John 17. John chapter 17. Pick back up in verse 9. Left off the last time in verse
8. Wait a minute, let me turn this
on. We're having volume problems
with The internet, when we put it up on the internet, it's so
low you can't hardly hear me. So I don't know what that is.
But anyway, the title of this message, and
it's a title that ought to give great comfort to all God's children,
to all those who believe God. I pray for them. I've had some of you all to ask
me to pray for you. I've had people from, that's
not here, they're away from here, have called and asked me to pray
for them. But the great comfort is this.
The Lord of glory says, I pray for them. I pray for them. That's so comforting. In the
first part of our Lord's intercession, He intercedes for Himself, that
the Father would glorify Him, and that He, in turn, would glorify
the Father. And it is so important that He
pray for Himself in such a manner, because if this does not happen,
the rest of the prayer does not need to be prayed. It needs to be glorified. He
needs to be supported and helped that He may go to the cross and
obtain our redemption. And in doing so, the Father is
glorified in our redemption. The Father is glorified in Him
giving unto us eternal life through His Son. And now He can say,
I pray for them. Here He's praying for His disciples,
but they are representatives of all God's children whom He
prays for. But he does pray for them particularly,
and the next, Lord willing, the next time we pick up, we'll see
in verse 20, neither pray I for these alone, but for them also
which shall believe on me through their word. He prays for us.
We'll see, Lord willing, next week, he prays for us. He prayed
for himself, he prays for them, and now he prays for us. But
here he's praying for his disciples, and his prayer includes us in
every generation and includes God's children in every generation. In the face of impending judgment
coming on Him, He intercedes for His own. You know, our Lord did nothing
for Himself. Everything He did, He did for
His own. And this prayer is a particular
prayer. He doesn't pray in general. Our
Lord never prayed in generalities, particulars. We ought to be particular
when we pray. We ought to pray for particular
things, about particular matters. We ought to be particular. We're
coming before God. We're coming before God, and
we are to cast all our cares upon Him. We are to lay before
Him what's on our hearts, or who's on our hearts. You know,
sometimes somebody's, oftentimes, someone particular is on my heart. And if someone particular's on
your heart, pray for them. Pay attention to what's on your
heart. Pray for them. If somebody's on your heart,
if God lays me on your heart, pray for me. Especially as I
do this. This is over my head. Paul said,
who's sufficient for these things? Paul, a very educated man, Paul,
who was taught the gospel by the Lord Jesus Christ himself
personally. He didn't receive the gospel
by someone preaching like me. He received it from the Lord.
And he says, no man's sufficient for these things. I'm not sufficient.
And if he's not sufficient, I'm sure not sufficient. But God's
our sufficiency. God can enable me this morning
to rightly divide the word of truth, to preach the gospel in
the power of his spirit, and feed the sheep. He can do that,
and you pray for me that he enables me to do that this morning, Thursday,
next week, and next week, as long as I stand in his pulpit.
By God's grace, whoever stands in his pulpit behind me, after
me, will do the same thing. But this prayer is a particular
prayer. I pray for them. It's a particular prayer for
a particular people. I pray for them. I pray not for
the world. There are some he does not pray
for. There are some. That's the truth. That's the
truth. He never prayed for those who
will never believe. He never prayed for those who
will never believe on him. He always prayed according to His
Father's will. When He says, I pray for them,
it's His Father's will that He pray for them. I pray not for the world, but
for them which thou hast given me, for they are thine. They are thine, you gave them
to me because they're yours, you gave them to me. He prays
for those whom the Father gave to Him in the covenant of grace. Let me read you something that
just came to my mind this morning as I was reading that, and as
I came across this statement that I wrote down, in the covenant
of grace, given to Him in the covenant of grace, I want you
to listen to Ezekiel, over here in Ezekiel 16. Our God is a covenant
God. Everything God does, He does
by way of the covenant. Let us never get tired of hearing
that. Never. You remember over in Ezekiel
16, that baby was cast into the field? He said in verse 6, And
when I passed by thee and saw thee polluted in thine own blood,
I said unto thee, When thou wast in thy blood, live. Yea, I said
unto thee, When thou wast in thy blood, live. He says in verse
8, Now when I passed by thee, and looked upon thee, behold,
thy time was a time of love, and I loved you, God loved you
with an everlasting love, and I spread my skirt over thee,
my glory, and covered thy nakedness, yea,
I swear unto thee, and entered into a covenant with thee. God entered into a covenant with
us in Christ. He entered into that covenant
with His Son, and with us in His Son. Whatever's in that covenant
belongs to us. I swear unto thee, and entered
into a covenant with thee, saith the Lord God, and thou becamest
mine. But you know what? Listen to
this. She grew up and played the harlot.
