The great American humorist, Will Rogers, had the reputation that he could make anyone laugh. President Calvin Coolidge, on the other hand, had the reputation that he never laughed. Want to know what happened the time those two met? Rogers was invited to visit the White House and as was the custom, the president's assistant brought Rogers into the Oval Office. As was the custom as he entered, the assistant said, "President Coolidge, this is Will Rogers. Mr. Rogers, this is President Coolidge." To which Rogers leaned forward and said, "I'm sorry. I didn't catch the name." With that, President Coolidge cracked up and started laughing.

Don't you wish you were as quick on your feet as he was? Quick with a comeback, quick with just the right thing to say. Well, of all the things that Jesus said, some of the most significant are the words in today's Gospel reading, when Jesus says, "I am the way and the truth and the life." There is an absolute nature to those words, isn't there? There is completeness to that saying. Perhaps that's why they are so powerful and so controversial as well. For among all the words that Jesus spoke, these are also some of the most debated. Notice — Jesus did not say, "I am one of the ways." He did not say, "I am one of the truths among others." He did not say, "I am a life among many others." No, he said, "I am the way and the truth and the life."

The great Catholic theologian, Thomas à Kempis, caught the meaning of Jesus' words and said this about them, "Without the way, there is no going; without the truth, there is no knowing; and without the life, there is no living. For Jesus said, ‘I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except by me.' "

This passage from chapter 14 of John is part of a great discourse, a body of teaching material that Jesus spoke to the disciples in the upper room. The end of his earthly ministry approaching, the cross looming before him, Jesus gathered his disciples around him and to help them understand his life and work, his approaching death and resurrection, he spoke to them these words, which include him saying, "I am the way and the truth and the life."

Let us pause a few moments this morning in our busy lives to give these words some thought. Let us take a few minutes today to pull them apart and examine them more closely for in them there is a great blessing. In them there is eternal meaning and truth.

Jesus begins by saying, "I am the way." When God created us, he didn't put us permanently in a set of revolving doors, like those that go around and around in the front of big buildings. Even though life may at times seem to be just going in circles, even though there are those who say that life is one cycle after another and that everything that comes around goes around, and even though there are theories about life that say that life is one reincarnation after another, Jesus does not say that. God has created us with a purpose. Life has a goal to it. We are created to travel through life toward an end. And the way to that end, Jesus says today, is through him.

We don't find the way by wandering. We don't stumble across it by gosh and by golly. It's not enough to live life by just doing it. There is a way. And Jesus tells us today it is through him that we find the way. The safest, most secure, most dependable way through life is by Christ. That's why Jesus says, "I am the way."

If we want to find our way to the place God has created for us, we must follow Christ. For Jesus leads us to God. The apostle Philip learned that. After Thomas had questioned Jesus on where he was going, Philip came to Jesus and said, "Lord, show us the Father and we will be satisfied." Show us God, Philip asked. Help us understand who God is and that will be enough for us to understand where you are leading.

And to that request, Jesus responded by saying, "Have I been with you all this time, Philip, and still you do not know me? Whoever has seen me has seen the Father." Imagine that! When Jesus says, "I am the way," he tells us that he is the way to know God. "Whoever has seen me has seen the Father." God need not be a mystery to us. If you know me, Jesus says, you know the Father.

So let's see what we know about Jesus. First of all, we know that Jesus is love. No one would dare argue against that. When we see Jesus, we see love in action. We see love reaching out a hand of care. We see love healing the leper, accepting the outcast, rebuking the hate-filled. We see love restoring the fallen, welcoming the prodigal, freeing the captive, and giving new life to all. Remember what Jesus said to the disciples of John the Baptist when they came to him asking if he was the Messiah, sent by God? In Matthew the eleventh chapter, Jesus says, "Go tell John what you see and hear: the blind receive their sight, the lame walk, those who have leprosy are cured, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and good news is preached to the poor." There is no doubt about it — when we look at Jesus, we see love in action.

Jesus' words, then, are an invitation to know God as well as an example of how to live our lives. They are intended to invite us to draw closer to God as well as give us a model to pattern our lives after. In fact, in verse 12, that's exactly what Jesus says. "Very truly I tell you, the one who believes in me will also do the works that I do." Again in chapter 15 of John, Jesus repeats this saying, "This command I leave with you: that you should love one another as I have loved you."

