This transcript was generated by whisper.ai.

(upbeat music) - Welcome to Daily Drive Time Devotions. We're in day five of our
look together through John chapter 17, verses 20 to 26 today. This incredible
prayer of Jesus in John chapter 17.

I know it's impacted your heart. How could you read this prayer without it
impacting your heart? And we've been talking this week about how you and I can
be an answer to Jesus' prayer.

We're an answer to Jesus' prayer when we give God glory in our daily lives by
doing what God's given us to do. We're an answer to Jesus' prayer when we live
in security in our daily lives by realizing we're not of the world. We're in the
world, but we're not of the world.

And by trusting in the name of Jesus Christ in our daily lives, His power. We're
an answer to Jesus' prayer when we're growing in maturity, when we realize that
He's sanctifying us through the truth of His word and the power of what He did
for us on the cross. There's a fourth way that we're an answer to Jesus' prayer.

Jesus has talked about it again and again in this prayer. We're an answer to
Jesus' prayer when we are gaining in unity. Unity with one another as believers
in Jesus Christ.

Listen to what Jesus prayed in John 17, 20 to 23. My prayer is not for them
alone. I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message.

Just a parentheses there, that's you. You believe in Jesus through the message
of these disciples passed down now through centuries. He's praying for you.

Verse 21, I pray that all of them may be one. Father, just as you are in me and
I am in you, may they also be in us so that the world may believe that you have
sent me. I've given them the glory that you gave me, that they may be one as we
are one.

I in them and you in me. May they be brought to complete unity to let the world
know that you sent me and have loved them even as you've loved me. This is a
prayer that extends across the centuries of time.

Think of the millions upon millions upon billions of people that Jesus is
praying for when He prays not just for these, but also for all who will believe.
Jesus prayed for me in this prayer. Jesus prayed for you in this prayer.

And not only did Jesus pray for me then in this prayer, He's also praying for
you right now. Romans chapter eight, verse 34 says, Christ Jesus, who died more
than that, He was raised to life, is at the right hand of the Father and is also
interceding for us, praying for us right now. And the heart of Jesus is shown in
this prayer.

What is Jesus praying as He prays for you right now? He's certainly praying for
your unity with other believers because this is at the heart, the passion of
Jesus' high priestly prayer. And Jesus' definition of unity, it is a high
definition of unity.

He prays just as you are in me and I am in you, Father. He defines it by the
Trinity, a deep spiritual definition of unity. So anything less than that is our
definition of unity.

Jesus is reaching for a kind of unity that can only be gained through our
relationship with Him. And yet many times, many times we see anything but unity
in the relationship of fellow believers. William Barclay has said, the cause of
Christian unity at the present time and indeed all through history has been
injured and hindered because men love their own ecclesiastical organizations,
their own creeds and their own ritual more than they love each other.

That is a startling indictment and yet it's true. And it goes totally counter to
the prayer of the heart, the passion of Jesus. Jesus prays for our unity because
the result of true unity, He prays it in this prayer.

The result of true unity is that the world will know that you sent me. The world
will know that you love them and by that, they will love me. You see, as we walk
through this prayer, Jesus is praying for such high things.

Jesus is praying for such challenging things in our lives that we're always
tempted to settle for less than what Jesus is praying. Jesus prays for our
security while we're in the world. We're tempted to settle for separation from
the world.

Maybe I could escape from the troubles in this world, but Jesus says, no, I pray
for their security while they're in the world, influencing the world. Jesus
prays for us to be sanctified, to grow in the truth, to become more like Him.
And we tend to want to settle for a list of religious rules instead of growing
in holiness and sanctification.

But Jesus doesn't pray that we'll know a list of rules. He prays for our
sanctification. And here, we are often tempted to settle for, instead of unity,
some kind of uniformity where everybody is the same.

Everybody agrees with me. And if you don't agree with me, I don't agree with
you, then I'll have nothing to do with you. But that's not what Jesus prays for.

He prays for the unity of fellow believers. And where does that unity come from?
In a world where we see that many times, even Christians in families, a mom and
a dad, or a mom and a son, or a dad and a daughter aren't unified, even though
they're believers.

And we see in churches this disunity. We see between churches and denominations,
this disunity. In a world like that, we have to ask ourselves, how can we be the
answer to Jesus' prayer?

And the answer to that is in looking at what Jesus prayed. Where does unity come
from? Jesus prays this, I've given them the glory that you've given me, so that
they may be unified.

