![[Photo man reading Bible]](https://www.deankwilson.com/Blog_images/sanctified_by_truth.jpg)
| Sanctify them by the truth; your word is truth. |
| —John 17:17 |
All throughout the New Testament, we find recorded therein the words of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. When I was a small boy, one of the older men in the congregation where I worshipped had a Bible that had set the words of Jesus in a red-colored typeface. I remember noting that the spine of this man’s Bible had the words “Red Letter Edition” stamped in gold leaf. This design element made it very easy to take note of when Jesus was speaking in the biblical text.
I can remember sitting next to this man as he turned the pages of the New Testament. All throughout the Gospels—Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John—the words of Jesus stood out in this red-colored text.
I asked this man what he thought were the most important words of Jesus. He quickly turned to John 17.
“These words of Jesus mean the most to me. This is a prayer that Jesus prayed right before He was crucified. He knew that the time was drawing near when the purpose for which He came to earth would be fulfilled. He came to die in our place on the cruel cross of Calvary. As He shed His precious blood, He covered our sins, paying the penalty for those sins in our place. Notice that the editors of this version of the Bible have titled this chapter: ‘Jesus’ High Priestly Prayer.’ In this prayer, Jesus prays for His disciples and He also prays for you and me, too.”
This wise, godly man looked at me with a smile on his face. I could tell that what he had told me meant a very great deal to him.
Later, I would spent hours reading through this prayer of Jesus, as recorded in John 17. I was fascinated to read the words that Jesus used to speak to His Father in prayer. The verse at the beginning of this blog post comes from this prayer. For context, it is important to read this verse in relation to the verses that immediately precede it. So, here’s John 17:6-26
“I have manifested your name to the people whom you gave me out of the world. Yours they were, and you gave them to me, and they have kept your word. Now they know that everything that you have given me is from you. For I have given them the words that you gave me, and they have received them and have come to know in truth that I came from you; and they have believed that you sent me.
“I am praying for them. I am not praying for the world but for those whom you have given me, for they are yours. All mine are yours, and yours are mine, and I am glorified in them. And I am no longer in the world, but they are in the world, and I am coming to you.
“Holy Father, keep them in your name, which you have given me, that they may be one, even as we are one. While I was with them, I kept them in your name, which you have given me. I have guarded them, and not one of them has been lost except the son of destruction, that the Scripture might be fulfilled. But now I am coming to you, and these things I speak in the world, that they may have my joy fulfilled in themselves.
“I have given them your word, and the world has hated them because they are not of the world, just as I am not of the world. I do not ask that you take them out of the world, but that you keep them from the evil one. They are not of the world, just as I am not of the world. Sanctify them in the truth; your word is truth. As you sent me into the world, so I have sent them into the world. And for their sake I consecrate myself, that they also may be sanctified in truth.
“I do not ask for these only, but also for those who will believe in me through their word, 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.
“The glory that you have given me I have given to them, 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.
“Father, I desire that they also, whom you have given me, may be with me where I am, to see my glory that you have given me because you loved me before the foundation of the world. O righteous Father, even though the world does not know you, I know you, and these know that you have sent me. I made known to them your name, and I will continue to make it known, that the love with which you have loved me may be in them, and I in them.”
Throughout this portion of Jesus’ amazing prayer, we can take great comfort and also receive a significant challenge. Jesus prays for us to become “sanctified.” Said another way, Jesus prays for you and me to become “holy”—for that is what becoming sanctified means. God desires us to become more and more like His Son, Jesus.
While we can never become fully holy in this world, because of the impenetrable stain of original sin, we can walk forward on the pathway that God lays out before us. And, this pathway is one of sanctification, or holiness.
As we begin another new day, I invite you to join me in humbly asking God to fulfill Jesus’ prayer by helping us to become more like Jesus. That is to say, become more holy. For the more we become like Jesus, the more able we will become to obediently serve God as His instruments of mercy, grace, and love in this world. The more effectively we represent God to our troubled world, the more He will irresistibly draw those He chooses to belong to Himself.
