Who can explain the meaning of this?
In my Father's house are many mansions
Did you click on the link I shared or no? I think it will add some insight into the meaning of the verse.
I originally wrote this as a reply in another thread, but I did not want it to derail the discussion. So, I gave it its own thread.
John 14:1-5 is often read a funerals. I believe this practice misses the meaning of the scripture.
John 14:2-6
In My Father’s house are many mansions; if it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you. 3 And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and receive you to Myself; that where I am, there you may be also. 4 And where I go you know, and the way you know.”
Thomas said to Him, “Lord, we do not know where You are going, and how can we know the way?”
Jesus said to him, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me.
The word for "mansions" is monē. It's the same word used in this verse when Jesus explains that the Father and the Son will live with believers:
John 14:23
Jesus answered and said to him, “If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word; and My Father will love him, and We will come to him and make Our home with him.
So, the question is:
if you are a believer, did you add onto your physical house to make room for the Father and the Son?
No, of course not. We know that Jesus is using figurative language. However, the language bears much weight!
Jesus is factually reporting that the Father and the Son will,
by their own volition, abide with those who love them. This hints at the depth of security in the covenant: it is assured not by man's strength (as was the Law) but by the will of the Father and Son. (that's another thread entirely)
Now let's look at "place".
Place is the word topos. The same word is used here, when the Jews appeal to the Pharisees to help with the threat that Jesus was to their nation and religion:
John 11:48
“If we let Him alone like this, everyone will believe in Him, and the Romans will come and take away both our place and nation.”
If we read "place" as a physical dwelling, we could conclude that the Jews were afraid to be evicted from their homes because of Jesus.
We know that's not what they meant.
They were afraid to lose their positions of influence and their places of power.
Let's look at one final area.
Jesus said "
And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and receive you to Myself". Is there anywhere in scripture where this is so? If He's not talking about receiving you in heaven when you die but, rather,
about receiving you to Himself on this side of life, we should be able to find that in the scriptures, right?
Of course we can.
Jesus, the man, was only one man. The laws of physics prevented another man from being in the same place as was Jesus. But, when He died (and this is what He was alluding to) He did not rise up as Jesus, another man. He rose up as the Christ. When we plant a seed we do not harvest only a seed. No. An entire plant full of seeds grows from the one that is planted.
So what is the corollary between Jesus dying, being resurrected, and being able to receive all unto Himself?
The many-membered Christ! Christ is the spiritual man in which all men, who are redeemed, are fit and knitted together.
Paul explains this mystery...
1 Corinthians 12:12
For as the body is one and has many members, but all the members of that one body, being many, are one body, so also is Christ.
Ephesians 5:30
For we are members of His body, of His flesh and of His bones.
Paul also used the same word for "receive" (
paralambanō ) in
Colossians 2:6-10
As you therefore have received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in Him, rooted and built up in Him and established in the faith, as you have been taught, abounding in it with thanksgiving.
Beware lest anyone cheat you through philosophy and empty deceit, according to the tradition of men, according to the basic principles of the world, and not according to Christ. For in Him dwells all the fullness of the Godhead bodily; and you are complete in Him, who is the head of all principality and power.
Notice how man "in Hims" are used in that small section. This is the reality of being
received unto Christ: our place is indeed "in Him".
We are the structure, engineered by the Holy Spirit, through which the corporate Christ is seen in the earth.
Furthermore, in Christ, we are not
another; we are not a foreign body. We are actually His flesh and blood. That is why He can share His glory with us:
And the glory which You gave Me I have given them, that they may be one just as We are one: I in them, and You in Me; that they may be made perfect in one, and that the world may know that You have sent Me, and have loved them as You have loved Me.
Let's look at the first set of verses again.
In My Father’s house are many mansions; if it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you. 3 And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and receive you to Myself; that where I am, there you may be also. 4 And where I go you know, and the way you know.”
Jesus is explaining how He will administrate next part of the New Covenant.
This is a paraphrase using the points from above:
My Father's family is vast! I tell you these things because I tell you my Father's business. By my passing and resurrection you may be included in the house of My Father; Our Father. I will arise as the Christ and include you in myself. When I walked the earth My Father secured a place for Me. He was always with Me. When I return and receive you to Myself, you will walk the earth with the same grace I was given. I will always be with you. Do not be troubled in your heart.
"I will never leave you or forsake you." -Christ Jesus
www.newadvent.org
