Living and Active Prayer
John 17:6-13,
“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. 7 Now they know that everything that you have given me is from you. 8 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. 9 I am praying for them. I am not praying for the world but for those whom you have given me, for they are yours. 10 All mine are yours, and yours are mine, and I am glorified in them. 11 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. 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, that the Scripture might be fulfilled. 13 But now I am coming to you, and these things I speak in the world, that they may have my joy fulfilled in themselves.”
John 17 is one of the most amazing chapters in the Bible because the entire chapter is a prayer of Jesus — and it’s a prayer he prays for us.
We know this because of what Jesus says in verse 20.
He says to his Father:
“I do not ask for these only [that’s the eleven disciples], but also for those who will believe in me through their word [that’s us, his church].”
By the grace of God, we believe in Jesus through the gospel that has been passed down to us in the apostolic word (that’s the New Testament!). So when Jesus prayed in John 17 — yes, the eleven disciples were right by his side and he prayed for them — but he also had us in mind.
Which means: what Jesus prayed in John 17 he prays for us — and notice I’m saying “prays for us” in the present tense.
For this to make sense, I think we need to understand something important about prayer itself. In Revelation 5, when the four living creatures and twenty-four elders bow down in worship to Jesus, John makes a curious statement about prayer. He says that each of these worshipers are holding “golden bowls full of incense, which are the prayers of the saints.”
It’s a minor detail on one hand, but it’s also a clue that the prayers of God’s people are collected. I think it tells us something about prayer that we can know by experience: it’s that our prayers don’t ever expire, but they accumulate.
The more we pray, over time, those prayers shape us into a certain kind of person. The prayers themselves can change, in maturity and clarity, but basically we all become the kind of person who prays the way we do.
Maybe a better way to say it is that our prayers stay with us.
When we pray about something, we don’t ever just ‘check the box’ and move on — because prayer is not ‘one and done’ sort of thing.
The way we pray, even in private, gets represented by us everywhere we go. Everywhere we go, we go as persons who are praying a certain way.
And we even talk this way as a church. A lot of times we’ll say something like “Yeah, I’m praying about that” or “I’m praying for you” — we use the present tense. We understand that our prayers stay with us. That’s true of us … and that’s true of Jesus, like right now.
I want you to know that the prayer Jesus prayed in John 17 is still operative. It’s not a mere record of the way he prayed once upon a time. It’s not left behind in the dust of history. But this is a prayer that reflects the heart of Jesus this morning.
Jesus carries this prayer with him, and he wants all of this for us now like he wanted it when he first prayed it. We know the word of God is living and active! — I want you to know this prayer in the word of God is living and active!
I want you to know that Jesus is praying this for you today!
There are three things he’s praying that I want to show you.
1. Jesus is praying for us to be kept.
I’m not sure what you think when you hear the word “kept” but it’s got a rich biblical meaning. And it’s really an image. For God to “keep you” means he holds onto you and cares for you. He doesn’t let you go and he provides for what you need.
That’s what we hear in Psalm 121 when the psalmist says:
The Lord is your keeper;
the Lord is your shade on your right hand.
The sun shall not strike you by day, nor the moon by night.
The Lord will keep you from all evil; he will keep your life. (Verses 5–7)
Or it’s like when God says of his servant in Isaiah 42, verse 6:
“I am the Lord; I have called you in righteousness;
I will take you by the hand and keep you …”
That’s an image. He’s saying: I’m looking out for you. I’m protecting you. I’m gonna get you where I’m leading you.
In the New Testament, we see this in places like 1 Peter 1:5, “by God’s power [we] are being guarded [or kept] through faith …”
Or Jude 24, which we sing sometimes, “Now to him who is able to keep you … be glory!”
Theologically, this idea of being kept is about endurance. It is part of a doctrine known as the “perseverance of the saints.” That doctrine teaches that those whom God truly saves he faithfully preserves. If you are in Christ, you will make it!
That’s the doctrine, and we see it in action in this prayer.
Doctrine in Action
Notice first how Jesus describes who he’s talking about. Jesus calls believers those whom the Father has given him.
We can see that right away in verse 6. Jesus says,
“I have manifested your name [Father] to the people whom you gave me out of the world. Yours they were, and you gave them to me …”
Jesus says that’s who he’s praying for. Verse 9:
“I am praying for them. I am not praying for the world but for those whom you have given me, for they are yours.”
