That They May Be One

[Read John 17:20-26]

I want to begin this morning by asking a provocative question: Does the Father answer the prayers of Jesus? I mean, it sounds like an easy question, right? Since Jesus and the Father are one, it seems like it’s impossible for the Father NOT to answer Jesus’ prayers. So, the answer should be an easy yes.

Yet, what do we do about this morning’s passage? Jesus prays to the Father: “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…” (John 17:20–21, ESV). Jesus is praying that God’s people would be one. That’s his prayer. It doesn’t seem like it worked, does it? I mean, look at us. According to one statistic I heard recently, there are over 45,000 denominations worldwide. Does that sound like we’re one? Just look at the church in the United States right now. Does it look like we are one? I mean, even those who are “united” under denominations are divided. We’ve been praying as a congregation for our own denomination and the current split we’re going through. So, if we’re so divided as Christians, does that mean the Father didn’t answer Jesus’ prayer for unity? OR, does it mean that we’ve misread and misunderstood this passage over the years?

Jesus begins by expanding his prayer beyond the disciples. He prays, “I do not ask for these only, but also for those who will believe in me through their word…” (John 17:20, ESV). Now, this is connected to last week’s message. Remember, last week we talked about the fact that Jesus is sending us out into the world with the gospel. That’s the job/mission he’s given us to do in the world. He was talking specifically about the disciples, but it also applied to us. Now, if the disciples do their job and God’s people do their job of bringing the gospel into the world, some people are going to believe and be adopted into God’s family. Jesus says that he’s praying for them too. He’s praying for all those who currently believe in him and all who will believe in him throughout the rest of history.

Again, notice how this is connected to last week. How will these people believe? Jesus says, “…who will believe in me through their word…” (John 17:20, ESV). People will believe in Jesus through the words that are spoken by God’s people—through the gospel that is proclaimed by God’s people as they are sent into the world. I want to keep emphasizing this because I think it’s so important for us to remember. God draws people to himself through the work of his people. To be more specific, God works in people to believe in him through the spoken words of God’s people. He doesn’t do it apart from us. He doesn’t even do it solely through our actions. He does it through our words, through our message, through our gospel proclamation. That’s how God works to continue his mission in the world and continue building his kingdom.

As Jesus acknowledges that people will continue to hear the gospel and believe in him throughout the ages, what is the first thing he prays for? He says, “…that they may all be one… (John 17:21, ESV). Well, that’s where we always stop reading. He actually explains what he means by this. He prays, “…that they may all be one, just as you, Father, are in me, and I in you, that they also may be in us…that they may be one even as we are one, I in them and you in me, that they may become perfectly one…” (John 17:21, 22–23; ESV). What do you notice about the way Jesus talks about this “oneness”? He prays that we would be one that we would also be in him and the Father. That’s really important. This isn’t talking about some external unity, but it’s talking about our unity with Jesus Christ himself—that we would be united with him in the same way that he is united with the Father. In that way, we are perfectly one with him and the Father. When we understand it that way—the way it was intended to be understood—we can see that the Father has definitely answered this prayer of Jesus.

So, what does it mean for us to be united with Jesus Christ? It’s a hard concept for us to grasp because it’s hard to comprehend what it means to be united to someone. Yet, remember how Jesus describes this unity, saying, “…that they may be one even as we are one…” (John 17:22, ESV). Now, over the years, some people have understood that Jesus was praying that our unity would be so great that it would reflect the total and perfect unity of the Triune God. But, think about the way Jesus has spoken about his unity with the Father throughout the Gospel of John. Here’s one example: “Do you not believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in me? The words that I say to you I do not speak on my own authority, but the Father who dwells in me does his works. Believe me that I am in the Father and the Father is in me, or else believe on account of the works themselves.” (John 14:10–11, ESV). Throughout the Gospel of John, Jesus has been saying that he never does or says anything apart from the Father. This is a testimony of their unity, or as in this passage, it’s a testimony to the fact that he is in the Father and the Father is in him.

So, what does this mean for us to be united to Jesus Christ? Well, in a similar way, it means that we are being transformed more and more so that we would only do and say what Jesus does and says. Or, another way of saying that is, being united to Jesus Christ is all about our sanctification through the power of the Holy Spirit. When we’re united to Jesus Christ, we’re united to him in his life, death, and resurrection, which means all of those things now belong to us through the Spirit. The Spirit is working on us to not only assure us of God’s forgiveness and cleansing, but also so that we would become holy—become more like Jesus Christ.

THAT is what Jesus is praying for in this passage. Jesus is praying that everyone who believes in him, throughout history, would be united to him in such a way that they would receive his life, death, and resurrection and slowly be transformed to be more and more like him to the point that everything we say and do are things that Jesus says and does. That’s Jesus’ prayer and that prayer is being answered in every Christian’s life.

