Prayer & Love

Prayer & Love

John 17:20–26 

My prayer is not for them alone. I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message,  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. Then the world will know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me.  

“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.  

“Righteous Father, though the world does not know you, I know you, and they know that you have sent me. 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.”

Introduction 

We come to the end of our series on prayer entitled The Lord’s Prayer. We’re growing in our love for the Savior by looking at how he prayed in John 17 and along the way we’re learning how to pray. 

The first week we talked about prayer and heaven. We noted that prayer fills our mental map of heaven as we think God’s thoughts after him. We said that God-centered prayer loves the glory of heaven. And we said that if Jesus prayed for the most worthy being in the universe—God the Father—to bring more glory to God the Son, what should lesser beings (we) pray for? The same.  

Then we learned about prayer and fullness. We saw there that in so much of Jesus’ prayer he’s rehearsing how much the Father has already given him. Seeing this blew my mind! Instead of focusing on what we think God has NOT given us, we should start in prayer from our fullness from God.  

Then last week we learned about prayer and identity. We learned there that as Jesus is not of this world, we’re not of this world. As he was sent into the world, we are sent into the world. As he sanctified himself, we are sanctified in truth. We truly are Jesus’ people.  

Our identity comes from him, and prayer rehearses our identity with Christ for the good of the world.  

Today we conclude with prayer and love. This is the right way to conclude because it’s how Jesus concludes and because love is what you find at the center of the universe.

Unity witnesses to love

John 17:20 

My prayer is not for them alone. I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message. 

There’s a clear shift in the prayer at verse 20. Up until that point, Jesus had been praying specifically, if not exclusively, for his first disciples. But now he includes everyone who will ever believe in him, so that includes us. I love that because we often extend to ourselves the applications and implications of what scripture says. For example, Jesus gave the Great Commission to the eleven apostles in Matthew 28. Go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Does that passage apply to us? Yes, by extension. He’s giving the command to the eleven and by extension to us.  

We do the same with the letters of Paul. We are not the people in Corinth or Galatia or Philippi, or Rome, but we know that all of God’s word is God’s word to us.  But in John 17:20 we don’t have to extend the application to include us. Jesus clearly says, My prayer is not for them alone. I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message. We are the ones who have believed through their message, many generations later. 

What does Jesus pray for us? That we may be one. He wants our unity to resemble the unity between the Father and the son: that all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you (v 21).  

If we are in them, displaying the oneness of Father and Son, something good happens in the world and to the world: they believe that Jesus was sent by the Father. May they also be in us so that the world may believe that you have sent me (v 21).  

Seeing the glory of Jesus builds our unity, which again is patterned after the unity between Father and Son: I have given them the glory that you gave me, that they may be one as we are one (v 22). 

Our unity, modeled after Father and Son, is something that grows: I in them and you in me—so that they may be brought to complete unity (v 23).  

The result is knowledge of two things for the world: 1) that Jesus comes from God and 2) that the Father has loved us with the love he has for Jesus: Then the world will know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me (v 23). 

It is clear from these verses that our unity can only prosper as a byproduct of our identity in Christ (I in them) and our understanding that Jesus and the Father are one.  

So how do we cultivate unity? 

Here’s how NOT to cultivate unity. Focus on issues.  

I’ve noticed in my house that we can be having a lovely morning, the sun is beaming through the window (a rare pleasure in Michigan), we’re having a lovely conversation, even the dog seems to be enjoying himself. And then someone decides to throw a bomb in the middle of our loveliness. Who left a fork in the bathroom?  

And now everyone chimes in. Yeah, can we talk also about who’s leaving clothes in the washer? 

Oh, I know who’s leaving forks in the bathroom and clothes in the washer? It’s so and so. 

Then so and so says, No, I’m not. Leave me alone.  

Then the dog starts barking and our lovely moment is gone. 

People become fixated on issues, and it’s a unity killer.

