Believe the Love • John 17:1-5

Teaching begins 20:30

Notes

This morning we address one of the biggest problems there is in the world today. Everybody struggles with it, even Christians, even pastors, even every single person in the world. It doesn’t matter if you believe in Jesus or not, everyone has a problem in this area. Everyone suffers alike.

Does God love me? We all know, yes, God loves me. But it makes no difference in our lives. That’s because to know the love of God you have to experience it.

That is what Jesus is praying for today. This is a prayer that God wants to answer. We’re going to listen in to Jesus’ prayers for the next few weeks and we begin with Jesus praying for Himself, but it’s really for us, that we would know and believe that God loves me, that He loves you.

We’re reading in John 17.

1. Jesus is praying to the Father.

A. Why? Because Jesus is a real human being, like you and me.

1. Praying is the normal way to live as a human being. You depend upon God for everything.

2. You and me are not normal human beings. We depend upon ourselves and get exhausted and in desperation pray, “God! Please help me!” And then we’re shocked that God actually answered our prayers.

3. Jesus is the only normal perfect human being, and He prayed as He breathed.

B. And Jesus prays especially now, because the hour has come.

1. This is the time written about in the Scriptures, when God would deal once and for all with sin. Sacrifice the perfect Lamb as the substitute for the people, remove all sin, and bring the people out of slavery into freedom with God. It’s been prophesied for thousands of years. Now the hour has come.

2. That means the Son has to suffer as the Scriptures say. He has to be rejected, mocked, beaten, whipped, crucified. He has to die.

3. The hour has come, therefore Jesus prays. This is the prayer before He spends three hours in Gethsemane praying.

C. He begins by saying, “Father.” Jesus is a true human being, but He has always been and always will be the Son of God. He shares the life of the Father from all eternity. That shows a relationship of love.

2. That relationship between the Father and the Son is all about giving one another glory.

A. You can read “glorify” as “give glory”. “Father, give Me glory.”

B. The purpose is so that the Son can give glory to the Father.

C. The Father gave the Son authority over all flesh, and then He gave the Son those to whom He wished to give eternal life.

D. The Son gives eternal life by giving the knowledge of the one true God and Jesus Christ whom the Father has given.

E. The Son gave the Father glory, by accomplishing the work which the Father gave Him to do.

1. I want You to represent Me perfectly to the world so that when a person sees You, he is really seeing Me.

2. So I want You to give good to people, asking nothing in return. Give people health, give them food, give them life even if they are dead, give them the truth about Me.

F. Finally, the Son prays, give Me glory, together with Yourself.

1. That’s not too much to ask for. Before the universe existed the Son was glorified with the Father, sharing the life and the glory as God.

2. The Son gave up that glory of being the Most High. He didn’t consider equality with God a thing to be grasped at all costs. So He emptied Himself and took the form of a slave and was conceived in a human womb. He gestated as a fully human baby.

3. But Jesus is praying now glorify Me as I was before, equal with You, so that worshipping Me means worshipping You. The glory that goes to Me also goes to You.

3. So the relationship between the Father and the Son is about giving, and especially, giving glory. But — what’s glory?

A. Aw, that’s easy, we say. Glory is what everybody thinks about you. Everybody thinks you’re great because you did something that everybody thinks is cool. You’re elected, you won an award, you made something cool, you’re outstanding. Everybody knows you: you’re somebody. You’re famous.

B. But this glory existed when there was nobody and nothing. Before the world was. That’s the Greek word kosmos. Before the universe and galaxies existed. Before people existed. There’s nobody, nothing, but there is the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, and there is glory.

C. The glory Jesus speaks of is in verse 24:

1. Father, I desire that they also, whom You have given Me, be with Me where I am, so that they may see My glory which You have given Me, for You loved Me before the foundation of the world.

2. To have the Father love you supremely is glory. I love You supremely in every way, from everlasting to everlasting. You are My beloved Son in whom I am well pleased.

3. Jesus counts the love of the Father as everything. In comparison, the opinion of the world means almost nothing. That’s why it didn’t matter when people turned away from following Him. Are His feelings crushed? What does their opinion mean in comparison with the love of the Father? What do you know about the love of the Father? I know His love, you poor, starving, wretched souls.

D. For that love Jesus will endure suffering and death. By that love He will give Himself as a substitute for all people. Then they will know the love of God by experiencing the love of God.

4. The whole point of the Father giving glory to the Son, and the Son giving glory to the Father, is that we might know God, and that is eternal life.

A. This is not something that you read in a book. This isn’t some theological proposition.

B. This means to come into personal contact with the Father, to see Him, hear Him, touch and handle Him. It means to live with Him so that you know by experience who the Father is.

C. Jesus speaks of that in verse 22: The glory which You have given Me I have given to them, that they may be one, just as We are one; I in them and You in Me, that they may be perfected in unity, so that the world may know that You sent Me, and loved them, even as You have loved Me.

D. That means that to receive Jesus is to receive the love of God.

1. John 3:16 For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish, but have eternal life.

2. The love of the Son. John 15:13 Greater love has no one than this, that one lay down his life for his friends.

5. There are examples describing this love in Scripture.

A. Isaiah 61:10 I will rejoice greatly in the LORD, my soul will exult in my God; for He has clothed me with garments of salvation, He has wrapped me with a robe of righteousness, as a bridegroom decks himself with a garland, and as a bride adorns herself with her jewels. He has clothed me as if I were Him, with His own robe of righteousness. Just as righteous as Him.

B. Isaiah 43:3-4 “For I am the LORD your God, the Holy One of Israel, your Savior; I have given Egypt as your ransom, Cush and Seba in your place. Since you are precious in My sight, since you are honored and I love you, I will give other men in your place and other peoples in exchange for your life.” Honored is another way of describing glory, the love of God. Precious: more precious than the life of the Son. That is a value that goes beyond comparison. More than the whole universe is worth. You are precious and valuable to God right now.

C. There is no other god like this. No other religion expresses the value put upon you than what God says right here. There are many more examples. This is the true and only God.

6. So what? Receive the love of God by believing the love of God.

A. This is what John says in 1 John 4:16 We have come to know and have believed the love which God has for us. God is love, and the one who abides in love abides in God, and God abides in him.

B. It takes some time, sometimes, to be truly convinced that God loves you. Even now, we are not convinced. We know this in our minds but we live like God hates us. We are lousy Christians. We don’t do very much and we’re not very good. We sin all the time.

C. We live like those who don’t believe in God. There’s really no difference. Titus 3:3 For we also once were foolish ourselves, disobedient, deceived, enslaved to various lusts and pleasures, spending our life in malice and envy, hateful, hating one another. Everyone without the love of God lives in fear, in shame, in guilt, whether you believe or you don’t.

D. God wants you to believe the truth, that He loves you already. He loved you before He made anything, before you existed. He sent Jesus to die for you. He loved you as He loved Himself. He loves you now.

E. Jesus is praying: glorify Me, that I may glorify You. I want those whom You have given Me to know Your fabulous love. I am going to suffer and die so they can know this love that I know. Because that is eternal life.

F. If you have this love then you will do fine in these days of wrecked jobs, wrecked marriages, wrecked nations. Paul said I can do all things through Him who strengthens me. This love strengthened Jesus to suffer, die, and rise again. Have this love in yourself, in Jesus’ name.

Let’s pray.