John 14:1-12 - Troubled Heart? - May 10, 2020

Today is Mother’s Day. What are some of the things you will thank your mother for – if possible – this year? For bandaging up your skinned knees? Helping you with your math homework? Finding a lost sock or missing toy? For just being there ready to listen to any problem? Could I suggest that we thank our mother’s this year for something strange: for the problems they weren’t able to fix? Why would we do that? Well, what does a mother – a Christian mother, anyway – do when her children come to her with problems she can’t fix? I would hope that your mother said what my wife says to our children: “Well, let’s take a moment to pray to Jesus and ask him to help?” That seemingly small thing is one of the most important things any Christian mother can do for her children: not fix all their problems – because she can’t – but point to the One who can, to Jesus. Our world is certainly filled with trouble and troubled hearts today, troubled by issues so vast and complex that no mother can fix them. And so, with all due respect to you mothers, we need someone better than you today. We need the only One who can calm truly, deeply troubled hearts; we need Jesus.

The words and events of John 14 took place on Maundy Thursday. Jesus and his disciples are still in the upper room when he tells (really, commands) them: do not let your heart be troubled. Now the obvious question is: why would their hearts be troubled? The answer lies in the context, in the previous chapter. They were troubled, they were stressed out because Jesus had just taken on the role of a servant and washed their feet (John 13:1-17), had announced that one of them would betray him (John 13:18-30), that he was going to be leaving them soon (John 13:31-35), and had predicted that their unofficial leader, Peter, would deny him three times. In other words, the disciples were troubled by Jesus’ humility, his calm willingness to be betrayed, tortured and crucified, and, most of all, by the idea that in just a short time he would be leaving them.

That’s kind of ironic, isn’t it? What was the apparent source of the disciples’ troubled hearts? The Gospel; the good news that God had sent Jesus to suffer and die for the sins of the world. In spite of the fact that from the first promise in the Garden of Eden (Genesis 3:15), the entire OT predicted that the Savior would suffer (cf. Isaiah 53); in spite of the fact that Jesus had told them repeatedly that he was going to Jerusalem to die – they continued to believe otherwise; they continued to cling to a false hope that somehow God would bring about a happier outcome. Because the disciples didn’t believe that it was God’s plan for Jesus to suffer and die to save them, they stumbled over Jesus in unbelief (1 Peter 2:8). Instead of rejoicing that Jesus loved them enough to die for their sins, the disciples were troubled that Jesus’ life was going to come to such a tragic end. So, in the end, it wasn’t the Gospel but the disciples’ false faith that caused their hearts to be troubled.

What’s troubling your heart today? I would venture to guess that you might think it’s any number of things: your children, your marriage, your job, your finances – maybe the awful impact the response to this virus has had on nearly every aspect of life. Why do I say that you only think that those things are the source of your troubled heart? Because the source of any and every troubled heart runs much deeper than those issues. The real reason your heart is troubled – and, for that matter, the real reason the hearts of people around the world are troubled during this crisis is not because of a virus. The real source of the trouble is sin. In fact, viruses themselves are the result of the Fall into sin, when God told Adam: the soil is cursed on account of you…by the sweat of your face you will eat bread until you return to the soil, for out of it you were taken. For you are dust, and to dust you shall return (Genesis 3:17, 19; see also Romans 8:22). Sin is the source of every disease, disaster and pandemic our world has ever seen and sin is the reason that death is hanging over all of our heads like a grim reaper. And that fear of death – and the dread of what comes afterwards – is what really lies at the root of every troubled heart – of every age.

The problem is that just like the disciples in that upper room, the devil often leads us to think that our biggest troubles aren’t sin and death (Romans 6:23). Why is it so dangerous to think that the source of our troubled hearts is our children, our marriages, our mental or physical health, our finances or a virus? It’s not because those aren’t real troubles…they are! Rather, it’s because, just like those disciples, it will quickly lead to false belief. If the source of your troubled heart is merely physical, financial or social – then what kind of Savior will you seek? Undoubtedly you will seek a mere earthly savior, someone to save you from temporary, earthly troubles.

Tragically, this is the Jesus of much of modern Christianity. This is the Jesus of practical, relevant sermons. This is the Jesus that has been preached in America since the days of Dwight Moody in the 19th century. This is the Jesus you find in virtually every book on the shelves of Christian bookstores. This is not a Jesus who comes to earth to go to war with sin, death and the devil but a Jesus who came to make you happy and healthy, joyful and successful. And how does that false version of Jesus address your troubles? Not by anything he actually did that was recorded in Scripture. Not by taking on your human flesh and blood. Not by keeping God’s law perfectly for you. Not by paying for your sins with his blood. Not by appeasing God’s wrath against your sins. Not by destroying sin, death and the devil forever by rising from the dead. No, the Jesus who solves your temporary, earthly troubles does it by teaching you how to solve your problems yourself. This kind of Jesus becomes a new Moses, a new law-giver (John 1:17). So that, if your trouble is an out of control toddler, then Jesus becomes a counselor who teaches you 10 steps to civilizing the little brute. If what troubles your heart is a marriage that’s lost its flame, then Jesus can give you some romantic advice to add fuel to the fire. If what troubles your heart is the loss of a job, the fear of a virus, or failing finances – then, honestly, you really don’t need Jesus at all. Then you just need the number for the unemployment office, Dr. Anthony Fauci, or Dave Ramsey. And if we see Jesus as nothing more than the fixer of all our temporary, earthly needs, then we become guilty of the very same thing those disciples were guilty of on Maundy Thursday: false belief and false hope – because that’s not who Jesus is or why he came.  

