The way, the truth, the life

14 “Don’t let your hearts be troubled,” Jesus continued. “Trust God—and trust me, too! ² There is plenty of room to stay in my father’s house. If that wasn’t the case, I’d have told you, wouldn’t I? I’m going to get a place ready for you! ³ And if I do go and get a place ready for you, I will come back and take you to be with me, so that you can be there, where I am. ⁴ And as to where I’m going—you know the way!”

⁵ “Actually, Master,” said Thomas to him, “we don’t know where you’re going, so how can we know the way?”

⁶ “I am the way,” replied Jesus, “and the truth and the life! Nobody comes to the father except through me. ⁷ If you had known me, you would have known my father. From now on you do know him! You have seen him.”

⁸ “Just show us the father, then, Master,” said Philip to Jesus, “and that’ll be good enough for us!”

⁹ “Have I been with you for such a long time, Philip,” replied Jesus, “and still you don’t know me? Anyone who has seen me has seen the father! How can you say, ‘Show us the father’? ¹⁰ Don’t you believe that I am in the father, and the father is in me? The words I’m speaking to you, I’m not speaking on my own initiative. It’s the father, who lives within me, who is doing his own works. ¹¹ You must trust me that I am in the father and the father is in me. If not, then trust because of all the things you’ve seen done.”

Another helper

¹² “I’m telling you the solemn truth,” Jesus continued. “Anyone who trusts in me will also do the works that I’m doing. In fact, they will do greater works than these, because I’m going to the father! ¹³ And whatever you ask in my name, I will do it, so that the father may be glorified in the son. ¹⁴ If you ask anything in my name, I will do it.

¹⁵ “If you love me,” he went on, “you will keep my commands. ¹⁶ Then I will ask the father, and he will give you another helper, to be with you forever. ¹⁷ This other helper is the spirit of truth. The world can’t receive him, because it doesn’t see him or know him. But you know him, because he lives with you, and will be in you.

¹⁸ “I’m not going to leave you bereft. I am coming to you. ¹⁹ Not long from now, the world won’t see me anymore; but you will see me. Because I live, you will live too. ²⁰ On that day you will know that I am in my father, and you in me, and I in you.

²¹ “Anyone who has my commandments and keeps them—that’s the person who loves me. Anyone who loves me will be loved by my father, and I will love them and show myself to them.”

My peace I give to you

²² Judas spoke up. (This was the other Judas, not Iscariot.)

“Master,” he said, “how will it be that you will show yourself to us and not to the world?”

²³ “If anyone loves me,” Jesus replied, “they will keep my word. My father will love them, and we will come to them and make our home with them. ²⁴ Anyone who doesn’t love me won’t keep my word. And the word which you hear isn’t mine. It comes from the father, who sent me.

²⁵ “I’ve said all this to you while I’m here with you. ²⁶ But the helper, the holy spirit, the one the father will send in my name, he will teach you everything. He will bring back to your mind everything I’ve said to you.

²⁷ “I’m leaving you peace. I’m giving you my own peace. I don’t give gifts in the way the world does. Don’t let your hearts be troubled; don’t be fearful. ²⁸ You heard that I said to you, ‘I’m going away, and I’m coming back to you.’ If you loved me, you would be happy that I’m going to the father—because the father is greater than me. ²⁹ And now I’ve told you before it happens, so that when it does happen, you may believe.

³⁰ “I haven’t got much more to say to you. The ruler of the world is coming. He has nothing to do with me. ³¹ But all this is happening so that the world may know that I love the father, and that I’m doing what the father has told me to do.

“Get up. Let’s be going.”