John 17:20-23

It's rooted in the very nature of God. He calls us to reflect the unity of the triune God. We see this from the comparative statements in the text, right? In verse 21, Jesus prays that we would be one

just as you, Father, are in me and I in you.

Again, in verse 22, he prays that we would be one

even as we are one.

And for a third time, right, we see this emphasized in verse 23.

He even says that we would be perfectly one. And so it should be clear that the church's unity is meant to image the perfect unity of the Trinity. And if you do a little thinking on it, that's actually what we were kind of made to do, right? Man was made in the image of God to reflect his nature into creation, and part of that was imaging the unity of God, I believe, in our interpersonal relationships. But sin fractured the good relationships God made us to have, both with God and with one another. Man, after he sins, is exiled from God's presence. Marriage was cursed. Think of Cain and Abel shortly after that. Brother turns against brother in murder. And we, deep down, are just like our fallen forefathers, right? It's the default setting of our sinful flesh to be divisive, proud, and self-interested.

And that sickness in us is what Christ came to redeem, right? He came to restore what was lost, marred the image of God and as the new Adam, Christ through his incarnation, suffering and victory over sin, saves us to bear that image rightly again, right?

How the Father and Son are one

And this prayer reveals to us that a significant aspect of imaging God rightly is that we might be one, unified humanity just as the Father and Son are one, he calls us to be one. And so if we want to understand how we should be one, we have to think about the Trinity. We have to think about how the Father and Son are one.

And thankfully, we don't really have to leave John's Gospel all that much, right? One of the themes throughout this book is the oneness of the Father and the Son. Think of even the first verse, right?

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.

So right from the start, we see the Trinity. We see both the unity and diversity of the Trinity.

The son, the word is distinct from the father and yet fully God. He's the perfect revelation of the father. Hebrews even says he's the exact imprint of his nature. And because God is simple, a nerdy term to say he's not composed of parts, that means the father and son are one in essence. The creedal language, they're both God, they're co-essential, co-eternal, and co-equal.

But the book also shows us that their unity isn't just intrinsic to who they are, but we also see the unity of the father and son and how they work out towards us to accomplish our salvation, right? Jesus does only what the father does, revealing him perfectly, and that's why he says,

whoever's seen me has seen the father.

Every word Jesus spoke and every miracle he did, he reflected the father's redemptive purposes. He never acted independently or in contradiction to the Father, but always in perfect harmony.

They operate inseparably. And we need to think about that because here in this prayer, Jesus extends that kind of unity to us. He prays in verse 23 for our unity, and he describes it as,

I in them and you in me, that they may be perfectly one.

And this is where the Holy Spirit comes into picture, right? The Spirit is the means by which Christ and the Father remain with us and actually bind us together. And by the Spirit, we're not just individually united with Christ, we're also brought into union with one another, and so our unity then isn't First and foremost, something we manufacture, it's a gift and fruit of our salvation. So the more we abide in Christ, the more we will be united, the more we will reflect the oneness of the Father, Son, and spirit.

And God tells us that God saved us for the purpose of our unity. God saved us for the purpose of recreating a glorified, unified humanity. Look at what Christ prays in verse 22.

The glory that you have given me I have given to them that they may be one even as we are one.

And that's special because the glory that Christ gives us is the revelation of God, of his nature. Jesus reveals what was previously hidden, what Moses wanted to see but could not see. Jesus reveals to us the glory of the triune God. Jesus in his incarnation makes the Father known, displaying his glory in human flesh and by the Spirit.

He gives that same glory to us, and not in the sense that we come to share in the divine essence necessarily, but that we might know who God is, right? That we might know His glory, and that by knowing God, we know what we're aiming at. We can accurately reflect His nature. In character, we are to be perfectly one as God is perfectly one.

And so understanding the unity of the Trinity is not merely an academic or theological exercise, right? It's to inform the way we act in reality. The unity of the Godhead should be seen in the form of A shadow in the way we relate to one another, right? Our speech, our attitudes, our service towards one another. And when we act like that, we image God. We reflect his unity to the world.

Our unity serves an evangelistic purpose

We declare to the world that God is not a God of division and chaos, but a God of perfect harmony and love. Our unity serves an evangelistic purpose. And we see this from the purpose clauses in the prayer. In verse 21, Jesus prays for our unity, again,

so that the world may believe that you have sent me.

Again, in verse 23, we see this repeated. He prays for our unity,

so that the world would know that you sent me.

And then he adds this,

and loved them even as you loved me.

And so our unity then is ultimately a means to testify of the gospel, right? It's to testify of the truth that the Father sent the Son into the world and that he loves us, that he loves us even as he loves his only begotten Son. And I think it's worth taking a moment to just stir in that for a bit.

