And now I am no more in the world, but these are in the world, and I come to thee. Holy Father, keep through thine own name those whom thou hast given me, that they may be one, as we are. While I was with them in the world, I kept them in thy name: those that thou gavest me I have kept, and none of them is lost, but the son of perdition; that the scripture might be fulfilled.... I pray not that thou shouldest take them out of the world, but that thou shouldest keep them from the evil (vv. 11–12, 15).
We have been considering our Lord’s main reasons for praying for his disciples, and now we come to his petitions on their behalf, and the first petition is the one which is recorded in verses 11, 12 and 15. It is his great petition that God may keep them and especially that he may keep them in his name. Now this first petition follows very naturally from all that we have been considering hitherto. His desire is that they may be kept continuously in the future, in the condition in which he kept them while he was with them. And he prays that in the light of who they are and what they are, and because of what they are meant to do and the circumstances in which they are placed.
We cannot begin to consider this in detail without again reminding ourselves, with grateful and thankful hearts, of this further expression of our Lord’s wonderful concern for his people. We can be quite sure that if we but realized his concern for us, most of our problems would immediately be solved. It is because we forget this and because we fail to realize his love for us, that we tend to become anxious and worried and troubled. It does seem to me, increasingly, that a truly happy and joyful Christian life first begins with just this realization that his concern for us and about us is altogether greater than any concern we may have for ourselves and our well-being, and for our witness and our testimony for him.
Our Lord’s great prayer is that God may keep them and keep them in rather a special way. Now there is no doubt but that in this particular instance the translation in the Revised Version is altogether better, and more accurate, than that of the Authorized. The right translation of these verses is undoubtedly as follows: ‘Holy Father, keep them in thy name which thou hast given me ... While I was with them, I kept them in thy name which thou hast given me: and I guarded them, and not one of them perished, but the son of perdition ...’ (vv 11–12, RV). In other words, the prayer is that he may keep them in his name.1 The Authorized Version is somewhat misleading here because it says, ‘Holy Father, keep through thine own name those whom thou hast given me’, when it should really be:’... in thy name which thou hast given me’. We have already seen that God had given him the people, and that has been repeated several times; what our Lord is referring to here is the fact that this particular name of God has been given to him. And he says the same thing in the twelfth verse:‘... I kept them in thy name which thou hast given me.’ So that, clearly, the petition is that God would keep these, his people, in that name which God had given to him.
In a sense, we have already seen that, in verse 6, where he says, ‘I have manifested thy name unto the men which thou gavest me out of the world.’ This is the mystic secret, if I may so put it, which the Christian possesses, and it is something which nobody else understands. The Father, when he sent his Son into this world, sent him to declare his name, God’s name, and the name, as we have seen, is the peculiar revelation of the person and character of God. This is a name which is only given to those who believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, but the moment we believe, we know God in terms of this, as yet unrevealed to us, secret name. We find this very frequently in the Scriptures. For instance, we are told in Revelation 3 that a name is given to the saints, to God’s people, which nobody else knows. It means that the Christian has an understanding of God, and a knowledge of God, which nobody else has. And our Lord’s prayer is that these Christians may be kept in that knowledge and in that understanding. It is all summed up by the name – that they may continue to know and to understand through their relationship to God, what God is to them and what they are to God. That is the meaning of this prayer, that they may be kept in the name which God has given them, the name of God himself which the Lord has come to reveal, the special revelation of God which is to be found only in and through our blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. And that, therefore, is his petition for Christian people now, that we may ever be kept in the full realization of our relationship to God.
But before we can come to consider that in its detail and in its context, we must here, of necessity, notice first of all the claim which our Lord couples with the petition. Not only does he present this petition to his Father, he also adds this: ‘While I was with them in the world, I kept them in thy name, which thou hast given me, and none of them is lost but the son of perdition that the Scripture might be fulfilled.’
