Instruments in His Hands - Myles Holmes | March 15, 2026

Hello and welcome to the Redemption Church Podcast.

We're a church in Newmarket, Ontario, Canada that exists to glorify God through the fulfillment of the Great Commission and the Spirit of the Great Commandment.

Thanks for joining us today.

If you have your Bibles, you can open them up to John chapter 17.

John 17 · chapter mention

We're going to be beginning in verse 14 this morning.

You're going to need a copy of God's word in front of you.

And so if you don't have one, the ushers are making their way to the front of the aisles.

You can flag one of them down.

They would love to get a copy into your hands, which you can keep as our gift to you.

There's two ways we value things in this world.

I'm sure that you have things that are valuable to them.

Some things we value because of their fragility.

They are fragile.

You'll think about the maybe heirloom watch.

You keep in a padded box, it almost never comes out or sees the light of day.

Maybe you have a set of fine china.

We had one when we got married, it was so nice we never even used it.

We just threw it out eventually.

Too nice.

You don't want to get it scratched up, you don't want kids' sticky fingers on it.

You keep it away to preserve its value.

That's one kind of value.

Another kind of value are the things that are valuable to you because of their function.

At my home, sitting on my oven right now is a cast iron skillet.

It is one of my most prized possessions.

If anyone else uses it, I'm not usually like this, but if someone uses my cast iron skillet, I need to be in the room while they use it.

And I especially need to be there when they clean it.

Because I cared for this thing.

Hundreds of pounds of ground beef have been cooked on this skillet.

And it has been seasoned many more times.

It is valuable to me, not because of how clean or preserved I've kept it, but because it's been used, it's put in a lot of work.

Now, throughout the final night in the upper room, Jesus has been reminding his disciples and reminding us of our immense value to him.

Reminding you that you indeed are loved by him, and that if your faith is in Jesus Christ, you were chosen in him.

And as he in John 17 lifts his eyes to the Father and prays to the Father, again and again we have been reminded that the thing that Jesus prays about is his disciples.

He loves them, he values them.

But the question that we must answer is that if there's two kinds of value, the fragile, valuable thing and the functional valuable thing, which of which value are you to Jesus?

I find it interesting that as we think about this, most of us have been conditioned to think that that spiritual maturity, that holiness in the Christian life is much like wearing a white suit of clothes.

Maybe you have that pair of white pants, you only get to wear them three times, right?

Have you ever made that decision?

I made that decision once to buy a white pair of pants.

You won't see me wear them.

I spilt coffee on them the third time and it never were the same again.

And maybe your idea of the Christian life is that success in the Christian life, spiritual maturity, holiness is just staying as far away from sin as possible.

Maybe you think often that faith would be easier if you didn't have to go to the office, if you didn't have to have your patience tested constantly by your kids.

This idea that our value is in our preservation, that our faith is fragile and must be preserved unharmed until the end.

He's got no interest in making fragile Christians.

He's got no interest in preserving Christians from the messy ugliness of the world.

He is praying to the Father here, not for fragile Christians, but for instruments.

For instruments to reach a world.

By his grace, you are a specialized instrument in his hands.

You are a specialized instrument in the hands of a king who desires to reach the world.

You are needed.

Jesus prayed for you, loved one, for you in John 17, that you would be like a sharpened surgeon's scalpel in a broken, dark world used as a specialized instrument to bring the world healing.

You are an instrument in God's hands.

And the kids are excited this morning.

And we are going to read God's word right now.

So would you stand up and join with me as we read John chapter 17 verse 14 to 26?

John 17:14–26

John chapter 17, verse 14.

John 17:14

I've given them your word.

And the world has hated them because they are not of the world.

Just as I am not of the world.

I do not ask that you take them out of the world, but that you keep them from the evil one.

They are not of the world, just as I am not of the world.

Sanctify them in the truth.

Your word is truth.

As you sent me into the world, so I have sent them into the world.

And for their sake I consecrate myself, that they also may be sanctified in the truth.

I do not ask for these only, but also for those who will believe in me through their word, that they may all be one, just as you, Father, are in me and I in you, that they also may be in us, so that the world may believe that you have sent me.

