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We have already mentioned that John 14, 15, and 16 are a message given to the disciples by the Lord on the night of His betrayal after His supper was established. Then in John 17 the Lord offered a prayer to conclude the message. I believe that after the previous messages you are very clear that in these three chapters — John 14, 15, and 16 — the emphasis of the Lord’s message is to show how He would die to solve the problems between us and God and open a way for us to be connected to God, enter into God, and abide in Him. Furthermore, He would resurrect from death to impart His life to us so that we may live as He lives, causing us to be able to abide in Him and He in us. In brief, the subject of His message is that He would bring man into God so that God and man would be fully built together to become one entity.
After He finished speaking the message, the Lord offered a prayer as a conclusion. We all have had such an experience. The concluding prayer we offer when we have finished speaking a message is often the central thought of the message. It is the same with the Lord’s prayer on that occasion. In His prayer He brought the central thought of the message before God, asking God to fulfill it. If we know this, then this prayer can be more easily understood.
John 17:1 says, “These things Jesus spoke, and lifting up His eyes to heaven, He said, Father, the hour has come; glorify Your Son that the Son may glorify You.” This is the subject of the prayer. The subject of this prayer is that God would glorify His Son that His Son may also glorify Him. What is glory? We confess that even today we do not fully understand it. All the Bible expositors and those who pursue spiritual experience admit that glory is very difficult to explain. We have said before that glory is the manifestation, the expression, of God. God manifested and expressed is glory. This explanation is relatively simple and accurate. For example, when electricity shines forth and is manifested from within a light bulb, the shining is the glory of electricity. The fluorescent lamps here are the electricity shining forth. This shining is the glory of the electricity, which is also the manifestation, the expression, of electricity. This is a little illustration to help us to comprehend the meaning of glory. What is God’s glory? God’s glory is God’s manifestation, God’s expression. Whoever bears the expression of God has the glory of God. If you sense that a meeting is full of God’s presence, then the meeting is full of God’s glory.
Therefore, it is not difficult for us to understand what the Lord meant when He said, “Glorify Your Son.” We need to keep in mind that the Lord’s becoming flesh was God’s entering into man. God Himself is glorious, but we human beings are not glorious; we are lowly and base. Therefore, the glory of God was concealed in the man whom God had become. In the tabernacle in the Old Testament, God’s glory, or we may say God Himself, was concealed within a veil in the Holy of Holies. Hebrews 10 says that the veil typifies the flesh the Lord put on in His incarnation (v. 20). When the Lord became flesh, His flesh, His humanity, was a veil that concealed God’s glory. Although the incarnated Lord was inwardly God Himself and absolutely glorious, He appeared before men outwardly as a lowly man. While He was in the flesh, in His dealings with men, His glory was not perceived, because it was hidden within Him. What people felt and touched in Him was a lowly man. Philippians 2 says that He emptied Himself, lowered Himself, taking the form of a slave, becoming in the likeness of men (v. 7). Therefore, when He appeared before men, He had no attracting form nor majesty that they should desire Him (Isa. 53:2). In man’s eyes He was merely a man whose visage and form were marred. His glory was fully concealed, veiled, within His flesh.
Recall the time when the Lord Jesus went up the mountain with three disciples and was transfigured before their eyes. That was the release of the glory from within Him. His flesh as a veil seemed to have become transparent, letting out the glory within Him. However, that was only for a short while; afterward, His glory was concealed again, and the lowly form reappeared. In His thirty-three and a half years on the earth, what was expressed was His lowly form, not His glory.
In John 17 the Lord offered a prayer before God, saying, “Glorify Your Son.” It is not difficult for us to understand the meaning of this word, which was to ask God to bring His Son fully into glory so that His Son may fully manifest and express God’s nature and God’s glory. This was concerning His resurrection. When He was on the earth, He was the Son of God and had God within Him, but people always saw Him as a lowly man. However, He was not the same after resurrection. Once He resurrected, the glory within Him was manifested. Once He resurrected, the God within Him, the life of the Son of God within, was expressed. When He resurrected, His flesh was transfigured from a lowly form to a glorious form. Therefore, Luke 24 says that the Lord’s resurrection was His entering into glory (v. 26).
