The Greatest Invitation | John 17 | Liz Trenckmann

We are taking a bit of a detour from our mission and vision, and we're jumping into the Gospel of John, chapter 17.

John 17 · chapter mention

And I just find this gospel absolutely incredible.

John kind of writes this magnum opus, you know, from his first words in chapter one till the end of chapter 21.

John peels back the layers of Jesus as the Son of God come in flesh.

And chapter 17 is the pinnacle of the gospel where the Son of God is praying to God the Father.

And in this chapter, we get to see a very intimate look into the relationship between the Father and the Son, the very relationship that we as children are invited into.

Now we're not tackling the whole chapter because I think we'd probably be here till like next Sunday.

So we're just gonna take the end of Jesus' prayer.

So turn with me to John chapter 17, verse 20.

John 17:20

My prayer is not for them alone.

I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message, 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.

I have given them the glory that you gave me, that they may be one as we are one, 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.

Father, I want those you have given me to be with me where I am and to see my glory, the glory you have given me because you loved me before the creation of the world.

Righteous Father, though the world does not know you, I know you, and they know that you have sent me.

I have made you known to them and will continue to make you known in order that the love you have for me may be in them and that I myself may be in them.

Listening to Jesus talk to his father reminds me of of my love for communication.

My family and I have been here about two months, and and I have found that I really love watching you guys talk.

Even just now, it's so evident that you love each other and you want to know each other.

It's amazing how love uh we can feel when people ask us questions, when they show interest, and when they they share about themselves.

I would say that Rob has always been good at asking questions.

When we first met, his parents came to the youth group that I was kind of going to.

Um, and the first thing they did was take us on a weekend retreat.

So we met in a parking lot and we all hopped in buses, and my best friend and I went in the bus where like no one was in it, so we could have all this room.

Um, but then, like halfway through the trip, these really rude boys jumped in our van to fill it up.

Um, but then this curly-haired boy with this big old smile turned around and he asked me a question, and that started a conversation, and it continued.

Friday, Saturday, Sunday.

Um, but I would say not all communication is the same, right?

At the end of the weekend, that boy got my email and he started emailing me.

But um what Rob came to learn about me is that I hate email, I'm not very good at it.

Um, I try hard, but but back then I was super busy.

I was going to school, I was working part-time, and I was playing high school sports.

I didn't have time for email.

But one day I was like, okay, I'm gonna check my email.

And I had like 15 emails from this kid.

And I was like, he is super crazy.

No smile and no curls were getting him out of this mess.

So I deleted all the emails and I changed my route around school so I didn't see him anymore.

In case you're wondering, um, he is and and was very persistent and walked around that school until he found me.

A few months later, he went off to college and things looked a little different.

Instead of deleting all of those emails, I faithfully checked my email.

Not just every day, but like multiple times a day, and I read every letter he sent.

In fact, I didn't just read them once, I read them over and over and over again, and I paid attention to everything.

Those letters were from someone I really wanted to know.

I love communication.

So if I had to define my ideal relationship with God in one word, I would probably use the word communication.

I really love listening to God's words and chatting to God in prayer.

Communicating makes me feel known and it helps me know and love God.

And I love that God delights in communicating with us, that his very word became flesh, and then after Jesus' death, he left us with the written word.

And in both, we get to see God's heart and we get to read about God's actions and we get to become familiar with his voice.

And so we see from Genesis to Revelation that God delights in communicating with his people.

But I would guess that not all of us in this room would define our ideal relationship with God by using the word communication.

Maybe it's because you don't feel like God communicates with you.

God actually feels like distant and silent, and your relationship with him feels stale.

You know, it's kind of like that old candy in the pantry.

You know it's there, but you don't do anything with it.

Um perhaps God feels like a master who desires power.

Um, he tells you what to do, and you obey.

There isn't much relationship, but you both know who's in charge.

Or maybe you view God like a grandpa or a Santa Claus.

He's always cheerful, and you ask for something and he gives it to you.

It's perfect.

Or maybe God is an experience to enjoy.

Your faith is held together by those kind of once-a-year special events, like think like camps or weekend retreats.

It's an emotional experience that makes us feel closer to Jesus.

But we all know these all have problems, right?

Um, if God is seen as a master, the goal becomes not to make God mad.

And then people tend to follow out of fear rather than faith or out of love.

If God is grandpa or a Santa Claus, then faith is based on getting what we want when we want it.

We're constantly asking for the next thing.

We're never satisfied.

God, just a little bit more, just the next thing.

And if God is an experience to enjoy, then we're searching for that next high.

God becomes like a drug.