Obviously we have to deal with this and to define it, not merely because we must do so out of intellectual honesty, nor because we must not omit anything when we are working in detail like this through a passage of Scripture. No, we must look at this because it does contain very high and important and serious doctrine.
First of all, then, let us look at our Lord’s claims. He claims two things, ‘While I was with them in the world,’ he says, ‘I kept them in thy name which thou hast given me: and I guarded them’ (RV). Again we must notice the superiority of the Revised Version here, because it brings out the difference between the two words which our Lord uses. ‘Keeping’ is a more comprehensive word than ‘guarding’, and the idea behind the word can perhaps best be illustrated by a shepherd’s care for his sheep. It is the business of the shepherd to ‘keep’ the sheep. That means that he always keeps his eye on them. He watches them, supervising them the whole time and taking care of them in the fields so that none stray away or get lost. When they have to be moved he sees to it that they are not driven too quickly, and he always makes sure that they are fed at the right time. Constant care, that is the meaning of the word ‘keep’. Now the word ‘guard’ is a lesser term. To guard means simply to protect against attacks, so you see this covers a more restricted area than the other. Guarding means just that one thing – there are enemies around, and it is the business of the shepherd to protect the flock against them.
But we should thank God for both these terms. They tell us that our Lord does not merely guard us, he also keeps us. He is not only concerned about the attacks on us by the world, and by the evil one, but more than that, he is constantly keeping us, watching over us. He is concerned about our welfare and our well-being positively as well as negatively. He not only prevents attacks, he sees to it that we are always in the right position and in the right place and given the right things. He has this great concern, this oversight. The apostle Peter says, ‘Ye were as sheep going astray; but are now returned unto the Shepherd and Bishop of your souls’ (1 Pet 2:25) – that is what our Lord is to us, the one who looks after all our interests in every way. In these verses his claim is that he has kept them and guarded them, but now he says he is going to leave them, and so he prays to God to keep them and to guard them as he had done.
How, then, and when did our Lord keep and guard them? The gospels, of course, are full of answers to that question, I merely note them. In the first place he had done so by teaching them – in a sense that was the purpose of his teaching, to instruct them in their relationship to God, and in the nature of the Christian life. That is why he preached the Sermon on the Mount, and gave them the Beatitudes, so that they might know the kind of people they were meant to be. All his teaching is designed to do this. He taught them about the world, and its subtlety, about sin, about the flesh and about the devil, for it was only as they were forewarned, that they could be forearmed. So his teaching was a very vital part of his keeping of them.
But not only that. It is remarkable as you go through the gospels to notice the amount of time he spent in warning his followers. There is nothing further removed from the gospels than many of the false cults which say, ‘You believe this and all will be well with you.’ The gospel does not do that. Our Lord had solemn warnings for these people, and he constantly prepared them for difficulties and dangers. In a sense, they were far too elated; he was almost alarmed at their lack of understanding, and so he warned them. On one occasion they had been out preaching and they had come back so jubilant because, they said, ‘Even the devils are subject unto us.’ But he said to them, ‘... in this rejoice not, that the spirits are subject unto you; but rather rejoice, because your names are written in heaven’ (Lk 10:17, 20). He knew the things they were going to find, so he warned them, and that is another way of keeping them.
He also keeps them by rebuking them at times, by chastising them. In their lack of understanding they tended to do things which were bad for them and bad for the kingdom, so our Lord rebuked them. ‘Whom the Lord loveth he chasteneth’ (Heb 12:6) and that is the business of chastening: to keep us, to keep us from straying and from wandering, to keep us from things that are harmful to us. And so in his love he keeps us by rebuking us and by chastening us. But above all, our Lord kept them and guarded them by actual manifestations of his power. He frequently stood between them and the attacks and assaults of the world and the flesh and the devil. That becomes clear quite often. Take, for instance, his words to Peter: ‘Simon, Simon, behold, Satan hath desired to have you, that he may sift you as wheat: but I have prayed for thee, that thy faith fail not’ (Lk 22:31–32). He knew that these onslaughts were coming, he anticipated them, and in this way he kept them and guarded them.