This is a big deal. Jesus is doubling-down on a distinction: there is the world here, and then there are those out of the world that the Father claims as his own and gives them to the Son.
Where Are You?
Here’s an important question: How do you know where you are?
Are you of the world? Or has the Father given you to Jesus out of the world?
That’s a good question. I was thinking about this the other day. I was on the road, sitting at red light, and there were seven cars at the intersection turning left in front of me, and I decided I would just look at the face of each person as they drove by. I think people are fascinating. So I’m looking at each person, and they’re all different; they’re all going somewhere; they all got stories, and I thought: “I wonder which of these people have been given to Jesus?” That one? That one? That one?
Here’s the thing: you can’t really tell by just looking at people, but I know the answer: The ones who are given to Jesus are the ones who believe in him.
That’s what it means to keep Jesus’s word in verse 6. Or, in verse 8, to “know in truth” who Jesus is. We’re asking the wrong question if we’re asking: “Have I been given to Jesus or not?”
The question is: “Do you believe him?”
If you believe in Jesus, you are given to Jesus, and if you are given to Jesus, you are kept by Jesus. Because he’s praying for that. Right now. This means, for Christians in the room, we are gonna make it! We need to remind each other of this more often, especially in the face of hostility.
Church, we will endure. We will make it through. Jesus is praying for us to be kept.
2. Jesus is praying for us to glorify him.
This is a very simple sentence in verse 10, but I’d love for you to see it. Everybody help me out and find verse 10. Chapter 17, verse 10.
“All mine are yours, and yours are mine, and I am glorified in them.”
This is the first time Jesus has ever said this. Now he’s talked about his glory before, at some key places in the Gospel. He opens verse 1 of this prayer asking the Father to glorify the Son so that the Son may glorify the Father. We saw that last week. Jesus is saying:
Father, make me shine, so that you shine!
Magnify me so that people see you!
And Jesus is referring to the cross and resurrection. That is the most vivid revelation of God’s heart! It’s what the entire ministry of Jesus was been building toward — when Jesus was lifted up as our sacrifice and then raised from dead to defeat sin and death!
Jesus is glorified in his cross and resurrection! He’s told us that. But verse 10 is the first time Jesus has ever said that he’s glorified in his disciples. It’s a remarkable statement.
Now Mediated Glory!
Last week, Pastor David Mathis walked through “the story of Jesus’s glory.” He showed us that Jesus has: Pre-world glory, Incarnate glory, Crucified glory, and Resurrected glory.
Today, we add one more: Mediated glory.
Now, like today — after his resurrection or because of his resurrection — Jesus shines through the work he does in his disciples. Including us.
Because he’s not here anymore, remember? But we are. That’s what he says in verse 11 — Jesus is now in heaven with the Father, but we are here, with his Spirit.
And that means that now we have become the living theater of his glory in this world. Jesus is now seen and heard, and known and loved, through the nature and witness of his church.
That is how he is glorified in us.
We might have the impression that to glorify Jesus means we must accomplish some grandiose thing; we might think we must do something super radical that gets people’s attention — but that’s not the case at all.
We glorify Jesus, first, simply by the reality of who we are as believers.
We trust him. We are born again to a living hope.
I told you last week, church, we are living miracles.
Our very being — and our being together — is because of the work of Jesus Christ. He is glorified in us by our existence.
And then, also, he is glorified in us when we bear witness to him — when we join his mission to make his glory known. This part is astounding. …
We get to really and truly display Jesus to others. We get to acknowledge him by our lifestyles, and give him in our relationships. We get to point to him and tell of him.
Our Eager Expectation and Hope
Christian, look: Jesus can be glorified in you through what you do. Isn’t that amazing?
You can make your Savior shine! You can show him, in all kinds of ways — starting with the meditations of your heart … to the words of your mouth, from serving your family well … to sharing the gospel with the lost, from small acts of faith … to costly acts of love, from resisting temptation … to enduring hostility with a smile on your face — we can do things that glorify Jesus. And don’t you want to?
Just for the wondrous fact that Jesus is happy about it. That he truly shines.
I believe that if we could see the smile of Jesus upon us, we could do anything.
