The third factor of oneness is found in verse 22. “And the glory which You have given Me I have given to them, that they may be one, even as We are one.” The third factor of genuine oneness is glory—in the divine glory for the expression of the Triune God. Since the glory which the Father has given to the Son has been given to us by the Son, genuine oneness is in the divine glory. What is glory? Glory is the sonship given to the Son by the Father with the Father’s divine life and nature to express the Father in His fullness. Notice that there are four aspects of glory: sonship, the Father’s life, the Father’s divine nature, and the expression of the Father in His fullness. These four things together equal the glory. This is the glory, which is a divine right and privilege, that we have in the Son. The Father has given this glory to the Son, and the Son is privileged to express the Father in this way. This is the very glory which has been given to us by the Son. Today we all have the sonship with the Father’s life and nature to express the Father in all His fullness in the Son. We need to become very familiar with these points, for it is in this divine glory that we are truly one.
Verse 23 continues, “I in them, and You in Me, that they may be perfected into one, that the world may know that You have sent Me and have loved them even as You have loved Me.” Here we see that being perfected into oneness still pertains to being in the Father and in the Son. If we take care of all these verses, then we shall be able to see real oneness.
In verse 24 the Lord said, “Father, I desire that those whom You have given Me may also be with Me where I am, that they may behold My glory which You have given Me, for You have loved Me before the foundation of the world.” The Lord was in the divine glory and prayed that all whom the Father had given Him would also be with Him in glory. We need to pay close attention to the tenses of some of the verbs in this verse. Here it does not say that they “shall be with Me” or that “they shall behold My glory.” According to the natural, religious concept, glory is in the future, in “the sweet by-and-by.” According to this concept, in “the sweet by-and-by” the glory will shine and we all shall come into that shining and be in glory. But the Lord Jesus did not use the future tense, but the present tense, saying, “I desire that those whom You have given Me may also be with Me where I am, that they may behold My glory.” The Lord said, “may also be,” and, “may behold My glory.” Being with the Lord in glory and beholding His glory are not for “the sweet by-and-by”; we may experience them today. The Lord seemed to be telling the Father, “Father, You have given Me Your glory, the sonship with the divine life and nature to express You and Your fullness. This is the glory which You have given Me, and I am now in this glory. But those whom You have given Me are not yet in this glory. I pray that they also may be in this glory.” When was this prayer answered? Firstly, it was answered on the day of resurrection and secondly, on the day the church was raised up. When the church was raised up, all the disciples were brought into that same glory, into the sonship with the divine life and the divine nature to express God the Father in the Son in all His fullness. Hallelujah, we all are in glory with the Son! The Son has the sonship with the divine life and the divine nature to express the Father, and we also have this. Thus, we are now where the Son is—in glory. By this we see that real oneness is in the Triune God through the process of the death and resurrection of the Son.
The first stage of oneness is the oneness of life, the second stage is the oneness of sanctification, and the third stage is the oneness in the glorification of the Triune God. The last stage, the glorification of the Triune God, is simply the manifestation of the Triune God, that is, the glory of sonship. When we come together realizing that we have been regenerated, sanctified, and crucified, then we are one to express God, to manifest God, and to be perfected into the glorification of the Triune God.
By applying these three stages, we can discover which stage we are in. In which stage are you—the first, second, or third? Are you simply one in life, or do you have the higher oneness in sanctification, or the highest oneness in the glorification of the Triune God? Not all of us are in the same stage. Some are in the first, others are in the second, and a few, by the Lord’s mercy, are in the third. As long as you have been saved and born again, you have the Father’s life and the Father’s name. Thus, you are the Father’s child and are one with all other Christians who also are the Father’s children. Hence, you are one in life. But you also need to be sanctified by the word in order to be separated from the worldly things and live in God. Then you will be one with the saints in the second stage. Finally, you need to realize the crucifixion of the cross in order to live in the glorification of the Triune God. This means that you must deny yourself, live in the manifestation of the Triune God, and be perfected into the oneness of the glorification of the Triune God. As we have seen, this is the ultimate step of oneness.
It is only in the third stage of oneness that the Lord’s prayer will be fulfilled. Only in this stage will the Son of God be glorified that the Father may be glorified in and through the Son. It is only in this stage that we shall glorify the Lord and manifest the Lord in oneness. In this stage we shall be absolutely perfected into oneness to manifest and glorify the Lord. Then we shall realize the sonship because all that God is and has will be embodied in us. This means that we shall have the life of God, the nature of God, and even God Himself for the purpose of becoming the very manifestation and expression of God. Finally, we shall have the full glory which God has given to the Lord as the Son of God.