“I pray for them: I pray not for the world, but for them which thou hast given me; for they are thine. And all mine are thine, and thine are mine; and I am glorified in them. And now I am no more in the world, but these are in the world, and I come to thee. Holy Father, keep through thine own name those whom thou hast given me, that they may be one, as we are. While I was with them in the world, I kept them in thy name: those that thou gavest me I have kept, and none of them is lost, but the son of perdition; that the scripture might be fulfilled. And now come I to thee; and these things I speak in the world, that they might have my joy fulfilled in themselves. I have given them thy word; and the world hath hated them, because they are not of the world, even as I am not of the world. I pray not that thou shouldest take them out of the world, but that thou shouldest keep them from the evil. They are not of the world, even as I am not of the world. Sanctify them through thy truth: thy word is truth. As thou hast sent me into the world, even so have I also sent them into the world. And for their sakes I sanctify myself, that they also might be sanctified through the truth.” John 17:9-19
Jesus and his disciples will soon leave the Upper Room and enter into the darkness of Jerusalem as make their way to the Garden of Gethsemane where he will be arrested. He will be bound and taken to the High Priest who will be waiting in his palace along with the scribes and elders. As the families of Jerusalem were concluding the Passover, the Rulers of Israel put into motion the last piece of their conspiracy to finally arrest Jesus. They had both Roman and Temple guards ready, false witnesses lined up, charges to bring, and a well thought through legal process that would put an end to Jesus once and for all. They even were ready to bring the matter to a head with a roar from the crowd when Pilate would offer to release Jesus: “Give us Barabbas,” they would shout!
But before Gethsemane, Jesus stood and lifted his eye heavenward and prayed out loud to his Father. As I said last week to lift up one’s eye to heaven is to look beyond all earthy things to the heavenly, to the abode of the Father, to that which hovers over all our terrestrial horizons. I submit to you that his posture and in particular his turning of his gaze from the horizontal to the vertical, from his disciple who were before him to his Father who is above them all was specifically for the well being of his disciples. As you can see our Lord’s prayer at the end of the evening is dedicated to his disciples — he petitions God the Father for their protection in the world, for their joy, their holiness, and for their own consecration to God’s service and worship. Jesus was about to leave the world and return to this Father but prior to his departure he makes provision for their protection. He places his disciples into his Father’s hands as their refuge from the storm to come:
“I pray for them: I pray not for the world, but for them which thou hast given me; for they are thine. And all mine are thine, and thine are mine; and I am glorified in them. And now I am no more in the world, but these are in the world, and I come to thee.”
The Father had given those who believe in Jesus to the Son and the Son kept them safe through out his earthly ministry. As long as Jesus was with his disciples bodily he did not reveal the mutual suffering they would share with him that mutual suffering that is part of our common life in Christ. And as long as he was with them bodily he would permit no one to harm them and that was exactly the case. Can you think of any of Jesus’ disciples who were harmed while he was still with them, prior to his crucifixion? No. None of them were harmed and in fact some people who were being harmed he rescued and they frequently became his faithful disciples after that, like for example the woman he rescued from stoning in Jerusalem. What that means for his Church — that as long as he was with them bodily he protected them — that is a reality that we have not explored very much but I would suggest that it is not by accident, but intentional so that he could say to his Father in the prayer of John 17 that he had not lost one of those the Father had given to him except for Judas whom he will refer to as “the son of nothingness,” (the man who turns from Being and takes hold of nothingness – the enfleshed nihilist) or “the son of calamity and destruction,” and that loss has something to do with the fulfillment of the Scriptures. Regardless, it is abundantly clear that Judas consciously and intentionally decided to betray Jesus, and plotting with the Rulers of Israel he took action to bring their mutual plan to fruition.
