John 14:6. Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, and the truth, and the life: no one cometh unto the Father but through me. The three terms here used must not be taken as expressing three independent thoughts; still less can we fuse them into one, as if the meaning were, ‘I am the true way of life.' It is evident, both from what precedes and from what follows, that the emphasis is on ‘way,' and that the two other terms are in some sense additional and explicative. But in what sense? Let us notice that the thought of the Father is the leading thought of the previous verses of the chapter, and that in John 14:7 the knowledge of the Father is the great end to be attained; let us further observe that truth and ‘life' are precisely the two constituent elements of that knowledge, the one that upon which it rests, the other that in which it issues; and we shall see that Jesus adds these two designations of Himself to the first, because they express the contents, the substance, of that in which the ‘way' consists. The Father is ‘the truth,' ‘the life:' Jesus is the revelation of these to men: because He is so He is ‘the way;' and because He only is so, He is the only way to the Father. We must beware, however, of the supposition that the ‘life ‘thus spoken of is only life to us in a future world. It is life now in that ever-ascending cycle of experience in which the believer passes from one stage to another of ‘truth,' and thus from one stage to another of corresponding ‘life.' In the present ‘way' we have present ‘truth' and present ‘life;' and each fresh appropriation of the truth deepens that communion by which the life is conditioned. It may be well to notice, too, that the prominence here given to the mention of the ‘way' arises from that thought of separation with which the minds of the disciples were filled. Jesus had said to them, ‘I must go away,' and it seemed to them as if in the language a journey were involved, which would separate them from their Lord. Therefore with loving condescension the figure is taken up, and they are assured that He is Himself, if we may so speak, this very distance to be traversed. Is it a ‘way' that they have to travel? Then He is ‘the way,' and all along its course they shall be still with Him. Hence also the following verse.

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Old Testament