http://goo.gl/wpU82B (link to live sermon)
This
particular passage of scripture is called the High Priestly Prayer, and also
the Farewell Discourse. The Gospel according John Chapter is divided into 2
books, the book of signs, and the book of glory, it is also has 7 discourses;
Sign No. 1wedding at Cana-John
Chapter 2
Sign No. 2 Healing
of the nobleman's son-John Chapter 4
Sign No. 3 Healing
of the lame man in Jerusalem-John Chapter 5
Sign No. 4 The
feeding of the 5,000-John Chapter 6
Sign No. 5 Jesus
walks on water-John Chapter 6
Sign No. 6 Healing
of the man born blind-John Chapter 9
Sign No. 7 Raising
Lazarus from the dead-John Chapter 11
Discourse No. 1 Early
Judean ministry: Nicodemus-John Chapter 3
Discourse No. 2 The
Samaritan woman: woman at the well/living water-John Chapter 4
Discourse No. 3 The
discourse on the father and the son-John Chapter 5
Discourse No. 4 The
bread of life discourse-John Chapter 6
Discourse No. 5 Feast
of tabernacles: the spirit-John Chapter 7
Discourse No. 6 Jesus
as light of the world-John Chapter 8
Discourse No. 7 Jesus
as the good shepherd-John Chapter 10
But John chapters 14-17 are known
as the Farewell Discourse, it is given by Jesus to 11 of his disciples after
the Passover meal, that we Christians refer to as the Last Supper. This is a
passing of the baton of sorts, Jesus knows what he has to do, so he is
preparing himself and the Disciples not only for what is to come, but what they
have to do afterwards.
As I was studying the passage, I
thought this was going to be a real complicated piece to preach, I thought I
was going to have to prune and take it piece by piece not trying to
overcomplicate the message with some sort of profound revelation, but the more
I studied the more I realized the purpose of this prayer was real simple.
Eternal life is to know God and know Jesus. All right there in verse 3, know
God and Jesus, you will know eternal life. That is what we are all here for
right? Once we get past tradition, and maybe our parents making us come, that
is why we are all here, we want there to be something more than the 70-100 if
we are real strong, years on this planet. Here Jesus provides a prayer and
gives us the answer, because he gives us the answer, he is operating like he
already has the victory. Notice
also this prayer is not alone, clutching a rock, like so many artist have
painted when he is in the garden; this prayer is right within earshot of all
the other disciples.
Jesus prays for his own
glorification in the first 8 verses, and he prays that the people know God,
that word that Jesus uses for know in the Greek, is comparable to the Hebrew
word used for know in the Old Testament, it means to intimately know God,
develop a relationship with Him. The next part of the passage, Jesus intercedes
for the disciples praying for them because he is going to the Father, they
still have work to do on Earth. Jesus is not praying with defeat, he is praying
from a position of victory.
I am a fan of video games; I am a
fan of all kinds of games but mostly video games and particularly those from
the 80s and early 90s, for the home console systems. Something that I
understand about those games is that they are expensive to make. Teams of
computer programmers, hardware and software specialist come together to make a
video game along with testers, graphic designers, musicians, etc. They work
together for a year or some years to develop a game, which is why they cost so
much. These days, they try to make the video game long to play (60 hours on some) so that the customer
doesn’t feel like they wasted $60, but back in the 80s and 90s there was not
much room on the disks and cartridges so to make the customer feel good about
their purchase, they made the game hard. I would spend entire weekends, and
when school was out, the whole summer trying to figure out how to win some of
these games, some I got really good at, others, not so much.
Just recently I came across a group
of professional gamers who “speed run” they have made a career out of playing a
video game better than everybody else, and some specialize in beating the game
in the fastest way possible. So games that would take me all weekend to get
halfway through, they can beat from start to finish in 10-15 minutes. Some of
these speed runners put on an annual charity marathon where they speed run
these games live and raise money for charity. For example somebody will call in
to the marathon and say they will donate $1000 to autism research if someone
can beat a certain game in 13 minutes, and the speed runner will do it.
Now after getting over the pain of
watching them make my childhood video game skills seem trivial I started to
watch how they played and noticed they didn’t play the same way I used to play
or play now, they have a whole different approach, and I found a sermon in it.
The speed runners play the game victoriously.
First off, they prepare, they know
the game sometimes better than the people who programmed it. We should all
study our craft no matter what it is.
2 Timothy 2:15
King James Version (KJV)
15 Study to shew
thyself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, rightly
dividing the word of truth.
That word study has other
translations, be diligent, do your best, The Message Bible even says
concentrate. The fact is if you want to be victorious, you have to prepare. One
of my favorite music producers Leon Lewis, says all the time, “I am not the best
musician, not the smartest, not the most creative, but you will NEVER out
prepare me.” We ought to spend time studying what ever it is we want to do, but
especially study God’s word.
Something else I noticed about the
speed runners, they don’t stop when the enemy comes, nor do they fight every
enemy. I watched the speed runners walk right past enemies, straight up ignore
them and what they were doing, didn’t fuss, didn’t stress, didn’t stop, just
kept moving. That is hard to do for some of us, we won’t allow ourselves to be
disrespected. We argue every motion, fight every battle, resist every bit of
change, because we want to do it our way and our way is best. We might think
so, but I noticed in the game when you stop to fight every enemy, you might
win, but you lose energy.
Psalm 23:4-5
King James Version (KJV)
4 Yea, though I walk through the
valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil: for thou art with me; thy
rod and thy staff they comfort me.
5 Thou preparest a table before me
in the presence of mine enemies: thou anointest my head with oil; my cup
runneth over.
Thirdly when they enemy does lay a
hand on the runner, they allow the damage caused or the way that they enemy hit
them, push them forward. Everything is used to push the runner forward and not
backwards, instead of sitting around complaining about getting hit they let the
hit push them further toward the end. Too many times we let our setbacks be our
stopping points, we want to spend the rest of our lives talking about something
that happened years ago instead of learning from it and moving on.
Philippians 3:13-14
King James Version (KJV)
13 Brethren,
I count not myself to have apprehended: but this one thing I do, forgetting those
things which are behind, and reaching forth unto those things which are before,
14 I press
toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus.
Last point I noticed about the
runners, they played with victory in mind, they knew in the end, they were
going to win, just like Jesus knew in the prayer Glory was his. Even though it
was the last supper he knew he had to be whipped all night long. Crown of
thorns on his head, nails in his hands, piercing in his side, fed vinegar for
water, hang his head and die. Be put in a borrowed tomb, but early on the third
day rise again!
