Sermon by Pastor Brent Kompelien
December 3, 2023
INTRO
Here we are on the first Sunday of Advent. The word “Advent” means arrival, appearance, or the coming of someone or something. Advent is the dawning of something entirely unique and new. It is something we celebrate for the 4 Sundays leading up to Christmas as we anticipates the coming of Jesus Christ in the incarnation.
Let’s begin with a thought experiment this morning:
Imagine we’re having a conversation about the concept of goodness, or how we understand was is good and true. We could probably wax eloquent for hours about this notion of goodness, we could define what is good, we could discuss how we want to practice what is good, we could describe the objective difference between good and evil, and we would probably make ourselves feel pretty good about our discussion about what is good.
But what would happen if Goodness (capital G) opened the door and entered the room? What would change if the embodiment of goodness himself entered the conversation? Think about this: If we were having a conversation about the concept of goodness, and then the fount of all goodness himself walked into the room, what would happen?
ILLUST — This is exactly the question that was posed by Missionary and Theologian Lesslie Newbigin. Newbigin says we’ve probably had this happen when we’re talking about someone, and then that person unexpectedly enters the room. Suddenly the conversation changes. When the person was absent, you had total control of how you talked about them. But when that person enters the room, you now have to shift to a completely different mode because their presence changes everything.
Newbigin says that this is exactly what has happened in the advent of Jesus Christ. In a manger in a stable in a little town called Bethlehem, we witness the arrival of the Son of God, the sudden appearance of the Word made flesh, the glorious dawning of the fullness of deity in bodily form. God has entered the room and has spoken.
We now need to stop our former conversation and listen, because now we have known the embodiment of all Truth and Goodness himself, the incarnate Son of God who looks upon us and says, “Who do you say I am?”
You see, our culture is searching for what is good and true, but so often searching in all the wrong places or trying to define goodness and truth without God. Maybe that’s where you are today.
But the shocking reality of Christmas is that God has entered history and we can no longer have merely conceptual conversations about truth or what is good. Truth is now a personed event, an incarnate reality, an embodied King of Kings and Lord of Lord to whom we must bend the knee.
This morning we are going to talk about the glory of Jesus Christ. We are going to be confronted with whether we know him, whether we see his glory, whether we will surrender to the reality that God in the flesh has come and that his Advent calls us to worship him.
Open with me to John 17:1-5. We are at the end of Jesus’ farewell to his disciples in the Upper Room as they are celebrating Passover the evening before Jesus is crucified. At this climactic moment before Jesus and the disciples head to the Garden of Gethsemane where Jesus will be arrested, Jesus stops and prays. Our text this morning is Part One of his prayer where Jesus prays to be glorified. READ John 17:1-5.
There is an interesting flow to these first five verses. This is an example of a literary structure we call “chiasm”, which means crossing, and comes from the Greek letter “chi” and is shaped like an X. In other words, there are parallel lines that draw your attention to the middle verse where everything crosses in order to emphasize something specific. Here’s what this looks like in our passage in summary: (SLIDE 2)
Verse 1 — Father, glorify your Son
Verse 2 — All authority to give eternal life
Verse 3 — This is eternal life: know God through Jesus Christ
Verse 4 — I have finished the work
Verse 5 — Father, glorify me in your presence
ORG SENT — Here’s how we will tackle this: I want to work our way from the outside-in, first focusing on verses 1 and 5 which talk about the glorification of Jesus, then moving to verses 2 and 4 that explain the redemptive work Jesus has done and his authority to give eternal life, and ending with verse 3 which crystallizes the heart of the gospel, that because of the incarnation, because God has entered the room, we must come to know the Father through Jesus Christ.
MAIN 1 — Glorifying Jesus (vv. 1 and 5). (SLIDE 3a)
Verse 1 ties this prayer back to the previous section, because Jesus uses some key terms again. If you were with us last week, we saw Jesus use time as a way of marking a contrast between the pre-cross reality and the post-cross reality. Look at how Jesus uses a time-word to mark a dramatic shift. READ v. 1.
This word “hour”, or sometimes translated as “time”, has come up over and over in the gospel of John and is typically used in two ways:
(SLIDE 3b) Jesus repeated throughout his ministry, “My hour has not yet come.”
(SLIDE 3c) Yet he also says things like: “a time is coming when true worshipers will worship the Father in the Spirit and in truth,” and “a time is coming when the dead will hear the voice of the Son of God and those who hear will live,” and “a time is coming when I will no longer use this kind of language but will tell you plainly about my Father.”
Now Jesus at this culminating moment, finally says, “The hour has come.” (SLIDE 3d) Everything in history is about to change. He is staring down the cross, and this is what he sees: the cross will become the pinnacle display of the glory of God.
What does this word “glory” mean? If you look at your text, verses 1 and 5 offer the same request, the exact same verb actually: Father, glorify your Son. This concept of “glory” bookends this whole first section of Jesus’ prayer. So, what does Jesus mean by “glorify”? A simple definition is (SLIDE 4a) “to clothe with splendor.” ILLUST — Think of a king on his throne, regal and powerful and benevolent and full of wisdom. This is glory. But let’s dig a little deeper with some clues from the text to understand what this word “glorify” means:
Verse 1 describes a reciprocal glorifying within the Godhead. (SLIDE 4b) The Father glorifies the Son so that the Son may glorify the Father.
Verse 5 describes an eternal and pre-existent glory, (SLIDE 4c) that Jesus has eternally shared in the glory of the Father before the world began.
Taken together, we see an important theological reality coming into focus: Jesus has come from glory and is going back to glory, he has voluntarily given up glory and is being restored back to glory. And at this moment in the Upper Room as Jesus prays, we see that the path to the glory of heaven is the nothing less than the cross. (SLIDE 4d)
You see, Jesus left his glorious throne when he came down earth, incarnate in human flesh, and then through the cross he is glorified (lifted up, literally!).
