STUDY THEME: WHAT ON EARTH ARE YOU DOING FOR HEAVEN’S SAKE?
“SET APART BY GOD.” JOHN 17: 9-13, 14-19, 2O-23.
PLEASE OPEN YOUR BIBLE TO JOHN 17.
While speaking at a funeral service, a minister said, “My friends, we are living for two worlds.” He was challenged after the service by a businessman who said, “We are living for one world and one only. We do not know of any world than this one.” The minister asked, “If you did believe in another world, would it make any difference to you?”
The businessman quickly replied, “Of course it would. If I had the slightest suspicion that we are really living for any other world than this, I should change every major business policy I have before night.
Jesus taught His disciples to pray, “Our Father in heaven, Your name be honored as holy. Your kingdom come. Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven.” Jesus wants us to do the will of God on earth as it is done in heaven. Our loyalty belongs to heaven while our ministry is here on earth.
In this four-lesson study we will examine important principles that will guide us in becoming effective agents for God in this world.
In the first lesson, “Set Apart by God,” we will study Jesus’ prayer for believers who would continue His ministry in the world. We will explore how to be in the world while maintaining our distance from its sinful ways.
In the second lesson, “Maintaining a Heavenly Focus,” we will study the need to keep God’s will for our lives as our primary focus in our daily lives.
In the third lesson, “Making a Difference in the World,” we will explore how God wants to use each of us to positively impact our sphere of influence.
In the fourth lesson, “Maximizing God-Given Opportunities,” we will study Paul’s effective ministry in Ephesus and we will focus on ways to sharpen our effectiveness in ministry for Christ where we live.
The words spoken by Jesus and recorded in John 13-17 are commonly referred to as the “Upper Room Discourse.” In chapters 13-16 Jesus spoke to His disciples and sought to prepare them for His impending death. Jesus revealed important truths to His disciples in these chapters.
In John 16: 28 as Jesus came to the end of His’ upper room discourse He said, “ I come from the Father and have come into the world. Again I leave the world and go to the Fathers.” In vs.29 His disciples said to Him, “See, now You are speaking plainly and use no figure of speech.” Jesus closed Ch. 16 with the final words, “These things have I spoke to you, that in Me you may have peace. And the last thing is that you will all forsake Me.”
In vs. 13 the Savior would not only have His people safe in eternity, but also he desires them to be happy here and now. He would have them enter into His joy.
His Father is our Father; His elation to God---that of a Son---is now ours, for in Gal. 4: 6 Paul wrote, “because ye are sons, God hath sent forth the Spirit of his Son into your hearts; crying Abba, Father. John wrote in 1 John 1:3-4 “truly our fellowship is with the father, and with his Son Jesus Christ. And these things write we unto you, that your joy may be full.”
A joyless Christian is one who is out of communion with the Father. Other objects have engaged his heart, and he walks not in the light of God’s countenance. What is the remedy? To confess our sins to God; to put away everything which hinders our communion with Him; to make regular use of the means which He has so graciously provided for the maintenance of our joy---the Word, prayer, meditation, dwelling constantly on the glorious future that awaits us, proclaim to others the unsearchable riches of Christ.
He longest recorded prayer Jesus Himself prayed is found in John 17. It can be called the Lord’s Prayer. Another title for it is the High-Priestly Prayer. Jesus began in vv. 1-5 by praying for God to glorify His Son by His death and resurrection. Then He prayed in vv. 6-19 for His disciples to be in but not of the world in order to fulfill God’s mission in the world. Finally in vv. 20-26 Jesus prayed for His disciples, and all who would come to believe in Him in the future.
The prayer is called “High Priestly,” because it is primarily a prayer of intercession by Jesus for believers. Under the New Covenant in Heb. 7: 27, Jesus is the High Priest and sacrifice for our sins. The Focal Passage for this lesson is a part of Jesus intercessory prayer for his disciples, including all believers today.
PLEASE READ JOHN 17: 9-13.
The great interest of this passage is that it tells us of the things for which Jesus prayed for His disciples. The Passover Meal is over. Judas has departed and Jesus has completed His Upper Room discourse with the eleven apostles. It is time for Jesus to pray. This word for prayer often occurs in the N.T., but it is never used of prayer except by John; and he never uses it of any prayer other than the prayers of Jesus. Three times in vs. nine, fifteen, and twenty we find the words “I pray.” Once in vs. 24, we find “I will.” These words reveal the plane upon which Jesus prayed.