The glory that you have given me, I have given to them, that they may be one even as we are one, I in them, and you in me, that they may become perfectly one, so that the world may know that you sent me and loved them even as you have loved me.

Father, I desire that they also whom you have given me may be with me where I am, to see my glory that you have given me because you loved me before the foundation of the world.

O righteous Father, even though the world does not know you, I know you, and these know you that you have sent me.

I made known to them your name, and I will continue to make it known, that the love with which you have loved me may be in them and I in them.

This is the word of the Lord.

You can grab a seat.

Filled with expectancy this morning.

I pray that you are reading in Hebrews chapter 9, verse 24, that Jesus entered into heaven, and there he is in the presence of God.

Hebrews 9:24

And the writer of Hebrews says, For us, on our behalf, do you know that loved one that Jesus is ascending for you?

I'm filled with expectancy because I know that the Holy Spirit is here and that he reveals God.

And the Holy Spirit is here revealing this truth to us that Jesus' desire for you is that you be an instrument in the hands of the one who came to seek and save the loss.

We are specialized instruments in his hands, but but you know this about tools that they must be sharpened to be effective.

We all have the kitchen knife that was once so useful that now we never reach for because we need it to be sharpened.

And so as Jesus looks to us as instruments, the first thing that must happen is the preparation.

We must be sharpened.

This is the first thing I want you to see about Jesus' prayer for your life as an instrument.

It is the preparation, a heart immersed in the truth.

A preparation, a heart immersed in the truth.

Look at verse 14 with me.

I have given them your word.

I have given them your word, and the world has hated them because they are not of the world, just as I am not of the world.

Remember where Jesus is as he speaks to his disciples.

Judas has left, and the shadow of the cross is on the floor of the room that they are speaking on.

He has just told them in John chapter 16: in this world you will have tribulation.

Many will try to kill you.

I am leaving you, and I am leaving you in the world.

Jesus is about to leave his disciples in the place that you and I are right now.

It is a territory that is hostile to his kingdom.

Loved one, remember that.

As you live in this world, sometimes the comfort of this world sort of lulls us into forgetting that this is not peaceful territory.

I mean, we know that maybe when we watch the news, we know that physically, but do you know that spiritually, loved ones?

That this is a war zone, that the way that you live in peace territory, in the way that you live in a war zone, is entirely different.

And Jesus is saying in this prayer that he has left you in a war zone.

Now, if you were leaving your friends, if you were leaving your family in a territory you knew was hostile, what would you leave them?

Maybe a gun, right?

Maybe a map, maybe, maybe a a map to here's some places you can hide.

Notice what Jesus gives to us, knowing that he is leaving us in this hostile territory.

I have given them your word.

Your word.

You know, loved one, Jesus knows the pressure that you will face, he knows the stress that you will endure, he knows the depth of your deepest and darkest valley, and he has given you something incredibly important.

He has given you his word.

Why the word?

Of what value does this word have to us?

It is of value in every way because we are reminded by John himself in John chapter 1 that to those who did receive him, that is, receive his word, he gave the right not to be born of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, nor of blood, but of God.

John 1 · chapter mention

It is by the word Peter reminds us that we are born again through the living and abiding word of God.

The word, when received in our heart, is what gives us new birth, so that it is by the word that when you are born again, your loves change, your fears change, your loyalties change, that you are taken, to use John 17 language, out of this world that is uh organized in its hostility towards God.

Everything has changed in you if you have received his word by faith.

And and what what Jesus is is recognizing here is that if the word has changed you, if you have received his word, which every one of these disciples in the upper room, now that Judas has left, have, Jesus has reminded them, then in this world you will have friction.

This is why Jesus says in verse 14, I've given them your word, and the world hated them because they are not of this world.

The word has snatched them out of the world, and Jesus has sent them now back into it, and because they have his word, there is a giant target on their back.

And loved one, you need to know the same.

Theologically, if you've placed your faith in Jesus Christ, you have been snatched out of this world, your DNA is completely changed, and you have now been sent back in.

And there is a target on your back.

The world throughout the Gospel of John can mean different things.

Sometimes it refers to a group of people.

More often than not, it refers to a system that is an organized rebellion against God, a system that is driven by self-interest.

That this is what this world is.

That everyone looks out for themselves.

They are driven by self-interest.

