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. 25 O righteous Father, even though the world does not know you, I know you, and these know that you have sent me. 26 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.
In the last 3 verses of Jesus’ High Priestly prayer, He speaks of two major Biblical themes: the glory of God, and Christian love. We’ll take a look at Christian love first, as a good place to end our study of Jesus’ prayer is the glory of God.
Jesus prayed that the Father would fill His people with love in verse 26. “That the love with which you have loved me may be in them.” Paul, in his great chapter on Christian love in 1 Corinthians 13, wrote, “So now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love.” (1 Corinthians 13:13)
At the beginning of Jesus’ Farewell Discourse, just after washing the feet of His disciples, He said, “A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another. By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.” (John 13:34–35)
You’ll remember from last week that truth matters. Christian doctrine matters, but many people see some kind of conflict between Christian love and Christian doctrine, almost as if they are on opposite ends of the Christian scale. The logic goes something like this: The greatest threat to Christian love is Christian truth, because there are basically two types of Christians - the legalistic, those who care about doctrine and those who show love. This is a flawed logic though.
Throughout John’s Gospel, and in chapter 17 in particular, Jesus has stressed the importance of the truth. Our faith must be built upon God’s truth, Christian doctrine, as taught in the Bible, and in the same breath as it were, Jesus teaches that we are to love.
We have to admit that there are some professing Christians who do seem to fit into one of these two categories, especially those in the first group, but this is not how it is meant to be, and it is certainly not what Jesus taught during His public ministry, nor is it what He prayed for in John 17.
Christian doctrine and Christian love are not opposites. They together are two crucial foundations of our faith. The source of love among God’s people is knowledge of the truth. In His prayer, Jesus teaches that in order for us to have God’s love, He has made the truth of the Father known to us. He prays in verses 25 and 26, “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.”
The knowledge of God is the source of Christian love. If we want to know who God is, what He is like, and what He has done for us, we have to know Him as revealed to us in the Bible, which is what Jesus prayed for, and as we deepen our knowledge of God, so we will learn to love Him more.
One of the reasons the world knows little or nothing about the God of the Bible is that it has no idea of His perfect righteousness. God is going to judge all sin with His perfect justice. This is very different to the general understanding of God as some kind of grandfatherly figure with a flowing white beard. The “man upstairs” or the “big guy in the sky” would never punish sinners. After all, we’re all essentially good people, aren’t we?
This is how badly the world has been deceived by the lies of the devil. What did he say to Eve all the way back in Genesis 3:4? “You will not surely die.” This great lie stands directly opposed to what the Bible teaches about sin and its consequences, as Paul wrote in Romans 6:23. “The wages of sin is death.” That’s the real truth, and that is what we need to know if we are ever to come to salvation.
But it gets even worse. The world has been so deceived by Satan, that it flatly rejects the righteousness of Christ that God offers as a gift to sinners who trust in the perfect life and sin-atoning death of Jesus. “You will not surely die.” Believe that lie, as so many do, and we have no need of a Saviour.
This is why it takes a supernatural act of God to open the eyes of those whom He draws to Himself. Unless God, by the work of the Holy Spirit, draws us to Himself, we will remain hostile to God. Christians, by the grace of God, are made aware of God’s righteous hatred of sin and at the same time receive the free gift of righteousness in Christ. The only response we have for this gift of grace is to love this God who loved us so much, even while we were His enemies.
If God has opened your eyes to the glory of the Gospel, and has clothed you in the righteousness of Jesus, your heart has been moved by the wonder of God’s grace and love.
When Jesus speaks of God’s name in verse 26, He was referring directly to the love of God. John, in his first epistle perfectly summarises the nature of God when he writes in 1 John 4:8, “God is love.”
Selwyn Hughes, the author of the daily devotional ‘Every Day With Jesus’ wrote that when the words of 1 John 4:8 were written, he imagined the angels leaning forward, peering over John’s shoulder, watching with bated breath. When John finally penned the words, “God is love,” the angels must have jumped for joy, saying, “Yes! They’ve finally got it! At last they understand!”
John uses this wonderful truth that God is love to expand on this teaching by writing in verses 7 and 8, “Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God, and whoever loves has been born of God and knows God. Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love.”
“Whoever loves has been born of God and knows God.” There it is again. Knowledge of God and love for God and His people.
Therefore, increased knowledge of God, another word for theology, as we become grounded in Christian doctrine, increases our love for God and each other. An emphasis on truth should never become a barrier to Christian love. In fact, the exact opposite should be true, but sadly you sometimes hear people saying that that so and so has become so obsessed with Christian doctrine, that there seems to be some kind of blockage between their head and their heart.