She got of age, aged to marry, what did she do? She played the
harlot. This one that he spread his skirt over and made a covenant
with her, she played the harlot. But now listen to what God says
in verse 60. Nevertheless, I will remember
my covenant with thee in the days of thy youth, and I will
establish unto thee an everlasting covenant. Right, you played the
harp. Every last one of us played a
spiritual harp. Every last one of us. Our hearts went after
the things of this world. Our hearts was steeped in idolatry. We worship something. We can't
say, well, I've never worshiped idols. Oh, yes, we have. An idol
is something set up in your heart. It don't have to be sitting on
a shelf. If it's sitting in your heart, you're in trouble. You've
worshiped an idol. And God said, I made a covenant with you, and
I'm not gonna break that covenant. I made a covenant with you and
my son, I made it with him, and I made it with you in him, and
I'm not gonna break it. So he says, but I pray for them,
thou hast given me, for they are thine in the covenant of
grace, and our high priest prays for them and for us. This prayer's
for us also. He's the great high priest. We
have a high priest. He's not in Rome. He's in heaven. He's seated at God's right hand.
He's our high priest. He's our advocate. He stands
for us. He intercedes for us. He pleads
our case, which is himself. And this prayer covers all of
God's elect, all of them. And notice here in verse 10,
our Lord sets forth the unity and the oneness of the Father
and the Son. He says, I come to you, I pray
for them, pray not for the world, but for those you gave me, for
they are thine, and all mine are thine, and thine are mine.
Everything they have, they have in common. Everything they have in common. And I'm glorified in them. In
essence, they are one. In purpose, they are one. In
ownership, they are one. And Christ said, I'm glorified
in my equality with the Father. He thought it not robbery to
be equal with God. That would be a robbery for me
to say, as a man, I'm equal to God. That's what Satan said. I'll send the heavens, I'll send,
I'll put my throne above God's throne. But here's what he's saying,
all the elect are mine. Man, I thank God for election.
I wouldn't be saved if it wasn't. Not a person in this world would
be saved. You know, if God hadn't chosen
the elect angels, they're called the elect angels, all of them
would have fallen, all of them. There wouldn't be one angel standing.
But there's an elect host of angels that God chose not to
fall. He didn't let them fall. And
there's a whole election of grace that's spoken of throughout the
Scriptures, and they're going to be saved. And who are they? Sinners. You're a sinner? You're
one of God's elect. You say, well, everybody's a
sinner. You just find one. I'm talking about a sinner according
to the Scriptures. John Bunyan called them Jerusalem
sinners. It's like that sinner that said,
Lord, be merciful to me, the sinner. as if he was the only
one on earth that was a sinner. He was so sinful. I tell you,
if God really, really, really makes you understand who you
are, what you are, you feel like you're the only one that's that
sinful. It's the only tribe where everybody's a chief. The chief
of sinners, everybody is. But all the elect, he's glorified
in their redemption, in their faith, face the gift
of God, redemption, you've been purchased of God. They are glorified
in their conduct, you're not like other men now, you don't
walk like the world, you don't. And He is glorified in their
final glory. Well, we've got to wait on that
one, then we'll see it. Then we'll see it. And we are
to the praise and to the glory of His grace. And the reason for this prayer
is found in verse 11. And now I am no more in the world. His physical presence was not
going to be with him anymore. He's going to die. He's going
to be buried. He's going to rise. He's going
to see him for a few days. I think it was like 30, 40 days,
whatever. Then he's going to go back to heaven. And he hasn't
been back since not in his physical presence. He's here. He's here
in spirit. He's here and he's in you. Christ
is in you. But now his physical presence
is in heaven seated at God's right hand. And he says, and
now I'm no more in the world, I'm going to go back to glory.
To the glory I had with before the world was I had with the
father, I'm going to go back to glory. I'm going to go back
there as the sacrifice. I'm going to go back there as
the forerunner. He went back and he took over heaven for us.
