The Path to Glory

INTRODUCTION

I invite you to turn in your Bibles to John 17. I’m at once excited and intimidated to preach this chapter because I know it’s going to be impossible to do this text justice.

So my goal this evening in the time we have is to help you see the big picture of John 17.

Now, in the end, the overall thrust of John 17 is the glory of God. We see this from the very first verse:

John 17:1 - 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,

Fast-forward to the end, and we see it again:

John 17:24 - Father, I desire that they also, whom you have given me, may be with me where I am, to see my glory.

So John 17 begins and ends with a focus on God’s glory. In fact, the term “glory”—doxa in the Greek—appears 8 times in its various forms throughout the chapter.

Now, when we talk about the glory of God, in this context, we’re talking about more than God’s honor or righteous character. Sometimes that’s what glory refers to with God, but in this case, verse 5 makes it clear we’re talking about the majesty and splendor that belongs only to God:

John 17:5 - And now, Father, glorify me in your own presence with the glory that I had with you before the world existed.

What Jesus is referring to is the resplendent majesty and brilliance that he shared with the Father in heaven from eternity past before he humbled himself in human flesh at the incarnation.

· It’s the glory that illuminated the universe on the first day of creation before there ever was a sun to shine light (Gen 1:3)

· It’s the glory that illuminated the night sky over Israel in a pillar of fire while they trekked through the wilderness

· It’s the glory that entered into the tabernacle in Exodus 40:34-35, and again in the temple in the days of Solomon in 1 Kings 8:10-11, making it impossible for the priests to enter for fear of their lives.

· It’s the glory that Peter, James, and John saw on the Mount of Transfiguration, when they saw the veil of Jesus’ humble humanity pulled back for a brief moment and they witnessed the blinding brilliance of his deity (Matt 17)

That’s what’s meant by “glory” in John 17. And what I think is so amazing about this is that Jesus’ final prayer in this chapter—verse 24, which we read already—is actually that you and I would be with him so that we may see His glory. I don’t know about you, but I’d like that very much.

Peter, James, and John thought the same thing. That’s why after they came down off the mountain, having seen Jesus transfigured, James and John came up to Jesus privately with a very special request:

Mark 10:35-37 - And James and John, the sons of Zebedee, came up to him and said to him, “Teacher, we want you to do for us whatever we ask of you.” And he said to them, “What do you want me to do for you?” And they said to him, “Grant us to sit, one at your right hand and one at your left, in your glory.”

Now, given what they saw, that’s an understandable request. After all, if you had just seen Jesus transform before your eyes into brilliant light, I think you’d want to figure out how to get as close to Him as you could. And that’s what they’re doing.

But this is where Jesus’ reply to them puts his glory into proper perspective:

Mark 10:38 - Jesus said to them, “You do not know what you are asking. Are you able to drink the cup that I drink, or to be baptized with the baptism with which I am baptized?”

In other words, there’s a path to glory. Jesus’ path to glory inevitably led him to the cross. Before there can be glory, there comes suffering. There’s a close connection in Scripture between suffering and glory that we don’t always pay attention to:

Romans 8:18 - For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us.

This puts our suffering into a different kind of perspective. We’re all familiar with suffering to one degree or another because we all experience the pains and implications of living in a world that is fallen and broken under sin and the curse. When we suffer, we know that this is the inevitable result of living in this world.

But what we need to realize is that there’s also purpose in this suffering—that suffering is part of a path—and there’s something at the end of that path. But because of our limitations—our finiteness, our weakness—we can’t always see what’s at the end of that path. We don’t know what God’s really doing.

So when we’re in the midst of suffering, we cry out to God like we should, like we’re instructed to. We cry out to him in prayer. But then Paul says in Romans 8:26, sometimes in our weakness, we don’t even know what to pray!

Romans 8:26 - Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weakness. For we do not know what to pray for as we ought…

It’s hard to pray when you can’t see the bigger picture. When the path you’re on crests a hill, and the slope is steep, and you don’t know what it leads to or where you’re going to end up, but it’s really hard going right now

That’s where John 17 comes in. This chapter gives us a perspective we could never have on our own. It pulls back a curtain on life and suffering and reveals God’s purposes for us in Christ.

