Definite Distinction

Ezekiel 36:20-23                          2 Corinthians 6:14-18                             John 17:20-26

Definite Distinction

I recently watched a BBC series called “The Inside Man”. The main story is about an English Vicar who was arrested on a charge of kidnapping, aggravated assault, as well as attempted murder. Now, of course, the story did not begin there…rather, it began with the vicar foolishly, yet ‘innocently’, agreeing to temporarily hide a computer memory stick belonging to a vulnerable yet perverted young man he had been counselling, because the said young man was terrified of his mother discovering the pornography stored on the device. 

Things began to spiral out of control when the vicar’s son accidently found the device lying in a drawer together with his father’s keys, and innocently gave it to his math tutor to use for the tutorial. When she opened the device, both father and son witnessed the horrified expression on her face. Now, at this point, only the math tutor knew that the device contained child pornography which is a criminal offence. Still not knowing what was actually on the device, the son attempted to protect his father by saying the device was his while the father attempted to protect his son by first claiming that it was his, but then that it had been given to him by a counselee whose name he was not at liberty to divulge. 

Of course, the math tutor still believed that the device belonged to the son and made it clear that she was going to the police. One thing led to another, and the vicar ended up imprisoning her in the basement of the vicarage. When the troubled young man, the original owner of the device, committed suicide, all hopes of proving his son innocent vanished and so the vicar, together with his wife, plotted to asphyxiate the math tutor. 

When he was finally caught and prevented from killing the tutor, he justified his actions by stating: “Don’t you dare judge me. I have acted out of love. I have acted out of duty. I have done my best, and nothing, none of this – none of it is my fault.”

Yes, this is a fictional story, but it does demonstrate how even the best intentions, in this case the protecting of family members, can spiral out of control once morally dubious lines are crossed and the consequent wrong actions reinforced with twisted logic. The character of the vicar exemplifies how far people might go to uphold their decisions once made even when the consequences compromise their own ethical standards.

Such decisions can have disastrous results. For example, when well-intentioned people in the Church try to navigate difficult moral territory, actions meant to protect or include could unintentionally lead to consequences that challenge foundational beliefs and create irreparable division. This shift, while sometimes motivated by compassion and a debateable idea of unconditional love, at some point always spirals out of control alienating and villainising those committed to upholding biblical standards. 

But, I think, the saddest part of it all is when those who have abandoned the Church’s biblically defined moral compass justify their actions by claiming to hold the higher moral ground because they, they claim, are acting out of love and out of duty. This warped sense of reasoning, caused by an abandonment of Scripture as the standard for faith and practice in the Church, ultimately obscures the glory the world is meant to see in us…and then, instead of revealing a holy and a righteous Father, we present the world with a god fashioned in our own image thus blaspheming his name before unbelievers.

The Church described by Jesus in his prayer is one that is based on the unity of the Father and the Son. As we have seen before, this unity is defined by the obedience of the Son to the Father, as well as the character of the Father as revealed to us in and through his Word, a Word that is meant to sanctify us so that we might be like the one in whom we are united. The Church can only be one inasmuch as we abide in the holy and righteous God revealed in Scripture, because it is only this God who has sent his Son to make a way for us back into his presence. Anything else is counterfeit and therefore false and eternally impotent. Ethnic or cultural or societal or relational agreement cannot unify us in a faith founded on truth as revealed to us in the person and practice of the God of Scripture.  

Jesus’ prayer for unity is not vague or ill-defined. It is very specific. When he prayed for the unity of those who would believe in the message preached by the disciples, he had already clearly described the character of the messengers as well as the content of their message. “Sanctify them” he prayed in verse 17, “in the truth; your Word is truth.” The disciples were united in the holy and righteous God revealed in his Word by the Son who was sent to reveal him to them. 

If we remove any one of these elements, we obliterate and obscure the message we have for the world. We may be ever so sincere in our motive, but if we change the Word of God for whatever reason, we set off a chain of events that will eventually lead people away from belief in the one, true God. Instead, we will present to the world a version of a god who is both in the world and of the world, and once we have reached this point, we effectually cease to be united in the God described here by Jesus.