He took possession of heaven for us. He's going to go within the veil
and make atonement for our sins. His bodily presence is going
to be here no longer. But he's going to be here in his spirit. That's just as real as him being
here physically. In spirit, God's spirit, the Lord says. But these
are in the world. They're still in the world. They're
not gonna die right now. They're gonna live a while. They're
gonna live and they're gonna come into some real trouble. These are in a hostile world. Do you see the world now as hostile? Do you see how hostile it is? We live in a hostile world. We
live in a world that hates Christ and hates those who belong to
Christ. And because of this, he says, I come to thee on their
behalf. On their behalf, I pray for them.
I come to thee on their behalf as their mediator, as their advocate
and father. And he calls him Holy Father. Keep through thine own name. You know, God is His name. God
is His attributes. God is power. It's not that God has power.
He is power. He is knowledge. He is wisdom. He is holy. He doesn't just possess
these things. These things are what He is. And we are shielded by who God
is. We are shielded by Him. Surrounded
by God. He's our fortress. He's our high
tower. God is. And he says, I come to
thee, holy father, keep to thy known name those thou has given
me. You have to be a total outright
in rebellion to deny that God has a people. You have to take
this Bible and just rip pages out of it. Let me read this. He's praying
for their unity. Keep them safe as they go throughout
this world to preach the gospel. Keep them safe. You know there's a hedge about
you. You know that? There's a hedge about you. Satan
goes to and fro seeking whom he may devour. He's looking for
a chink in the hedge. We don't realize that, I know
that. I can tell by, I can tell when I'm preaching, we don't
really grasp that. I know I don't. There's a hedge
about me. There's a hedge about you. And he's saying here, keep them,
keep them safe, but also keep them together in unity. Satan
is a divider. He seeks to divide the brethren
because a house divided cannot stand. If he could just get a
little division going here over something that's nothing. Now,
if we divide over the gospel, you know, if someone wants to
take issue with the gospel, we got a problem. We're going to
divide. But it's never over that, it's usually just petty stuff,
just something to divide us. Something to just get you irritated
with one another for one reason or another. James said this,
in all things we what? Offend. Offend. We offend, I'll offend you. I've
been here long enough to have done that for sure. If not, I
will. And we offend each other. Don't
we? We offend each other. But here's
the thing of it is, our love for Christ and one another overcomes
that. It overcomes that. I was telling
someone the other day, I was talking to him, we was talking
about terrors among the weak. I said, there's one way to tell
the, there's just one way, really, to tell the difference between
a tare and a wheat. They love Christ. The wheat loves
Christ. That's the difference. A tare
cannot and does not love Christ. And here's how it comes out.
Here's how it comes out. In love to one another. When
we genuinely love one another, look after one another, That
is a direct reflection of our love to the Lord Jesus Christ.
We love him when we love one another. When I was hungry, you
what? You fed me. When I was in prison,
you visited me. And those who were not, those
who were tares, he said, when I was hungry, you didn't feed
me. When I was in prison, you didn't visit me. You separated
yourself from me. That's the difference. Love is
the difference. Love's the difference. Now, while I was with them in
the world, I kept them in thy name. This shows his equality
and his power and his authority being equal with God. I kept
them. We would be, it would be, it
would just be blasphemous, I reckon, for me to say, I have kept this
church. I've kept you all here, you're
the reason you're here, I kept you. Only God can say that. And when
our Lord says this, he's showing his equality with God. I kept
them while I was with them in the world. I kept them in thy
name. Those thou gavest me, I have
kept. I haven't lost one of them. Our
Lord shall never lose any that the Father gave to him. That's
good news. That's good news. I can't be
lost again. I have known people who believe
you can be lost, be saved, be lost, be saved. It's like taking
a daisy. She loves me, she loves me not.
If she get to where she loves me not, you pick up another daisy
and keep going. That's not how it works. That's not how it works. I have
kept them. I have lost nothing. I've lost
nothing. You see, remember back in verse
2, he says he had power over all flesh, that he should give
eternal life to as many as the Father gave to him. He's not
going to lose any of them. Listen here to John 6, 39. And
this is the Father's will which hath sent me, that of all which
he hath given me, I should lose nothing. But she'll raise it
up again at the last day. I lose nothing. This is the will
of the Father, and this is my will. Judas, now, you know, somebody's
gonna always bring up Judas, and that's why this is written.