You need the next high to believe, and yet it never quite seems to be as fulfilling as the time before, and then after that high, you feel kind of empty and rather than fulfilled.

It's like whipped cream, an initial energy burst, and then crash.

How we view God and what we expect from God shapes how we relate to God.

How we view God and what we expect from God shapes how we relate to God.

Instead of thinking about what you expect from God, think about how you're currently relating to God.

Are you going from request to request?

God, please give me an A on that exam.

God, I just want to trip with my family.

God, I would like a little bigger house, a little nicer car, or maybe just a little better paying job.

Not too much.

Just a little.

Or from experience to experience.

God, I will believe you exist if I can just feel you.

God, I'll know you're present if you do this miracle.

God, I will know you care if you just fulfill this prayer.

Or maybe it's obedience.

Christianity is a checklist.

God, I didn't get angry at my kids today.

Check.

Um, God, I didn't honk at the person who cut me off in traffic.

That totally deserved it.

Check.

Um, God, I didn't cheat on my school test.

Check.

Um, God, I I prayed today.

Bonus points.

Um, God, I even read my Bible.

Like, I'm killing this.

Um thinking of these, let me ask you, how does the way you're currently relating to God reveal how you view God?

What do your expectations of Him say about how you view Him?

As we dig into this passage this morning, ask yourself, how does Jesus describe his relationship with the Father?

And then how does that change how we view and pursue a relationship with the Father?

Because how we view God shapes how we pursue God.

The Gospel of John is this incredible story of the Son of God becoming flesh, God Himself, maker of heaven and earth, becoming human and dying for the very people he breathed life into.

John 17 is right before Jesus goes to the cross.

He's had his last supper with the disciples, he's spoken his final words to him, and then he turns and he prays to the Father.

God is is talking, oh sorry, God the Son is talking to God the Father, Jesus is talking to his dad, and we get to listen in.

It's pretty crazy.

I think that Jesus is probably arguably at the most emotional peak of his life.

He's dying the next day, like tomorrow.

And he knows it.

I think if I were Jesus, I would probably be praying for God to fill this fear or or to take it away.

I'd be looking for hope.

I'd be looking for something good in this absolutely horrible situation.

But we don't see Jesus doing that.

We don't hear him saying over and over, Father, I need you, I need you right now, I need more of you right now.

Give me this or give me that.

Instead, he's doing something completely different.

As I read these words, think about what he's doing in this great time of need for him.

My prayer is not for them alone.

I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message, 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.

Right before his death, right before his greatest suffering, Jesus prays not just for his disciples that are sitting there with him, but he's praying for believers to come.

That's us in this room.

That's you and that's me.

That's incredible.

And what does he pray for?

What does he pray for people he's never met?

That they would be one with each other, and that they would be one with him and the father.

He prays that in the same way that he and the father are one in each other, we may be one and in their relationship, in their perfect and eternal relationship.

He prays that we would be in it.

That is absolutely incredible.

We're invited into this relationship.

But but this is crazy because we aren't Jesus.

We we aren't children of God in the same way, we're different, right?

Rob and I have some friends that adopted a little boy from Ethiopia.

He was like this big and now he's like this big.

Um, but I remember praying for him.

I remember their baby shower.

I remember um the wife and husband leaving to go get him and then coming back.

I remember her carrying him in a front pack for months.

He was so beautiful, and they were so in love.

I think he was about a year old, and and I went over um to talk with her.

Uh Caleb had been born in that year, and I remember having this conversation where I told her that when Caleb was born, I just stared at him.

I didn't want to sleep, I just wanted to hold him, I wanted to touch his sweet cheeks and hold his hands.

It was beautiful, and I had no idea that I could be so captivated by a person.

I even remember looking at Rob and being like, I'm so sorry.

And he was like, What?

And I was like, I think I love him more than you.

I'm really sorry.

And then after I told her this story and we laughed, I asked her, like, what does it feel like to adopt?

Like, does he feel like he's really yours?

And I remember her eyes sparkling and this huge smile coming across her face, and she said, The moment they put him in my arms, I knew that he was mine and I was his.

And when God looks at us, his eyes sparkle, and he has a big smile on his face, and he says, They're mine.

In Jesus' prayer, he's inviting us into this relationship that the Father and the Son have enjoyed for all of eternity.

When I think of relationships, they're they're kind of funny, right?

Growing up, if you came to my house for dinner, you would find two fairly quiet introverts and then me, Liz.

You went to my grandparents' house for dinner, you would find four fairly quiet introverts and then me.

Dinners were great.

Like I chatted my way through a meal at meal and no one interrupted.

