Deny the Self and Live by the Divine Life of Glory to be One in the Divine Glory

The Father gave the Son the divine glory, and the Son gave us this glory; genuine oneness is in the divine glory, for only when we deny ourselves and live by the divine life to express God are we one in the divine glory. Hallelujah!

In John 17 we see the Lord uttering an amazing prayer; this prayer was not mainly for the oneness but for glorification, for the glorification of the Son and of the believers in the divine life and nature so that God would be glorified.

This chapter is the final prayer of the Lord before He went to be crucified.

Before He offered this prayer, He gave a long discourse recorded in John 14-16 and His prayer in ch. 17 was according to what he spoke in those three chapters.

What did He speak about in these chapters? In John 13:31 He said that now has the Son of Man been glorified, and God has been glorified in Him.

If God has been glorified in Him, God will also glorify Him in Himself, and He will glorify Him immediately.

Toward John 13, the Lord Jesus alluded to the matter of glorification; then, he began to speak to the disciples in chapters 14-16 concerning this matter and concluded in John 17 with a marvellous prayer.

Many Christians think that this prayer in John 17 is on the matter of oneness.

If we read this prayer in a prayerful way, we see that the Lord prayed a number of times that the disciples would be one, even as the Lord and the Father were one.

But this oneness is the result; what the Lord prayed was not for oneness but for glorification, as He indicated right from the beginning.

In John 17:4-5 the Lord said that He glorified the Father on earth, finishing the work that He gave Him to do, and now, He asked the Father to glorify Him with the glory which He had with the Father before the world was.

What the Lord prayed for in John 17 was glorification, and oneness is an issue, a result of this glorification.

Once the Son is glorified and the believers in Christ are brought into this glory, the issue is the oneness.

Once we enter into the genuine oneness of the Triune God, the oneness in the divine glory, we cannot but be one, and the whole world will know that the Father sent the Son and that He loved us just as He loved the Son. This is amazing.

The Lord Jesus was God incarnated to be a man, but the glory which He had before His incarnation was concealed within the shell of His humanity.

As He was approaching His death on the cross, He knew that this glory will be released and that, in His resurrection, He will enter into the glory which He had before the world began.

So He prayed for this, and He prayed that we, the believers in Christ, would enter into this glory also.

Having Oneness in Regeneration, Sanctification, and Glorification; Genuine Oneness is in the Divine Glory!

In John 17 the Lord’s prayer indicates three grounds or levels of oneness; first, we are one in the divine life, having God as our Father, then we’re one in the sanctifying word of God, and finally, we are one in the divine glory.

The first ground of oneness is regeneration, the second is sanctification, and the third is glorification.

How can we, men who are very different from one another, be one? How can we be one with God and one with one another?

We are one in the Father’s life, in His name; when God becomes our Father through regeneration, we are one.

We are in the world, but we’re not of this world; rather, we are in the name of the Father so that we may be one, even as the Father and the Son are one (John 17:11).

Hallelujah, we are one in the divine life and nature of our heavenly Father!

The second level or ground of oneness is the sanctifying word of the Father (John 17:15-17).

We can be kept out of the hand of the evil one by being in the Lord’s sanctifying word.

The truth, the speaking of God’s word which brings in life and light, sanctifies us; God’s word is truth.

Christ, the Son, sanctified Himself when He came into the world, and now we are also being sanctified (v. 19).

The more we spend time with the Lord in His word, the more we are under the hearing of faith, the more we are sanctified, and in this sanctifying word of God, we are one.

We are one in the name of the Father, in the Father’s life and nature, and we are one in the sanctifying word of God.

We are one in the Triune God through sanctification, sanctification from the world by the word of God.

If we are not in the Word of God in an active way, we are just like the ones around us in the world.

But if we remain in the Lord’s sanctifying word, we are separated from the world, and we are one (v. 21).

As we are being separated from the world by the Lord’s sanctifying word unto God, we enjoy the Triune God as the factor of our oneness.

Our oneness is simply in God; God Himself is our oneness.

We all can testify that, the more we spend time with the Lord in His word, the more we read the Bible consistently and prayerfully, there’s a separation between us and the people in the world and the worldly things, for we are one with the Triune God and with the believers in Christ in this sanctifying Word.

And our oneness is not merely mental, on the level of our mind, based on some doctrines or understanding.

Our oneness is in God; we are one even as the Father is in the Son, the Son is in the Father, and we are in the Father and in the Son. Wow!

The third level or ground of oneness is oneness in the divine glory (v. 22).

The glory that the Father gave the Son, He gave to us, that we may be one, even as the Father and the Son are one.

This glory is the sonship with the Father’s life and divine nature (John 5:26).

This sonship was given so that the Son can express the Father in His fullness (John 1:18; 14:9; Col. 2:9; Heb. 1:3).

This glory was given to us so that we also may have the sonship with the Father’s life and divine nature (v. 2; 2 Pet. 1:4) to express the Father in the Son and in the Son’s fullness (John 1:16).

After praying for the stages of oneness in the Father’s name by the eternal life (John 17:6-13) and of oneness through sanctification by the holy word (vv. 14-21), the Lord prayed for the third stage concerning the believers’ oneness being in the divine glory for the corporate expression of the Triune God (vv. 22-24).