The whole point of what Jesus prayed here is that although the Church is in the world, it is not of it because it is united to the one not known by the world. We are meant to be different from the world because we have been taken out of the world. Trying to be more acceptable to the world by being more like the world is the exact opposite of what is revealed here. Such an action denies the very essence of what the Church is meant to be. 

Declaring ‘right’ what the Scriptures declare ‘wrong’, makes a mockery of the life and death of Jesus. The “sentness” of Jesus reminds us that he is the lamb of God who came into the world to take away the sins of the world. The glorious truth revealed by Jesus to his disciples is intrinsic to our being united as one community in him and because this community is founded on God’s holiness and righteousness we can have no partnership with what the Bible calls sinfulness. Light cannot be in fellowship with darkness and consequently, a believer can have nothing in common with an unbeliever. (2 Corinthians 6:14-16)

As our unity is a gift we receive from God because he has given us to Jesus, it is something we have rather than something we create. But the purpose of this unity is so that through us the world may believe in a closely and carefully defined holy and righteous Father…a Father who expressed his love for the world by sending his Son into the world to deal with that which ultimately separates the world from him…namely sin. And so, any attempt to make sin normal or tolerable is to render this prayer absurd. 

The ultimate desire of Jesus as expressed in this prayer is that the disciples and those who believe in him through their message live in his glorious presence for eternity. But God is completely holy…he is entirely set apart from all of creation…he alone is completely righteous and just…and he knows that the sinful cannot live in his presence, so he made a way for us to be sanctified through his Son. But that means we cannot redefine the love of God to accommodate and assimilate that for which Jesus died. 

In this passage, Jesus prayed for all believers, past, present, and future, expressing His desire for unity among His followers – a unity modelled on the perfect and harmonious communion between himself and the Father. This prayer for unity is both spiritual and relational, as Jesus asked that believers be one as he and his Father are one. As such, he emphasized a unity founded on love and truth…a unity that would reflect God’s character and consequently, a unity that would make his love visible to the world, praying that we would be united with him and with one another so that the world might believe the truth as revealed in Scripture.

And so, dearest beloved brethren, as we come to partake of the bread and the wine in Holy Communion, let us remember that this meal is a sacrament that both signifies and actualizes the unity Jesus prayed for. In this holy meal, we are drawn into everything the life and death of Jesus signifies, because it represents our intimate connection to God the Father through the substitutionary death of Jesus and, in him, to one another. 

But it also provides us with a vivid picture of what the oneness Jesus desired looks like. The sharing in the Cup of Jesus defines us as a cleansed covenant community that is distinct and detached from the world and all that the world represents. And in uniting us with every other true participant as members of the one Body of Jesus on earth, it makes us witnesses of his holiness and his righteousness.

To deny this distinction is to deny the world of a witness and to deny the world of a witness is to render the Church irrelevant, inconsequential, and apostate.

Shall we pray?

© Johannes W H van der Bijl 2024

In the World, For the World

Isaiah 57:15                  Hebrews 9:11-12 and 10:19-23                      John 17:11-19

In the World, For the World

As we’ve already seen in the opening lines of our Lord’s prayer in John 17, his initial; thoughts were primarily focussed on the status of those whom the father had given to him. But, as he continued to pray, his emphasis began to shift from the disciples as recipients of God’s gracious act of salvation to their task in the world out of which which they had been taken. Although they, like us, were not of the world, they were to remain in the world to be witnesses to the world. 

But for the disciples, it must have seemed as if there was one glaring problem with this arrangement. Jesus had just told them that he was about to leave them. Their reaction and their questions indicate that this imminent departure was one of the top thoughts on their minds. Initially they had just followed him, listening to him and watching him…but then he began to engage them in his teaching and his work…then he sent them out two by two on their own…but he had always been there. Now his prayer echoed his startling revelation: “I am no longer in the world, but they are in the world, and I am coming to you.”