It was like a chatty extrovert's dream.

It was amazing.

Now, when I met Rob, we became two chatty extroverts who could chat for days.

And I remember the first time he asked me to come to his house for dinner.

He grew up in a family of five.

And to be honest, introvert or extrovert, it did not matter.

Everybody had something to say.

And it seemed to me that no one breathed because if you paused or even if you even thought about it, someone else like sensed it and they had already taken the mic and the conversation a different direction.

And I remember sitting there like in utter disbelief.

I didn't think, I don't think I said a single word that dinner.

I still can't figure out how there wasn't a pause, and yet everyone seemed to eat their dinner.

How does that even work?

But I remember Rob leaning over a couple times, being like, Are you gonna say anything?

Like you're gonna contribute?

Being like, I I don't know how.

I felt so different.

I felt out of my debt.

Rob's family is wonderful and they're very inviting, but it was different than dinners at my house.

And I didn't really feel like I belonged.

Imagine with me being invited over to God's house for dinner.

Um, the table is covered in like beautiful Polish pottery.

Um, and in each dish, the food looks like a picture on a magazine, and your favorite foods are filling the table.

There's like the usual questions like where do I sit?

What are some questions I can ask?

How much can I eat of this incredible meal without looking like a glutton, you know?

Um, but then there's the usual ones, like, um, does God sit in a chair?

And like, if so, is it one or is it three?

Like, uh who prays for dinner held by God?

Like, please don't choose me.

Um, who do I thank for the cooking?

I don't know.

Um, how intimidating, right?

And yet, we who are imperfect are invited into this perfect relationship, this perfect oneness of the Trinity.

This is their heart, and we read it in verse 21, where Jesus says to the Father, just as you are in me and I am in you, may they also be in us.

Incredible.

But why?

Who is this God that he wants us, broken, little sinful human beings, to enter into the relationship between him and the Son?

If we turn to John 1-1, we would see that Jesus is the eternally begotten Son.

Through him came, though he came to be a man in flesh when Mary gave birth to him, he has been God's Son forever.

Jesus is the living word, the written word, and the spoken word.

And in Genesis 1, when God spoke, Jesus created and the Spirit hovered.

The Trinity has always been one and always been perfectly united.

What's the source of this unity?

1, John 4 8 says that God is love.

He's not loving or lovable, but is love.

The Trinity is perfectly one because God is perfectly love.

The very core of God is love.

Okay, so I say that, but I admit that I find that sometimes really hard to believe.

Sometimes it's it's hard to grasp that God is love, especially when we see so much in the world.

Um, when I was in high school, I had this soccer injury that affected my back.

I went to PT, it healed, and then I had my first baby.

Did PT again, but it didn't quite heal like it had before.

And then we moved to Hungary.

We rented an unfurnished house.

We didn't want to spend a lot of money on furniture because our stuff was coming from the US by boat.

Um, so we bought mattresses, but not bed frames, and we chucked them on the floor.

Like I, Rob and I had mattresses, Caleb had a mattress, our three interns that were living with us had mattresses.

Like, everyone had a bed.

It was a win.

Um but after a few weeks, I remember my back started to get sore, and and every morning it got a little more sore.

Um, a friend recommended that I go to this doctor, so I did.

She checked me out, she recommended a cortisone shot, and I was like, no problem, I've done my homework.

Um I know what I'm saying yes to.

However, um back then Hungary was about 30 years behind the medical here in the US, and they gave their cortisol cortisone shots blind, which means they didn't use like an ultrasound or an x-ray to watch where the needle goes in.

So um they gave it in and she um hit my spine.

A few minutes later, um the doc came in and she asked me to roll over, and I was like, I can't.

And so she helped me roll over and then she was like, Okay, now sit up.

And I was like, I I can't.

She had hit my spine, like an epidural, it paralyzed me from the waist down, and it started to leak.

Um the doctor just kind of looked at me and said, uh, happens all the time, you'll be fine, and sent me on my way.

Um, but the next morning, if you've had one of those, I woke up with that chainsaw headache that you feel like your head is going to explode and you just want to be flat.

Um, here in the States, it would be a super easy fix.

You could go in and get a blood patch, and then within you know an hour you're walking out of the hospital pain-free.

Um, but at that time, they they didn't do that yet in Hungary.

And so Rob took me to the hospital.

Um, it's gonna be the ER, they checked me in, and then after a horrendous overnight visit where they thought I might have had meningitis, they lost my records, um, another lumbar puncture, uh, brain scans, drunk men walking in and out of my room.

That was actually the storage closet.

Um, the doc agreed that it was a spinal fluid leak, and Rob took me home.

