Jesus' Prayer for Unity

Dr. Ryan Rush | John 17:20-23

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God's given us an amazing day of worship already, hasn't he? I had a chance to sneak over at nine, nine o'clock and and uh be in the courts for a little while. Incredible music in there and singing, and then here our orchestra and choir led us so well. Thank you, Scotty, and for the team bringing that together. You know, if you ever go to uh a symphony, it it sounds sort of chaotic when the orchestra is getting ready to go. Everybody's practicing on their, you know, just checking everything out, but then they all come together in tune and it's beautiful. Do you know that everybody tunes an orchestra to the same one instrument? It's to the oboe in the key of A. They play an A note and everybody comes together. It's not, and orchestras aren't together because everybody plays the same note. No, it's because they tune to the same instrument and because they look to the same conductor. And in a similar fashion, that's the way the church is supposed to operate. We're supposed to be in tune, in unison, in unity, rather. And do you know that Jesus prayed for that? I want to talk about that today. It's a part of the high priestly prayer in John chapter 17. Would you turn in John 17 if you have a Bible? If not, they're available all around the room as we look at this prayer together. And so looking forward to that. Speaking of unity, uh, thank you for preserving the unity, even though you had to, some of you had to climb mountains in order to get here with the crowds and the hallways and all these things. I'm so glad that you're here. And you can help preserve that unity by parking across the street at the Taylor High School parking garage, right in the shuttle. I'm grateful for that. And some of you can help with unity by joining me at either 8 a.m. or 11:45 a.m. for worship. We have wonderful times of worship that allow for those uh key times at 9 and 10.30 to have more seats for our neighbors and friends. And I'm so grateful to the many who've who've joined us already at those times. God has been good to us. Uh, incidentally, uh, this is the second to last sermon in our John series. Yes, we're almost done with our series in John. Please do not applaud. You may say, well, Pastor, this is chapter 17. There's four more chapters. Well, much of the coming chapters we already covered this year. We covered all of them through uh a lot of times around the Easter season. And so we'll wrap up next week in the 21st chapter of John, and then we'll move on. After that, we'll kick off a series that I'm really fired up about called Shaped at Home. We're going to be looking uh at most of September and October at uh at the story of Joseph in the book of Genesis. I'm fired up about that. We'll not only uh preach on it, but our community groups will be studying those passages, and our men specifically will have an opportunity to gather on Wednesdays. We'll have a big men's rally. I hope you'll all make time for um on the September the 9th. And then following those Wednesdays, we'll have options for men in the evening on Wednesday and the morning on Wednesday. So you have two different opportunities on both campuses every week for six weeks. And I'm praying that God does a work in our midst. So, John chapter 17, a prayer for unity. Incidentally, I'm grateful that we're a unified church. I want you to know I'm not preaching toward some particular incident that I know about. Uh, there's an unwritten rule among pastors that you don't preach on money when you're broke, and you don't preach on unity when you're fighting. And I'm glad that uh we're not we're not fighting. As far as I know, there's no big skirmish going on. So I'm I'm preaching to something that is close to the heart of God and is God's is in God's word, and so we celebrate together our uh unity. John chapter 17, we're going to look down at verses 20 through 23. You look on as I read from God's Word. Jesus says, I pray not only for these, but also for those who believe in me through their word. May they all be one, as you, Father, are in me, and I am in you. May they also be in us, so that the world may believe you sent me. I have given them the glory you have given me, so that they may be one as we are one. I am in them, and you are in me, so they may be made completely one, that the world may know you have sent me and have loved them as you have loved me. What a passage. Jesus is saying that we should be one. He's praying for our oneness. And he's not only praying for the disciples, did you notice that? He's praying for all those who come after them and believe. So he's praying for you and for me, that we would be one. God is calling us to oneness. Incidentally, even if you're not a Christian, if you're new to the church, you're just checking things out today, we inherently know this is true, don't we? That it's important to have unity. Uh, you need teamwork and on any team or or any business, any school. If you lose that uh on any group that's not working together, uh it's no fun. So we it we know that this is true, uh, but it we also inherently know that we can't just operate without anybody. You can't just fly solo through life. It's a dangerous place to be. Uh, the Surgeon General actually declared loneliness an epidemic. Uh he said that there's a comparable health risk to smoking 15 cigarettes a day. And I think we all kind of see that there's a loneliness crisis and there's a division in the world right now. We need loving relationships of other people who are