Brothers and sisters, for God to become flesh and enter into man was to be made lowly; for man to enter into God was to be glorified. It was lowliness for the Lord Jesus to become flesh and bring God into man, but it was glory for the Lord Jesus to be resurrected and bring man into God. Now the Lord would go and die; that is, He would go through death and resurrection, so He offered a prayer, asking God to glorify Him, to cause Him to be glorified. This means that He asked God to cause all that was hidden within Him — God’s life, God’s nature, and all that God is — to be manifested and expressed. In Him was all the fullness of the Godhead, the very God Himself. When He was in the flesh, the fullness of the Godhead was concealed within Him. His humanity and His body, as a veil, concealed and confined all the fullness of God. Now His going to die was to split open the veil. After He died, He would be resurrected, causing the “veil” to be transfigured. By the splitting and the transfiguration of the veil, He would fully shine forth all the fullness of the Godhead that was previously hidden in Him. The result would be His glorification. Therefore, when He prayed to the Father, “Glorify Your Son,” what He meant was, “May You cause all the fullness of the Godhead to be manifested and expressed from within Your Son.”
Once you understand this phrase, you will understand the following clause: That the Son may glorify You. This is to say, “If You glorify Your Son in this way, Your Son will also glorify You. Since all that You are and have are in Your Son, if this veil of flesh is not broken, not transfigured, then Your glory will be confined within it. Now glorify Your Son that all Your fullness may shine out from within Your Son. In this way You will glorify Your Son, and Your Son will also glorify You because all Your fullness will be expressed through Your Son.”
John 17:2 says, “Even as You have given Him authority over all flesh to give eternal life to all whom You have given Him.” We admit that this prayer of the Lord contains many great expressions. We do not have time to cover them one by one, and some we cannot cover thoroughly. For instance, the glory we have just spoken of and the eternal life here are both very great items.
Verse 3 continues, “And this is eternal life, that they may know You, the only true God, and Him whom You have sent, Jesus Christ.” This eternal life has a particular function within man, which is to cause man to know the only true God and Jesus Christ, whom God has sent. This eternal life within man has the function to cause him to know God and Christ; hence, it is related to the glory of the Son of God and the expression of God Himself as well.
Verse 4 says, “I have glorified You on earth, finishing the work which You have given Me to do.” This word is hard to understand. I would like to ask you, brothers and sisters, to what does the Lord refer when He says that He glorified the Father while He was on earth, finishing the work which He gave Him to do? We can explain it this way: The Lord Jesus did many things on earth, and everything was done according to God’s will. However, here the work which God had given Him to do refers specifically to the Lord’s expressing God on the earth. “No one has ever seen God; the only begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, He has declared Him” (1:18). “He who has seen Me has seen the Father” (14:9). These words indicate that God sent the Lord to the world with the intention of expressing Himself. The Lord came to the earth to declare God, explain God, express God, and impart God to man. In so doing, the Lord glorified the Father. Therefore, the Lord said that He had finished the work which the Father had given Him to do.
John 17:5 says, “Now, glorify Me along with Yourself, Father, with the glory which I had with You before the world was.” The Lord seemed to be saying, “Previously, I was with You, but when I became flesh, I came out from You into the world. Now I ask You to take Me back that I may participate in the glory along with You, in the glory which I had with You before the world was.”
Verse 6a says, “I have manifested Your name to the men whom You gave Me out of the world.” The name here is another great item. In this chapter we see three great items. The first item is glory; the second, life; and the third, the name. What did the Lord mean when He said, “I have manifested Your name to the men”? We know that the name denotes the person; the name is the person. That the Lord manifested the Father’s name to the disciples means that He manifested the Father to them. The Lord not only gave them the eternal life, but He also manifested the Father’s name to them so that they might know who the Father was.
