The Real Lord’s Prayer — #4

Text: John 17:20-26

Theme: Our Lord's selflessness in prayer as He stands in the shadow of the cross teaches His disciples an important element of prayer.

David Martyn Lloyd-Jones was a Welsh Protestant minister and medical doctor who was influential in the British evangelical movement in the 20th century. For almost 30 years, he was the minister of Westminster Chapel in London. In one of his many sermons from John 17 he said this: "In this Christian life, there are many problems and difficulties. But more and more, it seems to me that most of our problems indeed, if not all of them, arise simply from the fact that we fail to realize and understand and appreciate what is the real truth about us as Christian people."

There is a lot of truth in that statement. We read this chapter without meditating on the things that Jesus said. These are not abstract truths for theologian to ponder over. These are truths about us and for us.

Our Lord prays essentially about three matters.

• Verses 1-5 For Himself…that He may be glorified.

• Verses 6-19 For the disciples…to be sanctified.

• Verses 20-26 For future followers…to be unified.

I. JESUS PRAYED FOR DISCIPLES YET TO COME

v. 20 "My prayer is not for them alone. I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message . . .”

1. Jesus ends this extraordinary prayer by petitioning His heavenly Father to bless his Church yet to come

a. Jesus is actually being prophetic here

1) he is declaring that his Church will survive and thrive

a) he is not praying that people might be saved through the preaching ministry of the disciples and their successors

b) he is affirming in his prayer that people will be saved through the preaching ministry of the disciples and their successors ... it’s a done deal ... his church will be birthed on the Day of Pentecost, and it shall never end

2. Jesus’ prayer is for a Church that does not yet exist, but which he knows will exist

a. ours is an apostolic faith, meaning ...

1) 1st, the gospel we believe and proclaim, is the gospel the apostles believed and proclaimed, and is the only gospel that saves

2) 2nd, that this gospel was delivered by Jesus to his apostles and that gospel has been faithfully delivered from one generation of believers who have evangelized the next generation of believers

a) in that sense, the Church is always just one generation away from extinction

ILLUS. Go to any totalitarian state, weather it is a secular totalitarian state or a religious totalitarian state, and one of the things common throughout his is that totalitarian states attempt to limit the growth and influence of the Church by making evangelism — even of one’s own children — a criminal offense.

b) and yet the Church always finds a way to spread the gospel, to evangelize the lost, and win converts

b. you can threaten it, and you can persecute it, and you can even kill members of it, but the believers Christ prayed for will come to faith in him

ILLUS. The Church Father Tertullian famous wrote, "the blood of the martyrs is the seed of the Church." The more you kill us and persecute us the more we multiply.

3. when Jesus prayed in the garden we were on his mind

ILLUS. R.G. Lee was perhaps the greatest Southern Baptist of his Generation. He served as pastor of Bellevue Baptist Church in Memphis, TN for thirty-three years. While he was there he took a trip to Israel. While in Jerusalem, his tour group went to the grounds of the Garden Tomb. This is the traditional site of Jesus’ crucifixion and resurrection. Event to this day as you enter the grounds you can see what resembles the face of a skull hill behind the tomb. As the tour group was milling around, Dr. Lee broke away from his group and found a solitary place where he knelt and began to pray. When the guide and the rest of the group caught up to Dr. Lee, the guide said, “Dr. Lee, have you been here before?” Dr. Lee looked up with tears in his eyes and said, “Yes, I was here 2,000 years ago because I was on the heart and in the mind of Jesus when He died for me.”

a. here is one of the great truths of the Christian faith, when Jesus was on the cross, I was on his mind ... and so were you

A. THERE IS ONE HOLY CATHOLIC CHURCH

1. I believe in the holy catholic church

a. all good Baptists should also believe in one holy catholic church

1) of course that’s catholic with a small c

2. Jesus’ prayer reminds us that there is just one true church — and it’s not the Presbyterians, or the Methodists, or the Catholics or the Baptists

a. there are true believers — those who have been born from above — who have membership in the thousands of Christian denominations throughout the world

b. the word catholic simply means universal — all Christians, in all places, throughout time

1) it is a fellowship of the saints in Christ and through the Spirit that binds us together as family

ILLUS. This means that we are in spiritual union with a born again Methodist, just as must as we are in spiritual union with Moses. That we are in fellowship with born again Presbyterians, just as we are in fellowship with the Apostle Paul.

3. are we to worship them or pray to them?

a. absolutely not, but we are to remember that we are in spiritual union with every true believer across the world

1) this is why we pray for our Christian brothers and sisters in Ukraine

“Bear one another’s burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ.” (Galatians 6:2, ESV)

“Rejoice with those who rejoice, weep with those who weep.” (Romans 12:15, ESV)

2) these verses are not just to be practiced for those in close physical proximity to us

b. if Jesus can pray for a church 2,000 years into the future, we can pray for a church 5,000 miles away

... Jesus Prayed for Disciples Yet to Come and So Do we

II. HE PRAYED FOR UNITY OF CHRISTIAN FELLOWSHIP v. 21-22

“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. 22 The glory that you have given me I have given to them, that they may be one even as we are one,” (John 17:21–22, ESV)

1. some look at these verse and conclude that the church has certainly not been an answer to Jesus’ prayer

ILLUS. Within the family that calls itself “Christian” there are three major families — Catholic, Eastern Orthodox and Protestant. Within Protestantism there are nine major traditions including Adventism, Anabaptism, Anglicanism, Baptists, Reformed, Lutheranism, Methodism, Moravianism, and Pentecostalism. Eastern Orthodoxy has fifteen self-governing branches. Even Catholicism is made up of seven ecclesial traditions (Armenian, Byzantine, Coptic, Ethiopian, East Syriac (Chaldean), West Syriac, and Maronite) that all choose to place themselves under the authority of the Bishop of Rome.