I realize that many of you have probably never heard this understanding of this passage before, so I want to make sure you know that I’m not just making this up out of thin air. I want to share a couple quotes with you from people you should be familiar with by now: John Calvin and Herman Ridderbos. John Calvin says this, “Hence, too, we infer that we are one with the Son of God; not because he conveys his substance to us, but because, by the power of his Spirit, he imparts to us his life and all the blessings which he has received from the Father.” (Calvin, 184). How are we one with Jesus Christ? We receive his life and all its benefits through the power of the Holy Spirit. Also, Herman Ridderbos, “What must engender this belief on the part of the world is not the church’s unity as such or the degree to which it asserts itself in the world as a unified movement (alongside similar movements!), but the liberating power of Jesus’ word and Spirit as it comes to expression in the church.” (Ridderbos, 561-562). This is about the liberating power of Jesus’ word and Spirit as it works itself out in the life of the church.

This is why Jesus prays, “…that the love with which you have loved me may be in them, and I in them.” (John 17:26, ESV). Jesus prays that the love of the Father would be in us. How does that happen? Well, it happens as we are more and more transformed by the power of the Holy Spirit to become more like Jesus. The more that happens, the more we will love with the same love the Father has for the Son. This is about sanctification.

That’s also why Jesus prays, “Father, I desire that they also, whom you have given me, may be with me where I am, to see my glory…” (John 17:24, ESV). Now, there’s a lot to this prayer about seeing Jesus’ glory but I want to point out one aspect of this that John speaks about in one of his letters. He says, “Beloved, we are God’s children now, and what we will be has not yet appeared; but we know that when he appears we shall be like him, because we shall see him as he is.” (1 John 3:2, ESV). When will we see Jesus as he is, in all his glory? We will see him in all his glory when he comes again and we are completely transformed to be like him. Guess what? This is also talking about sanctification. There’s a sense in which the more we become like Jesus Christ, through the power of the Spirit, the more we see the glory of Jesus Christ. And one day, when we are fully transformed, we will see the glory of Jesus in all its beauty and fullness.

Jesus’ prayer for the church is that we would be united to him so that we would increasingly be transformed to become more like him so that we would love with the Father’s love and see the glory of Jesus Christ.

This is Jesus’ prayer for our congregation too. Many of you know and remember the difficult years in the life of this church six or seven or eight years ago, when there were conversations about whether the doors of Faith Community Church needed to be closed. We’ve been working hard for the past six to eight years to revitalize this church and see it become healthy again. Guess how a church becomes healthy again? It’s not through programs and activities. It’s not through building renovations. A Church becomes healthy by being united to Jesus Christ and being transformed to become more like him each day. THAT is how we will become healthy as a church. We look to Jesus Christ in faith, trust him, receive forgiveness, receive the Holy Spirit, and begin the process of being sanctified.

Don’t forget what Jesus said last week. He prayed for our sanctification there too. He said, “Sanctify them in the truth; your word is truth.” (John 17:17, ESV). So, if we want to be sanctified, we need to be in God’s Word. We need to be reading it daily in our homes. We need to be speaking it to one another as we go through our days. We need to be regularly attending church and singing God’s Word and hearing God’s Word preached to us and tasting God’s Word through the sacraments. This is how we are sanctified to become more like Jesus and to continue the process of becoming a healthy church.

Notice what Jesus also connects with this. Twice in this prayer he says, “…that they may all be one…so that the world may believe that you have sent me…that they may become perfectly one, so that the world may know that you sent me…” (John 17:21–23, ESV). Jesus says that our union with him, our becoming more and more like him, will result in the world knowing and believing that he came from God. There’s actually a missional aspect to our sanctification. As we’re united to Christ, and the Holy Spirit works in us to transform us to be more and more like him, the world will notice. They will begin to see the power and the beauty and the glory of living the life God has created us to live. We briefly hear this last week in the Heidelberg Catechism, that one of the results of our sanctification is that, "by our godly living our neighbors may be won over to Christ.” (HC Q&A 86).

I want to take a moment to connect all of the dots from the last few weeks because I think it’s really important for us to understand what Jesus is calling us to do. The last few weeks we’ve talked about how the world will hate us because we’re not like the world; we’ve talked about how the Holy Spirit has been given to us to equip us for mission in the the world; we’ve talked about how Jesus is sending us into the world that he has overcome; and we’ve talked about how his prayer is that we would be one with him, becoming more like him, so that the world would believe in him. Are you starting to understand the bigger picture of what Jesus is calling us to do in this world and what his prayer is for each one of us? His prayer is that we would believe in him and be transformed by his Word and Spirit. Then as people who’ve been changed and transformed, we enter into the world as witnesses. Living out our transformed life in our families, at work, at the grocery store, and throughout our community. As we do that, our transformed lives come in contact with the world. Some will shriek and hate it, and others, by the power of the Spirit, will be drawn to it. As they are drawn to it, we need to be ready to speak to them about what’s different in our lives—we need to be ready to share the gospel with them so that they can believe and be transformed too by being united to Christ. Jesus is praying that we would live Holy, Missional Lives in the world.

Yet, I want to end with the reminder that it begins with being united to Christ and transformed by the Spirit. We are so tempted to try to ignore that step and “get to work.” We’re so tempted to try to revitalize a church without focusing on revitalizing the people in the church. That will never work. It all begins with being united to Jesus Christ and being renewed and revitalized through the power of the Holy Spirit. It’s about seeking first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, seeking first to be united with Christ, seeking first to be made holy, seeking first to be faithful in following Christ, THEN all the rest will be added to us. Then the world will see. Then the world will ask. Then we will have a glorious opportunity to share the gospel so that they might believe and be united to Christ.