Christ's Prayer

²⁰ “My prayer is not for them alone. I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message, ²¹ that all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you. May they also be in us so that the world may believe that you have sent me. ²² I have given them the glory that you gave me, that they may be one as we are one— ²³ I in them and you in me—so that they may be brought to complete unity. Then the world will know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me.

²⁴ “Father, I want those you have given me to be with me where I am, and to see my glory, the glory you have given me because you loved me before the creation of the world.

²⁵ “Righteous Father, though the world does not know you, I know you, and they know that you have sent me. ²⁶ I have made you known to them, and will continue to make you known in order that the love you have for me may be in them and that I myself may be in them.”

This prayer of Jesus that I just got done reading was spoken around the time of the Last Supper and before the events of the passion had started to take full swing.  Jesus is praying for the disciples and the few that had believed in Him before He died on the cross but He is also praying all of us when He prays “...for those who will believe in me through the disciple’s message...”  First off, it is incredibly humbling that Jesus, our savior took the time to pray for us when His death was looming directly ahead.  We also find Jesus saying that the world does not know God and I thought that this seemed a little strange.  In today’s world, even those who do not have any faith whatsoever still have an idea of God is.  This lead me to doing some research on how many Christians there were in the first century and the best number that I came up with was an estimate of about 500k.  We have to remember that Christianity was an incredibly localized religion at its origins.  It is hard for us to remember that the way information was passed on back then is very, very different than it is today.  The truth is that hardly anyone knew God, very few people knew the OT scriptures and even less had heard of the miracles of Christ around the time of His death.  Yet Jesus had faith in the abilities of His disciples to share His message.  But what if?  What if the disciples would have completely failed and not spread the message of Christ at all?  If Jesus could have seen this coming, do you think He would have done anything differently? Would He have given up on them and not even tried?  

These questions got me thinking about the role of a mother figure in our lives.  Mother’s pour their hearts and souls into their children, and often times, they give a lot of themselves to children who aren’t even their own.  What drives them to do this?  Why give so much of yourself when the risk does not always match the reward?  Jesus went to the cross knowing that He would be rejected by most, yet He did it anyway.  Jesus knew that there would be those who would trample all over his name, yet He bore their sins on the cross just as He did for the most devout Christians.  He gave up everything for the sake of the few in the hopes that all would be united by what He was about to do.  I have to give you mother’s the same kind of credit, when disagreements arise in families, it is oftentimes the mother who helps the mend the fences.  The women in our lives are often our sources of strength and courage, even if they don’t get the credit.  But it is not credit they desire.  Just like Jesus, the women in our lives get the most satisfaction in the fruits of their labor producing people who love and share that love with others.  In both cases, the simple phrase of thank you goes a long ways.  On this Mother’s Day, I encourage you to tell the women in your life thank you.

As I kept reading this scripture, my heart kept pausing at one word and that word was unity.  But I struggled to figure out exactly what Jesus meant by unity.  Did he mean unity in worship and liturgy?  Did he mean unity in theology?  Upon further reflection I think Jesus meant unity to mean the unifying power of our personal relationship with God.  Jesus showed us that the union between Jesus and God was a relationship of love and obedience.  It was a unity of love for which Jesus prayed, a unity in which people loved each other because they loved Christ, a unity based entirely on the relationship between heart and heart.  Christians will never organize their churches all in the same way.  We will never worship God all in the same way.  We will never all believe the exact same things when it comes to our faith.  But the important thing to remember is that Christian unity transcends all of these differences and joins all of us together in love.  It is this unity that welcomes everyone who walks through those doors to partake in the sacraments.  It is this unity that allows us to worship here together regardless of our differences.  It is this unity that allows us to tear down the barriers of race and prejudice.  It is natural for us to be divided than united.  We are always trying to figure out which group we belong to, people are always trying to place us under different categories.  It is more human for us to fly apart than to come together and this leads to the world seeing Christianity as fragmented and disorganized.  We fight over Protestant, Lutheran, Methodist, Catholic, Baptist, Reformed and so on to what extent?  What is the point?  Since the world sees this side of Christianity most clearly, the world cannot see the most important value of the Christian faith.  As Christians, it is our individual duty to demonstrate that unity of love with our fellow men and it is this type of unity that Jesus was praying for.  

In verse 22 Jesus says that he has given us the glory the same glory that God had given to Him but

what does this mean for us?  The more difficult the task is to accomplish the more glory that comes with it.  If a surgeon performs a surgery that had never been done successfully before then the glory they receive is much higher and our faith is no different.  Jesus talked about this glory three different ways: First, the cross was Christ’s glory.  Jesus did not speak of being crucified, instead he talked about being glorified.  As a Christian, our glory is found in the cross that each of us must bear.  It is an honor to suffer as Christ suffered.  We should not think of the cross as a burden or penalty, we must embrace it as our glory.  When it is difficult to be a Christian, we must regard that difficulty as our glory given to us by God.  Second, Christ’s perfect obedience to the will of God was his glory.  We find our glory by doing our best to do the will of God, not by doing as we would like.  When we try to do as we want, as we all have done, we find nothing but sorrow and disaster.  We find the real glory of life in doing God’s will; the greater our obedience the greater our glory.  Third, Christ’s glory was found in the fact that in his life people were able to recognize that he had a special relationship with God.  They were able to see that no one could live as he did unless Christ was uniquely close to God.  The same goes for us, our glory shines when people see the reflection of God through us.  It is important for us to remember that right after this prayer was spoken Jesus was arrested, went to trial and hung on the cross.  Jesus was not able to speak to his disciples again.  We must not take for granted that these words of unity, glory and prayer were all spoken in the last few hours of Christ’s freedom.  Jesus left the disciples with the hope of glory not a bottomless pit of despair and pity.  

If you are searching for God’s glory, you can find it here today.  You have the opportunity to bear your cross in front of those worshipping here with you this morning.  You can also bear your cross to God privately, right where you are sitting.  No matter your circumstance, take a moment to give glory to God and honor Him by uniting together in worship. In the face of despair, God offers us a hope and I dont want anyone leaving here today not being able to see that hope.  Amen.