We'll come back to John 17, Matthew chapter number 6, and the title of my sermon tonight
is Christ's Example of Prayer, Christ's Example of Prayer.
Jesus Christ, of course, left us an example that we should follow in his steps, and one
of the things that we see in the Bible is Jesus Christ praying.
There are a lot of instances where Jesus Christ is off praying by himself.
He goes into a mountain to pray.
He prays on his own, and that's the majority of the time, because that should be the majority
of our prayer as well.
The Bible says, But thou, when thou prayest, enter into thy closet, and when thou has shut
thy door, pray to thy Father which is in secret, and thy Father which seeth in secret shall
reward thee openly.
So we don't pray out in the corners of the streets and in the synagogues to be seen of
men.
We want to do most of our praying in private, because it's between us and the Lord.
It's not for show.
So when we pray publicly, it's a short prayer.
When we do long prayer, it's something that we do privately, and we see that with the
Lord Jesus Christ and many other people in the Bible.
But there are a couple of times where we actually see Jesus Christ praying, and we actually
get a full prayer of what Jesus prayed.
Now the two most famous instances of this would be what we know as the Lord's Prayer,
which isn't really Jesus praying, but it's rather Jesus explaining to the disciples how
to pray, so he gives them a sample prayer or an example prayer.
But John 17 is where we actually get an actual prayer of Jesus praying out loud to the Father
in the presence of his disciples so that they're able to listen in to prayer between
the Son and the Father.
And John 17 is a powerful chapter for that reason.
It's a very unique chapter, getting to see Jesus Christ praying to the Father in such
a long prayer, you know, 25 verses there of prayer.
That's pretty interesting.
So look at Matthew chapter 6, and let's just take a quick look at the Lord's Prayer, what
we know as the Lord's Prayer, and then we'll go to John 17.
It says in verse 7, but when you pray, use not vain repetitions as the heathen do, for
they think that they shall be heard for their much speaking.
Be not ye therefore like unto them, for your Father knoweth what things you have need of
before you ask him.
After this manner, therefore pray ye.
So he's saying don't chant this, don't say this over and over, this is just the way that
you pray.
Pray after this manner.
This should be your style of prayer or an example prayer.
He says our Father, which art in heaven, hallowed be thy name.
Thy kingdom come, thy will be done in earth as it is in heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors, and
lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil, for thine is the kingdom and the
power and the glory forever.
Amen.
There's another version of this prayer over in Luke chapter 11.
We don't need to turn there.
It's just a little bit shorter than this version.
This version has the most content.
And in this prayer here, what we see is that this is a very spiritual prayer.
It's not a carnal prayer just asking for all kinds of things to consume upon your own lusts.
I mean look how spiritual this is.
What's he praying for?
He wants God's will to be done.
He's praying that we would be able to forgive other people and that we would be forgiven
by God, that we would not be led into temptation, but that we would be delivered from evil.
Notice these are spiritual things.
It's not just give me this, give me that, you know, I want this new car, house, job,
you know.
Now look, obviously there are things in life that we need carnally, and so that's why it's
said here, give us this day our daily bread.
That has to do with our physical needs that we have of just a daily bread, daily sustenance.
And of course elsewhere when the Bible teaches on prayer, even in this very chapter, it talks
about how God knows that we need clothing, and we need food, and we have human needs.
And there's nothing wrong with praying to God and asking Him to meet our basic human
needs.
We see that most of prayer is not just about receiving carnal things or things of this
world or things of the flesh and just basic human needs.
I mean that's part of our prayer, hey, Lord, please help me to pay my bills, you know,
help me to be able to pay the house payment or help me to be able to do a good job at
work and be able to put food on the table for my family.
There's nothing wrong with praying that at all.
You know, be careful for nothing.
What does careful mean, worried or anxious?
Be careful for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving
let your requests be made known unto God.
And the peace of God which passeth all understanding shall keep your hearts and minds through Christ
Jesus.
And so there's nothing wrong with asking for those things.
But what do we see Christ emphasizing in prayer?
Spiritual things.
So that tells me that if we go to the Lord in prayer and everything we're praying about
is only that which is fleshly, carnal, temporal of this world, we're not praying like Jesus
taught us to pray.
And we're definitely not praying like he prayed in John 17, right?
So we need to pray, yes, for our physical needs, give us this day our daily bread and
help us pay the bills and yada, yada, yada.
But we also need to be praying about our own spiritual condition.
Lead us not into temptation, deliver us from evil.
We also need to be praying about forgiving other people and interceding for other people.
Praying for God's will to be done.
Praying for people to be saved as we saw in John 17.
Praying for spiritual things.
We don't want to just only pray for that which is physical and fleshly.
Now the Bible, of course, tells us in the book of James it says you have not because
you ask not.
You ask and receive not because you ask amiss that you may consume it upon your lusts.
So if we're just praying to God in order to gratify our own physical desires and lusts,
we're asking the wrong way and he says you're not going to receive if you do that.
We need to pray according to his will not to just gratify our greed or lust or covetousness.
But I love what he says there, you have not because you ask not.
You know what that tells me?
That tells me that prayer actually changes things.
Prayer is not just an exercise that we go through.
And some people have this attitude that prayer is just an exercise that you go through and
whatever's going to happen is going to happen and nothing's going to change what's already
foreordained and predetermined.
But that is simply not true.
If we ask not, we have not.
If we ask, we receive.
Ask and ye shall receive.
Seek and ye shall find.
Knock and it shall be opened unto you.
What if we don't ask?
We don't receive.
We have not.
If you don't pray, you're missing out on blessings from God.
There are things that God would give you that you're not going to receive because you did
not ask for them.
I mean if you ask, you receive.
You don't ask, you don't receive.
So don't tell me praying is just this exercise.
And you know this is like a Calvinist philosophy that says, you know, it's all foredetermined
and foreordained and we just pray.
