Open your Bibles, please, to John 17, where we will continue our journey through the Gospel of John, and we'll be completing John 17 this morning with a focus on verses 24-26, which will also complete our examination of Jesus' high priestly prayer in John 17. He prayed first for himself in the first five verses, and then in verses 16-19, he prayed for his disciples. And then in verse 20, he shifted and began to pray for all of us, for all who would believe as a result of the word of the disciples, the word that he gave them, the word that the Holy Spirit inspired and brought to their remembrance and has given us in the New Testament, which was added to the Spirit of Christ's inspired word of the Old Testament, which is the means by which we come to know Him. Part of that word is, of course, a recounting of this prayer by the Apostle John. And since we are really looking at the end of a section of this prayer, I want to back up to the beginning of the section of this prayer by reading in verse 20 and read through verse 26. And then we'll pray, as always, and ask for our Lord's guidance. In verse 20, our Lord Jesus says, I do not pray for these alone, referring to the eleven with Him there in the upper room, but also for those who will believe in Me through their word, that they all may be one as You, Father, are in Me and I in You, that they also may be one in Us, that the world may believe that You sent Me. And the glory which you gave me I have given them, that they may be one, just as we are one. I in them, and you in me, that they may be perfect in one. And that the world may know that you have sent me, and have loved them as you have loved me. Father, I desire that they also whom you gave me be with me where I am, that they may behold my glory which you have given me, for you loved me before the foundation of the world. O righteous Father, the world has not known you, but I have known you, and these have known that you sent me, and I have declared to them your name, and will declare it, that the love with which you love me may be in them. and I in them. Let's pray. Holy Father, we come to you this morning once again asking for your enabling grace. We have come into this place this morning to worship you, seeking to put aside all of the cares of this world, casting our cares on you, seeking to quiet our hearts before you. that we might hear you speak to us this morning, seeking to give you all the glory for anything good in us, because you alone deserve all the glory. And we pray, Lord, you'd be glorified in us this morning as you make us good hearers of your Word, that we might be attentive to your Word, that we might recognize this morning that we are sitting at the feet of Jesus, our Good Shepherd our great teacher and guide. Help us to heed his words. Help us to take his words to heart. Overcome the sinful tendency in us to ignore your word having heard it, but instead to take it to heart and hear the encouragement that he offers us here. Help us to hear his voice. For Your Word says that as His sheep we will hear His voice. But we know we only hear it because of the work of Your Spirit. So please fill us with Your Spirit and with ability to hear. This morning we pray in the name of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen. You will all no doubt remember that the Apostle John began his Gospel account with an unambiguous statement asserting the deity and pre-existence of our Lord Jesus Christ when he said this, in the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. In other words, and he goes on to talk about creation, the very beginning of everything we know, Jesus was already present with the Father, existing in equality with Him. So we're not surprised to read then about Jesus' declaration to the Father here of His Father's love for Him even before the foundation of the world. He had a loving relationship with the Father in His pre-existent state before the foundation of the world, before the beginning of all that we know. And He's talking about that in verse 24 when He says, Father, I desire that they also whom you gave me, may be one with me where I am, that they may behold my glory which you have given me, for you love me before the foundation of the world." When Jesus says, Father, I desire that they also whom you gave me be with me where I am, He obviously isn't speaking of the eleven now still, right? Because they are with Him where He is in the upper room. They're listening to this prayer as he prays it. On the contrary, the larger context here indicates that he's thinking of his return to the Father as where he's going to be. He speaks in the same way he's spoken at the beginning of the prayer when he speaks of these things as already now happening. As good as done. His return to the Father is as good as accomplished. And he's talking about his desire that all that the Father has given him be with him there. He's just spoken, for example, in verse 20, of all those who would believe in him through the word of the disciples. Which means that he's thinking of all believers in this verse, and not just the eleven. So, Jesus is making his intention clear that his earlier words to the eleven, earlier that same night in the upper room, Don't just apply to the 11. They apply to us. These words about being with Him in the presence of the Father when He returns to the Father. Remember what He said back in chapter 14, verses 1-3. Disciples, let not your heart be troubled. You believe in God, believe also in Me. In My Father's house are many dwelling places. If it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you, and