It’s a great pity when we see this, and it is something that Paul warns against in 1 Corinthians 8:1. “Knowledge puffs up, but love builds up.” His point is that knowledge of God and understanding of Christian truth is important, but the result of this growth needs to be a deeper love of God and of each other, rather than spiritual pride.
Jesus also emphasises in verse 25 that knowing God is what divides those who belong to Him and those who don’t. “O righteous Father, even though the world does not know you, I know you, and these know that you have sent me.” The reason that Jesus was about to go to the cross was the world’s rejection of His revelation of God. The Jews accused Him of blasphemy, because He dared to not only claim that He spoke on behalf of God, but He was and is God. The religious leaders rejected the idea of God showing grace to sinners, which is why they had so little love for the people they were supposed to care for and minister to. True followers of Jesus, on the other hand, are those who know Him as the true revelation of God the Father, believing that the Father sent Him to show us what true love really is.
When Christians put that kind of love into action and love one another as Jesus loves us, we find it is possible to live in humble service of each other, which is the exact opposite of the world’s system of self-love and looking after number one.
Without a personal belief in and knowledge of the true and living God, we cannot live the humble lives of service that Jesus both taught and modelled in His own life. This is just another reason why the world hates Him. It is because His selfless life exposes the selfish lives of those who reject the truth of God. Now, of course, we all know some very nice people who are not Christians. No-one is denying that, but the world’s definition of love is very different to how God reveals love, because we naturally judge who is nice and who isn’t based on worldly standards. It is love for the God of love that makes the real difference.
The only way we can really know what true love is, is by coming to know the God of the Bible through faith in the Son whom He sent, Jesus Christ.
Another recurring theme in the Gospel of John is that Jesus, by the work of the Holy Spirit, will guide us into a deeper knowledge of the truth, and as we do so, we will grow in God’s love, something He continues to do today as He leads His Church into knowledge of God, through our study of the Word, our personal lives as disciples, and our service to God’s kingdom.
How do we deepen our faith and cultivate true Christian love? Part of the answer is by immersing ourselves in the truth as revealed in the Bible. It is when we make the mistake of separating love and truth that we end up with the self-righteousness we see in the Pharisees of Jesus’ day.
They were steeped in the truth. They knew the law of God almost by heart, not to mention all of the extra rules they added to the law which placed a tremendous burden on the people of God. This is what Jesus took them to task for in Matthew 23. “The scribes and the Pharisees sit on Moses’ seat, so do and observe whatever they tell you, but not the works they do. For they preach, but do not practice. They tie up heavy burdens, hard to bear, and lay them on people’s shoulders, but they themselves are not willing to move them with their finger.” He goes on to call them hypocrites, blind guides, blind fools, serpents and a brood of vipers.
This is what happens when we take love out of truth. You end up with a bitter kind of truth which may be accurate, but instead of attracting people to Jesus, it drives them away.
So it is no coincidence that Jesus concludes this wonderful prayer in John 17 by focussing on His love for us, and how we are to love one another. All the way back at the beginning of His Farewell Discourse, John wrote, “Having loved His own who were in the world, He loved them to the end.” (John 13:1)
This was just before Jesus gave His disciples a practical demonstration of love and servanthood by washing their feet. Of course, the next day He was about to show His love for us in an infinitely higher measure by giving His life for us on the cross.
Christian love is not just something we feel. It is something we do. After washing the disciples’ feet, Jesus said to them, “Do you understand what I have done to you? You call me Teacher and Lord, and you are right, for so I am. If I then, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another’s feet. For I have given you an example, that you also should do just as I have done to you.” (Matthew 13:12-15)
Hebrews 13:1-6 says, “Let brotherly love continue. Do not neglect to show hospitality to strangers, for thereby some have entertained angels unawares. Remember those who are in prison, as though in prison with them, and those who are mistreated, since you also are in the body. Let marriage be held in honour among all, and let the marriage bed be undefiled, for God will judge the sexually immoral and adulterous. Keep your life free from love of money, and be content with what you have, for He has said, ‘I will never leave you nor forsake you.’ So we can confidently say, ‘The Lord is my helper; I will not fear; what can man do to me?’” If we learn to love God, His Word and His people, all of these things and more will begin to fall into place and become second nature to us.
We close our study on Jesus’ High Priestly Prayer by looking at Jesus’ request in verse 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.”