Thank You, Father God, for giving us Your life and nature so that we may have God as our Father and be one in the Triune God! Hallelujah, we are children of God, born of God with His divine life and nature, and we are one in the name of our Father! Thank You, Lord, for Your sanctifying word which separates us from the world and keeps us in the oneness of the Triune God. Hallelujah, we are one in the Lord’s living, instant, sanctifying word that separates us from the world and keeps us in the Triune God as our oneness! Thank You, Lord Jesus, for giving us the divine glory which the Father gave You so that we may be one! Hallelujah, we are one in the divine glory, and we have the genuine oneness in the divine glory by being in God and God being in us! Praise the Lord!

Deny the Self and Live by the Divine Life of Glory to be One in the Divine Glory

How can we live in the divine glory and be one in the divine glory?

The glory which the Father has given to the Son has been given to us by the Son; genuine oneness is in the divine glory (John 17:22).

There are four aspects of glory: sonship, the Father’s life, the Father’s divine nature, and the expression of the Father in His fullness (Eph. 1:5; 4:18; 1 John 5:12; 2 Pet. 1:4; Rev. 21:9-11).

What the Son gave us is the glory which the Father gave Him – the divine sonship, the divine life of the Father, the divine nature of the Father, and the expression of the Father in His fullness.

We are one in the Triune God by first being regenerated to be the sons of our heavenly Father; regeneration is the first ground for our oneness.

We are one by being sanctified in the holy word of God to be separated from the world and saturated with God; sanctification is the second ground for our oneness.

To be one in the divine glory, we need to forsake ourselves, forget ourselves, and deny ourselves; being one in the divine glory means that it is no longer I who lives but Christ who lives in me (Gal. 2:20).

We have been crucified with Christ, and the self must be denied so that Christ may live in us.

This is the deepest and highest level of our oneness; we need to not only be regenerated with the Father’s life and nature and be sanctified from many worldly things by being in the word of God, but also deny ourselves and be one in the divine glory.

We have our own opinions, thoughts, and ideas; how can we be one if we live according to what we are by nature?

We need to first give up the world by being sanctified in God’s holy word and then give up the self and live by the divine life.

We need to live by the divine life of glory by denying the self to be one in the divine glory.

In the third stage of oneness, we as believers deny the self to enjoy the glory of the Father as the factor of our perfected oneness and thus express God in a corporate, built-up way (John 17:22).

It is not enough for us only to be regenerated or to be separated from the world through the Lord’s sanctifying word; we need to be brought on to the stage of oneness in the divine glory, being one in the glory of the Father.

It is only in this stage of oneness that the Lord’s prayer will be fulfilled; only in this stage is the Son of God glorified so that the Father may be glorified in and through the Son.

When we are one in the divine glory by denying the self for the expression of God, we will be absolutely perfected into oneness to manifest and glorify the Lord.

Then we will realize the sonship, for all that God is and has will be embodied in us.

We will have the life of God the Father, the nature of God, and we will even have God Himself for the purpose of becoming His manifestation and expression.

The result is that we will have the full glory which God has given to the Lord as the Son of God.

When we turn to our spirit, contact the Lord, and deny the self, Christ will live in us and we will live by the divine life of glory; the result is that we will live Christ, and Christ will express Himself through us.

Thank the Lord that we have His divine life and nature, we have the sonship, and we also have the divine glory so that we may express Him by being in the Triune God as our oneness.

May we go on from the stage of being children of God to being those sanctified by the holy word to be separated from the world, and even go further to live by the divine life of glory so that we may express the Triune God in our daily living.

When this happens, when we corporately express God by living by the divine life of glory with the denying of the self, we will have the genuine oneness – the oneness in the divine glory, and the Father will be expressed through His many children for His glorification in the church.

Lord Jesus, we want to advance with You from being one in Your life and nature to being sanctified in Your holy word! Sanctify us more today with Your word; may Your living word separate us from the world and impart the element of God into our being. Amen, Lord, may we be those who deny themselves and live Christ. May we forsake our self and put it aside so that we may live by the divine life of glory and be one in the divine glory! May we see how frustrating is the flesh, the self, and the old man, and may we simply deny the self and live by the divine life. Bring us to the stage of being one in the glory of the Father! Hallelujah, we are one in God’s life, nature, word, and glory! Fill us, Lord, with Your glory! Keep us in Your name, Your sanctifying word, and in Your very self that we may be one and so that we may express You corporately in Your glory!

References and Hymns on this Topic

• Sources of inspiration: the Word of God, my enjoyment in the ministry, a sharing by brother James Lee in the message, and portions from, Life-study of John (msgs. 38, 40-41), by Witness Lee, as quoted in the Holy Word for Morning Revival on, Crystallization-study of 1 and 2 Kings (2022 summer training), week 9, entitled, The Temple of God Filled with the Glory of God.
• Hymns on this topic:
  – In no other way could we be / Sanctified and share Thy vict’ry; / Thus only spiritual we’ll be / And touch the life of glory. / Thy Spirit will me saturate / Every part will God permeate, / Deliv’ring me from the old man, / With all saints building for His plan. (Hymns #501 stanzas 6-7)
  – Oh, the glory of the Triune God! / We’re His sons, oh, what a blessing! / We His glory are expressing— / Oh, the glory of the Triune God! / In Thy glory, in Thy glory, / In Thy glory we are one. / In Thy glory, in Thy glory, / In Thy glory we are all made one! (Hymns #1081 stanza 3)
  – Oh, what a life! Oh, what a peace! / The Christ who’s all within me lives. / With Him I have been crucified; / This glorious fact to me He gives. / Now it’s no longer I that live, / But Christ the Lord within me lives. (Hymns #499 stanza 1)