But as long as Jesus was with his little flock no harm came to them and had not Judas made up his mind to stab him in the back he surely would have come under his care and protection as well. The Good Shepherd protects his sheep, he will not run from the wolf or the lion but he will place himself in harm’s way, he will stand between his sheep and anyone or anything thing that intends to do them harm. In short he will lay down his life for his sheep. If we take the fact that he lost none of his disciples to malevolent forces while he was them, it is appropriate to take that historic reality to have a mystical meaning which is that Jesus is fierce, potent, indeed omnipotent when it comes to protecting Holy Mother Church and her children. There is no force, in life, or death; no angel, no prince, no menace, not from the past, not in the present, not coming in the future that can separate or disenfranchise you from your destiny in Christ.
“Holy Father, keep through thine own name those whom thou hast given me, that they may be one, as we are.”
“Holy Father, keep through thine own name those whom thou hast given me,” means to keep them from the contamination from the world. There is simply no getting around the duality between the Church and the world as embarrassing as this may be today. But see how wholehearted, how explicit Jesus is on this matter:
“I pray for them: I pray not for the world, but for them which thou hast given me; for they are thine.”
There are of course plenty of New Testament texts that demonstrate Christ’s love for the World, but that does not neutralize this unambiguous declaration of his ultimate concern. It is not for the World, it is for the Church and especially that the Church will be kept unstained from the World. And yet he is sending his disciples into this sin-sick world, still he he prays for his Church:
“I pray not for the world…”
Do not forget that the coming of the Son in flesh also brought judgment into the World and the World is provoked. By this time in the Gospel, the World had come to be identified with those who have and will reject Jesus and are under the power of Satan, the prince of the World. Thus Jesus does not pray for the World in this case, but rather he proves the World wrong and he conquered by the power of the Cross. Furthermore he sends his disciples into the World for the same reason the Father sent the Son into the World, namely to challenge the lies of Satan and the World. It is the case that throughout the history of the Church, her task is to, “gather together in one the children of God that were scattered” abroad in the World. Yes, the Church will be hated. And Jesus now reveals this to his disciples. In our day and time it is especially important not to blunt the words of Christ that may cause us embarrassment and scandal. St. James says that to be the friend of the World is to be the enemy of God. Obviously this is not the whole New Testament message concerning the Church’s role in the World, but the Bible is one of God’s chosen instruments for our sanctification — the Word of God written has the power to judge and to correct our way. Especially in our day, when many in the Church naively celebrate and affirm the values of the World and wish to find ways for the Church to be her friend, it is important to recall that Jesus emphatically states: “I pray not for the world…”
“And now come I to thee; and these things I speak in the world, that they might have my joy fulfilled in themselves. I have given them thy word; and the world hath hated them, because they are not of the world, even as I am not of the world. I pray not that thou shouldest take them out of the world, but that thou shouldest keep them from the evil. They are not of the world, even as I am not of the world…”
Jesus has delivered God’s word and God’s Name to his disciples and it is in his Word and his Name that they will be sheltered from the hostility of the World. Specifically Jesus has delivered to this disciples his relationship to the Father: that he is God’s only Son and that he is equal to the Father in his divinity in every way, except that Jesus is not the Father. All that belongs to the Father, belongs to Jesus already and he has delivered God’s word and love to his disciples. And the Name through which the Children of God will find abounding joy and perfect security is as our Lord put it:
“Holy Father, keep through thine own name those whom thou hast given me, that they may be one, as we are.”
A much more accurate translation would be: “Keep through the Name thou has given me,” which Name is the Name of Jesus. The fulfillment of our joy is not a matter of having our personal wants satisfied as though what matters in life is our own private circumscribe happiness, but rather our joy, our delight, our benediction and blessing is to do the will of Jesus just as his joy and delight was to do the will of his Father. And I submit to you that we most perfectly do the will of Jesus when we celebrate the Holy Communion, the great gift of the Sacrament of the Altar that he bestowed upon his Church that evening. Furthermore when Jesus says that, “Whatsoever ye shall ask the Father in my name, he will give it you,” there is no request that we may lay before God the Father that is dearer to his own heart, dearer to his Son’s heart, or dearer to the heart of the Church than the request we place before him in the Eucharist: