Prayer Spiritual, Personal, Unique

[HKHaugan]

John Chapter 17

 

What is about to be said here is first a commentary on the prayer itself. Secondly it looks at the verses in their context. The intention here is to feel the prayer; the circumstances and its depth for each of us personally.

 The Commentary

 It's still night and the end is near. “Father, the time has come.” The climactic moment of His life has come. Everything necessary for the disciples to know has been taught by Jesus as they approach the Kidron Valley, the impending events on the Mount of Olives, the betrayal and arrest in Gethsemane, then the unjust trial and crucifixion.   There is one more thing Jesus needs to do and that is pray which He does on the edge of the valley. His prayer is specific and really shows the heart of Jesus being poured out to the Father in front of the disciples, humanity immersed in its divine source, the bonding obedience of Son to Father, the relational seal of perfect human faith. Herein lies the meaning of the word glory. “Glorify your Son, that your Son may glorify you.” “Let the world see you in me that they may see who you really are.”   Jesus was the perfect Son of His perfect Father in the perfect Holy Spirit.

 After reading this Gospel I can only say this is a special Lord's Prayer. “Our Father,” the familiar shorter version from Matthew 6, is not any less of a prayer but its objective is different. It teaches us how to pray. It gives disciples a series of themes to pray about that can be taken line by line and filled with personal images to bring to the Father that He may direct us.

 This prayer in John 17 has another objective. It teaches us how to work. Jesus is seeking glory for His Father by being glorified through His sacrifice on the Cross and the Resurrection, His work. It is then a plea for a shift in mind, heart and spirit. In this world the secular drive is daily survival through labor, its income, the identity and sense of purpose it brings for the moment. Work is the labor providing physical and social survival. It is core to giving us a home, supporting a family, enjoying our environment and occupying time. In essence the world's idea of work is to develop an acceptable identity, lifestyle and appearance for comfort, social acceptance and self-security.

 The shift Jesus prays for is to an entirely new definition and purpose, an eternal purpose, through a spiritual relationship with Him that defines the present and the future. It's no longer a survivalist attitude concerned for self in every moment. Rather it is a relational faith where I am not a fear driven loner but a servant of Jesus whose every next moment is looking forward to making Him known. And, it is in the company of other people of faith whose worldview is shaped by that relationship.

 It is an entirely new concept of work, making every next moment a service to the risen Jesus. It's all-inclusive. This work includes every waking moment from home to job to every person we meet along the way, to our recreation, to friends and back home to family and a new sense of being. We shed the fears with which we face every moment and look forward to experiencing the eternal in the present. This is the cross of faith at work through the Holy Spirit. For every moment our mind, heart and spirit need truth, love, grace and personal confidence, the Spirit is there for us. These are needs that can be filled only by the Holy Spirit He has told the disciples about and will understand after Pentecost.

 Go back to Ch.4:31 just after He has changed the Samaritan woman's heart. Her testimony spreads in her town and many come out to see Jesus. His disciples don't seem to get the picture and approach Him as though He must be in need of food. Jesus never misses an opportunity to teach and the disciples have given Him a perfect one here. It reveals the theme that will later be the background to understand this His final prayer with them. He says, “I have food to eat that you know nothing about.” The disciples say to each other that someone must have brought Him food. But that's definitely not it.   Jesus wants them to grasp the spiritual reality that has just taken place so He replies with two mission principles, “My food is to do the will of Him who sent me and to finish His work.” The Samaritan experience was a clear example; obey the Father's will and complete His work.

 The context of the prayer then is Jesus praying to complete His work (the completion is the Cross) and then passing on the will and work the Father has prepared for the disciples and future believers (Matt.28:18-20, Eph.2:10), taking up their cross. We cannot repeat enough the way Jesus acts as a unique individual for whom the Father has a special work to do. He alone can bear the Cross, be a personal Savior and Lord, a Redeemer through whom grace and truth become a personal and relational reality. He alone can forgive sin, change minds, transform hearts and enable a second birth to a new life, a spiritual life.

 Because He is unique, spiritual, personal and relational, the perfect image of God, we too have been created with the same unique identity and purpose. However, sin has isolated us, made us alone individuals and our uniqueness has been taken over by self-centeredness from which we need deliverance. Each of us sins uniquely. This is why Jesus came and offered a relationship with Him so He could restore our personal uniqueness to its prior purpose. His special mission was our personal recovery, our being restored to our Father and rescued from our aloneness.

 Each of us is unique and special to the Father. Each of us has a personal mission that only we can accomplish. Jesus' disciples discovered that in Him half of their work was to pass on belief in Him. In Jesus we find that place, that work, those people for whom we have been recovered to offer Jesus. When the disciples asked Jesus what they had to do to meet God's required work He answered, “The work of God is this: to believe in the One He has sent (Jn.6:29).”   Belief is an every-next-moment calling based on the uniqueness each of us brings into that moment. Thus, our work is to love the Lord God with all our heart, mind, soul and strength and our neighbor as ourselves (Mk.12:30-31).

