John 17:6-19 (NRSV)
Read John 17:6-19 on biblegateway.com
Verse 6"I have made your name known to those whom you gave me from the world. They were yours, and you gave them to me, and they have kept your word. Verse 7Now they know that everything you have given me is from you; Verse 8for the words that you gave to me I have given to them, and they have received them and know in truth that I came from you; and they have believed that you sent me. Verse 9I am asking on their behalf; I am not asking on behalf of the world, but on behalf of those whom you gave me, because they are yours. Verse 10All mine are yours, and yours are mine; and I have been glorified in them.
Verse 11And now I am no longer in the world, but they are in the world, and I am coming to you. Holy Father, protect them in your name that you have given me, so that they may be one, as we are one. Verse 12While I was with them, I protected them in your name that you have given me. I guarded them, and not one of them was lost except the one destined to be lost, so that the scripture might be fulfilled. Verse 13But now I am coming to you, and I speak these things in the world so that they may have my joy made complete in themselves. Verse 14I have given them your word, and the world has hated them because they do not belong to the world, just as I do not belong to the world. Verse 15I am not asking you to take them out of the world, but I ask you to protect them from the evil one. Verse 16They do not belong to the world, just as I do not belong to the world.
Verse 17Sanctify them in the truth; your word is truth. Verse 18As you have sent me into the world, so I have sent them into the world. Verse 19And for their sakes I sanctify myself, so that they also may be sanctified in truth.
Devotion
My parents had a large vegetable garden. Dad especially liked planting potatoes...lots of them! I was home on vacation. The potatoes were growing fast. So were the weeds. Dad handed me a hoe. He took one for himself. We went to opposite ends of the row and began working toward the center. That's when I noticed that he had stopped and was leaning on his hoe. That wasn't like Dad. Then I realized that he was crying. I approached and asked what was wrong. "Oh. I'll be all right," he said. But I insisted: "Tell me what's wrong." "Oh", he said, "I've been such a poor dad to you kids." I tried to tell him what I thought, that he'd been a great dad to us. He thanked me, but I never was confident that I'd made the point as well as I should have. He died the following winter.
Jesus' prayer for his disciples included this: "I am not asking you to take them out of the world, but I ask you to protect them from the evil one." The evil one is busy tearing God's creation apart. Sometimes we can see it in ourselves or in the lives of those we love. As followers of Jesus, people for whom Jesus prayed, we have been given the charge to continue the work of our Lord.
Prayer
Guarded from the evil one, we live this day in faith and hope and love. Amen.