I mean, she actually said, you could stay and I'll take care of you for another day.

And I was like, uh uh.

Like, Rob, take me home.

Um but the leak didn't heal, and I spent months laying on the floor trying to play with my three-year-old son.

I'm not sure that I've ever felt so weak and frail in my life.

And God didn't feel kind or loving or caring.

And I wondered pretty much every day, why?

Why did you bring us all the way over here for not just me but my family, for Rob and Caleb to go through all of this?

And yet, God was working.

His love was infiltrating things that I couldn't see.

Just last week, uh Rob and I were talking about people we got to see come to Christ in Hungary, and the marriages now.

Because those people came to Christ have formed godly marriages.

The team that is now there is thriving and hungry, and people that they are loving on.

It was all more than worth it.

In the pain, God was inviting me and my family and others into something really special, into a special relationship.

The God who wants us broken, little sinful human beings to enter into the love relationship between him and his son is a God that is love.

The God who dwells in love and gives love and is the same yesterday, today, and will be tomorrow.

That is the God that says, You have a place in my home, at my table, and with my family.

You have a place with us and in us.

Because the very nature of who God is, we are able to enter into this incredible oneness between the Father and the Son.

The God of the Bible is the God that lives and dwells in love.

But it doesn't end there.

Jesus says this incredible sentence in verses 22 through 24.

In his prayer, Jesus says to the Father, I have given them the glory that you gave me, that they may be one as we are one, 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 me even as you have loved me.

Love them even as you have loved me.

Father, I want those you have given me to be with me where I am and to see my glory, the glory you have given me because you loved me before the creation of the world.

Did you catch that incredible sentence?

The Father gives Jesus glory, and then Jesus gives the Father glory.

It's this shared glory.

Even before creation, the Father and the Son lived in a relationship of shared, not selfish glory.

The Son doesn't glorify himself, and the Father doesn't glorify himself.

They glorify each other.

They share it.

This is really intriguing to me because if I'm honest, I find sharing glory hard.

Like there are days when I totally get jealous of people with big social media platforms or people who are making an impact on the world or whose names are well known.

I want my own glory.

And yet, neither Jesus nor the Father are concerned about their own glory.

They share it.

And the shared glory has the Father and the Son creating the world and rescuing humanity.

But did you notice the source of the glory of God?

So read verse 24 again.

Father, I want those you have given me.

Again, that's you and that's me to be with me where I am, to see my glory that you have given me.

Why?

Because you loved me before the creation of the world.

The source of their glory is love.

Because the Father and the Son live and dwell in love, they bring each other glory.

But even more, according to this verse, it's a glory that flows out from them rather than contained in them.

It doesn't flow just from the Father to the Son and the Son to the Father.

They do something even more.

They share their glory with us, with you and me, mere humans.

We get to share in the glory that flows within the Trinity.

What is crazy to me is that just in the previous chapters, Jesus was denied and he was betrayed and he was abandoned by both Judas and Peter, from the best of the disciples to the worst of the disciples.

And yet, knowing what is to come, he still washes their feet and he takes their sin to the cross.

And just as Jesus offers to cover them, he covers us with his glory.

And then it goes one step further.

To enter into their relationship and to share in the glory that they share.

How can this happen?

How can we ever enter into the relationship that the father and the son share?

I love John's answer.

It's so clear.

And through his spirit, binding us to the Father, the Father shares himself with us.

He shares his glory with us.

What incredible joy and security.

What amazing love.

But as they think of a father-son relationship or a kid-father relationship, there's some in this room that don't have good relationships with their father.

And it makes it hard for us to see the father without a clouded veil over our eyes.

It's blocking our view.

But what we can be sure about this father is that he never leaves.

He never grows tired of his kids.

He never gets bored.

He never argues or fights or hurts his kids.

He's never harsh about grades.

He doesn't comment on his kids' imperfect body, or he never hinders them in becoming exactly who he hopes they will be.

Instead, this father absolutely delights in his kid.

And this is the father that Jesus is pointing us to.

This is the father that Jesus is saying, know him.

Jesus says the father has the same love for you as he does for him.

As Jesus prays to the Father, Jesus points to the Father.

And the Father points to Jesus.

And we get to see a God.

And that God lives and dwells in love.

And is a God that delights in sharing his glory.

God doesn't come to solely to be a king to be worshipped or a master to be served.

Now he is both of those.

But he doesn't come solely to do that.

Nor does he come to us merely as an experience to be enjoyed or a genie to be exploited.

The true God, whose fundamental nature is God, who has existed from all eternity as Father and Son and Spirit, call us friend and invites us into relationship with Him.

