Or, What Jesus Prays for the World to Know
Scripture: John 17:20-23
Date: April 13, 2014
Speaker: Sean Higgins
There is no audio currently available for this sermon.
The theme of each message this past week at T4G was evangelism. Being together for the gospel should include a shared desire to spread the gospel in the world. We know that Jesus prayed for the Father to keep His disciples in the world and that He sent them into the world just as His Father sent Him. Jesus gave His disciples the words His Father gave Him (John 17:8) and we also must tell the evangel with words so that it can be heard. “Faith comes by hearing and hearing by the word of Christ” (Romans 10:17).
All the messages at the conference stressed this truth. The truth of the gospel should be spoken, proclaimed, taught. There is no other way to call unbelievers to confession, repentance, and believing in Jesus without words.
And yet, as Jesus prays for His disciples and as we come to His prayer for all future disciples, including us and those disciples who will come after us, Jesus Himself prays for more than our words. He prays for more than a crop of accurate theology knowers and clear truth talkers.
It is absolutely certain that no one will be saved without hearing and believing the message of Jesus. It is also important that those who bear the message of Jesus should be sanctified. In verses 17-19 Jesus prays for His disciples, not only that they would know the truth but also that they would be made holy in their lives by the truth. As Jesus expands His prayer He also prays that all disciples would be unified. Based on what He prays, what He says He wants the world to know, we will not have the evangelistic impact in the world apart from being a group of unified disciples.
In John 17:20-23 Jesus prays for the witness of His disciples in the world and grounds the petition in God’s triune nature, in Christ’s incarnational work, and in our unity. This is Trinitarian Evangelism. This is what Jesus wants the world to know and how He expects the world to know it. This is oneness as witness.
Having prayed for His glory (verses 1-5), then for the protection and sanctification of the eleven (verses 6-19), Jesus petitions His Father on behalf of all His sheep throughout all generations.
“I do not ask for these only, but also for those who will believe in me through their word, that they may all be one, just as you, Father, are in me, and I in you, that they also may be in us, so that the world may believe that you have sent me. (John 17:20–21, ESV)
Jesus made quite a point about those to whom He manifested the name of God and that He prayed for “the people whom you gave me out of the world. Yours they were, and you gave them to me” (verse 6). He said, “I am praying for them. I am not praying for the world but for those you have given me” (verse 9). As I’ve said over the last couple weeks, in these verses He petitions on behalf of the eleven disciples who were with Him, the ones listening to Him pray, though there has been application for us.
Now, starting in verse 20, Jesus prays directly for us. Here our High Priest thinks about and asks explicitly on our behalf. He says, I do not ask for these only, but also for all those who will believe in me through their word. The these are the eleven, the those who will believe include every disciple in every generation in every place since the apostles started proclaiming Jesus.
Though it may be assume-able among us, what defines us, what identifies us is believing in Jesus. We have no other hope and in Him is all our hope. The first 16 chapters of John provided reasons to believe as they showed His glory full of grace and truth. That said, the climax of the earthly part of Jesus’ ministry is still to come in chapter 18-20. We have learned about Jesus, His nature, His works, His teaching through the word of one of the eleven, from the apostle John. Our very existence as a believing people is part of the Father’s answer to His Son’s prayer. Their word was preached, and much of their word, their “message,” their “teaching,” is preserved for us in the New Testament. As God’s word in Genesis 1 created image-bearers, so the gospel word creates a community of Christ image-bearers.
Our spiritual grandfathers and our spiritual grandchildren are the people prayed for. And there are two parts of the petition. I ask…that they may all be one, just as you, Father, are in me and I in you, [and] that they also may be in us. The petitions are first, our unity with one another, and second, our union with God Himself. Jesus asks for lateral and vertical communion.
First, He asks for our oneness with each other: that they may all be one. “Father, take a multiplicity of diverse folks and bring them into unity.” The degree of unity is the same as the Trinity, with Father and Son in view first. Make them one, just as you, Father, are in me and I in you. The oneness of Father and Son isn’t new, but it is an argument in Jesus’ prayer. He desires divine unity for all disciples just as He prayed for the eleven in verse 11: “that they may be one, even as we are one.”
Second, He asks for our union with the Trinity: that they also may be in us. The petition is for disciples to live, to exist in communion with the Persons of God.
Oneness and union will be virtually unhindered in heaven. Yet Jesus prays for the unity of disciples on earth now for a purpose. The purpose of oneness and unity is so that the world may believe that you have sent me. The tight relationships between believers and other believers is a witness to the world.
Our oneness must be visible even to those who are spiritually blind. Faith does not come by observation, but observation through the eyes might open ears to hear why. Word lovers, when they don’t pay attention to all the words (like those here), miss that oneness is a platform for the words. Loving one another just as Jesus loved us proves to others that we are disciples of Jesus (John 13:34-35). Unity draws an audience. A certain sort of isolationist word-pusher wants to sweep water uphill. Give unity a chance.
The next two verses coordinate with the petition. They are not a petition nor are they a ground of the petition. Jesus’ previous work belongs with the same end for which He prays.
