You may already know the context I’m referring to. It’s John 14:2, where Jesus said in the KJV,
“In my Father’s house are many mansions. . . . I go to prepare a place for you.”
Now, I’ve got some lyrics for you to skim ever so briefly. Just to get the feel of them, mind you. Here goes.
Mansion Over the Hilltop (Ira Stanphill, 1949)
I’m satisfied with just a cottage below
A little silver and a little gold
But in that city where the ransomed will shine
I want a gold one that’s silver lined
I’ve got a mansion just over the hilltop
In that bright land where we’ll never grow old
And some day yonder we will never more wander
But walk on streets that are purest gold
Don’t think me poor or deserted or lonely
I’m not discouraged I’m heaven bound
I’m but a pilgrim in search of the city
I want a mansion, a harp and a crown
I’ve got a mansion just over the hilltop
In that bright land where we’ll never grow old
And some day yonder we will never more wander
But walk on streets that are of purest gold
Mansion Builder (2nd chapter of Acts, 1978)
I’ve been told that there are those who will learn how to fly
And I’ve been told that there are those who will never die
And I’ve been told that there are stars that will never lose their shine
And that there is a morning star who knows my mind
So why should I worry? Why should I fret?
‘Cause I’ve got a Mansion Builder
Who ain’t through with me yet
Why should I worry? Why should I fret?
‘Cause I’ve got a Mansion Builder
Who ain’t through with me yet
And I’ve been told that there’s a crystal lake in the sky
And every tear from my eyes are saved when I cry
And I’ve been told there’ll come a time when the sun will cease to shine
And that there is a morning star who knows my mind
So why should I worry? Why should I fret?
‘Cause I’ve got a Mansion Builder
Who ain’t through with me yet
Why should I worry? Why should I fret?
‘Cause I’ve got a Mansion Builder
Who ain’t through with me yet
A Mansion, a Robe and a Crown (Praise & Harmony, 2020)
I’m gonna trade my earthly home for a better one, bright and fair
Christ left to prepare a mansion for His children in the air
I’ll join Him in that land where tears nor sorrows can be found
And I’ll receive my mansion, robe, and crown
Mansion, robe, and a crown (in Glory)
There love’ll always abound (forever)
Let me Your throne surround
Lord, please reserve my mansion, robe, and crown
The weather there is always fair there is sunshine day and night
No cold nor rain will fall there for the sun shines ever bright
I’ll need no heavy garments I’ll just wrap my robe around
When I receive my mansion, robe, and crown
Mansion, robe, and a crown (in Glory)
There love’ll always abound (forever)
Let me Your throne surround
Lord, please reserve my mansion, robe, and crown
My head is bowed and bloody from the work I’ve tried to do
But one day I’ll be rewarded with a crown so bright and new
I’ll wear a smile so bright for there’ll be no cause for a frown
When I receive my mansion, robe, and crown
Mansion, robe, and a crown (in Glory)
There love’ll always abound (forever)
Let me Your throne surround
Lord, please reserve my mansion, robe, and crown
Mansion, robe, and a crown (in Glory)
There love’ll always abound (forever)
Let me Your throne surround
Lord, please reserve my mansion, robe, and crown
Lord, please reserve my mansion, robe, and crown
Mansion for Me (Skaggs and Rice, 1980)
There’s folks building homes as sweet as can be
They’re levelling their yards and planting their trees
But my little hut I’ll just let it be
Lord Jesus is building a mansion for me
A mansion for me (a mansion for me)
A mansion for me (a mansion for me)
Built by my Lord beyond Calvary
But my little hut I’ll just let it be
Lord Jesus is building a mansion for me
Each day I am getting more ready to go
He’s cleansing my sins more whiter than snow
I’m packing my troubles I’m bound with his love
Get ready to move to Heaven above
To you who have homes in this world below
Driving fine cars wherever you go
There’s coming a time when we’ll all pass away
Get ready to move with me on that day
A mansion for me (a mansion for me)
A mansion for me (a mansion for me)
Built by my Lord beyond Calvary
But my little hut I’ll just let it be
Lord Jesus is building a mansion for me
Okay, whew, done with that.
The “mansion” theme has been around in Christian music for a long time, longer than 100 years. I could have given you several more song lyrics. And to be specific, I’m talking about lyrics that directly teach the theme of “I may just be scraping by down here, but one day in glory I’ll be strutting like a peacock showing off my mansion!”
Ugh.
Covetousness or rooms or what?
Back in college, I used to sing “Mansion Over the Hilltop” with as much gusto as anyone, but I think a few of us chuckled at the song’s blatant covetousness.
Sigh.
