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John 17:20-21 JESUS PRAYING FOR UNITY AMONG HIS FUTURE DISCIPLES

Introduction:
	
	The 17th chapter of John is used to record an entire
prayer which Jesus prayed just before He and His disciples
reached the Garden of Gethsemane where He would be arrested.
In the first part of this prayer Jesus prayed for Himself.
In the next part He prayed for those disciples who were with
Him and who had followed Him during the three and a half
years of His ministry.  In the later part of the prayer He
prayed for those who would become His disciples in future
times.  We are not going to be able to cover all of this
part of the prayer, but we will go down to that part of the
prayer in which He prays for their unity.

I.  Jesus praying for His future disciples

	V. 20, "Neither pray I for these alone, but for them
also which shall believe on me through their word."  In His
prayer to God the Father for His disciples He had made two
requests.  First, He had prayed that God the Father would
keep His disciples.  He had kept them while He was with them
on earth.  Now that He was about to leave and return to
heaven, He was asking that God the Father would keep them.
	Secondly, Jesus was asking God the Father to sanctify
His disciples.  He asked the Father to sanctify them through
the truths of God's word which He had personally taught to
them while He was with them.  These were truths which the
Holy Spirit would later recall to their minds after He was
gone and would further explain so that they would have a
better understanding of these truths.  His disciples would
write these same truths in the books of the New Testament
and would enlarge upon them explaining them in somewhat
greater detail.
	Jesus said that in making these two requests of God the
Father He was not only asking the Father to keep and
sanctify those particular disciples who had followed Him
during His earthly ministry, but He was praying the same
things for all those who would yet become disciples in the
future.  He prayed these requests not only for those
disciples, but for all who would ever become disciples down
through the years.

II.  Jesus also praying for the spiritual unity of His
	future disciples

	In this portion of His prayer which we read in our text
today, Jesus makes an additional specific request concerning
His future disciples.  This request is still related to the
keeping and sanctifying of those disciples, but this request
is somewhat more specific.  He prays for their spiritual
unity.
	V. 21, "That they all may be one; as thou, Father, art
in me, and I in thee, that they also may be one in us..."
He asks the Father to keep them in spiritual unity as He and
the Father were in spiritual unity.  God the Father and God
the Son are two different persons in the Godhead, but they,
along with God the Holy Spirit, are so united in harmony
that they are as one.  They are so united that it cannot be
truly said that there are three Gods.  Rather they are three
distinct persons in one Godhead.  There is but one God.
	Jesus asks God the Father to keep His people, His
followers in a similar unity.  Even though each individual
believer will be a complete person separate and apart from
all other believers, yet he will be closely united with all
other believers.
	They were to be united in a family unit.  God's family
unit would be made up of all who are born-again believers in
Jesus Christ.  Salvation comes about with a new birth.
Jesus said, "Marvel not that I say unto you ye must be born
again."  He said, "Except a man be born again, he cannot see
the kingdom of God."  He said further that this new birth is
produced by the Holy Spirit of God.  He said that which is
born of the flesh is flesh and that which is born of the
Spirit (that is, that which is born of the Holy Spirit) is
the inward spirit of the man.  John would later write in I
John 5:1 that all who believe in Jesus Christ for salvation
are born of God.  They are born of God and are, thus, in the
family of God.  As members of the family of God, they have a
special bond of love for one another.
	They ought also to be united in a local New Testament
church.  A New Testament church is a local congregation of
believers in Christ who have been Scripturally baptized and
who are united together for the purpose of carrying out the
Lord's work as assigned in the Great Commission.  But not
all believers join a church.  Not all who are in the family
of God are in a New Testament church.  Some get saved and
never join a church of any kind.  In our day many who are
truly born-again believers join a church, but it is a church
that does not Scripturally qualify as a New Testament
church.  Many hold membership in a man made church that
teaches man made doctrines which did not come from God.  All
saved people ought to be in Scriptural New Testament
churches, but not all are.  Never-the-less, they are still
united with all believers in the family of God and there is
a bond of love between them and other believers because they
are all in the family of God.
	They ought all to be united in New Testament doctrines.
God the Father was the first to teach the doctrines which a
New Testament church should hold to.  He had one student.
That student was His Son, Jesus Christ.  Jesus in His
Eternal Spirit did not need to be taught.  As Spirit God He
knows all things.  But as a man dwelling in human flesh with
a human brain, He needed to be taught and God the Father
taught Him.  Jesus said that everything He ever taught in
all His ministry came to Him directly from God the Father.
It was God the Father's word which He taught to His
disciples who made up the first New Testament church.
	At the time when Jesus prayed this prayer He was about
to leave the world and leave His disciples behind.  They
were all united in doctrinal harmony.  They were not split
with some of them believing one thing and others believing
something else.  They had all been taught by the same
teacher, Jesus Christ.  They had all been taught the same
things, the things which God the Father had taught Jesus.
They all believed the same things.  They were all in harmony
in what they believed.
	When the New Testament writers wrote the books of the
New Testament they wrote the same things and they were all
in harmony in what they wrote.  It should have followed then
that every person who ever professed to be a Christian would
believe the same things doctrinally.  At least after he was
in a church long enough to be taught he ought to believe the
same things which Jesus had taught His disciples.  If all
believers down through the years would continue to believe
the same doctrines which Jesus had been taught by the Father
and which He had taught the early disciples, the churches
would always believe and preach and practice the same
things.