moving in the same direction. In fact, Solomon talked about this in the Proverbs. Proverbs 15, 17 says, Better a meal of vegetables where there is love than a fattened ox with hatred. And I especially love that verse because it's a reminder, Pastor Scotty, that beef is greater than vegetables. We share this bond together, brother. What is that verse saying? It's saying, listen, uh, there's something so precious uh about unity that even sometimes we have to take a step back from things that we love just in order to experience that. And we need unity. We don't just want it, we need it. And Jesus tells us how to have it. Before we dive into how he tells us how to have it, though, we need to talk about what unity doesn't mean. There's a lot of misconceptions. First of all, unity is not union, it's not the same thing as forcing connections with people who have no common bond. Um, you might be organized, but that doesn't make you unified. Uh, it takes more than organization. It takes trust, right? Some of you have been a part of a business or an organization where nobody really trusted each other, but they were they were organized. That's not unity, that's that's union. Um if you're visiting today, uh, surely you understand that in in part any part of life that you cannot have intimacy or connection, but you can just move in the same direction. Uh the late Adrian Rogers put it this way: he used to say, you could take two cats, tie their tails together, and hang them over a clothesline. There would be union, but there would not be unity. I'm not recommending you do that. I'm just saying that's what he said. Second, unity is not uniformity where everybody looks alike and thinks alike and does the same. No. We see in the scripture in Romans 12, 1 Corinthians 12 specifically, that each person in the church, believers are given unique gifts in the body. They're differing gifts, and that's beautiful. Our differences are beautiful. Football teams need unity to win, but not everybody plays the same position. Uniformity, if you think about it, is something we impose from the outside. Unity is produced on the inside. Unity is not uniformity, and finally, unity is not unanimity, where everybody always agrees. Obviously, that's not true. You can have unity without always having absolute agreement. Uh, Lana and I have been married for almost 35 years. We live in unity, but we aren't always unanimous. I will say I've I've found the more I agree with her, the more unified we become, which is interesting, just an observation. But unity is not agreement on every preference, it's agreement on what matters most, do you see? So by unity we mean oneness of heart, a similarity of purpose, and an agreement on truth. So, how do we gain true unity? Well, Jesus, as we eavesdrop in on this prayer, in my opinion, the most beautiful prayer ever prayed, we see three ingredients to biblical unity. I'd love to share those with you. Here's the first ingredient. A part of cultivating unity is a common relationship. Relationship. You might consider this the bond of unity. Our connection to one another arises out of our relationships. We're related to one another and we care for one another and we walk in community because of what Christ has done for us. Look at verse 21. May they all be one, as you, Father, are in me and I am in you. May they also be in us so that the world may believe you sent me. Do you catch that? Jesus uses the unity of the triune God as the example, as the breathtaking picture of the unity that Christ desires for us. That's a deep bond, isn't it? The Trinity is not three gods. The triune God is one God in three persons. God is perfect unity. Unity is in the very nature of God, and He's saying, that's the holy standard. God, that's what I want them to get a glimpse of in their relationships. That kind of unity cannot exist at a distance. In order for that to take place, we have to know one another. One of my favorite things about traveling around the world is running into somebody far from home that has a connection to home. You know? Maybe you hear an accent and say, wait, are they from Texas? Or you hear somebody, and where are you from? Well, I'm from Katie or I'm from Houston. Uh it's wonderful. You can connect two Texans uh in another nation. They immediately have a bond. You can be in England, you can be in New York, you can be in lots of other countries, and you can still have this sense of commonality, like we are one. Suddenly we're family. Shared identity uh creates this immediate connection that then we can cultivate. And you know, in order to be brothers and sisters, you have to be a part of the same family. And what's true in the physical realm is also true in the spiritual realm. John 1, verse 12 reminds us, but to all who did receive him, he gave them the right to be children of God. That means if you're a Christian, we have the same Father. We have the same Heavenly Father. Incidentally, that also means it begins with your relationship with Christ. So if you want to have unity with others, you want to have a relationship deeper than you've ever experienced, come to faith in Jesus Christ. You trust him, you receive the blessing of salvation and forgiveness that God offers to everyone who calls on his name and believes in him. What happens is now you enter into a family. You have the greatest relationship you can imagine with God, the one you were made for. And then you have these key relationships that God grants you in the body of Christ in his church. And I love those relationships. You know, when I arrive on