THE SECOND PART: A BIRD’S-EYE VIEW OF THE NEW TESTAMENT

The Gospel according to John
Message Four—The Genuine Oneness of the Body

Scripture Reading: John 17:1-24

I. The Lord’s prayer in John 17 was for the glorification, the manifestation, the expression, of the Triune God; God’s eternal purpose is to manifest, to express, Himself—vv. 1-5; Gen. 1:26; Eph. 3:8-11:

A. Christ was the unique grain of wheat containing the divine life with the divine glory; when the shell of His humanity was broken through His crucifixion, all the elements of His divinity—His divine life and His divine glory—were released—John 12:24:

1. The release of the glory of Christ’s divinity was to release Himself into man as the fire of life to burn on the earth—Luke 12:49-50.

2. Christ as the sevenfold intensified, life-giving Spirit today is a burning fire within us; we have been brought together by this fire, and now we are burdened that this fire would burn many others—Rev. 4:5; 5:6; 2 Tim. 1:6-7.

B. The release of the glory of Christ’s divinity was His being glorified by the Father with the divine glory in His resurrection through His death—John 12:23-24; Luke 24:46.

C. Christ prayed that His Father would glorify Him, and the Father answered His prayer by resurrecting Him; for Christ to be glorified was for Him to be resurrected to become the life-giving Spirit—John 17:1; Acts 3:13-15; John 7:39b; Luke 24:46; 1 Cor. 15:45.

D. The issue of Christ’s glorification was the producing of a universal incorporation for the expression of the Triune God, whose unique attribute is oneness, the oneness of coinherence—John 14:10-11, 20; 17:21:

1. The three of the Triune God were incorporated from eternity; this means that the Father, the Son, and the Spirit mutually indwell one another, that is, They coinhere—14:10-11.

2. The consummated Triune God and the regenerated believers became an incorporation in the resurrection of Christ; this means that the Son is in the Father, we are in the Son, and the Son as the Spirit is in us to make us an enlarged, divine-human incorporation who are coinhering with the coinhering Triune God in His oneness for His glory—vv. 20, 17; 17:11, 21.

E. In the Lord’s last words to the believers in John 14—16, there are three concrete expressions of this glory: the Father’s house (the church) in 14:2, the branches of the vine (the constituents of the Body of Christ) in 15:1-5, and a newborn corporate man (the new man) in 16:21:

1. All three denote the church, showing that the church is the glorious increase produced by Christ through His death and resurrection—12:23-24.

2. In this glorious increase Christ, the Son of God, is glorified, causing God the Father also to be glorified in Christ’s glorification, that is, to be fully expressed through the church—Eph. 3:19-21.

3. This expression needs to be maintained in the oneness of the Triune God; therefore, the Lord prayed in particular for this matter in His concluding prayer in John 17.

II. The Lord’s prayer in John 17 was for the oneness of the church as the Body of Christ, the oneness of the believers in the Triune God:

A. The first level of oneness is the oneness in the Father’s name and by the Father’s divine life—vv. 6-13:

1. The Father’s name denotes the person of the Father, the Father Himself as the source of life, the source of oneness—vv. 6, 11; 5:26, 43.

2. The Father’s life with His nature is the element of the oneness—John 17:2; cf. Eph. 1:4-5; Heb. 2:10-11; 1 Cor. 6:17.

B. The second level of oneness is the oneness in the reality of the sanctifying word—John 17:14-21:

1. The word is the truth, and the truth is the Triune God; to be sanctified by the reality of the word is to be sanctified by the Triune God Himself—v. 17; 14:6; 1 John 5:6b.

2. The word, which is the truth, sanctifies God’s people from the world and keeps them from the ruler of the world, the evil one—John 17:17, 15.

3. The Father’s sanctifying word is the means of our oneness, bringing us into the sphere of oneness—John 17:21; Eph. 5:26.

C. The third level of oneness is the oneness in the divine glory for the expression of the processed, mingled, and incorporated Triune God—John 17:22-24:

1. The oneness of all the believers in the divine glory is the oneness in the expressed sonship with the Father’s life and nature—v. 22; 5:26.

2. The glory of God is the expression of God; this splendid expression of divinity delivers us from ourselves and makes us fully one—cf. Rev. 21:11.

3. In this stage of the oneness the self is fully denied.

4. Our Christian life should be a life of “glory to glory”—2 Cor. 3:16-18.

III. We need to emphasize the oneness that the Lord has given us and preserve the oneness of the Spirit by being mingled constantly with the Triune God (thus nullifying the natural man, the world with Satan, and the self) to satisfy the Lord’s desire—Eph. 4:1-6.