It is important to remember that for Jesus, love was not primarily a feeling. For Jesus, love was much more concrete than that. That's why Jesus said, "You are my friends, when you do what I command." For Jesus, love was expressed in actions. Love was the words and deeds of our lives, our attitudes and actions toward others. The path through life to the place where God has created for us is found through love — love for God and love for one another.

Now, we are not only travelers through life, we are also called to be learners, and for that reason, Jesus went on to say, "I am the truth." We are created for the truth, and seeking and living the truth is what we are called to do. However, when you think about it, it is rather ironic. While more books have been written about Jesus than about any other person who ever lived, Jesus never wrote a book. He didn't sit down and write about the truth or anything like that. In fact, there is only one instance in the gospels when Jesus wrote anything and that was in the dust at his feet and we have no record of what he wrote.

But that's okay. Because instead of writing about the truth, Jesus lived it. His life was a witness to the truth. And the truth of his life is seen through the eyes of the blind man who now sees. The truth of his life is seen in the leper who returned to give thanks, the dancing feet of the lame made well, and the dead now raised to life. For Jesus is truth in the flesh — truth incarnate — truth able to say, "If anyone sees me, they see the Father."

For when we look at Jesus, we see the truth about God. We learn that, first and foremost, God is love. It is God's nature to love. It is God's nature to show mercy. It is God's nature to forgive and accept the outcast, welcome home the prodigal. In Christ, we see the very nature of God whose love for us is unearned, unwarranted, and most unexpected. And when we look at Jesus, we learn the truth about the life God wants us to live. We, too, are to love, to forgive, to show mercy, and welcome each other, and in doing so, be part of the truth about God.

The New Testament puts it another way in 1 John 4:7, when John writes, "Dear friends, let us love one another for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God." He also says, "If anyone says, I love God, and yet hates his brother or sister, he is a liar. For anyone who does not love his brother or sister, whom he has seen, cannot love God whom he has not seen."

When we look at Jesus, we also see the truth about ourselves. Maybe that's why it's so hard to look at Jesus sometimes, because when we look at Jesus, we see ourselves — the ugliness of our lives, the sinfulness of our thoughts and deeds, the blemishes of selfishness and pride, and our failure to love. When Jesus says, "I am the truth," he confronts us with our failures to forgive, our refusals to show mercy, and our self-righteousness pride that puts others down.

That is why it is so important that Jesus not only say, "I am the way and the truth" but also say, "I am the life." For without Jesus, there is no life in us. Left to our own, judged by our own thoughts and deeds, there is no hope for us. And, in fact, that, too, is the message of scripture, isn't it? How does Paul put it? "All have sinned and fallen short of God's glory." And "The wages of sin is death." Without Jesus there is no life.

That's why these words are so sweet to our ears because Jesus also says, "I am the life. No one comes to the Father except by me." These words remind us that Jesus is our life. Rather than get bogged down in a discussion on the exclusivity of Christianity and the exclusive nature of these words; rather than engage in a the old argument about who is and who is not saved, these words of Jesus are meant as gospel to us. They are Jesus' invitation to us to come to him, to receive in him the gift of life that God created for us.

In his book, The Magic of Believing, Charles Allen says just that. As a newspaper reporter, Allen covered a lot of stories and as he covered those stories and met a lot of people, he began to ask himself what the tangible difference between people really was. In hospitals he saw some people die while others get well. He watched some football teams win while others lost. He studied the lives of great men and women in all lines of human endeavor. And after years of study, he wrote this book in which he said, "Gradually, I discovered that there is a golden thread that runs through Jesus' words that makes them work for those who sincerely accept and apply them. And this golden thread can be named in a single word: faith."

It is faith that brings God's blessings to life for us. It is faith that puts us on the path that leads to God. It is faith that enables us to see the truth about our lives and to embrace the truth about God. And it is faith that brings God's gift of life to us. Faith comes from trusting in Jesus' word, following his example, and living with God. And with all deference to Charles Allen, it is not magic nor is it a secret.

Because Jesus tells us plainly, "I am the way and the truth and the life." Throughout John's gospel this has been the theme. In Jesus, we have life. In fact, in the very beginning of his gospel that's what John tells us, He writes, "In the beginning was the Word ... and in him was life and the life was the light of men." And again at the end of his gospel, John says that same thing. "These things are written that you may have life in his name."

That is God's promise to us. In Jesus, we have the way and the truth and the life that God creates us to be. In Jesus, we find the blessing that God has ready for us. In Jesus, we find the power for living and the essence of life itself. That's why he tells us. "I am the way and the truth and the life." In Jesus' name. Amen.