Title John 17:13-19
Today's text is a part of Jesus' last prayer to God the Father before he was arrested and crucified after completing the ministry of preaching the gospel of the kingdom. In this text, we can see who his disciples were in relation to Jesus Christ and what he asked God the Father to do for them. However, in verse 20, right after the last verse of the text, it says, “I do not pray for these people alone, but also for those who believe in me because of their word.” We can see who we are and what he asked God the Father to do for us.
First of all, who did Jesus say we are in our relationship with Jesus Christ? Verse 14 says, “I gave them your word, and the world hated them, because they are not of the world, just as I am not of the world.” In other words, like Jesus Christ, we are not of the world. This is repeated in verse 16: "They are not of the world, just as I am not of the world".
Then according to verse 18, who are we? “As the Father sent me into the world, so I sent them into the world,” he says. That is, we are people sent into the world by Jesus Christ.
Second, what did Jesus ask God the Father to do for us? In verse 13, Jesus said, "Now I am coming to the Father, and I say these things in the world, that they may have My joy in them to the full." That is, He prayed that we might have the fullness of the joy of Jesus Christ. In verse 15, Jesus prayed, “I do not ask you to take them out of the world, but to keep them from falling into evil.” In short, He prayed that He would preserve us from falling into Satan's temptations and sins. And in verse 17, Jesus prayed, “Sanctify them in the truth.” In other words, He asked to sanctify us with the truth.
Now, knowing that we are not of the world and that we are sent into the world by Jesus Christ, Jesus asks God the Father to make us full of the joy of Jesus Christ, preserve us from falling into evil, and bring us to the truth. We need to reflect on the meaning of the fact that He asked to be sanctified by God.
First, Jesus said that we are not of the world. Being out of this world means that we are different from the people of this world. They have different values, different ways of thinking, acting and living. We are hated by this world because we are different from this world.
Second, Jesus said we are sent into the world. To say that we are not of this world, but sent to this world implies that we have a mission. What would that mission be? It is to lead the world to know God and return to God.
Third, Jesus prayed to God the Father that we might have the joy of Jesus Christ to the full. Because we are not of this world and we are different from this world, our joys are different. That is why Jesus prayed to God the Father that we might be filled with the joy of the Lord, not the joy of the world. The more we face hatred and hostility from the world, the more certain we can enter into the Christian joy that the Lord gives us. What was the joy of Jesus? Isn't it only the joy of doing the Father's will, the joy of accomplishing all his will, and the joy of winning this world and gaining it for God's sake? Jesus wanted this joy to be our joy, and he prayed that it would fill us.
The word "holy" originally meant "different" or "separated" and has the following two meanings in it. The first is that they were “set apart for a special task.” What did God say when he called Jeremiah as a prophet? “Before I formed you in the womb, I knew you, before you were born I consecrated you, and I appointed you as a prophet to the nations” (Jeremiah 1:5). God also said to Moses, "You shall clothe Aaron your brother and his sons with him, and anoint them to commission and sanctify them, that they may give me the office of a priest" (Exodus 28:41). In this way, God gives us a certain task to sanctify us differently from this world.
The second meaning of the word "holy" in the sense of "different" or "separate" is that "he has given you the character or heart necessary to carry out that task." The greatest commandment Jesus gave us is to love God and love our neighbor. Therefore, the greatest manifestation of our holiness is none other than love. I said that holiness is a word that expresses God's being God, but that God is above all a God of love. Likewise, the greatest mark of our being God's people and of Christ's discipleship is love. You cannot achieve holiness without doing love.