Please turn with me in the Word of God to the 17th chapter of John's Gospel. We'll read there together the first eight verses. John 17, beginning at verse 1. John 17, verse 1. Let us hear God's own Word. After Jesus said this, he looked toward heaven and prayed, Father, the time has come. Glorify your Son that your Son may glorify you. For you granted him authority over all people that he might give eternal life to all those you have given him. Now this is eternal life, that they may know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent. I have brought glory to you on earth by completing the work you gave me to do. Now, Father, glorify me in your presence with the glory I had with you before the world began. 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. Now they know that everything you have given me comes from you. For I gave them the words you gave me, and they accepted them. They knew with certainty that I came from you, and they believed that you sent me. So far, the reading of God's word. The time I had in Geneva was quite a remarkable time. to be in that city for the 500th anniversary of Calvin's birth, to be there with a significant number of faithful Calvinists who had gathered to remember that occasion and to praise and worship God together, to be able to hold worship services over a period of five days in Calvin's own church, To begin our time there with a greeting from the president of the consistory and to be greeted in the name of one of the consistory members who is actually a direct descendant of someone who served in the consistory when John Calvin was there was quite a remarkable experience. There were about 300 of us at the conference, mostly Americans, but at least a smattering of representatives from reformed churches around the world, from the Netherlands, from South Africa, from Korea, from a number of other places as well. One of the more memorable conversations I had was with a young German man who is planting a reformed church in Heidelberg, where today there is no genuinely reformed church. where hardly anyone he meets has ever heard of the Heidelberg Catechism. And with great enthusiasm, this young man is going about the work of using the Heidelberg Catechism to plant a reformed church in Heidelberg. So it was a marvelous occasion. It required a fair amount of energy. There were five lectures every morning and three worship services every night. And I didn't make it to all of them. But especially the worship services were a great inspiration as we heard some wonderful preaching and had wonderful opportunities to sing psalms and hymns and pray prayers that had been written in the 16th century and have this intense sense of connection in faith to what had gone before but what was also happening in the world today. And one of the privileges of my life was that I was invited to be one of those preachers and to stand not only in Calvin's church, but in Calvin's pulpit. Well, to be perfectly honest, it's an exact replica of Calvin's pulpit. The original one fell apart in the 19th century, and they exactly copied it and rebuilt it. But it's one of these great Gothic churches built in the form of a cross with four huge pillars where the cross crosses. And circling around one of those pillars is this wooden pulpit that you rise almost a whole story up to preach from over this congregation, this church. So it was quite an occasion. And for me as a preacher, of course, the number one question was, what do you preach? Given this remarkable occasion, I'll probably be too old 500 years from now to preach in that church. So on this one opportunity, what text do you choose? What text do you preach from? And the minister who organized the conference said to me, what text would you like to preach? And I'd given it some thought, and I said without much hesitation or doubt, I want to preach from John 17, 3. This is eternal life, that they may know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom you have sent. And he responded, as several other people have responded, when I told him this story, why would you pick that text? I was sure you'd pick a text from Romans or from Ephesians. Aren't you a good Calvinist? And I said, I want to preach on John 17, 3, because I think it was Calvin's favorite text. I can't prove that absolutely. Calvin nowhere says, this is my favorite text. But as you read widely in Calvin's works, you're struck by how often he returns to refer to John 17, 3. It is striking. Five times in his institutes, at various crucial points, he returns to John 17, 3. Several times in his biblical commentaries, other books that he's commenting on besides John, he returns to John 17.3. In one of the prayers he appointed for regular public prayer, he cites John 17.3. And twice in the catechism, he lays down, he wrote, to teach the basics of the Christian faith to the church in Geneva, he quotes John 17.3. And as I've studied the theology of Calvin, reflected on the theology of Calvin, I'm convinced that if John Calvin were asked, what one verse best encapsulates the heart of the message that you preached? And of course, for Calvin, that would have meant no concern about himself, no concern about his work or his preaching. For Calvin, it would only have meant, what does the Bible say? What has God said to us in the Bible? I believe John Calvin would have said the essence of the biblical message is this. This is eternal life, that they may know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom you have sent. Now, there are many other things that the Bible