John 17 - Jon Courson's Application Commentary

After talking about the Father to His disciples in the Upper Room, Jesus talks to the Father about His disciples.

Prayer is not the way to get God to do our will in heaven. Prayer is the way to get man to do God’s will on earth. Once this is understood, you will find yourself praying in an entirely different manner. And that’s what Jesus is doing here. “Glorify Me,” He prays, “so that You might be glorified-even if that means that I will be pinned to the Cross of Calvary.”

“That sounds sadistic,” you say. But it isn’t because on the other side of the Cross is a crown-joy unspeakable, full of great glory. We only see five months or ten years down the road. But God sees the next ten zillion years. You see, Jesus’ allowing the Father to be glorified through Him ultimately bought a bride for Him for all eternity.

It’s so radical when a believer finally gets the big picture and stops saying, “God do it my way.” God is not Burger King. We can’t give orders about how things should be done, and then complain when we don’t get the lettuce and onions we asked for. God is not Burger King-He’s the King of kings, and He sees what is going to be absolutely best in the long run.

“I have glorified You on the earth.” This is the first point in determining how successful in life you are. It is said that former Mayor Ed Koch used to walk the streets of New York City asking everyone-the garbage man, the meter reader, the businessman-“How am I doing?” So, too, I think it’s sometimes good for us to say, “How am I doing, Father? Who has received the glory?”

Maybe you’re an excellent mother, a gifted musician, a deep Bible teacher, a wonderful neighbor, a hard worker. But who has received the glory? Jesus had a way of working where, without exception, every time He showed power, Scripture says the people saw it and glorified God in heaven.

How about you? Jesus said, “Let your light so shine among men that they might see your good works and glorify the Father in heaven” (Matthew 5:16). Are you getting the glory, or is God? God chooses to use the foolish things of the world (1 Corinthians 1:27) because then people say, “Wow! God is good to use a foolish weakling like him.”

Jesus didn’t say, “I started the work,” or, “I thought about the work,” or, “I was going to get to the work.” He said, “I have finished the work.” The roads from Bible studies and Bible conferences are strewn with the broken commitments of men and women who began but never finished what God told them to do. I’m sure glad that after Noah finished the frame on the ark, he didn’t say, “Close enough. We don’t need a roof.” No, he finished the work. He completed the task. If he hadn’t, we would all be sunk. What about you? If you knew you only had a few hours to live, could you say, “Father, I finished the work You gave me to do”? Or would you have to say, “I know you put this on my heart last year and I meant to get to it, but …”?

Have you finished the work? Saul didn’t. “Let not one Amalekite remain,” Samuel told Saul (1 Samuel 15:3). And Saul killed almost every one-but he decided to keep Agag, king of the Amalekites as a trophy. Twenty-five years later, wounded in battle, rather than being captured by the enemy, Saul turns to a young man on the field and says, “Kill me.” And the young man-an Amalekite-did just that. Where did he come from? Somewhere along the way, Agag fathered a son.

“Don’t leave a single Amalekite alive,” Samuel said.

“I gave it a pretty good shot,” said Saul. “Ninety-nine point nine percent isn’t bad.”

But the one he didn’t finish was the one who did him in.

What has God called you to do? What has He spoken to your heart about? Maybe it’s a certain sin that’s got to go, and you think, Well, I’ve got it pretty much taken care of. I know the Lord’s told me not to do this, but I’ve cut way back.

“Have you finished it?”

“No, but I’ve got it under control.”

Watch out. Agag is out to get you.

“It is Finished,” cried Jesus from the Cross. I’m so glad He didn’t say, “I almost did it, but I’m going to come down now”-because if He came down from the Cross, we would go down to hell. He paid the price. He finished the work.

“The whole city wants You,” Jesus was told in Mark 1:37. Having spent the morning in prayer, however, He knew that the directive of His Father was for Him to minister in the backwoods region of Galilee. Thus, He went in the opposite direction of the clamor of the crowd. I believe this is why you never see Jesus accused of being busy. His enemies accused Him of being a winebibber, a glutton, demon-possessed, and crazy-but never busy. Jesus moved with a paced peace and an ordered steadiness because He knew the heart of the Father. People’s burdens will give you an ulcer. People’s expectations will drive you crazy. Whenever the burden’s not light, I know I’m not doing the will of the Father. But when He directs me morning by morning, I find His yoke easy (Matthew 11:30).

“I have manifested Thy name.” The word translated “manifest” is phaneroo, which means “to shine forth.” It doesn’t mean so much declaration as it does illustration. When Jesus said, “I have manifested Your name,” He wasn’t saying, “I have preached about it verbally,” but rather, “I have lived it out observably.”

