1. The prayer of Jesus has three parts: the first, a prayer for Himself, John 17:1-5; the second, a prayer for His disciples, John 17:9-19; and the third, a prayer for all subsequent believers, John 17:20-24. John 17:6-8 form a transition passage between the first petition and the second, and John 1... [ Continue Reading ]
THIRD SECTION: 17:1-26. THE PRAYER. The shout of victory with which Jesus closed His conversations with the disciples was an anticipation of faith. To transform the victory which was announced into a present reality, nothing less was needed than the action of the omnipotence of God. It is to Him th... [ Continue Reading ]
“ _These things spoke Jesus; then he lifted up his eyes to heaven and said: Father, the hour is come; glorify thy Son, that thy Son also may glorify thee;_ 2, _as thou hast given him power over all flesh, that to all those whom thou hast given him he should give eternal life._ ” If Jesus had uttered... [ Continue Reading ]
VV. 2 is an explanatory annex to John 17:1. Jesus reminds the Father of that which gives Him the right to say to Him: _Glorify me!_ In praying thus, He acts only in conformity with the decree of God Himself: _As thou hast given him_ _power._ This gift consists in the decree by which God conferred th... [ Continue Reading ]
VV. 3 establishes the connection between the idea of _glorifying God_ (John 17:1) and that of _giving eternal life_ (John 17:2): to live is to know God; to glorify God is, accordingly, to give life by giving the knowledge of Him. VER. 3. “ _Now this is eternal life, that they should know thee, the... [ Continue Reading ]
“ _I have glorified thee on the earth; I have accomplished the work which thou hast given me to do._ 5. _And now, Father, glorify thou me, with thyself, with the glory which I had with thee before the world was._ ” After having thus described the life which He desires to communicate to the world, Je... [ Continue Reading ]
VER. 5. The most potent means of action of which He has need in order to continue this task, He can only obtain by recovering His state anterior to the incarnation. And this is the purpose for which He asks it again. There cannot be any temerity on His part in doing this, since this state of divine... [ Continue Reading ]
“ _I have manifested thy name to the men whom thou hast given me out of the world; thine they were, and thou hast given them to me; and they have kept thy word._ 7. _Now they have known that all that thou hast given me is from thee._ 8. _For the words which thou hast given me I have given them; and... [ Continue Reading ]
Jesus asks for the support of His apostles in faith and their full consecration to the divine work. It seems to me that it is altogether wrong for _Weiss_, with Lucke, _de Wette_, etc., to connect the passage, John 17:6-8, with what precedes, as developing the work of Christ on the earth, and as sti... [ Continue Reading ]
“ _I pray for them; I pray not for the world, but for those whom thou hast given me, because they are thine._ 10. _And all that which is mine is thine, and that which is thine is mine_, _and I am glorified in them._ ” From the infinite value which these antecedents give to the person of the discipl... [ Continue Reading ]
VER. 11. “ _And I am no more in the world; but they are in the world; and I come to thee. Holy Father, keep them in thy name, them whom thou hast given me, that they may be one, as we are._ ” At the moment of asking God more specially for His protection for His disciples, the thought of Jesus natura... [ Continue Reading ]
“ _When I was with them_, _I kept them in thy name; those whom thou hast given me, I have watched over; and none of them is lost, except the son of perdition, that the Scripture might be fulfilled._ 13. _But now, I come to thee; and I say these things while I am in the world, that they may have my j... [ Continue Reading ]
“ _I have given them thy word; and the world has hated them, because they are not of the world, as I am not of the world._ 15. _I ask not that thou shouldest take them out of the world, but that thou shouldest keep them from the evil._ ” The word of Jesus, which they have faithfully received, has m... [ Continue Reading ]
“ _They are not of the world, as I am not of the world._ 17. _Sanctify them by the truth;thy word is truth._ ” Joh 17:16 is the transition from the first petition to the second. Jesus has introduced them into the sphere of holiness in which He Himself lives; but it is not only necessary that they sh... [ Continue Reading ]
“ _According as thou hast sent me into the world, I also have sent them into the world._ 19. _And for their sakes I sanctify myself, that they also may be sanctified in truth._ ” If Jesus asks for them the spirit of their charge (John 17:17), it is because He has confided to them _the charge_ itself... [ Continue Reading ]
“ _And it is not for these only that I pray, but for all those who believe on me through their word_, 21, _that they all may be one; that, as thou, Father, art in me and I in thee, they also may be in us, that the world may believe that thou hast sent me._ ” Jesus has commended to God the _author_... [ Continue Reading ]
Jesus prays for the union of believers with Himself and among themselves. ADDITIONAL NOTES BY THE AMERICAN EDITOR. Vv. 20-26. 1. John 17:20-24. The prayer now turns to the great company of believers in all coming time. These will become believers through the word, spoken or written, of the apostle... [ Continue Reading ]
“ _And the glory which thou hast given me, I have given them, that they may be one, as we are one_, 23, _I in them and thou in me; that their unity may be perfect, that the world may know that thou hast sent me and that thou hast loved them as thou hast loved me._ ” In this whole prayer, Jesus rest... [ Continue Reading ]
VER. 24. “ _Father, my will is that those whom thou hast given me be with me where I am, that they may behold my glory which thou hast given me, for thou lovedst me before the foundation of the world._ ” Perfect unity is the last step before the goal of perfect glory. The repetition of the invocatio... [ Continue Reading ]
VV. 25, 26 have as their aim to justify this last will of Jesus, not only from the standpoint of grace, but even from that of _righteousness_, precisely that one of the divine perfections which might seem opposed to the petition of Jesus in behalf of His own. VV. 25, 26. “ _Righteous Father, the wo... [ Continue Reading ]
VER. 26. No doubt the light which has dawned in the hearts of the disciples through the revelation of God in Christ as yet only begins to appear. But Jesus pledges Himself to communicate to them for the future the fulness of the knowledge of the Father which He Himself possesses. The future: _I will... [ Continue Reading ]