If you’ve been in church for a while, you may have heard that the word “mansion” really means “rooms.” Some newer translations of the Bible have translated it that way (though the “mansion” imagery has certainly stuck in the Christian mind.) In ancient times, the patriarch of the family wouldn’t build a separate mansion for family members the way we think of them now. As the family expanded, he would add rooms to his house for all the new family members.
At least that’s the way I’ve heard it preached. So that helped some.
But recently I heard something that helped even more. Like, way more. So much I wanted to dig into the meanings of the words and get to the root of this passage.
And it fit with everything I’d already been understanding.
This is not about having your own mansion in heaven, or even your own room.
This is about relationship.
As I looked up these songs about mansions, I thought of many people I know who would say, “I don’t really care where I live in heaven. Do I have to live in a particular place in heaven? What I really want is a genuine relationship with God. And I want it right now, I don’t want to have to wait for it.”
So I spent some time in John 14. And as of now (when I’m today years old), I don’t think John 14:2 is even about heaven at all.
Yes, you read that right. I don’t think it’s about heaven at all, in the way we traditionally think of it.
When I studied John 14:2, looking at the words and the context, I saw this:
That Greek word translated “house” – “in my Father’s house” – can mean a building, yes. But it can also mean “household,” that is, the family group. In Matthew 12:25, for example, Jesus said,
Every kingdom divided against itself is brought to desolation;
and every city or house divided against itself shall not stand.
Of course here He wasn’t talking about the physical building. He was talking about the family.
So let’s try this.
“In my Father’s household—His family—you’ll find . . .”
Many mansions?
Many rooms?
About “many” and “mansions”
That word translated “many” can also have a different meaning, as we see in Matt 9:37, when Jesus said to His disciples,
“The harvest [of souls] is indeed plentiful/abundant/rich/great/vast /bigger than you can imagine.”
Different versions of the Bible use those different words to translate the same word translated “many” in John 14:1.
Before we apply that new thought, let’s look again at that Greek word translated “mansions.” That Greek word is used only one other place in the New Testament. And, interestingly, it’s in this very same chapter of John, verse 23. Jesus said,
“If anyone loves me, he will keep my word,
and my Father will love him,
and we will come to him and make our home with him.”
That’s the ESV. Other versions use “dwell” or “make our abode.” Both of these also have the sense of “home.”
A genuine “home” is a place of shalom. Peace, safety, protection, love, and kindness.
(I know so many abuse survivors who thought that was what they were signing up for when they got married. But I digress.)
Having your own gigantic mansion—when you’re the only one living there—can be crushingly lonely. You can “have your own room” in a house when you’re just renting. It doesn’t imply one way or another whether you’re part of the family or just being tolerated.
But what if we think of it this way:
Not about heaven. Let’s wipe that away for a minute to explore other possibilities.
I’m combining the thoughts of John 14:2 with John 14:23.
“In My Father’s family, there is so much room
for you to be at home. . . .
If you love me and treasure the truth I communicate to you,
then My Father and I will love you, and you’ll have a home with us.
In fact, we’ll come to you and make our home with you.”
What about “I go to prepare a place for you”?
Why did Jesus say, “I go to prepare a place for you?” Doesn’t this imply that He was going back to heaven to build and prepare this place, whatever it was, for us to receive when we finally die and go to heaven?
No, again, I still don’t think this is about heaven. I’m offering that there’s an entirely different way to think about this.
Remember, this was the last supper Jesus had with His disciples. He had told them He was going to leave them, and they were confused, sad, and scared.
Jesus wasn’t assuring them that eventually they would have a place to live in heaven. He was talking about the work He was going to do immediately.
Jesus completed His sacrificial work when He died on the cross. Then He had to rise again, ascend, and be seated.
“I go to prepare a place for you . . .”
Now that we have the entire New Testament and can read these words through the lens of Ephesians 2:6, I believe Jesus was saying, “When I am ascended and seated, then you will be seated with me in the heavenlies.”
And it wasn’t just about sitting down because He was all done. And it wasn’t about us getting to sit in the same chair.
It was about a change of status. It was about going from followers/disciples to sons and daughters.
And look at that, this word “place” can also be used to reference “position” or “status.” Here is Luke 14:7-11.
7 Now [Jesus] told a parable to those who were invited,
when he noticed how they chose the places of honor, saying to them,
8 “When you are invited by someone to a wedding feast, do not sit down in a place of honor,
lest someone more distinguished than you be invited by him,
9 and he who invited you both will come and say to you,
‘Give your place to this person,’ and then you will begin with shame to take the lowest place.
10 But when you are invited, go and sit in the lowest place,
so that when your host comes he may say to you, ‘Friend, move up higher.’
Then you will be honored in the presence of all who sit at table with you.
11 For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted.”
Now look at John 14 verse 3.
“If I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, that where I am you may be also.”
