Who's In Who?

Blessings, everyone! Jesus has some waiting on us today. And the best one is something he prayed about for us so long ago, on the night before he was crucified. Let's listen in on his conversation with God the Father in John 17:20-26. Read it out of your own Bible. There's just no substitute for that. Did you catch it? He's praying for some amazing blessings for us! One is glory. Glory we share in already (v. 22) as we live a life of love and harmony with other believers. Yet an even greater glory lies ahead!

Father, I want those you have given me to be with me where I am, and to see my glory..." (v. 24)

Now that sounds like something to look forward to! Jesus wants me to be with him. He wants to bring me to heaven and engulf me in his glory! And because it's God's eternal glory, it will never get old or grow dim. I am going there now. That is, it's coming down the road I'm now traveling. It's where I'm headed. And one day, I'll arrive! I'll be with Jesus. It reminds me that people so dear to me who also trusted in him and who have died and left this world have already arrived. How good for them!

And as much as I anticipate that, there is another blessing even more profound that Jesus prays for me:

"...that I myself may be in them" (v. 26, also v. 23)

This one's a little harder to grasp, isn't it? I can get going some place to be with Jesus. But having Jesus, the Son of God, living in me--now that's almost incomprehensible. Yet that's precisely what he prayed for you and me twice in this prayer. "I in them." I am not God (sorry, Shirley McLain), but God lives in me. Jesus lives in me through the Holy Spirit he sent into every believer. But he said, "I myself will be in them." It's the mystery of the Trinity. They are distinct yet so truly unified and one in nature and purpose and character that to have the Holy Spirit in me is to have Jesus in me and to have the Father in me. And what's more, I'm in them!

"May they also be in us..." (v. 21)

I've become so one with God through my faith in Jesus that I'm in God and God is in me. Jesus has a crazy dream. It’s a dream in which drastically different people sit together and worship and break bread together and take care of each other, and serve side by side in helping others, when the only thing they have in common is that Jesus lives in them, and they in him.

Everywhere I go, there he is not just with me but within me. I don't always feel it, but he's there. It's not about feelings; it's about faith. The reality is that he's there! I just want to be more aware of his presence. Because I can't think of a greater blessing than that. Not only is he going to welcome me into his home, he's made his home in me! I hope he feels at home there.

Do you, Lord? Is there anything in me that you want to clean out to make yourself feel more welcome? Show me if there is. And you have my full cooperation to clean me out. Take away all desire in me to do anything evil that now tempts me. Just remove the desire altogether and make me clean and whole. And thank you for the honor that you have chosen to live in me. I will gladly live in you today. Amen.

Please share whatever Jesus has put on your heart in this conversation. Comment below. (Either choose Anonymous in the "Comment as" box or sign in first at the top right corner).