Fifth Sunday after Easter – Year A

May 3, 2026

Gospel Lectionary Text

John 14:1-14

14:1 "Do not let your hearts be troubled. Believe in God, believe also in me.

14:2 In my Father's house there are many dwelling places. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you?

14:3 And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, so that where I am, there you may be also.

14:4 And you know the way to the place where I am going."

14:5 Thomas said to him, "Lord, we do not know where you are going. How can we know the way?"

14:6 Jesus said to him, "I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.

14:7 If you know me, you will know my Father also. From now on you do know him and have seen him."

14:8 Philip said to him, "Lord, show us the Father, and we will be satisfied."

14:9 Jesus said to him, "Have I been with you all this time, Philip, and you still do not know me? Whoever has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say, 'Show us the Father'?

14:10 Do you not believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in me? The words that I say to you I do not speak on my own; but the Father who dwells in me does his works.

14:11 Believe me that I am in the Father and the Father is in me; but if you do not, then believe me because of the works themselves.

14:12 Very truly, I tell you, the one who believes in me will also do the works that I do and, in fact, will do greater works than these, because I am going to the Father.

14:13 I will do whatever you ask in my name, so that the Father may be glorified in the Son.

14:14 If in my name you ask me for anything, I will do it."

Context

Welcome to the Fifth Sunday after Easter. In this week’s text, Jesus promises the disciples that they will dwell with God. He assures them that there are plenty of rooms and that they already know the way. And the One who awaits them is the spitting image of Jesus.

Jesus makes it clear that he is not just a messenger of God, but the criterion of God — the very standard by which God is known. To see Jesus is to see the Father. He says this to calm their troubled hearts.

This matters because the disciples had inherited more than one image of God. Sometimes loving and merciful, sometimes angry and wrathful. They were familiar with both faces of God. And after hearing more than 1,000 verses describing God’s own violent acts of punishment, along with over 100 passages commanding violence, not to mention the terrifying command to Abraham to sacrifice his son Isaac, they may well have wondered which God would greet them at the door of their promised dwelling.

So, if Jesus really is the true and trustworthy image of God, then the disciples can relax, and so can we. We can enter God’s presence with nothing to fear, in full confidence that we belong.

So, do not let your hearts be troubled. Grace and mercy are not only the truth and the life of God, but the way to God. When we are fully inducted into this “way” — the way of One in whom there is no violence, who is in rivalry with nothing — we may find ourselves doing things we never thought possible… including wanting what God wants.

Question

Last week Jesus claimed to be the gateway of mercy. This week, he says he is the way, the truth, and the life. What would it mean to come to the Father through the way of mercy instead of the way of sacrifice?

Reflections

Hope is the Way

By Trisha Welstad | May 5, 2023

John 14 reveals Jesus’ masterful ability to hold loss and hope together. As he comforts His disciples and calls them forward, he shares profound truths with them and speaks about what lies ahead.

By Ojii BaBa Madi | May 8, 2020

As fearful and terrorizing as it may be, the transfiguration causes me to long for a glimpse of the illuminated face of Christ and especially the body we have esteemed as most unlovable and unlikable. I pray that in meeting with such a vision, I will not be derailed, busying myself with building tabernacles, places...

By Ojii BaBa Madi | May 12, 2017

With a quick glance at Taina's bushy hair, one knew they had entered a wholly unique experience. As other students sat awkwardly on secondhand office chairs, Taina perched herself high against the opposition, sitting like an 8th Street Queen, atop one of the secondhand computer desks. The African, the Arawak, and the Taino all met...

By Kris Rocke | May 16, 2014

"Jesus said to him, "I am the way and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me."

Girardian Lectionary Weekly Reflection:

Understanding the Bible anew through the Mimetic Theory of René Girard.

Poetry

Thirst
by Mary Oliver

Another morning and I wake with thirst
for the goodness I do not have. I walk
out to the pond and all the way God has
given us such beautiful lessons. Oh Lord,
I was never a quick scholar but sulked
and hunched over my books past the hour
and the bell; grant me, in your mercy,
a little more time. Love for the earth
and love for you are having such a long
conversation in my heart. Who knows what
will finally happen or where I will be sent,
yet already I have given a great many things
away, expecting to be told to pack nothing,
except the prayers which, with this thirst,
I am slowly learning.

Prayer

Gracious God, grant us the gift of undergoing your love and the love of each other, discovering ourselves liked by the One in whom there is no violence and who is in rivalry with nothing, not even death. May that love relax our need to be right and instead make us real.

We pray this in the name of the Father who is for us, the Son who is with us, and the Spirit who unites us all in the never-ending dance of Love.

Amen.

Fourth Sunday after Easter – Year A

Sixth Sunday after Easter – Year A