In other words, the shame and suffering and outpouring of wrath at Golgotha, followed by the victory of the resurrection, are nothing less than the Son’s glorification, the display of the splendor of God in all his love, mercy, justice, goodness, and power.
This reality of Jesus’ glory, his being clothed in splendor and majesty, is perfectly described in Philippians 2:6-11 as Jesus emptied himself of his glory only to be glorified through his humble death to secure our redemption: (SLIDE 5 and 6) “Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be used to his own advantage; rather, he made himself nothing by taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to death—even death on a cross! Therefore God exalted him to the highest place and gave him the name that is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue acknowledge that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.”
Friends, the splendor of God is manifested in full measure in the cross and in the resurrection of Jesus Christ! Wow!
This is why the next part of our text, the next layer inward toward the center of these verses, explains the redemptive work of Jesus and his authority to give eternal life.
MAIN 2 — Work and Authority (vv. 2 and 4). (SLIDE 7a)
Verse 2 helps us see the purpose for why Jesus came to earth in the incarnation. READ v. 2.
Did you notice the word “all” repeated twice? These two “all” statements explain an important biblical reality:
As the text says, Jesus has authority over (SLIDE 7b) “all people”…so that he might give eternal life to “all those” the Father has given him. There is a sense of the (SLIDE 7c) universal authority of Jesus over humanity for the purpose that the Father would grant salvation to (SLIDE 7d) particular individuals within humanity.
KEY: In other words, the Bible continually presents two realities:
We know that God so loved the world (cosmos) (John 3:16), and that he wants all people to be saved and to come to a knowledge of the truth (1 Timothy 2:4). There is this sense of the grand picture of God’s love for his creation and his desire for everyone to bend the knee in total devotion to him.
Yet, we see the scriptures assert that whoever believes in Jesus will not perish but have eternal life (John 3:16). Only those whom the Father draws to Jesus (John 6:44) are those who have been chosen according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, through the sanctifying work of the Spirit, to be obedient to Jesus Christ and sprinkled with his blood (1 Peter 1:2). There is this sense of the particularity in bringing salvation only through Jesus Christ and his work on the cross. There is no other way. (SLIDE 7e)
This is why Jesus says in the parallel verse 4, that he has brought the Father glory on earth in the work that he has been given to do.
Jesus’ incarnation is a display of glory.
Jesus’ miracles are a display of glory.
Jesus’ teachings are a display of glory.
Jesus’ love and compassion are a display of glory.
Jesus’ decisive words and his warning of judgment are a display of glory.
And now, Jesus’ march to the cross and the coming resurrection are displays of glory!
HIS SPLENDOR IS UNMATCHED! In other words, Jesus’ life, death, and resurrection display the particular expression of the splendor of God in redemption.
This brings us to the last part of our text, the center of this opening prayer of Jesus in verse 3, which crystallizes the heart of the gospel, that because of the incarnation, because God has entered the room, we must come to know the Father through the Son.
MAIN 3 — Knowing God (v. 3). (SLIDE 8a)
This verse is central in this prayer namely because Jesus takes this pivotal moment in the Upper Room, just before he goes to the cross, and he defines what he means by “eternal life.” (SLIDE 8b) READ v. 3.
This word “eternal” is rich and dynamic with different dimensions to it:
There is a time element — life that never-ending life (SLIDE 8c)
There is a quantity element — life that is fully life (SLIDE 8d)
There is a quality element — life that is abundant life (SLIDE 8e)
It reminds me of what Jesus said in John 10:10 when he described himself as the Good Shepherd and the Gate by which we must enter to be saved. Jesus said, (SLIDE 8f) “I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full.”
KEY: You were made for everlasting life. But the curse of sin has brought death and destruction and strife and violence and evil.
ASK: Do you crave life? Do you have a longing, a desire, a tugging on your heart for never-ending, abundant, life-to-the-full kind of life?
The only way to know the life that is truly life is to know Jesus Christ. Eternal life flows from nothing less than knowing the only true God, and the only way to know the true God is through his only Son who is the way, the truth, and the life (John 14:6). In other words, if you want to know God, you must know and love Jesus.
APPLY
In the context of this passage, which has drawn our attention to the glory of Jesus Christ, what does it mean to “know” God? (SLIDE 9a) I want you to recall our thought experiment from earlier: How do we move from mere conceptual understanding of God to a truly redemptive and transformative knowledge of God?
We must realize that the answer begins at Christmas. The answer begins at the Advent of the One who brings the very presence of God from the glory of heaven to a cradle in the dirt. The answer comes in the nearness of Immanuel: God with us. (SLIDE 9b)
You see friends, we no longer know God from a distance. We aren’t left to shield our gaze from his holiness and hide from his wrath. We aren’t left to know his laws without the indwelling power of God to obey them. We aren’t having conversations about God as if he isn’t here with us.
You need to hear this today: (SLIDE 9c) Knowing Christ personally is a knowledge that transforms.
What a marvelous truth that we know God through the incarnate One, the Good Shepherd, the One who is gentle and lowly in heart and whose yoke is easy and burden is light!
Knowing him is an act of surrender and trust, repentance and the renewal of our hearts. We know God the Father through God the Son who knows us in our humanity; who has not only joined in our humanity, but who has overcome our sinful flesh and is the firstfruit of the new creation, a new humanity born again from the inside out, awaiting our full redemption in the new heavens and new earth where we will be face-to-face with Jesus!
I’ll say it again: His splendor is unmatched! (SLIDE 9d) And our text today reveals that Jesus Christ is worthy of our worship. He is worthy to be glorified, to be clothed in splendor, and in this we bring glory to the Father.