teaches. There are many other things that the Reformed churches have confessed. But in a profound sense, everything else that we teach and we confess flows out of this central message and confession. Everything we say about grace and about faith and about predestination, about the church and about the sacraments, are in effect an elaboration of this central truth that the heart of the gospel is that we might know the only true God and Jesus Christ whom he has sent. And if we don't grasp that, if we're not gripped by it, then we're not real Calvinists. And of course, it doesn't really matter whether we're Calvinists or not. Calvin would be very upset to find anybody wanting to call themselves Calvinists. Calvin set out only to make Christians. That's the only name he wanted anyone to bear. That's why he's buried in an unmarked grave. So Calvinists, on the 500th anniversary of his birth, can't go visit his grave, but have to go instead to his church and hear the word of God preached. That's how he would have wanted it celebrated. And so today I would like to preach to you this sermon on John 17, 3. A simple sermon because Calvin was a very simple preacher. Very straightforward preacher. And Calvin would want to say, you need to know three things to be a Christian. You need to know them. The word know is very important to Calvin because it's very important in the Bible. And for Calvin, know was another way of talking about believing. He said, when God speaks to us in his word and when we believe that word, we can know it to be true. The knowledge of faith is a certain believing. And so when Calvin says you need to know three things, He's not saying, you need to have three answers to a catechism test in your mind. He's not talking about information. He's talking about the heart commitment of our lives. We need to know and believe with certainty three things. We need to know the life that is eternal. We need to know the God who is true. And we need to know the Jesus whom God has sent. That's it in a nutshell. I could sit down now. The deacons might save money on this sermon. Those are the three things in a nutshell. We need to know the life that is eternal. We need to know the God who is true. And we need to know the Jesus whom God has sent. Let's think about that a little bit. The life that is eternal. What do most people in our culture live for? Well, over and over again, we hear the phrase, don't we? They live for the good life. What's the good life? Well, it's the life of enjoyment, isn't it? It's the life of doing what you want to do. It's the life of having the greatest pleasure and self-satisfaction. And John Calvin would have said in the spirit of all the scriptures, the good life must be the eternal life. Because if we paraphrase the Apostle Paul, we would have to say, for if this life only we have lived, we are of all people most to be pitied. What is the greatest truth of this life that every human being has to acknowledge it is that this life comes to an end. And that it comes to an end much more quickly than any of us plan on. And no matter how good our experience of this life is, if it's the only life we have, we are really to be pitied. because the truth of the scripture from beginning to end is that the good life and the real life is an eternal life. An eternal life that if we know God in Jesus Christ will be a life of eternal blessedness for us. And if we don't keep clearly in mind that we live for eternal life, we'll miss life altogether. Now, many people accuse Christians of wanting to promote a kind of life that sucks all the joy out of life. And maybe there are kinds of Christianity to do that, but it's not Jesus' kind of Christianity. You remember, don't you, that Jesus said, I've come that they might have life and might have it more abundantly. Jesus has come that we might have wonderful life, true life, overflowing life of blessedness. Not that we should have a life that is grim and terrible and awful. The truth is that a lot of what the world thinks of as a good life is a miserable life. is a selfish and self-destructive life that misses most of the greatest pleasures and blessings of life. And John Calvin said, we need to focus on eternal life. That's not to say we need to focus only on the life of the world to come, because eternal life begins now. The life that God gives us through his Son, Jesus Christ, is a life that begins right now and can be lived right now. And it's a life then that continues on in the life of the world to come, that goes from blessedness to greater blessedness, to the enjoyment of God in this life, to the greater enjoyment of God in the life to come. And we need to know that. We need to believe that. We need to allow our whole lives here and now to be lived in the light of the reality of the world to come. We have to ask what will become of us in the world to come. Will we live forever in the blessedness of our Father? Or will we live forever under his judgment? And so Calvin pleads with us as he pled with the people in Geneva 500 years ago. Don't miss the really good life. Don't miss the real life. Don't miss the life that is eternal. And Calvin said, you know, one of the ways we need to work on this in our Christian experience is we need to take time to meditate. On the future life. Calvin said if we meditate on the future life. It will be the beginning for us both of true religion and of a desire for godliness. Meditating on the life of the world to come will. Give us a taste for it. And a hope for it. And meditating on the life of the world