Sunday, uh it's it's usually before everybody gets here. There's just a few people setting up, and um, it's really quiet, and it's precious just to walk halls a little bit and pray. But then slowly, one of my favorite things on Sunday starts to happen. There's sort of a buzz, a glorious, chaotic sound that fills the hallways. And even before worship, you see people greeting one another, laughing, children talking to one another. It's the coolest thing just to watch all the excitement. And every now and then somebody will say to me, Pastor, I wish you'd address this because it's just not very reverent before we begin worship. Everybody's talking, it needs to be quieter. And listen, I get what you're saying. I know that maybe you want to get your heart right at that moment, but but I'll tell you what I like even better than that. I think it's a taste of heaven. I love the noise, I love the kids because I think we have an example there of the love that we have for one another lived out. That's the church. It's the reason why Paul says so often in his letter, I give thanks to you for you, because I hear of your love for one another. On that note, you can't be unified if you're never together. I don't mean just sitting by one another in worship. I'm talking about investing in others through community. You don't have to know everybody in the church. That doesn't happen at Kingsland, it doesn't happen at a church of 50. It's not, that's not the way it works, but you can know a few who know you. That's the way it's supposed to work. At Kingsland, we talk often about small groups where we study God's word and connect with one another in what we call community groups. You'll hear that phrase here, and you'll hear me say, community groups are the lifeblood of our church. Why? We don't just gather in those small groups in order to study God's word to get smarter. We we do study God's word, but we're investing in one another. We're seeking the Lord together, and there is a bond that is created there that you can't manufacture just by uh coming together in here. You have to invest in one another and do life together. Community groups are not just a fun idea, they are the heart of growth for a believer. It takes an investment. You have to pour into other people, let them pour into you. It takes time. So the first ingredient of biblical unity is common relationship. Here's the second ingredient. We must have a common spirit. And by spirit, I don't mean we have kind of school spirit together. I'm talking about the person of the Trinity, the Holy Spirit. You see? That unites us, that works in us. If relationship is the bond of unity, then common spirit is the source of our unity. Go back to verse 21, and I want to show you a phrase that we just passed over a moment ago. May they all be one, as you, Father, are in me, and I am in you. May they also be in us, so that the world may believe you sent me. Jesus praised the Trinity as a model for us. We saw that. But he actually said more than that. He said, You see that? May they also be in us. What is that about? He's praying for more than our having a relationship or a kinship. He's praying we would be of the same nature, mind, and purpose because God is in us. Remember, we talked about abiding uh a few weeks ago? This idea that we are in Christ and He is in us. We're so closely related to one another that we're intermingled. Like the Spirit of God indwells the heart of a believer. Think about that. And when that happens, do you see what that does for our unity? This is reserved for those who've trusted Jesus. There is a deeper bond because we are connected to God. And that cannot be faked or manufactured, it can only be received. We are one because of God's presence in us through the indwelling Holy Spirit. Do you know that aspen groves where trees or aspen trees grow are really one giant organism? Biologists say that it's actually the largest organism in the world are aspen groves. In Utah, there's a massive aspen grove called Pando, where there are 47,000 trunks spread across more than 100 acres, but scientists tell us they're really not 47,000 separate trees because underground they are connected to one enormous root system. And so what looks like many above ground is actually one life underneath. Above ground, many, below ground, one. And that's the picture of the church. We are many, but the same spirit gives us life. Do you see? That's more than just getting along. That's why Paul encouraged us in Ephesians 4. Listen to what Paul said in light of how the Spirit of God works in us. It's really interesting because it empowers us for more than just organization. He says, Therefore, I, the prisoner in the Lord, urge you to live worthy of the calling you have received. Watch, with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love. And then he says, making every effort to keep the unity of the spirit through the bond of peace. It's not just any union, the unity of the spirit, but do you see that phrase, making every effort? Some translations say, be diligent to preserve the unity. That means it's not just something that you just let happen. It means you are proactively pursuing unity and you are guarding against disunity, because disharmony and disunity inevitably hinder the Spirit's working among us. And there are times in order for us to be unified, because the Holy Spirit is working in each of us, that we work to pursue that unity. And that means we need to take action to do it. But notice how you take action. It doesn't mean you become a bulldog for Jesus and like tell