“CHRIST IN INTERCESSION” (continued) - part 4.

Tonight, I would like to draw your attention to John 17:1-3, especially verse three.

I will read through verse 9, however, since I will be referring to some parts of it as we go on.

Starting at the end of verse one:

      v 1: ‘...Father, the hour has come; glorify Thy Son,
      that Thy Son may glorify Thee.    
      v 2: As Thou hast given Him power over all flesh, 
      that He should give eternal life to as many as Thou 
      hast given Him.
      v 3: And this is life eternal, that they might know
      Thee, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, Whom 
      Thou hast sent.’
      v 4: I have glorified Thee on earth: I have finished
      the work which Thou gavest Me to do.
      v 5: And now, O Father, glorify Thou Me with Thine 
      own self with the glory which I had with Thee 
      before the world was.
      v 6: I have manifested Thy Name unto the men which
      Thou gavest Me out of the world: Thine they were 
      and Thou gavest them Me; and they have kept
      Thy word.
      v 7: Now they have known that all things whatsoever
      Thou hast given Me are of Thee.
      v 8: For I have given them the words which Thou
      gavest Me; and they have received them, and have
      known surely that I came out from Thee, and they
      have believed that Thou didst send Me.’
      v 9: I pray for them: I pray not for the world, but for
      them which Thou hast given Me; for they are Thine.’

Did you notice from the very start that the great divine purpose - a purpose immersed in divine glory - is combined with divine ‘giving’?

His Father first gave Jesus power over all flesh so that He could give eternal life to all those that God had given Him.

The fact that the Father gave power to the Son (v 2) does not indicate the giving of something by a superior to an inferior.

It signifies that there is a giving of one to the other that takes place in the Godhead.

This is an arrangement in the eternal counsels of the Eternal Trinity.

According to what we know from the Bible, it started with the Father giving to the Son the carrying out of the work of redemption in their Eternal Plan which would be extended to the eternal ages to come.

The divine glory and the divine giving were to go hand in hand for the redemption of men.

Thus this bestowal of the Gift of Life is an Eternal Gift involving all of the Godhead in the giving.

Each One works to this end.

And it is in this prayer of John 17 that we see the ‘giving cycle’ being passed on through Christ to all of His own. 

This fact becomes very evident in the remaining part of His prayer.

What the Father has, the Son has also. 

And that which He has is being given to His disciples and to all of His believers.

This meant that the disciples, and all subsequent believers who were to be included in this company of redeemed ones, the Church, would be endowed with this self-same desire Christ had - that His Gift of Life Eternal would be transmitted by Christ to those whom the Father has given Him.

This holy calling and this high purpose makes it an eternal involvement - the Church is involved in God’s eternal arrangement of things, a fact we saw all along now. 

In the light of that, I think this is an especially crucial time in salvation history for the Church to engage in serious intercession. 

Intercession has always been part of the Church’s work but, in this particular time frame, it seems to have an urgency connected to this call.

I have mentioned before how there seems to be a moving toward ‘knowing God’.

Have you noticed that?  

In one sense, we can be very thankful for this in that it indicates that there is an awakening to the need of attention to the part of man that seeks something beyond himself, something that is always seeking to fill that God-given void deep within man.

Daniel 12:4 speaks of the ‘unrest’ in the seeking of knowledge.

He is told to ‘...seal up the book, even to the end of the time: many shall run to and fro, and knowledge shall be increased.’ 

This unrest within the spirit of man is a good thing, provided it is met and calmed by the Spirit of God through Christ.

On the other hand, we must also be very conscious of the fact that the concept of ‘God’ in this current religious movement is not at all what Jesus has defined in this passage.

And I say this because of the definition Jesus gave in verse three of ‘eternal life’.

Once again, He said: ‘And this is life eternal, that they might know Thee, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, Whom Thou hast sent.’

Notice, first, how, quite strangely, Jesus prayed, in v 9:
‘...I pray not for the world but for those whom You gave Me...’.

Then, further still, in v 20, which we did not read in the opening passage, He prayed: ‘Neither pray I for these alone, but for them also which shall believe on Me...’.

