How Jesus restores my joy
Great joy came to the world upon the birth of Jesus, and joy comes back to me when I read the prayer of Jesus on the night He was betrayed. Three things Jesus said cheer me.
This is life eternal, that they might know You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom You have sent.
Sanctify them by Your truth. Your word is truth.
The world has not known You, but I have known You; and these have known that You sent Me. —John 17: 3, 17, 25
My joy surges when I read these words because, frankly, it wanes when I surf the blogs and read the book catalogs. So many voices tell me this and that about God, often contradicting each other. My culture berates me for believing Jesus is the truth: Such an absolute is intolerant. I’m told to be inclusive—yes, have “my truth”, but allow others theirs.
I get weary and become conflicted. What is true? What is real?
I know I am not alone. In his latest book, Where The Light Fell, Philip Yancey relates his life-long quest to answer these questions. (This is Yancey’s memoir, but I found myself asking more than once, Did you grow up in my house?)
It is like the story about a penitent who went to the altar to pray and others gathered for support. One cried out, “Let go, and let God!” Another gripped the altar rail and prayed, “Hold on, hold fast.”
What is a soul to do?
Amid the doubtful clamor, I find comfort and reassurance in this prayer. This is how Jesus restores my joy.
God is, and there is only one God. It is the fool who says there is no God, and the arrogant whose God is disabled—blind, deaf, and distant (Psalm 10). I live in a culture of pluralism that demands diversity and inclusion—there are many gods and we must accept them all equally.
Believing these words of Jesus, I am neither a fool nor arrogant. The God of Jesus is real; He lives and is more than able to do above and beyond what I imagine, even to the giving of eternal life.
This one God is true. Absolute truth girds this prayer of Jesus. The only true God. Your word is truth. Moreover, the One praying declared, I am the truth. So little is certain these days, so many are confused. Above our doubts and disputes reigns God—one God, the true God, the living God. Believe this or not, God remains true. This truth transcends us. It’s not my truth versus yours. It is His truth, over all.
There is one who knows God. I’ve heard the question—maybe you have asked it—”Who knows what God wants?” No one knows except Jesus and, by extension, those who know Jesus. “I have known You,” He said that night to His Father. Earlier He had told the disciples, “If you have seen me, you have seen the Father.” Jesus dispels our doubts and overrules our opinions. Jesus sets us straight about God and explodes our excuses. We can no longer claim ignorance: the Son has come; therefore, we may know His Father, the one true God.
We can advance from not knowing God, to knowing Him. Jesus entered a world whose misconceptions about God are because it doesn’t know Him. He chose from this brood twelve men who, three years later, “have known that you sent me.” Jesus made God so well known that John, one of these chosen twelve, writes later, “we know that the Son of God has come and has given us an understanding, that we may know Him who is true” (1 John 5:21).
This is such a message of hope and comfort. I think of Adam and Eve, brand-new creatures who didn’t know what God would do when they disobeyed and hid among the trees of Eden. Ever since, we also have been afraid and in the dark about God. They had to learn and we have to learn, and Jesus came so we could know. He came, “the just for the unjust, that He might bring us to God” (1 Peter 3:18). He came to bring us home.
This absolute truth makes us different. Jesus prayed, “Sanctify them by Your truth.” To sanctify includes the ideas of separation and cleaning. It is a verb of movement and alteration. This one true God separates us from lies about Him and ourselves. He separates us from what stains us: “Though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be as white as snow” (Isaiah 1:18). He separates us from the world that doesn’t know Him. Now separated from these things, we can live for Him.
I hear these words of Jesus and feelings like Ruth had toward Naomi emerge. The widow Naomi, bereft of a husband and two sons, was leaving Moab and her daughters-in-law, heading back home to Israel, when Ruth clung to her. “Wherever you go, I will go,” she said. “Your God shall be my God.” (See Ruth 1:1-18).
These words of Jesus have me saying to Him, “Your God shall be my God, and Your Father, my Father.”
My joy is full.
Have you been discouraged, your joy drained, and Jesus refreshed you? I’d love to hear about it. Please leave a comment and share this good news.