Verses 6b through 8 continue, “They were Yours, and You gave them to Me, and they have kept Your word. Now they have come to know that all that You have given Me is from You, for the words which You gave Me I have given to them, and they received them and knew truly that I came forth from You, and they have believed that You sent Me.” By now the disciples understood that the Lord came forth from God, but they still did not understand that the Lord was going back into God. By now the disciples knew that the Lord was the incarnated One, but they still did not understand that the Lord would also be the One who died and resurrected. Now they truly knew that the Lord came forth from the Father and was sent by the Father.
Verses 9 and 10a say, “I ask concerning them; I do not ask concerning the world, but concerning those whom You have given Me, for they are Yours; and all that is Mine is Yours, and Yours Mine.” The beginning of verse 10, which says, “All that is Mine is Yours, and Yours Mine,” is a great utterance. This is a matter of oneness. If you can tell the Lord, “All that is mine is Yours,” then you can also tell Him, “All that is Yours is mine.” This is similar to the relationship of a husband and wife. Because the husband and wife have become one, all that the wife has belongs to the husband, and all that the husband has belongs to the wife.
Verse 10b says, “And I have been glorified in them.” This means that because the disciples belonged to the Lord, the Lord was then expressed and glorified. Then verse 11 begins, “And I am no longer in the world; yet they are in the world, and I am coming to You.” The disciples did not understand this word yet. They understood only the first half, that is, that the Lord came forth from the Father. This verse ends with, “Holy Father, keep them in Your name, which You have given to Me, that they may be one even as We are.” The name God gave to the Lord is a very great item. The Lord asked that those who belonged to Him be kept by God in the name God gave to Him, in order that they might become one even as the Triune God is one.
Verses 12 through 16 continue, “When I was with them, I kept them in Your name, which You have given to Me, and I guarded them; and not one of them perished, except the son of perdition [Judas], 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 made full in themselves. I have given them Your word, and the world has hated them, because they are not of the world even as I am not of the world. I do not ask that You would take them out of the world, but that You would keep them out of the hands of the evil one [Satan]. They are not of the world, even as I am not of the world.” Your word in verse 14 is another great item; glory, life, the name, and the word are four great items.
Verses 17 through 20 say, “Sanctify them in the truth; Your word is truth. As You have sent Me into the world, I also have sent them into the world. And for their sake I sanctify Myself, that they themselves also may be sanctified in truth. And I do not ask concerning these only, but concerning those also who believe into Me through their word.” These refers to the disciples who were with the Lord that day. Those also who believe into Me through their word refers to all those who would believe into the Lord through the gospel preached by the disciples throughout the ages. This includes all who would be saved at all times and in all places. Therefore, the Lord’s prayer here is for all who have been saved and who belong to Him. Verse 21 continues, “That they all may be one; even as You, Father, are in Me and I in You, that they also may be in Us; that the world may believe that You have sent Me.” How could the disciples be in “Us,” that is, in the Lord and the Father? It was by the Lord’s giving them the Father’s eternal life, by the Lord’s manifesting the Father’s name to them, by the Lord’s making known to them the word of God, the truth of God, and their receiving it, and by the Lord’s giving them the glory that God gave Him. Through these four items — the eternal life, God’s name, God’s word, and God’s glory — all those who belong to the Lord were brought into God. Through the eternal life, which is the life of God Himself, we are in union with God. Through God’s name as God’s explanation, we can know God; that is, we can know what kind of God He is. Through God’s word we are separated, set apart, from the world. Through God’s glory we are fully brought into God. When we are fully in God, that is glory. Therefore, you must see these four items. God’s life brings us into a union with God; God’s name makes God known to us; God’s word separates us from the world; and God’s glory brings us fully into God. These four items not only bring all of us who belong to the Lord into absolute oneness, but they also bring us fully into the Triune God.
