At the end of chapter 14 in John’s Gospel there is an almost throw away line. Jesus and the disciples have just finished the Passover meal in the upper room. Jesus has been telling them that he is about to go where they couldn’t follow, and then at the very end he says, “Come now; let us leave.”

That line seems a little odd to me, it is really out of place. Some say that it’s just the transition of them leaving the room and going to Gethsemane, with the following discoursed are Jesus’s teaching on the way having things come to mind as sees things such as grape vines. If that was all there was to it, then why didn’t John just say they left the room and started walking to the garden?

I think there could be more to it. Recall that just the verse before Jesus says, “…for the prince of this world is coming. He has no hold over me…” That simple line “let us leave” could mean, that while we are still in this world we need to leave being of this world. For with us is the Holy Spirit and those with the Spirit must strive to be more Christ like and therefore not of this world. Or it could mean that now is the time confront the prince of this world and since he has no hold on Christ (and by extension, us) the time has come to defeat him. In other words, “it is time to go to the cross.” Or it could just be time to leave the room. Or it could be all three.

The problem is that too often we see a passage as having only one possible meaning. We cannot even conceive that it could have multiple meaning and inuendo. We need to open our minds and contemplate the idea that passages in scripture can have meaning beyond the surface and recognize the literary devices being used to help us reach a deeper understanding. Such as saying something simple about the current situation but meaning something deeper in the subtext.

I know there are those who balk at pointing out these literary devices in the Bible. They fear that this will cause the Bible to be seen as no more than a work of fiction, but they fail to see the power of God. He made us and knows what resonates with our hearts, minds, and souls. He can cause these things that look like mere literary devices to actually happen, and to inspire those writing about the incident to point them out. We must also remember that almost all of the literary devices of modern Western literature came from the Bible.

#Jesus, #LiteraryDevices, #DoubleMeaning, #GospelofJohn