Verses 1 through 5. John 17, 1 through 5. Technically speaking, we are on verses 4 and 5, hopefully to finish this section this morning. Let me remind you, verse 1 goes into verse 5. Verses 2 through 4 are kind of parentheses. This is kind of the way it lays out. And so you could read verse 1, when Jesus had spoken these words, he lifted up his eyes to heaven, said, Father, the hour has come. Glorify your Son, that the Son may glorify you. And then you could continue in verse 5, and now, Father, glorify me. in your presence with the glory that I had with you before the world existed. And then the parentheses is two through four. Since you have given him authority over all flesh to give eternal life to all whom you have given him, and this is eternal life, that they know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent I have glorified you on earth, having accomplished or having finished the work that you gave me to do. Did you see the news this week? Did you happen to catch that thread on Twitter? Or did you keep up with the conversation this week up on your Farsebook account? Were you in tune with some of the events that unfolded this week? I sure hope not. Imagine how much time is wasted on the news, how much time is wasted on electronic gadgets of trying to keep up with things you have nothing or no control over. What I want to know is, have you seen the glory of God? Have you got a God-entranced vision? In other words, have you come to a beauty that is of such rich, such depth, such preciousness that you start saying, it's like more sweet than honey in the drippings of the honeycomb? Have you found the glory of God, the very thing that drives your being and fills your soul and makes your heart to leap with joy? Have you found Christ? I think our view of God is far too small. That's why we entertain ourselves with fruitless, stupid junk. Because you don't value Christ. You understand the God of heaven has put all glory on his son and you give him two minutes God loves His Son. With everything that He is, this is my beloved Son. You would do well to listen. You say, how can I listen? You're going to have to read. You're going to have to look at the text. Oh Lord, would you speak to me this day? I just encourage you, check your own heart and see if Christ has value for you that he's more primary than secondary. We are on number four, verse four, the perfection of the work of Jesus. Simply amazed at Christ. There is no other who fills this category. So if you see there in verse four, let me, and I forgot how much it changes it, but let me give you my translation of verse four. That's the one I'm working from. It says, I have, I have, it's a completed act, the whole of Jesus' life, he makes this statement, I have glorified you, the you being God. Everything about my life? has glorified God upon the earth. Everything that I've done, the entirety of my existence in human flesh was for the glory of God. That's Christ. And then he says, having finished the work, having finished the work which you gave me so that I may do it. Who can talk like this? No one else can make statements like this. God, everything you said, I have done. This is Christ. He makes this boldly and clearly and puts it in writing by the Apostle John for all to see. If there's anyone who can come this day and show that Christ did something incomplete, come. Come. We'll have this debate right now. Everything Christ did was perfectly good. Not attempted, not tried to, but finished and completed with perfection. There's such value in Christ. You can spend all of eternity trying to get to His depths and never understand all that He is. The primary purpose of Jesus was to live a life that brought glory to His Father. It's the whole purpose. It's the driving motive of his heart. This motive, he says, was achieved on earth. This is what I sought to do and this is what I did. Now, he also says, having finished the work, completed, nothing is left hanging, if you will. Nothing needs correction. Nothing needs addition. Nothing needs subtraction. There's no remodeling necessary here. Everything necessary for the work that is given to Christ is perfect. Not only is it perfect when He completed it, it's perfect for all of eternity. There's never going to be a time when God comes back and revises the book. You guys come back after 2,000 years and say, well, there's this one thing I forgot to tell you to do. It's not going to happen. It's a completed work and Christ has accomplished it all. We can talk about a lot of areas, but if we want to be very clear, undoubtedly the work that Christ is referring to has everything to do with what is necessary for your redemption. We could get some other subcategories, but let's look at the primary. Here's the primary work of Christ, to redeem a lost humanity for the glory of His Father. That primary work includes all lesser works, but that is the great work. It is the work that He's about to enter upon the cross where He is slaughtered on the behalf of sinners. Now I remind you of a few texts that verify some of these things. One of those would be John 3, 17. For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world. That's not the work. His work's not condemnation. We've got Mount Sinai for that. That's not His work to condemn the world. But it's in order that the world might be saved through Him. Here's the work He sent me to do, not condemnation, but redemption. Or I remind you of John 4, verse 34, Jesus said to them, My substance is to do the will of Him who sent me." And to what? To finish. To accomplish the work. The second person of the Godhead. I am here and my sustenance