Sunday Service: 17 May 2026
A worship service was held at 10.30am in the church building on Sunday 17 May. The service was simultaneously broadcast on the Church Facebook page. For the next four weeks you can catch up here.
The Bible passage was John 17:1-11, and David led the service and preached. The sermon, about Jesus prayer to his Father in the presence of his disciples the night before his death, was vivid and powerful. You can read the full text of David’s eloquent and inspiring sermon below.
David described accounts of God coming down in the Old Testament: God’s glory came to the Tabernacle, the tent which accompanied the Jewish people in the desert; God came to the Temple which Solomon constructed in Jerusalem when they were settled. And then there’s Ezekiel’s tragic vision of God’s reluctant withdrawal from the Temple because it had been defiled. Would God ever return?
But then a child was born, the Messiah, the Son of God, Jesus: God came among the human race as a human being, thoroughly human, yet thoroughly God, the splendour concealed, though at times it could break through.
And then, in his prayer Jesus asks for his disciples and for those who would believe in future ‘that they may be one as we are one.’ (John 17:11) In other words, the God who was in the Tabernacle, in the Temple, who was at the heart of Jesus’ identity is now with us, and in us as believers in him. We are tabernacles, temples. Our bodies house God, while not in any way limiting God.
David vividly described the unity within God – Father, Son, Holy Spirit, aspects of God totally at one, existing in utter love, participating in a divine dance of love.
And it’s a dance into which we, with all our flaws, and all our disagreements are invited to enter. To live in love, and to express practical love for one another. David shared words attributed to Mother Teresa: ‘Not all of us can do great things. But we can do small things with great love.’
John writes:
One thing which struck me in David’s sermon was his mention of that vision of God’s presence being withdrawn from the Temple. I think there are times when we feel more conscious of God’s absence than of the divine presence. Perhaps we see ourselves as failures, perhaps we feel that we have messed up so badly that we have driven God away, perhaps we are depressed and troubled. It was this kind of thinking which led William Cowper to write his famous hymn, ‘Oh for a closer walk with God.’ See below.
It is good, as Cowper says, to examine ourselves to see if we’re acting or thinking in ways which don’t reflect God and so numb us to God’s presence. And if there are such things, we should address them. But often there will be nothing we can think of to account for the felt absence of God. I think it’s helpful to remember that God will never leave us, never forsake us. God loves us with an everlasting love which will not let us go. And that includes people who are neurotic depressives like Cowper was.
Cowper prays for help to identify things which might be blocking his sense of God so that he can do something about it. He thinks the fault is his, and if he can only address it the sense of God will flood back.
But perhaps a better approach is to be still, to smile with a wry humour at the absence of the sense of God, to recognise that it’s not our fault, to look back on times when God we knew God was alive and real within us, and to proceed on the basis that we are loved with an everlasting love, and that we are called to do small, or not so small things, with a big love.
And sometime – later today, tomorrow, this week, next month, next year, that sense of God will return to us and we’ll be able to know ourselves once again caught up in the dance at the heart of God.
Oh! for a closer walk with God,
A calm and heavenly frame;
A light to shine upon the road
That leads me to the Lamb!
Where is the blessedness I knew
When first I saw the Lord?
Where is the soul-refreshing view
Of Jesus and his word?
What peaceful hours I once enjoyed!
How sweet their memory still!
But they have left an aching void,
The world can never fill.
Return, O holy Dove, return!
Sweet the messenger of rest!
I hate the sins that made thee mourn
And drove thee from my breast.
The dearest idol I have known,
Whate’er that idol be,
Help me to tear it from thy throne,
And worship only thee.
So shall my walk be close with God,
Calm and serene my frame;
So purer light shall mark the road
That leads me to the Lamb.
Sermon
Scripture: John 17:1-11
It’s Thursday, 2 April, 33 AD. We are going eavesdrop on the Upper Room at Mount Zion, just outside Jerusalem. The gang are all here… – Jesus, of course. Peter, James, John, Andrew, Philip, Bartholomew, Matthew, Thomas, the other James, Thaddaeus, Simon the Zealot… oh and Judas Iscariot… he’s a funny one, that one. Oh, hang on… he’s left… I wonder where he’s gone.
It’s been a bit of a strange night, in amongst the eating and drinking of supper together. Bread has been broken, wine has been shared. Then Jesus washed the disciples feet which, apart from being a bit gross, is something I’d expect of the lowest ranking servant – not a great leader. You should have heard Peter! He told Jesus that there was no way he was going to let him wash his feet!
Jesus was having none of it. He said: “Unless I wash you, you have no part with me.” Strong words. What sort of leader serves as if he were the lowest? Peter gave in eventually – said he wanted his hands washed too… What a lad!
It’s been a jovial affair, the meal, as they usually are with this lot! But then Jesus became quiet and troubled – he said one of them was going to betray him.
And then night fell.
The upper room is a small space, the disciples are crammed together, the smell of the guttering lamps hanging in the air. Yet, somehow, it seems like while the room is small, the world outside is dangerously large. Jesus has been talking about leaving, which given the tension in Jerusalem, talk of betrayal, and the threats being made by religious leaders isn’t welcome news at all. It’s fair to say, a bit of panic is building.
Maybe you feel it too, sometimes? The fear of being alone, the fear of failure, the fear of escalating violence in the world, the worry God isn’t present?
Jesus has been training these followers for what was to come, but nothing can quite prepare you. But they ARE being changed, even if they don’t realise it. Jesus’ words and The Holy Spirit are working in each of them secretly like yeast in dough… until… until… well you’ll have to come back next week to hear about that…
But now, in the growing darkness, and the closeness, and the fear, and the uncertainty… with the taste of wine still on their tongues… Jesus does something completely unexpected.