Political issues. We know that if you’re a serious Christian, there’s no way you can belong to this political party or like this political leader. 

Cultural issues. I want to know if you think like I do about homosexuality, and feminism, and transgenderism, and climate change, and Elon Musk.  

Theological issues. Let’s talk about the end times and election and the number 666. 

People tend to get fixated on these things, and they want you fixated with them, and seeing things like they see them. And if you don’t, Mmm, I think I need to block your number. 

There are hundreds of different issues we can talk about and disagree on. Issues tend to bring out the worst in us. We become proud. We think we know better than we do. We kind of feel like we’re different from others. We say, We’re just different. But what we really mean is, We’re better. 

Knowledge puffs up, says the apostle, while love builds up (1 Corinthians 8:1). 

What we should focus on instead is our identity in Christ and our union with Christ.  

Focus on his glory. He says, I have given them the glory that you gave me, that they may be one as we are one. Seeing his glory leads to unity. 

Focus on Christ in you. He says, I in them and you in me—so that they may be brought to complete unity.  

The more we stare at the glory of Jesus, the more we contemplate that such a glorious being has made his home with us, the more we internalize that he’s taken us out of the world and given us his joy, his peace, his love, the less proud we become. We start to see our own sinfulness more clearly and, therefore, that we are far more like other people. 

When we sing worship songs, do you know what we’re doing? We’re training ourselves in our union with Christ. Take one verse from the song Yet Not I But Through Christ in Me:  

To this I hold, my sin has been defeated 
Jesus now and ever is my plea 
Oh the chains are released, I can sing, “I am free” 
Yet not I, but through Christ in me 

Just in that verse, I’m being reminded that I have sin, that it had to be defeated and has been defeated, that Jesus always is my plea, that chains used to hold me but have now been broken and I can sing, “I am free,” “I am free,” “I am free.” Yet not I, but through Christ in me. 

That’s why fixating our mind on Jesus, not on issues, increases our unity. 

Does this mean that we ignore issues, be they political, cultural, or theological? No. But when we’re saturated in the gospel, the issues get reframed, our intensity is adjusted, we tend not to think of ourselves more highly than we ought, we know what to fight for, what to pray for, what to bear with, what to let go of.  

When we’re a gospel-centered church instead of being issue-driven, the world sees something different. They learn that the Father sent Jesus and that the Father loves us with the same love he has for his son. So our unity waves a missionary flag for the world to see, with the love of God written on it.

Glory surrenders priority to love

John 17:24 

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. 

It’s so delightful to see how much Jesus wants us to be with him. That’s his will. We talk about the will of God. We talk less about the will of Jesus. But right here we’re staring at his will. Where he says I want, that’s what he means, I will. A literal translation of this verse would read, Father, those you have given me, I will that where I am, in that place, they also may be with me. 

He said a similar thing in John 14:3. There he was telling the disciples that in his Father’s house there are many rooms, and that he was going there to prepare a place for them. And then he says, And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back and take you to be with me that you also may be where I am.  

Jesus doesn’t just want to be with us. That’s his promise to us while we’re on earth and he’s in heaven. Go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age (Matthew 28:19–20). 

His promise is to be with us always until the very end of this age. But his desire, his will, is to take us to be with him where he is for all ages. And when we’re there with him, what does he want us to see? His glory. 

Jesus says, 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. We were created for glory, but not our own, the glory of Jesus, except that when we see him as he is, we will become like him. John tells us as much in his first letter. We know that when Christ appears, we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is. All who have this hope in him purify themselves, just as he is pure (1 John 3:2-3).

The great hope we have is that when we see Jesus in all his glory (all his perfection, purity, loveliness, goodness, power), we will become like him—glorious.  

If that is your hope, says John, purify yourself, just as he is pure. 

John 17:24 says something that caught me by surprise. I know I’ve read it before, and I’ve known it to be true, but it hit me afresh.  