if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and receive you to Myself, that where I am, there you may be also." This is what He has in mind here in His prayer in John 17, 24. And He has it in mind for all who will believe in Him. That includes you and I. There could be no doubt then that Jesus is even now preparing a place for you and for me, and that He desires for each one of us to be with Him where He is, with His Heavenly Father. Our Lord Jesus also clearly alludes to the beginning of His prayer here, in which He spoke of those whom the Father had given Him, and also of His preexistent glory. We see here in this verse, in verse 24, as He starts to wind up His prayer to the Father, that He's talking about those whom the Father has given Him. And here, they don't just include the eleven, and some other disciples who had believed at that time, but all who would believe. as already having been given to him by the Father. Of course, this is, as you recall, Jesus' way of talking about election. And he's talking about that again here. But he also talks about his pre-existence earlier, when he talks about the glory he had with the Father before the world was. Let's go back and read verses 1-5. Get them fresh in our minds again. Jesus spoke these words, lifted up His eyes to heaven and said, Father, the hour has come. Glorify Your Son that Your Son also may glorify You. We're going to see this theme of glory coming up again here at the end of the prayer again too. As You have given Him authority over all flesh, that He should give eternal life to as many as You have given Him. That's not just the eleven and the other disciples in those days as we get to the end of the prayer. That's all of us now. That's everyone who would ever believe because of the Word that they have preached and given us in the Scriptures. And this is eternal life, He says, that they may know You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom You have sent. I have glorified You on the earth. I have finished the work which You have given Me to do. And now, O Father, glorify Me together with Yourself, with the glory which I had with You before the world was." So there was a kind of glory that Jesus had with the Father before the world was. And in that glorious relationship, he knew the love of the Father from eternity past. And so Jesus has begun his prayer by speaking of his relationship to the Father before the world was, as well as of his pre-existing glory of the Father. But this glory is something which was set aside to some extent in the Incarnation. That's why he wants this glory restored. His glory wasn't being fully manifested to His disciples as He wants it to be when they're with Him where He is. Right? He wants them to have the fullest knowledge of His glory and the fullest knowledge of the Father's love for them as well as we'll see. The kind of glory that He had before the world was, the kind of glory that He will have again He wants us to see. But this glory is something that was hidden. And the disciples only saw glimpses of it in Jesus' ministry. Remember, for example, back in chapter 1 in John's prologue, in verse 14. Speaking of Jesus, He said, And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth. Notice, though, that the glory that he says that we beheld, that's not the glory Jesus is talking about. Not in its fullness. The glory he had with the Father before the world was something he has to get back when he ascends to the Father. But his glory wasn't completely missed. It still shone through, didn't it? Jesus' glory was seen in the grace and truth that characterizes every thought, word, and deed. It was full of grace and truth. And He manifested the true nature of the Father. Remember what He said to Philip? You've been with Me all this time and you don't know Me? If you've seen Me, you've seen the Father. But His glory was also seen in the miracles that He performed through His own power. For example, after telling us about how Jesus turned water into wine at a wedding in Cana, John then declared this in John 2.11, this beginning of signs Jesus did in Cana of Galilee and manifested His glory and His disciples believed in Him. So the disciples were seeing along the way glimpses of the divine glory of Jesus, but not the fullness of it. They saw shining through, as He fulfilled His messianic ministry, manifestations of His glory, glimpses of His glory. But after He returned to His Father, His glory would once again be fully manifested. And Jesus is saying in this prayer that He wants all those who believe in Him to be with Him and to see this fullness of His glory. That's what He wants for you and I. And He's shown you and I glimpses of His glory, has He not? In the same way. It's been through His Word. We've seen glimpses of Jesus' glory in the Gospel of John. It's been recorded for us as the Holy Spirit has brought these things, an understanding of these things, into our minds. But we haven't seen the fullness of His glory. We've experienced something of His glory as well in the fact that we're born again. And that He Himself has baptized us with the Holy Spirit into His Church. And we've experienced some of His glory that way. His guidance in our lives. We've heard His call, the call of our Shepherd. We've heard His voice through the Gospel, through the power of the Holy Spirit. There are ways in which we too have experienced His glory, seeing glimpses of His glory. But one day, one day we'll be with Him, that day in which His glory in all its fullness can be seen again. We will be with Him and we will be able to behold Him in all of His glory. But that's going