Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit · Sermon No. 1890
Delivered on Lord’s-day Morning, March 7th, 1886, by, the Metropolitan Tabernacle, Newington.
“Sanctify them through thy truth: thy word is truth.”—John 17:17.
OUR LORD JESUS prayed much for his people while he was here on earth. He made Peter the special subject of his intercession when he knew that he was in extraordinary danger. The midnight wrestlings of the Son of man were for his people. In the sacred record, however, much more space is taken up by our Lord’s intercessions as he nears the end of his labors. After the closing supper, his public preaching work being ended, and nothing remaining to be done but to die, he gave himself wholly unto prayer. He was not again to instruct the multitude, nor to heal the sick, and in the interval which remained, before he should lay down his life, he girded himself for special intercession. He poured out his soul in life before he poured it out unto death.
In this wonderful prayer, our Lord, as our great High Priest, appears to enter upon that perpetual office of intercession which he is now exercising at the right hand of the Father. Our Lord ever seemed, in the eagerness of his love, to be anticipating his work. Before he was set apart for his life-work, by the descent of the Holy Ghost upon him, he must needs be about his Father’s business; before he finally suffered at the hands of cruel men, he had a baptism to be baptized with, and he was straitened till it was accomplished; before he actually died, he was covered with a bloody sweat, and was exceeding sorrowful even unto death; and in this case, before he in person entered within the veil, he made intercession for us. He never tarries when the good of his people calls for him. His love hath wings as well as feet: it is true of him evermore, “He rode upon a cherub, and did fly: yea, he did fly upon the wings of the wind.” O beloved, what a friend we have in Jesus! so willing, so speedy to do for us all that we need. Oh that we could imitate him in this, and be quick of understanding to perceive our line of service, and eager of heart to enter upon it.
This chapter, which ought to be universally known as the Lord’s Prayer, may be called the holy of holies of the word of God. Here we are admitted to that secret place where the Son of God speaks with the Father in closest fellowship of love. Here we look into the heart of Jesus, as he sets out in order his desires and requests before his Father on our behalf. Here inspiration lifts her veil, and we behold truth face to face. Our text lies somewhere near the middle of the prayer; it is the heart of it. Our Lord’s desire for the sanctification of his people pervades the whole prayer; but it is gathered up, declared, and intensified in the one sentence that I have read to you: “Sanctify them through thy truth: thy word is truth.” How invaluable must the blessing of sanctification be when our Lord, in the highest reach of his intercession, cries: “Sanctify them!” In sight of his passion, on the night before his death, our Savior lifts his eyes to the great Father, and cries in his most plaintive tones, “Father, sanctify them.” The place whereon we stand is holy ground, and the subject whereof we speak demands our solemn thought. Come, Holy Spirit, and teach us the full meaning of this prayer for holiness!
First, I call your attention to what it is the Savior asks—“sanctify them;” and then, for whom he asks it—it is for those whom his Father had given him. Thirdly, we shall note of whom he asks it: he asks this sanctification of God the Father himself, for he alone it is who can sanctify his people. Lastly, we will enquire how is this blessing to be wrought?—“Sanctify them through thy truth;” and our Lord adds an explanatory sentence, which was a confession of his own faith towards the word of the Lord, and an instruction to our faith in the same matter. “Thy word is truth.”
I. At the beginning, then, consider WHAT HE ASKED. What is this inestimable blessing which our Savior so earnestly requests at the Father’s hand? He first prays, “Holy Father, keep them;” and again, “Keep them from the evil;” but this negative blessing of preservation from evil is not enough: he seeks for them positive holiness, and therefore he cries, “sanctify them.” The word is one of considerable range of meaning: I am not able to follow it through all its shades, but one or two must suffice.
It means, first, dedicate them to thy service; for such must be the meaning of the word further down, when we read, “For their sakes I sanctify myself.” In the Lord’s case it cannot mean purification from sin, because our Savior was undefiled; his nature was unblemished by sin, and his actions were unspotted. No eye of man, nor glance of fiend, could discover fault in him, and the search of God only resulted in the declaration that in him God was well pleased. Our Lord’s sanctification was his consecration to the fulfillment of the Divine purpose, his absorption in the will of the Father. “Lo, I come to do thy will, O God.” In this sense our interceding Lord asks that all his people may by the Father be ordained and consecrated unto holy service. The prayer means, “Father, consecrate them to thine own self; let them be temples for thine indwelling, instruments for thy use.” Under Jewish law the tribe of Levi was chosen out of the twelve, and ordained to the service of the Lord, instead of the firstborn, of whom the Lord had said, “All the firstborn of the children of Israel are mine: on the day that I smote every firstborn in the land of Egypt I sanctified them for myself.” (Numbers 8:17.) Out of the tribe of Levi one family was taken and dedicated to the priesthood. Aaron and his sons are said to have been sanctified. (Leviticus 8:30.) A certain tent was sanctified to the service of God, and hence it became a sanctuary; and the vessels that were therein, whether they were greater, like the altar, and the holy table, and the ark of the covenant, or whether they were of less degree, like the bowls and the snuff-dishes of the candlestick, were all dedicated or sanctified. (Numbers 7:1.) None of these things could be used for any other purpose than the service of Jehovah. In his courts there was a holy fire, a holy bread, and a holy oil. The holy anointing oil, for instance, was reserved for sacred uses. “Upon man’s flesh it shall not be poured;” and again, “Whosoever shall make like unto that, to smell thereto, shall even be cut off from his people.” These sanctified things were reserved for holy purposes, and any other use of them was strictly forbidden. Bullocks and lambs and sheep and turtle-doves, and so forth, were given by devout offerers, brought to the holy place, and dedicated unto God; henceforth they belonged to God, and must be presented at his altar. This is one part of the meaning of our Lord’s prayer. He would have each of us consecrated unto the Lord, designated and ordained for divine purposes. We are not the world’s, else might we be ambitious; we are not Satan’s, else might we be covetous; we are not our own, else might we be selfish. We are bought with a price, and hence we are his by whom the price is paid. We belong to Jesus, and he presents us to his Father, and begs him to accept us and sanctify us to his own purposes. Do we not most heartily concur in this dedication? Do we not cry, “Father, sanctify us to thy service?” I am sure we do if we have realized our redeemed condition.