Anchor My Faith

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Author: Stephen Weller
514 words, 3 minutes read time

Those Who Believe

Scripture: John 17:6-8

In the previous lesson we considered the request Jesus made to his Father to receive the glory he once had when in heaven. In this lesson we will consider those given to Jesus by the Father.

^{Jn 17:6} “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. ⁷ Now they know that everything that you have given me is from you. ⁸ 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.

To manifest the Father’s name among the people is to make him known as a person in terms of his words and his works. Jesus said, “No one has ever seen God; the only God, who is at the Father’s side, he has made him known” (John 1:18 ESV). Jesus claims to be God who was at the Father’s side, who while on earth made the Father known. If people knew Jesus they would also know the Father (John 8:19). Jesus told them “that the Father is in [him] and [he is] in the Father” (John 10:38) and thus seeing Jesus we see the Father (John 12:45).

These people that Jesus has manifested the Father’s name to are people the Father has chosen out of the world and given to Jesus. They are people who believe and live in obedience to the word. These people have learned that everything given to Jesus was from the Father, not from some other source.

While on earth, Jesus shared with his listeners the words he heard from the Father. Jesus never made up his own message, but always spoke the message of his Father. These chosen people have come to know these words as truth and that Jesus was sent and came from the Father on assignment. These are people of belief who have been born spiritually.

Those words that Jesus gave that were believed are the same words that the world hates (John 17:14) because those words expose their sin and thus a need for a savior. How do you relate to God’s word? Do you study and meditate on it and see it as an essential part of your life or does it usually remain a book to be opened now and then? We need to store up his word in our hearts, that we might not sin against him (Psalm 119:11). Is God’s word a lamp to your feet and a light to your path? (Psalm 119:105).

Conclusion

We began this harmonization study on March 22, 2017, and have now written 685 lessons. The narrative we are working from is 114 pages long and we are currently working on page 96. The total project will thus be about 813 lessons long, leaving about 128 more lessons to write.