Sermon on John 17
Fifth Wednesday in Lent
Zion Lutheran Church
Guttenberg, Iowa
25 March 2026
Dear brothers and sisters in Christ,
This reading that we had this evening comes from the last prayer that we have recorded from the mouth of Jesus before he died (John 17). It was said in the Garden of Gethsemane, and while the disciples were trying to stay awake, they were depressed, confused, and did not know whether up or down was coming.
It had been a whirlwind of a couple of weeks. A sense of things leading toward conflict grew with each step that they took toward Jerusalem.
Jesus had healed a blind man in Jericho (Luke 18:35–43), a clear sign of the Messiah. Jesus raised Lazarus from the dead in the sight of the priests, not miles from Jerusalem, after he had been dead for four days (John 11:38–44), yet one more sign of the Messiah.
On Palm Sunday, Jesus deliberately rides a donkey along the road that David took (1 Kings 1:33–34). He rode on a donkey, fulfilling prophecy (Zechariah 9:9), just as David had taken that very same road to reassume his throne, and just as his son Solomon had done, also riding a donkey into Jerusalem.
The sign was unmistakable to the pilgrims gathering for Passover, as the Passover lambs streamed in along the same road from Bethlehem, headed toward the temple for sacrifice.
He accepted the praises of the crowd, “Hosanna to the Son of David, blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord” (Psalm 118:25–26; Matthew 21:9), and none of this was lost on the priests and those around him. The disciples were both joyful and just a little bit nervous.
The road led up and across the brook Kidron and directly into the temple complex, where Jesus was to drive the money changers out of the temple (Matthew 21:12–13) for three days and argue with the scribes and the Pharisees as they tried all the trick questions they could think of. Every one of them, Jesus deftly turned aside, and the disciples could not miss the hatred in their eyes. They knew something was up, but they really didn’t know exactly what that was.
Thomas long ago had conceded that he was headed toward Jerusalem to die: “Let us also go, that we may die with him” (John 11:16).
It’s not only that, but Jesus had this tendency over the years to constantly predict his suffering, death, and resurrection, all at the hands of the scribes and the Pharisees (Matthew 16:21; Mark 10:33–34; Luke 18:31–33). And so, unsettled, they were listening to him, wondering half what this last teaching really meant for them.
And so, Jesus, quite aware of all of this, prays for them and for us.
What Is It That Bothers You Today?
We have quite a few things in this life: the usual litany of the phases of life—sickness, grief, death, hurricanes, tornadoes, all kinds of disasters that come our way, and ups and downs in the economy. Just when you think you can pay for your gas, you pull into the gas pump, and the price has jumped again.
All these things can worry and build on you. And if it’s not that, it’s chronic aches and pains, the issues that you find with workers and people alongside you. And any time you open your mouth to say anything to people about Jesus, you get at best a polite look of disdain and maybe even some ridicule along the way.
“In the world you will have tribulation,” Jesus told us (John 16:33). And he was right. We do have tribulation at every turn. These, he told us, are a sign that we are in the last days (Matthew 24:8), in the same way that you know that when labor begins, a woman is about to deliver her baby. And you might not know when, but you know it is coming, and it is coming soon.
And so it is we know that the end will come for us, either at the end of our days or at the end of all days, whichever the Lord wills.
The World, the Devil, and Our Own Sinful Flesh
The world itself is also preoccupied with everything that is on its agenda, each and every one of us being of the opinion that we, of course, should rule the world. And so we seek our own happiness, and the commercials and the television programs and the internet all urge us to splurge, to buy, to enjoy ourselves, to have all kinds of luxuries, that we are really right when we think that we are better than the people next to us and the people down the street.
Chief of sinners though I be… we might think all the rest are worse than me.
The devil’s accusations also play into this. Just as the devil tried to throw Jesus off his game with all of his sly things—“Turn these stones into bread… Bow down to me… Throw yourself down from the pinnacle of the temple” (Matthew 4:1–11)—so the same kinds of things also bear down on us.
When we know that we have to be disciplined, that we have to guard our lives so that we please God and our neighbors, so that we live in peace with people, and so that we raise our children well, we discover that sometimes those are very, very long paths and very, very long drawn-out things that you have to engage in, that could take you years to do. And so, taking a little shortcut, even if it’s not quite kosher, is a very tempting thing that comes our way.
