Dependency

“I once visited a “church” that manages, with no denominational headquarters or paid staff, to attract millions of devoted members each week. It goes by the name Alcoholics Anonymous. I went at the invitation of a friend who had just confessed to me his problem with drinking. “Come along,” he said, “and I think you’ll catch a glimpse of what the early church must have been like.” At twelve o’clock on a Monday night I entered a ramshackle house that had been used for six other sessions already that day. The “sharing time” worked like the textbook description of a small group, marked by compassionate listening, warm responses, and many hugs. The parallels to the early church are no mere historical accidents. The Christian founders of AA insisted that dependence on God be a mandatory part of the program. My friend freely admits that AA has replaced the church for him, and this fact sometimes troubles him. I asked him to name one quality missing in the local church that AA had somehow provided. I expected to hear a word like love or acceptance or, knowing him, perhaps anti-institutionalism. Instead, he said softly this one word: dependency. “None of us can make it on our own—isn’t that why Jesus came?” he explained. “Yet most church people give off a self-satisfied air of piety or superiority. I don’t sense them consciously leaning on God or on each other. Their lives appear to be in order.”
(Church: Why Bother? p. 49-51)
Via Philip Yancy

Jesus called out to the Father asking for this very thing – Dependency for his disciples.  Those that the Father gave him. 

Jesus knew the one thing we needed more than anything else… 

He did not pray asking that those who follow him or I should say are his family, have an easy life.  He did not ask that we should never experience hurt, fear of the unknown, sadness; nor did he pray that we receive everything we want.  He did not pray that whatever we set our mind to we should be able to achieve. 

What Jesus did pray for was two things,

He prayed that we not be taken from this world but that we be protected from the evil one.  And He Prayed for oneness. 

John 17

²⁰ “My prayer is not for them alone. I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message, ²¹ that all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you. May they also be in us so that the world may believe that you have sent me. ²² I have given them the glory that you gave me, that they may be one as we are one— ²³ I in them and you in me—so that they may be brought to complete unity. Then the world will know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me.

Questions;

   Who is Jesus praying For – Those who will believe (That is us) Jesus prayed for the disciples and    he prayed for all future generations of believers.  He knew you before  were born.  Your picture is in the photo album and your chapter in the book has been set aside; ready to be penned.  What is your chapter saying?

   What is His Prayer requesting - That all who believe may be one.   How so? Just as the Father is in the Son and the Son in the Father.  Is this possible?  It must be because Jesus  asked the Father that this be allowed.  We know that all things asked in our Lords name will be answered.  But are all things given?   This depends on this oneness.             

Why was Jesus requesting this unity?  - He obviously knew how important it was.  It was one of the  only things other than protection for the evil one that he asked the Father for.  I believe all things regarding true discipleship hinge on this oneness  with God.  Jesus knew it.  He spent hours with the Father in Prayer  everyday. 

 

Jesus then reiterates to the Father that He has in fact given us His glory.  What is this glory?  What does he mean?

 

The Hebrew word means “weight – worth” of something - The glory of God is the worthiness of God, more particularly, the presence of God in the fullness of his attributes in someplace or everywhere.

 

What this means is we have the attributes of God in us.  WOW!!!  Do you feel one with God?  Jesus prayed that you will. 

Matthew 11:50

No one knows the Son except the Father, and no one knows the Father except the Son and anyone to whom the Son decides ⁵¹  to reveal him.

 

Did he not pray that we would also be in them. 

 

Remember that at this point in time Christ was about to be arrested.  He knew what was going to happen, He knew the Fathers will and was staying on task.  Yet he wants us to be with Him.

 

He wants us to know their purpose.  He wants us to be one with Him.  Some of us here today maybe are saying I really do not feel absolute oneness with God.  You may think this is absolutely absurd to think you can be in that close of fellowship with God.  Not so!  What you are experiencing is either a lack of trust or of Faith. You may have become small-minded and cynical.   Jesus prayed for us requesting that we be one with them.  This is Jesus’ prayer, not ours.  The question we have to ask is am I willing to or wanting to become one with them?  Am I will to give up myself and my admirations for total dependency on God.  Notice how I said Total!!!!!!