Now we must surely raise the question as to why our Lord makes this claim at this point. The answer, clearly, is that it is another statement of his to the effect that he has glorified his Father in everything and that he has failed in nothing. You remember we had it at the very beginning of the prayer. ‘Father,’ he says, ‘the hour is come; glorify thy Son, that thy Son also may glorify thee.’ That was his purpose, he was always concerned to glorify the Father. In verse 2 he says, ‘As thou hast given him power over all flesh, that he should give eternal life to as many as thou hast given him’ – and then, in verse 4 – ‘I have glorified thee on the earth.’ And one of the ways in which he had glorified the Father was that he had kept these men whom the Father had given him. He had not failed in any single respect or detail.
Here again is something which calls for a word of comment. Read the four gospels again and keep this particular point in your mind. Look at the disciples, look at their frailty, their proneness to sinfulness. There was nothing exceptional about them. They were not learned in any way, but just ordinary men in this extraordinary position. Yet our Lord could claim, and claim rightly and truly, that he had kept them, though they were what they were, and in spite of all the temptations to which they had been exposed. He had kept them in these extraordinary circumstances because his strength was sufficient. They were ignorant, they did not understand him at times and they were bewildered and baffled. Yet in spite of all that we may say about them – the impulsiveness of a Peter or the scepticism of a Thomas – our Lord, by his amazing way of dealing with them, had kept and guarded them. And here, at the end, he is able to say to the Father, I have kept, I have guarded these people whom thou hast given me.
Ah yes, but there is, however, one statement which we have to face – ‘... and,’ says our Lord, ‘none of them is lost, but the son of perdition; that the scripture might be fulfilled.’ Now this is something which is truly remarkable. Here, I would remind you again, is our Lord just under the shadow of the cross, praying to the Father, and in this prayer he mentions the case of Judas. Why does he do that? As we seek to answer that question, I think that once more I can show you that this is a very important doctrine for us. First of all, we must notice here that he says but – ‘but the son of perdition’ – and not except. These two words always confuse the exegesis of this verse. Our Lord is saying here that though Judas is one of the twelve, he is not one of those who has been given to the Son by the Father. Judas is not a kind of exception among the apostles, he is in a category apart. He does not really belong to the same group, he is an odd man out: he is in the group but has never been of it. If our Lord had said, ‘I have kept them all except Judas’, the implication would have been that he had failed to keep one of them. But when he says, ‘I have kept them all but the son of perdition’, he is simply saying, Now of these men who have been accompanying me I have kept those whom thou hast given me, but there is one other who has been in the company, the son of perdition, and that is Judas.
Let me say why it is important for us to put it in that form. We are constantly told in the Scriptures themselves that Judas was not really one of the true company. Judas was never born again, and never became a Christian even though he belonged to the company of the twelve. Let me remind you of John 6:68–70. When Peter makes his great confession: ‘Lord, to whom shall we go? thou hast the words of eternal life. And we believe and are sure that thou art that Christ, the Son of the living God,’ our Lord turns to them and says, ‘Have not I chosen you twelve, and one of you is a devil?’ And in verse 71 we read: ‘He spake of Judas Iscariot... for he it was that should betray him, being one of the twelve.’
So, then, let us return to our question – why does our Lord mention that at this point in his most tender prayer? The first answer is one which I have already given – he is praying in an audible manner, and the disciples are listening to the prayer. He speaks thus of Judas audibly, in order that he may again claim in their presence that he has glorified the Father. It is an absolute claim. He has kept and guarded those whom the Father has given him: Judas has not been given to him in that way.