Then, if you actually begin naming individual denominations the division within the Church climbs to as high as 45,000 according to some estimates. There are more than three dozen kinds of Baptists organized as denominations in North America alone.

a. my point in all this is will the Body of Christ every experience the kind of unity Jesus prayed for?

1) on this side of heave, probably not

b. left to ourselves, we don’t automatically drift toward unity

1) in fact, our default-position is disunity

2) history is littered with the results of disharmony about humans

c. even the disciples, who spent three years with Jesus, demonstrated more disharmony than harmony

ILLUS. Unbelievably, right after Jesus celebrated his last supper with the disciples, Luke’s gospel records that an argument broke out among them, as to which of them would be the most important in Christ’s kingdom.

A. WHAT JESUS DOESN’T PRAY FOR

Jesus doesn’t pray for uniformity (for everyone to be the same)

ILLUS. Most of you are familiar with the word triage. In the medical world it refers the assignment of degrees of urgency to wounds or illnesses to decide the order of treatment of a large number of patients or casualties.

Across America first responders use four different colors to mark the severity of a person’s injuries. A black tag is used for someone who had already deceased. A red tag was given to someone who has experienced serious trauma and is in critical condition. A yellow tag is a more significant issue, but the situation might not be as urgent. Green tags were for those we called the “walking wounded;” who can often be treated and released.

In 2005 Dr. Al Mohler, wrote an important article calling for churches to use spiritual triage when it came to doctrinal issues. First-level theological issues would include those doctrines most central and essential to the Christian faith. Second-order doctrines is distinguished from the first-order set by the fact that believing Christians may disagree on the second-order issues, but still have significant fellowship. Second-order doctrines often create significant boundaries between believers, and set off one denomination from the other, i.e. mode of Baptism, meaning behind the Lord’s Supper. Third-order issues are doctrines over which Christians may disagree and remain in close fellowship, even within local congregations.

Jesus doesn’t pray for unanimity (for absolute agreement of opinion)

ILLUS. Christians who root for the Cardinals and those who root for the Cubs really ought to be able to worship together! Seriously. Augustine wrote: In essentials, unity, in non-essentials, liberty; I all things, love.” It’s possible to be diverse and yet not divided.

Jesus doesn’t pray for union (for absolute affiliation)

ILLUS. Unfortunately, in the world of the church union is often the result of corrosion or power and seldom a oneness of heart.

Jesus prays for unity (oneness of heart, faith, and purpose)

ILLUS. True believers in Christ are one, no matter what name is on the church sign. We’re redeemed by the same blood, and going to the same heaven, even though we might not be able to function together congregationally.

III. HE PRAYS THAT OUR FAITH WILL BECOME SIGHT AND FOR OUR ASSURANCE IN REDEMPTION v. 24

“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.” (John 17:24, ESV)

1. I think the saddest state a believer can find themself in would be not having assurance of their eternal destiny

2. Jesus prayed that God would give all His children an assurance of salvation

a. our assurance rests, not in the fact that we are faithful to God

b. our assurance rests solely upon the Father's faithfulness to His Son, Jesus Christ

IV. THE SPIRITUAL APPLICATION

A. OUR LORD'S HIGH-PRIESTLY PRAYER IS AN EXAMPLE OF WHAT CHRISTIANS OUGHT TO STRIVE FOR

1. Christians Ought to Strive for God to Be Glorified in Their Lives

a. the most important prayer a Christian can pray is, "God glorify yourself through my life today."

ILLUS. In his book We Believe in Prayer Lawrence Brings writes, "Prayer is at its highest and noblest when its purpose is not to get something, but to get close to someone—the Lord God, our Heavenly Father."

2. Christians Ought to Strive to Follow the Word of God

a. in vv. 8, 14, 15, 16, 17, 19, & 20 Jesus prayed that His followers would become followers of the Word of God

1) God’s Word gives us the meaning for life

2) God’s Word gives us our motivation for life

3) God’s Word gives us a mission for life

3. Christians Ought to Strive to be United in Love

a. in vv. 11, 12, 21, 22, & 23 Jesus prayed that all who call up His name would love each other like they love Him

b. Spirit-filled Christians, united in love, guided by a purpose they truly believe in, can do anything

4. Christians Ought to Strive to Be on Mission for God in Their Vocation

a. in vv. 2, 3, 15, 17, & 18 Jesus prays to the Father to equip His saint for the work of expanding the Kingdom

b. our mission is clearly defined, “As you sent me into the world, I have sent them into the world.”

ILLUS. Most of you have heard that a better translation of the Great Commission is, “As you are going” not the traditional “Go ye”. The sense is that since your are already going about your business in this world, that while you are going be on mission for God.

5. Christians Need to Pray for Those Who Are Not Yet Christian, but Whom God Seeks to Call into the Family

ILLUS. There is a story told about a faithful old deacon whose oft repeated prayer expression was, "O Lord, touch the unsaved with Thy finger." One prayer meeting night he was leading in prayer when as he mentioned this petition, as he so often did, he abruptly stopped praying. Supposing he had been taken suddenly ill, someone went to him and asked if there was anything wrong, if he were ill. "No," he replied, "I'm not ill. But just now, something seemed to say to me, Thou art the finger'."

Through our Lord’s Prayer we see that Jesus prayed for five things. He prayed that the members of the Linn, 1st Baptist Church would strive to glorify God in their lives. He prayed that we would follow His word. He prayed that we would be united in love. He prayed that we would be on mission for God. And He prayed that we would actively seek out the lost.