Daily Prayer Devotional for Women and Men | OnlinePrayerJournal

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For additional translations of the passage, use this link to Bible Gateway.

²⁵ “Though I have been speaking figuratively, a time is coming when I will no longer use this kind of language but will tell you plainly about my Father.  26 In that day you will ask in my name. I am not saying that I will ask the Father on your behalf.  27 No, the Father himself loves you because you have loved me and have believed that I came from God.  28 I came from the Father and entered the world; now I am leaving the world and going back to the Father.” 29 Then Jesus’ disciples said, “Now you are speaking clearly and without figures of speech.  30 Now we can see that you know all things and that you do not even need to have anyone ask you questions. This makes us believe that you came from God.” 31 “Do you now believe?”  Jesus replied.  32 “A time is coming and in fact has come when you will be scattered, each to your own home. You will leave me all alone. Yet I am not alone, for my Father is with me. 33 “I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.”

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Many films made today do not follow a chronological order but hold different moments in time together. Frequently, it feels like John adopts a similar technique. This passage starts with Jesus referring to ‘a time’ that ‘is coming’ when he will speak plainly of the Father (v. 25). The disciples assume that he is talking about their current time (‘Now you are speaking clearly …’; v. 29), but it seems more likely that Jesus is thinking of a time after his resurrection. Later, Jesus says, ‘A time is coming … when you will be scattered’ (v. 32). Here, he refers to an earlier time when he will be arrested, tried, and crucified. Just as Jesus holds together these different coming times, so he also holds together the truth that he will be left alone at the cross, with the truth that he is not alone, ‘for my Father is with me’ (v. 32). The disciples will desert him, but he is confident that his Father will be with him throughout his trials. By contrast, Matthew and Mark, who record Jesus crying from Psalm 22:1, ‘My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?’,1 John depicts Jesus’ deep trust in the Father’s presence (a trust that is, indeed, deeply woven into Psalm 22 as a whole). Do we recognize the Father’s presence with us, even in our own darkest times? There is a third way in which this passage holds together contradiction. Jesus urges his disciples to ‘take heart’ because he has ‘overcome the world’ (v. 33). Yet the means he will choose to do this are far from the triumphalist action the word ‘overcome’ might suggest. His overcoming involves his suffering and dying. It involves him dressing like a slave to wash his disciples’ feet. It looks very much like defeat, but do not be deceived: this is victory.

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