The Gospel isn’t meant to be gulped down on Sunday morning, but gnawed on through the week so it really becomes a part of us. You’ve got to work at it, like a dog with a good bone! Here’s the Gospel for this coming Sunday — the Seventh Sunday of Easter — with food for thought about the meaning of eternal life. Gnaw away!
Seventh Sunday of Easter: John 17:1-11
After Jesus said this, he looked up to heaven and said, “Abba, the hour has come! Glorify your Only Begotten that I may glorify you, through the authority you’ve given me over all humankind, by bestowing eternal life on all those you gave me. And this is eternal life: to know you, the only true God, and the one you have sent, Jesus, the Messiah. I have given you glory on earth by finishing the work you gave me to do.
“Now, Abba, glorify me with your own glory, the glory I had with you before the world began. I have manifested your Name to those you gave me from the world. They were yours, and you gave them to me; and now they have kept your word. Now they know that everything you’ve entrusted to me does indeed come from you. I entrusted to them the message you entrusted to me, and they received it. They know that I really came from you; they believe it was you who sent me. And it’s for them that I pray – not for the world, but for these you’ve given me – for they are really yours, just as all that belongs to me is yours, and all that belongs to you is mine. It is in them that I have been glorified. I am in the world no more, but while I am coming to you, they are still in the world. Abba, holy God, protect those whom you have given me with your Name – the Name that you gave me – that they may be one, even as we are one.”
The Backstory – What’s Going On Here?
John 17 is the end of the long “farewell discourse” — Jesus’ “last words” to his disciples. He ends it with a prayer … a prayer that our lectionary text unfortunately slices in half, giving us only the first section. (Read the whole prayer here — http://bible.oremus.org/?ql=173851331)
Jesus prays for three things, two of which are in this portion. First, he prays for himself (v.1-8). Next, he prays for his disciples (v. 9-19). Finally (v. 20-26) he prays for those who will become his followers (but we don’t get that part here).
Jesus’ prayer is a prayer of completion every bit as much as John 19:30 (http://bible.oremus.org/?ql=173851571), when he said from the cross “It is accomplished.” Immediately before the prayer, the disciples have said, “Now we know that you know all things, and need none to question you; by this we believe that you came from God.” or, in other words, “OK, we finally get it!” With that assurance, Jesus can move on to the cross, knowing that his “mission statement” of John 10:10 (“I have come that they might have life and have it abundantly”) has been accomplished, for “this is eternal life, that they may know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent.”
Jesus’ work was to take those God had given him, and show them the love and essence of God fully through himself. He now moves to the cross and beyond to “be glorified so that God might be glorified” … show that glory (“the glory as of a father’s only child, full of grace and truth. — John 1:14) to the whole world.
A few things to chew on:
*Jesus here defines eternal life differently than most of us are used to. It is simply knowing God and Christ. It’s not a heaven where we lie back on a couch being fed grapes or even where we get to see all the people we cared about who have gone past. Eternal life, our destiny and God’s dream for us, is simply just knowing God with the greatest depth of intimacy. If that is our destiny and greatest joy (and Jesus says it is), it is the end to which our whole lives can be directed. That means every second of our lives is a “teachable moment.” Jesus ended his words to his disciples with a prayer in part to show us how we should be — surrounding everything with prayer. Always asking God, “How can I know you better?” “Teach me.” “Use me.” “Be glorified in me.”
*Jesus talks about his disciples as “those whom you gave me.” They’re not “those whom I took” or “those whom I converted.” They already belonged to God … as all people and all creation already belongs to God. Spreading the Gospel is not about claiming people for God — God has us all already. It’s about inviting people to join with us on a journey deeper into the God who already owns us. Inviting others, with us, to be “given to Christ” as a commitment to walk down that road together.
Try this:
Jesus asked God to glorify him so that God might be glorified … and for Jesus, him being glorified was not about being put on a throne but offering himself fully out of love.
The world tells us to avoid pain and to chase after glory for ourselves. But Jesus says the opposite. Embrace sacrifice, even painful sacrifice … and not for our own glory but for the glory of God.
This week, take a few minutes each morning and pray that prayer of Jesus, “God, glorify me so that you might be glorified.” Pray it realizing that the glory you pray for yourself is about sacrifice and the glory gained is not for you but for God. Then when the opportunity for giving of yourself comes up during the day, try to remember and “be glorified so God might be glorified.”
Write this:
Jesus prays: “Abba, holy God, protect those whom you have given me with your Name – the Name that you gave me – that they may be one, even as we are one.”
There is a difference between unity and uniformity. God created us in incredible and beautiful diversity, which means God dreams for us to be one – unified – but not the same – not uniform. Too often, we try to achieve unity by enforcing uniformity. The role of Christ is to come together while staying unique. It is the role of love over dogma.
If you journal this week, think of someone who is incredibly different from you. Then imagine what a story of unity between the two of you might be that doesn’t mandate uniformity. Write that narrative of coming together. See if it changes your relationship.
One
Jesus prays, “Abba, holy God, protect those whom you have given me with your Name – the Name that you gave me – that they may be one, even as we are one.”
Unity is a concept that invites naive and easy sentimentality. Weddings are often full of it. But then the marriage begins, and it’s hard work.
It’s hard because “the two becoming one” in a sacrament that “signifies to us the mystery of the union between Christ and Christ’s church” is about mutual giving up of self for the sake of the other.
That swims against the whole tide of our culture, which worships individual rights. One reason marriages end – either suddenly with divorce or slow cohabitating disintegration — because one or both people become reclusive or abusive and either refuse to give of themselves or sometimes brutally take from the other. We bring the wounded pieces of ourselves into relationship … and sometimes it’s too much.
This pandemic is placing new stresses on all sorts of relationships – families, lovers, friends, colleagues. Cracks are beginning to show… and widen We are hurting. The ways we are different … and the ways we are alike in ways that are driving us crazy … are in our face more and more. Sometimes because we can’t see each other .. and sometimes because we are seeing each other way too much … being one and staying one is getting harder and harder and harder.
I think that’s why Jesus prayed for protection for those who seek to be one. We need it. We need safe spaces to go individually and corporately.
That’s where we come in for each other. We can look out for each other. We can be that “safe space” where someone can to talk, to vent, to just get away.
As more time goes by, we will encounter new challenges to being one … and we are finding new ways to come together, to be one.
And when we are able to be together again physically … we will be stronger for the effort, stronger for the love.
Collect for 7 Easter
Pray this throughout the week as you gnaw on this Gospel.
O God, loving in glory, you have exalted your child Jesus Christ with great triumph to your kindom in heaven: Do not leave us comfortless, but send us your Holy Spirit to strengthen us, and exalt us to that place where our Savior Christ has gone before; who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, in glory everlasting. Amen.