drives from this one source. Finishing the work. That's what He's here for. I'll remind you of John 5.36. But the testimony that I have is greater than that of John, John the Baptist. He says, The very works, at that point, I am doing, they bear witness about me that the Father has sent me. Even in the midst of his ministry, what I'm doing, what I did, what I will do, everything about Jesus' life is an accomplishment of the work given to him by his Father. John 19. John 19. You know this one. We've quoted it so often. The climatic accomplishment of this work is found there, and he says a statement like this. When Jesus had received the sour wine, he said, It is finished. It's finished. The work is over. I've accomplished everything. And then he did what? He bowed his head and he gave up his spirit. His life came to an end at the moment everything necessary for redemption is done. What a Savior! Hallelujah! That's the old hymn. Hallelujah! What a Savior! That's what we do. We rejoice in this Savior. Look, let's not play games. You know you're irritated with politics. You know you're irritated with people you work with. And you get irritated. Why? You say the same things every week. I hear the same nonsense every week. President Biden lied. He lied. Well, Trump's lying. This person's lying. That person's lying. The Republicans are liars. The Democrats are liars. All these politicians are liars. And you feed your heart with it. Don't blame me because you feed your heart with lies. Why don't you come to one whose yes is yes and no is no and everything he says is true? May you fill your heart with that instead of all this pointless politics that is taking men to hell, and then you're gripey, and you're bitter, and you're all in fear, and you're running around getting tested for everything the government tells you to test for. Why don't you read this book under this Savior and be satisfied? I'll be a doctor this morning. Try this for two weeks and see if your spirit improves. You get tested for everything. I went and got tested the other day. They said I wasn't pregnant. I'm like, that's good news. I was really hoping I'd have to carry a baby. I mean, good night. Okay, I'm sorry, I'm off track now. Unique statements by Christ in this text I draw your attention to. I want you to get the sense of how overwhelming this is. Jesus says, I have glorified. The whole of everything Jesus' life from the incarnation all the way through. Think of how difficult this. Everything I said, everything I thought, everything I did, everything I participated in, every relationship that I was involved in, every group that I went to, every temptation that I faced, everything in the entirety of my life from birth until death was to the glory of God. Can you say that? I can't say that. I've had it so many times, I've sullied the name of the Lord, but our Savior, I just want you to look at Him. I just want you to love Christ. I don't want you to be impressed with anything else but Christ. Every single thing about Him brought glory to His Father. What a way to live. That's one statement. That's a unique statement. I know no one else who can make such a statement as that. The second statement he makes, I am the one. I'm the one. I'm the only one. There's nobody else. I am the only one ever in the history of creation that has finished the work that you gave me to do. No one else, you go all the way back, all the way back to Noah, and he did all this for 120 years. This is a great work, but he never finished the work of redemption. You go back to Moses, you go back to David, you go back to Samuel, you go back to Joshua, you go back to all of these great men, if you will, all of these prophets, you go back to John the Baptist, who preached like he preached, you look at all those, none of them even came close to finishing the work of redemption because it was too costly. Only one. Christ, would you look unto Him, be mesmerized by who He is. I think about my pathetic life sometimes. We're always working and I never finish anything. At the end of this day, after preaching this morning and preaching this night, doing whatever I do this day, as soon as I lay down, I lay down with this thought, I must start tomorrow, because I'm still not done. Pastored this church for 20-something years, and here I am going, I don't even know if we've got started yet, because we've never finished anything. It's always incomplete. It just never works out. If you don't want to think about it spiritually, think about it materially. You say, Hey, we're building a new house. And so you start building your house and they come out and they do the ground work, they lay the concrete, they come out and they start framing the thing up, they put the roof on it, they put the shingles on it, they run the electricity, run the plumbing, do all this stuff. And one day you say, they're done. The moment you say they're done, a storm comes and your roof suffers hell damage. Well, we got to have a repair. Why do you gotta repair it? Because it wasn't sustainable. It was finished, but it wasn't finished. And then the electricity had a problem. Then the water had a problem. And then the plumbing got stopped up. We had to call the plumber. And there's always this work to do on the maintenance of the house. You're never gonna buy a house that stays perfect condition for your whole life, no matter what kind of house it is. But Jesus says, I've finished. There's never a time in all of the future that something of his work is going to deteriorate, and he's going to have to come back and re-shingle it, or unstop the plumbing. Never, because the work he did really