I cannot expound this portion verse by verse and sentence by sentence, but here I need to speak again about these four items — the eternal life, God’s name, God’s word, and God’s glory. Please remember that all of us who belong to the Lord have the eternal life in us. This is why we can fellowship with one another, as 1 John 1:2 and 3 says, “We...report to you the eternal life...that you...may have fellowship with us.” In the eternal life there is something called fellowship. The eternal life entering into you, into me, and into everyone who belongs to the Lord brings us all into fellowship.
On the other hand, God’s name causes us to know what kind of God He is. The more you know God, the more you are in union with God’s children. Furthermore, God’s word, God’s truth, separates us from the world outwardly. The more you know God’s word, understand God’s word, and comprehend God’s truth, the more you come out of the world and the more you are separated from the people in the world. The more someone understands God’s word and has God’s speaking, the clearer the separating line is between him and the world. On the contrary, the more you blend with the world, the more you are separated from the children of God. The more you blend with the world, the more difficult it becomes to be in harmony with the brothers and sisters. The more you are separated from the world, the more you are drawn toward God’s children, and the more you are in harmony with them.
Last, there is God’s glory as well. If you are fully in God, in the glory of God, you will be absolutely one with God’s children. In other words, if every one of us who belongs to the Lord lives in the fellowship of God’s life, knows God’s name, knows God Himself, receives God’s word, and learns to live in God’s glory, then we all are living in God. If so, do you think it is possible to not have oneness among us? It is impossible. On the contrary, if you and I do not live in the fellowship of the divine life, have a thorough knowledge of God, and sufficiently receive the word of God; if we instead blend, mix, with the world, and if at the same time we do not live in God or in God’s glory, do you think we can be one? If we are such persons, surely we are isolated and separated from the saints. What isolates us? The world isolates us, not knowing God isolates us, and our self isolates us. These various isolations prevent God from building us.
For example, we may build a house with reinforced concrete. If the gravel is not thoroughly washed when we mix the concrete, the concrete will not be solid. Likewise, if we have the stains of the things of the world on us or the things of the self, then we will not be able to mingle with God’s children. If we have all kinds of problems, we cannot be built together with God’s children.
Therefore, for the church to be built up, merely exhorting the brothers and sisters to be one or praying to the Lord for them to be one will not make them one. This is not the way. We need to help them know the eternal life that is in them. We need to help them know the name of God and who God is. We need to lead them to read and receive the word of God, the truth of God. And we also need to lead them to live in God. In this way you do not even have to speak about being one; the brothers and sisters will surely be one. This is the meaning of the Lord’s prayer. The Lord’s prayer shows how we can be one, how we can be built up as one with all the saints. This building, this oneness, is not merely the oneness between men, but it is a oneness accomplished through everyone being in God and mingling together with God. This oneness of God and man is the building we are talking about.
Brothers and sisters, this building is accomplished by the Lord’s resurrection. The Lord said, “Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up” (John 2:19). Here the Lord was saying, “You destroy this temple with the death of the cross, but I will raise it up with resurrection life.” This temple built with resurrection life is a building that is accomplished in God by those who are regenerated and who are living in Christ, being absolutely one with God.
If we are absolutely one in God in such a way, the world will believe that the Lord is the Christ sent by God. The power of the gospel is right here. If we are to lead others to know Christ, to know the Lord, we must have this testimony of oneness. You can go and observe; wherever the brothers are not in one accord, in harmony, there is no power of the gospel. The gospel continues to be preached, but not many are saved, and those who are saved are not very strong and prevailing. If you want to preach a prevailing and strong gospel that man may know Christ and know that He is the One sent by God and the Lord appointed by God, then you must have a church that is in oneness, a church that is built up.
John 17:22 says, “The glory which You have given Me I have given to them, that they may be one, even as We are one.” The Lord was saying, “Just as in You I am glorified along with Yourself, so I pray that in You they also will be glorified with You. Just as You desire that in You I have Your nature and be with You, so I pray that in You they also will have Your nature and be with You.” Only in such a condition can all the believers be one as the Triune God is one.