to come will help us with our priorities and values in this life. What are we living for? And so Calvin says, take some time, regularly, to think about the blessedness that awaits us. Because it not only prepares us for that life, but it prepares us for this life, the here and now. Think of the blessedness of a world in which sin has been removed. And maybe that will put the attractions of sin in this life in a whole different perspective. Think of the blessedness of a life to come where there are no tears and no death. But only life. That's what God has promised us. That's his assurance. Calvin knew that it doesn't come easy to us. He wrote once, such is the weakness of our minds that we rise with difficulty to the contemplation of his glory in the heavens. That's what we're called to. Oh, there's a great day coming. there's a great day coming. And oh, the tragedy of those who've lived only for this life and are missing the great day. Know the life that is eternal. And then John 17, 3, Our Savior calls us also to know the God who is true. Know the God who is true. Calvin wrote in his Institutes that human beings are prone to three kinds of errors when it comes to God. The first error is what he called theoretical atheism. People who say there is no God. Science proves there is no God. Philosophy proves there is no God. It's very interesting how Calvin responds to that. In the Institute he says, that position is so ridiculous it hardly bears any pausing over. Now, Calvin lived in a somewhat different world than the world in which we live. There were hardly any atheists in his world. And we live in a world where there are a fair number of atheists. But if Calvin were here today, he'd still say, it's ridiculous as a point of view. Almost all human beings through the history of mankind have believed in some kind of God. And Calvin would say, they believed in some kind of God because the idea of God is simply inescapable. It is only by the most ferocious act of will that one can deny that there is a creator when one sees a creation. It was the ancient Greek philosopher Aristotle who said, out of nothing, nothing comes. And philosophically, that is a statement that cannot be challenged. And therefore, the fact that there is something means it had to come from somewhere, or more particularly, from someone. Now, there have been a lot of atheists, although most modern atheism has been imposed on people. But even in countries that for decades have striven to be passionately atheist, communist countries, a belief in God still exists and even flourishes. Even in North Korea, there was an article in the paper this last week of a young mother being put to death because she was a Christian and had distributed a Bible. And so in that tyrannical country of militant atheism, a belief in God is irrepressible. But Calvin said the greater problem for most people is not theoretical atheism, it's practical atheism. They may say they believe in God, but they live as if they don't. They may tip their hat to God from time to time. But most of their lives are conducted with a great conviction that God does not see, God does not know, or at least God does not care. And Calvin challenges all of us to avoid any kind of practical atheism in our living. An attitude towards life that says, well, God doesn't really notice me that much. I can do what I want. That's not the true God. So if there's the problem of theoretical atheism, the problem of practical atheism, he also says there's the problem of false gods. There's the problem of idolatry. Calvin said the great human problem is not so much denying God. The great human problem is creating false gods. In one of Calvin's most quotable statements, he said, the mind of man is like a factory of idolatry. We're forever just churning out little gods that look the way we want God to look. We're forever recreating God in our own image. And Calvin said the great responsibility of creatures is to know the true God, The only true God. One of the great messages of the Bible is there is one true God. And we need to know him. We need to know him as he truly is. And how can we do that? And Calvin in the whole Christian tradition says we can only do that by finding him in his word. The only way we can know the true God is to know him as he reveals himself in his word. Many of us know the famous, often quoted statement of Jesus, you shall know the truth and the truth will set you free. But too many people who quote that verse forget what precedes it in John 8, 32. Jesus said, if you abide in my word, you are truly my disciples, and you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free. How do you know the truth? It's by abiding in God's word. It's by knowing that word, studying that word, reading that word, hearing that word preached. That's how we know that word, and that's how we know the only true God. We must know him according to his word, and then we must worship him according to his word. Idolatry comes in two forms, you remember. Idolatry can either be the recognition of a false god, or it can be the false worship of the true god. We can violate the first commandment, you shall have no other gods before me, but we can also violate the second commandment, you shall not make any graven image of me. The true God wants us to know him as he is and to worship him as he desires. And if you ask why we worship in the way we do here, why we as Reformed people have worshipped in this way for almost 500 years, it's because we believe it's the way in which God wants us to worship. This