Our Lord was talking to His heavenly Father. He had said the last words to the world. He had said the last thing to the group of men God had given Him out of the world. The word “world” in vs. 9 is a general name for mankind in their fallen state.
According to 1 Corinthians 7: 31 there is a “fashion of this world, a common mold according to which the characters of men is formed.” According to Ephesians 2: 2 there is “a course of this world” in which all walk, except those on the “narrow way” which leads unto life.
For the unbelieving, Christ prayed not. For whom He is the propitiation. He is an advocate, and for whom He died, He makes intercession, and for no others in a spiritual way. “I pray not for the world for here in John 17 Christ is seen as the great High Priest, therefore He prays only for His own; “for those which thou has given Me.” How this should bow our hearts in adoring worship. What thanksgiving it calls for! Oh what an inestimable privilege to be one of the objects of Christ’s intercession.
Millions passed by unprayed for by Him; but those who belong to the “little flock,” are held up by Him before the throne of grace.
We may ask, “How is it that You will pray for us, and not for the world?” All we can say is, it was the sovereign grace of the sovereign God who singled us out to be objects of His distinguishing favors.
But do Christ’s words in John 17: 9 forbid us to pray for the wicked? No! Indeed. Christ’s mediatorial acts as our great High Priest are not our standard of conduct, but in His walk of the perfect Man He has left us “an example.” On the cross He prayed for His enemies. So in Rom. 10: 1 and 1 Timothy 2: 1 we are commanded to pray for our enemies; and in vs. 10 Jesus prayed, “And all Mine are Thine, and Thine are Mine.” Here is the second motive for His request: The interests of the father and the Son should not be separated; what belonged to the one belonged to the other. It has been well said, “They are the Father’s children, Christ’s members, and the Spirit’s temples.
“And I am glorified in them.” This was His third plea. Since the Son was the supreme Object of the Father’s affections, then this was another reason for Him preserving those in whom the Savior was glorified. What a place for us! To be the subjects of this mutual affection of the Father and the Son. The more we glorify Christ, the more confidence shall we have of His intercession for us.
In Matt. 10: 32 Jesus said, “Whosoever therefore shall confess Me before men, him will I confess also before my Father who is in heaven.”
What a touching plea is vs. 11. The Savior reminds the father that the disciples would be deprived of His personal care as present with them, and this would expose them the more to the world. He had been their Guide, their Guardian, and their ever-present and all-sufficient Friend.
He had borne with their infirmaties; upheld them in their weakness, protected them from evil! But now He was leaving them, going to the Father, and into His hands He now commits His own charges.
“But these are in the world.” God could take each saint to heaven the very day he believed (as he did the dying thief) did He so please; but for reasons of His own He leaves them here for a shorter or longer season. He gets more glory by leavening them here.
2 Corinthians 12: 9 says God’s power is made perfect in our weaknesses. As a quaint old writer said, “It is more wonderful to maintain a candle in a bucket of water than in a lantern.”
Another reason why we are left in the world is to make us appreciate the more the coming glory. God is not only elevated high above all impurity, but He is absolutely, essentially pure in Himself. Rev. 15: 4 says, “Who shall not fear thee O Lord, and glorify thy name? For thou only art holy!”
In vs. 11 Jesus, about to return to the father on high, asks the Father that He will preserve those so dear to His heart, those for whom He bled and died. He hands them over to the care of the Very One who had first given them to Him. It was as though He said, “I know the Father’s heart! He will take care of them! He will take good care of them!
And why is it that we are so highly esteemed by Christ? Clearly not for any excelling which there is, intrinsically in us. The answer must be, because we are the Father’s love gift to the Son. It is striking to observe that seven times in the chapter Christ speaks of those whom the Father had given Him.
In John 3: 16 we learn of the Father’s love for us; here in John 17 we behold the Father’s love to Christ. “God so loved the world as to give His only begotten Son; and He so loved His Son as to give Him the people who, conformed to His image, shall through all eternity, sing forth His praises. We are the Father’s love gift to His Son. Who then can estimate the value which Christ puts upon us?
The worth of a gift depends upon the one w ho made it; its intrinsic value may be paltry, but when made by a loved one it is highly prized for his sake.
So we, utterly unworthy in ourselves, are ever regarded by Christ, in all the inestimable worth of that love of the Father which gave us to Him! Thus does the eye of our great High Priest ever look upon us with affection and delight.
