The Bible

 

John 17

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1 These words spake Jesus, and lifted up his eyes to heaven, and said, Father, the hour is come; glorify thy Son, that thy Son also may glorify thee:

2 As thou hast given him power over all flesh, that he should give eternal life to as many as thou hast given him.

3 And this is life eternal, that they might know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent.

4 I have glorified thee on the earth: I have finished the work which thou gavest me to do.

5 And now, O Father, glorify thou me with thine own self with the glory which I had with thee before the world was.

6 I have manifested thy name unto the men which thou gavest me out of the world: thine they were, and thou gavest them me; and they have kept thy word.

7 Now they have known that all things whatsoever thou hast given me are of thee.

8 For I have given unto them the words which thou gavest me; and they have received them, and have known surely that I came out from thee, and they have believed that thou didst send me.

9 I pray for them: I pray not for the world, but for them which thou hast given me; for they are thine.

10 And all mine are thine, and thine are mine; and I am glorified in them.

11 And now I am no more in the world, but these are in the world, and I come to thee. Holy Father, keep through thine own name those whom thou hast given me, that they may be one, as we are.

12 While I was with them in the world, I kept them in thy name: those that thou gavest me I have kept, and none of them is lost, but the son of perdition; that the scripture might be fulfilled.

13 And now come I to thee; and these things I speak in the world, that they might have my joy fulfilled in themselves.

14 I have given them thy word; and the world hath hated them, because they are not of the world, even as I am not of the world.

15 I pray not that thou shouldest take them out of the world, but that thou shouldest keep them from the evil.

16 They are not of the world, even as I am not of the world.

17 Sanctify them through thy truth: thy word is truth.

18 As thou hast sent me into the world, even so have I also sent them into the world.

19 And for their sakes I sanctify myself, that they also might be sanctified through the truth.

20 Neither pray I for these alone, but for them also which shall believe on me through their word;

21 That they all may be one; as thou, Father, art in me, and I in thee, that they also may be one in us: that the world may believe that thou hast sent me.

22 And the glory which thou gavest me I have given them; that they may be one, even as we are one:

23 I in them, and thou in me, that they may be made perfect in one; and that the world may know that thou hast sent me, and hast loved them, as thou hast loved me.

24 Father, I will that they also, whom thou hast given me, be with me where I am; that they may behold my glory, which thou hast given me: for thou lovedst me before the foundation of the world.

25 O righteous Father, the world hath not known thee: but I have known thee, and these have known that thou hast sent me.

26 And I have declared unto them thy name, and will declare it: that the love wherewith thou hast loved me may be in them, and I in them.

   

Commentary

 

Explanation of John 17

By Rev. John Clowes M.A.

Explaining the Inner Meaning of John 17

Verse 17:1. That the Lord, perceiving from his divine truth, that his Humanity was in a state capable of being fully united to his Divinity, is led from his divine love to desire that union.

Verse 17:2. That thus he might be the God of heaven and earth, and communicate his divine love and wisdom to all who were prepared to receive.

Verses 17:3, 4. Which divine love and wisdom consist in the heart-felt acknowledgement, that in the Lord, God is Man, and Man God, in One Divine Person, and that by and through the Manhood, of Humanity, the eternal Godhead, or Divinity, is made known in the church, and the great work of man's redemption completed.

Verses 17:5, 6. Which work required that the Divinity and Humanity should be made eternally one, as the divine love and divine wisdom are eternally one, and that thus mankind should become acquainted with the nature of that worship which the divinity requires, and should transfer all worship from the invisible Divinity to the visible Divine Humanity, living according to his precepts.

Verses 17:7, 8. And acknowledging that in the Divine Humanity are contained all things of the Divinity, and that through and by the Divine Humanity is communicated divine love and divine wisdom to such as can receive it, who are thus taught that the Humanity is from the Divinity, and that a right faith consists in so believing.

Verses 17:9, 10. Because through the Lord's Divine Humanity they have continual access to the divine good, which otherwise they could not have, and thus are convinced that the union of the Divinity and Humanity is reciprocal, and that the Divine Humanity, through that union, is all in all in heaven and in the church.

Verses 17:11, 12. Imparting the good of heavenly love and life to all who desire it, that they also may have reciprocal conjunction with the Humanity, as the humanity has reciprocal union with the Divinity, and may thus be preserved from evils and falsities, according to prediction.

Verses 17:13, 14, 15, 16. And through the eternal truth may attain conjunction with heavenly good, and thus be admitted into spiritual temptations, which are permitted for final purification and deliverance from evil, in like manner as the Lord by temptation-combats made his humanity divine.

Verses 17:17, 18, 19. For the eternal truth, or the Word, is the only medium of man's purification, and therefore all, who receive the truth, pass through a similar process of purification and trial with the Lord himself, and as he thereby glorified or made divine his humanity, in like manner they become spiritual, and are regenerated.

Verses 17:20, 21, 22, 23. For the divine love is willing to draw all to itself, and therefore the end of the Lord's glorification of his humanity was, that he might gift mankind with intelligence and wisdom, and thus lead them to conjunction of life and love with himself in every process of their purification and regeneration.

Verses 17:24, 25, 26. And that thus they might live perpetually in the light of the divine presence, and be made sensible of the divine love, and by the acknowledgement of the reciprocal union of the Divinity and Humanity, might no longer remain in evil and error, but attain to eternal conjunction with the Lord, in love and in truth.