Perhaps then, his words in the second half of verse 11 were meant to calm their fears. “Holy Father, keep in your name those whom you have given me, that they may be one, even as we are one.” Now, the term, ‘holy Father” is used only here in the whole of the New Testament. It is an interesting combination of words as “holy” indicates an otherness, a separateness, a transcendence…whereas “father” conjures up an image of connection and relational immanence. However, the grouping of these words is quite fitting as this section of the prayer concludes with a plea for sanctification…the divine act of making us children holy as he, our Father, is holy.

The request of our Lord for the disciples to be “kept” in the name of the holy Father highlights this act of sanctification. In the Ancient Near East, as still in many places today, a name often reveals an aspect of the bearer’s character. In this case, it is the holiness of the Father in particular. It is in this name…in this character trait of being holy…that the disciples will be kept and therefore enabled to, not only persist in the truth as revealed to them by Jesus, but also enabled to apply that truth to their own characters and thus be changed and conformed to the image of the Son (Romans 8:29).

And, according to Jesus, it is in this name…it is in this definite divine character trait of holiness that we find our unity. “Holy Father, keep in your name those whom you have given me, that they may be one, even as we are one.” The Trinity is, of course, our supreme example of unity…of oneness…of singularity of thought and purpose…but our oneness centres not around our collective selves, but rather our oneness is a direct result of our being united and kept in one name…the very particular name of the holy Father. 

Although there are many different and varied expressions of our faith, the fact remains that those who abide in the name of the holy Father are one. All those who are distinct from the world through their being united to this one distinctive God…all who follow him and demonstrate that following through obedience to his Word…they are one as they are all united in who he is. The unity of the Church is in essence a unity of spiritual character…a unity that reflects the one in whom we are united. As such, our Lord’s request was not for an organic unity even though a lack of such unity does tend to bear a negative witness to the world.

Now it is possible that the term “Holy Father” may have been used by Jesus to also invoke the idea of our entry into the holy of holies. As the book of Hebrews tells us, Jesus not only opened the way into the innermost sanctuary, but because of his entry those who are sanctified by him may also enter the very holy presence of God. Just like the High priest was sanctified before being allowed to enter the holy of holies, so too those given to Jesus by the Father are secured for eternal redemption by the blood of Jesus and are therefore able to draw near with full assurance of faith. 

In other words, we are not simply one because we claim that unity in Jesus. No, we are one because of our relocation…because of our new position…we are no longer outside, but rather we are inside the Holy of Holies because Jesus has opened the way and taken us in with him.  As Paul tells us in Ephesians, because God raised Jesus from the dead, so we too have been raised in him from the dead and we are seated together with him in heavenly places (Ephesians 2:4-6). There is no longer a dividing wall between us and our Holy Father because we have been sanctified by Jesus and brought in with him. 

We are one because we are united in the name of the holy Father and because we are united in his name, we bear the likeness of our holy Father. And because we are sanctified by the truth our unity is founded upon the truth revealed to us in the Scriptures. And we abide in Jesus because we have been given to him by the holy Father and kept by him in his name. You see, our unity is very specific. 

Interestingly, Jesus’ statement that he had guarded or protected them is set in the context of tragic loss and of tragic betrayal by a friend. As such this very short declaration presents us with a startling contrast. Unlike those who were kept in the name of the Holy Father, Judas’ action exposed him as one who had for a time appeared to be united with the others, but at this crucial point in time, his rejection of the truth ultimately proved that he was not in the Father at all. He was the son of perdition.  Judas thus serves as an image of those who do not keep the word…his deed reveals a shocking alternative to trust and love. If those who are in the Holy Father are there because of their being sanctified by the Word of truth, then those who are not in the Holy Father are not there because they are not sanctified by the Word of truth. By rejecting the truth of the Word, a very specific Word in this case, they have sealed their eternal fate. 

However, Jesus said that Judas’ action fulfilled Scripture. This is most probably a reference to Psalm 41:9: “Even my close friend in whom I trusted, who ate my bread, has lifted his heel against me.” But…and this is important…the prediction of his betrayal does not make God the author of the action of betrayal. Although nothing happens save that which is ordained by God, wicked people do wicked things because they are wicked, not because their deeds have been preordained.

