SPM 586
JESUS PRAYS part 3 John 17 In John 17 Jesus turns FROM man — and He turns TO Heaven — turns TO His Father. In this prayer the Holy Spirit pulls back the veil and gives us glimpse into the Heart of Jesus — lets us listen in as Jesus bared His soul in prayer to the Father before he stepped out into the night and onto the cross. Warren Wiersbe made a statement about this prayer that we have found to be true from the opening sentence of the chapter QUOTE: Wiersbe — “Trying to understand the depth of this prayer is like trying to shovel Mercury with a pitch fork.” As we study this prayer of Jesus we see that He prays for Himself in light of the cross; then He prays for His disciples; and then He closes His prayer focusing on all who would come to faith in Him through the witness of the first disciples (including you and me). We spent the great majority of our time the week before Easter in Verse 3 where Jesus defines the very essence and nature of eternal life. we find ourselves once again tethered to the prologue. 3
And this is eternal life, that they know you the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent. Eternal life does not consist in merely nodding in intellectual agreement with certain information about God, or in merely knowing that there is a God or knowing about God. QUOTE: Greek-English lexicon of the New Testament — γινώσκω ginṓskō: to learn to know a person through direct personal experience….Here the emphasis must be on the interpersonal relationship which is experienced. Such KNOWING is a relational knowing. Louw, J. P., & Nida, E. A. (1996). Greek-English lexicon of the New Testament : Based on semantic domains (electronic ed. of the 2nd edition.). New York: United Bible societies.
The gospel is not cliché. Salvation is not cliché. It is God doing something for us so that we can experience what He originally intended for man — KNOWING GOD! Eternal life begins with God revealing Himself to us. He shines into our hearts the light of the knowledge of the Glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ (2 Cor. 4:6). We respond to that knowledge of Him in 1
obedience and love and faith And we experience eternal life. That eternal life is not merely everlasting life. It is a personal knowledge of the Everlasting One in which there is an exchange of life and love and intimacy. Jesus continues praying — 4
I glorified you on earth, having accomplished the work that you gave me to do. 5And now, Father, glorify me in your own presence with the glory that I had with you before the world existed. There are two things for us to consider here — 1.) Jesus declares His eternality 2.) Jesus is remembering the expression of His glory before He became man. This morning we are going to focus on the first of these. This is a very unplanned stop in our study through this chapter. But I believe it is crucial for us to take a good look at it because of it’s profound implications. 5
And now, Father, glorify me in your own presence with the glory that I had with you before the world existed. Time and again in John’s Gospel Jesus publically claimed to be God. Here Jesus privately affirms it as He makes reference to the glory that He shared with the Father in heaven from before creation. By declaring His eternality Jesus is (once again) declaring His essential deity. Once again we are tethered to the prologue. John 1:1-2 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2He was in the beginning with God. DON’T MISS THIS — Jesus speaks of His pre-Incarnate glory relative to things created: the glory that I had with you before the world existed. This too tethers us to the Prologue and to the opening verse of the Bible John 1:1-3 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2He was in the beginning with God. 3All things were made through him, and without him was not any thing made that was made. 2