is finished. You can't add to the gospel. You can't subtract from the gospel. You can't improve the gospel. You can't prop the gospel up. The gospel stands on its own because Christ accomplished, finished, Completed. Behind all of these phrases is this thought. I'm laying something before you that is unchangeable, irrevocable, impeccable, lasting and true for all of eternity. Would you grab a hold of that this morning? What I'm saying to you is, you can invest your whole life understanding Christ, understanding the gospel, understanding the Word of God, and you can spend your whole life and just gain and gain and gain, and it's never going to be a correction come and say, well you should have went this way, you should have done this. It's always true. If this is always true and there is no lie here, it seems logical to me to invest in that which does not change. You say, well, pastor, I agree. Then why, pray, tell me, do you spend so much time knowing what all the scores of the games are? Why do you spend so much time sitting there dwindling while the preacher's preaching on your Facebook account? Everything you see within a matter of seconds is changed. It moves. It's gone. It becomes obsolete. It comes to nothing. I'm trying to say to you, you ought to come in the church and say, who has the memory verse? Everybody ought to raise their hand. Why not? Exactly how long does it take to do that passage? Forty-two seconds. Forty-two seconds. Thirty-seven through forty-three. Forty-two seconds. We don't have time to read God's Word. We don't have time to memorize. We don't have time to look at God's Word and meditate upon it and know it in our hearts. Why? Because we're too busy. We're too interested in all the other things. How can you not be interested in Christ as a primary? How can you not meditate upon Him and receive honey from Him? How can you not find pleasure in Him? How can you not spend more valuable time feeding your soul with the things that He's given us to feed our souls? We live in a state of unfinished. We bemoan, some Christians bemoan their lack of glorifying the Lord rather than being able to say, I have glorified the Lord. We're wondering whether we have or not, but we come to one here in our text that says, I have, and I have finished. Look, if nothing else, as I meditate upon verse four, it helps me to forget myself. That's a good thing. And to be caught up and lost in Christ. You say, that don't make any sense to me. Oh, yes, it does. You just ain't putting it together. We have to go back to relationships. The first time you fell in love with a girl or a guy, you fell in love and you went on your first date. And you're like, man, we've been on this date for 27 minutes. 29. When will it be over? You never even looked at your watch. You never even thought about any of that. All of a sudden, the girl says, hey, I have to be home by 11. Oh my gosh, it's 1059. You lost track of all time because you got caught up in the one you love. Anybody, you understand what I'm saying? Why is it not that way with Christ? That we're so caught up in him that we get in these moments that we're lost and oblivious to the world because we're so satisfied in the person of Christ. He really is that valuable. Would you treasure him like that? I just want to go on a walk tomorrow and spend time with Christ. I just want to pray and be alone in a place where it's my refuge. that he would be valuable to you. Everyone who is in Christ glorifies the Father. Be in Christ. Live upon earth with the priority of the glory of the Lord. Just a couple of thoughts and we'll go to verse 5. But live upon earth with the priority of glorifying the Lord. God's glory ought to be your thought for what you read. I am going to read this because I want my life to glorify God. Why am I reading this? What are you reading right now? You say, Pastor, what are you reading besides the Bible? What are you reading? I'm reading John Fawcett, an old Puritan, who says, this is what happens to your life if Christ is precious. I'm reading what I'm reading in order that my life could glorify the Lord more. This is how you evaluate whether I'm going to get this book or I'm going to get this book. Whether I'm going to Watch this or watch that. Do this or do that. In what way will this event cause me to be able to give glory to Him? You say, why are you saying that? Because that's the way Jesus lived and we're to imitate Christ. Everything He did brought glory to Christ. Well, if everything Christ did brought glory to God, how am I to imitate that? Everything I venture into, how can this bring glory to God? You say, well, it can't. Then stop it. If I do this, I don't think God's going to get any glory. I wouldn't waste my time with it. What will it do? Will it bring Him glory? Secondly, God's glory ought to be your thought for what to do today. Today we call it the Lord's Day. What can I do on the Lord's Day every week that would bring glory to Him? I know it's meddling, meddling if that's what you want to call it, but exactly what do you get by skipping Sunday school? What are you getting? What is it that's so profitable and so precious and so full of good fruit that is so much better than meeting with your church to study God's Word? I challenge any one of you, bring me something that is better than meeting together and studying God's book. It seems like it would bring glory to God if people met together corporately to study God's Word for His glory. He said, like tonight, even as I preach this, I know it's true, a lot of you, you won't come back, you'll say, what are you going to do tonight that's going to bring glory to