Over the past three weeks, we’ve been looking at Jesus’ High Priestly Prayer; that intimate prayer that Jesus spoke to his Father while in the Upper Room as he was gathered together with his disciples, after having instituted the Lord’s Supper and given them their final period of teaching. What we’ve seen during our look at this prayer is that while this is a prayer between Jesus Christ the Son and God the Father, this is so much more than just a prayer. As we’ve said all along, this is the longest recorded such prayer of Jesus in all of Scripture. And there are a number of different sort of breakdowns that are out there about how this prayer is segmented and who it is for. Unfortunately, when we break something like this up, the central message and unity of it can become lost. Now, don’t misunderstand me, it’s important for us to understand the parts that we’ve looked at; for us specifically, Jesus’ prayer for our worship, our discipleship, and our mission (or as some have called it, the upward, the inward, and the outward). So, that’s why we’ve broken this prayer into these sections, so that we could gain an understanding of the parts. As we’ve worked our way through this prayer, we’ve looked at it as a prayer specifically for the Church. So, I want to take some time and put all of these pieces or parts that we’ve seen together in order to create a unified vision in your mind of Christ’s prayer. I want us to have as clear of a picture of the whole prayer as we do of the parts of the prayer.
To do this, I need to remind you of some of the things that we’ve pointed out thus far in our Lenten series. Several weeks ago, when we looked at the first ten verses of this prayer, we focused in on the intimacy between Father and Son and talked about the glory of God. We talked about what is commonly referred to as the doctrine of adoption. We commented on how amazing it is that we can call out to God and use the language of Father, a word that is reserved for family; that we can call out to God who is so far above and beyond us like we’re on the same level. Now of course we’re not, but that’s the feeling we get. However, that’s sort of the catch-22 (if there is one) of this relationship that we have through Jesus Christ isn’t it? We rejoice in the fact that we can relate to God so intimately (calling Him Father), but we run the risk of becoming nonchalant with God and not giving Him his proper glory. We run the risk of being too casual in our relationship with Him.
A couple of year ago (three to be exact), before Amy’s sister got married, we threw them a party, a shrimp boil at my in-law’s house. We all gathered together with a lot of their friends, a good number of them we didn’t know, and celebrated Beth and Aaron’s impending marriage. After I was done cooking, I proceeded to take my place at the table with the shrimp, with no plans on moving until I was full. After a lot of folks had their fill, they went away to sit down. There were only a handful of us “bottomless-pit” types left standing, all of whom were groomsmen in the wedding except for me. Now, as most shrimp boils of this variety do, this one had plenty of refreshments to go around. And as some of the guys getting refreshments had a few too many, they started letting some things come out of their mouths that typically wouldn’t. I didn’t condemn, I didn’t condone, but just listened. Now, the funny part about all of this is that they all knew that I was Beth’s brother-in-law. What they didn’t know, was that I was the minister who was going to be officiating the ceremony two months later. There was a sense of casualness that they had with me when I was just family, as opposed to the pastor. That same casualness wasn’t there the weekend of the wedding, only a few months later, and it wasn’t as if I changed in any way during that time. Well, it’s sort of the opposite with God isn’t it? We are anything but casual in the infancy of our relationship with Him, but over time, we grow more casual, and even too casual and flippant.
That’s where the second part of Jesus’ prayer, discipleship, comes in. When we looked at discipleship, we said that true discipleship ought to produce within us three things: joy, holiness, and truth. We are to see the joy that it is to be in a relationship with God, the holiness that exists within the triune God, the holiness that we are to strive for in our daily living, and the truth about God. And I think that it’s this final aspect of discipleship that ought to help us keep ourselves in check when it comes to being too casual with God. When we really learn the truth about who God is and what He has done for us, it ought to keep us from ever being too flippant in our relationship with Him. If God is willing to allow all of His wrath to be poured out upon His own Son on the cross, then how could we ever feel completely comfortable in our sinfulness. Yes, we take joy in the words of Scripture (as we should) that we find speaking of how Jesus Christ is the once for all complete sacrifice, the propitiation, for our sins, but should there ever be a point in time where we are just so comfortable that we stop treating God with the reverence and respect and awe that He is owed?
Now my dad, as I have said before, was my best friend in this life prior to Amy. There has never been a time in my life that I ever doubted that he had my best interests in mind. I knew, and still know, that everything that he does is with my mother and me (and now Amy and the kids) at the forefront of his mind. There is nothing that he would ever do to hurt any of us, and we all know that. However, I had a fear of my dad growing up. Yes he was my best friend and I could go to him with anything, but he was also my father and the standard-setter in my life. If there was ever a time that I got too casual or too flippant in that relationship, he was very quick to put things back in their proper alignment. I was a college student, home for the weekend to play in a golf tournament with my dad. I got mad at something that happened and threw a golf ball down a street that ran alongside the course. My father, being none-too-pleased with this outburst, proceeded to calmly tell me to go get the ball. After my protesting, he, not so subtly, reminded me who was the father and who was the son. After running about a quarter mile there and back, I returned with not only my golf ball, but my attitude and framework properly adjusted. Discipleship, in the Christian life, is the constant reminder of who God is, who we are, and how we relate to Him, that, if done right, will keep us from having to run that quarter mile and back after the golf ball. It will keep us in a right relationship with God, and also help us to grow in that relationship. Discipleship is how we go from eating only spiritual milk, as Paul says in 1 Corinthians 3 and Hebrews 5 (at least that’s my opinion), to solid food. It is only through active discipleship that we will grow in our knowledge and understand of God. Spiritual growth and maturity don’t happen unless we put in the time, effort, and work.