It is a world that loves temporary comfort.

But you, but you, loved one, have been given the word.

And you have been shaped at a spiritual DNA level by a different truth.

And because of it, the world hates you.

The world doesn't hate you because of your personality.

It's not as though you're judgmental or mean.

It hates you because you are a foreign object.

You are made now of a different material.

You are born again as a child of God, and you are running on a different system.

You don't love what the world loves.

You don't fear what the world fears.

You probably ran into this kind of friction this week.

Maybe a conversation turned into gossip and you just simply refused to join in that conversation.

Maybe you're talking to a neighbor as they wrap their mind around a world crisis or a crisis that maybe your family's going it through, and you have this peace that the world can't make sense of because they do not know its source.

Maybe someone has mocked your commitment to your marriage, your generosity, the way that you use your time, your refusal to give up everything just to climb a ladder in this world.

You are different.

If your faith is in Jesus Christ, you are different.

Can we just say it like this?

You're weird.

Is that what you wanted to hear this morning?

You're weird, right?

I mean, the word has fundamentally changed you.

You are not of the world.

And so you will have friction in it.

So long as God is sharpening you by his word, you will have friction with this world.

Remember, loved ones, that's the point.

You are an instrument in God's hands in the world.

You are an instrument.

Just as metal creates sparks when it hits something hard, so your effectiveness in this world means that there will be friction.

The tool must be prepared for the task.

And so my question to you this morning, and Jesus' prayer for you this morning, is this how are you handling the friction?

How are you handling the friction of the world?

Are you sort of trying to blend in with the world?

And when the gossip happens, you know, you know, just well, I mean, maybe I'll take part of it just so I can sort of blend in.

Maybe your prayer in this world is just to, I mean, Lord, get me out of this world.

Just maybe if if I didn't have this job anymore, it'd be so much easier.

Get me away from these people, and faith will be so easy, but but look at verse 15 and notice, loved one, that Jesus' prayer for you is exactly the opposite.

I do not ask that you take them out of the world.

I do not ask that you take them out of the world.

Love one, you ever heard that in a prayer before?

We don't often pray about what we're not praying for, do we?

I mean, Jesus is making it crystal clear what the temptation for you is gonna be.

It is going to be your desire to be taken from the world, to isolate yourself from the world.

Well, I'll just unfollow that person.

They're a little worldly for me.

I just will avoid eye contact with that neighbor.

They're a little worldly for me.

And we sort of become these functional monks, living in our own self-made monasteries.

Jesus, you know, he says, I do not ask that you take them out of the world.

Jesus is not interested in your isolation from the world.

He's interested in your impact.

Jesus is not interested in keeping your faith hidden in a museum.

Jesus is very interested in your life being in the mess of the world.

So that if you look at your life right now and it is a mess, Jesus is saying, This is where I need.

This is where I need this instrument.

I do not ask that you take them out of the world, Jesus says.

Notice what he continues to say.

Keep them from the evil one.

Do you see the danger here, loved one?

The danger is not that you are just in the world, the danger is that you become of the world.

The danger is that the world becomes corrosive to you, that you begin to rush, that you begin to adopt their fears, their greed, their bitterness.

Jesus, knowing this danger, then, look how he prays in verse 17.

Sanctify them in the truth.

Your word is truth.

To sanctify something means to set it apart for a special purpose.

In the Old Testament, objects in the temple were sanctified.

Whether they were bowls or lamps or instruments, these objects they weren't sinful, but they were devoted to a purpose.

Kings had sanctified objects that only they were allowed to use.

It is sanctified for your purpose.

It is set apart for you.

Now, Jesus here prays for us that we would be sanctified.

Not that we would just be set apart from sin, but that we would be devoted to God's use, devoted to a purpose.

What Jesus then is doing here this morning for us is, I find quite astonishing.

You could imagine that he is grabbing you by the shoulders, okay?

I mean he's grabbing me as well, but he's grabbing you by the shoulders and he's looking you in the eyes, and he's saying, he's maybe actually not looking at you in the eyes, he's looking up at heaven and he's praying for you as he holds your shoulders and he says, Father, use them.

Father, I am devoting him to your purposes.

Father, I'm devoting her to your purposes.

He looks at you, loved ones.