Jesus says, 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—here it is—because you loved me before the creation of the world. Jesus is the most glorious being in the universe. But there’s something more important, something greater, than his own glory, and that is, the love the Father has had for him since before the creation of the world—for eternity past. 

Glory surrenders priority to love. They’re not in conflict or tension. But one is prior to the other. Jesus is so glorious because he is so loved. At the very center of the universe, there’s a being radiating in glory (greatness, majesty, power), Jesus Christ, but when you look at why he’s been given so much glory—when you peek behind the glory, so to speak – you discover love, the love of the Father. Do you realize how profound this is? 

Our world is intoxicated with glory. What’s the most glorious nation? What’s the most glorious company? Who’s the most glorious man? And we tend to measure it in terms of beauty, skill, influence, wealth. You know the names that come up. Who’s the most glorious woman? Same thing. Who are the most beautiful, skillful, influential, wealthy women? We give these men and women so much of our attention. We pay money to be around them, to learn from them, to become like them. We’re intoxicated with glory. 

At the same time, our culture is increasingly naturalistic, meaning, we believe that all that exist are natural phenomena, so everything that exists, including we humans, exists because time, chemical and chance happened to collide just so. Where then does love fit in this naturalistic view of the world? There is no love. There are only chemicals that fire in your brain in a certain way, and we call it love. But there is no love. Only power. Only human glory. It’s why people use each other, discard each other, cancel each other. There is no love. Only our intoxication with human glory.

Can we learn then from Jesus, who reveals to us that actually at the bottom of his own divine glory is the love of the Father? I want them to see the glory you gave me because you loved me before the creation of the world. Glory surrenders priority to love. 

Revelation produces love

John 17:25–26 

Righteous Father, though the world does not know you, I know you, and they know that you have sent me. 26 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.  

This prayer is the greatest prayer ever prayed. (Although Jesus’ not my will but yours be done (Luke 22:42) is arguably the most consequential prayer for humanity and eternity.) But the length and amount of revelation given to us from the lips of Jesus in this prayer are off the charts, and it ends on the highest note.  

Jesus in essence says, Mission accomplished. Though the world does not know you, I know you, and they know that you have sent me. That’s it. That was the mission. Of course, he still has to die the next day and rise from the dead. But we only know of his death and resurrection because his disciples understood what it meant. That the Father sent him. Then he says, I have made you known to them, and will continue to make you known—he’s here alluding to the ongoing ministry he gives to us through his Spirit—and then he gives us the reason he’s going to continue revealing the Father to us: in order that the love you have for me may be in them and that I myself may be in them.  

So let’s put all of this together. Greater than human glory is the glory of God, and greater than the glory of God is the love of God, the love the Father has had for all eternity for his Son.  

The reason Jesus came to earth was to make the Father known to us, and we needed to know the Father—he had to make the Father known—so that the love the Father has for the Son may be in us. There is nothing greater, deeper, higher, wider than the love God has for Jesus dwelling in us. And because we’re learning to pray as Jesus prayed, we could say it like this. 

 It’s not enough for us to say that the Father loves us. That is true. But what Jesus wants is for the same love he had known before the creation of the world to be in us—transforming us, making us full, killing our sin, softening our hearts to people, making us able to forgive, to sacrifice, to let go of wrongs and wrongdoing. 

He wants this love to be so compelling that anger dissipates, mercy triumphs over justice, material wealth flows to lift the poor. He’s going to the cross the next day to destroy the agents of evil that prevent the love of the Father from taking root on earth: Death, Sin, and the Devil. And he’s rising from the dead three days later to show us, This is done. It is finished.  

So, let’s pray like Jesus prayed. Let’s pray that the more he reveals the Father to us, the fuller with the Father’s love we will be. Let’s pray that in our own lives glory will surrender priority to love, that we will be servants not glory hogs. Let’s pray that our unity will give a compelling witness to the world.