John 14:2 “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 unto myself; that where I am, there ye may be also.”
The Lord gives us some things to think about when our “heart” is gravely “troubled” (John 14:1)! There are times when the things that trouble us will not go away, and we cannot undo them. Such troubles often bring us very low; and we find ourselves under a dark cloud of hopelessness. The Apostles were in that state of mind; for, the Lord was telling them that He was going away and that they would have to stay behind for a while. They were so distraught that they became as little children: “Peter said unto him, Lord, why cannot I follow thee now? I will lay down my life for thy sake.” (John 13:37), “Thomas saith unto him, Lord, we know not whither thou goest; and how can we know the way?” (John 14:5), “Philip saith unto him, Lord, shew us the Father, and it sufficeth us.” (John 14:8), and “Judas saith unto him, not Iscariot, Lord, how is it that thou wilt manifest thyself unto us, and not unto the world?” (John 14:22). The Lord understood their “troubled” hearts! For relief, He instructed them and us to focus upon our belief “in God”, which includes Him. We should think about the Sovereign power of our God, the “great love” (Ephesians 2:4) that our Lord has for us, and the “eternal life, which God, that cannot lie, promised before the world began” (Titus 1:2). We should remember that this troubled world is not our home; for, we are but “strangers and pilgrims” here (Hebrews 11:3; I Peter 2:11), we are just passing through it. But, we do have a permanent Home; as the Lord told the Apostles, “In my Father’s house are many mansions” and He has prepared “a place” there for us! This blessed “place” is “an inheritance incorruptible, and undefiled, and that fadeth not away, reserved in heaven for you” (I Peter 1:4). On the day that our bodies cease to live, every one that was “chosen in” Jesus Christ “before the foundation of the world” (Ephesians 1:4) will immediately be with Him in that blessed place He calls “paradise” (Luke 23:43; II Corinthians 12:4; Revelation 2:7). And one blessed day, the Lord will surely “come again” and raise our bodies to life again and take us, in our Resurrected bodies, to be forever with Him (I Corinthians 15; I Thessalonians 4:13-18). When our troubles become so great that we feel too helpless to go forward, the Lord sends “the Comforter”, “the Holy Ghost”, (John 14:26) to comfort us, to remind us of these things, to help us, and to lift us up above our troubles for a season. To help us remember these things; let us sing, “O troubled heart, there is a home, Beyond the reach of toil and care” (W.H. Bellamy)!