And I've even heard preachers get up and explain it like, you know, you just pray so that you
can kind of participate in stuff that's going to happen anyway.
You know, I heard a preacher talk about, you know, praying that the faucet would turn on
and then turning on the faucet and it's like an answer to prayer.
That faucet was going to turn on anyway, right?
I mean that faucet, it's not like some angels just jumped in there, fixed the plumbing real
fast.
It was going to happen anyway.
That's dumb to just go through an exercise.
You know, prayer should be sincere, not a vain repetition, not just a chant or something
like that or not just something to make us a better person.
I mean this is like your doctor tells you, right?
You know, do you have some kind of a prayer time or meditation routine?
Who knows what I'm talking about where you'll get that as health advice.
You know, make sure you have prayer in your life.
Why?
So you don't get too stressed out and anxious and upset and then your blood pressure is
wrong or something, right?
You know, hey, whether it's transcendental meditation or whether it's praying to the
Father or whatever, you know, just as long as you have something like that in your life,
right?
That's not why we pray.
It's not doctor's orders that we pray.
We pray because it actually accomplishes something.
That's why I pray.
I want something to happen, not just spinning my wheels.
I want to ask for something that I want to receive.
Prayer is asking and receiving as it has famously been said.
Go to John chapter 17.
John chapter 17.
So John chapter 17, you could also call this the Lord's Prayer.
In a sense, this is even more accurately described as the Lord's Prayer because this is the Lord
himself praying.
And so this gives us a great insight into his prayer life.
And again, people have said that when Jesus prayed, he's just going through an exercise.
Or he's just demonstrating to us.
It's not real.
Well, really, because in the Bible, when Jesus is in the Garden of Gethsemane praying, it
doesn't look like an exercise to me when he's got great drops of sweat as it were drops
of blood and he's in agony, the Bible says, praying in agony with great sweat coming off
of him.
You know, this is just, he's a great actor.
That's garbage.
He's actually pouring out his heart to the Father.
He's not just going through the motions.
He is praying and he means what he says there and it's real, okay?
When he was on the cross and said, Father, forgive them for they know not what they do.
If you're reading a King James Bible, you know the modern versions remove that, many
of them.
The ones that leave it in, they have a little footnote by it saying, you know, this probably
isn't really supposed to be here.
If you get the NIV, New American, they have a footnote that says, you know, this probably
shouldn't be here, this part that said, Father, forgive them for they know.
Hey, I'm glad it's there.
It's God's word.
These new versions are junk and when they're not removing stuff out of our Bibles, they're
putting doubt on what's there.
I don't have any doubt that when the Lord Jesus Christ died on the cross, he said, Father,
forgive them for they know not what they do.
That's what he said.
Father, forgive them.
Thus did he pray, even while his life's blood flowed fast away, praying for sinners while
in such woe.
No one but Jesus ever loved so.
Blessed Redeemer.
He said, Father, forgive them for they know not what they do.
And by the way, he's not talking to himself there.
He's talking to the Father.
And when he said, my God, my God, why has thou forsaken me?
He wasn't talking to himself either.
He's talking to the Father.
It wasn't like, note to self, forgive these people later.
He said, Father.
I mean, think about it.
Why would he even say, Father, forgive them.
They know not what they do.
Note to self.
They don't know what they do.
I better forgive these people sometime later.
Wrong.
That's nonsense, folks.
John chapter 17, let's jump into this great prayer of our Lord Jesus Christ.
This is real prayer.
This is just as real as when he's in the Garden of Gethsemane and the sweat's pouring off
of him.
This is just as real as when he's on the cross saying, Father, forgive them.
They know not what they do.
When he's crying out to the Father, my God, my God, why has thou forsaken me?
This is just as real.
It says in verse 17, or verse 1 of chapter 17, these words spake Jesus and lifted up
his eyes to heaven and said, Father, the hour is come.
Glorify thy son that thy son also may glorify thee, as thou has given him power over all
flesh, that he should give eternal life to as many as thou has given him.
And this is life eternal, that they might know thee, the only true God and Jesus Christ
whom thou hast sent.
I have glorified thee on the earth.
I have finished the work which thou gavest me to do.
Now look, this is a very spiritual prayer.
What does he desire here?
He wants people to know the Father.
He wants people to know him.
He wants people to know the Word of God.
As you study this chapter, when you see what it is that he's praying for, he's praying
for unity amongst the believers.
He says, Lord, that they would be one as we are one.
He says, Lord, I pray that you would not take them out of this world, but that you
would keep them from the evil.
Isn't that pretty similar to what we saw over in the example prayer in Matthew 6?
Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.
What's Christ praying here?
He's praying that the disciples would be kept from evil, that they would be led away from
temptation, that they would have unity, that they would be sanctified through the Word
of God, that they would know God, that they would know Jesus Christ.
These are spiritual requests that he has.
Now who is he praying for predominantly in this scripture?
Well he says in verse number 20, neither pray I for these alone, but for them also which
shall believe on me through their word.
You know what that means?
That means he's praying for me and you, because he's praying for the disciples.
He says, you know, I'm not praying for the world, I'm not praying for the whole world
here.
And there's a time to pray for unsaved people, there's a time to pray for lost people.
That's what he did when he said, Father, forgive them, they know not what they do.
But in this particular prayer, he's praying for Christians.
He's praying specifically for his disciples, for those believers.
But he says, I'm not just praying for these specific people, Peter, James, John.
But he says, I'm also praying for those who will believe on me through their word.
So when new people get saved, he has the same request for them.
So this is like a standing prayer from Jesus to the Father on behalf of all of us.
So you're included in this prayer, I'm included in this prayer.
Jesus is praying for us in this prayer.
He wants us to be one as he and the Father one.
He wants us to be sanctified.
He wants us to be kept from the evil.
He wants us to have all these blessings.
He's actually praying for us.
