If you make a journey what counts as travel essentials?
I dare say each one of us would answer in a different way. You might even have a list that you keep on a computer or on a piece of paper that you get out before you go on holiday. You might not be that organised and just gather it all together in the last half hour as it comes into your head.
What would you take on a journey with you?
Many of us would day we are on a journey, one that is more spiritual in nature, but it has some very earthy impact. What are the travel essentials for that journey?
What do you need to put in the rucksack to carry with you?
Discussion – Where are you?
There is a sort of map here on the screen for you to look at – Where are you? Where does it feel like you are at this season of your life?
Turn and talk to someone about where you are
“Follow the Yellow Brick Road. Follow the Yellow Brick Road.
Follow, follow, follow, follow,
Follow the Yellow Brick Road.
Follow the Yellow Brick, Follow the Yellow Brick,
Follow the Yellow Brick Road.”
Sang by Dorothy in the 1939 classic film The Wizard of Oz.
Do you know where you going to? Do you like the things that life is showing you?
From the classic song by Diana Ross that was a massive hit on both sides of the Atlantic.
“You’re packing a suitcase for a place none of us has been
A place that has to be believed to be seen.”
Bono in the clip you have just seen called Walk on. How can you pack for somewhere none of us have been to?
The recent TV series hit from the USA called Lost has featured a group who survived a plane crash on a desert island
Lostness, or a lack of direction is as old as what it is to be human.
Do you know where you’re going to?
Do you know what it is like to be lost?
Have you ever been completely lost?
Have you ever had the map in your hand but have still no idea where you are?
“Don’t let this throw you. You trust God, don’t you? Trust me. There is plenty of room for you in my Father’s home. If that weren’t so, would I have told you that I’m on my way to get a room ready for you? And if I’m on my way to get your room ready, I’ll come back and get you so you can live where I live. And you already know the road I’m taking.”
Thomas said, “Master, we have no idea where you’re going. How do you expect us to know the road?”
Jesus said, “I am the Road, also the Truth, also the Life. No one gets to the Father apart from me. If you really knew me, you would know my Father as well. From now on, you do know him. You’ve even seen him!”
John 14:1-7 (The Message)
Now we have to set the passage in it’s context. Jesus is in Jerusalem with his Disciples at the time of the biggest festival in the Jewish calendar – the Passover. Jesus has told the Disciples he is going to die, he has washed their feet as an act of service, he has told them of his betrayal and has now told them they will all desert him. The Disciples cannot follow the way he is going right now but the time will come when they will. Peter has said he will do anything for Jesus, even die for him.
Then, in the midst of all this bad news, all this gloom, all this turmoil Jesus asks them to trust him and in His Father.
Jesus knows where he is going but he also knows where the Disciples are going and there is plenty of room. Jesus will get things ready and he will be back for them. Trust me.
And then Thomas comes up with this wonderful question, “We have no idea where you are going, so how can we know the way” Sound familiar, Sounds like lostness or a lack of direction. “We have no idea where you are going, so how can we know the way” A child to a parent, a passenger to a driver, a friend to another friend, a student to a teacher, anyone to God,
I am not sure where you put yourself on the jelly baby map. Maybe you are on a high, maybe in the depths, struggling to keep afloat, maybe you don’t know,
Jesus says to Thomas and the Disciples I am The Road, The Truth and The Life.
Jesus being The Road or the Way – Difficult concept to get you head around. Jesus says he is the way, but how does that work, what does that mean?
The way the truth and the life has often been used as a doctrinal statement of who is in and who is out, but what happens if this statement by Jesus is an invitation.
It is an invitation to walk. An invitation to walk with Jesus. It is when we walk with Jesus that we are on the Road, we are on the way.
Dorothy followed the yellow brick road with her companions, the way was yellow and easy to see. I think Bono might have been more right that it might possibly have first seemed.
“You’re packing a suitcase for a place none of us has been
A place that has to be believed to be seen.”
That does not make it easy unless you put in the context of joining with Jesus on the journey he is making.
If you are lost who do you trust for direction?
Try Jesus, join him on his Road, on his Way.