The only reason believers in Jesus refrain from and are repulsed by their own sin, is because although they are in the world, they are no longer of it. Verses 13-16 focus primarily on the disciple’s lives after the ascension…after Jesus had returned to reign at the right hand of God the Father. 

The first thing Jesus asked for in verse 13 is that “they may have (his) joy fulfilled in themselves”. In John’s Gospel, the joy of Jesus is very much the mark of the true believer. His joy is not a joy found in external things – if it was those in the comedy industry would possess it in abundance. But comedians are often the saddest people of all. No, rather the joy of Jesus is found in the revelation and acceptance of the truth. 

Unlike the joy offered by the world, it is not a manufactured humour that needs to be excelled to elicit a constant upbeat response. No, our Lord’s joy comes from knowing that although the world and the evil one may hate us, we are kept safely in a place out of which nothing in all creation can remove us. 

As hymn writer, Maltbie D. Babcock wrote:

“This is my Father's world: O let me ne'er forget

That though the wrong seems oft so strong, God is the Ruler yet.

This is my Father's world: Why should my heart be sad?

The Lord is King: let the heavens ring! God reigns; let earth be glad!”

You see, the joy of Jesus is a joy founded on the unchanging nature of our almighty Father whose will cannot be thwarted by anything or anyone.

Of course, you must know that the moment the Word of Jesus touches your innermost being and you respond positively to it, you are declaring yourself at odds with the world. Our embracing the truth of Scripture indicates that we are no longer “of the world”. As sheep purchased by the Good Shepherd, we are led out of one sheepfold into another.

But as Jesus prayed here, we are not to be removed from the world because we have a very important task to complete.  As he taught in the Sermon on the Mount, we are to be both salt – a common ancient Near Eastern image of judgement (Judges 9:45) – and light – the image of blessing and of revelation. So, instead of removal or “rapture” from the world – something some dear fellow believers hope will happen soon – Jesus prayed for our protection from the world and from the one behind the hatred of the world, the evil one himself, because we are to remain in the world as witnesses to him! 

You see, God does not promise his children a life free from hardship, anxiety, opposition, or labour. He rather provides us with a joy that helps us to withstand these challenges. True, we may face danger, suffering, and persecution, but God’s grace keeps us from being overcome by evil. 

Modern Christianity seems to have forgotten that we are to remain in this world for a reason. The Father did not give up on his creation…Jesus did not give up on his disciples…the Holy Spirit certainly does not give up on us…so why is it so easy for us to give up on those who do not yet know Jesus? Because we are not of the world does not give us license to ask, contrary to our Lord’s prayer here, to be removed from the world. Neither does this provide us with an excuse to withdraw from the world…rather we are to be in the world to engage the world. 

Although our Lord was not of the world, he came into the world to save the world. To the hard-hearted, he was a constant irritant and a reminder of their falseness, their hypocrisy, and their ultimate destination. But to those who had ears to hear, he was a demonstration of God’s amazing and unconditional love for his creatures.

However, with his departure from the world, the Church as his body on earth has been given the same role as he had been given when he came to the world. As Jesus was sent into the world, so he now sends his followers into the world. For this reason, he asked for us to be sanctified in the truth. The word “sanctify” was usually used in the Old Testament to indicate a special dedication of a person or an object to God for special service. A sanctified person or object would then be declared holy …set apart by God for God. The various rituals surrounding the process and pronouncement of sanctification would attempt to show in temporal terms an eternal reality based upon a divine decree. 

In his prayer, Jesus appears to indicate that sanctification is a product of an alignment with truth…but a very specific truth…truth as it is revealed by God in his Word. This idea is as basic to godliness as error and deception are basic to wickedness. According to Ephesians 5:26, it is the Word that constantly washes us and cleanses us from innate impurity. 