Genesis 1:1 In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. THIS IS CRUCIAL — Everything else in the universe had a beginning. Not Jesus. He is the eternal God. Man was created to KNOW the eternal God. A lot of people tune out when it comes to Biblical themes like this. Teach a topical series on the subject of “Sex in the Bible” and people are going to show up in droves. Teach a series on “10 steps to _ _ _ _ _” and they will show up in droves.” But say the word “Eternality” or “Pre-existence” and they say — “This sounds too much like theology.” “Why do we have to talk about this stuff?” Well, this is theology; and Jesus, who is the SUBJECT of theology is the One talking about these things. And yes, we have to talk about this “stuff” because there are profound implications in it! Where you come from determines where you are going and why you are here! HERE ARE THE IMPLICATIONS of this statement of Jesus Man has a choice — There are only TWO alternatives: 1. Worship the eternal God, the Creator and Redeemer; or 2. worship things created. Turn with me to Romans 1 — And as you are turning there REMEMBER that Jesus has just mentioned His eternality and His glory the preexisted creation. There in Romans 1 Paul reiterates the ONLY TWO alternatives
Romans 1:18 For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who by their unrighteousness suppress the truth. WHAT is this “suppression of the truth?” It essentially means, “I know what the truth is but I don’t like it” QUOTE: Dr. George Wald Professor of Biology @ Harvard University (Nobel Prize in field of Biology 1971) Scientific American, August, 1954 — "When it comes to the origin of life, we have only two possibilities as to how life arose. One is spontaneous generation arising to evolution; the other is a supernatural creative act of God. There is no third possibility...Spontaneous generation was scientifically disproved one hundred years ago by Louis Pasteur, Spellanzani, Reddy and others. That leads us scientifically to only one possible conclusion -- that life arose as a supernatural creative act of God... (he keeps going — should have stopped there) I will not accept that philosophically (notice he said “philosophically — he didn’t say scientifically) because I do not want to believe in God. Therefore, I choose to believe in that which I know is scientifically impossible, spontaneous generation arising to evolution."
3
Romans 1:19 For what can be known about God is plain to them, How was it made plain to them? God has shown it to them.
Romans 1:20 20For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse. When we see the creation we can learn something about the creator (REMEMBER — General Revelation)
Romans 1:21-25 For although they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened. 22Claiming to be wise, they became fools, 23 and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal man and birds and animals and reptiles. 24Therefore God gave them up in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, to the dishonoring of their bodies among themselves, 25because Here is where we come to the ALTERNATIVES they exchanged THE truth about God THE truth = He is creator for a lie In the Greek it’s THE lie — they exchanged THE truth for THE lie. There is ONE truth and ONE lie. and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever! Amen. WHAT HAPPENS when you do not worship CREATOR God, and instead worship CREATION as god? You begin to worship created things — Animals / the environment. Ultimately you worship the human body because it is the apex of His creation! WE WERE CREATED to be WORSHIPPERS. The question is NEVER “WILL we worship?” The question is always — “WHAT will we worship? I want to encourage you to process your life, and the world around you by this. When you walk out the door tomorrow you will see the world around 4
you worshipping. The question is not, “Will man pour himself out to and for something?” The only question is, “To WHOM will we pour our selves out — give ourselves? HOW will we worship — pour our selves out — give ourselves?” If we do not worship Creator God — We WILL worship our minds, our bodies, our emotions, our experiences, our possessions. Paul goes on to say that sexual perversion is the result of rejectingEternal God of glory who created the body!