I mean, can we just don't think about the person beside you for a moment.

Don't think about me, don't think about the elder, don't think about the small group leader.

If your faith is in Jesus Christ, Jesus' prayer for you, no matter how inadequate you feel for the task, no matter how impossible it feels, Jesus' prayer for you lovingly with his hands on your shoulders.

Father, use them, sanctify them for your purpose.

But loved one, look again at verse 17 and notice where the devotion happens.

Notice where the sanctification happens in the tr in the truth.

Your word is truth.

If you want to be useful in the hands of the king, if you want to be sharpened as an instrument in God's hands, you must be shaped by the voice of the king.

You must be sharpened by God's word.

Now, Jesus does not shape his people simply so that they can be put into a display case and then shine their sort of brilliance to the world.

He prepares them so that he can send them, and that's the second reality I want you to see this morning.

A useful life in the hands of the king is not only prepared, but it is given purpose.

It is a life devoted to the mission.

This is the purpose, a life devoted to the mission.

Look at verse 18 with me.

Notice what Jesus says.

As you sent me into the world, so I have sent them into the world.

As you have sent me into the world, so I have sent them into the world.

This verse is staggering if we will slow down long enough to let its weight bear on our souls.

Jesus is looking at you this morning and not just simply saying, Have a mission.

I mean, the whole world says that, right?

You have a purpose.

You are important here.

Jesus is looking and he's saying so much more.

He is saying that in him you have a mission that is patterned after his mission.

As I have been sent, so I have sent them.

Now the Father sent the Son, who was eternally in heaven.

He sent the Son to earth to seek and save the lost.

Now the Son sends us, having taken us out of the world, into the world, to do the same.

Now, before we talk about being sent, then, the essential question we must talk about before we can even understand the purpose of our life is this Was Jesus sent for you?

Was Jesus sent for you?

Loved one, are you one of the ones that as Jesus prayers?

He says, This is the one I love, this is the one I have have chosen, this is the one who has received my word.

The Father sent the Son on a rescue mission, not to condemn the world, but to save it.

Jesus then came to this world and he carried on our shoulders our brokenness.

He didn't have to.

He for eternity was in heaven, separate from the brokenness of this world, separate from the darkness that is this world.

But he chose to descend into this world for one purpose and one purpose alone.

And it is perhaps emphasized in this prayer as we are just a few short hours away from when Jesus will be beaten and carry a cross on which he will hang.

And bear the judgment of all those who would believe in him.

This is hours away.

The ominous music in the gospel, according to John, is playing right now.

Jesus is about to die so that if you are here, you can place your faith in Jesus Christ and turn from your sin in this very moment and trust in him and be saved for eternity, so that you can have eternal the eternal life that Jesus came to bring, that he speaks about in verse 3, the eternal life of knowing God and Jesus Christ, whom you have sent.

None of this sermon can make sense unless you first believe that Jesus has been sent to die for you.

Loved one, your life cannot have a purpose that is of any substance unless you bend the knee to Jesus Christ and recognize that he has created you for a purpose.

This is where life begins.

Will you turn to him then?

Submitting in your heart to the King Jesus to say, Lord, I mean, I just have nothing apart from you.

What am I living for if it is not for you, Jesus Christ?

Now, once we do that, he not only forgives us, he gives our life a mission bigger than itself.

And he says to his disciples, as he says to each of us whose faith is in him, in the way that I was sent, I now send you.

You see it there again in verse 18: as you sent me into the world, so I have sent them.

This is why the preparation mattered.

This is why we needed to be sharpened, because Jesus' plan was never for truth to just stop with you.

It was always meant to shape you into an instrument that God could then send.

That is the point of the truth.

Jesus has us here in this church, not so that we can have sort of this holy huddle every Sunday morning and say, wow, it was a wild week.

Okay, hey, I'm so glad we survived.

I hope we can make it to next week.

There is a sense in which every Sunday morning is a commissioning where we are sharpened again by the word of God so that we can then be used by the word, but use the word.

We can be an instrument in the world.

What Jesus is telling us here is that Christianity is not a bunker where we hide from the world, that Christianity is a deployment center.

That to be a follower of Jesus is to be commissioned to his purpose, that to be saved is to be sent.