 The beautiful part in all this is that He is always present in us through the Holy Spirit in those every next moments. He's not just sitting in Heaven but working in each of us, directing traffic. It's Jesus Himself, His individuality, His mission and how it was, and now is, being accomplished.

 He has taken upon Himself the ultimate task of finishing His real work, the work of faith, to reveal the true nature of God and the true nature of being human. The overall mood of this prayer is His humanity contemplating His impending sacrifice, suffering, the weight of who He by faith has chosen to follow, to believe, to obey, to honor, to trust. For His Father and for us He chose to live in the limitations of a human body by faith.   Now catch this, it's critical---His choice was to experience living in the same skin, flesh and bones as we have but living totally according to the will of His Father as the Scripture directed. The one difference between Him and us is that His humanity was conceived by the Holy Spirit in Mary whose virginity (to prove His sinless nature) was prophesied seven centuries earlier (Is.7:14). Now think about Creation, the birth of the universe. In the same way it was done by the will of the Father through Jesus and conceived by the Holy Spirit (Jn.1:3). So, each of us and the universe were spiritually created with an eternal destiny and purpose to work out our individuality spiritually, personally and relationally in a moral context defined by His Word.

 What we see in this prayer of Jesus is the ultimate belief, trust and faith of one alone human being choosing to put His life in the clutches of the devil's sin and evil. These invisible dynamics envelop every person in the world in every level of experience and authority. Those unseen but very real dynamics wrapped around Jesus were the gates of hell; every world power, every spiritual enemy, every conspiracy, every fear, every self-stabbing temptation that could encircle Him---and finally kill Him. He submitted to it all and let them kill Him, the work only He could do. His death was for every man and woman's lonely death.

 Neither His family, His disciples, nor His close friends ever really understood Him. That is what makes being alone in this world the final challenge. No one ever really knows or understands anyone regardless of the length of a relationship, nor how much affection, emotion and sharing has been done. Sin has placed the wedge of distance between people. Everyone is born, lives and dies alone. Paul was right when he said that we see through a glass darkly and only know and are known partly (1Cor.13:12).

 Everything from the darkness of what you can't see to the world of what you can see was rallied against Jesus. And we wonder what it means when Scripture tells us, “And being in anguish, He prayed more earnestly, and His sweat was like drops of blood falling to the ground (Lk.22:44).” Why would He put Himself through this kind of agony, this kind of submission, this kind of punishment? He was innocent. Never once did He falter in His life. He knew as God’s only Son that His perfect earthly life was the single spiritual sacrifice that could personally save all people for all time from the aloneness of death and its separation from God. His faith to accept death for His Father is the gift He died to give each of us. Faith in Jesus is the proper sacrifice for all people everywhere for all time. His Cross of faith is the cross He gives us. He died by faith so that we could live by faith. He died a lonely death so that we could live relationally forever. He bore the fruit and payoff of sin, death, so that we could bear the fruit of the Spirit and live forever. He took our place on the Cross and was the substitute spiritual sacrifice to bring the image of God in us to its planned eternity.

 No matter who He was with and what He did, it was all for His Father and now He's about to be killed for it. Yet, there is no self-pity, bitterness, defensiveness or fear. The mood is finally one of wanting to please His Father, comfort and protect His disciples and bring His faith to all future believers. This prayer is our prayer. It was made for us, done for us and accomplished for us. As the centurion will say at His crucifixion, “Truly, this was the Son of God (Mt.27:54).”

 

The Prayer

Vs.1-5 are Jesus' prayer for Himself. He prays for His glorification. When He prays to be glorified it is not like us, out of some need for identity and acceptance, but for the glory of His Father. The glory is the obedience and faith His humanity perfected in the truth, grace and love of God. His submission to His Father's will is glory alive and flourishing in pure humility. His disciples will see these qualities of the nature of God and know that if His Son gives Himself to them that is what will bring them fulfillment for their humanity as He intended. This is how our mind embraces obedience to the truth, our heart embraces trusting Him and our spirit motivated by embracing faith to act for Him.

It follows that if Jesus prays to be glorified so that His Father is glorified then we should pray that we may be glorified so that Jesus is glorified. This is why we pray to be filled with the Holy Spirit. Like Paul says, “Since we live by the Spirit, let us keep in step with the Spirit (Gal.5:25).”

The glory Jesus is praying for is that everyone will see the Father's love for Him and for all people. That they will see His obedience to the Father's will, His faith to go to the Cross, His self-sacrifice for His Father. That the world (the people we are in contact with each day) will see in us His obedience and love overcoming the devil's sin, temptation and power, the same that led Jesus to the Cross. That the glory will unfold in His Resurrection. He sums up glory when He says to His Father, “Not my will but your will be done (Lk.22:42).”

