Them Which Shall Believe

Our Bible passage, introduction to Sunday 20th July service and hymns are below.

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Our principal verses are:

Jhn 17:20 Neither pray I for these alone, but for them also which shall believe on me through their word;

Jhn 17:21 That they all may be one; as thou, Father, art in me, and I in thee, that they also may be one in us: that the world may believe that thou hast sent me.

Jhn 17:22 And the glory which thou gavest me I have given them; that they may be one, even as we are one:

Jhn 17:23 I in them, and thou in me, that they may be made perfect in one; and that the world may know that thou hast sent me, and hast loved them, as thou hast loved me.

 Them Which Shall Believe

It is the highest wonder known to man that the infinite God should condescend to join Himself to our humanity and take our nature into Himself. Five times in these few verses the Lord Jesus speaks of the oneness and union that exists between Him and His people under the terms of the covenant of grace. Here the Lord is telling us, in this High-priestly prayer, that all who have faith in Christ are united with Him and with His Father. We are loved by the Father with the self-same love as the Father loves the Son.

Christ’s other sheep

Having spoken of His disciples our Saviour turns his attention specifically to us: His people worldwide yet to be gathered and bestowed with faith. This is the whole body of believers, chosen by God, called by grace and brought into a living, spiritual relationship with God in Christ. There is no doubt in Christ’s mind that His covenant people will not be endowed with faith. Faith is God’s irresistible gift. Were salvation determined by man’s free will the Lord Jesus could not speak decidedly of ‘them also which shall believe’.

Safe in the Father’s hand

‘Them also which shall believe’ are Christ’s redeemed people yet to be brought to faith through the ministry and preaching of Christ’s apostles and their successors. The Saviour’s prayer is this: ‘That they all may be one’. Christ calls for His Father to go forth in effectual power to convert and gather-in all for whom Christ died and unite them to Himself. Having completed all His covenant duties the Lord Jesus committed the fruit of His labour into the hands of His Father for safekeeping.

Christ’s sacrifice honoured

Again we are reminded that the Saviour is merely claiming the rights due to Him under the terms of the everlasting covenant of peace. Christ has title to His people according to the settlement of grace. When the Saviour died on the cross all the requests listed in this prayer – for His own glory, that His people might be kept, that they might be one with the Father and be brought into God’s presence in glory – are claimed as the prize of His redemptive success, the reward of His victory on the cross.

The unity of faith

Our Saviour intercedes for His people that the Father would enable union amongst them in true doctrine, knowledge of Christ, brotherly affection and Christian fellowship. We are different people but our salvation is common and shared. Paul tells the Ephesians, we have ‘one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, who is above all, and through all, and in you all’. As believers our union derives from our union with Christ and the Father’s gifts to us; His presence in us and with us. Our union with the saints is a witness to the world of Christ’s achievements.

The glory of Christ

The glory Christ speaks of giving to His disciples is not His glory as God, His divine glory that makes Him co-equal with the Father and the Spirit. We shall never be divine. Nor is it the mediatorial glory given solely to Christ in His covenant offices. Our Lord alone uniquely fulfilled this role and owns the acclaim. There is glory in the gospel we presently possess and glory in the inheritance we shall soon possess.

Christ seeks what we seek

We have seen previously how all three persons of the Godhead indwell the heart and soul of a believer. Here the Lord restates that He is in His people. We are new creations, born again with the life of Christ. New life characterises every child of God and the Lord Jesus looks forward to that time when His gathered church is completed, the body perfected and every redeemed soul is brought to a knowledge of the truth and faith in their Saviour.

Christ’s ‘perfect’ church

Again, the church’s completion and ‘perfection’ will be a testimony to the whole world of the success of the Lord Jesus. The church is already perfect in righteousness. In Christ Jesus we are holy, blameless and free from all condemnation. When Christ’s body is finally revealed in all its numerical entirety the world of men will be obliged to own that Jesus is the Christ, His gospel is true and His church is all-glorious in Him.

God’s great love to us

The world will also learn how the Father has loved us, even as He loved His own Son. God’s love is from eternity. It is a love of pleasure, contentment and delight. It is not a general love to all men but, like His love to His Son, special and distinctive, unchangeable and indissoluble. It will last for ever. The love the Father has for the Son is shared with those who are in the Son, for Christ declares, ‘Thou … hast loved them, as thou hast loved me’. What an astonishing truth!

Amen

Hymn 66

Free Election. John 17. 23, 24; Rom. 8. 29

W. Tucker                                   L.M.

1
Deep in the everlasting mind
The great mysterious purpose lay,
Of choosing some from lost mankind,
Whose sins the Lamb should bear away.

2
Them, loved with an eternal love,
To grace and glory he ordained;
Gave them a throne which cannot move,
And chose them both to means and end.

3
In these he was resolved to make
The riches of his goodness known;
These he accepts for Jesus’ sake,
And views them righteous in his Son.

4
No goodness God foresaw in his,
But what his grace decreed to give;
No comeliness in them there is
Which they did not from him receive.

5
Faith and repentance he bestows
On such as he designs to save;
From him their soul’s obedience flows,
And he shall all the glory have.

Hymn 405

Exulting in Eternal Union with Jesus. John 17. 21-23

J. Kent      L.M.

1
’Twixt Jesus and the chosen race,
Subsists a bond of sovereign grace,
That hell, with its infernal train,
Shall ne’er dissolve nor rend in twain!

2
This sacred bond shall never break,
Though earth should to her centre shake;
Rest, doubting saint, assured of this,
For God has pledged his holiness.

3
He swore but once; the deed was done;
’Twas settled by the great Three-One;
Christ was appointed to redeem
All that his Father loved in him.

4
Hail, sacred union, firm and strong!
How great the grace! how sweet the song!
That worms of earth should ever be
One with incarnate Deity!

5
One in the tomb; one when he rose;
One when he triumphed o’er his foes;
One when in heaven he took his seat,
While seraphs sang all hell’s defeat.

6
This sacred tie forbids their fears,
For all he is or has is theirs;
With him, their Head, they stand or fall –
Their Life, their Surety, and their All.

7
The sinner’s Peace, the Daysman he,
Whose blood should set his people free;
On them his fond affections ran,
Before creation-work began.

8
Blessed be the wisdom and the grace,
The eternal love and faithfulness,
That’s in the gospel-scheme revealed,
And is by God the Spirit sealed.

Our Lord Jesus Christ enlarged the objects of His high-priestly prayer to include us, all who would believe on Him by the ministry of the Apostles. He claims for us all the blessings of the covenant of peace and re-confirms our union with Himself, the love of God towards us and the certainty of our conversion by the glorious gospel of grace.