Study 49: Father Glorify Your Son

1. The Threshold of the Prayer

The closing words of John 16 prepare the reader for a decisive change in the narrative. Jesus has spoken to His disciples about their approaching grief, the Father’s love, and the victory He has already claimed over the world. He now turns from addressing the disciples to addressing the Father. John 17 is commonly called the High Priestly Prayer, not because John explicitly supplies that title, but because Jesus intercedes for those who belong to Him while approaching the sacrifice through which His saving work will be accomplished. The first five verses establish the theological foundation for the entire prayer: the Father and the Son are united in the work of glorification, and eternal life is received through knowing them.

2. “These things Jesus spoke” — The Literary Transition (17:1)

John deliberately connects the prayer to the farewell discourse. The phrase “these things” points backward to the instruction, warnings, and promises of chapters 13–16. Rather than presenting a disconnected devotional moment, the evangelist allows the reader to hear Jesus pray in light of all that He has just taught. The disciples are about to witness His arrest and death, but the prayer interprets those events before they occur. What will appear to the world as humiliation will be the climactic revelation of the Son’s obedience and the Father’s saving purpose.

3. Eyes Lifted Toward Heaven (17:1)

Jesus lifts His eyes to heaven and speaks directly to the Father. This posture accords with ancient Jewish practices of prayer and reminds the reader that biblical prayer is not restricted to one physical position. More important than the gesture is the relationship it expresses. Jesus does not appeal to an unknown deity or struggle to establish access to God. He speaks as the Son whose mission has proceeded from the Father and whose impending death will fulfill that mission. His prayer is therefore both genuinely personal and uniquely revelatory: it opens a window into the communion of Father and Son.

4. “The Hour Has Come” (17:1)

Throughout the Fourth Gospel, Jesus’ “hour” has been anticipated but not yet realized (John 2:4; 7:30; 8:20). In John 12:23 and 13:1, the hour is finally announced as present. Its arrival encompasses the cross, resurrection, and return to the Father, events John consistently understands together as the Son’s glorification. Jesus does not ask to avoid this hour; He asks that its divine purpose be displayed. The wording gives the prayer a solemn sense of inevitability without suggesting that the suffering ahead is painless or morally inconsequential.

5. “Glorify Your Son” — The Meaning of Glory (17:1)

In Scripture, glory speaks of the manifested weight, splendor, and worth of God. John has already declared that the incarnate Word revealed divine glory (John 1:14), and the signs of Jesus have displayed that glory in particular ways (John 2:11; 11:4, 40). Here glorification cannot be reduced to public acclaim or an escape from suffering. The Son will be glorified precisely as His obedient love is disclosed through the cross and vindicated in resurrection and exaltation. The prayer thus challenges ordinary human expectations: divine glory may be revealed most fully where human observers perceive disgrace.

6. “That the Son May Glorify You” — Reciprocal Purpose (17:1)

The petition is not self-regarding. Jesus asks the Father to glorify the Son so that the Son may glorify the Father. The mutuality is essential. The Son’s obedience reveals the Father’s character, purpose, and saving love; the Father’s vindication of the Son makes clear that Jesus has acted as the Father’s true emissary. John’s Gospel never presents the Father and Son as rivals for honor. Their unity of purpose is revealed in the Son’s complete faithfulness, even as the distinction between the One who sends and the One who is sent remains intact.

7. Authority Over All Flesh (17:2)

Jesus grounds His request in the authority the Father has given Him “over all mankind,” literally “over all flesh.” The expression emphasizes the breadth of His commission, extending beyond one nation or social group. Yet the purpose specified in the verse is that He give eternal life to all whom the Father has given Him. These two statements should be held together rather than collapsed into one another: universal authority is affirmed, while the granting of life is described in relation to the people entrusted to the Son. The verse anticipates later intercession for believers without implying that human beings can fully map the mystery of divine giving and believing.

8. Eternal Life Is Knowing God (17:3)

Jesus defines eternal life in strikingly relational terms: knowing the only true God and Jesus Christ whom He has sent. In biblical usage, knowing God is not merely the accumulation of accurate information, although truth matters profoundly. It is personal recognition and covenantal fellowship shaped by God’s self-disclosure. Eternal life therefore has a present dimension: believers already enter into relationship with God through the Son, even while they await the resurrection and the final defeat of death. John 17:3 must not be detached from John 5:24, 6:40, and 11:25–26, where present possession and future consummation belong together.