The error in believing in a God that is dynamic…in other words, a God who, contrary to the teaching of Scripture and the faith held by the historic Church, is changeable, malleable, adaptable, or even pliable…is that if God alters or adjusts to suit the fluctuating deviations of the world, then the counter cultural message of every book of the Bible becomes baseless, meaningless, pointless, and irrelevant.

God uses His Word, not human ideas or opinions, to set us apart from the world for his special purpose. If we were like the world, we would not reflect the otherness of God or the holiness of God…and for this reason, our values, goals and actions ought to be different from the world.

But the main reason for this plea for sanctification is because the followers of Jesus are not only to be like their Lord, but they are also called to do the work of their Lord. In verse 18, Jesus said that as the Father had sent him into the world, so he, in turn, sends his followers into the world. As such, Jesus is the supreme example and pattern of what the Church should be. Every true follower of Jesus ought to be like him in his “sentness”. Not sharing the truth of the Word with the world means not being like Jesus. 

Now, of course, part of being sent into the world like Jesus is learning to pray like he did. Prayer is central to what it means to belong to God while living in the world.

But my point is that we have been chosen out of the world for the world for a reason and a purpose. We have been left in this world for the world for a reason and a purpose. We have been sanctified by the Word for the world for a reason and a purpose. As Jesus was sent to the world, so we are sent to the world. We are salt, we are light, we are witnesses, we are ambassadors of truth. 

For this to become a possibility, Jesus had to first sanctify himself so that he might sanctify others. Now, obviously, Jesus didn’t need any moral or spiritual improvement, but he was set apart by God for God. The imagery of the High Priest entering the Holy of Holies with the blood of the sacrifice to make atonement for the people is once again helpful here. As our great High Priest, Jesus was at once both the sacrifice as well as the one sacrificing…as we have seen before he had authority to give his life…no one took it from him…and he had authority to take up his life again. So, he is both sacrifice as well as the one sacrificing. He was sanctified or consecrated or set apart to complete this task of atonement.

But, unlike the High Priest, Jesus entered in with his own pure, undefiled, unblemished blood thereby establishing an eternal, once for all, atonement and reconciliation between God and humanity. One Lord…one sacrifice…one atonement…one way…one truth…one life.

In the world, but not of the world because we are in the world, for the world. The prayer of our Lord Jesus shows that we are indeed a special people…a chosen people, a holy people, a set apart people, a sent people. Yes, we are called out of the world to live in the presence of the Holy Father…but even so, simultaneously, we are to remain in the world so that the world may have a perpetual witness to what life was meant to be like…what life might indeed be like in the light of God’s merciful and loving character. 

So, I echo the words of our Lord as I pray for us. May the Holy Father keep us in his name. May he sanctify us in his truth. May he sanctify us by his Word. And as he sent Jesus into the world, so may we be sent into the world. In the world, not of the world, but for the world. 

Amen.

© Johannes W H van der Bijl 2024

Given to Give

Ezekiel 18:21-24                         1 Timothy 2:1-6                        John 17:6-10

Given to Give

As we saw last week, this final prayer of our Lord’s incarnate life centred around the one aspect uppermost in his mind, namely a reconciled relationship between the one true God and humanity. In the first five verses Jesus’ focus was mainly on himself as the one through whom eternal life would be made possible, but in verses 6-10, his prayer centred primarily on his disciples and their relationship to God the Father through him. 

These next five verses are basically the introduction to an intercessory prayer in which Jesus presented to the Father those whom the Father had originally given to him. I think here he was more than likely referring specifically to the twelve and perhaps to the small group of women that were part of their company. If you recall, Jesus was very specific in his choice of disciples. Before he chose the twelve, he spent all night in prayer, and perhaps he was now alluding to the divine guidance behind that choice. They did not choose him, but rather he had chosen them. 

Nevertheless, in these verses, the words of our Lord were so carefully and precisely chosen that they may present us with a picture of what would become the New Covenant People of God. By using the words of his prayer here, we could divide the characteristics of any Christian community into three basic points.

Firstly, we are a community given to Jesus. Secondly, we are a community given to know Jesus. And thirdly, we are a community given to glorify Jesus.