Verses 23 and 24a say, “I in them, and You in Me, that they may be perfected into one, that the world may know that You have sent Me and have loved them even as You have loved Me. Father, concerning that which You have given Me, I desire that they also may be with Me where I am, that they may behold My glory, which You have given Me.” I would like to ask you brothers and sisters what the Lord meant when He said, “Concerning that which You have given Me, I desire that they also may be with Me where I am, that they may behold My glory, which You have given Me.” I believe that by now you surely understand. What the Lord meant was that He was now in the Father, and He also would like His disciples to be with Him in the Father.
Therefore, what the Lord spoke in chapter 14 is fully fulfilled. In chapter 14 the Lord said, “In My Father’s house are many abodes...for I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I am coming again and will receive you to Myself, so that where I am you also may be” (vv. 2-3). Now it is clear that this where does not at all refer to heaven, a place, but refers to being in God, that is, to being in the Father.
I repeat, what the Lord accomplished in His incarnation was only to bring God into man. He still had to go through death and resurrection to bring man into God. In His incarnation He only caused God to be made lowly. If He did not go through death and resurrection, He could not cause man to be glorified. His incarnation was for man to see how He lowered Himself as a man. His death and resurrection was to bring those who believe in Him into God that they may see the glory with which He is glorified in the Father and that they may be glorified along with Him and God.
Therefore, the Lord prayed, “Father, concerning that which You have given Me, I desire that they also may be with Me where I am, that they may behold My glory, which You have given Me” (17:24). What is this glory? This glory is to be with God and to express God, that is, to be in God. The Lord seemed to be saying, “I was in You, and I was with You. Now they have beheld how I became the Son of Man and how I lived as a lowly man, but they do not see how I am One who is in God and how I am glorified along with God. So now I ask You to bring them into You even as I am in You. In this way they can behold how I enjoy the glory with You.” This was what the Lord meant, and this was what the Lord would accomplish in His death and resurrection. Through His death and resurrection He brought us into God just as He was in God. The more we learn to live in God, the more we know the glory of the Lord.
Verse 24 concludes, “For You loved Me before the foundation of the world.” This means, “In eternity You loved Me and glorified Me along with You and in You.”
Verses 25 and 26 say, “Righteous Father, though the world has not known You, yet I have known You, and these have known that You have sent Me. And I have made Your name known to them and will yet make it known, that the love with which You have loved Me may be in them, and I in them.” This portion seems to be saying, “Just as You have loved Me and caused Me to be in You, to be one with You, and to enjoy the glory with You, so You will also love them and cause them to enter into You to be one with You and to enjoy the glory with You.” This is what was meant by, “That the love with which You have loved Me may be in them.”
We have finished reading John 14, 15, 16, and 17. I will now pause briefly and ask the brothers and sisters to consider: In these four chapters, is the emphasis on the Lord’s bringing us, the saved ones, from earth to heaven? Is there such a thought? In these four chapters can you recognize such a concept that the Lord’s intention is to save us who are on the earth and bring us to heaven? The answer clearly is no. These four chapters concern the Lord’s going through death and resurrection to save us who are outside of God into God, that is, to save us, who had absolutely nothing to do with God, to a point that not only do we have a relationship with God, but we even enter into God. I say again that His incarnation was to bring God into man. When He was incarnated, there was at that point one person on the earth who had God in Him. But if He had not gone through death and resurrection, man could not be in God, for man had not yet entered into God. Therefore, before John 14 you cannot find any verses in which the Lord told the disciples, “You are in Me” or “I am in you.” You can at most find verses saying that the Lord was among the disciples. It is only after He said, “If I go and prepare a place for you, I am coming again and will receive you to Myself” (v. 3) that He could say, “You are in Me,” and “I am in you.” Do not forget 14:20, which says, “In that day you will know that I am in My Father, and you in Me, and I in you.”