Look at verse 9.
I pray for them.
I pray not for the world, but for them which thou hast given me, for they are thine.
So let's back up again and see this.
He says in verse number 2, as thou hast given him power over all flesh, that he should give
eternal life to as many as thou hast given him.
And this is life eternal, that they might know thee, the only true God and Jesus Christ
whom thou hast sent.
You know, that is life eternal.
Now keep your finger there.
Go to 1 John chapter 5.
There's kind of a similar statement over in 1 John chapter 5.
The Bible says in verse 19, and we know that we are of God, and the whole world lieth in
wickedness.
Look at verse 20.
And we know that the Son of God is come, and hath given us an understanding that we may
know him that is true, and we are in him that is true, even in his Son, Jesus Christ, this
is the true God and eternal life.
This is the true God and eternal life.
So again, in 1 John 5.20, the Bible's telling us, look, eternal life has to do with knowing
God and knowing the Son of God, the Lord Jesus Christ.
Those two things are related.
Go to John chapter 17.
Now obviously, in order to be saved, you know, you have to know the Lord on some level, right?
Or rather be known of him.
Because the last thing you want is for him to say, depart from me.
I never knew you, right?
But when we get saved, we know the Lord on some level.
Obviously, we now have knowledge of the true God in order to be saved.
We have knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, but God wants us also to grow in knowledge
over time.
The Bible says grow in grace and in the knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.
So over time, we gain more knowledge.
So we know him.
It'd be like if I said, well, I know my wife, right?
But I also knew my wife when we got married.
But don't you think I know her a little better now than I knew her when we first got married?
Especially since we didn't date for very long, but that's another story.
So the point is that you get to know people, you know, you know somebody like, yeah, I
know him.
But then there's knowing somebody, right?
And you learn more and more.
So the Christian life is a process of knowing the Lord on a deeper level, knowing the Bible
more and more, getting closer to God, and having a greater knowledge of the Lord.
That's part of growing in the faith and growing as a Christian.
It's important to grow in knowledge, and knowledge is underrated today.
In churches especially, it's all about just a relationship.
Well, you know what?
Knowledge builds that relationship because to know him is to love him.
To know him is to commune with him and to understand him.
So the more we read our Bibles, the more knowledge we have, the more doctrine we understand,
you know, that's going to draw us closer to him.
Just like the more I know my wife, the closer and better our relationship is going to be
as I get to know her more and more.
So we don't want to ever downplay knowledge.
We want to make sure that knowledge is something that we're seeking.
Every time we go to church, we want to gain some knowledge.
Every time we open the Bible and read it, we want to gain knowledge.
This is one of the great pursuits of the Christian life.
Yes to win souls to Christ.
Yes to get sin out of our lives and purge out the scum out of our pot, as it were, but
also that we might get to know God and Jesus Christ and to get a greater knowledge, understanding,
wisdom.
These are things that God wants for us.
These are things that Christ prayed for us.
That we would know thee, it says in verse 3, that they would know thee, the only true
God and Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent.
Now John 17, 3 is the verse that the Jehovah's Witnesses will show you at the door to try
to disprove to you the deity of our Lord Jesus Christ.
Who's ever had a Jehovah's Witness show you John 17, 3?
Wow, only a couple people.
That's good that you're not even given the Jehovah's Witnesses the time of day.
Way to shut them down before they can even get to John 17, 3.
But I've had Jehovah's Witnesses and Mormons pull this out.
They're kind of like a broken record.
They're kind of a one-trick pony.
They only have a few verses.
Turn to Psalm 83.
Who's been taken to Psalm 83 by the Jehovah's Witnesses?
They got to first base, but not to second base.
But anyway, they kind of just have a couple of verses that they love to take you to.
This is one of them, because I've been taken here many times by Mormons and Jehovah's Witnesses.
They say, well, right here it says that they might know thee, the only true God and Jesus
Christ whom thou hast sent.
So here's their logic.
Their logic is, well, if God the Father is the only true God, then Jesus Christ whom
he sent can't also be God.
That's their faulty logic.
There's God and then there's Jesus.
But here's the thing.
The Bible teaches that Jesus is also God.
Now if you remember in Isaiah, the Lord says, before me there was no God formed, neither
shall there be any God after me.
I'm he.
There's none else.
Beside me there is no Savior.
But what you have to understand is that Jesus Christ is not God that came later.
It's not like some other God was formed after, because Isaiah 43 makes it pretty clear.
There's no other God that predates him or post-dates him.
So in order for Jesus Christ to be God, he would have to have always been God, all the
way back.
Because he can't come before or after the Father, because that would violate what Scripture
teaches.
You see, Jesus Christ is God, because all the way back in the beginning, he was with
God and he was God.
John chapter 1, verse 1.
So before you get to John 17, 3, you've got to read John 1, 1, which says, in the beginning
was the word, and the word was with God, and the word was God.
And here's the real proof, if we keep reading, because he says, this is life eternal that
they might know thee, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom thou saith.
Here's what that means.
What that means is, he's the only true God, like the God of other religions, isn't real.
The God of the Philistines, the gods of Greek mythology, the gods of Roman mythology.
But he's not excluding himself and the Holy Spirit from that statement, when he says,
hey, that they might know thee, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom thou has sent.
Jesus Christ is included as God, because he was in the beginning with God and he was God.
Okay.
Obviously, there are other verses that we could go to, to demonstrate the deity of Jesus
Christ, and that's a whole sermon in and of itself, but Hebrews 1, 8, unto the Son he
saith, thy throne, O God, is forever and ever.
And on and on.
There are lots and lots of examples.
1 Timothy 3, 16, many different places we could go.
But let's keep reading.
Let's actually get the context right here in this passage.
He says, that they might know thee, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom thou has sent.
I have glorified thee on the earth.
I have finished the work which thou gavest me to do.