everybody what they're doing wrong. That's not what it says, because it says, with all humility and gentleness. Do you see that? So there's a lowliness recognizing that I am broken, I am a sinner, and I've been saved by grace, and God is still working on me. And then when I have that attitude, I look to someone that I know deeply because of the common relationship we already talked about, and I say, I'm worried about my brother or my sister. And so we need to have a talk. Because I'm worried about it. It means sometimes when when gossip starts or or or somebody is being run down that's not in the room, we stop one another and say, Hey, hey, hey, have you talked to so and so? Man, I love you, but let's let's not do that. We we want to preserve the unity that God has given us. And so we take an active role to guard against disunity. And sometimes we have to seek to repair unity. Sometimes that means speaking the truth in love. Sometimes it means confessing sin to one another. Sometimes it means forgiving your brother or sister. We don't do those things because they're easy. We do them because we need one another and because the Holy Spirit has empowered us to do it. At Kingsland, uh, several years ago, we wrote this down as one of our five core values. We call it spirit-led community. And the reason we chose those words is we found if you look at the life of a believer at Kingsland, that the greatest, deepest relationships we have are those when we are seeking the Lord together. So it's not as though we have prayer ministry over here and we have fellowship ministry over here. No. You want to connect deeply with somebody, you study God's word with them, and you seek the Lord with them, you get desperate for God side by side with others, and watch the Lord connect hearts in a whole new way. Why? Because the Holy Spirit is doing the work. A few weeks ago, it was raining outside. I went out to my truck and I saw there was a young man trying to get his car going. He's clearly the car was stalled out. And so I went over and said, Hey man, can I grab my jumper cables and help you? And he had a different idea. He said, No, what I normally do is just push-start the car. Can you help me do that? Man, I haven't heard that term in so long. Push-start a car. I don't think I push-started a car since it had a cassette player. I mean, it's been a while. And so I was like, Yeah, dude, I'd love to do that. So I get behind it, he gets behind it, we get the car moving forward, and then actually he wasn't behind it too, because he had to steer. He's like, if you had the picture, that would be really bad if we're just pushing. So he he's he's pushing on the door, you know. Some of you have done this before. And then he jumps in and he pops the clutch and it starts right up. It's kind of a cool experience to watch it. It feels more like a man when you push-start a car. It was kind of cool to watch that happen. But do you see what Jesus is praying for and what Paul was warning against? He's saying, you can't push-start unity. Like you're not going to be able to pull off true biblical unity on your own. The Spirit of God is going to have to do the heavy lifting for you in order for you to really do that. Only the Holy Spirit can make us one. You can put people in the same room, you can schedule events, you can have programs, but the Spirit of God does the work. The unity to which we're called requires fellowship, relationship, and the Holy Spirit is a supernatural thing. When God calls us to unity, he calls us to a common relationship. There is a common spirit. And finally, to cultivate community, we must have a common mission. You could consider this the purpose of unity. We want to do more than just get along for the sake of getting along. We want to be in on what God is doing. Look back at verse 23. I am in them and you are in me, so that they may be made completely one, that the world may know you have sent me and have loved them as you have loved me. We are sent into the world to share the love of Jesus. There's a reason that we're being unified in Jesus' prayer. We're designed to be together for a mission. An observation that breaks my heart. And I know you guys have seen it too. You go back the last few years, really starting about 2020, COVID. It's been so much division in churches. I'm friends with pastors in the area and around the country. And it's heartbreaking to hear some of the stories of how people have been divided since that time over COVID or masks or race or politics, all sorts of things. Praise God for that. We just really haven't, it doesn't mean we haven't had like some disagreements at times, but God's been so good to us. And I think I know why. I think there's two primary reasons that we have escaped that division. Number one, it's the hand of God. It's not as though we can just puff our chest out and say, look how good we've done. You know, there's praying people. God has answered our prayers, and the Spirit of God has quenched that mess. But there's another reason, I think, and we've largely avoided all the disunity. It's because we have a mission that's so big we don't have time to mess around and bicker. God has called us this unique vision of seeing a million seven homes transformed by the power of the gospel. You can't do that and get distracted. So many of you are plugged into what God is doing. I pinch myself sometimes that I get to be in on what's happening here. That right now, through the Empowered Homes Ministry, thousands of churches have used the resources that you have put in place. For