III.  A problem that brought division to the Christian world

	But a problem developed in the Christian world.  For one
thing, not everybody who has joined the Lord's churches were
born again believers.  Many of them were merely professed
believers and were not genuinely saved.  Therefore, they
found it difficult to accept the teachings of Jesus and easy
to hold to erroneous teachings.  Those unsaved people
brought man made doctrines into some of the Lord's churches.
	As time went by and more and more unsaved people came
into the membership of the Lord's churches, more and more
man made doctrines came into the Lord's churches.  Some of
them became so permeated with the doctrines of man that they
can no longer be properly identified as New Testament
churches.
	This brought controversy and division into the Lord's
cause.  It brought controversy and division within the
membership of many churches.  It brought controversy and
division between churches which still hold to the doctrines
and practices which Jesus taught and those churches which
have deviated from the teachings of Jesus.

IV.  The answer to the problem not found in ecumenism

	There are some who suggest that the way to solve the
problem is for all who profess to be Christians to all unite
together in one common cause and for all churches which
claim to be Christian to unite together in one common cause.
	This is impossible.  In Amos 3:3 it is pointed out that
it is impossible for two to walk together except they be
agreed.  It is impossible for a group of Christians to work
together in harmony unless they can be agreed at least on
the basic principles and doctrines of Christianity.  They
might differ on minor points and still work together in
harmony, but unless they agree on the basic doctrines, there
can be no harmony.  So it is impossible to gain unity
through ecumenism.
	Not only is it impossible for all so-called "Christian
faiths" to work together, but it would be unscriptural for
them even to attempt to do so.  Some men teach and preach a
"works-for-salvation" plan of redemption, there is no way
that those who hold to the true gospel can work in harmony
with them.  Some men deny that Jesus Christ is eternal Deity
God, there is no way that those who hold to the truths of
God can work together with them in a common goal.  When some
men hold to unscriptural dictatorial plans of church
government and there is no way that those who hold to
congregational rule as taught in Scripture can work together
with them in harmony.  Some men hold that big churches
should lord it over the little churches in cooperative
associational programs and there is no way that those who
hold to the truth can work together with them in harmony.
They cannot work together for the same goal because they do
not have the same goal.  Their goals are not the same.
	The Apostle Paul wrote to the Galatian churches, "But
though we, or an angel from heaven, preach any other gospel
unto you than that which we have preached unto you, let him
be accursed.  As we said before, so say I now again, If any
man preach any other gospel unto than that ye have received
let him be accursed," Gal.  1:8-9.
	So true believers who are members of true New Testament
churches and who hold to true New Testament doctrines cannot
be harmony with those who teach doctrines which are rank
heresy and which outrightly contradict New Testament truth.