to require a change in us. Here's what the Apostle John who wrote this gospel by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, wrote in his first epistle, he said in 1 John 3, 2, Beloved, now we are children of God, and it has not yet been revealed what we shall be, but we know that when he is revealed, referring to Jesus at his second coming, we shall be like him. How can we be so sure that we'll be like him? Well, he says, for we shall see him as he is. The implication there is there's no way we could see him as he really is unless we've been changed in some way to be more like him. We have to be glorified, as Paul would put it in Romans 8, in order to see Jesus in all his glory. We have to have glorified eyes for that, you might say. The Apostle Paul describes the way in which we'll be changed in a little bit more detail in his first epistle to the Corinthian church For example, in 1 Corinthians 15, I read verses 51 through 57, where Paul says, Behold, I tell you a mystery. We shall not all sleep. He's referring to death there. But we shall all be changed in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised incorruptible. And we, referring to those who would be alive at His coming, We shall be changed. For this corruptible must put on incorruption. This decaying existence has to become a non-decaying one. and this mortal must put on immortality. For when this corruptible has put on incorruption, and this mortal has put on immortality, then shall be brought to pass the saying that is written, death is swallowed up in victory. Oh, death, where is your sting? Oh, Hades, where is your victory? The sting of death is sin, and the strength of sin is the law, but thanks be to God who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. We're going to be changed. And we're going to be able to see Him as He is. Not just glimpses revealed in the Word and in His power transforming our lives. The fullness, the reality of His glory. Paul also offers us great encouragement as we look forward to the return of our Lord Jesus, reminding us that we will always be with Him. He says this to the Thessalonians in 1 Thessalonians 4, verses 13-17. He says, I don't want you to be ignorant, brethren. Well, you could say that to a lot of Christians today, right? I don't want you to be ignorant, brethren, concerning those who have fallen asleep. Again, talking about death here. Lest you sow as others who have no hope. For if we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so God will bring with him those who sleep in Jesus. For this we say to you by the word of the Lord." He's referring to the teaching of Jesus himself, which he's passing on. that we who are alive and remain until the coming of the Lord will by no means precede those who are asleep. For the Lord Himself will descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of an archangel, and with the trumpet of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first. Then we who are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. And thus we shall always be with the Lord." He's not saying that when our brothers and sisters in the Lord die that we shouldn't be sorrowful. He's saying we don't sorrow as those who don't have any hope. Our sorrow has mixed in with it the joy of knowing that our loved ones are with the Lord and that we will see them again. We have a hope in our sorrow even when someone dies that the world does not have. And that hope ultimately consists in what? Always being with Jesus. Our glorified, risen, ascended Savior. And seeing Him as He is. These precious promises are ours because our Lord Jesus won the victory over sin and death. But these promises are also ours because we come to know the Father through Him. And that's what Jesus talks about in verse 25, when he says, O righteous Father, the world hasn't known you, but I have known you, and these have known that you sent me. Well, that's how they know the Father, right? Through Jesus, whom the Father sent. As we were reminded earlier, when I read the beginning of this prayer, such knowledge is essential for eternal life. And it guarantees our future in heaven. Remember what he said in verse 3? And this is eternal life, that they may know you, the Father, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent. Knowing God the Father through Jesus Christ is equivalent to everlasting life in Jesus' mind. To truly know Him is to have everlasting life. And so Jesus speaks to his father as the righteous one, assuming that he will most assuredly keep his word and reward us with the everlasting life in his presence that he has promised. He then goes on to end his prayer with an emphasis on the way in which he has revealed the father to the disciples. He's talking about having revealed him. He's known them. They've known that the father sent him. That's how they know the father. That runs throughout the upper room discourse. He talks about something of the way he made the Father known in verse 26 as he ends his prayer. He says, I have declared or literally made known to them your name and will declare or will make known your name, implied, that the love with which you love me may be in them and I in them. Now, when Jesus says that He has declared the Father's name, this is something we've talked about before, when He talks about His name and praying in His name, or the name of the Father. He's referring to His revelation of the Father's true nature and character. That's what it means to reveal the Father's name. And He is referring to how He has faithfully made known all that the Father desired for His people to know about Him and