And now, O Father, glorify thou me with thine own self, with the glory which I had with
thee before the world was.
So this shows that Jesus Christ is not a created being that came into existence in Bethlehem's
manger, but that rather, even before the world was, in the beginning, it says that he shared
glory with the Father.
This is one of the most important verses in the whole Bible.
John 17, 5.
Underline it, memorize it, study it, meditate on it.
This is one of the most important verses in the New Testament.
Why?
Because this is the verse that just destroys the oneness Pentecostal doctrine.
It just demolishes it.
It just game over, insert coin, you're done.
It says, Now, O Father, glorify thou me with thine own self.
So is he talking to himself?
No.
He said the Father's got his own self.
Here's a good definition for the word self here, person.
Look it up in the dictionary.
And now, O Father, glorify thou me with thine own self, with the glory which I had with
thee before the world was.
You see, oneness Pentecostalism teaches that the Son of God didn't exist in the Old Testament.
There was no Son of God that basically God fathered a child in the New Testament, that
God fathered a child in Luke 2 or Matthew 1, and that that's where the Son of God begins
to exist.
This is what oneness Pentecostalism teaches.
That's not true because Jesus Christ shared glory with the Father before the world ever was.
That's a powerful truth.
So before this world ever even existed, what have you got?
You got the Father and the Son sharing glory, having a relationship.
And let me just prove it to you even further.
Look at verse 24 of the same chapter.
Father, I will that they also whom thou hast given me be with me where I am, that they
may behold my glory which thou hast given me, for thou lovest me before the foundation
of the world.
How could the Father love him before the foundation of the world if he did not exist as the Son
of God?
How could there be love between Father and Son before the world even began?
How could they share glory together before the world...
That wouldn't be sharing if you just have one person existing in the beginning before
the world began.
There's no sharing.
There's no self-loving or something like that.
No, you have the Father and the Son.
And by the way, if the Father is eternal, then the Son's eternal.
You know what?
We gave out root beer floats today to all the fathers.
You know what all those fathers had in common?
Just some child, okay?
Not just like, well, I'm going to be a father someday.
So I'm just going to start calling myself a father now.
You think that that's what God was doing before the world began?
Just calling himself a father?
Just having a root beer float because of the fact that someday, thousands of years from
now, he's going to beget a son?
No, no, no.
He was already in the beginning, Father and Son.
Why?
Because God eternally exists as Father, Son, and Holy Ghost.
And if any of them came into existence at a later date, then that would be some other
God being formed after him or some God being formed before him.
And no, no.
They have to both be co-eternal.
And they have to both, and including the Holy Ghost would be all three, would have to go
back all the way to the beginning, already be there in the beginning was the Word.
The Word was with God.
The Word was God.
So that's a pretty powerful verse, isn't it?
Especially when you take verse 5 and verse 24.
If you can't see it, well, you're blind at that point.
Look at verse number 6.
It says, I've manifested thy name unto the men which thou gavest me out of the world.
Thine they were, and thou gavest them me, and they have kept thy word.
Now here's another similarity I want to point out between this prayer and what we saw that's
known as the Lord's Prayer in Matthew chapter 6.
We talked about a few similarities.
But another similarity I want to point out is the idea of us doing our part and then
asking God to do his part.
Forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors.
So I've done what you've told me to do, Lord.
Now I want you to do your part.
Asking God to do his end of the bargain, to fulfill his end of the covenant, because we
have done the work that he gave us to do, right?
Isn't that what we see in this passage?
Because Jesus says, I have glorified thee on the earth, verse 4.
I have finished the work which thou gavest me to do.
Now that's the type of praying that we should be able to do, right?
To be able to get on our knees and say, Lord, I finished the work that you gave me to do.
I glorified you, Lord.
Now would you do for me X, Y, and Z?
Would you meet my need?
And of course focusing on that which is spiritual, not just always asking for that which is carnal
and physical.
But going to the Lord, there's nothing wrong with going to the Lord and saying, Lord, here's
what I've done.
You asked me to do this.
I did it.
Now, Lord, would you please step in and help me out in this area that I need?
We don't want to just go to the Lord.
We haven't done anything that he told us to do.
He gave us all a list of work to do.
We haven't gotten any of it done.
We didn't read our Bible.
We didn't go to church.
We didn't go soul winning.
We're not singing praises to his name.
And then we just come to him like, all right, God, I got a long prayer list of things that
you need to do for me.
It's like, well, wait a minute.
What did we do for him?
This is like when your child comes to you and says, Mom, I've cleaned my room.
I have done the dishes.
And I put away laundry.
May I now have an ice cream cone?
As opposed to just give me ice cream.
Well did you do your work?
Did you do your schoolwork?
Did you do your chores?
No.
Oh, well then, why would I give you anything?
You know what?
That is a picture of our walk with God as well.
When we pray unto our Father, which is in heaven, it's not really that different from
a little child asking their mother or father for something on this earth.
Just like we as parents give gifts unto our children, right?
How much more?
Sell your Father, which is in heaven.
Give good things to them and ask him.
But you see how there's a give and take here.
It's not just a one-way street.
Jesus did always those things which pleased him.
He said, hey, I've glorified you.
I've finished the work that thou gavest me to do.
And now, here's my request.
And then he makes his petition to the Father.
We find that both here and in Matthew chapter 6.
The Bible says, I've manifested thy name unto the men which thou gavest me out of the world,
thine they were, and thou gavest them me, and they have kept thy word.
And now they have known that all things whatsoever thou hast given me are of thee.
What does that mean?
They know that the Father is the source of everything that Jesus Christ has taught.
He said, my doctrine is not my own, but it's the Father's.
It came from the Father.
He gave me a commandment, what I should say and what I should speak.
And so he said, now they know that.
Now a lot of people get hung up on this, what's the name?
Because he said, hey, I've manifested thy name.
Here, everybody, drum roll.
What's the name of God the Father?
