Author Archives: Phillip

Read John 17:11-14:

V11: Now Jesus will leave the world, but they remain in it – the hostile world He has spoken of in John 15:18-21. So He prays that the Father will “keep them” – protect them and preserve them, NOT primarily from physical harm, almost all of these first disciples would die a martyr’s death, but that God would bring them safe to glory, keeping them safe ” in Christ”, despite all that the world and the devil would do. And again, to keep them in the bonds of love for one another, love as complete as that between Father and Son.

V12: In His life and time with them, Jesus has kept them Himself – the only one lost is Judas, solemnly called ” the son of destruction” ( other versions, “perdition”). He was never saved, but though this is a mystery, his betrayal was still the wilful act of his own sinful heart.

V13: All that He says to them in these chapters is that they may know the joy of the Lord, the joy which is to be the believers’ strength ( Nehemiah 8:10.) This joy is through knowing Jesus as Saviour and Lord, and being right with God through His sin-bearing death. Do we know this joy?

V14: God’s Word to His people, through Jesus, is the source of this joy. But those who know it in Jesus no longer “belong” to this rebellious world, so the world hates them, just as it did their Master – again, John 15:18.

Read John 17:6-10: 

V6: He has made God known to His disciples ( to “know His Name” is to know Him as He is, His true identity – think of Moses in Exodus 3:13-14.). They are the ones His Father has given Him – the sovereign grace of God in salvation – and they have received and kept ( obeyed ) God’s word through His Son – oh, not perfectly, but by that grace it is true of them. May it be true of us too.

V7: The disciples now know that all Jesus says and does is from the Father, in the full authority of God.

V8: He has given them His Father’s truth, and now they truly know and believe Jesus has come from the Father, with whom He is One. ( The application in part of what Jesus has taught in these great chapters.)

V9:  So He is praying not for the unbelieving world, but for His people, whom God has given Him. In v.6-19, for these first disciples, who have been with Him in His earthly ministry. In the full shadow of the cross, Jesus is concerned to pray most for them, not for Himself.

V10: Again, to belong to Christ is to belong to the Father. How is He glorified in them? Surely in the changed lives they will lead as His redeemed people, and in bringing them safe to glory – the full salvation won on the cross for all His people.

Read John 17:1-5:

Introduction: Sometimes called the “High Priestly Prayer”, it is made in the shadow of the Cross, as Jesus pours out His heart to the Father, and takes up some of the themes of these chapters we have looked at.

V1: Jesus looks up to heaven – the normal Jewish posture of prayer – He knows this is the very hour for which His Father sent Him, the hour which will take Him to the cross. His first prayer is that His Father will glorify Him in this – that the cross itself will bring glory to both Jesus and His Father, as He dies in the work of redeeming love, and in full obedience to God.

V2: His Authority is from the Father, the full Authority of God, which includes authority over life and death. In this authority He gives eternal life to all His true disciples, those the Father has given Him. (compare John 10:28-29 )

V3: The source and essence of that life is to know God – the One true and living God – and to know Jesus Himself, the Saviour, in Whom alone we can truly know God. (John 14:6.) and know eternal life through faith in Him.

V4: All that Jesus has said and done is to God’s glory – in full obedience to Him – and He can speak of that work as finished ( accomplished ), as if the Cross has already taken place, for His obedience will not waver.

V5: So, He prays the Father will bring Him again to the glory He has known in His eternal Oneness with Him – but in terms of time, at least – He will return with the added glory of our Redeemer, of course. (Philippians 2:8-11)

Read John 16:28-33

V28: Jesus came to this world from the Father, with whom He had been One from all eternity (John 1:1-2) In the wonder of gospel grace, God sent His Son, eternally one with Him, to be the redeemer of sinners like us. ( John 3:16) Now it is His hour to leave this world and return to the Father ( see ch13 v1 ) but this will be by His death on the cross – the purpose for which God sent Him.

V29-30: The disciples say they understand now ; they believe, they say, because He has shown His knowledge of God’s purposes – but how far they really are from understanding. The arrest and sufferings of Jesus will be devastating for them, despite all He has said. Do we sometimes think we understand, when in fact we are resisting rather than receiving the truth of God’s Word?

