Passage of the Day - January 16, 2013

John 17:6-12

⁶ “I have manifested Your name to the men whom You gave Me out of the world; they were Yours and You gave them to Me, and they have kept Your word. ⁷ Now they have come to know that everything You have given Me is from You; ⁸ for the words which You gave Me I have given to them; and they received them and truly understood that I came forth from You, and they believed that You sent Me. ⁹ I ask on their behalf; I do not ask on behalf of the world, but of those whom You have given Me; for they are Yours; ¹⁰ and all things that are Mine are Yours, and Yours are Mine; and I have been glorified in them. ¹¹ I am no longer in the world; and yet they themselves are in the world, and I come to You. Holy Father, keep them in Your name, the name which You have given Me, that they may be one even as We are. ¹² While I was with them, I was keeping them in Your name which You have given Me; and I guarded them and not one of them perished but the son of perdition, so that the Scripture would be fulfilled.

How wonderful it would be to be able to pray a prayer similar to this about our own children some day.  We have a charge to keep and are to take very seriously our responsibility to raise our children in the Lord.

I did notice something interesting in this passage.  Look in verse six – “…they were Yours and You gave them to Me,…”  Note how they belonged to God before they even knew Jesus or were instructed by Him.

It harkens back to when Peter and the gang became disciples in the first place.  What was the pivotal moment?  What level of knowledge did they have of the kingdom of God?  You remember, of course, that Jesus simply said “Come” and that was it.  They came and were His disciples from that point on.  If it’s that simple to become a disciple, a baby can be one.  Being a faithful disciple, well, is a different story.

Scripture taken from the NEW AMERICAN STANDARD BIBLE®,
© Copyright 1960, 1962, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1977, 1995 by The Lockman Foundation
Used by permission." (http://www.lockman.org/)