God? What are you going to do? Watch a game? Sleep? What are you going to do? Play on Facebook? Walk around the yard? Mow the grass? What are you going to do? What's going to be more valuable than going to Galatians chapter 3 and seeing that we were imprisoned until faith came? Show me what you have that has more value than Christ. You see, God's people ought to be lost, caught up in the glory of God. Our day would be set apart to give glory to Him. God's glory ought to be your thought for what you wear, especially to church. God's glory ought to be your thought for conversations, for investments. God's glory ought to be your thought for your home, for your marriage, for your family, and etc. There's many areas. I'm just listing a few because this is how Christ lived. From birth to death, I have glorified you. That's the way he lived. Surely, if you're Christian, you would not quibble over the point that our lives are to imitate Christ. It doesn't take an exegetical hero to come up with an interpretation here that Christ's life was for the glory of God. Okay, logical connection. Then how can I live in a way like this where my life brings glory to God? I answer that question, and I invest in that. That's the way we live, trying to figure out ways to bring glory unto him. Now, the last verse, the permanence of glory, verse 5. Now, Father, because he's finished this work perfectly, now, Father, glorify me. in your own presence with the glory that I had with you before the world existed." Or my translation would read this way, and now you glorify me, Father, with yourself, with the glory which I had with you before the world came to be. So the resurrection, the ascension, and coronation of King Jesus at the right hand of God will be to His glory. One statement taking a whole lump of theology, resurrection, ascension, coronation, and there He is put at the right hand of the throne of God's glory. There's a line in here that says, glorify me with yourself, with yourself, is a direct connection back to the beginning of the book. John 1.1, in the beginning was the word and the word was with God. Glorify me with yourself. He was with God before the beginning. This perfect eternal state of glory, he's bringing it back here before our minds again, I want to be restored and put back in my original eternal position, which was to your glory. This is his statement. This is my destiny. This is my direction, he is saying. So Jesus resided, eternity passed, in eternal glory. He entered the world through the incarnation, took upon human flesh. He lived a life of impeccability without sin, without mistake, without error. He died a sinless substitute. He was vindicated by being raised from the dead. He ascended to heaven. And for all of eternity, He will be what He has always been. which is the glory of God. All praise, all radiance, all beauty wrapped up in the second person of the Godhead. This is His eternal residing. So I encourage you, if you would, turn to the book of Hebrews, to the 12th chapter. Hebrews chapter 12. Verse 1, after this illustrious chapter of faith, how the saints lived who believed Christ, you get therefore. Faith, shall we live by faith? Therefore, since we, the saints of today, are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, We have a responsibility, there's something that we ought to do. Let us, let us sit by the word Baptist Church, let's do something. Let us lay aside every weight. Whatever is slowing you down spiritually. Whatever's hindering you from progress in the things of God, whatever it is, because of the example by all of the saints of the Old Testament, by all the example of Christ himself, and because there are all this cloud of witnesses, I want to take and lay this aside. If you don't understand that terminology, if you want to run the Boston Marathon 26.2 miles and you want to compete in the Boston Marathon, I highly doubt that you're going to wear work boots. You're not going to wear a vest full of water that weighs 50 pounds. You're going to be as light as you can be with this material they make the running pants and shirt out of, and you look kind of goofy wearing all that stuff, but you want to be as light as you can in order that you can run. You get rid of everything that hinders you. In the bicycle world, they don't talk about pounds. They talk about grams. Grams cost lots of money. It makes things light. We want it light. The Christian wants it light. Don't weigh yourself down with the news. Don't weigh yourself down with electronic media. Don't weigh yourself down with frivolous, worldly junk. Take and lay that junk aside and say, you know what? I'm going to invest my life for the glory of God. He says, lay every weight aside. The sin, and Jack said the word cling. I don't know if it's the same as the Hebrew word there, but which clings so closely. It's always trying to grab your attention, pull you away. It's always there. Put this stuff aside. I want to run. I want to run with endurance. What? This race. This Christian race. This narrow path with this narrow door for the glory of God that there's a few people on this road. I want to run this race and I want to run it well and I want to win. I want to make it all the way home to the finish line where the gates are open and I go into glory and he says, well done. That's the race I want to win. If you don't like to look at the Old Testament saints, then verse 2, looking to Jesus. We've done enough exegesis here to be able to make the statement. We look at Jesus and his whole life was for the glory of God. I look to him and he's the founder, he's the perfecter, he's the source and the