free, they've got to do that and continue to do that. Thousands of churches, hundreds of thousands of families have taken advantage of the resources that started at Little Old Kingsland. Think about that. Only God. We have over a hundred local and international missions partners going to some of the hardest places on earth to share the hope of Jesus Christ. Some of you have been there, all of you have participated through your generosity. And when you have that kind of vision, you don't have time for all the stuff. In fact, we have to say no to a lot of things in order to say yes to that kind of vision. But what happens is we're moving together forward toward that which God has called us. And when that happens, God brings us together and we become a team. And it's the coolest thing to watch, isn't it? Unity because of mission. You, church, have made the sacrifices to make that happen. On a basketball team, how many of you know that the best team isn't always the one with the best player? In fact, sometimes you can have the best player and it can hurt you because that person becomes all about their stats. The best team is the one who has the players willing to sacrifice because winning matters more than getting credit. And the same is true with the church. The moment getting credit matters more than winning, the team begins to fracture. And the moment my preferences matter more than our mission, unity begins to fracture. It's why Paul said in Philippians 1.27, I will hear about you that you are standing firm in one spirit, in one accord, contending together for the sake of the gospel. We're in one accord. Why? Because we're moving towards something. Because we don't have time for all that. Because we have something for which eternity is at stake. We have people all around us who are longing to know the hope of Jesus. And we get to be in on that miracle. Our connection is deeper than our preferences or our tastes or our racial backgrounds. It comes from our common passion for the Lord Jesus Christ. Before we close, let me just say a word to some of you who are here and you're just checking out church for the first time or the first time in a long time. I want to say, first of all, that some of you have been away from church for a while because a church has deeply hurt you. Maybe because of some disunity, because some work the enemy was doing, and you haven't been back. First of all, I want you to know I'm sorry that you got hurt. That's not Jesus. And that's my plea to you. Don't look at the actions of what Christians have done and equate those with what Christ has done. In fact, please don't even do that at Kingsland because we're gonna have issues too. We got baggage. You do not have a perfect pastor, that's for sure. There was a dude in the eight o'clock service that called me afterwards and said, Pastor, I wanted to amen after you said that so bad. And I said, You should have. You should have. It's true. It's true. I'm gonna disappoint you. See, that's not what it is, it's what Christ has done, do you see? And then there's some in the room that you haven't come to faith in Christ yet. You've missed out on that glorious relationship for which you were made. Do you know that this prayer Jesus prayed was literally for you? Look at the verses that I read, and you see over and over again, verse 21 and 23 literally say, verbatim, so the world may believe. Our unity should exist so the world may believe. He's praying that our unity would be so supernatural that people would see us and say, that's not normal. I want to be in on that. Our unity together is one of our greatest witnessing tools. You see? And so I'd encourage you, if you're new to the church, you're checking things out. I pray that you see Christ in us, but hang around long enough and you're gonna see something that's not natural. It is supernatural because we get to live the answer to this prayer. So, how do we apply this? Let's covenant together, church, that we stay on mission, that we remain diligent to preserve the unity, we love one another well enough to have the hard conversations when we need to, so that we're not just faking unity. We've all been to family reunions or Thanksgiving dinners and stuff where people just said, just behave for three hours, get through it so we can get home. That's not family unity, and that's not what the church has in mind. Well, let's just fake like we love each other. No, let's really love each other. Some of you need to just bring those hurts to the Lord and say, God, there's been pain. I just want to bring it to the altar in my heart and say, God, would you take it and heal it? And some of you need to come to Jesus and you're going to experience relationships in a whole new way when you understand the love that He's shown.

unknown 29:07

Okay, okay, okay, okay, okay, okay.

SPEAKER_00 29:09

Let's bow together, Church. Father, thank you for your word. I pray now, Holy Spirit, that you would speak to our hearts. You would show each of us the steps we need to take to be diligent to preserve unity, biblical unity. Pray these things in Christ's name. Amen. Hey, Pastor Ryan Rush here, and I just want to thank you for being with us at Kings and Mother Line today. What an honor. But I'll tell you what would be even better. We'd love to see you get connected with the physical church in the days ahead, if you haven't already. And that means maybe if you're local in the West Houston area, we'd love to see you the kingdom. We'd love to help you jumping into a local church near you. And we can do that together. You can get it.