Jesus begins a series of heart lessons. As previously noted in this series, He is saying things He knows their hearts will recognize and will absorb, and store in their souls for use later. The only drama here is the vast gulf between the otherworldly nature of the message and the very worldly track on which their brains are locked. John remembers these things in part because he was likely young enough to have spent less time chasing down those false tracks.
Jesus begins to steer them off that false track. He mentions His Father’s household, something that should register with them as a synonym for Heaven. He says He is going to spend time in Heaven establishing residences for them. The imagery here is rather like the royal heir returning to the royal palace and building onto it lavish apartments for His personal staff. Then, when they come along later, He would meet them and show them to their new homes. This is what He meant by going away for awhile. He was going ahead of them to prepare their eternal homes.
Surely they understood all this? He affirmed that they did know where He was going, and that they also knew how to get there.
Thomas was clearly not listening. He was so far down the wrong tracks that his questions came off obtuse. Jesus tried to call him back, to help him switch to the right track. He said that He was the way to the destination. All they had to do was pick up where He was leaving off. The only way to be welcomed in the Kingdom of Heaven was to take up the ministry Jesus began. “Do you know me, Thomas? Then you know as much about the Father as you possibly can know.” However much they had experienced with Jesus up to this point was enough of a clue.
Philip wasn’t listening any better than Thomas. “Just show us the Father and we can take it from there.” Jesus reminded Philip that anything He could put before their eyes now would hardly provide more than they had already seen. Having followed Him around during these past few years was all they were going to see of the Father for now. Did Philip not recognize what he had been seeing all this time?
Was Jesus not the Son of God, the sole Heir to the Throne of Heaven? How different would the words and actions be if the Father Himself had said and done them? All of this was a perfect manifestation of the Father’s will. If Philip couldn’t see it in that light, then maybe he could at least get there just recognizing that the miracles were the finger of God. Had not Philip himself performed some of those miracles?
The Pharisees had been careful to maintain the external impression of the Hebrew lifestyle, claiming to eschew the Hellenist culture. However, they had absorbed the intellectual processes of the Greeks, particularly the logical assumptions. This had begun leaking into the Jewish society at large. They had completely lost the heart-led understanding, reducing everything to abstract logic. Thus, the divine was pulled down to the human level, while the actuality of a higher realm of existence was pushed off into spooky mental territory. They claimed to understand everything via human intellect, but understood nothing that hearts alone could grasp. Lacking the power of the heart, their convictions became hidden away and they had only legalistic concrete doctrine to guide them.
The disciples had been inflicted with some of this, and they were largely unable to pull their heads out of it. It would require a powerful miracle to set them free.