substance, he's all of that of what? of our faith. The reason we believe is all because of Him. Notice what He did. The ESV says sphor, it's the Greek word anti. Because in the place of, in the stead of, or in the substitution of joy. the substitution for the glory he had in heaven. Listen, here he is enthroned in heaven with his father full of glory and instead of that glory he set that glory aside in order that he could come down. That's what he did. So he chose that which was lower rather than to exist in that which was higher. He could stay eternally in heaven under the glory of his Father forever, but he willingly submitted himself to the Father's will to come down. Why would he come down? To save a wretch like you. In order, the joy that was set before him, he set it aside and he did what? He endured the cross. bearing your sin, stripped naked, spit upon, ridiculed and mocked. Many of you won't even leave your living room to go to an outreach in Azel. The last thing you're going to do is go to another country and try to reach somebody there. We just don't have a capacity to sacrifice in some regards. We're not willing to give up anything of our comforts, right? We don't want to do nothing like that. We know that's true, but we look at Christ. You talk about a five-star motel. He's in heaven. with everything about His glory, and He sets that aside, and in place of that glorious position, He takes on human flesh, and He's living in this world, bringing glory to His Father. What humility. He's despising the shame. And then, when this whole process of the work being finished, it says in the last part of verse 2, that he is seated at the right hand of the throne of God. So he went from the place of joy or glory, he came via incarnation, he departed earth via crucifixion, and he has now returned to the joy or the glory that he had from all of eternity. Quibble if you will, but you have never met someone like this. Somehow God's people need to learn to value him more. But we could go on for a long time. How much time is invested in transient things? How much time is invested in stuff that doesn't even matter? We're so corrupt in our world. Look, I ride a bicycle. I'm corrupt. I ride a bicycle. People can't even drive out of their driveway without looking at their phone. I'm like, what happened from the time you got in the car to the last 40 feet when you got to the end of the driveway? What's so important in this little phone world of yours? We're the people who are lost in Christ. We're the people who can talk about the glory of God. We're the people who can have a conversation about the things of God. I was on the phone this morning with different people, and they're like, you know this, you know this. I didn't know nothing, and I don't care. This is what I care about. And so then I go off preaching my sermon this morning to some pastors. I tell them, they say, why? This is what matters. It matters for your soul. It matters for eternity. It matters for your children, for your grandchildren. They need to know the value of Christ. Don't allow them to look at your life and conclude that they ought to value the world. Money, jobs, material possessions, reputation, hobbies, etc., etc., etc. Without a doubt, we invest much more time in the transient than the intransient. What are the intransient things? Heaven, the glory of King Jesus, the church, souls. Wisdom and basic logic demands this of the Christian. You can turn in your Bibles. There, Jesus said it, so I'm pretty confident it's true. A sermon like this demands Christian logic. And so, Matthew 6, Jesus says this. It's a command in the negative and a command in the positive. And here it is, do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth where moth and rust destroy, where thieves break in and steal. But, here's the contrast, positive command, lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven. where neither moss nor rust destroys, and where thieves do not break in and steal. And what a verse, for where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. So the question of the day for this morning's application is this, where is your heart? Where's your heart? What are you living for? What are you living for? What's driving you? What's your motive? What's your direction? This morning maybe God's saying, correct your course. You're off track. You're like Christian and hopeful and this path looked like it went the same way. It is a lot easier. Get back on track, set up a sign and warn the next guy not to go that way, in order that you can live in a way that brings glory to God. As Brother Kevin comes to lead us in song this morning, Father in heaven, thank you for your word. A lot of things can be said, a lot of things can be applied, but Lord, my prayer is that we would value Christ all the more, the one and only one who glorified you with the whole of his life. The only one who was able to finish the work. There's a lost boy, lost girl, lost man, lost woman in this room today. I pray that they would look to Christ, to Christ alone. And they'd say, Lord Jesus, I've heard you're merciful. I know I'm a great sinner. Would you have mercy on me? Would you save me? Would you give me a new heart and a right spirit? I need help. Would someone this day cry out for Christ to save them? Lord, for Christians in this room, I pray, we get caught up. We get busy. We get tired. We get caught in all the little traps. today that we would repent of carnality and of worldliness. We would put our hand to the plow to live a life that would bring glory to King Jesus. Lord, help us to live for your glory. In Christ's name we pray. Amen.