Jesus' Farewell Speech To The Disciples

Weekend Message/Devotion

May 19, 2019

Jesus’ Farewell Speech to the Disciples

John 13:31-35

Sermon Prayer: “Heavenly Father, I stand before Your people, to deliver Your message. Though the words are mine and I prepared this message, I pray that this message is Your message in its entirety. I pray your blessing and anointing on the message, its delivery, its reception - and most of all, its application in our lives.” Amen

Today’s gospel reading is short reading but packed with meaning for His disciples AND for you and me. We are led to refer to some events having taken place recently, and in understanding the foresight of Jesus the Omniscient.

“Now the Son of Man is glorified, and God is glorified in Him.” (v31)

Interestingly, this is the last time that Jesus refers to Himself as the “Son of Man”.

Here Jesus presents Himself as the “Suffering Servant” as is described in Isaiah 53:1-3:

“Who has believed our message

and to whom has the arm of the Lord been revealed?

He grew up before him like a tender shoot,

and like a root out of dry ground.

He had no beauty or majesty to attract us to him,

nothing in his appearance that we should desire him.

He was despised and rejected by mankind,

a man of suffering, and familiar with pain.

Like one from whom people hide their faces

he was despised, and we held him in low esteem.”

“I have brought you glory on earth by finishing the work you gave me to do.” John17:4

Are we – you and I - not to do the same? As I typed those words, the image of Peter denying Christ three times after His crucifixion came immediately to mind. Chills ran through my body! Do we glorify God or even try to glorify God in ALL that we do or only when it is convenient and comfortable? Yes, we sing our hearts out on Sunday mornings with praise and worship. We “AMEN!” the pastor when he/she makes a powerful point in the sermon. We shake hands and exchange hugs with those around us in church during a greeting session. And then what? We get in the car and express anger in any of many visible or auditory means when someone cuts us off in traffic, or when interrupted from an interesting piece of reading or television program. You get the picture, don’t you? How much contrast is there in your glorifying God in a church setting versus elsewhere?

Jesus recognizes this very point and thus COMMANDS us:

“A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another.” (V34)

This commandment is the very basis for our church mission statement: “WE LOVE AND SERVE GOD BY LOVING AND SERVING EACH OTHER” We often add with emphasis “EVERY EACH OTHER!”

It can be very discouraging to reach out to someone with sincere love and be rejected in many cold and cruel ways. But isn’t that exactly what Jesus did? Isn’t that exactly how Jesus glorified the Father?

Let us pray.

I humbly and sincerely ask for your prayers!

https://churchleaders.com/outreach-missions/outreach-missions-articles/311609-how-to-pray-for-your-pastor-ronnie-floyd.html?utm_source=outreach-cl-daily-nl&utm_medium=email&utm_content=read-more&utm_campaign=cl-daily-nl&maropost_id=&mpweb=256-7370272[HG1]

Note: It is the practice of this church to preach straight from the bible. We follow the lectionary assigned readings from which the sermon/messages are derived.