. It is a person, and that person has a name: Jesus Christ.
That’s why the only way to really understand truth and apply it to your life is by having a real, live relationship with Jesus Christ—because he is the truth! He doesn’t just speak the truth. He doesn’t just know the truth. He is the truth!
That means that if you have trusted Jesus Christ for salvation, you have not only become acquainted with truth; you have the Truth himself living inside you! So you see, making right choices isn’t really about following a bunch of rules. It’s a relationship—a relationship with the Truth himself. And the closer you get to him, the more he—through his Holy Spirit—will help you to learn the truth, know the truth, and live the truth.
REFLECT: Have you trusted Christ for salvation? Are you following the one who said, “I am the way, the truth, and the life”? If not, why not? If so, you have the Truth living inside you. How does knowing Jesus help you to obey his commands?
PRAY: “Lord Jesus, you are ‘the way, the truth, and the life.’ Thank you for saving me from sin and coming to live inside me. Help me to make right choices, not by following a bunch of rules, but as a natural result of my relationship with you.”