He looks up, and begins to talk to someone else.
It’s like we are being transported in the moment to the most amazing place… the Throne Room of heaven. This is Jesus talking to his Father. The disciples are being led into the presence of God. The thin space between Heaven and Earth which always seems to exist around Jesus has evaporated completely.
Jesus could pray silently, I suppose. But this is a prayer he wants us to overhear. This is important. Last words are always lasting words, especially when they are from the greatest human who ever lived. It’s a moment the disciples will come back to again and again in their minds.
The hour has come, says Jesus. This is the moment all of human history has been building to.
Jesus says that he has been given authority over all people.
Wow.
Jesus isn’t a trapped teacher. He has been given the keys to every human heart – so that he might hand out the gift of life to the people in the Upper Room… and to those in church 2000 years later.
And then Jesus talks about eternal life.
Now this is eternal life: that they know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom you have sent.
Which is stunning, really. It seems that eternal life isn’t something that happens a long time after you die. Knowing God isn’t the means to eternal life; it is eternal life.
Jesus says that he is to be returned to the glory He had before the world began and suddenly we see Jesus for who he really is. Jesus stops talking about the bread on the table and starts talking about the foundations of the universe. Jesus isn’t just a great teacher from Nazareth. He is speaking to The Father as the eternal Word who was there when the stars were lit.
And then watch the disciples jaws drop as Jesus continues:
I have revealed you to those whom you gave me out of the world. They were yours; you gave them to me and they have obeyed your word.
They have obeyed your word. It’s like Jesus is telling his father just how proud his is of them. You should see Peter’s face!
Jesus is telling the Father that Peter has obeyed? How can He say that? Peter has doubted, he has argued with the others about being the greatest, and Jesus knows Peter is about to deny him.
And yet, Jesus is not listing Peter’s sins to the Father. Jesus is not presenting a list of his failures. He is claiming Peter. He is telling the Almighty that Peter belongs to the Truth because Peter belongs to Him.
Peter starts shaking as he realises that his standing before God isn’t based on his own temperamental loyalty, but on Jesus’ perfect testimony.
And then Jesus speaks 4 words:
I pray for them
You can hear a pin drop. This is Jesus speaking to God his Father, praying for the disciples in this room. This is Jesus, the only witness who matters, handing them to God.
Jesus has been talking a lot about Glory. His Glory, His Father’s Glory.
Now, you might have heard it said in Scripture that ‘The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. (John 1:14)
God’s glory, God’s presence, is not in a building, but in a person. What filled the Tabernacle in Exodus is in front of the disciples wearing sandals. And in the upper room, glory doesn’t look like a throne; it looks like a basin, and a towel, and freshly washed feet.
The disciples are far from perfect, but it’s clear that they bring glory to the Father when they too follow His commandments as Jesus did. Jesus has told them:
My command is this: love each other as I have loved you.
The disciples are to choose peace over violence. Reconciliation over dispute. Unity over division.
And it’s important. Jesus is making it clear that his time on earth is nearly over. He is going to be with his Father. It will be down to the disciples to share this command, this example, this love.
You know, those weren’t the only words that Jesus said on that night. He knew the disciples in this Upper Room would too pass away and their work would pass to new generations through the ages.
Amazingly, Jesus also prayed for all in Hilton Church this morning who believe Jesus said:
“My prayer is not for these disciples. I pray also for those who will believe in me through the disciples’ message,
that all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you. May they also be in us so that the world may believe that you have sent me.
I have given them the glory that you gave me, that they may be one as we are one—
I in them and you in me—so that they may be brought to complete unity. Then the world will know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me. (John 17:20-23)
Observant Jews pray a Biblical prayer twice a day.
Hear, O Israel: the LORD our God, the LORD is one.
God is perfectly united as one. God the Father, God the Son, God the Holy Spirit. Not three Gods, but three persons perfectly united in a divine dance of love and compassion and peace. As theologian Henri Nouwen suggested, God is a community with no rivalry and no competition: only total self-giving.
And it is into that non-violent, self-giving dance that Jesus invites his followers across the millennia when He says, ‘I pray for them’.
Unity isn’t about erasing disagreements – it’s about maintaining connection despite them. When we use our gifts together, faithfully, we show that God’s love transcends the divisions our world creates.
The world sees differences as division; God sees differences as good design.
Jesus prayer for unity embodies the mystery of God: some early church Fathers saw it as an outpouring of love, from Father to Son, from Son to Spirit, from Spirit back to Father. Round and round the love goes, constantly overspilling into one another.
The unity of God is not just a dance to be observed from afar; it is an invitation. The early church’s shocking across-the-board unity, across ethnic, economic, and gender lines, was itself the miracle that made outsiders stop and ask questions.
To quote the Bishop of Washington:
Unity is a way of being with one another that encompasses and respects differences, that teaches us to hold multiple perspectives and life experiences as valid and worthy of respect; that enables us, in our communities and in the halls of power, to genuinely care for one another even when we disagree. Those across our country who dedicate their lives, or who volunteer, to help others in times of natural disaster, often at great risk to themselves, never ask those they are helping for whom they voted in the past election or what positions they hold on a particular issue. We are at our best when we follow their example.
How can we give God’s glory in the world and enter into this unity? How can our non-violence and our peace and our love from God overflow and pour out from these walls, guided by the promptings of the Holy Spirit.
Who is Hilton Church being called to love?
Mother Teresa once said,
“Not all of us can do great things. But we can do small things with great love.”
Today, her quote serves as a reminder that the pressure to be extraordinary often distracts us from the beauty of being helpful, compassionate, and human. Not everyone will build monuments or lead revolutions, but every one of us can make life brighter for someone else.
And, Hilton Church, we can do it together: one, as God is one.
Amen.