Before I began to read my passage of scripture for the day, my husband shared with me where he was reading in Luke 22. He was reading about the Passover meal Jesus had with his disciples which is referred to commonly as “The Last Supper.” The disciples had prepared the meal, and then…
“When the hour came, Jesus and his apostles reclined at the table. And he said to them, ‘I have eagerly desired to eat this Passover with you before I suffer. For I tell you, I will not eat it again until it finds fulfillment in the kingdom of God.’”
My husband said that he was stuck on that passage of scripture and felt that he needed to understand what that meant before he moved on, so he began to look intently into what Jesus meant by what he said here, and also to look at what “the kingdom of God” meant. The kingdom is also referred to as “the kingdom of heaven.” So, we talked about that for a little while. We talked about how Jesus said that the kingdom was there with them (in the person of Jesus) and that he also said that it was coming and that it was near. “The time has come,” he said. “The kingdom of God is near. Repent and believe the good news!” We discovered that the kingdom of God/heaven is fulfilled in the person of Jesus Christ, in his earthly ministry, in his death and resurrection, in his sending the Holy Spirit to dwell within the lives of believers in Jesus Christ so that the kingdom of heaven is within us, and ultimately it will be fulfilled when he returns for his bride and he sets up his earthly kingdom and he reigns on the earth for 1000 years and then in eternity when we are with him forever and ever.
Then, I sat down to read in John 17, and as I began to read, I found myself in the same predicament as my husband. I found that I could not get past the first sentence when I felt as though the Lord was saying that he wanted me to break this passage apart one phrase at a time so that I understood its meaning. So, that is the process that began as I read John 17:1-5:
After Jesus said this, he looked toward heaven and prayed:
“Father, the time has come. Glorify your Son, that your Son may glorify you. 2 For you granted him authority over all people that he might give eternal life to all those you have given him. 3 Now this is eternal life: that they may know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom you have sent. 4 I have brought you glory on earth by completing the work you gave me to do. 5 And now, Father, glorify me in your presence with the glory I had with you before the world began.
As soon as I read “he looked toward heaven and prayed,” this phrase jumped out at me. I thought how we, as evangelical Christians, have been taught to bow our heads and close our eyes and pray and yet Jesus, with eyes open, looked toward heaven when he prayed. I looked it up in my study Bible notes and it said that it was the customary attitude in prayer. So, I began to really think and pray over this phrase and what it means to look toward heaven. So, I began by looking at the word “look” to see what other phrases in the Bible might further our understanding of what it means to “look toward heaven.” If Jesus, as was learned by me and my husband, is the embodiment of the kingdom of heaven, then for us to look to heaven would be to look to Jesus. So, how do we “look” to Jesus?
Looking after the needs of the needy is like doing it to Jesus himself - Matt. 25:36: “I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me.”
Looking in the sense of watching and waiting and being aware and awake spiritually - Matt. 26:45: Then he returned to the disciples and said to them, “Are you still sleeping and resting? Look, the hour is near, and the Son of Man is betrayed into the hands of sinners.”
Looking for Jesus in the sense of seeking after him to find him, to know him, to be with him, to hear and obey, and to fellowship with him, etc. - Matt. 28:5: The angel said to the women, “Do not be afraid, for I know that you are looking for Jesus, who was crucified.”
Looking in the sense of keeping our eyes focused on Jesus and not on our circumstances. When they looked up, then they had hope - Mark 16:4: But when they looked up, they saw that the stone, which was very large, had been rolled away.
Looking in the sense of looking forward to our ultimate redemption when Jesus returns - Luke 2:38: Coming up to them at that very moment, she gave thanks to God and spoke about the child to all who were looking forward to the redemption of Jerusalem.
Looking in the sense of having our eyes opened to our own spiritual condition - Luke 13:34-35: “O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, you who kill the prophets and stone those sent to you, how often I have longed to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, but you were not willing! Look, your house is left to you desolate. I tell you, you will not see me again until you say, ‘Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord.’”
After Jesus had looked toward heaven, he prayed. He prayed to the Father stating that the time had come for the Son to be glorified and that the Son may glorify the Father. So, like my husband wanting to understand “the kingdom of heaven,” I felt God wanted me to understand what it meant to “glorify” the Son and the Father, so I looked it up. I read about it in Nelson’s Illustrated Bible Dictionary, which said that “glory” means “beauty, power, or honor; a quality of God’s character that emphasizes His greatness and authority.” Then, it said that the word was used in three senses in the Bible: 1) God’s moral beauty and perfection of character; 2) God’s moral beauty and perfection as a visible presence, and 3) Praise – at times God’s glory may mean the honor and audible praise which his creatures give to him.
