There is yet another unity of the deepest interest which our Lord next spreads before the Father: not discipular or apostolic, which was so marvelously sustained, nor of testimony in the grace that would embrace all Christians, which after a bright display at first has long painfully broken down, but unity in glory where all is stable and according to God.
“And the glory which thou hast given me I have given them, that they may be one as we [are] one, I in them and thou in me, that they may be perfected into one, that the world may know that thou didst send me and lovedst them as thou lovedst me.” (Vers. 22, 23.)
This is wholly distinct from what we have seen, though all be to the praise of Christ. It is an exclusively future unity, though the glory be given to our faith now, and grace would have us apprehend it and feel and walk accordingly. For all is revealed to act now on our souls. But this unity will be in glory when we shall be one as the Father and the Son are. Hence failure here is impossible. The weakness of man, the power of Satan, can damage no more.
The manner of this unity is to be noted also. It is not the mutuality which we had described in verse 21, that we should be one in the Father and the Son, as the Father in the Son and the Son in the Father. Such is the admirable way in which the Savior set out what we are called to now by the Spirit, that the world may believe the Father sent the Son. But by-and-by, when the glory is revealed, there will be this new character, that, while the saints are to be one even as the Father and the Son are one, it will be Christ the Son in them and the Father in Him. And this as exactly agrees with Rev. 21 as the former answers to 1 John 1:33That which we have seen and heard declare we unto you, that ye also may have fellowship with us: and truly our fellowship is with the Father, and with his Son Jesus Christ. (1 John 1:3).
For as the holy city, new Jerusalem, is the bride the Lamb's wife, the symbol of the glorified saints in that day, so we are shown that the city had the glory of God, and the Lamb its lamp, while the nations walk in its light. (Vers. 11, 23, 24.) Thus are the blessed on earth to enjoy the heavenly glory, not directly like the glorified on high who have the Lord God Almighty and the Lamb as their temple and need none other; whereas those on earth have it but mediately. Yet how constant and impressive the proof before them that the Father sent the Son! For how else could there have grown up such a holy temple in the Lord? And what adequately could account for men thus called out of the earth and glorified on high? Sovereign grace had given them that heavenly portion as the fruit of His mission who at all cost to Himself had glorified God on the earth. And now they share His glory above, and are so displayed before the wondering world. The salvation-bearing grace which had appeared to all and had done its suited and appointed work in redeeming and purifying these to God as a people of possession will then have given place to the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ, but this through the church reigning over the earth, at any rate as the ordinary or normal method of its manifestation during the kingdom. As we by faith saw the Father in the on to eternal life, they in that day will behold and learn them in the church, the glorious vessel of the light of Christ in whom God's glory shines. For then the false glory of man is forever judged, never more to mislead the heart, and Satan will never regain his bad eminence in the heavenlies whereby he found means most effectively to misrepresent God, oppose Christ, accuse the saints, and deceive the world. It is thenceforward the glory of God that is established before all eyes, so that men “know” it in and by the glorified saints, instead of being objects of testimony that they might “believe.” For the earth shall be full of the glory of Jehovah (Num. 14:2121But as truly as I live, all the earth shall be filled with the glory of the Lord. (Numbers 14:21)) and of the knowledge of Jehovah (Isa. 11) and of the knowledge of the glory of Jehovah, as the waters cover the sea, when Christ shall have come to be glorified in His saints, and to be admired in all them that believed, in that day.
Therefore do we hear for the first time of being “perfected into one.” The apostolic unity first spoken of, unity in counsel and action, as the Father and the Son gave pattern was as blessed as it was all-important for the place they had to fill and the work to be done in the testimony of Christ. Still it was comparatively partial, and necessarily on a small scale. Far wider was the second unity of fellowship in the Father and the Son exhibited in the Pentecostal assembly at large, when thousands of souls walked together superior to selfish influence and great grace was upon them all, and of the rest durst no man join himself to them, but the people magnified them, and believers were the more added to the Lord, multitudes both of men and women. But this was only transient. The third will be perfect in glory, and so permanent as well as complete.
And the effect will be immense and immediate, as indeed one could not conceive it otherwise. The world will contemplate with amazement the church in the glory and the glory of God in the church, or (as the Lord says) the Father in Him, and He in them glorified. It is unity perfect both in connection with its source and in manifestation of the divine glory. And what a demonstration that the Father sent the Son and loved the saints as He loved Him! For how should the Son be there as the glorified Man unless previously sent here in love? and how should we be manifested together with Him in glory, unless loved with the same love? It is no question of “believing” this being undeniable fact. The world will “know” it. We may know now what is only revealed in the word to our faith; but this will be a display of divine glory.