John 17:6-19
Lesson Focus
Understanding the intertwined concepts of unity, diversity, and love as exemplified in Jesus' prayer for his disciples.
Lesson Outcomes
Through this lesson, students should:
1. Grasp the importance of unity within diversity in both the divine and human contexts.
2. Recognize the inseparable link between unity, diversity, and Christlike love in fulfilling the mission of the Church.
3. Reflect on their media consumption habits and consider how various voices influence their perspectives on unity, diversity, and love.
Catching up on the Story
Jesus and the disciples are in the upper room sharing the Passover meal. Jesus has many things still to tell his friends about what is soon to take place. Not only will Jesus tell his friends what’s going to happen, but he also prays to the Father for them.
It’s kind of hard to imagine what exactly that was like. I’m sure the disciples had some inkling of what Jesus was talking about. They’re not so dumb to have missed all of the times that Jesus said he was soon going to die. So, somewhere in the back of their minds, they knew that the end of what they had experienced for the last several years was close.
Last week’s text came from the same section in John’s gospel. Then, Jesus implored them to adhere to his commandment and love others in the same way that he had loved them.
We discovered that the way we are loved, the quality of the love we receive, and the manner in which it is received shape who we are and how we offer love to others. The nature of Jesus’ love for us is shaped by the nature of the love that exists within the Trinity.
Jesus makes it clear that the way in which Jesus and the Father and Spirit love each other is the same way that he loves the disciples. The disciples, in turn, are to love each other and the world around them with that same love. God's love for them shapes their love for the world.
Protect them…
Jesus is wrapping up his prayer and this particular discourse. After this, Jesus and his disciples will go to the garden where Judas will betray Jesus by handing him over to the Jewish religious leaders. For now, however, Jesus focuses on seeking protection for his friends.
The richness of this particular section of John makes it difficult to choose one or two things on which to focus. I constantly fear failing to communicate what God has us to hear from his word. Nevertheless, I think two things are particularly important for us as the church.
First, Jesus prays for divine protection for his friends and unity with them. Unity has always been God’s plan for creation. If we were to go back to the Garden of Eden story, we’d find that this is what Adam and Eve experience, not just with one another but with God as well.
Oh, I imagine that the first couple had disagreements with each other, but those disagreements never resulted in the kind of destruction we see today. This is an important point for us as we consider what unity in the church is about.
Unity doesn’t require uniformity. It doesn’t require that we all be the same, thinking exactly the same thing or believing exactly the same thing. If uniformity was God’s plan, then Adam and Eve wouldn’t have been different.
The world around them wouldn’t have existed in the vast diversity it had and continues to have. All zebra stripes would have been identical, and each leopard would have the same spot pattern. Adam and Eve, indeed the plants and animals, experienced unity within their difference.
I think this unity in diversity is baked into the fabric of creation exists in God. While we confess that God is one, we also confess that God is triune; God is one in three: God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit.
God exists in a unity of love, faithfulness, movement, purpose, and deference to each other. God is unified, but God is also diverse.
I know it’s hard to understand, and I’m not trying to be difficult, but this triune nature of God is important for us, for our relationship to God, our relationship to each other, and our relationship to the world.
So, Jesus begins this part of the prayer by asking the Father to protect his followers so that they may be one as Jesus and the Father are one. The unity that was part of the fabric of creation was lost when humanity decided it knew better than God. Instead, we’ve replaced unity with all of its beautiful diversity, with uniformity.
It may not seem like this on the surface, but that’s what’s going on. We want uniformity because we’re selfish and afraid. We want everyone else to be exactly like us because we are scared of what we don’t understand, of things that aren’t like us, that don’t think, act, and believe like us.
So we make the difference in the world an evil thing. Fear makes us do weird things.
When we’re scared, we can’t recognize the humanity of those who are different from us, and when we do, we exclude them. We also don’t recognize the brokenness in others that sometimes causes them to be different from us.
Please hear me correctly. I am not saying that anything goes. Our faith warns us of dangerous and sinful things, and we should continue to be weary of them. But we cannot be so afraid of them that we cease to be unified. We can never let our awareness of sin keep us from being unified.
