Revealing Himself

[Jesus said,] “Those who accept my commandments and obey them are the ones who love me. And because they love me, my Father will love them. And I will love them and reveal myself to each of them.”

John 14:21

SOMETIMES THIS FAITH thing required of the Christian is so difficult. You can’t see Jesus. You can’t touch him. He’s not on the evening news. We feel as if we’ve heard the stories in the Bible a million times. In some ways, they can get old. We yearn for something different, something new.

Actually, every religion out there has stories, words of wisdom, promises. But not one of them has something like the last line of the verse above. Jesus says, I will “reveal myself to each of them.” What is this? Something to do with mystical apparitions?

No, it’s nothing like that. Every Christian receives a personal visitation from Jesus in his or her heart. There probably won’t be an actual voice. You probably won’t see him. But what this means is that Jesus will make himself real to you. If you believe in him, follow him, love him, his promise is that he won’t leave you in the dark. He won’t hang you out to dry on some “faith line” and expect you to believe without any inner assurance. No, if you trust him, he will reveal himself to you.

Jesus’ revelation will be different for each of us. But the promise is it will happen to those who love him.