Scripture – “My prayer is not that you take them out of the world but that you protect them from the evil one. They are not of the world, even as I am not of it. Sanctify them by the truth; your word is truth. As you sent me into the world, I have sent them into the world. For them I sanctify myself, that they too may be truly sanctified.”
John 17:15-19 NIV
Observation – Jesus is praying to God the Father and asking him not to protect his disciples by taking them out of the world (if they were in heaven nothing bad would ever happen to them) but by protecting them from Satan. Jesus asks his father to sanctify them, set them apart by making them holy to do his work on earth, just as God the Father sent God the Son to do work on earth.
Application – Chad McDonald says the reason he doesn’t hold you under during baptism and send you onto glory is because, as a follow of Jesus Christ, filled the the Holy Spirit, you are set apart to do good works. (Ephesians 2:8-10)
Prayer – Dear Jesus, thank you for my life and for not taking me out of this world. I pray that you sanctify me to do good works today so that my clients are served well, that I do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit and so lost people can hear that there is a God in heaven that loves them and wants to actively, daily work in their lives. Amen.
What are you doing? Do it better 