The glory that you have given me I have given to them, that they may be one even as we are one, I in them and you in me, that they may become perfectly one, so that the world may know that you sent me and loved them even as you loved me. (John 17:22–23, ESV)
Glory is such a thick yet woolly word. It is thick, it is warm, but it’s hard to know what all is in there. Here, in this context, it refers to everything that makes God great. And the Father gave all that greatness to the Son who in turn gave it to His disciples and their disciples. Glory is grace and truth. Glory is loving sacrifice. Glory is manifestation of the name. Glory is revelation of God. Jesus revealed God and the revelation aimed at the same purpose as His petition: that they may be one even as we are one.
The word (of revelation) works for oneness. The revelation describes relationships within the Trinity and also effects relationships with the Trinity and among worshippers of the Trinity. I in them and you in me that they may become perfectly one. The glory of God is most glorious in loving communion, the glory of God works for glory in creating/giving/enabling loving communion. The perfectly or “completely” is from τελειόω which is from τέλος: to complete, to bring to finish, to reach the goal. Jesus’ end is oneness with no cracks, no seams.
There is witness purpose in the oneness: so that the world may know that you sent me and loved them even as you loved. Our unity and union reveals Jesus. To evangelize with words without oneness undermines the words we proclaim.
Elements in the Formula
These are perhaps accurate explanations of the formula (disciples in unity equals witness), but they beg a couple more questions. Most important, how does our unity show that 1) Jesus was sent and 2) that the Father loved us as the Son? Our being sent would image Jesus being sent. Our faithful retelling of the story of Jesus being sent could get the point to the world. But why does Jesus put our unity as the means of witness?
Before we can answer that, however, in what way are we to have unity? How are we “one” as Father and Son are one? The weight of our witness rides on our oneness, so what is it and then how does that oneness show sent-ness and love?
It seems to me that there are three distinguishable ways to think about oneness from this text. First, oneness could be a oneness of belief. The Father and Son (and Spirit) are one in being. Because that is true, we ought to receive it as true. For a whole group to receive and speak of the truth is a way to be one. Jesus may be praying for unity as we think the same about God. Our witness is united from commonly held doctrine.
Second, oneness could be a oneness of mission. The Father and Son (and Spirit) are one in purpose. Each person has a different role—the Father chose and sent, the Son submitted and sacrificed, the Spirit regenerates and illuminates—all to the same end. The Trinity coordinates to save the given ones. So then as a group we ought to be one in mission as witnesses to the world. Not only is oneness thinking the same but also acting together.
These may be included in what it means to be one, but they are not sufficient. Thinking the same doesn’t always equal agreement. Lawyers can think the same thing, even as they take the bar examination, but that doesn’t mean they are in agreement. Wearing the same jersey and shooting at the same basket does not mean that a team has chemistry. Even a winning team doesn’t mean that it is a winsome team, a team you want to know more about and want to be a part of.
If oneness simply means same believing, what does oneness prove that sentences don’t by themselves? Why hassle with the harder thing? If oneness means acting together, what makes the common mission attractive? Why would I be drawn to a group’s unified mission against me if I couldn’t see how it was for me?
So third, oneness could be a oneness of fellowship. The Father and Son (and Spirit) do exist in oneness of being. All three Persons do act together in oneness of purpose. But what makes Him/Them irresistible is that they enjoy each other. They have chemistry. And they are at work bringing all the given ones into believing communion.
The what of oneness (our fellowship) belongs with how oneness brings the world to believe and know about a sent Son and a Father’s love. In other words, our fellowship with each other, which is enabled by God Himself, reveals God to the world. Oneness only exists in a universe made by a God of unity. Oneness only happens now because of God’s gracious purpose. He is showing the world His glory. He is showing the world how to have the fellowship they long for by working to form a glorious, fellowshipping one on earth in us.
True oneness isn’t created or sustained around similar hobbies or shared interests or common geography or family blood. True oneness is enabled by humility and love and sacrifice. On other words, true oneness is created and sustained by God through Christ who humbly gave Himself through loving service and sacrifice in the flesh. God is making us, Jesus prays that we would have unity in the same way, through humble, loving sacrifice. That’s why unity shows the sent Son and loving Father to the world.
Our unity shows what sort of God we have; our God is one and He works to make one. Our unity shows what sort of love our God has for us.
The ineffectiveness of our witness in the world must be attributed more to our lack of oneness than our lack of words. We have great words about Jesus even saying that He was sent by a loving Father. Our lack of unity means we’re shouting into the wrong end of the megaphone and making our message smaller.
A proper pursuit of unity as an evangelistic strategy does not make us man-centered or pragmatic because we are as depending on God’s grace for our unity as we must be for conversions. Jesus prays for God to make us one because we weren’t and won’t be by ourselves. Depending on Him to unify us and then to use our unity to make the world want what we have still gives Him all the glory. He gave the words. He brings oneness. He gives life to the world through a believing, proclaiming, fellowshipping people.