When you read it through the lens of relationship, you’ll see.
I will go and prepare a place for you . . . in my Father’s family
Then I will come again . . . through the Holy Spirit, who is coming in power in just a few weeks
and will receive you to myself . . .
This doesn’t have to mean at death or at the return of the Lord. Look at Colossians 2:6.
“As ye have therefore received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk ye in him, Rooted and built up in him, and stablished in the faith.”
So that where I am, you may be also – Where was Jesus after He ascended? We might naturally think, “In heaven.” But what about this? The Apostle John, who was leaning on Jesus’ breast that night, said this (John 1:18) about where Jesus was and is:
The only begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, He hath declared Him.
In the bosom of the Father. That’s where we’re being invited to. Even right now.
Belonging. At home. Well loved. This is a hint of what He said outright in verse 23:
We will come to him and make our home with him.
A completely different way to look at it
So then, this whole chapter—verse 2 included—is not about heavenly real estate. It’s not about huge beautiful buildings or square footage or even rooms added on to a patriarchal house.
It’s about the Father’s family. It’s about the abundance of welcome. It’s about Jesus preparing, through His finished work, a place of belonging for His people—right now. A home with Him. A home in Him. A home where the Father and the Son draw near and make their dwelling with us.
For anyone who has longed for genuine loving relationship more than earthly reward, this is very good news.
There is a place for you in the Father’s family.
A place to belong.
A place to be loved.
A place to be at home.
Jesus welcoming children into His Father’s family
*****
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Very well thought out, we are part of Gods family, we don’t have to wait for heaven to know He is with us! We can depend on Him today as His children❤️
Yes, amen.
Love this. Makes a lot of sense because it puts the focus where it belongs.
Yeah, those songs were missing the point. A good relationship with God is the difference between Heaven and Hell. Eternity without God would be Hell even if it involved a lovely house and no physical torture.
Yes, missing the point is a great way to put it. Living in a mansion alone? I can’t imagine much of anything more lonely than that.
Beautiful I love this way of thinking!
Thank you for this, Rebecca. This spoke to me in a way I’m sure is at least partially not how you you intended, but we’ve both seen God speak the same words and different people receive it slightly differently based on what they’ve been through or what they’re feeling at the time. I’ve been looking at a particular situation from what I see happening here, but not from God’s perspective. I think I might now be able to release the feelings of unfairness and not being accepted or acknowledged, and focus on the fact that God loves and acknowledges me as His daughter, regardless of the behavior of others. Therefore, when these “others” I’m speaking of make me feel unseen in any positive way or like a gnats they want to flick away because they think they’re better than me, I can not care so much, because God says different things about my value and worth. I have been battling this situation for over a year now, primarily at work, but it bleeds over into other areas of my life because those feelings of inadequacy and worthlessness stick in your mind and permeate your thoughts, emotions, and life. Because of reading this, I believe I can use this to not only stop focusing on how these earthly people make me feel and remember that I am a daughter of the most high King, and straighten my crown as His Princess, brush off those thoughts of inadequacy and worthlessness like the previously mentioned gnats. (Instead of them dismissing me, I’m dismissing the negative thoughts and feelings.) You can’t know how much this means to me and how helpful this has been to me!
THANK YOU!
Phyllis
That is so hard when others treat you in such a way. I’m so very sorry this is happening to you, Phyllis. But yes, no matter how others demean us, remembering WHO loves us and HOW He loves us can help overcome all of it.
Your comments resemble what I’m going through. Lord we lift us up into Your Hands. Amen
Thanks, Rebecca. This brought tears and was just what I needed to hear this morning. To matter, to belong, and to be welcomed and beloved are far greater treasures than any building could be to me.
This deeper look refreshes my soul.
God’s timing is the best! This morning, I woke up and continued reading in John where I’d left off…Chapter 12. And read through 14. Lately I’ve been trying my best to skip over the “headings” so I can read it as the continuous flow that it was written as. I paused to look up a few words in the original, but didn’t with “place” in 14:2. Once I’d read to vs 23, I used the context of the whole passage and decided to re-read it and use the concept of “dwelling place/home”. I’d come quickly to the likelihood that this is what was meant, more of an “immanuel” / “God with us” interconnected and intimate meaning and that the “preparing” was the work on the cross. But even with all that simmering in the back of my mind, I couldn’t be sure and I wouldn’t have been able to lay it all out or prove it. And then…
Then I opened my email and found your Tiny Untwistings in my inbox! Thank you!
Oh my word, that’s amazing!
