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New Year 2026 – The Gospel of John
- Thursday 19th March – John 17:6-10 ‘Yours’
Letter writing is increasingly a lost art. In our modern world of phones and computers, we use texts and emails, or don’t use words at all, substituting them for pictures and emojis. Those of us old enough to remember the days when the letter formed a major part of our communication would have learned a set of protocols, particularly with regard to how we ended a letter. ‘Yours sincerely’ if the person was named, ‘yours faithfully’ if the addressee was unnamed (‘Dear Sir/Madam’). These in themselves are effectively shorthand: go back further in time, and the sign-off was often far more florid. If you enjoy a good Victorian novel, you’ll often find sign-offs like: ‘Believe me, sir, that I remain humbly and affectionately yours…’ – or somesuch!
In our consumer world, where possession is considered an absolute, we are uncomfortable with images of ownership. What does it mean when we tell someone we are ‘theirs’ – even in a letter? It is good to remind ourselves that scripture takes a far more positive view. As we see in today’s passage, the idea of mutual dependence is rooted in the very personhood of God himself. The Father and the Son belong to each other, as Jesus prays: (v10) ‘All I have is yours, and all you have is mine.’ You could say that every communication between them is ‘yours faithfully’.
One of the great blessings of following Jesus is that we, too, are drawn into this community of mutual dependence, invited to be ‘faithfully yours’. This is an ongoing privilege: Jesus prays for his friends, noting to his Father that ‘they were yours’ (v6), and also that ‘they are yours’ (v9). We can abide continually and eternally in this divine community of love; an abiding which brings glory to Jesus (v10).
What is our response to this extraordinary invitation? To believe in Jesus and his mission (v8) and to obey the word of God (v6). Believe and obey – not out of coercion or fear, but in hope and love.
And what Jesus declares is what can declare also. All we have is God’s; and amazingly, all God has is ours: ‘praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in the heavenly realms with every spiritual blessing in Christ.’ (Ephesians 1:3)
May the Lord grant us all grace to be ‘faithfully and sincerely his’ today – believing, obeying and abiding. And may that divine life flow out through us and into the lives of those we love and those we meet, that we may be ‘faithfully theirs’ too, for Jesus’ glory. Amen.
- Wednesday 18th March – John 17:1-5 ‘Glorify your Son’Read more...
To read John 17 is to stand on holy ground. All scripture is God-breathed, of course, but when we read this chapter, we get a glimpse into the heavenly throne room, as the divine Son shares intimately with the heavenly Father. Imagine being John, listening to Jesus offering this remarkable prayer. No wonders he remembers it word-for-word decades later. It’s not ...
- Tuesday 17th March – John 16:25-33 ‘A time is coming’Read more...
And so this special conversation between Jesus and his disciples comes full circle. We began at the start of chapter 13, as the Passover Meal commenced: ‘Jesus knew that the hour had come…’ It is fitting that he concludes this conversation by repeating this phrase: ‘The hour is coming…’ (v25, v32) It’s often translated time, but the word ‘ora’ is the ...
- Monday 16th March – John 16:16-24 ‘Your grief will turn to joy’Read more...
Lent is traditionally a season of self-denial. Many millions of Christians every year give things up, or make extra sacrifices. Why? Sadly, there is much misunderstanding of Lent’s true purpose. It’s not to earn brownie points with God – as if that would ever work! It is certainly to identify with Christ, in some very small way, on his journey to ...
- Saturday 14th March – John 16:12-15 ‘Guided into all truth’Read more...
When I first came to Christ in 1982, I didn’t know very much at all. I wasn’t quite ten years old. I had attended church every Sunday (not very enthusiastically, as I admitted yesterday), and all I really knew was that Jesus loved me and died for me. As I write this reflection more than forty years later, I hope I’ve ...
- Friday 13th March – John 16:7-11 ‘Deep conviction’Read more...
July 25th 1982. Just a normal Sunday. I went to church with my family, to (what we then called) the Family Service. My Dad was giving the talk, about Jesus meeting Nicodemus in John chapter 3. It was the days of Overhead Projectors (OHPs – remember them?!), and he showed this acetate of a wooden cross. When he got to the ...