Abiding In Christ 7

Defining Purpose

John 17:1-19

To know that your adored leader prays for you can be an overwhelming discovery of committed love.

Surely the 11 were overwhelmed when their Master turned from talking to them

— at length and with feeling

—about the Father, to talking, still at length and with feeling, to the Father about them.

Knowing he must leave them behind in a perverse and corrupt world, he asks for their continued protection from Satan, their sworn enemy for their ongoing holiness and sanctification; for lasting unity with each other, as proof of their new supernatural life; and for them finally to be with him in his glory beyond this world.

Clearly, Jesus wants them to overhear his prayer so as to realize that his love for them is not going to fade, but is an eternal reality.

Shouldn’t we be equally overwhelmed to know that from this throne Jesus intercedes for us in exactly these terms?

Discipleship takes wings when we constantly remind ourselves that at this moment Jesus, my Savior, Lord and Friend, is praying for me.

GROUP DISCUSSION

If you were setting out on a complex mission or task, what would be most important for you to know?

PERSONAL REFLECTION

Suppose you were able to say to God at the end of your life, “I have completed the work you gave me to do.”

What would you want that to mean?

Four times during his goodbye conversation with his disciples, Jesus admonishes them to pray, and each time he makes powerful promises connected with prayer.

Now at the end, Jesus prays in their presence: first for himself, then for his followers.

Read John 17:1-19.1

John 17:1–19:1 ESV

When Jesus had spoken these words, he lifted up his eyes to heaven, and said, “Father, the hour has come; glorify your Son that the Son may glorify you, since you have given him authority over all flesh, to give eternal life to all whom you have given him. And this is eternal life, that they know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent. I glorified you on earth, having accomplished the work that you gave me to do. And now, Father, glorify me in your own presence with the glory that I had with you before the world existed. “I have manifested your name to the people whom you gave me out of the world. Yours they were, and you gave them to me, and they have kept your word. Now they know that everything that you have given me is from you. For I have given them the words that you gave me, and they have received them and have come to know in truth that I came from you; and they have believed that you sent me. I am praying for them. I am not praying for the world but for those whom you have given me, for they are yours. All mine are yours, and yours are mine, and I am glorified in them. And I am no longer in the world, but they are in the world, and I am coming to you. Holy Father, keep them in your name, which you have given me, that they may be one, even as we are one. While I was with them, I kept them in your name, which you have given me. I have guarded them, and not one of them has been lost except the son of destruction, that the Scripture might be fulfilled. But now I am coming to you, and these things I speak in the world, that they may have my joy fulfilled in themselves. I have given them your word, and the world has hated them because they are not of the world, just as I am not of the world. I do not ask that you take them out of the world, but that you keep them from the evil one. They are not of the world, just as I am not of the world. Sanctify them in the truth; your word is truth. As you sent me into the world, so I have sent them into the world. And for their sake I consecrate myself, that they also may be sanctified in truth. “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. 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. Father, I desire that they also, whom you have given me, may be with me where I am, to see my glory that you have given me because you loved me before the foundation of the world. O righteous Father, even though the world does not know you, I know you, and these know that you have sent me. I made known to them your name, and I will continue to make it known, that the love with which you have loved me may be in them, and I in them.” When Jesus had spoken these words, he went out with his disciples across the brook Kidron, where there was a garden, which he and his disciples entered. Now Judas, who betrayed him, also knew the place, for Jesus often met there with his disciples. So Judas, having procured a band of soldiers and some officers from the chief priests and the Pharisees, went there with lanterns and torches and weapons. Then Jesus, knowing all that would happen to him, came forward and said to them, “Whom do you seek?” They answered him, “Jesus of Nazareth.” Jesus said to them, “I am he.” Judas, who betrayed him, was standing with them. When Jesus said to them, “I am he,” they drew back and fell to the ground. So he asked them again, “Whom do you seek?” And they said, “Jesus of Nazareth.” Jesus answered, “I told you that I am he. So, if you seek me, let these men go.” This was to fulfill the word that he had spoken: “Of those whom you gave me I have lost not one.” Then Simon Peter, having a sword, drew it and struck the high priest’s servant and cut off his right ear. (The servant’s name was Malchus.) So Jesus said to Peter, “Put your sword into its sheath; shall I not drink the cup that the Father has given me?” So the band of soldiers and their captain and the officers of the Jews arrested Jesus and bound him. First they led him to Annas, for he was the father-in-law of Caiaphas, who was high priest that year. It was Caiaphas who had advised the Jews that it would be expedient that one man should die for the people. Simon Peter followed Jesus, and so did another disciple. Since that disciple was known to the high priest, he entered with Jesus into the courtyard of the high priest, but Peter stood outside at the door. So the other disciple, who was known to the high priest, went out and spoke to the servant girl who kept watch at the door, and brought Peter in. The servant girl at the door said to Peter, “You also are not one of this man’s disciples, are you?” He said, “I am not.” Now the servants and officers had made a charcoal fire, because it was cold, and they were standing and warming themselves. Peter also was with them, standing and warming himself. The high priest then questioned Jesus about his disciples and his teaching. Jesus answered him, “I have spoken openly to the world. I have always taught in synagogues and in the temple, where all Jews come together. I have said nothing in secret. Why do you ask me? Ask those who have heard me what I said to them; they know what I said.” When he had said these things, one of the officers standing by struck Jesus with his hand, saying, “Is that how you answer the high priest?” Jesus answered him, “If what I said is wrong, bear witness about the wrong; but if what I said is right, why do you strike me?” Annas then sent him bound to Caiaphas the high priest. Now Simon Peter was standing and warming himself. So they said to him, “You also are not one of his disciples, are you?” He denied it and said, “I am not.” One of the servants of the high priest, a relative of the man whose ear Peter had cut off, asked, “Did I not see you in the garden with him?” Peter again denied it, and at once a rooster crowed. Then they led Jesus from the house of Caiaphas to the governor’s headquarters. It was early morning. They themselves did not enter the governor’s headquarters, so that they would not be defiled, but could eat the Passover. So Pilate went outside to them and said, “What accusation do you bring against this man?” They answered him, “If this man were not doing evil, we would not have delivered him over to you.” Pilate said to them, “Take him yourselves and judge him by your own law.” The Jews said to him, “It is not lawful for us to put anyone to death.” This was to fulfill the word that Jesus had spoken to show by what kind of death he was going to die. So Pilate entered his headquarters again and called Jesus and said to him, “Are you the King of the Jews?” Jesus answered, “Do you say this of your own accord, or did others say it to you about me?” Pilate answered, “Am I a Jew? Your own nation and the chief priests have delivered you over to me. What have you done?” Jesus answered, “My kingdom is not of this world. If my kingdom were of this world, my servants would have been fighting, that I might not be delivered over to the Jews. But my kingdom is not from the world.” Then Pilate said to him, “So you are a king?” Jesus answered, “You say that I am a king. For this purpose I was born and for this purpose I have come into the world—to bear witness to the truth. Everyone who is of the truth listens to my voice.” Pilate said to him, “What is truth?” After he had said this, he went back outside to the Jews and told them, “I find no guilt in him. But you have a custom that I should release one man for you at the Passover. So do you want me to release to you the King of the Jews?” They cried out again, “Not this man, but Barabbas!” Now Barabbas was a robber. Then Pilate took Jesus and flogged him.