I hope the young brothers and sisters can take the time to count how many ins there are in John 14, 15, 16, and 17. Just in the last sentence in the concluding prayer in John 17, there are two ins: “That the love with which You have loved Me may be in them, and I in them.” You need to see that the central thought of the Lord’s message and His concluding prayer is that a group of people who belong to Him — whom God chose before the foundation of the world, whom God set apart from the world, whom God would use to build His dwelling place — were outside of God and alienated from God, and they had not entered into God to be built with God. Therefore, He had to die on the cross and thereby deal with their sins, their flesh, their enemy, and the world within them so that He could open a way for them to enter into God and live in God. This is what is meant by His going to prepare a place for them. When He had prepared the place in such a way, He would come again, which is to resurrect and come not only to be among them but also to enter into them so that they might receive the life of God. In this way He would bring them into God to be joined to God as one. Then they would receive the eternal life of God, know who God is, receive God’s word, and thereby be separated from the world. Moreover, they would fully live in God, enjoy God’s glory, and become one entity with God. This is the temple that the Lord built up after He resurrected and ascended to heaven. This temple is built with the resurrection life in His resurrection.
After John 17 chapter 18 talks about the Lord’s being betrayed and judged. Then chapter 19 talks about His crucifixion for the accomplishing of redemption. In particular, it says that blood and water came out of the Lord’s side (v. 34). Of the four Gospels, only John mentions blood and water. You need to realize that the coming out of blood and water was the Lord’s preparing a place for the disciples. Blood is for redemption, and water is for imparting life. His death, on the one hand, was the shedding of blood for redemption, thus solving the problems we have before God. On the other hand, it was the releasing of the life of God that we may enter into God and have a union with God.
Then in chapter 20 He resurrected. We will read only a few verses, beginning with verse 19: “When therefore it was evening on that day, the first day of the week, and while the doors were shut where the disciples were for fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood in the midst.” Please keep in mind that this was His coming. In chapter 14 He said that He was going; here in chapter 20 He came. He said, “Yet a little while and the world beholds Me no longer, but you behold Me” (14:19). The “little while” was three days according to the Jewish way of counting days, although it was only less than two days in another way of reckoning. The Lord came again into their midst and showed Himself to them. Verses 19b and 20 of chapter 20 continue, “And said to them, Peace be to you. And when He had said this, He showed them His hands and His side. The disciples therefore rejoiced at seeing the Lord.” This proves that He was not merely a soul or a spirit but an actual man. This also fulfilled the word in John 16:22: “I will see you again and your heart will rejoice.”
Then Jesus said to them, “Peace be to you; as the Father has sent Me, I also send you” (20:21). This meant, “Just as the Father has sent Me, being within Me, so I also send you, being within you. I am in the Father and the Father is in Me. The words that I say to you I do not speak from Myself, but the Father who abides in Me speaks His words [14:10]. Now in the same way I also send you from within you and speak My words in you.”
Verses 22 and 23 of chapter 20 continue, “And when He had said this, He breathed into them and said to them, Receive the Holy Spirit. Whose sins you forgive, they are forgiven them; and whose sins you retain, they are retained.” Please keep in mind that the breath the Lord breathed into the disciples was an extraordinary breath. This breath was His transfiguration. He Himself was in that breath. Receive the Holy Spirit means “Receive Me. I am now entering into you just as this breath is entering into you. Previously, I was in the flesh; I could only be in your midst. Now I can enter into you because I have been transfigured into the Spirit. From now on, I am no longer outside of you but inside of you. Therefore, whose sins you forgive, they are forgiven them; and whose sins you retain, they are retained. This is because it is not you who do this work, but it is I who do it. The only reason you have such great authority to forgive and retain the sins of others is that I am in you. You speak these words not by yourself, but it is I who speak My words in you.”
Brothers and sisters, from then on, the Lord was not only in the midst of the disciples but also in the disciples. His being in the disciples was invisible but very practical. I would like to ask you, did the Lord Jesus go away after verse 23? According to our concept, there should be an additional sentence in verse 23, saying, “After Jesus spoke this word, He went away.” However, there is not such a word in the Bible.
