That the Love With Which You Loved Me May Be in Them
“For the Souls in Purgatory – Eternal rest grant unto them O Lord”
John 17:26
I made known to them your name and I will make it known, that the love with which you loved me may be in them and I in them.
Grace Prayed For
Father, let the love you have for the Son — infinite, perfect, eternally free — become the very atmosphere of our lives. May we live from that love and love from that center.
Reflection
The great prayer of Jesus ends here, with this astonishing petition: not merely that the disciples would be loved by God from outside, but that the love the Father has for the Son — the love that defines the inner life of the Trinity — might be in them.
This is the ultimate destination of the Gospel. Not rescue from damnation, though that is real. Not moral improvement, though that is necessary. Not even eternal life as duration, though that is promised. The destination is participation in the love of God — being drawn into the very relational center of the Trinity, so that what flows between Father and Son flows through us as well.
This is what the mystics mean by union with God. It is not the dissolution of the self into the divine — it is the self finding its deepest life by being taken up into the life of the Trinity. As the branch does not cease being a branch when it participates in the life of the vine, we do not cease being ourselves when we participate in the love of the Father and the Son.
‘I in them.’ Jesus does not want to be merely admired from outside. He wants to inhabit his disciples — to think through their minds, love through their hearts, serve through their hands. The whole of the Christian life is the slow (and sometimes fast) expansion of that inhabitation.
As we draw close to Pentecost, let this verse be your personal prayer: that the love with which the Father loves the Son may be in you. Not earned, not performed. Received. Inhabited. Lived.
This is the destination. We are close.
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Sharing
Jesus last words on Earth were to his disciples, can be found in Matthew Chap 28 when Jesus told his disciples, “Then Jesus approached and said to them, “All power in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go, therefore, and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, until the end of the age.”
Jesus calls all of us to share in his redemptive mission here on Earth. I would ask you to share this Scripture reflection with your family, your friends and your acquaintances, and then share it with a couple of individuals that you may may not be comfortable sharing with, keeping in mind always the words of Jesus, And behold, I am with you always, until the end of the age
Author was assisted by AI in the drafting of this Post