Focus particularly on Jesus’ prayer for himself in verses 1-5.

1. What do you learn here about Christ and his purpose?

2. Several times in his prayer for himself, Jesus uses words and phrases that speak of time. What does his use of time language reveal to you about time and eternity, God and his people?

3. How can Jesus’ prayer for himself contribute to your own worship of God as Trinity?

4. “I pray for them,” says Jesus in verse 9. At this point in his ministry Jesus has eleven remaining disciples: Peter, James (son of Zebedee), John, Andrew, Philip, Bartholomew, Matthew, Thomas, James (son of Alphaeus), Thaddaeus, Simon.

Select one of these disciples as your own “stand-in,” and for the moment give yourself one of these names.

Read verses 6-19, listening to Jesus’ prayer through the ears of this disciple with all that you imagine him to be.

What words and phrases are important to this disciple you have chosen to imitate?

Why?

Which words and phrases are important to you in your own context? Why?

5. Review uses of the term world, which Jesus uses nearly a dozen times in this prayer. What good can Christ-followers accomplish because they are in the world, but not of the world?

6. Read again this petition in Jesus’ prayer: “Holy Father, protect them by the power of your name—the name you gave me—so that they may be one as we are one” (v. 11).

In view of the task and the purpose that Jesus has given his followers, why is the kind of unity described here important?

7. When and how have you experienced this kind of kinship with other believers?

8. Prayerfully read the last three sentences of Jesus’ prayer for his disciples (vv. 17-19). What does this second part of Jesus’ prayer in John 17 suggest about his purpose—and its impact on his followers?

9. Jesus began this prayer for his disciples with a statement to his Father: “I have revealed you to those whom you gave me out of the world” (v. 6). As you think back over what you know of Jesus’ life and teachings, when and how have you seen Jesus reveal the true nature of his Father?

10. When have you seen God revealed in or through someone?

11. Mentally picture a dozen people who follow you in one way or another. What would have to happen for you to be able to say at the end of your life, “Father, I have revealed you to those whom you gave me out of the world”?Spend some time in prayer thanking God for these early disciples and Jesus’ ministry through them.

Now or Later

Select one of the eleven disciples who remained with Jesus at this point. Research how that person spent the remainder of his life. Consider ways that this disciple lived out the purposes expressed in Jesus’ prayer for him.