Romans 1:26-32 26For this reason God gave them up to dishonorable passions. For their women exchanged natural relations for those that are contrary to nature; 27and the men likewise gave up natural relations with women and were consumed with passion for one another, men committing shameless acts with men and receiving in themselves the due penalty for their error. 28And since they did not see fit to acknowledge God, God gave them up to a debased mind to do what ought not to be done. 29They were filled with all manner of unrighteousness, evil, covetousness, malice. They are full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, maliciousness. They are gossips, 30 slanderers, haters of God, insolent, haughty, boastful, inventors of evil, disobedient to parents, 31foolish, faithless, heartless, ruthless. 32Though they know God’s decree that those who practice such things deserve to die, they not only do them but give approval to those who practice them. WHY is it so important that we spend this time on the eternality of Jesus and His glory that pre-exists the creation of the world? It is because the ALTERNATIVE to believing Jesus is the eternal CreatorGod of glory is NOT the absence of spirituality — It is PAGANISM! There is THE truth and there is THE lie! QUOTE: Dr. Peter Jones (holds an MDiv from Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary, a ThM from Harvard Divinity School, and a PhD from Princeton Theological Seminary) — coined the terms ONE-ism and TWO-ism ONE-ism is THE lie. One-ism says that there is no Eternal, pre-existent Creator-God of Glory who is distinct from His creation. One-ism says there is no distinction between creator and creation. This is the root of pantheism and panentheism. It eliminates distinctions. The GOAL of One-ism is to do away with all distinctions! There is no 5
God — just everything. I hope that you have noticed that in Genesis 1-2 there are distinctions throughout. The Creator Himself remains separate and distinct from His creation. He distinguishes light from darkness – day from night. He divides the waters above from those below. He separates the sea from the land. He defines specific habitats. He engineers life to reproduce after its kind. God even creates humanity with distinction - male and female. ONE-ism works to have no distinction between mankind as the image bearers of God and the rest of creation. (ONE-ism energizes radical environmentalists — To them, a tree has as much a right to live as a family; so they will burn down homes. They insist that scientific research on animals or plants aimed at saving human life is immoral). The Proponents of ONE-ism work to have no distinction between right or wrong. For them — there is no God distinct from creation who says, “That is wrong and that is right.” ONE-ism is what drives post-modernism. There is no truth and error. There is no darkness and light. There is no truth and lies. It is all about perspective and ideology and culture. BY THE WAY — Charles Manson said, “If all is one, what is bad?” ONE-ism works to have no distinction between genders. Hence the feminist agenda — the gay-lesbian-transgender-bisexual agenda. ONE-ism works to have no distinction between religions. So they have to do away with Jesus because He keeps saying that He is the Eternal God of glory who pre-exists creation and is distinct from creation! Let’s let Jesus be a nice guy/ good teacher — but NOT Jesus Who is God, the Savior. We need ONE religion. (Oprah and Friends) ONE-ism works to have no distinction between God and angels and Satan and demons. There is just spirituality! (Oprah – The Golden Compass) ONE-ism works to have no distinction in regards to Divinity. We don’t have to look outside of ourselves for the divine. We look within to find the spark of the divine. My hope is not in God — My hope is in ME because I AM god! You hear this stuff ALL the time from EVERY direction (music/movies/books). Now you now why it exists and where it comes 6
from. Now you have a name for it. Now you know that it is the only alternative to worshipping Jesus, the eternal Creator-God of glory. QUOTE: Dali Lama — “The world use to believe there are two. We now know there is one.” OTHER EXAMPLES: The Lion King — The award winning song “The Circle of Life.” Man — trees — animals — ALL are IN the Circle of life. There is nothing outside of the Circle — no Creator — no Redeemer — no Savior — no Judge. No one is coming in to save us — fix us. It is ALL contained in the Circle of Life.
THE ALTERNATIVE IS Two-ism — which is exactly what Jesus declares in His prayer. TWO-ism is the FOUNDATION for Biblical living. THIS is how we process reality! If you miss this you will not THINK as a Christian; you will think as a PAGAN. You might still be spiritual. You might still be religious. You might even try to be moral. But you will NOT know the God of the Bible — which is the very nature and essence of Eternal Life (John 17:3). TWO-ism is the distinction between God and His creation. Father, glorify me in your own presence with the glory that I had with you before the world existed. THAT is the FIRST distinction! How does the Bible begin? In the beginning God created. What does John say in his Prologue? In the beginning was the Word…. There are TWO things. God — and what He created. God is eternal. Creation has a beginning. God is INDEPENDENT. Creation is DEPENDENT upon God. There are TWO – not one.