Loved one, you can I just let you know, your spiritual life will make absolutely no sense if you are not sent for the purpose of the gospel.

It is like a conduit where you can put as much water in the one side as you as you can possibly fathom.

If the other side is blocked up, it just does not work.

The call that Jesus has placed on your life to reach the lost, to be sent for his purpose.

It is what makes the Christian life work.

We are deployed by Jesus.

Prepared by him, by the truth of God, so that we can be sent into a world that opposes him.

You know you're ascent?

Do you feel the weight of Jesus' commission on your life?

Do you know that your life is not random?

Do you know that the neighborhood you live in is not random?

You know the workplace that you are a part of is not random.

You know, the relationship that your life is connected to.

It is not random.

They are your assignment.

They are your assignment.

You are a specialized instrument in the hands of a king, and the king has placed you exactly, exactly where he wants you.

With a reach that nobody else in this church has.

You know that about your life?

I mean, I'm sorry if you didn't, and I'm sorry if that's like news that is like, you know, you know, depressing to you.

This is what Jesus has made you by his word.

This is what he has commissioned to you, you two, when you came to him and you said, It's not my life, Lord, it's yours.

He has commissioned you to this.

But but I want you to notice something here: that one of the evidences of the reality that you have been saved is that you are sent, and not just sent in any way, that you are sent as Jesus was then sent.

So the question then, as we read this text, is this Does your life bear the marks of the reality that Jesus has been sent for you?

And so then what we can do is think about the way that Jesus was sent for us for a moment and ask ourselves: are we sent in the same way?

Are we living the same way?

And so we've got a little substructure here up on the screen.

I hope this is helpful to you.

Loved one, I want you to notice first that Jesus was sent from comfort to commission.

Jesus was sent from comfort to commission.

Jesus did not leave heaven in the warmth of intimacy with God the Father to pursue comfort.

He came on a commission.

Think about the reality of that first day when Jesus was born into this world.

You know, some sort of fairy tales say that he was born without tears, that as a baby he didn't cry.

And I don't know if there's anything more weird and I don't even want to call it supernatural than that.

Jesus was born into a world where he cried.

He was born as a baby, and all the things that come along with babies and, you know, diapers and all that stuff.

He was born into a world that was broken.

He faced trial, he faced the death of ones that he loved.

He faced the darkness of this world.

He lived in a world where he was afraid of his safety.

Every single trial and temptation we are told, Jesus faced, he knew the darkness of the world.

He left the comfort of heaven where none of that darkness was on a commission.

And if we are sent the way he was sent, our lives cannot be built around comfort either.

The question can no longer be: how can I build the most comfortable life?

How can I use my time in the most comfortable way?

How can I use my talents in the way that benefit me the most?

How can I use my treasures to build the kingdom of comfort?

The question must become: where has the king placed me so I can represent him?

From comfort to commission.

Notice, secondly, loved one, that Jesus came from isolation to proximity.

He did not save the world from a distance.

He could not.

Jesus needed to come and be our human righteousness.

And when he came, he came nearer to us.

It gives us great comfort as sinners to know that Jesus ate with sinners.

It gave us great gives us great comfort to know as broken people that Jesus drew nearer to the broken.

It gives us great comfort to know that in the messiness of our human life, Jesus was constantly entering into the messiest of situations.

And in verse 15, Jesus says, I do not ask that you take them out of the world.

Why?

Because your mission requires proximity to people.

The mission requires that you get your hands muddy with the dirt of people's lives in order that you might bring a message of hope to them.

You cannot reach people who you never get close to.

From consumption to contribution.

Jesus did not come to take from the world.

Even as everyone sort of wanted him to, even as soon as he started his ministry and Satan tempted him in the desert and said, Hey, listen, you could have all these, this you could have this throne, this worldly throne, and everyone would bow to your knee, bow bow the knee to you.

Even as the disciples tried to sort of host this revolution and make him a political ruler, Jesus constantly said, No.

He humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.

And that was the way that he was exalted.

He gave himself up.

We were told the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve and to give his life as a ransom for many.

We live in a world that is obsessed with consumption.

What can I get from the church?

What programs does the church have to benefit me?

What other people can I connect with that are going to serve my needs, serve my purposes?