So, to glorify the Son so that the Son glorifies the Father means to honor and to reveal the character and nature of God through the Son which then reveals the nature and character of the Father. The way in which God’s nature and character were thus revealed through Jesus were through his life, his ministry, his miracles, through him completing the work the Father had given him to do, through his death on the cross for our sins, his resurrection and conquering of death, hell, Satan and the dominion of sin over our lives, in his ascension into heaven and in sending the Holy Spirit of God to indwell the lives of believers so that his divine character and nature are revealed through his working in us in transforming us into the image of God, and ultimately in Jesus’ return for his bride at which time our salvation will be complete and we will no longer be in these earthly bodies but will have glorified bodies no longer subject to the flesh and sin and physical death, but fully revealing the divine nature and character of God.
Then, Jesus, after he had asked the Father to glorify him said, “for…” which means “indicating a reason why something happens or is done” (Encarta). So, the reason the Father should glorify (to honor and to reveal his divine character, nature and purpose) the Son is because God has granted Jesus authority over all people that he might give eternal life to all those the Father has given to him. So, basically what Jesus was asking the Father to do was for the Father to now fulfill the purpose for which Jesus had come to the earth and that was for him to die on the cross for our sins, to be buried and to rise again thus conquering the grave, death, hell, sin and Satan. He was submitting himself to the Father and to the cross. For Jesus’ glory to be revealed in our lives, it also means submitting ourselves to the cross in our own lives in our death to sin and to our resurrected lives in Christ free from the bondage to and the control of sin over our lives.
Then, Jesus explains what it means to have eternal life – that we may know the Father, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, God in the flesh. So, what does it mean to “know” someone? Encarta dictionary says: “to believe firmly in the truth or certainty of something; to have a thorough understanding of something through experience or study; to recognize somebody or something by a distinguishing characteristic or attribute; intimacy; understand; comprehend; recognize,” etc. (Encarta & MS Word Thesaurus). I know my husband. I know his body language. I know his facial expressions. I know his eye movements. I know his tone of voice. I know his habits. I know his likes and dislikes. I know what pleases him and what displeases him, and I know immediately when he is displeased about something. I know his sense of humor, his enjoyment of the simple things in his life, his intelligence, his thoughtfulness, his generosity, his kindness, etc. I know him because I spend time with him, I listen to him, I observe him, I experience him when I am with him, I am intimate with him, etc. And, that is how we know God, too.
A head-knowledge of God does not constitute knowing him. We must have that kind of heart knowledge of him that I have of my husband through time spent with him at his feet, in listening to him, in watching how he works in our lives, in obeying him, in enjoying him, and just in being with him. We can’t know someone if we barely even spend time with him or if we are in too big a rush to stop and listen and pay attention and heed what he says.
So, let us glorify the Father and the Son in our own lives through looking to heaven, i.e. by looking to Jesus through how we treat others, in being awake spiritually and being watchful about sin, in seeking after him to find him, to know him, to be with him, to hear and obey him, in keeping our eyes on Jesus instead of on our circumstances, in looking for Jesus’ return and for our redemption to be complete, and in keeping our eyes opened to our own spiritual condition so that we can repent, turn from our sin, and turn to God. Let us honor and praise our Lord, giving him the glory, by giving him authority over our lives (making him Lord), by allowing him to work his character and nature into our lives, by dying to our old lives and sin nature and being made alive unto God, by completing the work he has given us to do, through our obedience and submission to the cross in our lives and our willingness to be completely abandoned unto God in all that we do, by refusing to be conformed to the pattern of this world but instead allowing the Holy Spirit within us to transform us by the renewing of our minds, and by moving beyond just head-knowledge of God to full intimacy with him as a new bride for her husband.
The One, The Only Jesus / NewSong
He’s the One that I turn to
When things don’t turn out right
The only One I depend on
To help me make it through the night
He’s my warm winter blanket
When I’m cold and alone
He’s my rock, He’s my refuge
He is my song
He’s the One, the only Jesus
The only One worthy of our praise
He is the Holy One
He is God’s only Son
The One, the only Jesus
He’s the resurrected king
In the castle of my heart
The only friend that I have
That will never depart
He’s creation’s creator
He has crafted each part
The only Son of the only One
He knows me by heart
He’s everything I hope that He would be
He’s the One, the only Jesus…
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