We have no real idea of what heaven is going to be like. What God has done for us and what He has prepared for us is simply beyond our imagination, but there is a vital phrase in John 17:24 which tells us what our salvation is actually all about: “To see my glory.” As incredible a gift as our eternal salvation is, it is not really about us. It is about the glory of Christ. This takes us back to the beginning of Jesus’ prayer. “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.” (John 17:1-5)
The glory of the Gospel is that Jesus came to redeem us to share in His glory in eternity, as He prays in verse 24. “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.”
His desire is for us to be with Him in eternity, and this should be our great desire too.
We have all felt the pain of death, and the emptiness and despair of losing those we love the most. Our hearts break terribly when the people most precious to us die, but as Christians we know the hope of eternity.
In those times of great sadness, we hold onto the promise Paul writes about in 1 Thessalonians 4:13-14. “We do not want you to be uninformed, brothers, about those who are asleep, that you may not grieve as others do who have no hope. For since we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so, through Jesus, God will bring with Him those who have fallen asleep.”
And he writes in Philippians 1:21-23, “To me to live is Christ, and to die is gain. If I am to live in the flesh, that means fruitful labour for me. Yet which I shall choose I cannot tell. I am hard pressed between the two. My desire is to depart and be with Christ, for that is far better.”
Death, our greatest enemy, has been destroyed, and as much as we don’t want to lose those we love, or leave them behind when we die, we have the hope of glory because of Christ. To be with Christ and to share in His glory for all of eternity is the promise and the great hope we have. The greatest joy of heaven will be to be there with Jesus.
Fanny Crosby wrote more than 8000 hymns, the most famous of which is Blessed Assurance. She went blind when she was only 6 years old, and she was often asked if she wished she could have her eyesight restored. Incredibly, she said no, and she gave the reason in another wonderful hymn called “My Saviour First Of All.”
“His smile will be the first to welcome me. I shall know Him, I shall know Him, and redeemed by His side I shall stand, I shall know Him. I shall know Him, by the print of the nails in His hand. Oh, the soul-thrilling rapture when I view His blessed face, and the lustre of His kindly beaming eye; how my full heart will praise Him for the mercy, love and grace, that prepare for me a mansion in the sky. Oh, the dear ones in glory, how they beckon me to come, and our parting at the river I recall; to the sweet vales of Eden they will sing my welcome home, but I long to meet my Saviour first of all.”
Yes, we will be reunited with our loved ones in eternity. Exactly what this will be like, and how different the relationships we had in this life will be to those in heaven are a mystery, but to see finally Christ face to face and to share in His glory will be a far greater joy. R. C. Sproul wrote, “To be with Christ is the supreme yearning of the Christian.”
Heaven is where Christ is. It is the eternal place where we will have perfect communion with Jesus Himself.
The Scottish theologian Samuel Rutherford, who lived in the 17th century, wrote, “O my Lord Jesus Christ, if I could be in heaven without Thee, it would be a hell; and if I could be in hell, and have Thee still, it would be a heaven to me, for Thou art all the heaven I want.”
This is what Paul wrote about in Romans 8:16-18. “The Spirit Himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God, and if children, then heirs - heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ, provided we suffer with Him in order that we may also be glorified with Him. For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us.”
The great questions for each of us are these: Are you certain of sharing in Jesus’ glory in eternity? Are you sure of the same victory, and will you face your own death with the joy of certain glory?
You can know that you will be glorified with Jesus if you believe He is the Son of God who came to earth in human form and lived the perfect life you have failed to live. His sacrificial death on your behalf is all you need to be assured of eternal life when you die, but in order for this promise to be yours, you must confess your sin and trust in Christ to save you.
Do you believe that, having died for your sins, Jesus was raised from the grave and rose to the glory of His eternal kingdom, so that He reigns forever as Lord and King?
If you are not sure, then ask Him to reveal His glory to you in the pages of the Bible, open your heart to believe the truth about just who Jesus is and what He has done for you. Call on the name of Jesus in faith, and you will be saved, and you will share in His glory forever.
We close with Paul’s words to the Church in Colossians 1:24-27. “Now I rejoice in my sufferings for your sake, and in my flesh I am filling up what is lacking in Christ’s afflictions for the sake of His body, that is, the Church, of which I became a minister according to the stewardship from God that was given to me for you, to make the word of God fully known, the mystery hidden for ages and generations but now revealed to His saints. To them God chose to make known how great among the Gentiles are the riches of the glory of this mystery, which is Christ in you, the hope of glory.”