Study in the Book of John (7)

FOUR PROMISES JESUS MADE IN JOHN 16

Promise #1 – The Holy Spirit (vs. 4-11)

Promise #2 – Imminence of His passion (vs 16-17)

Promise #3 – Their prayers will be answered (vs. 23-24)

Promise #4 - Your faith will be shaken (vs. 32-33)

High Priestly Prayer

Hebrews 10:11–12 ESV

And every priest stands daily at his service, offering repeatedly the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins. But when Christ had offered for all time a single sacrifice for sins, he sat down at the right hand of God,

High Priest had to make a sacrifice for himself

Jesus is the sacrifice

Hebrews 10:9–10 ESV

then he added, “Behold, I have come to do your will.” He does away with the first in order to establish the second. And by that will we have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all.

Divisions of Prayer in John 17

Prayer for self and Father – vs. 1-5

Prayer for Apostles – vs. 6-19

Prayer for future believers – vs. 20-26

1. Prayer for self and Father

John 17:1–5 ESV

When Jesus had spoken these words, he lifted up his eyes to heaven, and said, “Father, the hour has come; glorify your Son that the Son may glorify you, since you have given him authority over all flesh, to give eternal life to all whom you have given him. And this is eternal life, that they know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent. I glorified you on earth, having accomplished the work that you gave me to do. And now, Father, glorify me in your own presence with the glory that I had with you before the world existed.

Question #1

What event is it now time for?  (v.1 and 12.23-24)?

Questions #2

What does it mean to glorify someone? (v. 4-5, 10,22,24).  How is Jesus’ deity emphasized here?

2. Prayer for Apostles

John 17:6–19 ESV

“I have manifested your name to the people whom you gave me out of the world. Yours they were, and you gave them to me, and they have kept your word. Now they know that everything that you have given me is from you. For I have given them the words that you gave me, and they have received them and have come to know in truth that I came from you; and they have believed that you sent me. I am praying for them. I am not praying for the world but for those whom you have given me, for they are yours. All mine are yours, and yours are mine, and I am glorified in them. And I am no longer in the world, but they are in the world, and I am coming to you. Holy Father, keep them in your name, which you have given me, that they may be one, even as we are one. While I was with them, I kept them in your name, which you have given me. I have guarded them, and not one of them has been lost except the son of destruction, that the Scripture might be fulfilled. But now I am coming to you, and these things I speak in the world, that they may have my joy fulfilled in themselves. I have given them your word, and the world has hated them because they are not of the world, just as I am not of the world. I do not ask that you take them out of the world, but that you keep them from the evil one. They are not of the world, just as I am not of the world. Sanctify them in the truth; your word is truth. As you sent me into the world, so I have sent them into the world. And for their sake I consecrate myself, that they also may be sanctified in truth.

Question #3

Who is the focal point of Jesus?  Why? If you had to file a report to the Father on Jesus’ activities, how would you verify v. 6-8?

Question #4

What is Jesus’ concern in v. 11 and 15? What does he mean by the “the name you gave me” (8.58 and Ex. 3.14)?  What does the original revelation of this name show about its power to save? (Ex. 3.7-10).

The name Jesus combines Yehovah (Yahweh, the name of God) and yasha (meaning "to rescue," "deliver," or "save").

Question #5

What does Jesus mean by his request in v. 17?  What is its purpose?

3. Prayer for future believers – vs. 20-26

John 17:20–26 ESV

“I do not ask for these only, but also for those who will believe in me through their word, that they may all be one, just as you, Father, are in me, and I in you, that they also may be in us, so that the world may believe that you have sent me. The glory that you have given me I have given to them, that they may be one even as we are one, I in them and you in me, that they may become perfectly one, so that the world may know that you sent me and loved them even as you loved me. Father, I desire that they also, whom you have given me, may be with me where I am, to see my glory that you have given me because you loved me before the foundation of the world. O righteous Father, even though the world does not know you, I know you, and these know that you have sent me. I made known to them your name, and I will continue to make it known, that the love with which you have loved me may be in them, and I in them.”

Question #6

Who is the focus of Jesus’ prayer in v.20-26? Toward what end? What kind of unity exists between God and Jesus that we should copy?

Question #7

What does Jesus’ ultimate desire (v.24) reveal about his love for us?

Question #8

How do verses 25-26 sum up the major concerns of Jesus in chapters 13-16?