EPISODE 17 John Chapter 17 ” Jesus Prays” for Share The Word

Hi, and welcome to Share the Word, the best way to learn your way through the New Testament one chapter at a time. We know there are a lot of devotionals and encouraging thoughts for the day from the Bible available online, but our goal is a little more to honestly and systematically present the whole story of the New Testament. We are excited to have Margie Biasotto. So again, open those Bibles and let's get started. Hi, I'm Margie, and we are looking at John chapter 17, Jesus prays. Well, since it's on prayer, I thought I'd do a joke on prayer.

A pastor was holding a big old prayer meeting, and a young man raises his hand and asks for prayer for his hearing. Well, the pastor calls him up, and the elders gather around, and they lay hands on him, and they rattle heaven on this guy's behalf. Afterwards, the pastor looks the young man right in the eyes and says, Son, how's your hearing? To which the fellow replies, Well, I don't know yet. It's next week. Ba-dum-tsh.

So John 17. Ah, I love this chapter. It is so intimate and personal and specific. It's a rare look at the relationship between parent and child, an urgent, transparent conversation between a father and a son who genuinely love one another, a communication that we call prayer. As my father's health deteriorated, our conversations became more and more like that. Urgent and transparent.

Rather than small talk, we went right to the heart of the matter, straight to the things that were important to us. I was blessed by having a kind, loving, and responsible father. Growing up, I thought every daughter had a good dad and communicated with their father this way, easily and honestly. It wasn't until I was much older that I realized what we had was very rare, very special. And now because of Jesus, I can have that same type of relationship and communication with my eternal Father as well. Actually, any of us can.

So let's take a closer look at this dialogue and see what we can learn. Now Jesus had previously taught how to pray, but this was different. This was a prayer for himself, for his closest friends, and for his future followers. As God, Jesus had no need to pray for himself. But as a man, Jesus stood in deep need of prayer. He beautifully, naturally, and practically pours his heart out, his concerns out, to his Abba Daddy, who cares and who is willing to listen and to help.

When I first became a student of Scripture, I was encouraged to pay close attention to repeated words and phrases. Well, John 17 holds several of those important repetitions. So as we pore over this powerful prayer, we will take a closer look at some of these repeated words. John 17:1 through 5, Jesus asked the Father to restore him to his former glory. Glory is one of those repeated words. It's used seven times in this passage.

Glory has a few different meanings in Scripture. It means a manifestation of perfection, or of perfected character. It means adoration or worship of God. It also means being raised to a position of honor, or to honor another in word and deed. And finally, it is a reference to heaven or the dwelling place of God. But Jesus' request is to be glorified and to bring His Father glory.

Bringing God glory was Jesus' deepest desire. It was His top priority. It is what moved Him constantly towards Jerusalem, towards the cross. It was His mission that He perfectly satisfied. Scripture gives us the Father's answers to the Son's request. That first glorification was realized upon Jesus' resurrection.

The second glorification was Jesus' ascension back into heaven. And the third glorification is still in process right now, as Jesus is seated at the right hand of God the Father as the first man of new humanity, awaiting His future, final, and victorious return to the world. Now, here's a crazy side note. Jesus also enables His followers to partake in His glory by sending His Holy Spirit to them to empower them for eternal tasks. Through believers, Jesus was and is and will continue to be glorified by the fruit of their labor. In other words, the eternal harvest that began with the eleven still continues today.

In John 17, 6 through 19, Jesus interceded for his disciples. Now, this is such a precious and personal part of his prayer. He prays with a heart of gratitude for the remaining eleven disciples, referring to them as those whom you gave me. They were yours, but you gave them to me. Jesus stated with pride and pleasure that they had accepted him and his words. And then Jesus gives his beloved friends back to God the Father.

Now, this phrase, you gave me, is used eight times in this passage. You may have heard it said, Ah, that guy thinks he's God's gift to the world. Well, followers of Jesus actually are God's gift, a gift to Jesus and a gift to the world. Each follower comes to Jesus because God the Father drew their hearts to him. However, each person must individually choose whether or not to respond to that drawing invitation. It is clear that Jesus considers his disciples evidence of his Father's great love.

It's a beautiful sentiment that his followers are such a source of joy to Jesus. Now, speaking of world, that is our next repeated word. This word is used 19 times in this chapter, which denotes its importance. But it can be a bit confusing because world can sometimes mean the actual physical planet Earth. And world can sometimes mean the fallen, the sinful spiritual state of humanity. In this case, Jesus covers both.

He continues to pray for his disciples' protection, for them to be kept from evil in the world and from the evil one in the world. Now, at this time, Jesus is not praying for the whole fallen world and everyone in it, but for his closest friends who are left in the fallen world. This earthly world, earthly realm, is the domain of Satan, which is why Jesus calls Satan the prince of this world in chapter 16. Christ followers no longer belong to the fallen world system, which is why Jesus warns believers that they will be hated by the fallen world, just as it hated him. However, Jesus still loves the fallen world and all the people in the fallen world. That is why he sends his followers into that fallen world to carry the gospel, the good news message of his love and forgiveness and reconciliation through faith.