So, we praise God and we come to know God in a sense of growing in our understanding of Him and keeping ourselves in a proper relationship with Him, and that drives us to go out and proclaim His name. The text that we read for our call to worship is part of a larger text in John 12 containing John’s account of the Triumphal Entry. Had we read the entire section, we would have found these words, “His disciples did not understand these things at first, but when Jesus was glorified, then they remembered that these things had been written about him and had been done to him. The crowd that had been with him when he called Lazarus out of the tomb and raised him from the dead continued to bear witness. The reason why the crowd went to meet him was that they heard he had done this sign.” Well, how do you think that they had heard of what Jesus had done? All of the crowd that was gathered there along the road just trying to catch a glimpse of Jesus and cheer the coming Messiah (which many biblical historians have projected to be somewhere upwards of 2 million people) wasn’t there for all of Jesus’ miracles. Many of them had never even seen Jesus before. As that passage I read just a moment ago tells us, the people who had seen Jesus (and in particular his raising of Lazarus) had “continued to bear witness.” In other words, folks were talking about Jesus and spreading the news that the Messiah had come and that his name was Jesus. If we were to go back through the gospel accounts, we would see that earlier on in his earthly ministry, Jesus would tell folks not to spread the word about him because his hour hadn’t come yet. However, in the accounts of Jesus’ latter miracles, we don’t see any such request to not make known the works and teachings of Jesus.
As a matter of fact, the longer Jesus’ ministry goes on, the more we start to see not only an absence of his admonition for people to remain silent about his identity, but we begin to see his encouragement for proclaiming his identity as the long-awaited Messiah. Now, one of the things that we have to remember about our text and ourselves today is that we are on the opposite side of both the cross and the empty tomb. Remember, this prayer was made the night before Jesus’ arrest, trial, and crucifixion. If we look at Jesus’ words to his disciples during the time between his resurrection and his ascension, that’s where we find our marching orders for what going out is to look like on this side of the cross. We see things like Jesus’ discourse with Peter in John 21 where Jesus tells him to “feed his sheep.” We see the Great Commission in various renderings in Matthew and Mark’s gospel accounts where Jesus tells his disciples to “Go into all the world and proclaim the gospel to the whole creation” and “baptize them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you.” Also, lest we forget, there are those words recorded in the book of Acts that give us Jesus’ final words to his followers and are really the theme of the entire book, “and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.”
Friends, God is to be praised and worshiped. The Word of God is to be poured over and taught and instilled within our own hearts, the hearts of our children, our friends, and all those who have ears to hear. And the good news of the gospel is to go out into the world. It may feel at times like we’re not making any progress, but understand that it’s not your job to make progress, to change a heart. It is your job to proclaim the gospel, to scatter the seed. It is the work of the Holy Spirit that softens the heart, waters the seed of faith, and causes it to take root in the “good soil” of Matthew 13.
So, as Jesus has now shared this meal and instituted the Lord’s Supper; as he has spent this time teaching his disciples one last time; he looks upward to His Father in heaven and he asks for God to be glorified through the work of the Church. He asks for the kingdom of God to be advanced on this earth through worship, discipleship, and a taking of the gospel out into the world. Jesus knows that his followers are going to face hard times, he knows that they’re going to face struggles and persecutions. We talked a few weeks ago about Jesus petitioning His Father right near the middle of the prayer to “keep them [his disciple] from the evil one.” He prays that they would be given the strength to carry on the work that Jesus started. Jesus initiated, he instituted the kingdom of God here upon this earth. Think back to the words of John the Baptist as he spoke about Jesus in the beginning of Matthew’s gospel, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.” He goes on to further say, “Even now the axe is laid to the root of the trees. Every tree therefore that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire.” If we look at the words of Jesus at the beginning of his ministry as they are recorded in Mark’s gospel account we find him saying, “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand; repent and believe in the gospel.” Jesus was praying here in John 17 for his disciples, and all those who were to follow them in worshipping God, would continue the task at hand.
You know, in some regards we could even say that Jesus was praying that we would not become what we find in so many churches today. He was praying that worship would be about God, and not the type of music or the air temperature or any of those other things that we focus so much upon. He was praying that our times of discipleship would be about growing in our faith and not merely our being entertained. He was praying that we would be more concerned with proclaiming the good news of the gospel than with creating for ourselves a more comfortable environment. Jesus was praying that we would have the strength and the courage to continue on the course that the Church was on. Now, obviously I’m not saying that every church is concerned with these things over God. I’m not even saying that a majority of churches are more concerned with their church than they are God. However, we all know that there are some churches and Christians who are more concerned with building the kingdom of self than the kingdom of God.
The Church is a beautiful thing. Jesus died for the Church. The Church is referred to as the bride of Christ. The Church universal and the local congregation are precious gifts that God has given to us. He has given the Church to us, as we’ve said, as a means by which we may worship Him properly and grow soundly and faithfully in our relationship with Him. He’s given us the Church so that we might have a mechanism that helps us to proclaim the love of Christ and the wondrous news of the gospel to the ends of the earth. Doesn’t it give you great hope and great strength to know that during the moments prior to Christ’s greatest work, when he’s feeling his most vulnerable, gathered together with his disciples, that he’s praying for you? John Knox, the Thundering Scot, who is really sort of the father of Presbyterianism in Scotland, famously had his wife read and reread this prayer to him while he was on his deathbed. He told her that he wanted to hear Jesus prayer for him. He wanted to hear Jesus’ prayer for the Church that Knox had literally given everything to during his lifetime. The Church is precious. She is so precious that Christ instituted her, loved her, died for her, and prayed that she would be strengthened as the end of the age drew near. Shouldn’t we have the same love for the Church, for the kingdom of God? If so, why wouldn’t we do everything we can to celebrate, to grow in our own knowledge, and to make known that love that we have and the blessing that we have in being the bride of Christ?
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