The Lord’s Prayer, Part 1: For Himself

This morning, I want to share a message with you entitled, “The Lord’s Prayer.”  However, we aren’t in Matthew 6 but John 17. 

 

In Matthew 6, Jesus taught us how to pray.  In John 17, we see and hear Jesus praying.  If not called the Lord’s Prayer, this chapter is often called “Jesus’ High Priestly Prayer.”  It is unique material that is only found in the gospel of John.

 

Including today, our next three times in John will be here in John 17.  Today, we will hear Jesus praying for Himself.  Next week, we will hear Jesus praying for His disciples, those remaining Eleven.  Then, we will hear Jesus praying for us.

 

Please remember, it is still Thursday night or maybe Friday morning.  Chuck Swindoll puts John 17 at midnight.  Jesus and His disciples seem to be on their way to the Garden of Gethsemane. 

 

Keep in mind that they are distressed as Jesus was leaving them, Judas was going to betray Jesus, and Peter was doing to deny Jesus.  They were surely exhausted at this point, and maybe they were hungry. 

 

 

Exposition

These first verses are a chiastic structure.  What that means is that main point is found not at the beginning or the end but in the middle. 

 

Jesus prayed for God the Father to glorify God the Son.  That means to praise Him and honor Him and celebrate Him. 

 

Therefore, this prayer focuses on eternal life.  You will find that phrase in verses 2 and 3.  Let’s look at the text to see what Jesus prays and what we can learn about eternal life.

 

 

1. Eternal Life is knowing God the Father.

 

We see this truth in verse 3.  Remember our chiastic structure. 

 

Jesus can hardly be more explicit.  Eternal life is knowing God, and Jesus called Him Father in verse 1. 

 

This word “know” is used when talking about close friends and even spouses.  Therefore, it means to know intimately. 

 

Jesus then called God the Father the true God.  Therefore, He is true and other are false. 

 

Consequently, God the Father is the only true God.  There are no others. 

 

By the way, the absolute and best possible way to know God is to know His Word.  Read your Bibles, and if you want to hear God speak audibly to you, then read your Bibles out loud.

 

 

2. Eternal life comes through Jesus Christ, God the Son.

 

Check out the beginning of Jesus’ prayer in verse 1.  Glorify Your Son. 

 

Verse 2 says God the Father gave God the Son authority over all flesh.  It also says that Jesus Christ, God the Son, will give eternal life to as many as God the Father has given to Him. 

 

In verse 3, not only is eternal life knowing God the Father, but it is also knowing God the Son.  I would be so bold as to say what God’s Word says, and that is that you can’t know God the Father without knowing God the Son. 

 

John 14:6, 6 Jesus said to him, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me.

 

Romans 5:1, 1 Therefore, having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ,

 

2 Corinthians 4:6, 6 For it is the God who commanded light to shine out of darkness, who has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.

 

Hebrews 1:1-3, 1 God, who at various times and in various ways spoke in time past to the fathers by the prophets, 2 has in these last days spoken to us by His Son, whom He has appointed heir of all things, through whom also He made the worlds; 3 who being the brightness of His glory and the express image of His person, and upholding all things by the word of His power, when He had by Himself purged our sins, sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high,

 

 

3. Giving Eternal Life is why Jesus came to earth.

 

In verse 1, Jesus said the hour has come.  What was He talking about?  He was talking about the time for Jesus to die on the cross for the sins of the world.

 

However, this was a very specific time, and we have seen earlier in our study when the time had not come yet. 

 

John 2:4, 4 Jesus said to her, “Woman, what does your concern have to do with Me? My hour has not yet come.”

 

John 7:6, 6 Then Jesus said to them, “My time has not yet come, but your time is always ready.

 

John 7:8, 8 You go up to this feast. I am not yet going up to this feast, for My time has not yet fully come.”

 

John 7:30, 30 Therefore they sought to take Him; but no one laid a hand on Him, because His hour had not yet come.

 

John 8:20, 20 These words Jesus spoke in the treasury, as He taught in the temple; and no one laid hands on Him, for His hour had not yet come.

However, by John 12, Jesus knew that His time had come, and this hour and time for Him to die was His express reason in coming to earth with flesh and blood.

 

John 12:23, 23 But Jesus answered them, saying, “The hour has come that the Son of Man should be glorified.

 

John 13:1, 1 Now before the Feast of the Passover, when Jesus knew that His hour had come that He should depart from this world to the Father, having loved His own who were in the world, He loved them to the end.

 

 

4. Eternal Life in heaven for any individual is an act of God.

 

In verse 4, Jesus said that He had glorified God the Father on earth by finishing the work that God the Father sent Him to do. He speaks of the cross as an already accomplished act in the past. 

 

However, notice that the work is not something that you or I did or can do.  The opportunity for eternal life is an act of God. 

 

Back in verse 2, the individuals who will have eternal life are the ones that God gave to Jesus.  In other words, salvation is not about us.  It is not about you.

 

It is not our goodness or morality or merit or righteousness. I would even say it is not our faith, but the faith that God gives us.

 

Ephesians 2:8-9, 8 For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, 9 not of works, lest anyone should boast.

 

In the language of the NT, nouns have gender.  Grace and faith are both feminine. Therefore, you would expect “that” and “it” to be feminine too. 

 

However, “that” and “it” are neuter.  What that means is that not only is the grace not of yourselves but the faith is also not of yourselves.  In other words, God gives you the faith to believe making it His faith so both grace and faith and salvation are all acts of God. 

 

 

5. Eternal life in any individual was decided before the foundation of the world.

 

In verse 5, Jesus points back to the glory that He and God the Father shared before the world was. I would suggest glory was about eternal life just like this glory here is about eternal life.  Listen to Paul in Ephesians 1:3-4.

 

3 Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ, 4 just as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before Him in love,

 

And here is John in Revelation 13:8 talking about who isn’t saved.

 

8 All who dwell on the earth will worship him, whose names have not been written in the Book of Life of the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world.

 

 

Invitation

Our invitation this morning is for you to receive eternal life.  Verse 2 says that Jesus is glorified when He gives eternal life, but will you receive it?

 

John 1:12-13, 12 But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God, to those who believe in His name: 13 who were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God.