Except for the son of, and none of them is lost but the son of
perdition. He doesn't call him a son of God. He was never a
child of God. Tares are not children of God. They may come in here, they may
be baptized, and they may sit there, and they may say, I believe
the doctrine of election, and I believe particular redemption,
I believe total depravity, I believe all those things. And yet never love Christ. Peter,
do you love me? They can believe these things.
You can be raised up, you can be raised up from a child under
the gospel, and you can say, I believe those things. It's not when you believe those
things. It's when you believe God. When you fall at His feet
and He becomes real to you, and you believe Him, you believe
a person. You don't believe a system. You
don't believe a system of doctrine. You believe God concerning the
record He's given of His Son. You believe on the Lord Jesus
Christ. And He says here, And these things
I speak in the world, in verse 13, and now I come to thee, the
only true God, I come on their behalf, and these things I speak
in the world aloud. That's what he's talking about,
aloud. I speak these things aloud. And
here's why I speak these things aloud. This is why the gospel
is preached to you aloud this morning. That they might have my joy fulfilled
in themselves. Can you imagine? The disciples
there that night at the Garden of Gethsemane, and this prayer takes place,
you know, he's been teaching them and this prayer takes place,
and they hear him talking to God. And he said earlier, he
said, they believe that I came forth from thee. And they hear him praying on
their behalf. And he says, I'm praying this
out loud, that my joy that I have, the joy I have with you, in union
with you, the joy I'm about to have with you when I go back
to glory, I pray they have this same joy. We're listening to him pray this
prayer all over again this morning. This prayer is being prayed right
now, again this morning, as we read it. And he says that they
may have my joy, not just joy, my joy. Real joy, spiritual joy,
my joy fulfilled in them. The gospel of our Lord is designed,
it's designed to create joy in the heart, real joy, His joy. Our Lord was truly concerned
about their joy in this hostile world. You know, when you come
under cover, when you undergo heavy trial, When you one of the first things
Satan's one the first thing Satan wants to do is charge God with
folly In your heart and you know, that's not true you say you say
that that thoughts not of God No, that's not so, you know you
Job, you know how many thoughts he probably had to fight Go undergo such a heavy trial
he expressed a lot of them He thought God was his enemy at
one point He set me up for the mark. He's gonna destroy me. And then you know in your heart,
that's not so, that's not so. He said, I say these things aloud
that my joy might be fulfilled in them. The gospel, it's designed
to bring great joy in you even in sorrow, even in the face of
Torture, like it did the apostles. I've given them thy word. You
know God's given you his word. He's given it to you again this
morning. I've given them thy word, thy
word that works effectually in them, powerfully. This is more than preaching,
this is more than preaching. I've put my words in them. I have put my words in their
heart. Christ said to his disciples
over in John 15, if my words abide in you, I have put. It's not like he's offering us
his word and we agree with it. No, he said, I put my word, thy
word in them. The word of God is in you. Christ, who is the word, And
the written word, how many times has the word of God has come
to your mind in certain situations? Promises, under trial. I have put my words in them,
and the world hath hated them. They were hated by the Jews.
They were hated by the religious world. They were hated. Because they are not of the world,
even as I'm not of the world. The reason the world hates them
is this. God put a difference between them and the world. There's
a difference between God's children and the world. They operate by
different principles. They operate under different
spirit. That which is born of the spirit is spirit. And the
world operates under the spirit of darkness. The message we preach, the message
they were gonna go out and preach, exposes the world for what it
is. You know, I don't have to go out and say, you know, me
personally, now me personally, the way I may think about something, that doesn't mean anything. No,
it really doesn't. It's what God says. When we take what God says, The world hates you for it. It hates you for it. You take
immorality and you expose the world, expose to the world what
God says. This is what God says about it.
It doesn't matter what Congress says about it or the Senate says
about it or what they legislate is right and wrong. That matters
nothing. What does God say about it? That's
what's right and that's what's wrong. And when you and I tell
the world what God says about it, you're hated for it. You
will suffer for it if you tell it. I'll tell you, you will.
You just stand up for it. What God says about it. John
the Baptist said to Herod, it's not right for you to have your
brother's wife. John, you might not want to say
that. and he got his head cut off for
it. He lost his head, but he didn't lose his life. Paul speaking to, I believe it
was Agrippa, you know, when he trembled, almost I'll persuade
me to be a Christian. It was either Felix or Agrippa.