The Father's love for us is as immutable as his love for his eternal Son. That means it doesn't fluctuate based on our failures. It's not weakened by our weaknesses. God's love doesn't depend on our loveliness. No, but because we are united with Christ, the one truly lovely Son of God, we who are unlovely, sinful, and broken come to share in the Sonship of Christ.

We come to share in the love of the Father that the Son has known from eternity past. And I stress that because at times we can functionally act like God is divided, right? We're functionally tri-theistic. We like to compartmentalize the attributes of God and assign them to different persons, right? The father we see as the wrathful and just God of Nahum even, right? We see him as distant. The son is always receptive, gracious, warm, and fuzzy. The spirit is often ambiguous, unattached to objectivity. We attribute movings of the spirit to our emotions or intuition.

But John 17 smashes all those ideas, right? In his prayer, Jesus shows us that the Father and Son and Spirit are perfectly united in purpose, their love and their work towards us. The Father doesn't distance himself from us in our sin with wrath. He loves us with the same steadfast love he has for his eternal Son.

And the problem is that we forget that all of the time, right? We forget the depth and breadth of God's love for us. We doubt our salvation when we struggle with indwelling sin. Our sense of God's love for us can even waver as we face suffering. There are seasons in life where everything goes wrong, right? Where God feels distant, nothing makes sense, and even those closest to us cannot offer true comfort.

And in those moments, it's an understanding of the Trinity that will allow you to understand the fullness and steadfastness of God's love through all of that, right? The Trinity. is what tells us that the love of the Father towards us is immutable, and thank God that's true whether we feel it or not. Objectively, truthfully, he loves us as if we were the innocent, perfect, eternal son of God who has dwelt at the Father's side from eternity past. To stop loving us, God the Father would have to stop loving God the Son, and that's impossible. The Father's love for the Son is eternal, immutable, omnipotent, and awesome. It has no beginning or end, it has never faltered and it never will, and therefore it has not, does not, and will not ever waver towards us who are in Christ.

But the way we are to testify of that love to the world is our unity. Our unity should make the world feel like they're missing out on the most satisfying thing in all creation, right? The immutable, omnipotent, abundant love of God. And that, if nothing else, should motivate us to pursue that kind of unity.

God saved us to be one with God, but also with one another. And we often think of our salvation as a me thing, as individualistic, right? We like to think of our individual justification, my innocent standing, my growth in holiness, my ultimate glory. But this prayer reminds us that God's work of redemption isn't just about me, right? It's about redeeming mankind, redeeming the created order, and part of that's how we relate to one another.

Jesus even says in John 13, 35,

by this all people will know that you are my disciples if you have love for one another.

1 John 4, 12 says,

if we love one another, God abides in us and his love is perfected in us.

So the redemptive work of God is perfected in us as we begin to love one another. As we become one as God is perfectly one and therefore Again, we should pursue that kind of unity.

Start with just one person

But where do we begin, right? If it's such a grand unity, it's easy to think about unity in broad and idealistic terms, right? We might think of the church as a whole, ecumenical movements, even our denomination. But I think we should start a lot smaller than that.

I think it starts with the people God has sovereignly placed in our proximity. God in his wisdom made us with eyes that see a finite distance right here, a certain distance, limbs that only extend so far. And I think that shows us that in our finiteness, our greatest ability to impart any sort of goodness into the world is to those directly around us, right? And so as we think about unity, we should start that by looking to those placed around us right now. You can even look around the room.

There are people in your life, in this church, where pursuing greater unity or reconciliation would be a really good thing, and not just for your sake, but for the sake of Christ. In fact, it's probably necessary for all of us. And pursuing unity doesn't mean ignoring sin or pretending that conflicts don't exist. It means like our church covenant says,

seeking swift and lasting reconciliation.

It means being humble enough to apologize to another when we wrong each other, graceful enough to forgive each other, and receptive enough to receive one another.

And so as we close, I want us to leave with a challenge to start with just one person. Maybe there's someone you've avoided because of past hurt, or a conflict or tension that's gone unaddressed for too long. Maybe there's someone who you should apologize to. Maybe if you're like me, there are many. But whatever that is, or whoever it is, whether it's someone as close to you as your spouse, your children, your parents, friends, or even old enemies, I encourage you to leave here committed to pursuing greater unity with just one person.

And as we take small steps, one person at a time, one act of humility at a time, we will begin to image the God who in his great mercy forgave us, adopted us and reconciled us to himself when we were utterly unworthy to receive anything good from him.

And so Jefferson Park, I pray we would all leave here with a greater desire to pursue unity. I pray that we would be one, even as God is perfectly one, in order that we might testify to our community and those around us of the gospel, the wondrous truth that the Father sent his Son into the world to save us, and that he loves us, even as he loves his eternal Son. So let's close in prayer. Our Father in heaven, grant us by the power of your Holy Spirit, the ability and desire to pursue unity. And we pray that our unity would bear witness to the world of the wondrous truth that in love you sent your son to save us. And we pray this in the name of your son. Amen.