A story is told of a boy who was drawing a picture. His teacher asked what he was drawing.
“I’m drawing a picture of Jesus, miss,” he replied.
“But, Johnny, we don’t know what Jesus looked like.”
Johnny paused for a moment, perked up, and said, “but they will when I’ve finished”
We laugh at that story because we’d all like to know, but know we can’t. There’s an attraction to the figure of Jesus. Yet surely this desire to know the human face of Jesus evades the fact that the most important ‘face’ of Jesus to know is his ‘divine’ face.
Our reading this morning from John chapter 17 forms part of his ‘High Priestly Prayer’. Jesus prays for himself, then for his disciples and finally, in that part we just heard, his prayer is for those, “who will believe in me through their message” (John17:20b). It’s a prayer for believers through all ages: it’s a prayer for you and me if we believe in him as Lord and Saviour. Verse 21 says “I have given them that glory which you gave me.” These are staggering words if you stop and think of their implication.- and Jesus prays also about knowing that love which he and the Father have for each other (John17:24).
This morning my desire is that that prayer would speak to each of us; that prayer which speaks of love and glory. It speaks of the love that the Father has for the Son; that which we can’t begin to understand or to comprehend in all its magnitude. There’s a unity and a fullness in the Godhead which is the unity of divine love, so that Jesus could speak of being one with the Father and of doing nothing except what he saw the Father doing. There’s surely a ‘prodigality’ in that love, and a fire which blazes at the centre of the being of God. I use the word ‘prodigality’ because I believe that the parable of the Prodigal Son is actually about the ‘Prodigal Father, and it throws light on the love of the Father for the Son. We see Jesus coming to this world, laying aside his divine nature, being made sin for us, being one with us as he bore all our dirt and degradation on the Cross, and then returning to the courts of heaven. And in this prayer, Jesus surely looks forward to that as he says to the Father, “I am coming to you now” (John17:13). If I may put it that way, surely the Father embraced the Son when he returned.
Then in verse 23, the prayer is that, “[we] may be brought to complete unity, to let the world know…that you have loved them even as you love me.” So, part of this prayer of the Lord Jesus Christ for us, is that we should know that God loves us; the Father loves us even as he loves his Son. It’s a love that Jesus has for his whole church, and for each one of us that we may know it. And let’s just note on this day when we pray for unity and celebrate unity, that it is not our prime goal. The Father desires our unity so that the world may know his love for us.
A bride looks radiant on her wedding day. I’ve known (and I’m sure you have) known the plainest of ‘Janes’ look radiantly beautiful on their wedding day. Why?
Well- a bride knows that she is loved; that she is counted as someone very special by someone who has responded to her with all his being. She prepares herself in beauty for him and is beautiful as she comes to meet him at the wedding. There is a joy in that radiance; a sad and plain bride would seem a contradiction in terms.
I can’t help but see this as something special that God has planted in the human heart- that it might speak to us of how we are to see God’s love. The New Testament speaks in two places of the love of Christ for his church (and thereby surely, of his love for each individual member) as that of a husband for his bride.
And this human love is but a pale reflection. In that famous passage (read at many weddings) from 1 Corinthians, Paul says, “now we see but a poor reflection, as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face” (1Cor 13:12). Paul, when he spoke of a mirror, wouldn’t have thought of our modern mirrors, but of a sheet of (not too flat and probably tarnished) sheet of metal, which would have given a very distorted reflection. The prayer of Jesus is that we may have some knowledge of the reality of God’s love.
Jesus then goes on to pray that, “the love which you have for me may be in them” John 17:26. Jesus wants us to know the love which the Father (and he) has for us. But (and this is probably even more amazing) his prayer is that he wants the love he has for the Father to be in us too! So that we may love God and love Jesus in that way. The Lord Jesus Christ wants us to develop a passionate desire and love for him, and a ‘prodigal’ desire for God.
Such ways of thinking aren’t, of course, very English!! We’re more comfortable with a cold, almost expressionless love. So- it’s almost wrong to have this sort of love for God! It’s wrong to bring our emotion in! But, then, surely we can expect God’s Word to give us some sort of idea- some sort of idea of the sort of feeling which is right and proper to have for God. Well, the Bible doesn’t let us down:
“As the deer pants for the streams of water, so my soul pants for you, O God. My soul thirsts for God, even the living God. Where can I go and meet with God” (Ps 42:1-2)”
Also, in Psalm 27-
“One thing I ask of the Lord, this is what I seek: that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, to gaze upon the beauty of the Lord, and to seek him in his temple”(Ps 27:4).
‘One thing I ask’ says the psalmist. And here we see a passion for God. Jesus is simply praying that we might have that passionate love, that ‘prodigal’ love that exists between the Father and the Son; that it might be in us.
Or, turn to the Song of Songs. Again this love which God desires, and which Jesus desires is mirrored dimly in the love of a man for a woman.
“My lover is mine and I am his” (SS 2:16). “I delight to sit in the shade, and his fruit is sweet to my taste. He has taken me to the banquet hall, and his banner over me is love” (SS 2:3b-4).
The Lord’s desire is for an abandonment of coldness, and a passion in our love for him. And we impoverish our relationship and intimacy with him because we feel we must rule out all emotion. So we rule out our need to spend time- quality time- with Jesus.
Finally, Jesus prays for believers to come to true unity, rooted and grounded in God’s love. It’s a unity which is not worked for, but grows out of the soil of that love. So, the third part of Jesus’ prayer is that that love may be seen in the church too, as he prays 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” (John 17:21).
How little that love is actually seen in the church! It would, of course, be quite easy to get into a guilt-trip here. That’s not what we’re meant to do. We are just meant to see that Jesus is praying, that it is his desire that that love and one-ness should be in the church. We might ask ourselves: Well, how can this be? How can this be? How can we know the love the Father has for us; how can we have that passionate love for Jesus; how can we show that selfsame love in the church?
The answer’s there for us in John chapters 14 to 16. Abide in him. Let the Holy Spirit come. God promises to pour his love in by the Holy Spirit. (Rom 5:5). That love then, can only come as we open ourselves to the flow of the Holy Spirit; as we allow ourselves to be filled. Only then can we know and experience that love. Only then can we grow in passionate love for the Lord Jesus Christ. Only then will his love be seen amongst us.
Why then does Jesus want this? Not just for our own indulgence, not just for a spiritual-emotional sauna.
First he wants his glory to be in the church. “I have given them the glory that you gave me” (Jn 17:22). His desire is that his glory be in the church. “Father, I want those you have given me…to see my glory” (Jn17:24).
Also, that the world may believe. Jesus’ specific prayer for all believers seems to be that through his disciples, the world may believe. If we read the words carefully, we shall see that Jesus does not directly pray that we should be one, that the world may believe. NO! He prays, “May they be in us so that the world may believe” (Jn 17:20). So often we try and manufacture a unity between the churches. So, may I emphasize: The world will believe when it sees the unity of the church with her Lord. That is the heart and the desire and the burden of the Lord Jesus Christ.