“Great is the mystery,” Paul would later say, “that God was manifest in the flesh,” (see 1 Timothy 3:16). Truly, the Word became flesh and dwelt among us (John 1:14). Jesus said, “This is what I’ve done Father-I have fleshed out, lived out Your Name and Your Nature before these men You’ve entrusted to Me. They have seen You by seeing Me.”

As the law came down from Mount Sinai, it read, “Thou shalt have no other gods before me. Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image. Thou shalt not commit adultery. Thou shalt not covet.” It was heavy-but the people received it because it was delivered to them by a man whose face glowed (Exodus 34:29). So, too, if you come down on your friends, colleagues, or kids, and you’re growling instead of glowing, they’ll resent you and reject the law you bring. Your kids will rebel; your friends will leave; your employees will quit because they’ll resent what you share. But if, like Moses and like Jesus, you’re spending time with the Father, you will be able to correctly manifest Him.

I have given them thy words.” The word translated “words” in this verse is rhema, and refers not to the written word, but to the spoken word. Rhema is also found in Ephesians 6:17, in conjunction with the sword of the Spirit. In this context, rhema refers not to a theological, scriptural, doctrinal statement, but to a particular word for a particular person.

“You have said well you have no husband. You’ve had five husbands and the man you’re living with now is not your husband at all” (see John 4:18) said Jesus, as He tenderly wielded the daggerlike, Spirit-inspired rhema-the particular word for a particular person.

Maybe you’ve been following the story that has been in the news several times lately about a group of kids who preach at the top of their lungs on their way to school, using their Bibles for megaphones. Recently kicked out of school because they refused to quit preaching, they’re now being home-schooled. “Obviously what they’re doing doesn’t seem right,” people say. “But they are preaching the Word.”

Ah, but it’s not the rhema word. It’s not the exact word. It’s not the right word at the right time. It’s offending, not convicting. When people justify obnoxious behavior under the guise of preaching the Word, we need to say, “Wait a minute, brother. The Word of God is exact-for the right person at the right time in the right way. And what you’re doing is not right.”

“I pray not for the world,” said Jesus. The term “world” has three references scripturally. First, it speaks of the planet, of the earth (Job 37:12). Second, it speaks of humanity (John 3:16). But the world Jesus is talking about here is neither the planet nor the people, but the system. Consequently, He is praying not to transform the system, not to politically organize to change the system, but rather He is praying for those the Father has called out of the world’s system.

“I have kept them,” Jesus said. According to the teaching of Jesus in John 10, we are in the Father’s hand and no man can pluck us out. Nothing can loosen us from His grip. Therefore, while we must not be ignorant of Satan’s devices, the key to overcoming darkness is to walk in the light and to realize that Jesus Christ promises to keep us (Jude 24). Yes, there is a danger in demon possession or demon oppression-but I believe the greatest danger right now is demon obsession. We should be obsessed not with darkness, but with Jesus. He should be the subject of your study, the passion of your ministry.

“I have kept them,” Jesus said. What about us? In one sense, in order to apply this to our lives, we need to realize we cannot keep our children, grandchildren, or people to whom we’re linked in ministry because they’re not ours to keep. They’re His. You have opportunities one day at a time to be a blessing to your children and others to whom you minister-to serve them, discipline them, and love them. But you can’t cling to them because they’re not yours (Ezekiel 18:4). I cannot keep people selfishly-but I must keep them in my heart tenderly. This is what Paul speaks of in virtually all of his epistles when he says, “I have you in my heart.”

Old Testament priests wore stones representing each tribe both over their hearts on a breastplate and on their shoulders because there’s a connection between the burden of intercession and the heart of compassion. When you pray for people, you will find that as you bear them on your shoulders in intercessory ministry, they will become jewels on your heart.

The word “perdition” means “wasteful.” What did Judas say when Mary anointed Jesus with oil? The son of waste himself said, “Is not that wasteful? Couldn’t it have been used more practically?” (see John 12:4-5). This son of perdition could not understand the reason one would bestow anything of worth on Jesus.

“Have not I chosen you, yet one of you is a devil?” Jesus said (see John 6:70). Judas was never saved. That is why he was not kept.

Unlike in verse 8, the word translated “word” here in verse 13 is logos. “I have given them the Scriptures,” Jesus says.

“Thy Word is truth.” Truth comes in a three-volume set. The first volume is the Scriptures-a Book you can learn from. The second is the Son (John 14:6)-a Person you can love. The third is the Spirit (1 John 5:6)-a Power to live by. If you are learning from the Scriptures, loving the Son, and living in the Spirit, you will be walking in truth.