Our own hearts, you see, are still inclined to sin (Romans 7:18–25), although we have been baptized and washed by the blood of the Lamb (Revelation 1:5), that we have been made his children and heirs, and a new person put in our hearts (2 Corinthians 5:17). That old Adam and that old Eve still keep coming along, and as is sometimes attributed to Luther, although I can’t find it in him, the old Adam is a good swimmer—very hard to drown in the waters of baptism (Romans 6:3–6). And he will be with us until the day that we die, and the Lord relieves us of him once and for all.
But in the meantime, we have all these things that tempt us to sin, and more often than we would like, we fall into those sins and have to start all over each day, asking for forgiveness and trying one more time.
“I Pray for You”
In the midst of all of this, which can get sometimes very confusing, they say that when you go into a battle, the moment that the first shots are fired, the smoke and the noise and the splashing of light is such that nobody knows where anybody or anyone else is, and the confusion is almost as bad as the violence around you.
And so it is in our world sometimes. We really can’t figure out what’s up or down some days.
And that’s why it is good that Jesus says, “I pray for you.” (John 17:9, 20)
Jesus, you see, rescued us from this, taking all of these sins, all of our doubts, all of our worries, all of our fear, and went to the cross right after he prayed this prayer, where he suffered and died that our sins might be completely paid for, washed away by the shedding of his very own precious blood on that cross (1 Peter 1:18–19).
And when he died and paid for it once and for all and said, “It is finished,” (John 19:30), it was really finished. Our sins are forgiven. Our lives are promised to be with him forever. And when our time comes to an end, that is where we will be, with him in glory forever and ever (Philippians 1:23).
And so he prays for us because he knows exactly what this life is like. One of the side benefits of the incarnation is that God walked as a man, suffered, had the same pains and the same temptations as each one of us (Hebrews 4:15), and knows very well what we’re up against. And so when he prays, he prays for what he knows very, very well.
Just as he begins to pray, it is not the last time he does so. It sounds like it—the High Priestly Prayer comes to an end, he’s arrested and off to the cross. But we’re told in various and sundry different places that in the midst of this world, in the midst of all of the trials and tribulations and the groanings that we have in this world, that Jesus is at the right hand of God interceding for us (Romans 8:34; Hebrews 7:25).
Now, on the side of him, the Holy Spirit is at work, listening to us, and when we don’t have the words to pray, praying those words himself for us (Romans 8:26–27).
In that promise, we can stand knowing that every day of our lives, not only are we not alone, but that God himself is praying to God for us. You really can’t lose when that’s going on.
Why Does He Pray?
And as if that were not enough—and it sure is—he continues to encourage us through the reading, the singing, and the preaching of his word (Romans 10:17), through the waters of baptism (Titus 3:5), through the comfort of hearing God’s own voice through your pastor forgiving your sins (John 20:22–23), through the sacrament of his body and blood where we receive the very body and blood of Christ shed for us for the forgiveness of our sins (Matthew 26:26–28).
In all of this, why does he pray?
He prays that we would be forgiven (John 17:17).
He prays that we would be one with each other and with the Church in heaven (John 17:21–23).
He prays that we would be made holy (John 17:17).
And you know, if God prays to God, there’s only one answer to that prayer, and that’s yes.
And so we can have comfort in this:
When you cannot pray, Christ prays for you.
When your faith is weak, his prayers undergird you and hold you up.
When you are weak and don’t know what is coming next, he is there to strengthen you.
And on the last day, he will send his angel to escort you to be with him (Luke 16:22).
So it is that you live with God even now. In the center of the Holy Trinity, in that family of persons that are one being, yet three, we are also one in some mysterious way with him, even in this life (John 14:20; John 17:23).
For Jesus said, “I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in me, even though he dies, yet shall he live. And he who lives and believes in me shall never die.” (John 11:25–26)
And so it is with us. As we walk in this life, we can be confident that no matter what comes our way, Jesus is with us and he prays for us. And that is really, really good enough.
Originally posted at What does this Mean? Blog: https://whatdoesthismean.blog
The posts in the blog What does this Mean? are now available at What does this Mean? | Rev. Robert E. Smith | Substack
Rev. Robert E. Smith
Pastor Emeritus
Fort Wayne, Indiana
©2026 Robert E. Smith. All rights reserved. Permission granted to copy, share and display freely for non-commercial purposes. Direct all other rights and permissions inquiries to cosmithb@msn.com