Jesus desires that the entire fallen world should believe that God sent him and that all would receive eternal life through him. In the next part of this powerful prayer, Jesus requests that God the Father continue to help the disciples' faith to continue to grow in truth. He asks the Father to sanctify them. This word sanctify embodies the meaning of holiness. Sanctify means to set apart, which actually has two purposes: to set the disciples apart from sin and to set the disciples apart for God's use. The disciples will need this covering as they remain Christ representatives here on earth, as a light in the darkness, to be overcomers in trials, to grow in godly character, and to bring glory to God.

Now, in this next section, Jesus prays for unity. First, he prays for oneness with God and himself. Then he prays for the disciples to be included in that unity. Oneness, or one, is used four times in these verses to emphasize the importance of unity. Jesus prays for the disciples to share in oneness with him and therefore they are unified with God the Father and the Holy Spirit. Then he prays for the disciples' oneness with one another to reflect triune oneness, which would give a testimony to the whole world that they belonged to him.

Without the Holy Spirit's help, that isn't just hard, it's impossible. Remember, this little band of eleven men argued and competed with one another the whole time they were with Jesus. The disciples did not exemplify unity until after the Holy Spirit came to dwell within them and once empowered with Christ's Spirit. They put all of that bickering aside and experienced joy-filled unity. Now, speaking of joy, Jesus also prays for them to have joy. This type of happiness or joy happens only when the heart is filled with Jesus.

It is a deep wellness of being and a contentment despite the circumstances. It is not natural. It is supernatural. In John 17, 20 through 26, Jesus is coming to the end of the prayer, where he intercedes for future disciples. Now, this blows my mind and touches my heart so deeply, knowing that my Jesus, while he was headed for the agony of the cross, stopped and prayed for me. And not just me, but all believers that followed him throughout all time.

How? He deliberately included those who would believe through the spoken and the recorded word of his current disciples. In other words, Jesus is grafting in the future followers, the ones who come to believe upon him because of the testimony of his eleven disciples. Jesus wanted all of his followers to be one. And here, that oneness includes the disciples who have gone before us, the disciples who will come after us, and oneness with the triune God. As Jesus followers from the past, the present, and the future, we are bound miraculously and mysteriously to one another and with the Godhead.

With this being Jesus's hope and prayer, you might be thinking, So why don't we see more of it? What is going on? There are so many fractions and fights and separations among believers. I'm sure it breaks the heart of God. Sadly, many of us have seen this happen, or maybe experienced it ourselves. Many of the church splits and disagreements are over petty, eternally unimportant topics, ideas, and opinions.

In other words, it boils down to bruised egos, stubborn hearts, and easy offenses, rather than splits or disagreements over important doctrinal issues. It is a sad state of affairs. The Center for the Study of Global Christianity says that out of the two billion Christians on planet Earth, there are some 45,000 denominations in the world. Christlink cites five things that cause disunity in the church. That would be, number one, a lack of Bible teaching, focusing on God's Word and having truth be the standard and the authority, which, in other words, would be a place to agree. Secondly, a lack of prayer for leaders, the body of believers, and the world in general.

For the leaders to have wisdom and grace, meekness, and servant leadership. For the body to worship as one and work as one and operate as one, and to impact the world with God's love and to serve as a team representing Jesus. Number three, there's a lack of true communication. Deep fellowship, real connection, and authentic relationship. Commitment to invest in others by stepping out of our busy, selfish, isolated lives to make a real difference and build into others. There's a lack of, number four, direction, a clear vision, a focus, and a common goal.

Having a goal, a godly goal, to pull resources and use gifts to work together to achieve Christ's aim. And then fifth, a lack of humility. And all I have to say to that is, yikes. The opposite of humility is pride, which easily leads to gossip and judging and complaining and severed relationships within the body. Unity is supposed to be what points us to Jesus. Unity is a powerful witness to let the world know that we belong to Him.

It doesn't mean that we all need to be cookie-cutter carbon copies of one another, but to use our differentnesses, our diversities, our uniqueness, our passions and our personalities to build each other up, to help each other grow, to support one another in faith and in times of suffering. If you are a Christ follower, then Jesus was praying for you, for you to participate in and to protect unity of the body. How are you doing that? How are you responding to folks who have different ideas than you? Are you praying? Reaching out?

Forgiving? Attempting to truly love and understand another? All of that without compromising truth or the tenets of faith? Listen, we have choices here, people, on how we choose to respond, love, accept, relate, and communicate with others. So let's keep Jesus' prayer for us in mind and move towards oneness. Remember, this is Jesus' great desire for his disciples to be one.

Unity is a powerful witness to God's great love. Jesus ends the prayer by asking the Father to let all of his disciples, of all generations, share in his glory, to have all of his followers with him in glory. This conversation in John 17 is full of love and of trust and of joy. And though my relationship with my earthly father was special and earnest, it pales in comparison to the intimacy of God the Father with his child Jesus the Christ. Their relationship and communication surpasses my human understanding and reaches beyond any human experience I've ever had or imagined. Again, I'm Margie, and this is Share the Word.

Thank you, Margie, and thanks for listening. We hope you found this commentary both interesting and insightful. Visit sharetheword.org and check out all the podcasts we've already released, as well as other offerings available to you. Everything that's produced at Share the Word is free for you to use and to share. From all of us at Share the Word, our blessings and prayers go out to all of you.