CLOSING DO you know that God made YOU? You are NOT the result of an atheistic random process. I hope you know that you are made by a personal God. DO you know that THAT God has a NAME — Jesus? DO you know that THAT God saw that you and I sinned — that our first 7
parents bought THE lie. Yet He LOVED us and CAME for us. In a demonstration of INFINITE humility — He laid aside the expression of His divine glory and took upon Himself our HUMANITY. Yet as a man he lived a sinless life. He NEVER EXCHANGED THE truth for THE lie. He went to the Cross where He suffered and died to PAY for your sins and my sins. We want you to KNOW Him. Revelation 4:11 “Worthy are you, our Lord and God, to receive glory and honor and power, for you created all things, and by your will they existed and were created.” We were CREATED to worship Him. Jesus died on the Cross in order to REDEEM us back to Himself — make a way for us to Worship Him.
8
And this is eternal life, that they know you the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent. Eternal life does not consist in merely nodding in intellectual agreement with certain information about God, or in merely knowing that there is a God or knowing about God. QUOTE: Greek-English lexicon of the New Testament — γινώσκω ginṓskō: to learn to know a person through direct personal experience….Here the emphasis must be on the interpersonal relationship which is experienced. Such KNOWING is a relational knowing. Louw, J. P., & Nida, E. A. (1996). Greek-English lexicon of the New Testament : Based on semantic domains (electronic ed. of the 2nd edition.). New York: United Bible societies.
The gospel is not cliché. Salvation is not cliché. It is God doing something for us so that we can experience what He originally intended for man — KNOWING GOD! Eternal life begins with God revealing Himself to us. He shines into our hearts the light of the knowledge of the Glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ (2 Cor. 4:6). We respond to that knowledge of Him in 1
obedience and love and faith And we experience eternal life. That eternal life is not merely everlasting life. It is a personal knowledge of the Everlasting One in which there is an exchange of life and love and intimacy. Jesus continues praying — 4
I glorified you on earth, having accomplished the work that you gave me to do. 5And now, Father, glorify me in your own presence with the glory that I had with you before the world existed. There are two things for us to consider here — 1.) Jesus declares His eternality 2.) Jesus is remembering the expression of His glory before He became man. This morning we are going to focus on the first of these. This is a very unplanned stop in our study through this chapter. But I believe it is crucial for us to take a good look at it because of it’s profound implications. 5
And now, Father, glorify me in your own presence with the glory that I had with you before the world existed. Time and again in John’s Gospel Jesus publically claimed to be God. Here Jesus privately affirms it as He makes reference to the glory that He shared with the Father in heaven from before creation. By declaring His eternality Jesus is (once again) declaring His essential deity. Once again we are tethered to the prologue. John 1:1-2 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2He was in the beginning with God. DON’T MISS THIS — Jesus speaks of His pre-Incarnate glory relative to things created: the glory that I had with you before the world existed. This too tethers us to the Prologue and to the opening verse of the Bible John 1:1-3 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2He was in the beginning with God. 3All things were made through him, and without him was not any thing made that was made. 2
Genesis 1:1 In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. THIS IS CRUCIAL — Everything else in the universe had a beginning. Not Jesus. He is the eternal God. Man was created to KNOW the eternal God. A lot of people tune out when it comes to Biblical themes like this. Teach a topical series on the subject of “Sex in the Bible” and people are going to show up in droves. Teach a series on “10 steps to _ _ _ _ _” and they will show up in droves.” But say the word “Eternality” or “Pre-existence” and they say — “This sounds too much like theology.” “Why do we have to talk about this stuff?” Well, this is theology; and Jesus, who is the SUBJECT of theology is the One talking about these things. And yes, we have to talk about this “stuff” because there are profound implications in it! Where you come from determines where you are going and why you are here! HERE ARE THE IMPLICATIONS of this statement of Jesus Man has a choice — There are only TWO alternatives: 1. Worship the eternal God, the Creator and Redeemer; or 2. worship things created. Turn with me to Romans 1 — And as you are turning there REMEMBER that Jesus has just mentioned His eternality and His glory the preexisted creation. There in Romans 1 Paul reiterates the ONLY TWO alternatives
Romans 1:18 For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who by their unrighteousness suppress the truth. WHAT is this “suppression of the truth?” It essentially means, “I know what the truth is but I don’t like it” QUOTE: Dr. George Wald Professor of Biology @ Harvard University (Nobel Prize in field of Biology 1971) Scientific American, August, 1954 — "When it comes to the origin of life, we have only two possibilities as to how life arose. One is spontaneous generation arising to evolution; the other is a supernatural creative act of God. There is no third possibility...Spontaneous generation was scientifically disproved one hundred years ago by Louis Pasteur, Spellanzani, Reddy and others. That leads us scientifically to only one possible conclusion -- that life arose as a supernatural creative act of God... (he keeps going — should have stopped there) I will not accept that philosophically (notice he said “philosophically — he didn’t say scientifically) because I do not want to believe in God. Therefore, I choose to believe in that which I know is scientifically impossible, spontaneous generation arising to evolution."