 

Ministry Excerpts:

THE PROFOUND PRAYER UTTERED BY THE LORD IN JOHN CHAPTER 17

In this message we come to the profound prayer uttered by the Lord in John 17. This prayer is the completing prayer of the Lord’s message given in chapters fourteen, fifteen, and sixteen. If we read John 14 through 17 carefully, we shall realize that these four chapters have a very specific flavor in utterance and composition. This flavor is altogether different from the other chapters in the Bible. Although the whole Bible undoubtedly is God-breathed, these four chapters have a special taste, a special flavor, that no one can imitate. This flavor is not only holy but divine. No human being can utter something that is so divine. The flavor of these chapters is special, impressive, and unique because it is absolutely divine. The person who composed these chapters must have been divine. No human could have written something like this. No human being could say, “Father, glorify Your Son that the Son may glorify You.” Only the Son of God could utter such words. Although you may not understand these chapters, if you are in the spirit as you read them, you will sense the divine flavor. This is the divine speaking, the divine utterance, and the divine flow with the divine flavor. I am confirmed in my belief that the Bible is the Word of God. Who besides God could have composed these four chapters? Could John, a fisherman from Galilee, utter such things? It is impossible. If we gather together two hundred men with Ph.D.’s, they would not have the substance to compose a writing with such a flavor. How we must worship the Lord for these four chapters! We must worship Him for the message He gave before His death, and we must worship Him for His concluding prayer.

In order to understand the meaning of His prayer, we must remember the central thought of the message given by the Lord in the previous three chapters. The central thought of that message is rich, deep, and profound. The first aspect of this central thought is that the Lord Jesus, the Son of God, was sent by the Father to be among us. Then He was transfigured from the flesh into the Spirit that He might be able to come into us. In other words, He was transfigured into the Holy Spirit, and He comes into us as the Holy Spirit. When the Holy Spirit comes into us, He comes as the Spirit of reality to make the Lord Jesus real to us in every respect. By doing this, the Lord brings us into the Father and brings the Father into us. This is the mingling of divinity with humanity. Included in this mingling is the mutual abode. We become the abode to the Triune God, and the Triune God becomes the abode to us. We can abide in the Triune God, and the Triune God can abide in us. This is the central thought of the profound and glorious message given by the Lord in these three chapters. After giving that message, the Lord offered a closing prayer.

THE THIRD STAGE OF THE FULFILLMENT OF THE LORD’S PRAYER IS THE NEW JERUSALEM

What is the third stage of the fulfillment of the Lord’s prayer in John 17? It is the New Jerusalem. This prayer in John 17 will be ultimately fulfilled in the New Jerusalem. Through the holy city the Son will be fully expressed in glory, and God will also be glorified in Him for eternity (Rev. 21:11, 23-24). Look at the picture of the New Jerusalem: it is a vessel to express Christ, to make God expressed through Christ. The New Jerusalem is the glorification of the Son so that the Father might be glorified through the Son.

Perhaps you are not clear about the picture of the New Jerusalem. Revelation 21 and 22 reveal clearly that God is the light and that Christ, the Lamb, is the lamp. The light is in the lamp, and the lamp is the center of the city, around which is a transparent wall. God is pictured as the light shining through the lamp, the Son of God. The Son of God will be glorified through the transparent wall of the city. The city, composed of all the redeemed ones, has the names of the twelve tribes of Israel and the names of the twelve apostles. The twelve tribes represent all the saints of the Old Testament, and the twelve apostles represent all the saints of the New Testament. The New Jerusalem is the composition of all the redeemed ones who are very transparent and are built together. They have Christ, the center, as the lamp in which God, the light, shines. When the lamp is manifested and glorified through the wall of the city, the light in the lamp is also glorified.

The New Jerusalem is a complete picture showing how the Son is glorified in that city and how the Father is glorified in the Son’s glorification. Many times some dear saints have said to me, “Brother, you don’t know how poor the church is where I am.” I do not like to hear that. It is a lie. The church may be poor today, but after a period of time it will no longer be poor. Perhaps you do not have the faith to say this of your local church. You may say, “No, the church in my locality could never be better.” Do not use the word never, for, at the least, your church will be good in the New Jerusalem. Every part of the city of the New Jerusalem will be radiant and glorious.

In 1941, during a prayer meeting in the church in Shanghai, a leading sister offered a long prayer. In that prayer she said, with groanings, “O Lord, have mercy on us. The church here is so weak.” Immediately afterward, Brother Nee offered a prayer in which he said, “Praise the Lord that the church is not weak. The church is glorious.” His prayer shocked everyone. There seemed to be a fight going on between these two prayers. Which prayer was right? Ultimately, when we come into the New Jerusalem, we shall see that Brother Nee’s prayer was right. The church is altogether glorious. Do not help Satan, the liar, to spread his lies. Do not believe the lies. The church is glorious. If it does not appear so today, it may be glorious tomorrow, next year, or in the next age. In eternity, for certain, all the church will be glorious.

