What Jesus Prays For

As we are drawn up to share in the life of Jesus, we will find ourselves sharing in the work of Jesus, as we come to share the heart and desire of Jesus; for his people, and for the world.

In the great “high priestly prayer” of John 17 we witness Jesus seeking the Father on our behalf, for the sake of the world: “I ask… that they may all be one, just as you, Father, are in me, and I in you, that they also may be in us, so that the world may believe that you have sent me… That they may be one even as we are one, I in them and you in me, that they may become perfectly one, so that the world may know that you sent me and loved them even as you loved me.”

The first desire of Jesus for us, his people, is our UNITY; our one-ness in the Spirit. Why? Primarily, because this is what GOD is LIKE. Our calling, in Christ, is to manifest the character of the Lord in and through the medium of our own “with-God life”. And the Lord God is not a mere, static individual in isolation, but the living, eternal, triune community of self-giving love, Father, Son and Holy Spirit. From the very beginning, it has always been in loving COMMUNITY that we have been created and called to bear the image of God. This is not a work that we can do in isolation. It is as we love and serve and remain with one another that we manifest the life of Christ in the world. 

And it follows, second, that it is in precisely this way, Jesus says, “that the world may believe… that the world may know”… It is in and through our lives, built upon and given to one another in love, that the work of Jesus to make visible the nature and heart and purposes of God continues to be accomplished.

This is Jesus’ first desire in prayer: our unity, in His own life and in the Spirit, as a witness to the world.

If we are going to see a regional, cultural, generation-defining move of the Holy Spirit our day - or ANY day - it will begin with a Church that is UNITED in crying out to God in prayer that He should do it. It is going to begin with a people of God who are committed and consecrated and hungry enough to “break up the fallow ground”, of our lives, of our silos, our divisions, our secondary issues and concerns; who are consumed with love and longing for the presence and the Kingdom of God such that there is simply no other response available to us but to wholeheartedly, incarnationally surrender our whole lives to that cry, and that pursuit. “It is TIME to seek the LORD.” (Hos. 10:12)… To do so sacrificially, and to do so in UNITY of voice as the people of God. We are, TOGETHER, the Body and Bride of Christ. ONE, in Spirit. ONE, in prayer.

This is Jesus’ first desire; the unity and community, and communion of his people, in and by his own Spirit. And what is Jesus’ second, and ultimate, desire? “Father, I desire that they also, whom you have given me, may be with me where I am… that the love with which you have loved me may be in them, and I in them.”

As leaders, may our desires and prayers ever grow into one-ness with JESUS’ own desires and prayers for us; that the world may know, and that we would find our dwelling forever in and with him!

Rev. Chris Bannon
Area Coordinator North, Revive New England