Biblion Bible Commentary
Read the introduction to John · About this commentary
Father, the Hour Has Come
John 17:1-5
1 Jesus said these things, then lifting up his eyes to heaven, he said, “Father, the time has come. Glorify your Son, that your Son may also glorify you; · WEB
He stops teaching and prays out loud, and the first thing he asks for is the cross.
Jesus said these things, then lifting up his eyes to heaven, he said, "Father, the time has come" John 17:1.
The longest recorded prayer of Jesus, and the disciples are listening to it. That is the first thing to notice: he prays aloud, in their hearing, about them — and the whole chapter is available because eleven men stood in a room while he talked to his Father.
The time has come is the announcement the book has been waiting for. Since Cana it has been not yet John 2:4 John 7:30 John 8:20; it turned at the arrival of the Greeks John 12:23, and here it is stated as an accomplished fact at the head of a prayer.
"Glorify your Son, that your Son may also glorify you" John 17:1.
The first petition is the strangest request in Scripture, once it is read in this book's vocabulary. Glorifying, here, is the cross. He is asking to be crucified — and asking for it as the means by which the Father will be honored.
And it is not a request for anything for himself. The purpose clause runs straight back: that your Son may also glorify you.
"Even as you gave him authority over all flesh, so he will give eternal life to all whom you have given him" John 17:2.
The authority granted is universal — all flesh — and the giving of life is directed to those given him. The two are not in tension; the second is what the first is for.
"This is eternal life, that they should know you, the only true God, and him whom you sent, Jesus Christ" John 17:3.
The verse is the New Testament's one definition of eternal life, and it is not a measurement of time. It is a relationship — know, which in the Scriptures means acquaintance rather than information, the verb used of a husband and wife.
That is why this Gospel keeps saying the believer has eternal life in the present tense John 5:24 John 6:47. If it were a duration it could only begin later. Defined this way it begins the moment the knowing does, and death is an interruption of the body rather than of the thing itself.
And the definition is binary: knowing the Father, and knowing the one he sent. The second is not an addition to the first.
"I glorified you on the earth. I have accomplished the work which you have given me to do" John 17:4.
Spoken before the cross, in the perfect tense. The work is described as finished the night before it is finished, which is how this book speaks of everything from chapter thirteen on — and accomplished is the verb behind the word he will say from the cross John 19:30.
"Now, Father, glorify me with your own self with the glory which I had with you before the world existed" John 17:5.
The last petition of the opening is the boldest sentence in the prayer. He asks for the restoration of a glory he had, in the Father's presence, before there was a world.
Nothing in Scripture says this more plainly. The prologue stated it as narration John 1:1; here the man about to be arrested says it in prayer, and asks for what was set aside to be given back.
settled What this mark means