Sue and I have three kids who are now in their forties with families of their own. But when they were young and under our roof, our primary goal was to lovingly watch over, care for, train, and guide their lives in ways that would one day reproduce the values of our family in theirs, especially regarding our faith. We prayed that it would become a family trait. And it’s a delight beyond expression to now witness our seven grandkids growing in their own relationships with Jesus as a result.
John 17:11-12 marks the point in his High Priestly Prayer when Jesus began to make several specific appeals for his disciples, and these verses contain the first two. After clarifying that the reason for his supplication was that he would no longer be physically present with his disciples in the world, he highlighted the significance of the requests he was about to make by using an expression found nowhere else in Scripture. He prayed, “Holy Father,” and proceeded to ask that the disciples be kept or preserved in that name, and that they would experience the kind of unity among themselves that would echo the oneness of the Godhead.
The Bible employs several names for God but none more frequently than Father. And John’s Gospel quotes Jesus using that term more than a hundred times to refer to the one who’d sent him. So, even though no single word in any language can begin to adequately communicate the magnificence of who he is, it’s clear he at least wants us to understand him in the light of what THAT word conveys and the kind of relationship it’s meant to describe. Our God is a father.
So, when Jesus asked that his followers be kept in that name, he was requesting that they be held close, protected, and nurtured within that aspect of who God is. He’d carefully introduced them to the fatherhood of God and said that except for the son of perdition, Judas, he’d preserved all of them within the embrace of its truth. Now, as he was preparing to return to the Father, he was leaving that task to him.
In addition, he prayed that this relationship and understanding would produce among the disciples the kind of unity that characterizes God’s family, especially the oneness within the Trinity.
I think you’d agree that unity is not a characteristic of the human family in its sin-scarred state, but it certainly is of God’s. He models it himself and enables his kids to do the same in the power of his Spirit. It’s a family trait.
Ephesians 4:1-3 encourages us, “Walk worthy of the calling with which you were called...endeavoring to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.”
This is one of the things that set believers apart from the world and identify us as God’s children. In fact, one of the key descriptors of the early church in the book of Acts is a word that is translated into English as accord or together.
But the togetherness experienced among those first believers couldn’t always be characterized as unanimity. Instead, they lived out a diversity that was harmonious. In music, harmony is achieved not by playing the same notes but different ones that together create a unique sound much richer than its components. And that’s what the family of God should sound like. Sadly, we don’t always, but that’s why Jesus prayed.
So, as we live out our faith in this world together as his kids, let’s daily shed the selfishness, insecurity, and spiritual immaturity that produces discord, and instead, yield to our Father as he harmonizes us by his Spirit into the accord that demonstrates what our Savior prayed for.