But he spoke to him of judgment, of righteousness, and you know
what else he spoke to him of? Temperance. Temperance. I think the temperance part got
him. The judgment part scared him. The temperance part, self-control
was like, he didn't want to give it up. There's things he didn't
want to give up. He didn't want to give up his
lifestyle. He had anything he wanted. Boy, and Paul spoke of those,
he's just like, all judgment, righteousness, made him tremble. But the temperance part, he's
just like, I don't want to give that up. I love that more than
I love Christ. When you love Christ more than
you love anything else, giving it up won't be hard. It will
not be hard. Not when he becomes the love
of your life. And then he says here in verse
15, I pray. Boy, that's just so powerful. I pray. Not that thou shouldest
take them out of the world. That's not what I'm praying for.
No, they still have a work to do. They have a ministry to fulfill.
They can go out and preach the gospel even though the world
hates them. I pray that you not take them
out of the world. You know, if there's anybody in this world
that ought to be grateful, and I know God's people are, but
the world ought to be grateful for you. You know that? They don't. I do, I know it,
you know it. When God put Noah in the ark,
he killed the world, he flooded it, drowned everybody in the
world, except those eight people and animals in that ark. Sodom
and Gomorrah. When God delivered Lot out of
it, He'd burn it down. And when God takes the church
out of this world, He's gonna burn it down. That's the truth. This world, instead of hating
God's people, ought to be thankful that they're still here. Because
when they're not here, the rest of this is not gonna be here.
Noah's an example, Lot's an example. The world still exists because
you are still here, the church. That's why. But here's what I pray for, that
thou shouldest keep them from the evil. Keep them from the
evil one. I said earlier, Satan goes about
seeking whom he may devour. He's not talking about the street
walkers, the harlots on the street. He's not talking about the drug
addicts, the drunks, and the losers out there, whatever you
want to call them. That's what we were. He's talking about you. He's
seeking whom he may devour among God's people. That's who he's
seeking to devour? You. You. just looking for that opportunity
to devour you, to devour God's church. You know, listen, we see a lot
of things going on in this world, don't we? And I know God's hand
is over all of it. His eternal purpose is being
brought about. But the real battle that goes
on with Satan These others are diversion tactics. They get you
looking at this, this, this one, all these political things going
on. Get you looking at these things. And the real battle is
over you. You. He wants to destroy this
church. He wants to destroy every local
assembly in this world that preaches the gospel. I'm telling you,
he wants to destroy it. That's the real battle. And let
us not lose sight of it being get caught up in all this other
junk or all this other stuff that goes on. Don't get. Don't
get caught up in the confusion of battle. Because the battle
is against the Lord Jesus Christ and his glory, and you who believe
are his glory. You are his chief glory. Oh, he said, I pray not that
thou shouldest take them out of the world. But that thou shouldest keep
them from the evil, the evil one, keep them from the evil
of men. But brother, here's one of the strongest things that
we are to be kept from. The evil that dwells within me. That's my prayer too. Keep me
not only from the evil one, Satan, and from the evil of men, the
evil principles of this world, but Lord, the evil that lurks
in me. You know, there's still in me
an evil heart of unbelief. There's still in me a nature
that is sinful, ungodly. That nature's still there. It'll
be there until God lays me into the ground, lays this body in
the dust, and finally it's gone. I have it no more. Oh, keep them from the evil one,
the evil man, and the evil of indwelling sin. We need God to keep us. Scripture says we are kept by
the power of God through faith. He keeps us and He keeps us believing. He keeps us coming here. That's
why you and I are here. He keeps us coming. He keeps
us desiring the bread of life. He keeps us hungering after righteousness,
His righteousness, to be right with God. And to know and be
found in Christ, who is our righteousness. He keeps us hungry for that.
And that's why we are here. That's why we are here. Now,
I'm going to close with that. We'll pick up there, Lord willing,
next time. I was going to pick up on verse
20, but I think this is a good place to stop. I make my notes
and I don't know where I'm going to stop at. I have a stopping
point, but I may stop before I get there. And I think this
is a good place to stop. I pray for them. So when you feel down, when you
feel low, and you feel spiritually depressed, remember, I pray for
them. I pray for them. Well, that's
good news. All right.