V31-32: Jesus tells them plainly that far from understanding, when He is arrested they will all leave Him and flee in fear of their own lives. They would leave Him alone, for all their confidence they will not do so. (most familiarly, Simon Peter – John 13:36-37, but see also Matthew 26:35) Yet He will not be alone, His Father is always with Him – until that awful moment of devastation on the cross – Mark 15:34. What a wonder and mystery is here – The Son knows the agony of separation from The Father, with whom He is eternally One, as He bears our sins.

V33: His Word to them is the source of peace, a peace beyond human understanding (Philippians 4:7) Do we know that peace, whatever our outward circumstances, in and through Christ? We may be far from earthly peace – Jesus tells them plainly, they will know trouble and trials – Christ’s people in the world that hates Him, and therefore them – (John 15:18.) but they can know His peace in the midst of it all, for He has won the victory, ultimately and eternally, and He brings His people in to that victory and gives it to them (1 Corinthians 15:57) Do we know the peace and the victory of this verse, through our Saviour’s redeeming death for us?

Read John 16:22-27:

V22: First, their sorrow will turn to great and lasting joy when they meet the Risen Lord. This joy, both for these first disciples and all Christ’s redeemed people, cannot be taken from them, it will be eternal joy, with Him! Do we know the joy of the Lord, whatever our outward circumstances, and is it our strength? ( Nehemiah 8:10 )

V23: “That day” – after the Resurrection, and the coming of the Holy Spirit, they will pray to the Father with full assurance that He will hear and answer, for now they truly know Him as Father, through Jesus -and the work of the Spirit of adoption! ( Romans 8:15-16 ) Do we pray in this same assurance?

V24: They have not yet known what it is to pray like this, to know what it is to ask in the name of Jesus, and to receive. In this too He wants them to know a fullness of joy. Do we know what it is to pray like this, in this spirit – and in THE Spirit?

V25: This ‘plain speaking’ is surely His living Word in the Scriptures, the full revelation of God, illuminated by the Spirit. The NT was revealed first to, and in .some cases through, these first disciples. Now the Lord speaks through it to all who, by grace, have ears to hear.

V26-27: They (and we) can now pray confident of the Father’s willingness to hear and answer our prayer, for the Father’s love is fixed upon His people, known and called by grace, and trusting in the Saviour,

Read John 16:16-21:

V16: There is surely a double meaning, or as its often put, a near and a distant horizon here. ‘The little while’ when they will see Him no more speaks first of when He is seized, taken to that mockery of a trial, and crucified ; but then, of His Ascension into heaven. ‘The little while’ when they will see Him, of His Resurrection appearances, but then supremely of they and all His people seeing Him in glory.

V17-18: Still they do not understand, but after His Resurrection, and above all after the Holy Spirit is given on the day of Pentecost, they will. We live on this side of Pentecost, and the Spirit gives us understanding through the Scriptures.

V19: Jesus knows what is in their hearts and minds, what they want to say, but do not yet understand. He still knows our hearts, and even what we cannot put in to words, Romans 8:26 speaks of the Spirit’s ministry in this context too.

V20: At His crucifixion, before they know the glorious truth of the Resurrection, they will weep, and His enemies, the unbelieving world, will rejoice. But their sorrow will be turned into joy, when they know that He is risen, and His redeeming work accomplished.

V21: He gives the vivid comparison to a woman in the pains of labour, whose pain will turn to joy when her child is born. In Romans 8:22-23 we are told all creation is groaning in travail now (this broken world) but when the full work of redeeming grace is revealed, when creation is transformed and renewed,  creation itself, but above all the people of Christ, those He has redeemed, will leave the groaning for ever!

Read John 16:12-15

V12: In fact His earthly ministry to them is almost at an end. Surely, the “many things” yet to be said, which they cannot yet ‘bear‘ ( understand ) points to the ministry of the Spirit after Pentecost, and to the completion of Scripture under His inspiration.

V13: Jesus confirms this, the Spirit of ( God’s revealed ) Truth teaches with the full authority of God, and will reveal what is yet to come – so, the whole NT. through which the Spirit reveals and seals God’s truth.

V14: He will glorify not Himself but Christ. ( Some Christians seem to get this balance wrong!) He will bring back to them and apply the things Jesus has taught – and does so still today through His Word.

V15: Again, the Oneness of Father and Son, and of course the Spirit whose direct ministry this is, who opens hearts to receive the teaching of Jesus which is from His Father.