I pray as a church that our ambition would become like the apostle Paul’s, who said in Philippians 1:20, “it is my eager expectation and hope that … Christ be honored in my body, whether by life or by death.”
That’s it. Whatever it takes! Jesus be glorified in us — and Jesus is praying that! Jesus is praying for us to glorify him.
3. Jesus is praying for us to have his joy.
Take a look at verse 12. Jesus prays:
“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. 13 But now I am coming to you, and these things I speak in the world, that they may have my joy fulfilled in themselves.”
Jesus says again here what we’ve already seen — he keeps his own. He guards his people. Judas, however, ‘went out from them because he was never truly of them’ (1 John 2:19).
It was foretold in the Scripture. Jesus was not surprised by this. It was no failure on his part.
He has been faithful to the mission the Father gave him, and he says again in verse 13 what he’s been saying this whole time: I’m coming home.
Another Purpose Statement
Jesus is going back to his Father, and we’re staying here — and he wants something for us here.
In fact, Jesus makes another purpose statement about the Farewell Discourse.
Notice in verse 13 he says, “these things I speak in the world that they may have…” — it’s a purpose statement.
The “these things” includes this prayer he’s praying, but he’s thinking about everything he’s been teaching. Jesus is praying that everything he’s been teaching will accomplish a purpose. I want you to tell me what it is.
Everybody look at verse 13, Jesus says: “these things I speak in the world, that they may have my joy.”
He already told us he wanted us to have his peace, now he tells us he wants us to have his joy!
Now you gotta go back to those people who asked you about the Farewell Discourse a couple of weeks ago, and you gotta tell them that Jesus wants us to have peace and joy! That’s what he says. He wants his joy fulfilled in us.
He said the same thing in Chapter 15, verse 11. He said there:
“These things I have spoken to you, that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be full.”
He wants our joy to get filled up with his joy.
The Joy of Jesus
We can say for sure here that Jesus is not talking about generic joy. He says “my joy.” So what does that mean?
What is the joy of Jesus that he wants us to have?
The joy of Jesus that he wants us to have is joy in the glory of the Trinity.
It’s joy in the love that the Father has for the Son, and the Son for the Father, and Spirit who is the very presence of that joy.
The joy of Jesus is truly joy in God himself — it is non-derivative, infinite, independent, and inexhaustible. That’s why it’s so good. It’s what we could call “big picture joy” — and I mean that in the most profound way you could ever imagine it. Biggest possible picture joy.
Which means: it’s a joy that has the ability to look beyond the immediate. It can look beyond even pain and suffering. Now this is really important: I’m not saying that this joy ignores pain and suffering. It does not pretend those things don’t exist. They do.
This joy can say: “Father, it if be possible, let the cup pass from me!” (Matthew 26:39).
This joy can say: “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” (Matthew 27:46)
This joy can say: Father, this hurts. I don’t want it. Make it stop. Bring me through it.
This joy doesn’t ignore pain and suffering, but it’s able to see to the other side. “For the joy that was set before him he endured the cross” (Hebrews 12:2).
Big picture joy — the joy of Jesus — is a joy in front of us so glorious that it reaches back into our lives now and makes us make it.
We’re gonna make it because of this joy — and if I keep going, I’m describing the ministry of the Holy Spirit.
But let me say this: Jesus wants you to have his joy — He prays for you to be kept. He prays for you to glorify him. He prays for you to have his joy.
The Invitation
And this morning, I would like for us to close with an invitation: Would you open your heart to the joy of Jesus?
I mean this, first, for non-Christians: If you’re here and you’ve never put your faith in Jesus, you are currently without this joy. You do not have Christ, but I’m inviting you to have him. Right now, you can pray: Jesus, I’m done walking down this path I’ve been on, save me. Trust in Jesus Christ.
And for all the Christians in the room, for Cities Church: don’t we want more of the joy of Jesus? For many of us, the burdens have piled up. We’re weighed down. Life is heavy. We need that big picture joy! We need the joy of Jesus — and I’m inviting you: open your heart to him again. Ask for a fresh filling of his joy this morning.
And you can do that at this Table.
The Table
At this Table we remember the death of Jesus for us! He welcomes us again into his fellowship, into his joy. If you are a Christian, this is for you. Receive his bread and cup today and may the Lord Jesus restore to you the joy of his salvation. He’s praying for you.