Vs.6-19 are Jesus' prayer for His disciples, the longest section in the prayer. When you read this section of the prayer it is totally devoid of any social, political, economic, ethnic or emotional appeal. It is strictly for the disciples' spiritual consciousness and strengthening centered in Jesus. The world is the anti-Christ, the anti-personal, relational and spiritual opposition. When you read it there is no question that there are two dimensions, the secular world where the devil is the evil one and life in Jesus which is eternal reality. The one concentrates on the temporary fix. The other is the eternal, the real present. Note the eternal quality in Jesus' requests, His part in securing them and the disciples' part in embracing them. Note the hostility of the secular world.

But the real note here is God's strategy. You change the world heart by heart in a relationship with God not by physical and emotional intimidation and fear that rule the world apart from God. First and foremost is the direction to be spiritually conscious. This lifts the individual by giving him a new and unshakeable eternal identity, relational courage and confidence and the motivation to please God, others and self in that order.  

The following are the specifics that Jesus prays in front of His disciples for their benefit. They are grouped to see Jesus praying for each image of God who in the future will believe in Him. Vs.6-8 Jesus prays for their mind. Vs.9-12 Jesus prays for their heart. Vs.13-15 Jesus prays for their spirits. Vs.16-19 Jesus prays for their sanctification:

Their minds:

First, the disciples were given to Jesus by the Father.

Second, Jesus revealed the Father to them.

Third, they have obeyed the Father's Word.

Fourth, they know and accept everything He has given them has come from the Father.

Fifth, they know He came from the Father and believe the Father sent Him.

 

Their hearts:

Sixth, He is not praying for the world but for the disciples.

Seventh, all Jesus has is the Father's and all the Father has is His, the source of His glory.

Eighth, He prays for the disciples' protection because they remain in the world.

Ninth, He kept them safe by His name which makes them one.

Tenth, the only one lost was prophesied to be such.

 

Their spirits:

Eleventh, what Jesus has taught was for the disciples' inward joy.

Twelfth, He has given them the Father's Word and the world hates them.

Thirteenth, the disciples are not of the world just as Jesus is not.

Fourteenth, just as Jesus protected the disciples now, He again asks the Father to do the same.

Fifteenth, specifically He asks the Father to protect them from the evil one.

 

Their sanctification:

Seventeenth, Jesus asks that they be sanctified by the Word which is truth.

Eighteenth, as the Father has sent Him into the world He now sends the disciples into the world.

Nineteenth, for the disciples' sake Jesus sanctifies Himself.

Twentieth, Jesus' purpose for self-sanctification is the disciples' sanctification and ours.

 

As the Son He has revealed that God is His Father, the disciples' Father and our Father. This is a direct proclamation that implies relationship, authority and mission.

Now we come to the last part of the prayer, for the believers yet to come (vs.20-26). First, we need to recognize Jesus' immediate future will end on the Cross. He has been conscious of His Father's will in the whole of His earthly life. That will end the next day. So, He prays for those yet to believe through the message of His disciples. “That all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you.” Jesus has finished the work He came to do. Now He is passing on to the disciples the work of recovery and restoration which will make new believers and it is the new believers that will too, carry on the same work. For both His disciples and all of us who are future disciples the work is the way of the Cross in every next moment, event, circumstance and occasion. But, keep in mind, the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit are always working. When Jesus was confronted by Jewish leaders for healing on the Sabbath He responded, “My Father is always at His work to this very day, and I, too, am working (Jn.5:17).”

He prays that each new believer will be one with the other, “that they may be one Father, just as you are in me and I in you.” “May they also be in us so that the world may believe that you have sent me. That is, to be witnesses for Him. Jesus then says He has given them the glory the Father gave Him. He is speaking both in the present and for the future. That glory is His faith, His obedience, His grace and His truth and His love that are seen in the believers' lives as they move about in the world. It is this glory that makes them one. It is no longer about getting temporary personal glory as the world defines it but pointing to the glory of Jesus which is eternal. This is our work.

The key: “I in them and you in me. May they be brought to complete unity to let the world know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me.”

Then Jesus prays that those the Father has given Him will be where He is, to see His glory, the glory He was given by the Father---before the creation of the world! ---because He loved Him. There is a very open declaration here that the Father is sharing the love He has for His Son with those who are willing to believe in His Son. The whole theme of the 'indwelling God of love, the God who is love' is Jesus' emphasis in this prayer. Notice how this prayer ends, Jesus' pure and perfect humanity summing up a final human plea, “Righteous Father, though the world doesn't know you, I know you, and they know 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 will be in them.” God's love is spiritual, personal and relational. If you will, picture in your mind the Cross. It is spiritual (the vertical beam), it is personal (Jesus at the center) and relational (the horizontal beam stretched out right and left from the center).

Keeping the Cross in mind, the sequence of the prayer's three parts (vs.1-5, 6-19, 20-26) can be summarized this way. If we pray to be glorified (to be faithful) and then pray for our brothers and sisters in the Body to be glorified (our unity in the faith) and then for those who are yet to believe (their coming to faith), this is the Spirit working to bring glory to Jesus. “Always give yourselves fully to the work of the Lord, because you know that your labor in the Lord is not in vain. (1Cor.15:58).”