Jesus Prayer for Us: A Sermon based on John 17:20-26

Is anyone else’s head spinning after reading that Gospel- I in them, and them in me- and you know me and I know you, and on and on. 

Someone I heard this week commented that said the Gospel sounds an awful like a Beatles’ song. 

Well, let me set the scene for a moment—supper has just ended- the bread has broken- wine has been drunk- Jesus has tenderly stooped and washed the feet of his disciples.   Judas has left to do whatever Judas is going to do betray Christ- Jesus is less than 24 hours away from his taking final breath nailed upon a cross.  He finishes the evening, the Last Supper by launching into a prayer---“ I ask (he’s asking God the Father) I ask I not only on behalf of these, but also on behalf of those who will believe in me through their  word…

Jesus prayer this evening isn't just for the Peter and Andrew and James and John and all who have gathered around the table that- his prayer that night is for his follower’s followers and his prayer that night is for his follower’s follower’s followers- His prayer is for all those in every generation who will come to know him- His prayer has traveled across time and space and landed here today May 12, 2013- his prayer isn’t just for people who we never met- his prayer is for me and you.  I ask on behalf of those who will come to believe in me. 

So now that we've established that Jesus has gotten on his knees to pray for us- what exactly- is he praying for-   Essentially -- that we all would be one- he is praying for unity one with each other and one with God.

Well some 2000 years later- there are only 33,280 different denominations, according to Wikipedia, 33,000 different types of  Christian-  guess we messed that one up just a little bit.   

But Jesus’ deepest prayer is also that his followers, is that you and I would know the love that Jesus knows, that we would taste the love that Jesus tastes, that we would experience the love that he has experience from God the Father.

Listen again to how today’s Gospel ends, “I have made your name known to them, and I will make it known, so that the love with which you have loved me may be in them.   

“So that the love with which you have loved me may be in them.”  

Now I would imagine that if I were to go downstairs during Sunday school and gather up a group of kids and ask them to tell me some things about God.  I know for certain  that they would tell me two things.  They would probably tell me that God looks like an old man with a long white beard and that they would also tell me that God loves us. 

You know kind of like the song--Jesus loves me this I know -for the bible tells me so. 

As Christian people we know that God love us. We get that- at least we get that with our brains, with our intellect but is that all that Jesus is praying for here. Is all Jesus praying for that we know, with our brains- with our intellect- that God loves us like it’s some sort of fact like 2+2=4 is a fact or that the capital of New York is Albany is a fact.

Is that what Christ is praying for- that we would simply know that God love us?  Would that have driven him to lay down his life on the cross, would that knowledge have encouraged him to break the religious conventions of the day like healing people on the Sabbath or uttering  blasphemies like your sins have been forgiven?    

Or does Christ  wants us to know and experience and taste a love that is deeper, wider-  does he want us to know a love that has the ability to  sweep into our lives and radically transform them,  a love that has the ability to remake and heal the wounds of the world, a love has the ability to  breathe resurrection life into dead situations?

There once lived a man by the name of Ignatius-  Ignatius was born into a  wealthy Basque family  in the year  1491.  As a young man, Ignatius was injured when he was struck by a cannon ball in the battle of Pamplona. While he was convalescing from his injuries I am told that Ignatius had a radical conversion experience. Several years after his conversion, Ignatius was called to found a religious order called the Society of Jesus or as you may know them, the Jesuits.  

One of the rules that Jesuits had to follow was to twice a day engage in something called the daily examen. Sounds like a medical test I would rather not have- the daily examen.

Anyway, the daily examen is a prayer discipline that enables the participant to better recognize the presence of God in one’s life. 

 About  14 years ago I was taught the daily examen by a Jesuit priest  who was my spiritual director at the time - one particular part of the examen- is to spend some time reviewing the day trying to remember the times when you did something that was loving and  also to remember the times when you were loved by others.  

Now the wonderful thing about the daily examen is that it helps the participant to begin to recognize the ways in which they found God loving them through the actions and activities of others.  And it was not profound mystical moments but rather simple things like smile or a card received from a dear friend that day that helped them see God’s love breaking into their world.  Over time the person using this technique begins to appreciate that the love of God is ever present in our lives and in our world.  I would invite you to try this. 

Now I am not sure that we can ever fully know the love of God on this side of heaven- but I can think that we can catch glimpses of God’s love in the here and now- Christ prayer for us today is that we might know the love that he knows- and that that love would reside within us. May we on this day know that God truly loves us and that it is simply much more than mere fact.

AMEN