Here, Jesus comes and instead of asking what can I get from the church, he begins by modeling for us what we must ask.

How can I contribute to the mission of God?

Where can I serve?

How can I be involved in discipling people?

Who can I help move closer to Christ?

Loved ones, these are the marks of ascent life from comfort to commission, from isolation to proximity, from consumption to contribution.

And this is not theoretical for us.

We can make this incredibly practical right now.

I'm just incredibly, I said it already, but just expectant that the Holy Spirit is working in this place where there's this kind of burning desire in you, like there is in me, along with this recognition of there's a lot of growth that needs to happen.

There's this recognition that God is graceful, and there's this desire, God, I want to be used.

I want to be used.

I know I don't have much to offer.

I want to be used.

Let's get immensely practical.

In just a few weeks, we're gonna gather to celebrate the resurrection of Jesus Christ.

And for many people that you know, this is a rare moment in the year where they are actually open to stepping into a church.

Which means this is a unique opportunity for a people who then by the Holy Spirit have this conviction to be a sent people, for a people who, like Jesus, want to be commissioned, who want to be close to other people, who want to contribute.

This is a unique opportunity for us.

You should have received.

If you didn't, you can find them after the service.

It's probably scattered out on chairs and at the back at the Connection Center, an invite to Easter.

These beautiful Easter cards.

They are very beautiful, but they're not meant to stay in your hands, nor are they magical.

They're somewhere in between those two things.

This is a tool for you.

It is a tool that can help you live the kind of life Jesus is talking about here.

And so let me encourage you to do something incredibly simple.

Choose three people in your life.

Let's get really practical.

I mean, write them down today, after the service, in your car, maybe even on this invite, okay?

You can grab three more and just use this as scrap paper.

Is that okay, Joel?

If Joel's okay with it, okay?

You can write them down on this on this invite.

Here are the three people.

And then with those three people, do three things.

First, pray for them that God would open their heart.

Second, invite them.

Hand them the invite, send them a picture of the invite, tell them about it, tell them about the details.

Third, bring them.

Offer to sit with them, meet them at the door, make it make it easy for them to come.

I want you to, I mean, take this challenge.

I'm I'm doing the same thing.

I've got three people.

I'm doing the exact same thing.

Loved one, you can make this so practical.

Take this desire that the Holy Spirit has placed in your life and this tool that the Holy Spirit has placed then in your hands and make practical the commission that Christ has given to you to be sent.

You know what I find so fascinating is how, you know, prone we are to just question the worth of an invite.

And yeah, I want to tell you a story.

My mother-in-law, who attends this church, she she grew up around the gospel and knew the gospel but had departed from it.

One day she's getting her hair cut, and her hairdresser did something incredibly simple.

She invited her to church.

I mean, as far as I know, there is no sort of like gospel conversation or just, hey, you know, you should come to church with me.

And it was that invitation that the Lord used to bring my mother-in-law back into a relationship with her.

And it was her relationship with my wife then that that began faith, that the Lord used to begin faith in my own wife.

And now my kids are being raised in this heritage of discipleship, and I can't, I just, my mind is blown at the reality of what can happen with through a simple invitation.

Do you know why that can happen, loved one?

Look at verse 20 with me.

Look at verse 20 with me.

When Jesus prays, I do not ask for these only, but also for those who will believe in me through their word.

Through their word.

I mean, just a couple weeks ago we saw that you can never witness to a person that the Holy Spirit has not yet witnessed to.

Now we recognize that those people that are on your heart as we talk about this, where maybe even the inner lawyer right now is saying, No.

I mean, I can't not them.

It can't be them.

Jesus has prayed for them.

He's prayed for them.

I do not pray for these only.

I pray for those who will believe through their word.

Loved one, do you believe in the power of prayer?

Do you believe in the power of Jesus' prayer?

For the people who will believe through something so simple as an invite.

We take up the invite.

We take the opportunity to share.

And Easter, I gotta say, is one of the simplest opportunities we have.

Now, as Jesus continues to pray, as he continues to lift his eyes to the Father, at the end of his prayer here, from verses 21 to 26, he shows us where the power for change is really seen.

Where the power for salvation is displayed.

If every believer simply tried to do this alone, it would eventually be too great of a pressure.