We have seen that this prayer has a threefold fulfillment. The first stage of the fulfillment was the resurrection of Jesus. By His resurrection, the Lord Jesus has been manifested and glorified, and by this glorification the Father has also been glorified. The second step of its fulfillment is in the church. From the day of Pentecost to the day of the Lord’s second coming, the Holy Spirit has manifested and will continue to manifest Christ through the saints. In other words, the Holy Spirit glorifies Christ through the church. When Christ is glorified, the Father also is glorified in the Son. The last stage of the fulfillment of this prayer will occur when the fullness of time comes. At that time, all the redeemed ones of both the Old and New Testament will be composed together as the complete expression of the Triune God. In this complete expression, Christ will be the lamp and God will be the light. Christ will be manifested and glorified through the New Jerusalem, and God the Father will be manifested and glorified in the Son as well as through the New Jerusalem. That will be the complete fulfillment of the Lord’s word, “Glorify Your Son that the Son may glorify You.”

THE SON TO BE GLORIFIED

The Son is to be glorified along with the Father (vv. 1, 5). In verse 5 the Lord said, “And now, glorify Me with Yourself, Father, with the glory which I had with You before the world was.” The word with is used three times in this verse. In the phrases with Yourself and with You, the same Greek word is used for with. The sense of this word is “along with.” This means that the Son is exactly the same as the Father in glorification. The Son is glorified along with the Father and with the same glory that the Father has. This word strengthens the indication in verse 1, concerning the deity of the Lord’s person, that He had the divine glory along with the Father before the world was, that is, in eternity past, so that He should be glorified along with the Father with that glory now. The Lord participates in the divine glory, not separately by Himself, but along with the Father, for He and the Father are one (10:30). The Lord, by praying this way, indicates His person, His deity, showing that He is the same as the Father in the divine glory. (Life-Study of John, msg. 38)

Although much has been said about John 17, still more is necessary. We must never forget this chapter, for in it the Lord prayed that God would glorify Him so that God might be glorified in and through Him. The words, “Father, the hour has come; glorify Your Son that the Son may glorify You” (17:1), are the subject of this prayer. How was the Son of God glorified so that God the Father might be glorified in and through the Son? It was by the resurrection which follows death. After His death, the Lord was resurrected, meaning that He was manifested and glorified. The Lord was released and manifested by resurrection; hence, He was glorified. When the Lord was thus glorified, the Father was glorified in and through the Son.

We have seen how the Son was glorified in His resurrection. Now in what way will the Son be glorified today so that the Father might be glorified in and through the Son? It is by the church. When the church has been regenerated, sanctified, crucified, and united with Christ in glory, then the Son of God will be expressed and manifested. The Son of God will be glorified in the oneness of the church. The Son of God being thus glorified, the Father at that time will also be glorified in and through the Son. Therefore, the prayer, “Glorify Your Son that the Son may glorify You,” includes and depends upon the matter of the church being regenerated, sanctified, crucified, and united in oneness with the Son of God.

THE FIRST STAGE OF ONENESS IS THE ONENESS OF LIFE,
THE SECOND STAGE IS THE ONENESS OF SANCTIFICATION,
AND THE THIRD STAGE IS THE ONENESS IN THE
GLORIFICATION OF THE TRIUNE GOD

As we have seen, the Lord’s prayer in John 17 unfolds three stages of oneness. In this message, let us pay careful attention to the verses in John 17 that are concerned with oneness. Verse 11 says, “Holy Father, keep them in Your name which You have given Me, that they may be one even as We are.” We see here that oneness is a matter of being kept in the Father’s name. As we have already pointed out, the reality of the Father’s name is the Father’s divine life. Hence, the first factor of genuine oneness is the Father’s name with the Father’s divine life. This is the life mentioned in 17:2, where the Lord said to the Father that He had given the Son “authority over all flesh, that He may give eternal life to all whom You have given Him.” We must take care of these two verses in order to see the first main factor of genuine oneness.

John 17:21 is a wonderful, deep, and profound verse. “That they all may be one; even as You, Father, are in Me and I in You, that they also may be in Us, that the world may believe that You have sent Me.” The oneness in this verse is the oneness in the Triune God. When we all are in the Triune God, we have oneness. How can we be in the Triune God? Only through Christ’s death and resurrection. This is the reason why the Lord told us in chapter fourteen that He had to go in death and come in resurrection. It was through death and resurrection that His disciples were brought into the Triune God. In the Triune God is the real, genuine oneness. We must take verses 17 and 18 along with verse 21. “Sanctify them in the truth; Your word is truth. As You have sent Me into the world, I also have sent them into the world.” In verse 17 we have the sanctifying word. Although we are in the Triune God, we may slip out of the Triune God into the world. Thus, we need the sanctifying word to separate us from the world back to the Triune God. Therefore, the second factor of genuine oneness is in the Triune God through sanctification by the holy word.