“I have sent them.” Jesus not only kept those entrusted to Him, but He sent them out. He made opportunities for them. Earlier, He had said, “They are not of the world,”-but yet He sends them into the world. Christian, listen carefully. We are not to be of the world-but we must be in the world. The mistake of the monastery movement lies in isolation from the world. You can get away, yes, but don’t stay away. Jesus ripped into that wrong understanding when He told the parable of the Good Samaritan. You can’t walk on the other side of the street to avoid the stench and infection of the world. The answer lies not in isolation, but in incarnation-for just as God became Man yet retained His deity, so we are a people who, although we live among humanity, are linked to eternity. We’re here in the flesh, but we are really living in the heavenlies. That’s where our hope, our destiny, and our source of strength lie.

In the aftermath of the December seventh bombing of Pearl Harbor, divers were sent to rescue the survivors. In one compartment of the USS Utah, however, it was impossible to get to the men trapped inside. The divers could hear men tapping “Is there any hope?” in Morse Code-but rescue was impossible with the technology then available.

We’re deep-sea divers, gang-down here on earth, but connected to heaven. We don’t fit in here, we don’t belong here, and we ain’t gonna stay here. But the Lord has allowed us to be here, pumping the oxygen of the Spirit and the Scriptures to us, saying, “There are people to rescue. Do what you can as I guide and lead you.”

If you’re of the world, you’re in big trouble. You’re going to try to boogie eighty feet underwater, and it’s just not going to work. We’ve got souls to save, people to reach, things to do. Let’s get moving-and let’s go home to heaven.

Jesus prayed not only for those with Him at that time, but for those who would believe later on-for you and me.

Keep in mind that it was after talking about truth in verse 14 that Jesus prays His people might be one here in verse 21. Ephesians 4:15 says we are to speak the truth in love because love without truth is hypocrisy, while truth without love is brutality. You see, if I speak the truth without love, it’s like a fire without warmth. Who wants to be in a room on a cold night with light but no warmth? If I speak love without truth, however, it’s like a blaze without light. And who wants to be in the dark? The idea is to have light and warmth. Unity is based upon telling the truth in love-not always easy, but absolutely necessary.

Such a powerful evangelist was George Whitefield that thirty thousand people would regularly attend his open-air meetings. So anointed and eloquent was he, history records many orators and actors would come just to watch him. Charles Wesley, a contemporary of Whitefield’s, was also preaching to multitudes. Yet so diverse were the views of these two men on certain doctrines, they took out advertisements in the newspapers explaining why they believed what they did-and why the other was amiss. People thought these men hated each other-until one reporter asked Whitefield, “Tell me, Mr. Whitefield, do you expect to see Charles Wesley in heaven?”

“No,” answered Whitefield. “He’s going to be so close to the throne, and I’m going to be so far back, I’ll never see him.”

I like that! Here these guys had very different views doctrinally, and very different flavors in ministry, but they had unity through love in their diversity.

“I have given them the glory,” Jesus said, speaking of the chabod, the substance, the reality of holiness.

Jesus gave the glory to His disciples? To men who would deny Him and abandon Him? Yes. And that same glory has been given to you, for whom He justified, He glorified (Romans 8:30). Listen carefully, saint: The Father looks at you and says, “You are not only elected and predestined, called and justified, but you are already glorified.” I’m so glad the Father doesn’t see me in my frailty and my flesh, my carnality and stupidity. I’m so thankful He sees me glorified in His Son.

Wouldn’t it be radical if you looked at your sons and daughters, husband or wife in their glorified state? Think about the person who bugs you the most. Now, ask the Lord to show you how He views him. You see, it’s not that love is blind. It’s that love sees more. And because love sees more, it is willing to see less. Filled with glory, the eyes of love don’t have room for shortcomings and failure.

For topical study of John 17:20-23 see “Unity in the Family”.

I know for a fact we’re going to heaven because of the promise Jesus made in John 14:1, the prayer He prayed here in John 17:24, and the price He paid (1 Thessalonians 5:10).

“I have declared thy Name,” said Jesus. Unlike manifesting God’s Name, which involves living it out (verse 6), declaring His Name refers to speaking it out. “I AM the Bread of life,” Jesus declared. “I AM the Door. I AM the Way. I AM the Vine. I AM the Truth. I AM the Light. I not only showed people illustratively, but I declared Your Name verbally.”

Gang, as we treat people as though they are already glorified, as we speak the truth in love that we might be unified, as we keep those the Lord has given to us on our hearts through intercession, as we manifest as well as declare the nature of the Father, as we give people the exact word, and share with them the Scriptures, as we finish the work He gives us to do, we will be doing the very things Jesus said our lives should be about.

But as you who are students of management know, this measurement of success is radically contrary to what is propagated in our American culture. It doesn’t chart well in popularity polls, on financial fact sheets, or resumes. It won’t produce trophies in your case or plaques on your wall-only a voice in your ear, saying, “Well done, good and faithful servant.”