God the Father.
His name's God the Father.
Look up the word name in the dictionary.
See what the word name means.
A word or group of words by which a person, place, or thing is known.
We know God the Father as?
God the Father.
All right, so that is his name.
You say, well, that's not a very exciting name.
Well, actually it's a pretty interesting name because for 4,300 or so years of human history
and the entire Old Testament, that name was never revealed, God the Father.
So that's pretty exciting.
Another real exciting name in the New Testament is Jesus.
These are plenty of names in the Old Testament, but you don't see the names Jesus and God
the Father coming up.
Those are new in the New Testament.
I like them both.
Says in verse number 7, now they have known that all things whatsoever thou has given
me are of thee, meaning that he is the source of them.
And we saw a lot of other examples of that in the book of John.
For I have given unto them the words which thou gavest me, and they have received them,
and have known surely that I came out from thee.
They have believed that thou didst send me.
I pray for them.
I pray not for the world, but for them which thou has given me, for they are thine.
And all mine are thine, and thine are mine, and I am glorified in them.
Now again, in verse 10 here, we see the importance of the fact that you don't just have a relationship
with the Son without having a relationship with the Father or vice versa.
You know, you either have both or you have neither.
So you can't say, well, the Jews, you know, they're just kind of going straight to the
Father.
Well, no man cometh unto the Father but by me.
That's what Jesus said, right?
You can't go to the Father unless you go through Jesus.
Whosoever denieth the Son, the same hath not the Father, but he that acknowledges the Son
hath the Father also.
So it's a package deal, folks.
You can't just pick one and not the other.
You either have both or you have neither.
This is what's being taught.
You know, if all mine are thine and all thine are mine, you know, if you're in Christ, you're
in the Father and vice versa.
You either belong to him or you don't.
Verse 11, and now I am no more in the world.
Obviously, the moment that he's saying that, he is in the world but he's speaking that
way because he's literally going to be leaving this world in like less than 24 hours.
So you know, he's just basically saying, you know, I'm out of here.
Sort of like if I said, I'm out of here.
It's like, well, not really because you're still standing there.
This is a way of using present tense to express future.
I'm out of here.
That means that my departure is imminent, right?
So he says here, you know, I'm no more in the world.
I'm out of here.
But these are in the world.
And I come to thee.
Holy Father, keep through thine own name those whom thou has given me that they may be one
as we are.
Now again, you know, the oneness people, right?
But they go nuts on, you know, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost are all one, right?
And they just see that as just, they're one.
One person.
But hold on a second.
Are we all one person?
Here?
No.
But the Lord wants us to be one as Father, Son, and the Holy Ghost are one.
So are we all going to merge and become one person?
No.
We are one in purpose.
And when the Bible says in 1 John 5, 7, when it says there are three that bear record in
heaven, the Father, the Word, and the Holy Ghost, and these three are one, what's the
context?
The context is there are three that bear witness in earth, the Spirit, and the water, and the
blood.
And these three agree in one.
Does that mean the Spirit is the blood?
Is the water the blood?
Is the water the Spirit?
No, no, no.
Well, they're one.
They're one.
Like it's just this big Spirit, water, blood mixture.
No.
What it means is they agree in one, and the three that bear record in heaven, they are
one as well.
Meaning that they don't have these separate conflicting testimonies.
They are one, okay?
Now when the Bible here says, you know, that they may be one, as we are, we see that the
relationship between Jesus and the Father is an example of unity.
It's an example of submission.
The Bible talks about in the church we are to submit to one another in the fear of God,
and we see a perfect example of that with Jesus submitting to the Father.
Now when you talk this way, people will then say, oh, yeah, you don't believe in the deity
of Christ, or you're saying Jesus, but that's not what we're saying at all.
They're just saying what the Bible says.
We don't need 1 John 5.7 to tell us that Christ is God because we have numerous other passages
to tell us that Jesus Christ is God.
So we don't have to make 1 John 5.7 say something that it's not saying when we have verse after
verse after verse that God was manifest in the flesh, that the Lord himself, Jehovah
himself, suddenly came into his temple and cleaned the place up.
You know, again, I'm not going to do a sermon on the deity of Christ, but if you really
look hard, you know, and you really study hard, you could probably find a hundred verses
that beyond any shadow of a doubt prove the deity of Jesus Christ.
You know, you could rattle off ten that are just easy.
You know, Hebrews 1.8, 1 Timothy 3.16, you know, just kind of certain go-to proof text,
John 1.1, things like that.
But if you really dug in deep, you could probably find a hundred that would prove it beyond
a shadow of a doubt.
You know, they might take a little more study and cross reference, but the deity of Christ
is without question that he's, you know, eternally God, that God eternally exists as Father,
Son, and Holy Ghost.
But here when he says that they may be one as we are one, this is talking about their
unity because he's teaching unity amongst the flock, unity amongst the disciples.
He says in verse 12, while I was with them in the world, I kept them in thy name.
Those that thou gavest me I've kept and none of them is lost, but the son of perdition
that the scripture might be fulfilled.
And now come I to thee and these things I speak in the world that they might have my
joy fulfilled in themselves.
I've given them my word and the world has hated them because they are not of the world
even as I am not of the world.
So of course, we should expect that if we're following Christ, we're going to be hated
of the world.
Now, who is he praying for?
He's praying for us.
Everybody got that?
I mean, he's praying for me.
He's praying for you.
He said, this isn't just for Peter, James, and John.
He's not saying, look, oh yeah, the world hated them.
The world hated Peter or James or John or Andrew or Phillip or Bartholomew.
No, no, no.
He's saying the world hated you.
The world hated me.
Why?
Because we're the ones who believe through their word.
Obviously, it's gone through several people before it got to us, gone through hundreds
of years of one person winning another person, winning another person to the Lord.
But eventually, it gets down to us.
