Is John 17:17 a mistake? Charlie Kirk reflections.
Current event applications are a few sentences below, but we need to start with Jesus!
The astounding implications of 17:17
Is John 17:17 a mistake? Obviously, I believe the answer is no. But Jesus prayed that we would be sanctified in the truth of God’s Word – in the middle of His prayer for unity. We tend to assume that you have to choose between a pursuit of truth and a pursuit of unity. Jesus disagrees with us on that perspective. Several relevant and timely implications:
John 17 is a prayer for His past and present followers’ unity, with truth as a subset. It’s not a prayer for the truth with unity as a subset.
Said differently, Jesus saw unity as the big picture and the overarching concern. In fact, He sees our love for one another as the primary strategy for the Great Commission (John 17:23).
Jesus doesn’t pray that we pursue truth while hoping that unity is maintained.
Instead, He prays that we would be sanctified in the truth as we pursue unity.
Here’s the biggest implication – the way to get to truth is through unity. Maybe it’s the only way?
Bye-bye blindspots
When we learn to love other followers of Jesus who are radically different from ourselves – to the point that Jesus is the only thing we hold in common – we actually discover more of the truth. We can’t help that our experiences shape our perspectives, making us prone to accentuate some parts of God’s Word and downplay other parts. The nature of worldviews is that they function like a lens, filtering pieces out without our conscious consent. Broader and deeper unity leads to a more mature embrace of the Truth. Rather than causing conflict, broad Biblical unity produces a greater grasp of the truth.
And now, Charlie Kirk
Charlie Kirk’s assassination has the world’s attention. I was on a global leadership training call the Monday morning after the memorial service, and Kirk came up multiple times. One young man shared that the memorial service had been played live in a London pub, and every time Jesus’ name was mentioned, people cheered. In a pub in London – not exactly known as a hotbed of overflowing love for Jesus!
Charlie’s wife Erika chose to publicly forgive her husband’s killer, because “that’s what Christ did”. God can and consistently does take what the enemy means for evil, and bring good out of it. Love conquers evil. Love vanquishes hate. Love alone can do that. Jesus alone wins the victory.
AND I received a call from a friend in Geneva asking, “Can you explain what’s going on? I’m hearing so many conflicting stories.” We don’t have to choose between all or nothing. We don’t have to celebrate every aspect of an event in order to celebrate parts of it.
My appeal
Dear followers of Christ who were part of the memorial service… you have friends who are brothers and sisters in Christ who were not present. Intentionally. Don’t undo Erika’s bold statement of Christ-like love by harboring judgment against those who aren’t celebrating everything being done and said, who struggle to separate a young man from the politics surrounding him which are absolutely NOT always Christ-like.
What we must not do is assume that our perspective is the complete and only correct one. People who love Jesus as much as we do, and read and treasure His Word as much as we do, are seeing different facets to the story than we are. How foolish it would be to plug our ears and write off all differing perspectives without even seeking to understand them.
Advancing revival
I can’t count how many times I’ve heard and seen new faith – hopeful signs of revival – during this last week. Do we want to see the streams of revival become a mighty ocean? Keep verse 17 connected to John 17. Love those who are different from you, even opposed to you – which is especially important when they are fellow citizens of a heavenly Kingdom. Become an answer to Jesus’ prayer – which has no footnotes saying “except where politics are concerned”.
Seek first not to be understood, but to understand.
Hating those who differ from us? That will ensure that this revival is stillborn.
That would be Satan’s strategy for reversing revival.
This week’s episode of the Both/And Life is my reflection on one singular aspect of the Kirk story.
Dave Drum, Founder