9. “The Only True God” and the Identity of Jesus (17:3)

The Father is addressed as “the only true God,” a phrase consistent with Israel’s uncompromising confession of the one God. It would be a mistake, however, to read this statement as though John had not already identified the Word as God (John 1:1) or presented Jesus as sharing the Father’s divine prerogatives. The immediate verse distinguishes the Father from Jesus Christ, the One sent, while the surrounding passage speaks of glory shared before the world existed. John’s theology holds together the Father’s identity as the one true God, the Son’s distinction from the Father, and the Son’s participation in divine glory. Later doctrinal formulations seek to articulate these claims; the interpreter must first hear John’s own language.

10. “I Glorified You on the Earth” (17:4)

Jesus speaks of having accomplished the work entrusted to Him even though the crucifixion is still ahead in the narrative. The statement reflects the certainty and unity of His mission, not an assertion that the cross is unnecessary. John frequently presents the decisive outcome of Jesus’ work as assured before its visible completion. The obedience of His ministry, teaching, signs, and imminent self-offering belongs to one work received from the Father. In this sense Jesus’ words express a completed commitment moving toward its appointed climax.

11. Glory Before the World Existed (17:5)

The prayer culminates in a request that the Father glorify the Son in His own presence “with the glory which I had with Thee before the world was.” The natural force of the language points to the Son’s personal preexistence and to a shared glory that precedes creation. This recalls the opening of the Gospel, where the Word was with God in the beginning and all things came into being through Him (John 1:1–3). The request is not that Jesus be granted divine significance for the first time; it is that the incarnate Son, having completed His earthly mission, be glorified in the Father’s presence. The passage is consequently central to John’s presentation of Christ’s eternal identity.

12. The Cross, Resurrection, and Return to the Father

The first five verses resist any attempt to isolate the cross from resurrection and exaltation. Jesus’ “hour” is a unified redemptive movement: He gives Himself in obedience, is vindicated by the Father, and returns to the glory that was His before creation. John’s narrative will soon linger over betrayal, interrogation, and crucifixion, yet the prayer ensures that readers understand those events through the larger horizon of divine purpose. The Son does not lose control of His mission when His enemies seize Him; He continues the work for which He came.

13. Theological Synthesis

Three themes converge in this opening prayer. First, Jesus’ identity cannot be adequately described merely in terms of an inspired teacher or prophet: He speaks of authority over all flesh and of glory shared with the Father before the creation of the world. Second, salvation is personal communion with God, given through the Son rather than secured through human achievement. Third, the Father’s glory and the Son’s glory are mutually revealing, especially in the obedient self-giving that leads to the cross. The passage therefore provides both a high Christology and a profoundly relational account of eternal life.

14. Implications for Christian Life and Teaching

For the believer, Jesus’ definition of eternal life corrects the tendency to speak of salvation only as a future destination. The hope of resurrection remains indispensable, but eternal life also begins now as a relationship of trust, obedience, and communion with the Father through the Son. For teachers, the passage offers a model of theological care: we should neither diminish the Son’s eternal glory nor obscure His genuine relationship of obedience to the Father. For worship, it reminds us that the saving work of Christ reveals the glory of God not through worldly triumphalism but through faithful, self-giving love.

15. Interpretive Cautions and Questions for Reflection

The title “High Priestly Prayer” is a later descriptive label rather than John’s own heading. “Eternal life” should not be reduced either to mere duration or to a purely present spiritual experience; John affirms both present communion and future resurrection. The Father’s designation as “the only true God” should be interpreted alongside John’s larger testimony about the Son rather than used to silence it. Finally, “I accomplished the work” should be read with the approaching cross firmly in view. Questions for reflection: How does John’s definition of eternal life reshape our understanding of salvation? Why does Jesus ask to be glorified so that the Father may be glorified? How does the Son’s preexistent glory change the way we read His suffering?

Scripture connections: John 1:1–18; 2:4, 11; 5:24; 6:40; 11:4, 25–26, 40; 12:23–33; 13:1, 31–32; 16:33; 17:6–26; Philippians 2:5–11; Hebrews 2:9–10.

Scripture references and brief quotations follow the New American Standard Bible, 1977 edition. Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. www.Lockman.org