1Now these are the commandments, the statutes, and the ordinances, which Yahweh your God commanded to teach you, that you might do them in the land that you go over to possess; 2that you might fear Yahweh your God, to keep all his statutes and his commandments, which I command you—you, your son, and your son’s son, all the days of your life; and that your days may be prolonged. 3Hear therefore, Israel, and observe to do it, that it may be well with you, and that you may increase mightily, as Yahweh, the God of your fathers, has promised to you, in a land flowing with milk and honey.
4Hear, Israel: Yahweh is our God. Yahweh is one. 5You shall love Yahweh your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your might. 6These words, which I command you today, shall be on your heart; 7and you shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise up. 8You shall bind them for a sign on your hand, and they shall be for frontlets between your eyes. 9You shall write them on the door posts of your house and on your gates.
10It shall be, when Yahweh your God brings you into the land which he swore to your fathers, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, to give you, great and goodly cities which you didn’t build, 11and houses full of all good things which you didn’t fill, and cisterns dug out which you didn’t dig, vineyards and olive trees which you didn’t plant, and you shall eat and be full; 12then beware lest you forget Yahweh, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage. 13You shall fear Yahweh your God; and you shall serve him, and shall swear by his name. 14You shall not go after other gods, of the gods of the peoples who are around you, 15for Yahweh your God among you is a jealous God, lest the anger of Yahweh your God be kindled against you, and he destroy you from off the face of the earth. 16You shall not tempt Yahweh your God, as you tempted him in Massah. 17You shall diligently keep the commandments of Yahweh your God, and his testimonies, and his statutes, which he has commanded you. 18You shall do that which is right and good in Yahweh’s sight, that it may be well with you and that you may go in and possess the good land which Yahweh swore to your fathers, 19to thrust out all your enemies from before you, as Yahweh has spoken.
20When your son asks you in time to come, saying, “What do the testimonies, the statutes, and the ordinances, which Yahweh our God has commanded you mean?” 21then you shall tell your son, “We were Pharaoh’s slaves in Egypt. Yahweh brought us out of Egypt with a mighty hand; 22and Yahweh showed great and awesome signs and wonders on Egypt, on Pharaoh, and on all his house, before our eyes; 23and he brought us out from there, that he might bring us in, to give us the land which he swore to our fathers. 24Yahweh commanded us to do all these statutes, to fear Yahweh our God, for our good always, that he might preserve us alive, as we are today. 25It shall be righteousness to us, if we observe to do all these commandments before Yahweh our God, as he has commanded us.”
This chapter is one of the heaviest theological chapters in the New Testament. As we hear the words of Jesus, we have a glimpse into the mind of Christ. Famous Welsh theologian, Martyn Lloyd-Jones, wrote several books and hundreds of pages on what goes on in this chapter. It has been discussed and debated by many Christian thinkers. In the first four verses, we hear Jesus, God in the flesh, praying to God the Father in heaven. Those who deny the divinity of Christ sometimes point to these verses, showing that in no way did Jesus claim to be God, because how and why would God pray to Himself? But the stickler is there in verse five. Jesus says, “5 Now, Father, glorify me with your own self with the glory which I had with you before the world existed (v.5). Jesus clearly states that He was there, in the beginning, “with the glory which I had before the world existed.” There was none there at the beginning, before the world began, other than God Himself. In short, Jesus is God in the flesh.
His prayer continues. He prays for those with whom He has had contact and fellowship while here on earth in His earthly ministry. He prays for His disciples and others in the world at that time, and then He gets to us! “Not for these only do I pray, but for those also who will believe in me through their word.” He is talking about you and me, who have believed in Him through the testimony of the disciples, which has made its way down to each one of us. If you read this, and you are ‘in Christ’, you heard the gospel message, and you received it. Jesus is praying for our unity. He is praying that we may be one in Him as He is in us. Unity is important to God. The Shemah Yishrael states, “Hear oh Israel, the Lord our God is echad (unity)”. (Deut 6:4). Unity in the family of God is also very important to God. We derail this unity when we create division over all kinds of things. The Holy Spirit speaks through the Psalmist when he says, “See how good and how pleasant it is for brothers to live together in unity! (Psalms 133:1 WEB) God is interested in our unity. Interestingly, He doesn’t call for our uniformity.
We disrupt this unity in the Church when we argue or create division over peripheral issues. What are peripherals? That word means the “outer boundaries.” So, the outer boundaries of what? I would say the outer boundaries of the faith's core tenets. When we argue about the color of the carpet, the inadequacy of the youth pastor, the delivery of the associate pastor’s sermon, the timing of Jesus’ return, the intricacies of exactly how God saves us when we come to Him. The last one is a doozy because we pretend to have the theological imagination to fully understand the mind of God. These can easily become divisive. I am not saying these things might not be important. I am saying that they are not to be ARGUED over. They are not to be the central thing. They are the peripheral things. We are clearly warned in Scripture that God doesn’t like those who create needless division, and He gives great scrutiny to those who sow discord. “There are six things which Yahweh hates, yes, seven which are an abomination to him, and he who sows discord among brothers. (Proverbs 6:16a and 19b WEB) Jesus prayed for unity. Now do your part to live in unity. That is what God loves.