Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit · Sermon No. 2938
“Jesus said unto him, I am the way.” John 14:6.
IT is coming on dark and we are lost among the mountains. There is an awful precipice there, a quarter of a mile straight down. There is a bog over yonder and if a man once gets into it, he will never get out again. There is a forest yonder and if one should be lost in its tangled paths, he will certainly not find his way out till the rising of the sun. What do we need just now? Why, we need someone who will tell us the way! Our friend the philosopher, with whom we talked half-an-hour ago, was very valuable to us, then, and gave us a great deal of information. But, as he does not happen to know the way, we would sooner have the poorest peasant lad that feeds the sheep upon the hills for a companion than that man. The classic scholar, who has been repeating to us some admirable lines from Horace and delighting us with an admirable quotation from Virgil, did very well, indeed, for us while we could see our path and had hope of reaching our home by nightfall. But now the poorest lass with uncombed hair who can just point the way to the cottage where we may rest tonight will be of more value to us. What we need is to know the way!
This is just the case, dear Friends, with poor fallen humanity. The need of mankind is not the refined lecture of the learned, nor the acute discussion of the debater—we simply need someone, be it a lad or be it a lass, to show us the way! And the most precious person you and I have seen, or ever shall see, will be the person who shall be blessed and honored of God to us to say, “Behold the way to God, to life, to salvation and to Heaven.” I shall not need, then, to offer any apology for coming out again to show the way. There are many here who are lost and there are some upon whom the shades of night are falling. Their hair is gray, they pant as they walk and rest upon their staff for the support of their tottering legs. Their case is dangerous and when they cannot, of themselves, discover the pathway, surely they will heed any voice, however hoarse, from any person, however rough he may be, if they may but discover what is the way to eternal life!
Travelling some time ago, the coachman, when it was getting nearly dark, informed us that he had never been on that road before—and one can hardly tell how pleased we were to see a signpost. Now, a signpost is not a very interesting thing—there is nothing very poetical about it. It may be questionable whether it decorates the road as it sticks out an arm with only a word or two written on it, but, toward night, when neither the driver nor you know the way, it is about the most pleasant thing you can greet! I shall stand here tonight as a simple signpost. The words may be dry, but it shall be enough for you if they do but show you the way! Mr. Jay tells us that on one occasion, when riding on the mail-coach to Bath, he asked a great many questions of the coachman. He asked, “Whose seat is that? What squire owns that fine lawn? And what gentleman is the squire of yonder parish?” To all which questions the driver only answered. “I don’t know. I don’t know.” At last, Mr. Jay said to him, “Well, what do you know?” “Why,” he said, “I know how to drive you to Bath.” Well, now, I pretend to no greater knowledge than this—I do know the way to Heaven and I do hope I shall be able to tell it to you so plainly and so simply that some here who are lost as in a wild forest may see the path and, by the Grace of God, be enabled to run in it!
I. First of all, then, let us notice THE EXCLUSIVENESS OF OUR TEXT—“I am the way.”
Christ declares that He, and only He, is the way to peace with God, to pardon, to righteousness and to Heaven! Falsehood may tolerate falsehood, but truth never can. Two lies can live in the same house and never quarrel. But truth cannot bear a lie even though it should be in the highest part of the attic! Truth has sworn war to the knife against
falsehood and hence it never knows what it is to admit that its contrary can shake hands with itself. The Hindu meets the Muslim and he says, “No doubt you are sincere as well as we are, and you and we shall at last meet in the right place.” They would salute the Christian, too, and say the same to him, but it is a necessity, if our religion is true, that it should denounce every other and that it should say unto those who know not Christ, “Other foundation can no man lay than that is laid, which is Jesus Christ.” Yes, it goes still further and pronounces its anathema upon those who pretend to any other way! “Though we or an angel from Heaven preach any other Gospel than that which you have received, let him be accursed.” I simply mention certain other ways to assure you, in God’s name, that there are roads which lead to Hell and that none of them can bring you to Heaven—for there is only one way by which the soul can came to God and find eternal life—and that way is Christ!