Another obvious reason is that he is anxious that these disciples should know beforehand what is going to happen and what Judas is going to do, lest they be offended when it actually takes place. Here again is an indication of our Lord’s lovingkindness and his care for his own. Indeed it is a perfect example of how he keeps them. He knows that Judas is going to betray him but the others do not. Our Lord spoke of it earlier, but they did not understand. He now states it again before them, so that they might know for certain that it is going to happen, and will not be surprised or dumbfounded at the subtlety of it.
There is a further reason, too. He is anxious to reveal to them his own deity and to assert that he is the Son of God. He is also anxious that they should realize his foreknowledge. He knows exactly what Judas is going to do; he prophesied it earlier, as we saw, in the sixth chapter. He repeated it in the thirteenth and now here it is once more. He knows everything. He knows the end from the beginning, and here he has declared once more that he is indeed the Son of God. And also, clearly, he says this in order that he might pay this testimony to Scripture – ‘that the scripture may be fulfilled’. The treachery of Judas is prophesied in the Scriptures in Psalms 41 and 109. Psalm 109 in particular gives a detailed description of Judas, and so, as our Lord says here, the scripture has said it all. He says, in effect, It is not only I, but the scripture, too. The prophets have seen it coming, and the son of perdition is going to fulfil the prophecy that was already made long ago.’
That, then, is but the mechanics of this matter, so now let us apply this great and spiritual message. It seems to me that here we have, in a terrible picture, the exact difference between belonging to the world and belonging to the Lord Jesus Christ. ‘I pray for them: I pray not for the world.’ The difference between them and the world is the difference between the eleven and Judas Iscariot. He was not praying for Judas, and he does not pray for anybody who belongs to the Judas position. So this is the essential difference between being a Christian and not being a Christian, it is all depicted in the alarming picture in this most holy prayer.
Here, then, I suggest, is something by which we ought to examine ourselves, because the lesson at this point is that it is possible for one to belong to the innermost circle and yet to be lost – that is the terrible and terrifying lesson which we must take to ourselves. Mere membership of the church means nothing in and of itself. Judas was one of the twelve and yet he was lost. He was one of those who was sent out with the others and he was one of those who had listened to the most intimate teaching. He was right in the inner circle and yet he was the son of perdition. That is why Scripture constantly exhorts us to examine ourselves. A mechanical position does not guarantee that there is life. There are obviously certain things which characterize this condition of Judas, and we must consider them. The mere fact that I am interested in Christian things does not prove I am a Christian. Why did Judas come among the twelve? For three years he had been with the others and there he was following our Lord and listening to his intimate teaching. There must have been something that attracted him. So we have to realize that we may be attracted to the church, and to the gospel and to Christ himself, and yet not be truly Christian, but sons of perdition.
What are the characteristics of such people? Here are some that seem to be indicated in Scripture. First of all, Judas was dominated by Satan. ‘One of you is a devil,’ says our Lord in John 6:70, by which he means that this man is entirely, as it were, possessed by the devil, dominated and controlled by him. Then another thing that is very obvious is that he was blinded so that he could not see the truth. As the apostle Paul tells us, ‘But if our gospel be hid, it is hid to them that are lost: in whom the god of this world hath blinded the minds of them which believe not, lest the light of the glorious gospel of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine unto them’ (2 Cor 4:3–4). Here is a man sitting day by day and listening to the truth from the very Son of God, and yet he never sees it, because he is blinded to it. He hears the words but he does not hear the message. He could probably recite certain words, but he does not know their meaning – he is blind to the truth.