In verse 6 Jesus prayed, “I have revealed you to those whom you gave me out of the world.” This is the first characteristic of all true Christian communities. We have been taken out of the world and we have been given to Jesus by the Father. Although Jesus’ earthly ministry was as public as ours should be, it was only those to whom it had been given who understood and responded positively to his words. For example, in Matthew 13:11 Jesus said the following to his disciples: “To you it has been given to know the secrets of the kingdom of heaven, but to them it has not been given.”

But this does not mean that the salvation of some and the damnation of the rest are preordained conclusions. As we saw with both our Old Testament and New Testament readings, it is the will of God that none are damned…that all come to a saving knowledge of Him. There are many other places in Scripture that express the same sentiment, none quite so poignant as God’s statement to the reluctant missionary Jonah: “You pity the plant, for which you did not labour, nor did you make it grow, which came into being in a night and perished in a night. And should not I pity Nineveh, that great city, in which there are more than 120,000 persons who do not know their right hand from their left, and also much cattle?” You see, in Jonah’s mind, only Israel was predestined to be the people of God. Gentiles were predestined for destruction. But here God revealed to him the divine heart for the lost.

Now, as I was thinking about what Jesus said here and how I could best explain his meaning, I thought of a film I saw about the British stockbroker Nicholas (or Nicky) Winton. In a race against time, before the Nazi occupation closed the borders, Nicky struggled for nine months to rescue 669 predominantly Jewish children from Czechoslovakia, bringing them to the UK and placing them in foster homes. He tirelessly fought to get visas for them, campaigned to raise the necessary funds, and begged families to take them in. 

However, the train carrying the last group of children, scheduled to leave Prague on the 1st of September 1939, was unable to depart. With Hitler's invasion of Poland on the same day, the Second Great War had begun and of the 250 children due to leave on that train, only two survived the war. The film showed a distraught Nicky waiting in vain on the platform of the station for those he was not able to save, and for years their fate haunted him.

Now, of course, we can hardly compare the awful fate of these children to that of unrepentant sinners, but I do think we can catch a glimpse of the agony of our God when that one train doesn’t arrive. 

We know that there is joy in heaven over one sinner who repents (Luke 15:7), but I think it safe to say that the reverse is just as true. Jesus wept over unrepentant Jerusalem (Luke 19:41). God said that he finds no pleasure in the death of the wicked (Ezekiel 33:11). He wants everyone to be saved and to fully understand the truth (1 Timothy 2:4). 

Just like in this story about Nicky Winton, God has done everything possible to save us from the world…in one sense, Jesus is our visa to freedom, a visa paid for with his own blood, and we have been taken out of a perilous situation and adopted into the family of God. But we must board that train…eleven of the chosen disciples did while one clearly did not as we will see when we get to verse 12 of this chapter.

But for us who do board that train, our eternal salvation is secure. As Jesus said in John 6:37, “All that the Father gives me will come to me, and whoever comes to me I will never cast out.” And in John 10:28-29, “I give them eternal life, and they will never perish, and no one will snatch them out of my hand. My Father, who has given them to me, is greater than all, and no one is able to snatch them out of the Father's hand.”

And so, the first mark of any Christian community is that we are a people taken out of the world by the Father and given to Jesus. 

The second mark is that we are a community that knows Jesus. In verses 7-8 Jesus said, “Now they know that everything that you have given me is from you. For I have given them the words that you gave me, and they have received them and have come to know in truth that I came from you; and they have believed that you sent me.” Many people saw Jesus. Many people heard Jesus teach. Many people experienced his healing touch. Yet they did not know him. When he did not do what they wanted him to do, they abandoned him. 

Today, many know about Jesus. They know him as an historic person. They might even know something he taught or something he did. They might acknowledge him as a great teacher or a good man. But the kind of knowing Jesus was speaking about here was very specific. It is a knowledge based on receiving and accepting the words of Jesus as the truth. 

