The Cross and the High Priestly Prayer
“I have shown you to the disciples you gave me out of the world. They were yours. You gave them to me. And they have obeyed your word. Now they know that everything you have given me comes from you. I gave them the words you gave me… Glory has come to me because of my disciples. I will not remain in the world any longer. But they are still in the world, and I am coming to you. Holy Father, keep them safe by the power of your name. It is the name you gave me. Keep them safe so they can be one, just as you and I are one.
John 17:6-11
The Last Supper has ended. Jesus has washed the feet of the disciples and has been telling them about what the future holds. He then turns to pray for Himself and for His disciples in John 17. He knows His death is coming and He accepts it as the Father's will. In light of what is about to happen, Jesus prays that the Father will glorify Him and give Him victory over Satan. Why? So that through His redeeming death and victorious resurrection, He would bring glory and honor back to God the Father.
The Cross glorifies the Father because, as Jesus said Himself, "I have finished the work that you gave me to do." (John 17:4) For Jesus to have stopped short of the Cross would have been to leave His task unfinished and God’s will incomplete. Jesus came into the world to tell humankind about the love of God and to show it to them. Without the Cross, it would have said that God's love goes just this far and no further, and changed nothing. Jesus showed the world there was nothing God was not prepared to do for humankind. There is no limit to God's love.
Then Jesus prays for His followers. Among the many things He prays, Jesus asks the Father to give them strength while they are still in the world and to stay in the world until their work is done. As Jesus finished the work of sacrifice the Father gave Him, He prays that His disciples would have the strength to do the same. As He was sent into the world, so are His followers. He doesn’t pray they would be kept from the world, just protected from the devil as they go forward into it (v.17). He sends the disciples into the world, sanctified by the truth.
May the same sacrificial love of God and our Lord Jesus Christ be in each and every one of us and compel us to go forward into the world in faith today.