The third factor of oneness is found in verse 22. “And the glory which You have given Me I have given to them, that they may be one, even as We are one.” The third factor of genuine oneness is glory—in the divine glory for the expression of the Triune God. Since the glory which the Father has given to the Son has been given to us by the Son, genuine oneness is in the divine glory. What is glory? Glory is the sonship given to the Son by the Father with the Father’s divine life and nature to express the Father in His fullness. Notice that there are four aspects of glory: sonship, the Father’s life, the Father’s divine nature, and the expression of the Father in His fullness. These four things together equal the glory. This is the glory, which is a divine right and privilege, that we have in the Son. The Father has given this glory to the Son, and the Son is privileged to express the Father in this way. This is the very glory which has been given to us by the Son. Today we all have the sonship with the Father’s life and nature to express the Father in all His fullness in the Son. We need to become very familiar with these points, for it is in this divine glory that we are truly one.

In verse 24 the Lord said, “Father, I desire that those whom You have given Me may also be with Me where I am, that they may behold My glory which You have given Me, for You have loved Me before the foundation of the world.” The Lord was in the divine glory and prayed that all whom the Father had given Him would also be with Him in glory. We need to pay close attention to the tenses of some of the verbs in this verse. Here it does not say that they “shall be with Me” or that “they shall behold My glory.” According to the natural, religious concept, glory is in the future, in “the sweet by-and-by.” According to this concept, in “the sweet by-and-by” the glory will shine and we all shall come into that shining and be in glory. But the Lord Jesus did not use the future tense, but the present tense, saying, “I desire that those whom You have given Me may also be with Me where I am, that they may behold My glory.” The Lord said, “may also be,” and, “may behold My glory.” Being with the Lord in glory and beholding His glory are not for “the sweet by-and-by”; we may experience them today. The Lord seemed to be telling the Father, “Father, You have given Me Your glory, the sonship with the divine life and nature to express You and Your fullness. This is the glory which You have given Me, and I am now in this glory. But those whom You have given Me are not yet in this glory. I pray that they also may be in this glory.” When was this prayer answered? Firstly, it was answered on the day of resurrection and secondly, on the day the church was raised up. When the church was raised up, all the disciples were brought into that same glory, into the sonship with the divine life and the divine nature to express God the Father in the Son in all His fullness. Hallelujah, we all are in glory with the Son! The Son has the sonship with the divine life and the divine nature to express the Father, and we also have this. Thus, we are now where the Son is—in glory. By this we see that real oneness is in the Triune God through the process of the death and resurrection of the Son.

The first stage of oneness is the oneness of life, the second stage is the oneness of sanctification, and the third stage is the oneness in the glorification of the Triune God. The last stage, the glorification of the Triune God, is simply the manifestation of the Triune God, that is, the glory of sonship. When we come together realizing that we have been regenerated, sanctified, and crucified, then we are one to express God, to manifest God, and to be perfected into the glorification of the Triune God.

By applying these three stages, we can discover which stage we are in. In which stage are you—the first, second, or third? Are you simply one in life, or do you have the higher oneness in sanctification, or the highest oneness in the glorification of the Triune God? Not all of us are in the same stage. Some are in the first, others are in the second, and a few, by the Lord’s mercy, are in the third. As long as you have been saved and born again, you have the Father’s life and the Father’s name. Thus, you are the Father’s child and are one with all other Christians who also are the Father’s children. Hence, you are one in life. But you also need to be sanctified by the word in order to be separated from the worldly things and live in God. Then you will be one with the saints in the second stage. Finally, you need to realize the crucifixion of the cross in order to live in the glorification of the Triune God. This means that you must deny yourself, live in the manifestation of the Triune God, and be perfected into the oneness of the glorification of the Triune God. As we have seen, this is the ultimate step of oneness.

IT IS ONLY IN THE THIRD STAGE OF ONENESS THAT THE LORD’S PRAYER WILL BE FULFILLED, TO EXPRESS AND GLORIFY THE LORD

It is only in the third stage of oneness that the Lord’s prayer will be fulfilled. Only in this stage will the Son of God be glorified that the Father may be glorified in and through the Son. It is only in this stage that we shall glorify the Lord and manifest the Lord in oneness. In this stage we shall be absolutely perfected into oneness to manifest and glorify the Lord. Then we shall realize the sonship because all that God is and has will be embodied in us. This means that we shall have the life of God, the nature of God, and even God Himself for the purpose of becoming the very manifestation and expression of God. Finally, we shall have the full glory which God has given to the Lord as the Son of God. (Life-Study of John, msg. 41)