But it is more than simply knowing the Scriptures. It is also believing that Jesus came from the Father. To the unbelieving Jews, Jesus said in John 5:39-40, “You search the Scriptures because you think that in them you have eternal life; and it is they that bear witness about me, yet you refuse to come to me that you may have life.” And in John 8:19, “You know neither me nor my Father. If you knew me, you would know my Father also.” Knowing what they thought about an all too human Messiah was not enough.  If I may once again reference the tragic story of Nicky Winton, knowing that there was a visa and that there was enough money and that there was a family waiting for you was not enough…you had to board the train and leave. 

Truly knowing the biblical Jesus means knowing that he came from the Father – that he is divine. In order for the substitutionary sacrifice to be efficacious, Jesus had to be divine. Only someone who was both fully God and fully Man could mediate between God and humanity (1 Timothy 2:5). The sacrifice of a sinless life was necessary for atonement for human sins and so, because all humans have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, a perfect person…one born in the form of humanity, yet without sin…was required to pay the penalty for sin. 

Only God can reveal God…and as Jesus came to reveal God’s character and nature to humanity, he had to be divine or else he would have failed to embody the fulness of God and he would not have been able to demonstrate the essence of God. Only God can forgive sins, and Jesus came so that sinners might be forgiven. Only God could conquer death and the devil because the presence of sin would nullify any substitution. 

To know Jesus only as a man is to miss all that he came to do…it is to miss the free gift of salvation from God, through God, to humanity. So, the second mark of a Christian Community is that we know the biblical Jesus.

The final mark of a true Christian community is that it brings glory to Jesus. Verse 9 and 10 are very particular. Jesus said, “I am praying for them. I am not praying for the world but for those whom you have given me, for they are yours. All mine are yours, and yours are mine, and I am glorified in them.” As our mediator, Jesus intercedes for those who are his (1 John 2:1). In fact, he is seated at the right hand of the Father interceding for us right now (Romans 8:34; Hebrews 7:25). 

He already warned his disciples that in the world those who follow him will experience tribulation, but this is more than overcoming the world. Jesus intercedes for us because of our own sin, because of Satan's accusations, and because we need his help to carry out our kingdom purpose. Because of his intercession, when we sin, we may receive forgiveness if we confess our sins (1 John 1:9). Because of his intercession, Satan’s accusations cannot condemn us (Romans 8:34). Because of his intercession, we are empowered to make disciples of the nations (Matthew 28:18-20). In other words, because of his intercession, we can faithfully endure to the end. Because of his intercession, nothing will ever be able to snatch us from his hands. We are his…period.

And because we are his…because we belong to him…because we no longer belong to the world, Jesus is glorified in us. Our salvation speaks of his greatness. When non-believers look at us, they see a community of people who exist because of God’s loving kindness…we exist because of his grace, his mercy, his compassion, his goodness, his faithfulness. Those of the world may boast of their achievements, but we boast only of his achievement, acknowledging and confessing that we are nothing without him. We have nothing to boast of except the cross of Jesus (Galatians 6:14). 

Our very existence as a community of the forgiven, gives all glory, praise and honour to God because of who he is for what he has done. Our existence exclaims the very opposite of a self-seeking or self-gratifying lifestyle. Our existence is centred around the Lord God whose love for us is exhibited in that while we still sinners, Jesus gave his life for ours. Everything we are and everything we will ever become is because he has given it to us. If that doesn’t deserve all our glory and praise, I don’t know what does. 

The film about Nicky Winton comes to a climax when the children he had saved in 1939 meet him for the first time as adults in 1988…50 years later. A BBC talk show host managed to track some of them down and during a live broadcast, those who owed their lives to a man they had not known face to face before were able to express their gratitude for his selfless deeds.

And so, as we participate in the meal that brings to remembrance the one who was sent by the Father to save us out from the world through his selfless sacrifice, let us reflect on the kind of people we ought to be because of him. It doesn’t matter if we are rich or poor, many or few…what matters is that, in our gratitude and humility, we give ourselves as Jesus gave himself so that others may be given the knowledge of the greatest gift of all time. 

Shall we pray?

© Johannes W H van der Bijl 2024