John 17:15-22
“I do not ask that you take them out of the world, but that you keep them from the evil one. They are not of the world, just as I am not of the world. Sanctify them in the truth; your word is truth. As you sent me into the world, so I have sent them into the world.
And for their sake I consecrate myself, that they also may be sanctified in truth.
“I do not ask for these only, but also for those who will believe in me through their word,that they may all be one, just as you, Father, are in me, and I in you, that they also may be in us, so that the world may believe that you have sent me. The glory that you have given me I have given to them, that they may be one even as we are one, I in them and you in me, that they may become perfectly one, so that the world may know that you sent me and loved them even as you loved me.”
Is this real to you?
Did Jesus pray for you? Are you his? Are you in him as he is in the Father?
Here is our sure and certain hope: that we are in Christ Jesus just as he is in the Father… because the Father has given us to him and all that the Father has given him… he has lost none!
Here in this verse we see that Jesus prayed for all of those whom the Father has given him… not just the 11 (12 counting Paul, the disciple out of time) but all those who believe because of the word that they preached from that point forward. Think about it… Jesus Christ, before going to the cross, prayed for every believer that was his.
Here we also see the truth of sanctification and holiness. Both of which are not works that we do, it’s not something we gin up and is accounted to us because of our efforts. Actually just the opposite, we do the works because of this reality… that we are being conformed to his likeness, that as we grow in Christ we become more holy because he is holy and our sanctification is the outworking of becoming more Christ like.
Our works are not what sanctifies us, our works are the result of our being sanctified. Our works are the results of our becoming holy just as he is holy. As we become more “in him” we can’t help but do those things that show outward authentication of who we are becoming inwardly.
If our Holiness and our sanctification were something that we could do something that we could work up then we would boast in it. We would be prideful in our boasting “hey look at me, look how sanctified I am, look how holy I am” but we know that there is nothing good in us. All we can boast of is who we are in Christ because of what he has done, because of who he is, because he has redeemed us to be his own!
If it was something that we did in and of ourselves how would we ever know that we had done it right enough, or well enough, or sincerely enough, or righteously enough, or that we did it with enough humility because at that point our humility would become boasting. No… it’s all Christ! It’s all him and it’s all who we are in him. What an awesome reality that it’s not what we do it’s what he has already done, it’s who he is and because of his love for us.
Selah
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