The Place Jesus Prepared for You

This was one of many “God winks” that I will always treasure. As an undergraduate student, I had experienced severe health issues and was forced to move back home from college. I was very low emotionally during that time and really needed encouragement from the Lord. One evening, I was reading John 14 and meditating on verses 1 through 3. My mom had been in another room reading a daily devotional she had purchased at a yard sale. She felt prompted to show me one of the Scriptures because it had really encouraged her. Which one? Yep, you guessed it! It was John 14:1-3.

“Do not let your heart be troubled; believe in God, believe also in Me. In My Father’s house are many rooms; if that were not so, I would have told you, because I am going there to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I am coming again and will take you to Myself, so that where I am, there you also will be.” (NASB)

Jesus was clearly speaking to my mom and me through His Word, just as He had spoken those same words to His disciples. During the time of my illness at home, I had experienced a lot of torment concerning salvation and whether I was truly born again. I was feeling defeated because of all the health issues and lack of victory in my life. The Holy Spirit was breathing life through those verses and highlighting that Jesus had prepared a place especially for me with the Father.

God reminded me that I could trust I was His child because I believed in His Son, Jesus. He desired that I would stop allowing my heart to be troubled about salvation and, instead, to rest in the work Jesus had finished. Jesus was seated at the right hand of the Father and had seated me with Him. I could find assurance in what He had done and be secure in the Father, the same way He was while on earth.

John the Apostle went to great lengths in his writing to show us that the Father was Jesus’ constant focus. Jesus mentioned His Father 23 times in John 14—and over 90 times in the Gospel of John. To have seen Jesus was to have seen the Father (John 14:9). Jesus was the only way to Him (John 14:6). I had been living like a spiritual orphan by worrying about whether or not I was His child, allowing my heart to be troubled. But God longed for me to sense His pleasure as one of His sons and to stop allowing fear to distort my standing with Him.

Now when I read this passage, I am renewed in what Jesus did, remembering that He prepared a place for us with Him forever. Fresh hope is released in His promise of continuous relationship—with Him here on earth, as well as for all eternity in His presence. Jesus has prepared the way because He is the Way. By believing in Him, we are guaranteed to partake of what He has already prepared for us.

May our Father renew you today in the joy of being His child. May your heart abound with hope in what He has prepared for you—both here and in heaven.

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Scripture quotations are taken from The New American Standard Bible^®, Copyright © 1960, 1962, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1977, 1995 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission.