Let’s Be the Answer to Jesus’ Prayer

John 17:20-26

Rev. Juvenal Cervantes, Pastor
St. John’s United Church of Christ, Greeley, Colorado
July 18, 2021

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[a] 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.”

2. JESUS PRAYED WE WILL BE WITH HIM TO SEE HIS GLORY.

To me, these are some of the most touching words Jesus prayed. He knew He was dying and going to glory, and He was leaving us behind to live in a world that would hate us. So, He prayed for us for the time when we would join Him in Heaven. In John 17:24 He prayed,

“Father, I want those you have given me to be with me where I am, so that they will see my glory.”

Charles Spurgeon was called the Prince of Preachers in London in the 1800s. He preached in a time when preaching was eloquent oratory. I don’t really speak that way, but I love to read the way Spurgeon described this verse: Charles Spurgeon wrote: “He did not say he wished his people to be in heaven; but WITH HIM IN HEAVEN, because that makes heaven heaven. There shall we have no fields to till, no garment to spin, no wearied limb, no dark distress, no burning thirst, no pangs of hunger, no weeping of bereavement; we shall have naught to do or think upon, but for ever to gaze upon that Sun of Righteousness, to be satisfied forever with his favor, and full of the goodness of the Lord! Oh! if we have only to die to get to such delights, as these, death is gain, it is swallowed up in victory!” That’s why Paul could write, “For to me, to live is Christ, but to die is gain.”

How do we know Jesus wants His children in Heaven? There are three reasons in John.

(1)       Because of the price Jesus paid in John 3:14 He said, “As Moses lifted up the snake in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up so that whoever believes in him shall have eternal life.”

(2)       Because of the promise Jesus made in John 14:1 when He said, “In my Father’s house are many rooms, I’m going there to prepare a place for you.” And

(3)       Because of the prayer Jesus prayed. Jesus prayed here in    

John 17:24. He said, “Father, I want those you have given me to be where I am.”

This world is a crazy place. There are so many ways that we suffer. Right now, people are suffering physically, emotionally, financially, and relationally. This world is a place of suffering.

That’s why Jesus prayed that we would be with Him one day. The Apostle Paul summed it up when he wrote in Romans 8:18: For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is going to be revealed to us.

But there’s a third prayer request that Jesus prayed for you.

3. JESUS PRAYED WE WILL BE FILLED WITH HIS LOVE.

These final words at the end of the prayer are filled with important truth. In fact, we find a perfect summary of the Christian life in the last five words of Jesus’ prayer.

In John 17:26 Jesus prayed, “I made your name known to them and will continue to make it known, so that the love you have loved me with may be in them and I may be in them.” (John 17:26) Keep that slide up for a minute. The last five words of Jesus’ prayer is the key to the Christian life. Jesus prayed, “I may be in them.” The secret of the Christian life is the indwelling Christ. It is Christ in you the Hope of glory. Christ with you is comforting. Christ with you is reassuring, but Christ IN you is revolutionary.

Paul prayed a similar prayer to Jesus in Ephesians 3:16-19: “I pray that he may grant you, according to the riches of his glory, to be strengthened with power in your inner being through his Spirit, and that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. I pray that you, being rooted and firmly established in love, may be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the length and width, height and depth of God’s love, and to know Christ’s love that surpasses knowledge, so that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.”

So how do we maintain this unity? By looking to Jesus as our author and finisher of our faith.

Don’t look at me or any other man or woman for your model for unity. Look to Jesus.

CONCLUSION

A.W. Tozer wrote that you can have 100 pianos in a large hall. You can tune the first piano, and then if you tune the second piano to the first, and the third to the second, and all the way to the 100th piano, those 100 pianos would be out of tune and the result would be ear-screeching disharmony.

On the other hand, if you tune each of those 100 pianos to a single tuning fork, all 100 pianos would produce beautiful music in harmony. What’s the lesson? You don’t model your life after me, or her, or him. Our model is Jesus. He is our tuning fork. And when I’m in tune with Him I will be in tune with you. That’s the way unity works.

Warren Wiersbe wrote about a little girl in Montana who wandered away from her village before a snowstorm. The family sounded the alarm and the entire village turned out to search for the lost child, shouting her name. The falling snow kept covering the tracks.

After several hours someone suggested that they form a human line holding hands and walk through every field surrounding the village. And eventually they found the girl but it was too late, she was frozen. The grieving father said, “Oh, if we had only joined hands sooner!”

There’s a lesson from that tragic story. There are thousands of men, women, and students in University of Northern Colorado and Aims Community College who are lost without Jesus. We just join our hearts and hands to show the world that God sent Jesus. When they see how we display the unity of the spirit in the bond of peace, they will believe our message.

St. John’s UCC has something very valuable. Not every church has it. I’m not talking about the building, or our worship, or the amazing volunteers. We have the beautiful unity of the Spirit. Jesus prayed for us to have it. I want you and I to do our part to keep it. I pray that we will be a church that isn’t frozen together with formalism, or wired together by organization, or roped together by programs. I pray that we will be a church that is melted together by the love of God found in the Lord Jesus Christ.

We all pray, but today, I want you to focus on being the answer to Jesus’ prayer. He prayed three things for you: Will you keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace? Will you trust Him so you can be where He is for all eternity? Will you allow Jesus to fill you with the Love of the Father?