This becomes clear when we hear the cure that Jesus prescribes for the disciples’ troubled hearts. Listen again: do not let your hearts be troubled. Believe in God; believe also in me. In my Father’s house are many mansions. If it were not so, I would have told you. I am going to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and take you to be with me, so that you also may be where I am. You know where I am going, and you know the way. Does Jesus say “Don’t worry, I didn’t really mean it when I said that I was going to be betrayed, tortured and suffer and die at the hands of evil men? Don’t worry, Peter, you won’t really deny me three times, I was just kidding. Don’t be troubled, I will rip up God’s eternal plan of salvation so that I don’t have to leave you.” No! Nor does he promise his disciples that he will remove all the troubles from their lives on earth in the future. In fact, Jesus doesn’t address their immediate, “felt-needs” at all.

What does he do instead? He cures their troubled hearts by pointing them beyond the borders of this world. He assures them that in spite of the fact that there would be dark days ahead; that they would see wicked men betray, torture and crucify him; in spite of the fact that life in general would continue to be difficult and especially so for them because they were to be his witnesses throughout the world (Acts 1:8); in spite of the fact that death would still loom over their heads as the wages of sin (Romans 6:23) – they still didn’t need to be troubled. Why not? Because the very reason Jesus was willing to suffer crucifixion at the hands of evil men, to leave his disciples was to prepare a place in his Father’s house for them, a mansion with their name on it. In the end, the hope of eternal life is the only true cure for a truly troubled heart – simply nothing else will do.

The practical, relevant Jesus is no help against real issues of sin and death that trouble your heart. A Jesus who teaches you how to overcome your troubles on your own is no true help either. Like your mother (hopefully) taught you, you need something better. You need the Jesus of our text. The Jesus who says that he is one with the Father and whoever has seen him as seen the Father (John 14:10-11) – and proves that claim by his words and works – especially his resurrection from the dead. You need the Jesus who gently reveals that the true trouble with your heart is that your heart is wicked and depraved (Jeremiah 17:9; Matthew 15:19), and then prescribes the only possible cure. What is that cure? Jesus mentions that he was going to prepare a place for you. What does that mean? Certainly the One who created the universe with his almighty Word didn’t need to gather an angelic work crew to pour a foundation or finish the roof on your mansion. No, the preparations he needed to complete were to suffer and die to take away your sin – because sin is what has separated us from God – kept us quarantined, locked out of his house – in the first place (Genesis 3; Isaiah 59:2). This is the cure for your troubled heart. You don’t need a Jesus to teach you or give you a better life in this world, you need a Jesus who has removed the barrier between you and God with his blood – so that – no matter what temporary, earthly issues are troubling you today – you can look forward every day to spending all eternity in your Father’s house in heaven where there are no troubles at all.

Your heart may or may not be troubled at this moment (although I think everyone’s nerves are a little frayed), but, when it is, you need to know where to go for the cure. Don’t go somewhere that gives you tips on how to deal with the temporary troubles of life yourself – go to the place that deals with the true troubles of the heart: sin and death. When you heart is troubled go to the place where in confession you can openly and honestly lay your sins before God with the confidence that he will never blink at what he sees there and instead will tell you to “go in peace, your sins are forgiven.” When you heart is troubled run back to the unbreakable promise God made to you in Baptism, that he has called you by name, that you are his, that no one can snatch you out of his hand (John 10:28-30), or rob you of your place in heaven. Go to the place where you receive the true body and blood of Jesus – the only medicine that can lift your heart out of the gutter of this troubled world and focus it on the glorious and unending life that will be yours when Jesus returns. Those are the true cures for truly troubled hearts.

I’ve found it kind of interesting that so many people believe that we are living through some sort of novel or unique time in history. We’re not. There have been worldwide pandemics – not to mention wars and depressions and famines – throughout human history. More importantly, we need to understand that the true source of all troubles and the cure haven’t changed a bit since Genesis 3. Sin and death are what truly trouble us and the only cure is a Savior who destroys those enemies once and for all. The cure can’t be found in a mythical Jesus who promises that everything will be all right, that things will eventually return to normal – that Jesus doesn’t exist. The true cure for a troubled heart can’t be found in a Jesus who tells you that you need to solve your own problems. The true cure isn’t found in a vaccine, in wider testing, or in another round of stimulus checks. The only true cure is found in the true Jesus who went through the trouble of taking your place under God’s judgment so that you might take his place in heaven far away from all troubles. And you know where you can find this cure, too: in the Words of Jesus, in the waters of his Baptism, in the body and blood he gives you to eat and to drink. And when you have the assurance that not even sin and death – much less a virus – can rob you of your heavenly mansion, well, then there’s really no reason to be troubled at all, is there? Amen.