And if we're following Christ, all that will live godly in Christ Jesus shall suffer persecution.
So if we're loved of this world, I got bad news for you.
This chapter is not really talking about you apparently because he's praying for people
that are hated of this world.
He's praying for people that are a little more of a serious Christian apparently in
this verse.
So we don't want to be one that's just trying to be a friend of the world then we miss out
on this great prayer.
I mean, look, I like it when people are praying for me.
Now, sometimes people just say, hey, praying for you, brother.
Praying for you.
Hey, praying for you.
If somebody's actually really praying for me, that's a blessing.
I need that.
We need that.
We need that intercession.
That's going to help us, right?
If somebody's praying for us and God's going to bless us because of someone's prayers.
That's great, isn't it?
Wouldn't you love to have people praying for you and really praying hard and really
meaning it?
But here's the ultimate person praying for you, Jesus.
Well, if you're the friend of the world, you know, are you getting the full benefit of
this prayer?
I don't know.
Because he's praying for people that have received the word of God, they've kept God's
word and the world has hated them.
Why?
Because they're not of the world.
So if we live our lives and we're just totally of this world, we fit in with the world, we're
living like the world, well then we miss out on this awesome prayer of Jesus that could
be for us.
I pray not that thou shouldest take them out of the world but that thou shouldest keep
them from the evil.
Now what does that mean?
That means that we should not go off and live in a compound somewhere.
And look, this has been tempting for Christians throughout history to just say, man, I'm just
so sick of all the junk and the filth and the temptation and it's just hard to be a
Christian in this city or that city or out in the world.
And so they want to just seclude themselves.
And so throughout history there have been hermits and monks and people that just want
to hide somewhere, right?
And even independent fundamental Baptists who they just move out to the middle of nowhere,
they get that cabin in the woods somewhere and they just get totally off the grid or
they move to some super small town out in the middle of nowhere and finally they can
just have peace and raise their children without all the junk and everything.
But you know what?
That's not God's will for our lives.
That is not God's will for our lives.
You know where I want to live?
I want to live in the city.
That's where I want to live.
And you know what?
When you look at the scriptures about Jerusalem and we talked about this, you know, how the
Levites and the people who were really serious about serving God, you know, they dwelled
in Jerusalem but then they also dwelled in cities all throughout Israel.
They dwelled in the cities.
The towns and the suburbs were where the rest of the people lived.
The people who were of other tribes, you know, Naphtali, Asher, Gad, Ephraim, Manasseh,
whatever the tribe.
Do you remember my sermon a few weeks ago on Chronicles and we talked about this, I
think it was 1 Chronicles chapter 6 and we were talking about how, you know, the Levites
are the ones who are teaching the Word of God and they lived in the cities.
They were city dwellers.
Why?
That's where the people are.
Now I guarantee you though that they ministered to those people in the small towns and in
the villages and so forth.
Jesus Christ lived in the city but what did he do?
He went out and hit all the towns and villages.
Every little town, every little village, he went there and taught and preached.
Now look, I'm not saying that it's wrong for you to live in a tiny town.
I'm not saying that at all.
I don't want you to misunderstand me.
I'm not saying it's wrong for you to live in a tiny town or to live rural or to live
out in the country.
But I will say this.
If you want to be really serious about serving God, you know, if you're going to be a big
time soul winner, how are you going to do that out in the middle of nowhere?
You're going to run out of doors to knock.
You're going to run out of people to preach to.
Now theoretically if you're just going to keep going from town to town and keep evangelizing
but you know what tends to happen is people tend to seclude themselves and isolate themselves
and bear less fruit.
Well you know what?
Life's too short to go hide out in the middle of nowhere somewhere and you say well it's
a cleaner, more wholesome environment.
You know what?
I long for that too.
I long for that too but at the end of the day though there's people dying and going
to hell.
We need to be here reaching the people where they are, okay?
And so you know whether you have this desire to have like a water wheel on a river and
a little cottage and all that, you know that's all great but at the end of the day though
why are we on this earth?
Why are we even here?
What are we even doing?
You know and maybe you just want to be a more lackadaisical Christian and maybe you want
to do very little for the Lord and so you're okay to just kind of go out in the middle
of nowhere and give somebody the gospel every five months or every eight months when you
talk to them.
But you know what?
If you really want to get serious about pulling people out of the fire, if you really want
to bring forth fruit, some 30, some 60, some 100, you know you probably have to live in
a city to do that.
And if you can do that in a small town or a village, go for it.
But most of the church, because a lot of people are like oh we need you to start a church
in this town that's got 300 people in it.
It's like well what about this town that's got 30,000 people in it or 300,000 people
or 3 million people in it?
Those are our priorities.
That's where we're going to start.
You know we're going to start with the big cities and then we'll move to medium sized
cities and then we'll move to towns and villages.
But you know from the big cities, look we're going out and we're hitting small towns in
our Indian reservation soul winning and small town soul winning.
But look, don't get this attitude of getting taken out of the world.
Don't get to this point where you can't even go to the grocery store because it's too wicked.
Can't go to the gas station, too wicked.
You know, can't go to the fabric store, too wicked.
You know, can't go anywhere.
I mean look, I can go to those places.
Why?
Because I'm in the world but I'm not of the world.
I don't want God to take me out of the world.
I want God to keep me from the evil.
That should be our philosophy right there.
He says in verse 17, sanctify them through thy truth.
Thy word is truth.
What does it mean to be sanctified?
Sanctified means literally to be set apart or made holy.
Be different.
Be set apart.
Be holy.
Through the word of God.
As thou has sent me into the world, even so have I also sent them into the world and for
their sakes I sanctify myself that they also might be sanctified through the truth.
So what's Jesus saying here?
You know, he's leading by example.
If he's going to tell you to sanctify yourself, he's going to sanctify himself.
Right?
If he's going to give you work to do, he's going to do the work himself.