is not just the way we think would be fun to worship. Probably kids especially sitting on the front row for a whole hour would not describe this as the most fun thing in the world to do. So why do we do it? It's because we believe that praise and prayer and scripture reading and scripture preaching are what pleases God, what he's taught us in his word. And it's critical to maintain that word and that testimony in our world. Our God is the true and only God. He is serious and is to be worshipped seriously. So we must know the life that is eternal, we must know the God who is true, and we must know the Jesus whom he has sent. Now again, the name of Jesus is used in so many irresponsible ways in our time to cover so many false ideas and persons. And that's why Jesus himself says to us in this verse, the Jesus you need to know is the Jesus, the true God, truly sent. It's not enough to take the name Jesus on your lips. You have to know who he is. You have to know that he is the very eternal Son of God come in the flesh. You have to know that he is the final prophet. There is no prophet who will supersede him. You have to know that he is the all-powerful king. there is no power on earth that can undo his purposes. And you have to know that he is the merciful high priest. There is no other priest to offer sacrifice and intercede for his people. This is the Jesus of the Bible. This was the Jesus prepared for in the Old Testament. This is the Jesus who came in the New Testament. This is the Jesus whom we still must know and honor and believe and trust. Trust to tell us who God is. And trust to save us from ourselves. Jesus is the one who tells us who God is. And Calvin says, you know the hardest thing that Jesus teaches about who God is? The hardest thing that Jesus teaches about who God is, is that God is your Heavenly Father. That's the hardest thing for us really to believe as we go through the difficult days of life. How can God love me when I'm such a sinner? How can God be caring for me when I go through such trouble? How can God really be a loving Heavenly Father when my life has so many difficulties? That's the hard thing to believe. And Calvin says, we know it's true because Jesus not only tells us it's true, but Jesus shows that it's true. John Calvin wrote the gospel contains nothing but love provided it be received by faith do you want to say yes but yes but it has to have something else no the gospel the good news is that God loves you for Jesus' sake, if you just trust him, if you just turn to him, if you just rest in him, if you just accept him. He is for you in Jesus nothing but love. I think that's hard to believe. It's not hard to believe God is powerful. It's not hard to believe that God is holy. It's not hard to believe that God will come in judgment. These are things that make sense if you have any kind of God at all. But it's hard to believe that God would love a sinner like me. If you don't think you're hard to love, you haven't thought long enough about yourself. You maybe need to meditate not only on eternal life, but meditate on yourself. God loves us in Jesus Christ. He came to reveal that to us, to make it clear to us. And he can love us in Jesus Christ because Jesus Christ fulfilled the law in his life and took away our sin on the cross. That's the real Jesus. That's the real Jesus. The one who every moment of his life kept God's law, not only for himself, but for you and me. If we believe in him. So that when we stand before God, we are able to say, I am perfect in Jesus. Because he kept the law, every bit of it, for me. And we'll be able to say, and he took away every one of my sins. Every one of my sins. Do you have some sin you think he can't take away? Some sin you've committed too often? Some sin that's too vile? Then you don't know him. Then you don't believe in him. For his people, he's taken them all. And he's clothed you with his righteousness. This is the Jesus whom he sent out of the love of the Father to show the love of the Father, to fulfill the love of the Father for his people so that he might have a people for his name. I've known a lot of you people a long time. It's tempting to think he could have done better. Right? There are smarter people. There are better people. There are certainly better looking people. But he's loved us. This is eternal life. To know the only true God. And Jesus Christ, whom he has sent. That's what it means to be reformed. Reformed according to the word of God. That's what it means to have real life, to have the real God, to have the real Jesus. Calvin wrote in his commentary on Isaiah, Where Christ is not known, men are destitute of true wisdom, even though they have received the highest education in every branch of learning. for all their knowledge is useless until they truly know God. John 17, 3. Do you know God today? Do you know eternal life? Do you know the Jesus whom he sent? God grant that every one of us here has eternal life in Christ. Amen. Let us pray. O Lord, our God, we are thankful that in the history of your church you have raised up great students of your word. Faithful theologians. Powerful preachers. But how much more thankful we are for the one to whom those preachers point. and so we thank and praise you for our Lord Jesus Christ, acknowledging that we have no life and no hope but in him. And we pray, dear Lord, that your spirit will be so present among us this morning that everyone here may know that he or she has eternal life in Jesus Christ. Hear us and bless us, O Lord. For we pray in Jesus' name, amen.