What Was The Unity Of John 17?

by J. L. Ferguson | Category: General | Sept 1960

We might profitably first remind ourselves of the references to unity in the prayer of the Lord Jesus-" in the night in which He was betrayed," as recorded in John 17.

Verse 11: "Holy Father, keep them in Thy Name which Thou hast given Me, that they may be one, even as we are."

Verse 20, 21: "Neither for these only do I pray, but for them also that believe on Me through their word; that they may all be one ... that the world may believe ... "

Verse 22: "And the glory which Thou hast given Me I have given unto them; that they may be one, even as we are one."

Verse 23: " I in them, and Thou in Me, that they may be perfected into one; that the world may know ... "

In each of the four references the gender of the Greek word, "one" is neuter. The same word, of course, occurs elsewhere in the New Testament in neuter form. In John 10.30, for example, the Lord Jesus said, "I and the Father are one." Thus, the Father and the Son, though separate Persons, are nevertheless one in essence. Together, with the Holy Spirit, they form the Godhead; separate in their Persons, yet forming One, one unity of Divine Being.

Even so, the Saviour prayed that the men whom the Father had given Him would also be one-that is, one thing. And not these men only, but those also who would believe on Him through their word. Our consideration then is-what was the "one thing" He wished them to form? Was it to be expressed in the indivisible unity of the Church, the Body? Or was it a unity to be expressed in outward testimony to the world?

We know that "all the members of the body, being many, are one body; so also is Christ. For in one Spirit were we all baptized into one Body" (1 Corinthians 12.12, 13), and again, "Your bodies are members of Christ" (1 Corinthians 6.15). Through the simple act of faith in the risen Saviour the believer is baptized in the Spirit into the Church which is His Body and becomes eternally one with the Head and all His members.

But members of that Church, that unity, may of themselves be quite unknown to one another. As "the wind bloweth where it listeth," so the Spirit breathes in His sovereignty, and men and women are born of the Spirit, the world over, many unknown to each other. That unity is, of itself, spiritual and unseen.

There was no need for the Lord Jesus in His prayer in John 17 to repeat once and again the longing that His followers might be one, if that oneness was the unity of the Body. They were that, in the divine mind, from before the dawn of time. They were one "Church ... according to the eternal purpose which He purposed in Christ Jesus our Lord" (Ephesians 3. 10, 11). This eternal purpose is above the adversary's striking power, inviolate, safe in the keeping of Him who is the Preserver of the Body (Ephesians 5.28).

But just as in the human body, the hand, for example, performs a functional service with the foot, so is it also with the members of the Church which is His Body. There are diversities of gifts, of ministrations, of workings, and indeed "to each one is given the manifestation of the Spirit to profit withal." God has tempered the Body together, "that there should be no schism in the body; but that the members should have the same care one for another

Yet the fact remains that believers could live or work beside each other with their common membership unrevealed. They might thus be of no mutual service the one to the other, give no evidence of the bond of love binding the one to the other, and generally the practical outworking of the divine objective for the present has miscarried. For only as they are in open united testimony can the John 17 prayer be fulfilled-" that the world may believe," and again, "that the world may know." The world can only believe and know as they hear and see.

Therefore the Lord prayed for the thing that the adversary could destroy, and would leave no stone unturned in his efforts to disrupt, that is, the unity of the disciples in "one thing." Not a unity invisible and unknown, but manifest to the world in declared and united testimony. And when He ascended on high and "the day of Pentecost was now come, they were all together in one place." There we see the men whom His Father had given Him out of the world, in the beginnings of their dedicated years, yielding the early responses to their Master's yearnings-" together in one place ""one thing" for Him in His absence.

And not the apostolic band only, but those also who would believe through their word, for "They then that received his word were baptized: and ... added" (Acts 2.41).

"And the Lord added to them day by day those that were being saved" (Acts 2.47).

"Many of them that heard the word believed; and the number of the men came to be about five thousand" (Acts 4.4).