I love what it says in Matthew chapter 11, after he had spent time lining out his disciples
for soul winning and sending them out two by two and saying, okay, you're going to go
to these towns and villages.
In the next chapter, verse 1, it says that when Jesus had made an end of commanding his
disciples, he departed thence to go and teach and preach in the villages.
So he spends a whole chapter giving them instructions on the work they're supposed to do and then
what's he doing in the next verse?
He goes out and does the same thing.
Why?
Because he's leading by example.
The Bible says, the four matrices have I made, O Theophilus, of all that Jesus began both
to do and teach.
Right?
He didn't just talk the talk.
He walked the walk.
He did and taught.
So the Bible says here that he sanctified himself.
We already talked about verse 20.
Look at verse 21, another emphasis, that they all may be one as thou, Father, art in me
and I in thee.
That they also may be one in us that the world may believe that thou hast sent me.
What's the goal?
Getting people saved.
Getting people to believe that Jesus Christ was sent by the Father.
And the glory which thou gavest me, I've given them that they may be one even as we are one.
I in them and thou in me that they may be made perfect and one and that the world may
know that thou hast sent me and has loved them as thou hast loved me, Father, I will
that they also whom thou hast given me be with me where I am, that they may behold my
glory which thou hast given me for thou lovest me for the foundation of the world.
O righteous Father, the world hath not known thee but I've known thee and these have known
that thou hast sent me and I've declared unto them thy name and will declare it that the
love wherewith thou hast loved me may be in them and I in them.
So Jesus was the ambassador of the Father.
They don't know the Father but they can know the Father through Jesus because he's the
ambassador of the Father.
They can't see the Father.
No man shall see his face and live.
He's the invisible God.
But who can they see?
Jesus.
And they can see the Father through Jesus because of the fact that no man hath seen
God at any time but the only begotten Son which is in the bosom of the Father, he hath
declared him.
Here's another key point for you.
Jesus Christ is the image of the invisible God.
Everybody get that?
Colossians?
Jesus is the image of the invisible God.
That means that he is not the invisible God because if he were the invisible God, he could
not be the image of the invisible God.
Like for example, if I said to you, you know, this is an image of my wife and I held up
a picture.
That's not my wife.
Right?
I mean, Ken Hovind taught you that how many thousands of times.
Every time he gave his son.
Right?
This is not my wife.
This is a picture of my wife.
If Jesus is the image of the invisible God, then he's not the invisible God.
He's the image of the invisible God.
If he were the invisible God, then we wouldn't be able to see him because you can't see that
which is invisible, hence the word invisible, right?
Jesus is the image of the invisible God.
So how can we see the invisible God?
He's invisible.
He can see Jesus, which allows us to see the Father.
Not because Jesus is the Father, but because Jesus is the image of the Father, right?
So he allows us to know God.
How do we come to God?
Through Jesus.
Come to the Father through Jesus the Son, right?
We sing the song, give him the glory, great things to get done.
And so Jesus Christ is an ambassador of the Father.
But here's the thing, we're ambassadors of Christ, okay?
So have you ever heard people say that, you know, I saw Jesus in you.
I think, isn't there a song like that or something?
Who's heard a song like that?
Just my wife and Corbin.
All right.
So, but there's a song, I saw Jesus in you.
I don't remember anything about the song.
I couldn't sing it to save my life right now.
But what does that mean?
It means that, you know, when we are an ambassador for Christ, right, we're letting that light
shine.
That's why Jesus said, as the Father sent me, so send I you, right?
We are ambassadors for Christ.
We beseech you in Christ's stead, be ye reconciled to God.
Jesus Christ was the ambassador of God the Father, sent to this earth.
Now go to Ephesians chapter 4, I'm going to close with this.
Unity is what we're talking about.
So what's the title of the sermon?
Christ's example in prayer, right?
Christ's example of prayer.
Christ gave us an example of prayer.
First he taught prayer, right?
He said, okay, here's how you pray, our Father which art in heaven, hallowed be thy name.
But then he demonstrated an in-depth prayer from his own heart when he's in his hour
of need, when he's about to be in great agony, when he knows that he's literally got less
than 24 hours on this earth before he's going to die on the cross for our sins, and he's
about to be beaten and spat upon and go through all that shameful treatment.
And I mean, he's really speaking from the heart.
Again, I don't think John 17 is an exercise.
I believe he's speaking what's on his heart.
I think it's just as much from the heart as other prayers.
I think it's a beautiful glimpse into the heart of the Son of God as he pours out his
heart to the Father in John 17.
What's on his mind?
What's on his heart?
Spiritual things.
Very spiritual prayer in John 17.
It's all about spiritual things.
And what is he praying for?
He's spending a lot of time praying for other people.
So we can learn from this Christ example of prayer is pray for spiritual things.
Pray for other people, right?
He's praying for the disciples.
He's praying for you.
He's praying for me.
What's the big thing that he keeps bringing up over and over again?
If you had to pick a theme for his prayer request, it's unity amongst believers.
He wanted there to be unity amongst believers.
Now, why would he spend so much time praying for that?
Why would he care so much about that?
Well, because there's so little of that.
I mean, look, Jesus Christ, he knew the future.
He knew what's going to happen just right after he's gone.
What's going to happen?
A whole bunch of false teachers are going to come in, a whole bunch of Judaizers, a
whole bunch of people that are going to try to merge Christianity with paganism.
I mean, look at all the denominations today, right?
There's so many denominations, so many Bible versions, so many doctrines, and there's so
much confusion out there.
God's not the author of confusion.
God's desire is that there be unity.
God's desire is that we be rallied around the truth of the right doctrine and that we
all walk by the same rule, that we all mind the same thing, that we all believe the same
thing.
I mean, a perfect world, right?
We'd all believe right, so we'd all believe the same things.
There's very little unity.
Even in a local church sometimes, there can be a lack of unity, and we need to remember
that Christ wants unity.