Thank you so much for this. A “Mansion in the sky by and by” implies that Jesus’ priorities are completely different than what He revealed of His heart while He walked on earth. He wants us to walk every day, all the time, in an intimate relationship with Him. That, in and of itself, is a greater treasure than any Heavenly House made of whatever we can imagine. And when He gave us the Holy Spirit, He provided the WAY for us to abide in that intimacy. Right here, right now, and forever. Setting our hearts on a dwelling place, a structure, a mansion that waits for us if only we can hang on by our fingernails until we die, just is so much LESS than what He wants for us. He wants our hearts set on HIM, on relationship with HIM, intimacy with HIM, because that is far richer and more satisfying than any possible house or room could ever be!
You put this so beautifully!
Thank you for your thoughts and for sharing your wrestlings on this point.
This extends into Jesus’ prayer in John 17, which ends the whole discourse. There, He says, “Now this is eternal life: that they know You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom You have sent.” The whole point of the gospel, “that they may not perish but have eternal life,” is not just life unending or life in mansions and peace. Rather, it’s so much greater and grander, because eternal life is intimately knowing God, being in unified relationship, dwelling in Christ with our loving Creator.
Then, going further through Jesus’ John 17 prayer, He reveals more of the shocking oneness that this knowing looks like.
“…that all of them may be one, Father, just as You are in Me and I am in You. May they also be in Us so that the world may believe that You have sent Me. I have given them the glory that You gave Me, that they may be one as We are one — I in them and You in Me — so that they may be brought to complete unity… Father, I want those You have given Me to be with Me where I am, and to see My glory, the glory You have given Me because You loved Me before the creation of the world… I have made You known to them, and will continue to make You known in order that the love You have for Me may be in them and that I Myself may be in them.”
The gospel includes the wonderful salvation from sin and bondage and death in the past in Christ, the wonderful hope of glory and restoration and all-made-right in the future in Christ, AND the wonderful co-seated and made new and free indeed RIGHT NOW in the present in Christ. The gospel is about life, and eternal life is about knowing God in intimate, loving, oneness relationship in ways that boggle my mind.
Thank you for sharing your Scriptural wrestlings in the Spirit and for your heart for those in great need.
Amen, John 17 is a wonderful commentary on John 14. Thank you.
Thank you!
Yes, I agree with your interpretation of these scriptures! I always was bothered by the youth group song “(Come and go with me to) My Father’s House ”. It took the passage so very literally, and I was always like, “isn’t heaven going to be like… completely different from earth? Football, lots of food? Hmm”
I’m not as familiar with that one, but that sounds similar!
Thank you for this beautiful untangling, Rebecca.
The impact of songs on our beliefs and doctrines…! I was just thinking today about a new hymnal which has been well-received in our circles. One of the notable things about the book—something I love—is that the “eternal life” section does not contain heaven songs. Rather it contains hymns exploring the richness and “life more abundant” of life in the Eternal God now. The mansions are here! Our old songbooks tend to make heaven and eternal life synonymous. Anyone can invent their own image of the after-life. More rigorous and rewarding, to explore the rich inner blessings promised us in this life. Thank you for your call to see these, here.
I love that! Excellent!
What about pairing that portion of scripture with 1 Corinthians 3:5-17 and 2 Corinthians 5:1-11?
It’s no wonder that some parts of the New Testament remind us of other parts.The whole New Testament points us to the entrance of the New Covenant (and the fading of the Old) and what life in that New Covenant is like.
I’ve written before about how important cross referencing has been in my own journey. Something tht sounds so academic can actually be quite an adventure!
O build me a cabin
In the corner of glory land
In the shade of the tree of life
That it may ever stand…
Charley Pride
Hadn’t heard that one.
Hi! Thank you for this encouraging word.
Somewhere in the Old Testament the Lord says, “there is a place beside Me on the rock.”
Your words also bring to mind the idea of inheritance. And portion. And each individual part. So much there.
These thoughts cause me to want to write that book.
I’ve been studying inheritance/portion a good bit too. It’s a fascinating study throughout the Scriptures!
Excellent untwisting! Thank you. We don’t start eternal life on “that side of Heaven”. God, through Jesus means us to have that kind of life here and now. Real relationship. Intimate relationship. With the One who lives us more than life. Why wait, “till the sweet bye and bye.”? He desires relationship live and refreshing now.
Beautiful, yes!
This makes so much sense! Thank you, Lord God, for the way you created Rebecca’s brain to not be satisfied with a simple reading of the words, but to crave the “more” that is waiting to be discovered by a curious mind.
Thank you, friend!
It is easier to control people and make them perform religious duties if they think there is a great “spiritual” reward awaiting them; and it shows how a legalistic, controlling, even abusive, church can minimise a heart relationship with the Father and can crush our true identity.
This is a wonderful untwisting – I have heard the “rooms” are rooms in Father’s heart for us.
Yes, the age-old materialistic “carrot” to accompany the “stick” for control.
But a place in the family of God is so much better than a mansion!