about salvation that He offers, full and free. through his son Jesus Christ. In fact, when Jesus says that he's declared or made known the Father's name, he actually uses the same Greek verb that he's used only in one other place in his teaching as recorded in John's Gospel. Earlier in the upper room, in a very important teaching that he gave, when he referred to his disciples as his friends, he uses the word twice here in 1726. Norizo, this form of to know or make known. He says in John 15, 15, No longer do I call you servants, for a servant does not know what his master is doing, but I have called you friends. For all things that I heard from my Father, I have made known to you. He hasn't held anything back of the Father's revelation to them. And that's how He's treated them, as His friends. He's given them the fullness of the revelation that the Father has called them to give. But Jesus doesn't just say that He has made known the Father's name, He stresses that He will continue to make it known in the future, doesn't He? He says, I have made known Your name to them, and I will make it known. But how will Jesus continue to make His Father known after His return to His Father? He's talking about leaving. So how is this going to happen? How is He going to continue to make His Father known to the disciples there and to all who will believe as a result of their word? Not just when He brings them to salvation, but throughout their lives, He will continue to do this. Well, he's already told us how he will do this, hasn't he? When he's promised to send the Holy Spirit. There are several passages we could look at, but I'll just rehearse one of them for you from John 16, verses 12 through 15. He's talked about this at least four or five times in the Upper Room Discourse, the coming of the Helper, the Holy Spirit. And he says in John 16, 12, I still have many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now. However, when He, the Spirit of Truth has come, He will guide you into all truth, for He will not speak on His own authority, but whatever He hears He will speak, and He will tell you things to come. He will glorify Me, for He will take of what is Mine and declare it to you. All things that the Father has are Mine." So what's the Holy Spirit going to be doing? If He's taking the things of Jesus and declaring it, He's taking the things of the Father and declaring it. all things that the Father has are Mine. Therefore I said that He will take of Mine and declare it to you." It is thus through the Holy Spirit that our Lord Jesus will make the Father known to us through faith in Him as the ultimate revelation of the Father. That's what the Holy Spirit does. He leads us to faith in Christ as the ultimate revelation of the Father. He helps us to see Jesus' glory, even if it's Somewhat veiled. We see it when other people don't. Remember when they saw His glory manifested in Cana? His disciples did what? They truly believed when they saw His glory. Not everybody saw His glory as they did. And believed as they did. He said, We beheld His glory in 114. As the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth. Not everybody sees the glory of Christ in his work through the proclamation of the gospel. Why do we see that glory? Because the Holy Spirit shows it to us. He helps us to see. As Jesus said to Nicodemus, you can't see the kingdom and therefore the glory of Jesus is king or enter the kingdom unless you've been born from above. That's how we get eyes to see. What a gracious Savior we have. What a gracious Savior we have. But Jesus also gives a reason why He wants to continue to reveal the Father to those who have been given to Him by the Father. All who have been given to Him by the Father. Namely, that the love with which you love Me, He says, may be in them. There's a point to this that He wants us to see. There are several things we could learn as we look at his teaching, but here, the point he wants us to see is that I want you all to be with me and so forth, and I want you all to know the love with which the Father has loved me. Think about it. The love with which he himself has been loved by the Father from before the foundation of the world, he wants to be experienced by those who believe in him. Now this kind of love, this is an everlasting love. This is an undying love. This is a love that will not let us go ever. That's the kind of love he's talking about here. I think D.A. Carson captures the intent of our Lord Jesus very well when he writes, the purpose of this continuing manifestation of God himself is first that the love of the Father has for the son may be in them, which may mean amongst them, and displayed in their love for one another then, or it may be within them, so that as individuals they become loving people. He may have either of those senses. But he's right when he goes on to say, it is impossible to think of one without the other. The crucial point is that this text does not simply make these followers the objects of God's love, as in verse 23, but promises that they will be so transformed, as God has continually made known to them, that God's own love for His Son will become their love. The love with which they learn to love is nothing less than the love amongst the persons of the Godhead. I think he's right about that. What greater love can there be than the love of the Father for the Son? What greater comfort may we have than to know that we are loved with this same love? What more powerful witness is there than for others to see such divine love in our lives toward one another? When people look at us and they see the love we express