Jesus said to him, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life; no one comes to the Father but through Me.” (John 14:6)

“Life,” the word, occurs 47 times in the Gospel According to John, more than the other three gospel accounts combined. When John (quoting Jesus) uses that term, he is not just thinking of the animation of moving, biological entities. Rather, he conveys the sense of aliveness with the Spirit of God animating us fully to be what God has created us to be, namely, His image bearers. On the sixth day of creation, “The Lord God formed man of dust from the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living being” (Gen 2:7). That is life, the energizing of a biological entity with the Spirit of God.

Enter sin through disobedience in the Garden, and our first fore-parents died (Gen 1:17). Satan would have us to believe otherwise (Gen 3:4), but the human race died spiritually, being separated from the life of and relationship with God. Physically, they continued on until their earthly death (separation from physical life), but they lived a life of death from their disobedience on.

Enter Jesus Christ, who came as “the Life.” John prologues this to us, when he writes, “In Him was life, and the life was the Light of men” (John 1:4). He quotes Jesus Himself, saying, “The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I came that they may have life, and have it abundantly” (John 10:10). What a contrast with the religious leaders of that day, whose influence toward godliness was motivated by self-interest and disregard for the true needs of others. Jesus spoke in extremely harsh but poignant terms.

Yet, He offered life to all who would believe in Him. At the death of her brother Lazarus, Jesus said to Martha: “I am the resurrection and the life; he who believes in Me will live even if he dies, and everyone who lives and believes in Me will never die. Do you believe this?” (John 11:25–26). This remains the question today: Do we believe this? As believers, we trust what Jesus said in the Upper Room, “This is eternal life, that they may know You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom You have sent” (John 17:3).

And we need to trust Him continuously as our life, and not fall back into thinking that we need what the world offers in order to experience life. He is the only life we need, because He is life. Knowing Him is life. Knowing eternal life is knowing Him. That is why Christians through the ages have been willing to die for Christ, because He is greater than our life.

Lord, as an ancient poet wrote, I confess that in You, I “live and move and have [my] being” (Acts 17:28). I can do nothing apart from You, Lord.