In this prayer, we see that a part of Jesus’ mission in the world was to restore the unity of creation. Jesus has called his followers to participate in that mission with him, and we can’t do that if we are not unified ourselves. And we cannot be unified—we can’t be one as Jesus and the Father are one—if we do not love each other in the same way that Jesus has loved us.
Jesus prays this prayer of protection because he knows that his followers will experience pushback and resistance from the world for their efforts to love and be unified.
The world doesn’t want love because love is always selfless; it always looks out for the good of the other. The world doesn’t want love because we’re selfish and care more for ourselves than others.
The world doesn’t want unity because if we were unified, truly unified as Jesus and the Father are, then we’d have to face the difference between us. We’d have to navigate that difference with grace and love, which would mean being a little less selfish. So, we’re scared because we don’t want to accept what is good in the difference of others. Fear makes us do weird things.
We don’t belong to this world because this world wants everything to be uniformly selfish.
As You Have Sent Me...
This leads me to the second important thing about this passage: Not only does Jesus want us to be unified, like he and the Father are one, but he also wants us to go out into the world the same way he went into the world.
We might not belong to the world, and sometimes it doesn’t want us, but we’re to love the world just the same.
I think we have to go back to John chapter 3: "For God so loved the world that he sent his only son so that whoever believes in him will not perish but have everlasting life. Indeed, God did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world, but so that the world might be saved through him. “Let’s change that up and put ourselves as Jesus' followers in that passage: “For Jesus, who is one with the Father, so loved the world that he sent his followers, his church, into the world so that whoever believes in Jesus will not perish but have everlasting life. Indeed, God did not send his church into the world to condemn the world, but for the world to find salvation because of and through the church.” But we have to read both the original John 3:16-17 and our reworking of it through the rest of the gospel story. While he’s alive, Jesus works hard for the world’s salvation, both here and now, by healing, feeding, loving, and for eternity, by selflessly giving his life to all, even the sinners, especially the sinners.
This is the way that we are sent: to work hard, right along side Jesus, for the sake of the world’s salvation by healing, feeding, clothing, freeing, and loving. We are sent to work equally as hard so that through us, the world around us might find eternal life as well.
So What...?
I think our unity and our sending are intimately connected. Jesus can’t send us out like he’s been sent out if we aren’t unified as Jesus and the Father are unified.
The strength needed to do the hard work of God’s mission for the world is impossible apart from the diversified unity of believers. And that unity requires love, a Christlike, selfless love. In our world today, I’m not sure how we work for unity within the great diversity of our world. And we’re not as diverse as a lot of places around! It seems, though, that in the last few years, we’ve practically invented new ways to disrupt the unity we did have.
I wonder if what will help us be more unified in our diversity is if we concentrate more on the voice of the Father, Spirit, and Son.
I wonder if we need to turn down or even turn off the other voices screaming at us.
I wonder what it would be like if we turned off cable news.
I wonder what it would be like if we shut off the talk radio.
I wonder what it would be like if we severely limited or shut off social media.
I don’t want us to stick our heads in the sand about what’s happening in the world. I realize those outlets are the places we get our news. But this is an issue of discipleship. We’re disciplined by the voices we spend the most time with. What voices are you spending the most time with?
Discussion Questions
Read the text aloud. Then, read the text to yourself quietly. Read it slowly, as if you were very unfamiliar with the story.
How do you interpret Jesus' prayer for unity among his disciples in the context of today's diverse society?
Why do you think the fear of difference often leads to attempts at uniformity, both in religious communities and broader society?
In what ways does the Trinity serve as a model for unity within diversity?
How can we balance the call to unity with the recognition of legitimate differences among individuals and communities?
Do you agree that love is inherently selfless? Why or why not?
How does the media influence our perceptions of unity, diversity, and love?
What steps can we take to diversify the voices we listen to and engage with?
Have you ever experienced pushback or resistance for trying to love others selflessly? How did you handle it?
What practical actions can we take to promote unity within our communities while embracing diversity?
How might our understanding of Jesus' mission shape our approach to engaging with the world around us?