V.  The special love that Christians have for Christians and
	the importance of that love

	Yet all who are born again, have a special love for all
who have been born again.  They are united together in the
family of God even though they cannot be united together
with them in church fellowship nor in associational
fellowship nor other organizational fellowships which seek
to unite them together.
	The Scriptures teach that the Christian is to love all
men whether they are saved or unsaved.  In Matthew 22:39
Jesus quoted from the Old Testament, "Thou shalt love thy
neighbor as thyself."  That means love him whether he is a
Christian or not.  If he is a Christian, it means love him
whether he is doctrinally sound or not and whether he is in
a Scriptural church or not.  In Galatians 6:10 Paul said
that Christians are to do good to all men whether they are
saved or not.
	Then he added, "...especially unto them of the household
of the faith."  The Christian is to love all men and do good
unto all men, but there is to be a special love for his
fellow Christians who hold true to the true doctrines of the
Lord.  Jesus most certainly did not call upon Christians to
join in with those who teach heresy and help them to promote
their heretical teachings and their heretical organizations.
But He does want Christians everywhere to love all men and
have a special love for those who are brethren in the
doctrinal faith.
	(V. 21), "...that the world may believe that thou
hast sent me."  Back in John 13:35 Jesus told His disciples
that it was by this kind of love that all men would know
that they were His disciples.  It is by this kind of love
that unsaved men become convinced that those who preach and
teach the true gospel are really telling the truth.  It is
by this kind of love that many lost people are persuaded to
turn to Jesus and be saved.

VI.  How unity will can be achieved

	With this in mind, there comes a perplexing question.
Since Jesus prayed to God the Father and asked God the
Father to bring all of His disciples into unity, why is it
that there is so much disunity today?  And when, if ever
will all of the Lord's disciples be brought to total unity
throughout the world?  The answer is that the Lord's cause
is so very much divided today because of the work of the
devil in this world.  Satan is the culprit.  He is the one
who has caused all of the disunity among Christianity.
	But unity will never be achieved by ecumenical movements
which seek to bring all churches together in harmony.
Christian unity could be achieved today if everybody in the
Christian world would believe the truths which God the
Father taught Jesus and which  Jesus taught His disciples,
but many people in the so-called Christian world today do
not and will not believe.
	Therefore, unity will never be achieved in the Christian
world until Jesus Himself comes back to this world and sits
upon the throne in Jerusalem.  When He returns He will put a
stop to all heretical teachings.  The only doctrines that
will be taught in the world during the millennium will be
the truths of God as Jesus taught when He was here
on earth.  I strongly suspect that even you and I will have
to change our minds at time on some of the ideas that we
hold to.  If everybody believed the truth now then everybody
would believe the same thing and there would be unity.  That
will never happen until Jesus comes again.
	But there is one unity which we should especially strive
for today.  We should strive to keep unity within our own
church congregation.  We should seek to love and appreciatly divide it.  Let us
never be guilty of seeking to make the Scriptures agree with
what we already believe.  Rather, let us seek to bring
ourselves to agree with what the Scriptures teach.
	Brethren, let us also seek to give ourselves to the work
of God.  There are still a lot of unsaved people in the
world who need the testimony that we can give to them about
Jesus Christ, the Son of God, the Savior of men.  Let us
seek to spread the gospel to a lost and dying world.
	Let us seek to live lives that are sanctified.  Let us
seek to live clean godly, lives.  Let us cultivate a love
for all men and let us demonstrate the love of God in our
lives.  That is the only kind of living that can convince
lost men, women, boys and girls that the gospel which we
preach is the truth of God.
	Let us seek to worship God from the very depths of our
heart and soul.  Let us worship and serve God in spirit and
in truth.  Let us search the Scriptures and seek to rightly
divide the word of God.  Let us preach and teach the word of
God whether the world believes it of not.  It is our
responsibility to preach it and teach it.  It is then their
responsibility to believe it.  But it is up to them whether
or not they will believe it.
	Let us seek to please the Lord in all that we do.  Yet
let us pray God that we will never be guilty of compromising
the truths of God.  In the words of Jude 3, let us earnestly
contend for the faith that was once delivered to the saints
by the Lord Jesus Christ, Himself.

Conclusion:

	If you are unsaved, God is giving you a special
invitation to heaven right now.  Please do turn God down.
He may not give you another opportunity.
	If you are saved, God is calling upon you to be set
apart to His honor and glory.  Please do not turn Him down.
He may not give you another opportunity.