These were still of the world for whom He prayed - those who would come into a relationship with Him in time.

At first, it seemed as though He was abandoning the world when He prayed, ‘I pray not for the world’.

But, He had not forgotten the world.

The world was on His heart since He was in union with His Father Who had so loved the world that He gave His Son for the world.

His Father had given Him power over all flesh; that is, over all mankind, both those who will accept His atoning work and those who will reject it.

And, He would be giving Life that is Eternal to all that the Father had given Him. (v 2)

And, He went on to define exactly what He meant by ‘eternal life’. 

It is to know God and to know Himself, Jesus Christ.

The phrase ‘only true God’ was not meant to exclude the Son or the Holy Spirit.

It alludes to those idols and false gods that usurp the knowledge of the Trinity.

So, He defined eternal life as a knowing of both God and Jesus Christ, a sure, definite knowing - nothing vague or nebulous about it.

And, in so doing, He let it be known that to know God without Christ is not to know His redemptive power and is not Christianity at all.

Why would Jesus make such a definite statement about knowing God in His intercession?

There is no doubt in my mind that He knew what the year 2000 AD would bring -  the bringing in of a great universal movement to ‘knowing God’.

And He knew that, with the bringing on in of the new covenant, knowing God, outside of Himself, - would be like a ‘consuming fire’, in which one would be trifling with His divine plan in Christ, - disregarding it, shunning it, - and being consumed with ‘never being able to come to the knowledge of the truth’. (2.Tim.3:5 and 7)

This passage in 2.Timothy speaks of those ‘having a form of godliness but denying the power thereof’ and of those, ‘ever learning and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth’.  

That kind of ‘knowledge of God’ fills men with fear and delusion - God out of Christ is a religion of fear and is an idol of the mind.

It is a barrier to the divinely initiated revelation of the Gift of Christ and His saving Life.

Note John 5:39: Jesus looked at the barrier the Jews were into and said to them, “Search the Scriptures; for in them ye think ye have eternal life: and they are they which testify of Me.”

To see clearly at the same time, a holy, pure, sin-hating God and a loving, merciful, sin-atoning, and life-giving Christ is life eternal and is knowing God and Christ alike, a knowledge the Jews lacked as Jesus spoke to them.

John said it well in 1.John 1:3: ‘...truly our fellowship is with the Father, and with His Son Jesus Christ.’

It was merciful for Jesus to give this description of the Gift He has to offer.

Were it not for His graciousness in this regard, we would all be walking in blindness, delusion, and deception.

For, - man has a natural void in himself.

He tries anything - anything at all to try to fill it, but always misses it until he finds and accepts the Gift of Jesus Christ.

Thus Jesus prayed that all who are to be in the company of His own would be kept to that end.

It was later, in Matt.28, that He commissioned His disciples to be involved in the giving of His Gift of Life to His own.

And, today, that call is, I dare to say, the most pressing work of His ministry through the Church. 

For, I am sure, there are included many, many of those who are counted among those for whom Christ prayed in today’s current ‘religious movement’ of ‘knowing God’ and who desperately need our serious involvement in the answer to Christ’s intercession.

And, the reason for this is given in 2.Thess 2:1-3 where we read, “Now, we beseech you, brethren, by the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, and by our gathering together unto Him, that you be not soon shaken in mind, or be troubled, neither by spirit, nor by word, nor by letter as from us, as that the day of Christ is at hand. Let no man deceive you by any means: for that day shall not come, except there come a falling away first, and that the man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition;...”

This is the passage that speaks of a great falling away, an apostacy.

A falling away from what and by whom?

It is certainly not those who are ‘born anew’ of His Spirit.

Here, Paul is warning of a ‘shaking’ of the mind, a violent unsettling that is not stable enough to resist deception or delusion.

These are those he further on, in v 11, described as not ‘loving the truth’ and are influenced by the manifestations of signs and wonders, by the great ‘show’ of power that the lawless one will stage at that time. (v 9)

Some in the Church were ‘holding some’ wrong views concerning the Lord’s second coming so Paul wrote this letter to them.