In fact, there’s a unique grammatical feature to this chapter. In Greek, there’s a special kind of phrase that’s used to show purpose—it’s called a hina clause. It could be translated “so that” or “in order that.” This word occurs 19 times in chapter 17.

This chapter is all about purpose. It’s all about divine intent. It’s about Jesus, the Son of God, sent into the world in order to accomplish God’s mission of redemption. And we get to listen to the Son of God’s heart as he talks to the Father who sent him on that mission. We get to listen as Jesus prays for us in a way we could never pray for ourselves.

1. Jesus Prays for Himself (17:1-5)

Now, if you remember from our previous studies in John, it’s the Feast of Passover. Jesus knows that his hour has come and he is going to be arrested that night. So in chapter 13 we find Jesus and the disciples in the upper room eating the Passover meal together. And after Judas leaves them, he begins to teach them. For four chapters, Jesus gives them instructions, and his teaching culminates in this final prayer.

John 17:1-5 - When Jesus had spoken these words, he lifted up his eyes to heaven, and said, “Father, the hour has come; glorify your Son so that the Son may glorify you, since you have given him authority over all flesh, in order to give eternal life to all whom you have given him. And this is eternal life, in order 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.

Jesus begins by praying for himself. He is singularly focused. He knows he has arrived at the end of his earthly ministry. “The hour has come,” he says. There’s only one thing that’s left to do.

But notice what he talks about. He doesn’t talk about his suffering. He doesn’t mention his death. Instead, he talks about glory. “Glorify your Son,” he says. He talks about his death in terms of glory. In other words, Jesus sees a bigger picture beyond the suffering. He sees an end that’s beyond the cross. His suffering is a path that leads to glory.

But he’s even thinking beyond that. “Glorify your Son so that the Son may glorify you.” He knows that his own glory has an even greater purpose in that as he receives glory, the Father receives glory for accomplishing the redemptive plan he initiated when he sent Jesus into the world in the first place.

So we’re talking about purposes and ends at the grandest scale—the ultimate glorification of Father and Son in accomplishing God’s plan of redemption. This really is cosmic in scale! It makes us feel pretty small doesn’t it? And it should.

Yet that’s what makes this prayer so amazing is that we fit into this grand, cosmic plan.

John 17:2 – even as you have given him authority over all flesh, in order to give eternal life to all whom you have given him.

Yes, the ultimate goal of this cosmic plan is God’s glory. But he doesn’t get any glory if Jesus dies on the cross to no avail. God sent Jesus into the world with sovereign authority so that all whom the Father chose would have eternal life. There’s a purpose—eternal life for you and for me.

And even our eternal life has a purpose:

John 17:3 - “This is eternal life, in order that they know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent.”

“Knowledge” here isn’t talking about intellectual knowledge. That’s a Greek concept. The Hebrew idea of knowledge is one of intimacy. Adam “knew” Eve and she gave birth to a son. It’s relational and intimate. Not only did Jesus atone for our sins, but he reconciled us to God. Our eternal life leads us to know God and Jesus Christ. The relationship that was severed at the fall has been restored through Christ.

All of this purpose—God’s glory, our eternal life, our intimate relationship with God—it’s all routed through one event. “The hour has come.” The cross. He doesn’t talk about it, but that’s the path.

Application: If you haven’t noticed already, there’s an amazing insightfulness to Jesus’ prayer. It leaves us asking the question, ‘How could I ever pray a prayer like this?’ We can’t. There’s a divine insight Jesus reveals which we simply could never understand. We can’t connect the dots and understand the purposes and reasons for all that’s happening. We see the temporal, we experience the difficulties and sufferings of this life, and we don’t even know how we should pray. But Jesus prays with divine purpose and divine knowledge.

He prays for us.

2. Jesus Prays for His Disciples (17:6-19)

In verse 6 Jesus begins to pray specifically for his disciples. And verse 6 all the way up to verse 11 is a prelude to the core of his prayer for his disciples.

