Last week, we were in John 12, and today as we move to John 13 through the Gospel of John,

at this point, when we transition from chapter 12 to chapter 13, things really slow down.

In fact, for you note takers, while chapters 1 through 12 of John cover three full years of Jesus' public ministry.

The next seven chapters, 13 through 19, covered just 24 to 36 hours.

So it really slows down now.

And in particular, chapters 13 to 17 are known as the upper room discourse. This is when Jesus has a private conversation

with his disciples in the upper room as he shares this last Passover meal with them before he is

crucified. If you have a red letter edition of the Bible, which is basically a Bible that

prints the words of Jesus in red,

you might notice that chapters 13 to 17 are almost entirely in red, because these are almost all

exclusively the words of Jesus in this private setting to his disciples. Now, this private setting

is an upper room somewhere in Jerusalem that has been prepared

specifically for Jesus to have his final Passover meal with his disciples before he is

crucified.

And although Jesus hand-selected 12 disciples, The word disciple basically means student or follower.

So in that sense, even though Jesus hand-selected 12,

everyone who sees Jesus as his or her personal Lord and Savior

is in essence a disciple of Christ.

And therefore, these private words that Jesus shares with His 12 are just as relevant

for all of us today who call ourselves disciples or followers or students of Christ.

Now, everything that Jesus says obviously is important.

But there's something to be said about the final counsel of Christ. Now, everything that Jesus says obviously is important, but there's something to be said about the final counsel of a dying man, because he's about to be crucified. He will rise again from

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