He told them that before Christ comes back there will be a deliberate abandonment of a former professed position.

This company of people who will fall away are those who will turn their backs on what they once professed about God.

And, it will be a universal happening that will reach its climax just before Christ returns. 

This current ‘God-movement’ may well be only the beginning of what Paul is describing to the Thessalonians.

The universal concept of ‘worshipping your own god’ and accepting everyone’s religion as a valid way to knowing God is gaining momentum, as you well know.

It has already reached such a proportion that any well-known religious leader is able to make such an impact that followers will regard him as ‘god-king’.

He may embody certain ‘enlightened qualities’ and be considered a very valid channel of God. 

But this is only another way to try to fill up the empty spiritual void man has when one comes under such impact.

This is all part of this great ‘falling away’ that is to take place before Christ’s return.

So, according to 2:11, this can well be that ‘great delusion’ spoken of in the Bible.

So, in v 11, Paul reemphasized the fate of the rejectors of the truth and their ‘abandoning God’ and the powerful delusion in which they will believe the lie that is so supernatural in character that it will prove irresistable to rebellious humanity.

God will create false belief to make them believe a lie.

The people are ‘corrupted by flatteries’. (Dan.11:32)

The heaven-sent delusion will be God’s judgment on those who do not ‘believe the truth’, who had Him in the knowledge of the mind and refused to go on into knowing Christ.

Read Romans 1:16-28 to see the outcome of such a place.

This will be their only alternative because they have refused to ‘love the truth’, the ‘truth’ of Jesus Christ, of knowing Him. (v 10)

The Satanic promise that deceived Eve (Gen.3:5) will find ultimate fulfillment in the end-time master of deceit.

They will be completely defenseless against the false claims of the lawless one (v 4) and his perversions of the true gospel.

They will mistake someone else and his lying promises for God and the truth.

The ultimate consequences for them will be condemnation.

What we are seeing today perhaps is just as much of a fad as anything else has been and will continue to be down through the years.

But - there are and will be those among this company who are earnest ‘seekers and finders’, who will be in need of the extended intercession of Christ through His Church.

They are the ones for whom the Church is called upon to hold dear to Christ’s heart, to pray that the ‘Word of God may be glorified’, or may ‘triumph’ (RSV), as Paul went on to say in 2.Thess.3:1.

We are told to pray that they will heed their historical call to salvation.

They will need the Church’s prayer of intercession to become stable, firm, to resist the delusions.

For this, the Church must intercede for the breaking down of the stronghold of rebellion toward Jesus Christ and His work.

What the Triune God purposed in eternity is to give to them in history, now, at this time, the Gift of Life that is Eternal. 

In the meantime, the Church stands with Christ on their behalf as His intercession prayer flows through it to them. 

And, one more thought: the Church is never to despair when it sees any such mass movement that eliminates Christ Jesus.

For it is the Church that is the only valid ‘Being’ living in the ‘love of truth’, that is able to point to the Way, the Truth, and the Life.

It is only to remain faithful in prayer in its steady, stable  union with our Christ.

Daniel wrote, in v 3 of the chapter I quoted earlier.

There he said, “And they that be wise shall shine as the brightness of the firmament; and they that turn many to righteousness as the stars forever.”

Surely, we must see by now, how truly privileged the Church is, yet how great its responsibility is, to be the faithful channel of Christ’s intercession for those current ‘seekers’ to ‘know God’.

The giving of ourselves to Christ’s call, to work this end with Him, - to seriously heed those Holy Spirit-led impulses for the salvation of the many who earnestly speak of God but who can be led astray and not go on into a relationship with His Son - that is our mission.

For there will be many who ‘...will say to Me on that day, Lord, Lord, did we not...?’ - but He will say to them, ‘...I never knew you; Depart from Me,...’. (Matt.7:22-23)

I hope we all will take this before the Lord within our own selves and with our spouses as well as with our families, and consider it earnestly before Him.

Lord willing, we will continue next week in John 17.