Frankly, dutiful service and ecstatic experiences are both meager substitutes for this loving relationship.

Imagine with me if this type of love, if this type of unity filled every Christian and every church.

Think about how it would change us and change the church and change our communities and change the world.

If people loved each other as Jesus and the Father loved each other, there would be a lot less need and hurt and war because there would be a lot less selfishness and insecurity and want.

Most of us grew up hearing in history class about wars around the world, and we put those kind of facts into a box, you know, so we can pull them out at party games and stuff.

But those facts become real when you experience the effects of it firsthand.

When Rob and I were first married, Rob's sister worked at Africa New Life.

So it's a mission, an organization in Rwanda, Africa, and we got invited to join a team that was going over there.

We supported some kids through Africa New Life, so we got to meet them, and Rob did some treat uh teaching.

It was just an incredible trip.

Um, but there was a day that was really gut-wrenching.

Um, while we were there, we visited the Kigali genocide.

In 1994, there was a genocide against the Tutsis, and about 800,000 people died in around 100 days.

What made that memorial so powerful was that we went through it with Tutsis that were going through it for the first time.

And these Tutsis had parents and grandparents and siblings that had died in that war, and they were seeing these pictures and they were reading the stories for the first time, and tears flowed from their eyes and down their cheeks.

As broken, sinful humans, self-protection and hatred and anger and separation are our natural tendencies.

But if people, if we fully entered into this incredible relationship with the Father and the Son and loved each other as Jesus and the Father love each other, imagine how we'd be changed.

Have you ever thought that how we view God changes how we pursue God?

That how we view God shapes how we do or don't enter into the relationship with Him.

As I was thinking about the sermon, I kept asking, how does God, being both love and sharer of His glory, impact how we pursue Him?

If God is love, then sin is much deeper than just a behavioral problem.

It's a heart problem.

It's a love problem.

We love the wrong things.

Therefore, sin isn't and can't be solved by simply doing good behavior.

It can only be solved through heart surgery, through transformation by the power of the Spirit.

Romans 5.5 says, the Holy Spirit pours the love of God into our hearts.

When we need what we love to change, only the Spirit can do it.

So when I struggle with sin, I need more than anything else to draw near to the God of love so he can change my heart and change what I love.

Because it's God's love that changes everything.

How do we pursue him?

Bible, prayer, worship.

But since God is love, then we don't read the Bible merely to gain knowledge or behaviors or pray to get things or worship for a spiritual experience.

We read to know him.

We read so our hearts can be shaped by his heart.

We read and we pray and we worship to enter into the love the Father shares with his son.

We read and we pray and we worship to know his love, to spend time with him.

What an incredible privilege.

What grace he's offering us.

Through the Spirit, we join the Son and delighting in the Father.

When we respond to God's glory, we're reflecting his glory back to him.

Not because we have to, but because we love him.

When we view God as love, it changes how we pursue him, it changes our hearts, and it changes our lives.

So let me ask you, how are you enjoying, relishing in, and delighting in this relationship that you're invited into?

Do you find yourself captivated by the goodness of God today?

Is your heart warm towards him?

Are you spending time in his presence?

Are you plumbing the depths of the goodness of God?

Is your worship towards him rich?

As you join him on mission, are you motivated by love and joy?

Listen, I get it.

I know I'm kind of describing this ideal.

I'm not perfect.

Um, Rob and I actually just had a conversation about going away for a couple days with another family.

And I looked at him and I was like, uh we ready for them to figure it out that uh our family has like issues that we're not perfect.

But honestly, like our family just moved internationally.

I started a new job.

We have three kids going three different directions.

Um, I feel stressed out about our house in the UK, and life isn't it's not simple, it's it's not easy.

I do get way too tired, and I've struggled with headaches because I keep like locking my jaw, and I'm finding that I'm expecting God to do what I ask rather than ask what he wants me to do.

I'm missing his blessings because I'm focusing on the blessings I don't think he's answering.

But God in his faithfulness loves me anyway.

God in his goodness pulls me back.

God who is full of grace invites me to fix my gaze on him and marvel at his goodness.

God who is love invites me to delight in his presence.

God has invited us to be in them as they are in us.

So I ask you, are you so full of the love of God that it spills out on the people around you?

Is your life flavored by God's values and heart?

If not, I would encourage you to take a moment today and reread this chapter, soak in the truth of what Jesus is praying for you, of what he's inviting us into.

You are being prayed by the prayed for by the Son of God to the Father, so that the love they share will be in you.

This is the greatest invitation that you will ever receive.

Will you pray with me?