The opposition would be too real, which is why the last thing that Jesus prays about is not strategy for the people that he's praying would be sent.

It is for unity.

Notice what he says in verse 21.

He says that they may all be one, just as you, Father, are in me and I in you, that they may all they also may be in us.

So that, loved one, circle the so that there.

This is so important.

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

This is the third thing I want you to see this morning.

I want you to see the proof.

Here is the proof of God's love for the world that He came to seek and to save.

It is a people united for witness.

It is a people united for witness, that they may be all one, that the unity of God's people may be intact so that the world may believe that you have sent me.

What is it in the world that will convince the lost that the gospel is true?

It's fascinating.

It's fascinating what Jesus points to.

When he says the world needs to be convinced the gospel is true, it's fascinating that Jesus doesn't point to a building.

I mean, praise God for that for us, right?

For our church at least.

He doesn't point, I mean, look how amazing their buildings are.

He doesn't point to programs.

Look how amazing their youth ministry is.

As amazing it as it is, shout out to Adam, wherever he is.

You know, as amazing it as it is.

Look at their small groups, look at their programs.

He doesn't even say, look at their preaching.

As amazing as that is, right?

Amen.

Just help me out here, even if it's not, okay.

You know what he says?

Look at their genuine love for each other.

The church should be able to look at the world and say, something supernatural is happening here.

These people are too different.

They're too diverse.

I mean, this kind of gathering, it doesn't happen by mistake.

They are too welcoming of outsiders for absolutely no reason.

It's kind of weird.

That is what the church should see when it looks into the world.

A genuine love for one another, because Jesus believes that when the world sees that, they will then believe that you have sent me.

That the only logical explanation for that will be the love of the Father for these people.

But it gets even deeper than that.

Look at verses 22.

And as Jesus goes on in verse 23 and 24, it's really the same thing he's saying: the glory that you have given to me, I have given to them, that they may be one, even as I am one.

Jesus is saying that when the people of God genuinely love one another, the very life of God has been shared with his people.

That same love that the Father has had for the Son throughout all of eternity is now alive in the church.

This is why Jesus can then leave to go back to be with the Father.

Because as the church is then established, there is a display of God's love made known in the world.

The church is not just a place where there are friendly people.

And I praise God that there are incredibly friendly people here.

But you know, one of the things that people say the most about our church as they come and they're new is it was so welcoming.

It was so welcoming.

And you know, you know why I praise the Lord for that?

Because Paul in Romans says, welcome one another as Christ has welcomed you.

Welcome one another as Christ has welcomed you.

And I genuinely believe that the heart of this welcoming, and I'm saying this to encourage you, church, in what you are doing and encourage you to just to excel all the more in this.

I want you to see the overflow of divine love that is in this place.

The same love that the Father has for the Son, the same love that the Son has for the Father is now living inside the people of God.

It has made all these different people of different ages, of different personalities, of different backgrounds, of different struggles.

It has made them into family.

You know, can I speak to you if you feel like you are perhaps an outsider?

I was looking at the demographics of our church.

I actually want you to know that we're all outsiders.

The biggest demographic of our church is four to eleven year olds.

By about double.

Which I find kind of terrifying because I have a four-year-old who, if she were in charge of a revolt, of a revolution at Redemption Church, would be absolutely terrifying, okay?

So in one sense, we are all outsiders to those group of people who were screaming a few minutes ago in the service.

But in another sense, I understand that in a lot of ways we are a very young church, that the main demographic of this church is families with young children.

And I know how difficult it can be to feel like, to feel like, well, you know, that's not really us.

Maybe we're in a different stage.

And I want you to know, loved one, how important, how important you are.

I want you to know how the parents, the young parents of this church need your encouragement.

You know, if you have been through those days and you've survived, I mean the parents sometimes just need you to say, hey, listen, it's gonna get messy, but you're gonna be okay.

You are gonna be okay.

Maybe you're here and you're younger and you're looking ahead and you're saying, Man, I just I don't know if I have much to offer.

I mean, maybe planning to have kids myself, and so I can take an example.

And I just want you to know that that the church, older believers need younger believers to spur them on in the faith, to remind them of what is important, to remind them of what is exciting.

I mean, that's what I love in a small group.