"And the multitude of them that believed were of one heart and soul ... they had all things common " (Acts 4.32).

"Believers were the more added to the Lord" (Acts 5.14).

"The church which was in Jerusalem " (Acts 8. 1).

"The church throughout all Judea and Galilee and Samaria had peace" (Acts 9.31).

Yes, these were great days, not only to the united members of the Body on earth, but to their exalted Head also in heaven. The men whom the Father had given Him, and those who were believing on Him through their word, were together as "one thing." The members of the Church the Body were finding an outward and visible expression of unity, firstly in the church of God which was in Jerusalem, and then, as the disciples multiplied, in the integrated churches in an ever widening field.

Let us look first at "the church which was in Jerusalem" as it is defined in Acts 8.1. Elsewhere, in Galatians 1.13, Paul terms that same assembly "the church of God." Later he recounted how he persecuted the disciples "unto " (not " in") foreign cities (Acts 26. 11), for the church of God was in Jerusalem. They numbered many thousands in Jerusalem, doubtless meeting in many companies (as see Acts 4.23) but they formed one church in the city, that is, the Church of God in Jerusalem. Nor was it simply the church of God in Jerusalem, but that church was also "in God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ," as is stated in 1 Thessalonians 1.1.

And as it was in Jerusalem, so also it came to be in Antioch, Ephesus, Corinth, Rome and to earth's uttermost parts one doctrine (Jude 3) and common practices (1 Corinthians 11.16) binding all the churches of God in "one thing." The pattern was uniform everywhere. Believers came forward to express themselves in this divinely ordered unity, and following baptism, were added to those already together in testimony for God. So that a disciple taking his place in this unity for God in, say, Corinth, soon learned the precious truth that he was actually in a much wider unity than he had perhaps envisaged. He was in "the Fellowship of His Son, Jesus Christ our Lord." In each church the disciples were one. In the Fellowship the churches were one. And it had come to pass in large measure, even as our Lord Jesus had prayed, "that they may all be one."

Were we to examine any one of these early churches we might find no more apt description than that of Corinth in 1 Corinthians 12.27, "Now ye are the body of Christ, and severally members thereof." As most are aware, the word "the" was not in the original writing, but has been inserted for the help of the English reader. Actually, however, we are helped more without it. The church of God in Corinth was not the Body of Christ. Even the aggregate of all the churches of God was not the Body of Christ. But characteristically it was so. So the Lord's good pleasure was that all believers, having been baptized in the Spirit into the Body, should then be baptized in water and added to a church of God. There the principles of the body could be expressed, the gifts could function, and the members could exercise the same care one for another.

Not only so, but the love of members could be shown, and distributed gifts could be ministered, to those in other churches of God also, since in these churches the members of the Body were distinguishable for this very purpose. Indeed, in principle, all living members of the Body should have been found as the Lord's obedient disciples, in the churches of God, His House. Thus all living members of the Body of Christ would function in the House of God, in accordance with the design of the Builder.

We therefore conclude that the unity for which the Lord made request in John 17 was not the unity of the believers in the Church which is His Body, but rather the unity, later expressed in the New Testament, in the churches of God which together formed the House of God, not simply in independent assemblies with no responsibilities the one to the other, nor in national Churches, but a unity expressed in the churches of God in all lands, integrated to form the one dwelling place of God.

That this unity was first disturbed and then later disrupted by the adversary is first evident from the New Testament Scriptures and confirmed by the subsequent history of the churches. We humbly thank God, however, that after being covered up for many centuries these precious truths are once more being practised world-wide in the churches of God today-with much joy in the Holy Spirit. Any of our many readers meeting with other groups of Christians are warmly invited to write to the Publishing Office for further literature on this subject, which lay so heavily on the heart of our beloved Master in "the night in which He was betrayed." For it still stands written, "A disciple is not above his master, nor a servant above his lord. It is enough for the disciple that he be as his master, and the servant as his lord" (Matthew 10.24, 25).

J. L. Ferguson | Sept 1960
General