3
Romans 1:19 For what can be known about God is plain to them, How was it made plain to them? God has shown it to them.
Romans 1:20 20For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse. When we see the creation we can learn something about the creator (REMEMBER — General Revelation)
Romans 1:21-25 For although they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened. 22Claiming to be wise, they became fools, 23 and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal man and birds and animals and reptiles. 24Therefore God gave them up in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, to the dishonoring of their bodies among themselves, 25because Here is where we come to the ALTERNATIVES they exchanged THE truth about God THE truth = He is creator for a lie In the Greek it’s THE lie — they exchanged THE truth for THE lie. There is ONE truth and ONE lie. and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever! Amen. WHAT HAPPENS when you do not worship CREATOR God, and instead worship CREATION as god? You begin to worship created things — Animals / the environment. Ultimately you worship the human body because it is the apex of His creation! WE WERE CREATED to be WORSHIPPERS. The question is NEVER “WILL we worship?” The question is always — “WHAT will we worship? I want to encourage you to process your life, and the world around you by this. When you walk out the door tomorrow you will see the world around 4
you worshipping. The question is not, “Will man pour himself out to and for something?” The only question is, “To WHOM will we pour our selves out — give ourselves? HOW will we worship — pour our selves out — give ourselves?” If we do not worship Creator God — We WILL worship our minds, our bodies, our emotions, our experiences, our possessions. Paul goes on to say that sexual perversion is the result of rejectingEternal God of glory who created the body!
Romans 1:26-32 26For this reason God gave them up to dishonorable passions. For their women exchanged natural relations for those that are contrary to nature; 27and the men likewise gave up natural relations with women and were consumed with passion for one another, men committing shameless acts with men and receiving in themselves the due penalty for their error. 28And since they did not see fit to acknowledge God, God gave them up to a debased mind to do what ought not to be done. 29They were filled with all manner of unrighteousness, evil, covetousness, malice. They are full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, maliciousness. They are gossips, 30 slanderers, haters of God, insolent, haughty, boastful, inventors of evil, disobedient to parents, 31foolish, faithless, heartless, ruthless. 32Though they know God’s decree that those who practice such things deserve to die, they not only do them but give approval to those who practice them. WHY is it so important that we spend this time on the eternality of Jesus and His glory that pre-exists the creation of the world? It is because the ALTERNATIVE to believing Jesus is the eternal CreatorGod of glory is NOT the absence of spirituality — It is PAGANISM! There is THE truth and there is THE lie! QUOTE: Dr. Peter Jones (holds an MDiv from Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary, a ThM from Harvard Divinity School, and a PhD from Princeton Theological Seminary) — coined the terms ONE-ism and TWO-ism ONE-ism is THE lie. One-ism says that there is no Eternal, pre-existent Creator-God of Glory who is distinct from His creation. One-ism says there is no distinction between creator and creation. This is the root of pantheism and panentheism. It eliminates distinctions. The GOAL of One-ism is to do away with all distinctions! There is no 5