In the end, Jesus only has two requests for the disciples that sit before him in that upper room: that God would (1) keep them in the faith, and (2) sanctify them in the truth. That’s the core of his prayer for them.

John 17:11 - “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.”

Jesus knows he’s about to leave them. He already told them that earlier in chapter 16. He won’t be there with them much longer. He loves his disciples. They’ve been given to him by the Father as a love gift. He’s coming to his Father, but they’re going to be left in the world.

There’s danger implicit in this. They’re going to be vulnerable. They won’t be alone—they’ll have the Helper, the Spirit—but they’ll be left in a hostile world, a world that hates them, a world that’s under the power of the evil one.

So he prays, “Holy Father, keep them in your name, which you have given me” (v. 11). Keep them. Guard them. Protect them. Keep them secure. Why?

John 17:11 - Keep them in your name…so that they may be one, even as we are one.

The purpose of their protection is unity. Jesus wants them to be “one.” He wants the same kind of unity and love that characterizes his relationship with the Father to be what characterizes the people whom the Father gave him.

While he was with them, they could see God. They could witness the union he had with the Father. But he won’t be with them any longer, so they need to be guarded so that they can be one even while he’s not with them. He says in verse 12:

John 17:12 - 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, so that the Scripture might be fulfilled.

That is to say, even Judas’ betrayal had a purpose. His falling away wasn’t a failure on Jesus’ part. It was actually part of the plan all along. Jesus keeps his own—all whom the Father gives him he will not lose. No one can snatch them out of his hand (John 10:28). So what does that mean? It means that Judas wasn’t one of his own. He was never part of that love gift given to him by the Father.

Which is why Judas isn’t here right now, listening to Jesus as he asks the Father to keep them. When he left that upper room, he left God. He left the faith.

John 17:13 - But now I am coming to you, and these things I speak in the world, so that they may have my joy fulfilled in themselves.

There’s another purpose for why Jesus is asking the Father to keep his disciples safe. He wants them to have his joy. Remember in John 15, when Jesus is talking about abiding in him. He says this in verse 9:

John 15:9-11 - As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Abide in my love. If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commandments and abide in his love. These things I have spoken to you, that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be full.

Jesus wants his disciples to experience the fullness of his joy, a joy that’s intimately linked to abiding and remaining in him. That’s why he’s praying to the Father for their protection. He wants them to continue in his love, to abide in him, to manifest their faith in obedience and love and so experience the full joy of belonging to him.

He also asks for their protection because of the danger they’ll face. Look at verse 14:

John 17:14-15 - 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 so that you take them out of the world, but so that you keep them from the evil one.

In other words, his prayer isn’t for God to remove the disciples from the world. This isn’t an evacuation. No, they’re remaining in the world. And it’s a hostile world. They’re surrounded by a world who hates Christ and so they will also hate them. And at the center of this world system is the evil one—Satan. There’s danger. And these disciples, if left to themselves, will fall away. Their trials and their sufferings and difficulties will lead them away. So Jesus prays for God to keep them—so that they will remain despite the danger.

Keep them in the faith, and, sanctify them in the truth:

John 17:16-17 - They are not of the world, just as I am not of the world. Sanctify them in the truth; your word is truth.

The word “sanctify” is tabernacle language. It’s the idea of setting something aside from ordinary use and dedicating it specifically for God’s purposes and for God’s service. So for a person to be sanctified means they’re being set aside for his purposes and his use. And that act assumes that such a person his going to do what God wants, is going to love what God loves, and is going to hate what God hates.

When we talk about sanctification, that’s exactly what we’re talking about. We’re talking about God changing our hearts and wills so that we more and more love what he loves, hate what he hates, so we can be more and more useful for his purposes for us in the world.

And how does that happen? What instrument does God use to do that? “Sanctify them in the truth; your word is truth.” Sanctification happens through the repeated exposure to God’s truth.

But here’s the thing. There’s something else that has to happen in order for us to be sanctified in the truth:

John 17:18-19 - As you sent me into the world, so I have sent them into the world. And for their sake I consecrate myself, so that they also may be sanctified in truth.

