EVERYONE IS WELCOME HERE! 

10:30 am Worship

Wednesday, April 30, 2025

John 17: 11-18

¹¹And now I am no longer in the world, but they are in the world, and I am coming to you. Holy Father, protect them in your name that you have given me, so that they may be one, as we are one. ¹²While I was with them, I protected them in your name that you have given me. I guarded them, and not one of them was lost except the one destined to be lost so that the scripture might be fulfilled. ¹³But now I am coming to you, and I speak these things in the world so that they may have my joy made complete in themselves.¹⁴I have given them your word, and the world has hated them because they do not belong to the world, just as I do not belong to the world. ¹⁵I am not asking you to take them out of the world, but I ask you to protect them from the evil one. ¹⁶They do not belong to the world, just as I do not belong to the world. ¹⁷Sanctify them in the truth; your word is truth. ¹⁸As you have sent me into the world, so I have sent them into the world.

Why, some might ask, did I choose a life of faith?

In families of faith, perhaps, faith is imprinted on children. They do not choose, but rather become steeped in the need for belief. My mother made sure I attended classes, participated in worship, prayed. She made sure I learned the children’s songs and the stories of faith appropriate for the very young. Noah and his ark. Daniel and the lion den. Jesus and the lambs and the small children. When she became pregnant again and I told her I wanted a baby sister, she told me to pray and to go to church. I did so for months, and my sister was born.

Life began to teach me other lessons. Lessons about the brutality and weakness which can occur even in the loving domains of family. The reality of poverty. The existence of tears in the night. Slowly, I became aware of evil in the world. Finally, as in every life, moments of crisis brought on by human brokenness.

I discovered there, almost intuitively, a place of rest, a path to peace and joy.

I find the prayer of Jesus for his followers in John 17, to be one of the most powerful in the Bible. When I turned to it in my devotional time this morning, I found myself remembering yesterday’s quote from Catherine of Siena: “Where we see sin, God sees weakness.”

Jesus knows his disciples will live in a broken world. He know the reality of evil. He is aware they will face trials and tribulations. He also knows the weaknesses and failures of his disciples. He knows some will betray him, others will run off, some will doubt. He knows they too are only human.

But it doesn’t matter. He does not view these shortcomings as sins, but rather as weaknesses, and he prays his Father will strengthen, guide, and protect them. He knows they love him and, loving him, will love the Father. I love the gospel’s understanding. Jesus abides in the Father, and the Father abides in him. When his disciples abide in Jesus, he abides in them, and all together, Father, Son, and believing followers become one.

When we become one in each other and in God, no brokenness, no weakness can overcome us. Abiding in Jesus and in the Father, I can – in Catherine’s words – see weakness rather than sin. I can devote myself to compassion and forgiveness, as God has.

Doing so, I find myself in a world of togetherness, not a world of division. The world needs that right now.

This is why I believe.

Hymn of the day: I Have Decided to Follow Jesus. Online at Rossford UMC - Media.

Rev. Lawrence Keeler