Author: Jeff Englund

I will not leave you as orphans; I will come to you.

My childhood is indelibly stamped with odd memories. In the room of my mind, there are thousands of shelves and niches, each filled with memories. Some are normal. Some are strange. Many, like faded old photographs, are now so indistinct that they can no longer be made out. Then there are those that are indelibly etched on the canvas of my mind. Even among this latter category, most have been covered with dust or pushed out of sight. Yet now and then, something will cause one to fall off the shelf, shake loose the dust, and jump out at me. Today’s verse has prompted one of those events.

I was perhaps six or seven years old. We lived on a quiet semi-rural street to nowhere. Down from our house, the main road turned left but the road we lived on continuing for about half a mile to a dead end.

It was evening. The sun had set and the clear summer sky had turned a pale blue yellow. It was quiet and still.

A car had driven down the dead end and into a light pole, knocking out the power on our street. All the neighbors had gathered to see what had happened. I was told to “stay,” so I did. I waited at the entrance of our driveway, sitting on the warm concrete. I was looking at the faded sky and the deepening blue-gray of the tree-shadowed end of the road.

And I will do whatever you ask in my name, so that the Father may be glorified in the Son. You may ask me for anything in my name, and I will do it.

In 1970 Janis Joplin released a song that indirectly satirized this verse. It also parodied consumerism. She sang…

“Oh Lord won’t you buy me a Mercedes Benz…”

I mention this because the words to the song capture the expectation some have based on this verse. The idea that God will provide things is both justified and unjustified. It depends on what the expectation is.

Is it unreasonable to pray for a car if one needs transportation? It sounds reasonable to me. Is it reasonable to pray for a certain kind of car because of the ego gratification and social status it imparts? Mmmm… not so much.

Very truly I tell you, whoever believes in me will do the works I have been doing, and they will do even greater things than these, because I am going to the Father.

Do you believe in Jesus? Have you been doing the works he has been doing? Have you done even greater things, or do you know someone who has?

The key question here is what does Jesus mean by, “…the works I have been doing?” What works?

Believe me when I say that I am in the Father and the Father is in me; or at least believe on the evidence of the works themselves.

When Jesus says, “Believe me when I say…” it sounds like a command. But then he adds, “… or at least…” which sounds much different. Almost like he is pleading. Then there is the fact that he repeats this theme over and over again, almost a dozen times throughout John alone by my count.

Jesus answered: ”Don’t you know me, Philip, even after I have been among you such a long time? Anyone who has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say, ‘Show us the Father’? Don’t you believe that I am in the Father, and that the Father is in me?”

Today’s verse represents what is for me a theological mountain too high to climb. Jesus says, “Anyone who has seen me has seen the Father.” How does that work?

At this point, I have to step back from my earthbound human perspective for a moment. Remember that Jesus speaks like someone from outside space and time. He looks at things from a heavenly perspective. We tend to look at things from an earthly perspective. This difference in perspective is why people did not understand Jesus.