Now, unity is not achieved by compromising the truth or joining hands with heretics and
joining hands with the wicked.
You know, God's a God of division, and Christ definitely taught division, but he wanted
the people who truly knew him and truly loved him to have unity, right?
So he doesn't just want everybody to have unity, but the people who the world hates,
the people who are serious about the things of God and they love the Lord, he wanted us
to have unity.
So as much as is possible, we should strive for unity that we might be an answer to Christ's
prayer, and we should also, if he prayed for unity, we should pray for unity too, right?
I mean, if it's good enough for Jesus to lift up his eyes to heaven and pray, let them be
one as we are one.
And how many times did he say that?
Very repetitive in John 17.
The most repetitive statement in John 17 is that they may be one.
They may be one.
I want them to be one.
So wouldn't it make sense for us to go home and pray, Lord, help Faithful Word Baptist
Church to be one.
Help Faithful Word Baptist Church to have unity.
Help us have unity, Lord.
Help us have unity with our brothers and sisters in Christ who love you.
Look, if there's something that we disagree on, help us to come to the right agreement
and be unified.
Give us unity, Lord.
That's a great prayer request.
But you know, unity doesn't happen by accident.
Look what the Bible says in verse 2 of Ephesians 4, with all lowliness and meekness with long
suffering forbearing one another in love, endeavoring to keep the unity of the Spirit
and the bond of peace.
You see, you have to endeavor to have unity, meaning that unity takes work and effort.
Now notice, what is the enemy of unity, according to verse 2?
Pride and ego, because lowliness, meekness, long suffering and forbearance are going to
give us unity.
Right?
You see, where a lot of false doctrine comes from, it comes from pride and ego, not just
a misreading of the Bible.
It comes from coming up with some cute new thing or some cool new thing.
You know, oh yeah, let me show you what I came up with.
Yeah, that's where a lot of dumb stuff comes from, right?
So that's an enemy of unity.
Also, it's an enemy of unity, ego, pride, things like that, because of the fact that
if people are always striving to have the preeminence, right, then they don't work well
as a team.
Think about on a sports team, and I'm not a big sports guy, but if you think, you know,
I know enough about sports to know that, you know, if you're on a basketball team,
and your goal is just how many points you can make, how many baskets you're going to
shoot, right, and everybody has that mentality, you're not going to play well as a team.
Can somebody who actually knows how to play basketball verify that, what I just said is
right?
All right, good.
Three people agree with me.
You know, I mean, it's like, if I'm just always just give me the ball, pass it to me.
No, no, no.
A really good team player, you know, he's going to pass it to the guy that's open.
He's not just always going to take the shot, whether it's a good shot or not, because it's
just all about how many baskets can I make.
A really good player just cares about the team winning.
He doesn't care if he doesn't make a basket the entire night, he just wants the team to
win.
Does everybody follow me?
It's not about whether I kick the ball into the soccer goal, it's just about how many
points my team has at the end of the night.
And if I can sacrifice my body and slide tackle and dive and play defense or it doesn't matter
whether I'm the forward, I'm just trying to sound like I know what I'm talking about,
you know, it doesn't matter whether I'm the forward or the halfback or the fullback or
the goalie, you know, it's just did the team win?
And you know what?
That ought to be the mentality that we have about church.
Are you a team player tonight?
Are you part, do you even believe in the team?
Are you part of the team at Faithful Word Baptist Church or are you just kind of this
solo commando lone wolf doing your own thing or are you part of the team?
You know, because what we ought to care about, and there's an even bigger team than Faithful
Word Baptist Church that's just the cause of Christ.
That's an even bigger team.
And you know what that means is that what we care most about is the cause of Christ
going forward.
That even supersedes how well our church does.
How well does the cause of Christ do, right?
So we're not just about ourselves as a church.
But then within the church, it's not just about what's best for me or what's best for
you.
It's about what's best for the church.
It's about what's best for the cause of Christ.
It's about the team.
Be a team player.
But see, that takes what, lowliness, meekness?
That takes long suffering, putting up with other people, being patient, forbearance,
not to just always have to have it your way all the time and everything's got to be your
way.
You got to endeavor to keep the unity of the Spirit and the bond of peace.
There's one body and one Spirit even as you're called and one hope of your calling.
One Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all who's above all and through
all and in you all, but unto every one of us is given grace according to the measure
of the gift of Christ.
So you know, we're all part of the team, but we should all be on the same team, right?
We've all got the same Lord, the same faith, the same baptism, right?
Same God and Father of all.
Same Holy Spirit living inside of us.
We should all be on the same team.
And so we should have unity and we should pray for unity.
So Christ's example of prayer is what?
It's about praying for that which is spiritual.
Just throw in your carnal needs and don't leave those out completely because you don't
want to be careful for those things.
You don't want to be worried about those things.
You don't want to have anxiety about, you know, let them be made known unto God.
Ask those things, but spend some time praying for other people, praying for the church,
praying for spiritual things, praying for the unsaved, praying for the saved, praying
for your brother's insistent Christ, praying for unity and also make sure that you bring
something to the table when you come to the Lord in prayer and say, hey, Lord, okay, I've
read my Bible, Lord.
I've let you talk to me and now I'm here to talk to you.
Not just, well, I don't want to hear what you have to say, but let me tell you what's
on my mind.
You know, why don't you let him talk to you a little bit?
Because I have a two-way communication here.
Prayer is one way, Bible reading's the other way, right?
It's about to rise and have a word of prayer.
Father, we thank you so much for this powerful chapter, Lord.
I pray that the words of John 17 would really sink down into our ears, become a part of us, Lord.
Help us to grasp the important doctrines that are found in John 17, but also, Lord, help
us to put John 17 into practice by enhancing our prayer life and praying like Jesus prayed.
Help us to put that into practice and to have the heart and the mind of Christ.