for one another, You know what they should see? The kind of love that the father has for the son, the son has for the father. They should see that kind of love. You say, well that's impossible because we're human beings. You're right, it is. Unless God does it in us. With whom all things are possible. People ought to see, when they look at a Christian community, a supernatural kind of love. Something that just cannot be explained in worldly terms. That's for sure. The love of the Father is in us. It's in us. It will also be amongst us, won't it? And others will see it. And this love is rooted in a relationship with God the Father through Jesus Christ. It's the basis also for our unity in Christ. A unity for which Jesus had just prayed in verses 22 and 23. When he said, And the glory which you gave me I have given them, that they may be one just as we are one, I in them and you in me, that they may be made perfect in one, and that the world may know that you sent me and have loved them as you have loved me. It's a unity of love. David Guzik has aptly pointed out, I think, that there is a unity of compromise, or of fear, or of coercion. Jesus wanted a unity of love and common identity in Jesus. See the difference there? There's all the difference in the world between a love that is coerced A love that comes from compromise versus a love that's grounded in Jesus Christ and our identity in Him and is based on the truth. When our Lord Jesus adds the words, and I in them, notice that. He says, that the love with which you love me may be in them and I in them. Notice how he connects that. To have Christ in you is to have the love of the Father in you. You don't have the love of the Father in you, you don't have Jesus in you. These things go together. That's why John can say, no one can say I love God and then hate his brother. You just can't do it. It's a lie. But I think he's referring ultimately here again to the Holy Spirit who indwells us and thus brings the presence of Jesus Himself into our hearts and lives. When He speaks of a time when through the Holy Spirit, I think, He will continue to manifest the Father to us and show the Father to us. I think He also has in mind that the Holy Spirit will be the one that communicates His presence to us. Christ in you, as poets say, the hope of glory. Remember what He said in John 14, 16-18, and I will pray the Father and He will give you another helper. meaning another of the same kind there, like Him, that He may abide with you forever, the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees Him nor knows Him, but you know Him, for He dwells with you and will be in you. And then He says, I will not leave you orphans, I will come to you. Remember when we studied that? What Jesus is saying is when the Holy Spirit comes to indwell you, I am coming to be with you through the power of the Spirit. So we have the presence of Jesus within us, and that's why we have his love within us. That's how others may see him among us, as we love one another just as he has loved us. I'd like to conclude by simply joining in the prayer of our Lord Jesus. in asking our holy, righteous, heavenly Father to give us an assurance of His love for us, to give us an assurance of His desire to manifest His love through us to a lost and dying world. So let's ask Him for that. Holy Father, we've heard our Lord Jesus' words this morning, and we want them to be true of us more and more every day. He promised that through the Spirit he would reveal himself more and more fully to us, that he would reveal you more and more fully to us, and he has done that this morning through his words recorded in this passage. He has kept his word. You have answered his prayer, and we have heard of you, of your great love for us, of your desire that we be with you in heaven, in the presence of your Son. Lord, give us assurance as we leave here today that no matter what else is happening in our lives, no matter what discouragements, sorrows, pains, fears, doubts, temptations, One thing is true above all else, that in Jesus Christ, our Lord, we are loved by you forever, and nothing can change that. No circumstance can affect that. We are loved. Help us, we also pray, to manifest that love to one another. Humbly recognizing that we don't deserve to be loved by you, We should expect other people around us to deserve to be loved by us either. Help us to be gracious in loving one another. Manifest your presence among us, Lord. Help others to see in our love for one another your love for a lost and dying world. Help us to be faithful, we pray. Do in us and through us what we cannot possibly do for ourselves or on our own. Fill us with your spirit and with power to be faithful. Forgive us, Lord, for our many sins, our great sins. Forgive us most of all this morning, Lord, for any doubt we've ever had about your love for us. It is blasphemous to think such things, to question you, to doubt you. And we're so sorry when we do it. So renew us, we pray. And for any who have not yet come to know you, it is our prayer this morning that you would do for them what you have done for us. Through the power of your spirit, that you would open their eyes, that they may see the glory of Jesus Christ in the gospel. that He died for sinners, that He rose from the dead, that we might have everlasting life, that He offers forgiveness as a free gift, everlasting life as a free gift, if we'll but cease trusting ourselves and trust in Him. We'll give you all the glory for what you do. We pray all these things in the name of our great God and Savior, our glorious God and Savior, Jesus Christ. Amen.