Little wonder, in view of what has just been said that the first thing the Savior asked for on behalf of those given to him by the Father was their preservation. He was leaving them in a hostile world. He asked that they may be kept from evil, from being overcome by temptation, from being crushed by persecution, from every device and assault of the Devil.
It is the old nature, still in the Christian, which makes needful the intercession of Christ.
In vs. 11 Jesus asked the father “ keep them in Thy name---that they may be one, even as we are one. Keep them from evil---sanctify them in the truth.” This refers not to a manifestation of ecclesiastical oneness; rather it is a oneness of personal knowledge of and fellowship with the Father and the Son, and therefore oneness in spirit, affection, and aim.
It is the oneness which is the outcome, not of human agreement or effort, but of Divine power, through making each and all ”partakers” of the divine nature.”
Has the request of the Savior been granted? It has. In Acts 4: 32 we read, “And the multitude of them that believed were of one heart and of one soul.” And is it not true that among the real people of God, despite their minor differences, there is still a real, fundamental and blessed, underlying unity? “One as We” shows that the union here prayed for is a Divine, Spiritual, invisible, unbreakable one!
In vs. 12 Jesus pointed out that He had kept those that God gave Him. None were lost but Judas who was not given to Jesus by the Father, but was added to the Apostles that the scripture might be fulfilled. Not one of them given to Christ can or will be lost.
Four reasons may be suggested for Christ referring to Judas here to show there was no failure in discharging the trust which the Father had committed to Him; to assure the disciples of this, so that their faith might not be staggered; to demonstrate that Christ had not been deceived by Judas; and to declare that the Scripture might be fulfilled.
It is clear in vs. 13 that one chief reason the Lord Jesus uttered audibly the wonderful prayer recorded in John 17 in the hearing of His apostles was that they might be instructed and comforted thereby; and not the apostles only, but all His people since then.
PLEASE READ JOHN 17: 14-19.
The disciples had seen and were son to see again how the world hated Jesus. He asked the Father to help them understand that the world hated Him because He was not of the world, and that it hated them for the same reason. John 15: 18 says, “If the world hates you, ye know that it hated Me before it hated you.”
Jesus was living in the world created by God and living among people who lived in sin. He befriended sinners in an attempt to win them, but He never committed their sins. Thus although He was in the world, He was not of the world. He said that His true followers also were not of the world.
The disciples would be representatives of the Father and Son to the world. In order to effectively represent the kingdom of God to the world, they must live by different standards than those of the world. In this part of His prayer Jesus prayed that His disciples would live lives of obedience to God and that they would be protected from temptation and persecution.
Jesus summed up His instructional ministry to the disciples when He said, I have given them Your word.
Jesus revealed the Father through His character and His teaching. Jesus’ parables, explanations of O.T. Scriptures, and dynamic preaching revealed important truths about the Father, the Son, the Holy Spirit, and every other important doctrine.
Jesus declared that He was not of the world. His way of living was radically different from the morals, values, and perspectives of a world that did not know or obey God. The disciples who believed in Jesus and received His revelation are also declared to be not of the world.
Jesus did not ask the Holy Father to take them out of the world, but that He would keep them from the evil one. He wanted God to strengthen them against the temptations of the devil. People sometimes speak of the world, the flesh, and the Devil. The world in this saying is the world we are not to love. John wrote in 1 John 2: 15-17, “Love not the world neither the things that are in the world. If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, is not of the Father, but is of the world. And the world passeth away, and the lust thereof: but he that doeth the will of God abideth forever.” Satan seeks to lure us through our sinful nature to yield to temptation and to practice the ways of sinful people.
The disciples commitment to Jesus Christ and His Word put them on a collision course with the world.
Opposition from unbelievers was constant throughout Jesus’ ministry. The opposition would
Culminate soon in His arrest, torture, and crucifixion. The same world that was hostile to Jesus would be hostile to His faithful disciples.
Faithful Christians will always be at odds with an unbelieving world. The differences sometimes lead to hostility by unbelievers who do not want their deeds of darkness revealed by the light of God’s Word.
Jesus made it clear that He was not praying for the Father to take them out of the world. Jesus was leaving the world soon, but they must remain. Only by interacting with the world could Jesus’ disciples complete their missions. Some Christians apparently believe the safest way to maintain their faith and commitment to God is through withdrawal from the world. Jesus wanted His disciples to take the good news of salvation to the ends of the earth.
In order to share the gospel, Christians must interact with unbelievers. Christians are to live out their commitment to Jesus Christ in full view of those who need to see the truth. Christians are to be in the world but not of the world.