Verses 24 through 26 say, “Thomas, one of the twelve, called Didymus, was not with them when Jesus came. The other disciples therefore said to him, We have seen the Lord! But he said to them, Unless I see in His hands the mark of the nails and put my finger into the mark of the nails and put my hand into His side, I will by no means believe. And after eight days, His disciples were again within, and Thomas was with them. Jesus came, though the doors were shut, and stood in the midst and said, Peace be to you.” Please tell me what the story behind the Lord’s coming is. To be precise, the Lord’s coming here is not His coming but His appearing. He never left after He came on the previous Lord’s Day evening. This is because when the Lord breathed into the disciples and said, “Receive the Holy Spirit,” He entered into them and remained within them always; He never left at all.
Verses 27 through 29 continue, “Then He said to Thomas, Bring your finger here and see My hands, and bring your hand and put it into My side; and do not be unbelieving, but believing. Thomas answered and said to Him, My Lord and my God! Jesus said to him, Because you have seen Me, you have believed. Blessed are those who have not seen and have believed.” Does the Bible then say, “After Jesus spoke these words, He went away”? No. John mentions only the Lord’s coming, not His leaving.
After chapter 20 there is still another chapter — chapter 21. Without John 21 we may still think that the Lord went away. However, this chapter shows that the Lord was still here. Let us read verses 1 through 7a. Verse 1 begins, “After these things Jesus manifested Himself again to the disciples at the Sea of Tiberias.” It was not a matter of coming but a matter of being manifested. He never went, so He did not need to come. Rather, He lived in them. Verses 1b through 4 say, “And He manifested Himself in this way: Simon Peter and Thomas, called Didymus, and Nathanael from Cana of Galilee and the sons of Zebedee and two others of His disciples were there together. Simon Peter said to them, I am going fishing. They said to him, We also are coming with you. They went forth and got into the boat, and that night they caught nothing. Now as soon as the morning broke, Jesus stood on the shore; however the disciples did not know that it was Jesus.” They also had no idea how He came. Verses 5 through 7a continue, “Then Jesus said to them, Little children, you do not have any fish to eat, do you? They answered Him, No. And He said to them, Cast the net on the right side of the boat, and you will find some. They cast therefore, and they were no longer able to haul it in because of the abundance of fish. Then that disciple whom Jesus loved said to Peter, It is the Lord!” At this time they finally realized that it was the Lord. They did not realize it was the Lord until they saw so many fish. This is similar to what happened with the two disciples on their way to Emmaus (Luke 24); the Lord was in their midst, but they did not know it.
You can read through to the end of John 21, but you will not find that Jesus left them, that Jesus went away. It seems that the Gospel of John does not have a conclusion. John finished his writing, but there was no conclusion to it. In John 20 and 21 he uses two or three examples to show that after the Lord’s resurrection He as the Spirit had entered into the disciples to be with them forever, never to leave. At times, due to their weaknesses, He would manifest Himself for them to see. That was not His coming but His manifestation. After His manifestation He was hidden again. The Lord was still with them; He never left them.
Please keep in mind that this is the work accomplished through the Lord’s death and resurrection. He brings those who belong to Him fully into God, and as the Spirit, He Himself abides in them that they may be fully built up together with God and become one with God. This is the temple He raised up. He seemed to say, “Destroy this temple that I obtained in My incarnation, and I will raise it up again in three days. I will resurrect from death and raise it up in resurrection with the resurrection life. I am now living in the body of one man, but after My resurrection I will live in the Body with millions of people.” From our perspective as human beings living in time, today He is still building this temple in resurrection. From God’s perspective, however, He has already resurrected and completed this temple, because with Him there is no element of time.
Dear brothers and sisters, this is the Gospel of John. Do not forget that the subject of the Gospel of John is the Word becoming flesh and tabernacling among us. That was a temporary temple; that was a single man. Men destroyed this temple, but the Lord raised it up in resurrection. His death and resurrection were to bring man into God so that man might have a union with God. Now He abides in man, and man becomes a temple built by God.
