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Jesus spoke these words to the eleven disciples in the upper room on the eve of His crucifixion:
“Let not your hearts be troubled. Believe in God; believe also in me. In my Father’s house are many rooms. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you? And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, that where I am you may be also.” (John 14:1–3)
Judas had gone to do his evil work of betrayal. And the eleven disciples had heard Jesus say, “Yet a little while I am with you” (13:33). But they had not fully understood Him and were now “troubled.” These were disturbing days for the disciples, and Jesus could see their worried expressions.
He told them that in His Father’s house are “many rooms.” The King James Version expands the phrase to “mansions,” which sounds even better. It is a metaphor; literally, it is “dwelling places,” which suggests the idea of permanence. Jesus was going to prepare a place for His disciples to live forever.
Some think that this means that Jesus was going to His Father’s house (heaven) to get things ready for them. It is more likely, however, that Jesus was referring to His substitutionary death, burial, resurrection, and ascension. This was the preparation necessary to ensure a future residence in His Father’s house. If that is so, then Jesus’ saying that He will come again and receive them into His Father’s house is a reference to what happens when the disciples die rather than to the second coming.
What happens when a believer dies? It is an important question. Believers, when they die, are transported to another part of God’s created universe. Their souls, the conscious element of human existence, will awaken in another realm. Believers will be in the presence of the church triumphant, where angels and archangels and other creatures now reside.
The disciples could scarcely take it in, as we who now read these words can scarcely imagine the glory, the beauty, the presence of Christ. C.S. Lewis wrote in Mere Christianity, “If I find in myself a desire which no experience in this world can satisfy, the most probable explanation is that I was made for another world.” Knowing this to be true provides us with a resolve to persevere through all the trials of this world, knowing that this world is not our home. Christians were made for heaven, and ultimately, the new heavens and new earth (Isa. 65:17–19; 66:22; 2 Peter 3:13; Rev. 21:1–5).
Jesus gave this assurance to His disciples. He did not utter these words in the presence of Judas the betrayer. Nor are these words a promise to unbelievers. As sure as there is a heaven for believers, there is a hell for unbelievers. And no one made that clearer than Jesus Himself.