Day 1 - Intro to the Upper Room

Reading Passage: John 20:30-31

Most of us have experienced saying goodbye to someone who we love to be around. The kind of person who understood us and who deeply knows us. Often times those kinds of goodbyes feel sad with a lack of closure, and honestly — we really just wish things didn’t have to change!

I mean, even though we understood WHY our best person or people had to leave… that didn’t make the situation better.

I don’t know about you, but I have been both the one letting someone go, and I have been the one leaving, enough times that I’m not a fan. 

Everything feels so heavy, and important since… well, being in each other’s lives on the daily is no longer an option. The moment where the culmination of in-person relationship ends up in a room where we say our farewell to people we had grown to love, trust, look up to, and depend on.

Definitely not my favorite.

I had to say goodbye to people I dearly loved after doing ten years of life alongside of them. You know, ten years is a long time for relationships to deepen and for trust to be built. 

It was enough time for people (including ourselves) to go through difficulty and come out on the other side. 

It was enough time to see victory and healing prevail. 

It was enough time to see below the surface of relationships and dig deeper and be known.

It was enough time to establish tradition and memories and live in unforgettable moments.

It was enough time to walk with Jesus together, to cry out to Him, to celebrate the miracles He had done in our lives and those we were surrounded by.

As you can imagine my heart was in knots as the farewell gathering allowed opportunities to speak words of thanks, words of honor, and encouragement to press on to so many people we loved deeply.

Each year when the Easter season is within sight, I begin to wonder about the relationships Jesus had with the disciples. After all, Jesus was not just another friend, another ministry leader, another teacher. Jesus was the Son of the Living God. Jesus was God in flesh. 

Do you ever sit back and wonder what it would have felt like to be in that upper room where Jesus gave His final teachings? Where He shared what was to come with His closest people — the disciples? I do, and I can’t help it! I have SO many questions and I know that the disciples must have too.

Studying the book of John gives us a stunning picture of the kind of closeness the disciples experienced with Jesus day in and day out living life together. 

The level of impact, wisdom, and prophecy taking place in front of the disciples eyes had to have been absolutely indescribable.

Jesus was preparing to say His earthly goodbye in the upper room, but that wouldn’t be the end of their relationship.

The time Jesus spent with those who agreed to leave their fishing nets, their occupations, their homes, had an eternal impact (Matthew 4:18-22). An impact so deep and wide that still today, we get to experience the upper room through the eyes of John, the closest disciple to Jesus, written so that we would remember the things Jesus spoke, the promises He made to us — His people.

As you read today’s passage in John 20:30-31, why did John write this gospel? How does that change your perspective as you enter into the upper room to hear the final teachings of Christ?

Written by: Jenny Howell