I love when a small group has a new or a young believer who is for the first time tasting things that that you know I'd seen years ago, and I'm reminded, oh, it isn't that is amazing.

That truth is amazing.

Love when you are needed here.

You are needed here.

The church needs a unity of different ages, of different personalities, of different backgrounds, because there's no other place in the world that is like that.

There isn't.

I mean, I'm a part of a hockey team, and there's a bunch of weird guys there too, but as soon as I stop playing well at that hockey team, I'll be off.

I don't actually know if that's true.

We're in the bottom division of our league.

But, anyways, you understand what I'm talking about.

There is nothing in the world that says, for no reason apart from the fact that I have been loved, I'm gonna love you.

And when the world sees that, they begin to ask questions.

That brings us back to the original image that we started with.

We are instruments.

And perhaps maybe to deepen the illustration.

You think about a musical instrument and it can make a sound, but it is when many instruments play in harmony that something far more powerful happens, and the church is meant to be that harmony.

And when the world hears it, it points them to a composer.

Notice how Jesus ends this prayer in verse 26.

That the love with which you have loved them may be in them.

Love me may be in them, and I in them.

This means that the love of God is not just something we receive, the love of God is that is something that the church displays, that the world sees through the love of his people.

That means something really practical.

It means that your relationships in your local church are an incredibly important plan for God's witness.

This is why when we studied the first epistle to Timothy a few weeks ago, it said that when the world is looking for truth, the pillar and the buttress of the truth, the scriptures say, are the church.

The church.

It means the way we live together actually matters for the credibility of the gospel.

It means that if there is a if there's someone you're bitter with, that's not just like a you thing, that is a church thing.

It requires forgiveness, requires unity, requires reconciliation.

This is how the gospel is made visible and loved one.

It is, it is muddied.

It is muddied when we don't love well.

It also means something else.

It means this that as an instrument in God's hands, you cannot display the kind of love that God wants to display in your life when you are living at a distance from the church.

You have to be a part of the life of the church.

You have to lean into relationships.

You have to get so deep into the relationship that there is possibility that you might even be hurt by this people.

Can you imagine that?

I mean, everyone here looks so friendly, but can you imagine what happens when a hundred sinners try to do life together?

Is that there is this relational hurt.

And it is that the it's when this hurt happens and the gospel reveals something stronger that the witness of the gospel grows.

You need to lean into relationships.

The world's watching.

And in a culture, don't you feel this that is increasingly divided, that is increasingly hostile, that everywhere you look, I mean, it's just like political that, political this, they're there words that I shouldn't say from the pulpit, and you know, they're also nice people, and everywhere you look, isn't the world like that?

Where's the one place where the world can see real love?

Where forgiveness is real, where unity is real.

It's the church.

Can I ask you then something?

Are you in close enough proximity to the people in this church or in your church, wherever that that kind of love is visible in your life?

You can't reach the world on your own.

Jesus never intended you to.

When he talks about a sent people, it is not by accident that he ends with unity.

He is forming a people, a church that is shaped by truth, sent into the world.

A people whose love for one another becomes living proof that the gospel is real.

Remember where we started?

That there is value in certain things because they are fragile, because they are locked away, because they are protected, but other things are valued because they are useful.

They are placed in the hands of the master and put to work.

Otherwise, Jesus is not making fragile Christians.

He's forming instruments.

He is shaping those instruments by the truth.

He is sending those instruments into the world, and when those instruments work together in unity, the world will know and believe the love of God.

Would you pray with me?

Father, we thank you, Lord, that you have not just saved us to just a life of hiding away and waiting for your return as we do eagerly long for and await your return.

You have commissioned us to a task.

And Father, we pray, Lord, that your Holy Spirit, as you have been so faithful to do already, would continue to commission us to that task, to empower us for it.

Father, thank you that all authority is yours, that you reign supreme, that as we are being sent, we are not being sent without help.

God, that even in John 17, we have been prayed for ourselves, and that those we are sent to have been prayed for as well, so that we have every hope.

And so, God, we take this time now then to worship you, knowing that you are sovereignly in control of all things, and that it is from that power that you have sent us into the world.

God, you're so worthy of praise.

And we pray this all in the name of your son.

Amen.

Amen.

Would you stand and respond in song with us?