What is Jesus talking about here? He’s talking about the cross. None of this can happen apart from Christ’s own self-sactification. Christ’s sacrifice sets the believer apart.

Application: Are you beginning to see the bigger picture? Once again, Jesus is praying a prayer for his disciples that they could never have prayed on their own because he has a perspective they can’t have. Neither can we.

When trials come, we can’t see past the fog of suffering. But Jesus has prayed to the Father: “In the midst of their suffering, keep them in the faith. Keep them in the faith so they can remain united together like we are. Keep the them in the faith so they can experience full joy. Keep them in the faith despite the aggressions of the world. Keep them in the face, and sanctify them in the truth, just like I sanctified myself on the cross for their sake.”

3. Jesus Prays for His Future Disciples (17:20-26)

For time’s sake, I want us to fast-forward to the end of chapter 17. There’s something even bigger here than you think. Beginning in verse 20, Jesus shifts his focus beyond the men in the room with him. His prayer for their protection and sanctification have a larger purpose than just them. They’re being left in the world because there will be others who will come to faith through their witness.

But what I really want you to see is in verse 24. This is Jesus’ final request. He’s asked the Father to keep them in the faith. He’s asked him to sanctify them in the truth. Now he has one final request—that the Father would perfect us.

John 17:24 - Father, I desire that they also, whom you have given me, may be with me where I am, so that they may see my glory that you have given me because you loved me before the foundation of the world.

We’ve come full circle. When he began his prayer, his focus was on God’s glory—that the Father might glorify him so that he might glorify the Father. And we talked about the fact that the path to that glory came with a price—his death. And he knew that.

Now his prayer is that we might be with him. He has left us in the world, but he longs for us to be with him. Isn’t that incredible? That’s one of the most encouraging things in the Bible. That Jesus wants us to be with him.

And that means that he must have left us in the world for a reason—a reason he’s already revealed—that the world might know through our unity and faithfulness and joy that Jesus really is the Son sent to save the world.

But our ultimate end is to be with him. Why? “…so that they may see my glory that you have given me.” Jesus wants us to be a witness to his glory—the kind of glory that has only been shown in moments of flashes to a few individuals he wants you to see in full.

There’s only one way that can happen. You have to be made perfect. Remember the hymn—“Holy, holy, holy, though the darkness hide Thee, though the eye of sinful man Thy glory may not see.” There’s only one way for you to be able to see the glory of God—you have to be made not just positionally pure through justification, but also practically pure. And that only happens through your death or the coming of the Lord Jesus.

Jesus’ final prayer is going to the very end—the end of time, the end of days, when your sanctification is complete and you’re home with him.

Conclusion

When we look at our life on earth, and we ask questions like, “Why is this happening?” or “What is God doing through all this?” When we go through sometimes intense seasons of suffering, and we struggle to see the bigger picture, when we struggle to know how or what to pray because we can’t see the forest through the trees, remember Jesus’ prayer.

He prayed a prayer you can’t pray. He prayed foryou, with the most cosmic of purposes in view. He can see the purposes of your trials. He knows the path he’s leading you down. He wants you to see his glory, and you can only trust him for how he’s using those trials to get you there.

We often hear Romans 8:28 quoted in times of difficulty—" And we know that God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose.”

Isolated as a single verse, that passage might bring some temporal encouragement. It’s good to know that God can turn the bad things in life into something good. But taken in its context, it’s scope and scale is just as grand as Jesus’ words in John 17:

Romans 8:28-30 - And we know that God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose. For those whom He foreknew, He also predestined to become conformed to the image of His Son, so that He would be the firstborn among many brethren; and these whom He predestined, He also called; and these whom He called, He also justified; and these whom He justified, He also glorified.

What is God really doing in your trials? He’s conforming you to the image of Christ. The ultimate end of your life is not your comfort, it’s how much you look like Christ. And God is using every difficulty, every trial, every circumstance, to make you fit to be with Jesus and see his glory.

So yes, God causes all things to work together for good. But we might not see that good until we see Jesus. Until we’re standing in front of him, having been made into his likeness, having been perfected and made fit to be with him and to see his glory.

Romans 8:18 - For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us.