Jesus said we would do the works He did, and even greater works!  What a promise!  And if you ask anything in His name, He will do it! Wow!  Lots of exclamation points—but this is really astonishing stuff.

Why do the fulfillment of these promises seem completely absent from our experience in the American Church? Was Jesus just teasing us? Did He really mean what He said?  Are we misinterpreting His words, or are we excusing God’s apparent failure to fulfill His promises when we compose such explanations?

What does it mean to “ask anything in My name?”  Does concluding our prayers with the tag “…in the name of Jesus Christ” give us magical powers?  What if we have sufficient faith?  If we have sufficient faith do we get what we ask for even if God does not agree?

Seem like tough questions? Slogan Christianity fails to carefully consider the implications of these queries, and suggests that the celebrated promises of Jesus in this weighty passage on Christian living are about securing God’s blessing for ourselves.

Join with me and carefully and prayerfully read and contemplate Chapters 14, 15, and 16 in the Gospel of John, and help me resolve the mystery.  Let me know what you think. If we can, we can see the Father glorified and participate in accomplishing God’s will in our communities and the world.