Prayed For

 

Text: John 17:1-11 (NASB)

Focus: Unity

Function: to see how the Spirit makes us a family of God.

17:¹Jesus spoke these things; and raising His eyes to heaven, He said, “Father, the hour has come; glorify Your Son, so that the Son may glorify You, ²just as You gave Him authority over all mankind, so that to all whom You have given Him, He may give eternal life. ³And this is eternal life, that they may know You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom You have sent. ⁴I glorified You on the earth by accomplishing the work which You have given Me to do. ⁵And now You, Father, glorify Me together with Yourself, with the glory which I had with You before the world existed.

⁶“I have revealed Your name to the men whom You gave Me out of the world; they were Yours and You gave them to Me, and they have followed Your word. ⁷Now they have come to know that everything which You have given Me is from You; ⁸for the words which You gave Me I have given to them; and they received them and truly understood that I came forth from You, and they believed that You sent Me. ⁹I ask on their behalf; I do not ask on behalf of the world, but on the behalf of those whom You have given Me, because they are Yours; ¹⁰and all things that are Mine are Yours, and Yours are Mine; and I have been glorified in them. ¹¹I am no longer going to be in the world; and yet they themselves are in the world, and I am coming to You. Holy Father, keep them in Your name, the name which You have given Me, so that they may be one just as We are

I hope that through the understanding of this passage, we do not fall into the pride of believing that somehow we are better, or more special, in the eyes of God.

However, the passage rings of a distinction between those who consider themselves part of God’s kingdom, or family as I like to call it, but they are one in the same and those who are not yet part of God’s family.

The church, I believe, consists of those who seek to follow Jesus by loving their neighbors in obedience to his all encompassing command, the new commandment: Love One Another.

I once attended a debate between an Anabaptist preacher and a Greek Orthodox priest. The Greek Orthodox priest said something that transformed me and changed my perspective.

He, like me, believes that in the end, Love Wins and everyone will be saved by the love of God. “So what is the purpose of the church?” He was asked.

And he replied that it was the family of God already here on earth, since they will all be included in the family in heaven.

I agree. Except I might say that the church is those who consider themselves to be the family of God here on earth. This viewpoint bears witness to my soul and the fact that according to 1 john 2:2: Jesus came to save the entire world from its brokenness or sinfulness.

Everyone is God’s child, the church is the people who recognize that. (repeat)

So, since Jesus came to save the world entire, God loves everyone and wants everyone back into God’s own family.

And that leads us to our mission as Christ followers. We are to be the peacemakers that help to restore people to God and to each other. It is a big task, given the divisive nature of our nation, politics and the irreligious culture wars that are being waged.

That is sort of the lesson I learn from this passage, but I want to emphasize the fact that this is Jesus praying for those of us who consider ourselves to be the family of God here on earth.

Jesus’ prayer is that we may be one, just as he and the Father are One and united.

It is a mystery to be united with the living God. I believe that Jesus is talking again about the advocate, the comforter, the Spirit of God living inside everyone and filling those who consider themselves part of the family of God.

Of course, that is my theology interpreting the passage the way I see fit. Someone else might have a different and brighter understanding of the mystery of God being united with humanity as one.

It reminds me of a book I am reading: “Eager To Love” by Richard Rohr. He speaks of this exactly and how the Christ is incarnated in everyone and everything. And he doesn’t disavow the unique relationship that is happening to people of faith, like us, who are now prayed for by the Christ that we also might experience the mystery of the divine in our own lives.

I believe that the path to this is forgiveness. Jesus told us to stand forgiving (Mark 11:25) when we come to God in prayer.

Now, don’t be proud, but be happy because we are the prayed for by Christ. We are those who are empowered by Christ to love others in ways that we do not imagine. We believe that in the end of all things, the love of God for God’s children will win out. We are excited to be called to that purpose. For that is what the word “Church” means, the gathering of those who are “called out” by God.

Because we have turned away from ourselves and dedicated ourselves to the teachings of Jesus to love others, be filled with mercy for the least of these and to be peacemakers in a world of conflict, we are prayed for and empowered by none other that the Spirit of Christ itself inside of us.

Praise God!

Let me correct a little bit of perspective that I learned from this passage. Jesus makes a statement that I have never heard a sermon on except the few times I have preached about it. Like I’m about to.

Jesus was killed because his politics threatened the status quo and they needed to silence him. His politics were so radical that the fist thing the disciples did after the resurrection was to start a commune. Yet I never heard about that growing up.

I heard only this. Jesus came to save us from hell so that when we die we can escape the wrath of God and end up in heaven. And by the way, it is your mission to convince everyone else of this truth and if you don’t they will go to hell and it will be your fault. But don’t worry, you’ll be in heaven and forgiven for all of the things that you did.

Do you see what happened? Jesus said, If you love me, you will love others, and by the way, this passage is about how God will empower you to love others.

Jesus commanded the direct action of caring for others. In the sermon on the mount, he tells us all these commands about what to do and then, three centuries later, the Apostles Creed was written and it had nothing to do with what we are called to do, but only what we believe.

So look at verse 4 from the text. Jesus said, I accomplished all the work you sent me to do.

For three years Jesus has been teaching his disciples everything that God wanted them to know and to do. It was so radical that they killed him to silence him and the disciples took radical action as we already mentioned in response to what Jesus taught.

For those first three centuries, the Church took on the responsibility of caring for the poor until it became the State Church and the welfare system as we know it was formed and taken out of the hands of the people of God and placed in the government.

No longer did the church care for the poor. By the way, the pastors weren’t in it for the money and they met in houses to control expenses so that there was more money to give to the poor. Records show that 80-90% of their income from giving went to outreach.

The Church changed the narrative about the poor and included them and empowered them and they were blessed and became servants of each other. Most of it was because the rich among them followed Jesus and shared their wealth.

The organization appealed to the masses and grew quickly. Praise God.

All of that was because of the church’s devotion to Jesus and the mission that got him killed.

Now, my brother would read this sermon and might respond with, but Jesus wasn’t political and his mission was to save the world from its sins so that everyone who believes is saved and those who do not believe are condemned.

We disagree on that point, and the problem is that he is counting on the next phase of Jesus’ ministry. Which is also relevant.

For three years he taught us how to live. He commanded us to focus on that and his teachings. That is why I primarily stick to the gospel passage every week. Growing up, no one emphasized the teaching of Jesus to love one another, they instead emphasized the sacrifice of Jesus to keep us from hell. They were three day Christians, as I call them.

And that is because in three days his sacrifice and resurrection took place to prove to humanity that death is not to be feared if we trust and rest in the power of God.

We will live again. And although I would still be a follower of Christ if neither hell or heaven existed, because I believe in the teachings of Jesus, I am blessed to believe and place a hopeful peace in the knowledge of the resurrection and the hope that Jesus has gone ahead to prepare a place for us.

The three days are important. I find the mystery of Jesus being God and man to come out here. He says that as God he accomplished all that God wanted him to do. And then he goes on to work as man, on behalf of man, to be the atoning sacrifice for all of humanity.

He worked on behalf of God for three years teaching us how to live and he worked on behalf of mankind for three days as the atonement for our sins.

Praise God.

I can’t forget either. To forget the teachings of Jesus in exchange for quoting a creed seems to be missing the point of Jesus life and teachings since it only focuses on the three days of his sacrifice.

I love to focus on the three years of teachings because they give us so much to do and to understand and they consume much of the gospel’s narrative.

And the emphasis, the beauty of this passage is that we are prayed for by Jesus to have the power to follow him. It is journey he wants us to walk with him.