You notice, also, the essential baseness of his character and nature. We are told in John 12:6 ‘... he was a thief, and had the bag, and bare what was put therein’ – he was dishonest. He was in charge of their communal bag and stole from it.2 People often have mercenary reasons for belonging to the church; they join for their own selfish ends. Judas was a hypocrite and he pretended to be something he was not. He was treacherous. He was always selfish and self-seeking and the whole tragedy of Judas is that he brought his own interests into the presence of the Son of God himself. It was his avarice that seems to have taken him there. He came to Christ because of certain things he wanted, not because of what Christ had to give, and that is the essential difference between a man who is not a Christian and the true Christian. People have their own personal reasons for being interested in religion. There are certain things they want and they think that religion can provide them – that is the Judas attitude. The true Christian is one who goes empty-handed, as it were, with an open mind and heart and just listens and receives. Judas never did that. He always had his own point of view, his own interests, and it was to further them that he kept with the disciples. He never really opened himself to receive the message because he was selfish and self-centred.
And there is another great lesson here. Does it not show us the final and complete fallacy and fatuity of thinking anybody can ever be saved or become a Christian merely by teaching or instruction? So many people think that. They say, ‘We do not believe in the rebirth, what is needed is good teaching’. But they say that in spite of the case of Judas. Here is a man who for three years received divine instruction through the lips of the blessed Son of God himself, and yet he is ‘a son of perdition’. By mere teaching and instruction no man can ever be made a Christian. Or take the people who think that the way to make people Christian is to give them a good example, to put them in the right environment and surround them with the right influence. Is that not the kind of thing that is still being taught? Yet here is a man who had spent three years, not only with the apostles, but in the very innermost presence of the Son of God himself, and yet he is the son of perdition. No, example and influence and environment are not enough. The Christian is not merely a man who is trying to imitate the Lord Jesus Christ, for it cannot be done. In Judas we see a man who has every advantage yet he is lost.
Let me therefore sum it all up in these words. If there is one thing in the Scriptures that proves, more conclusively than anything else, the absolute necessity of the rebirth, it is the case of Judas Iscariot. What differentiates the Christian from the non-Christian is not that the Christian lives a better life than he did before, nor that he knows more of the Scriptures, and all these other good things. Judas knew all that and he probably lived a good outward moral life during the three years he was among the disciples. No, what makes a man a Christian is that he is born again, he has received the divine nature, he has indeed become indwelt by the Spirit of the living God. It is this that gives the understanding, and everything that Judas did not have. It was because Judas was never renewed and given the new life that he remained the son of perdition. And here I want to utter a solemn, terrible word. The end of the non-Christian, even though he may be highly religious, is perdition, which means perishing. Though Judas was in the company of the apostles all along, he really belonged to the world, and the fate of the world is to perish. Whatever its appearance may be, its end is destruction, with no hope whatsoever; because it has not truly believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God, it perishes.
This is an unpleasant subject and yet we have to face it, because, in the very centre of this most wonderful prayer, our Lord had to mention it as a solemn warning. He was not praying for Judas, he was praying for those who were God’s people, those who belong to God.
My dear friends, are we certain that we belong to God? Do we know that we have received the divine life? Are we born again, and are we sure of it? I warn you in the name of my blessed Saviour, in the light of this teaching, do not rely upon anything but the certain knowledge that you have received life from God. Interest in religion is not enough, interest in Christ is not enough, interest in morality is not enough, membership of the church is not enough – none of these things is enough. Judas seemed to have had them all. The one thing about which we must be absolutely certain is that we are the children of God. If you are, praise him and give yourself anew to him. If you are not certain, then I beseech you, learn the lesson of Judas. Go to the Lord Jesus Christ and tell him that you are uncertain, that you do not know, that you are even doubtful whether you have new life. Tell him the truth about yourself. Cast yourself utterly at his feet and ask him in mercy to look upon you and by his Spirit give you this new life and the blessed assurance that you are born again, that you are indeed his child and his heir, a joint-heir with Christ, and that you truly belong to him.
1 The New International Version has, ‘Holy Father, protect them by the power of your name – the name you gave me – so that they may be one as we are one. While I was with them, I protected them and kept them safe by that name you gave me.’ (Ed.)
2 The NIV translates this:’... he was a thief; as keeper of the money bag, he used to help himself to what was put into it.’ (Ed.)