The Best of the Portals of Prayer

Read John 17: 20–26

“I will come again and will take you to Myself, that where I am you may be also.”
John 14:3

Where I Am, You May Be Also

No one can trace the trend of the Savior’s thoughts during the closing scenes of His earthly life without being deeply impressed by the one compelling force that lay behind His every word and deed: His affectionate attachment to His faithful few and His deep desire that His intimate and free companionship with them be continued in His Father’s house above. Thus, for instance, in His High Priestly Prayer in the Upper Room that night, after imploring the Father’s many blessings upon all Christians of all times, He climaxes this prayer of prayers with the jewel of all petitions: “Father, I desire that they also, whom You have given Me, may be with Me where I am, to see My glory that You have given Me” (John 17:24). He shares with His Father a desire that, when He repeats it to His disciples, becomes a promise: “I will come again and will take you to Myself, that where I am you may be also.” Jesus has secured His Father’s approval and permission to bring His friends into His Father’s house. By His death of reconciliation, He has unlocked the door of His Father’s home. Heaven is now an open house! “Where I am you” – you who have come to the Father by Me –“may be also.” What greater delight, what higher ecstasy can the sin-bound soul envision than to spend the endless ages of the world to come in the Father’s house with Jesus!

January 13, 1944