Where does our unity come from as fellow believers? Where are you going to be
unified with someone that you're having a hard time with now, relationally as a
believer? How are you going to have a new sense of unity towards this group, this
Christian group, that you've never really wanted to have any unity with?

And you're being challenged right now by these words of Jesus. How is that going to
happen? How are you going to begin to think in a different way, live in a different
way?

Jesus says, it comes through God's glory. And notice closely, that Jesus doesn't
pray here, I've given them glory. He prays, I'm giving them the glory.

Now, what's the difference? To me, he's not praying for our glorification, for
us to be glorified, for the spotlight to be shined on us. No, he's saying, I'm
giving you the gift of God's glory in your daily life.

It's not your glory that Jesus is praying for. It's the gift of God's glory
being revealed in your daily life. What is God's glory?

God's glory is God's presence. Christ in you, the hope of glory. God's glory is
God's presence through God's spirit, and that, and that alone, is what unifies
us.

Anything else that we lean on, depend on, hope in for our unity, it's not going to
last. Because at some point, we'll disagree. At some point, we'll hurt each
other.

At some point, we'll go in different directions. At some point, some problem
will come up that we cannot solve. The only unity that lasts is unity that is
based on God's presence through God's spirit.

That is what unifies us. And as Jesus ends this prayer, this high priestly
prayer, he shares his heart. And as he prays his heart, looking forward to God's
glory in our daily lives, he also looks forward to eternity.

And in praying towards eternity, he prays towards our unification. There will
come a day when all who are believers in Jesus Christ will stand before the
throne of God and will be unified in our praise to him, Jesus is Lord. We will
say together in unity.

Holy, holy, holy. We will say together in unity. Worthy is the lamb.

We will say together in unity. And Jesus prays towards that day. John 17, 24 to
26.

Father, I want those you have given me to be with me where I am and to see my
glory, the glory you've given me because you loved me before the creation of the
world. Righteous father, though the world does not know you, I know you and they
know that you have sent me. I have made you known to them and will continue to
make you known in order that the love that you have for me may be in them and
that I myself may be in them.

Did you notice in this prayer what draws us towards unity? As believers in Jesus
Christ, what draws us towards unity is the future, the prayer. Jesus says, I
want them to be with me.

Why? To be cold my glory. Beholding Jesus' glory is not just some, it's not a
spectator sport.

It's not just sitting around saying ooh and ah and wow. We will say that, but
there is much more to it than that. It's more than just sitting and saying.

It's also serving and doing and rejoicing and praising. First John chapter
three, verse two says, we know that when Christ comes again, we will be like him
because we will see him as he really is. It also has to do, seeing his glory
with enjoying his glory in our own lives.

And notice that Jesus prays towards this glory that he's going to show us someday.
He prays, I'm going to continue to make you known to them. Right now.

Jesus' prayer is going to be answered. I have no doubt about that. So right now,
Jesus is making the Father known to you.

Right now. So that just as God's love and Jesus himself is in you, you will be
unified with other believers. If you're leaning on your own opinion for
unification, if you're leaning on your own strength, your own emotional energy
to be unified with someone, it'll never happen that way.

Lean on this. I will continue to make you known so that the love that you have
for me may be in them and I myself may be in them. As we pray today, pray that
you'll be an answer to Jesus' prayer.

We've talked this week. Pray that you'll be an answer by showing God glory, by
living in spiritual security, by growing in maturity, but also pray that you'll
be an answer to his prayer by gaining in unity. If you've got a hurt with a
fellow believer, an unforgiveness, a disagreement that's causing you not to live
in unity, pray, God, help me to love them in Christ's name.

You may not agree with them, but you do not have the option in Jesus Christ not
to love them. Jesus loves you. If they're a fellow believer in Jesus Christ,
we're to love even our enemies.

You are to love them, so pray, Jesus, help me to love them. If it's some group
of Christians that you've written off because you disagree with them, you know
they're fellow believers, so pray today. Jesus, even though I don't agree with
them, I pray that I would live in unity with them knowing that we are all going to
spend that moment in heaven rejoicing with you, and then that moment is going to
extend all the way throughout eternity.

And so because of that, I pray that my love for you would extend to my love for
those of my fellow believers in the world, and that our love for each other
would show the world what you're like, Jesus, and would cause the world to fall
in love with you. I pray this in Jesus' name, amen. Well, join us next week
following this prayer of Jesus Christ in John 18.

We're going to begin to look at the arrest and the trials of Jesus Christ.