God — just everything. I hope that you have noticed that in Genesis 1-2 there are distinctions throughout. The Creator Himself remains separate and distinct from His creation. He distinguishes light from darkness – day from night. He divides the waters above from those below. He separates the sea from the land. He defines specific habitats. He engineers life to reproduce after its kind. God even creates humanity with distinction - male and female. ONE-ism works to have no distinction between mankind as the image bearers of God and the rest of creation. (ONE-ism energizes radical environmentalists — To them, a tree has as much a right to live as a family; so they will burn down homes. They insist that scientific research on animals or plants aimed at saving human life is immoral). The Proponents of ONE-ism work to have no distinction between right or wrong. For them — there is no God distinct from creation who says, “That is wrong and that is right.” ONE-ism is what drives post-modernism. There is no truth and error. There is no darkness and light. There is no truth and lies. It is all about perspective and ideology and culture. BY THE WAY — Charles Manson said, “If all is one, what is bad?” ONE-ism works to have no distinction between genders. Hence the feminist agenda — the gay-lesbian-transgender-bisexual agenda. ONE-ism works to have no distinction between religions. So they have to do away with Jesus because He keeps saying that He is the Eternal God of glory who pre-exists creation and is distinct from creation! Let’s let Jesus be a nice guy/ good teacher — but NOT Jesus Who is God, the Savior. We need ONE religion. (Oprah and Friends) ONE-ism works to have no distinction between God and angels and Satan and demons. There is just spirituality! (Oprah – The Golden Compass) ONE-ism works to have no distinction in regards to Divinity. We don’t have to look outside of ourselves for the divine. We look within to find the spark of the divine. My hope is not in God — My hope is in ME because I AM god! You hear this stuff ALL the time from EVERY direction (music/movies/books). Now you now why it exists and where it comes 6
from. Now you have a name for it. Now you know that it is the only alternative to worshipping Jesus, the eternal Creator-God of glory. QUOTE: Dali Lama — “The world use to believe there are two. We now know there is one.” OTHER EXAMPLES: The Lion King — The award winning song “The Circle of Life.” Man — trees — animals — ALL are IN the Circle of life. There is nothing outside of the Circle — no Creator — no Redeemer — no Savior — no Judge. No one is coming in to save us — fix us. It is ALL contained in the Circle of Life.
THE ALTERNATIVE IS Two-ism — which is exactly what Jesus declares in His prayer. TWO-ism is the FOUNDATION for Biblical living. THIS is how we process reality! If you miss this you will not THINK as a Christian; you will think as a PAGAN. You might still be spiritual. You might still be religious. You might even try to be moral. But you will NOT know the God of the Bible — which is the very nature and essence of Eternal Life (John 17:3). TWO-ism is the distinction between God and His creation. Father, glorify me in your own presence with the glory that I had with you before the world existed. THAT is the FIRST distinction! How does the Bible begin? In the beginning God created. What does John say in his Prologue? In the beginning was the Word…. There are TWO things. God — and what He created. God is eternal. Creation has a beginning. God is INDEPENDENT. Creation is DEPENDENT upon God. There are TWO – not one.
CLOSING DO you know that God made YOU? You are NOT the result of an atheistic random process. I hope you know that you are made by a personal God. DO you know that THAT God has a NAME — Jesus? DO you know that THAT God saw that you and I sinned — that our first 7
parents bought THE lie. Yet He LOVED us and CAME for us. In a demonstration of INFINITE humility — He laid aside the expression of His divine glory and took upon Himself our HUMANITY. Yet as a man he lived a sinless life. He NEVER EXCHANGED THE truth for THE lie. He went to the Cross where He suffered and died to PAY for your sins and my sins. We want you to KNOW Him. Revelation 4:11 “Worthy are you, our Lord and God, to receive glory and honor and power, for you created all things, and by your will they existed and were created.” We were CREATED to worship Him. Jesus died on the Cross in order to REDEEM us back to Himself — make a way for us to Worship Him.
8
