The glory of the Son of God
SERMON PREACHED MAY 17, 2026, SEVENTH SUNDAY OF EASTER, YEAR A
ACTS 1:6-14; JOHN 17:1-11
From the Gospel: Jesus said, “5So now, Father, glorify me in your own presence with the glory that I had in your presence before the world existed.”
Who do you say that I am? Jesus asked his disciples this question, and at various times and in various ways they confessed that he is Jesus the Christ, the Son of the living God. Sometimes, as in the case of Thomas, the answer was a simple declaration: “My Lord and my God!”
A simple declaration, but begging to be separated in layers. We know earthly events. The young virgin, Mary, learns from an angel that she will be overcome by almighty God, who will beget a child to be born from her womb. This unique Being will be the Son of the Most High. He will be named Jesus and called Immanuel – God with us.
And so it happens. Joseph, Mary’s betrothed, is the earthly father to Jesus. He guides Jesus from the infancy, through childhood and the teenage years. Into young manhood. Jesus is known as one of the guys in the village of Nazareth, the oldest of the brood Mary and Joseph are raising. From his father, Jesus learns the skill of carpentry. He learns all that a young male Jew should know about the law and the prophets. From his mother, Jesus learns all that the heart knows about life, and he learns to love her cooking. From his siblings, Jesus learns the tug and pull of different ages and personalities under the same roof.
In other words, when we answer the question, Who do you say that I am? To this point in Jesus’ life we can say that he is a sympathetic, intelligent, member of a family and a community.
Now, at the age of about thirty years, the next chapter opens. Jesus goes to his cousin John to be baptized by water in the Jordan River. At that moment, the Holy Spirit descends on Jesus in the form of a dove. And his heavenly Father speaks: This is my beloved, my Son, in whom I am well pleased. Listen to him.
From this point on, Jesus has his marching orders. He is to preach and teach the Kingdom of God. Heal the sick, feed the hungry, bless the poor, give sight to the blind, make lame legs strong. He is to call to his side a dozen students to learn deeply from sharing his life. He is to become a shepherd to the dozens and hundreds and thousands who are drawn to him. And he is to do this as an itinerant, walking from village to town, staying where hospitality is extended and leaving where it is not.
This dusty, ordinary individual, undistinguished by wealth or breeding, has the effect of creating turmoil among the Pharisees and Sadducees of the Temple. The ones who nit-pick the law without understanding, the ones who oversee the life and laws of Israel. The ones who are in power. Jesus’ teachings undermine the very structures of power. The poor are blessed? Sacrilege: everyone knows it is the wealthy who are blessed. And shot throughout Jesus’ ministry and very being is love. Jesus is love. That’s almost illegal, when it comes to running a kingdom.
So now, how do we answer the question, “Who do you say that I am?” Our hope is to be among Jesus’ followers who have been illuminated by the Holy Spirit. Our hope is that we would say, with Martha the sister of Lazarus, I believe that you are the Messiah, the Son of God, who is to come into the world.
But still Jesus is very much human. So human that he can be tortured. So human that he can be killed, in what the centurion proclaimed a miscarriage of justice. So human that his remains can be buried in a rock-hewn tomb.
Yet John’s gospel declares the glory of Christ! 5”So now, Father, glorify me in your own presence with the glory that I had in your presence before the world existed.” Jesus prays these words in front of the disciples, just before he goes into the Garden of Gethsemane, there to be betrayed.
Glory! The glory of God, the glory of Christ, is all the beauty and love and truth that the Father and the Son contain, immeasurably far beyond any earthly beauty and love and truth. This divine glory is not ephemeral, or passing – it is real, solid, and eternal.
Jesus tells of having glory in the presence of the Father before the world existed! He prays the Father to glorify him now. He goes on to pray, “glorify your Son so that the Son may glorify you, since you have given him authority over all people, to give eternal life to all whom you have given him.” See how the glory of God flows between Father and Son. And the purpose of the Son’s glory is to give eternal life to all who turn to him by the Father’s grace.
Jesus says to the Father, that he glorified the Father by completing the work that the Father gave him to do. And this work was finished on the cross. The cross is glory.
Now consider, we have thought of Jesus as human, in all the actions I just described. But Jesus, the Son of God, is filled with glory from the beginning of creation. He is glory in the womb. He is glory when at twelve years old he teaches in the Jerusalem temple. He is glory when he traipses from village to town to village, proclaiming and working the Kingdom of God. He is glory when he is crucified, dead and buried. He reclaims his glory on Resurrection Day.
But there is even more. Jesus was glory when with the Father and Holy Spirit he formed you in the womb. Glory surrounded him when he called you by name in baptism. When he called you to seek baptism. Jesus was glory when he led you through the trials and blessings of this life. He will still be glory at your grave, and when he welcomes you to eternal life.
There more yet: in some miraculous fashion, the glory of Christ shines in us. Listen to what Jesus said, “All mine are yours, and yours are mine; and I have been glorified in them.”
In us, Jesus has been glorified.
That is nearly too big a truth to take in. But believe it we must, because our Lord and Savior prayed it to the Father. We are part of the glory of Jesus. All that beauty and love and truth is ours.
THANKS BE TO GOD. Amen.