The High Priestly Prayer

Prayer- Introduction

How is your prayer life?

Good? Bad? Don’t really know?

What is the most desperate prayer you have ever prayed?

Maybe it was the first time you cried out to God in full surrender

The Storm (Tell the story about dad on the boat)

My Grandpa used to talk about a prayer my dad prayed while they were out fishing once.

This prayer seemed powerful but Jesus prayed a much greater prayer once

Discuss that before we did our Christmas service we were in the book of John and for my last week I wanted to share this text with them

Background of John 17

John 15-17 is known as the upper room discourse in which Jesus spoke to his disciples before he would be arrested and go to the cross

In this final talk he has with the disciples he commands them to abide in him. He also tells them they will go through great struggles and tribulation. People will hunt down and kill the disciples and they are doing an act for God in the process.

If you remember I preached on John 15 two weeks ago

We discussed what it really means to abide in Christ and stand firm in him.

Verses 1-2: The Son Glorified and Given Authority

John 17:1–2 ESV

1 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, 2 since you have given him authority over all flesh, to give eternal life to all whom you have given him.

“Lifting ones eyes to heaven” was a common gesture of prayer

The Hour Has come (Verse 1)

Jesus knows that the time has come for him to be crucified. We see several different places in the Gospels where Jesus gets away from his pursuers because it says that “it was not his time”.

Well now we know that it is now that time. It is time for Jesus to go and bear our sins.

It is time for the Lord’s passover lamb to go and be the sacrifice for us. Just as a lamb was killed on the passover night in Egypt so God’s wrath would pass over the people of God. The final passover lamb is going to the cross to be slaughtered for payment of sins—once and for all.

His obedience and our call to prayer

Christ is being obedient to the Father. Jesus knew the sovereign will of the Father and knew that this (his crucifixion) has to be done. He knew this was in God’s plan. He knew that it was going to happen. However, I want you to notice something here: Jesus still prays anyway. He did not take a proper understanding of God’s sovereignty as something that would result in him acting fatalistic. Jesus reacted to God’s control and sovereignty as opportunity to pray. Jesus prays that the Father will accomplish His purpose at the appointed time.

Because God is in control we should pray! If God was not totally sovereign and in control then what would be the point of prayer?

Therefore, we know and understand that God has a plan. I believe our prayers are to adjust ourselves and our mindset to be in accordance with God’s plan. We pray not so that we can change God, but so that he can change us.

The Son has been given all authority, and the power to give eternal life to all the elect

Christ has been given all authority

Matthew 28:18–20 ESV

18 And Jesus came and said to them, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. 19 Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20 teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.”

God has authority over all things—nothing is out of his control.

Even the worst of tragedies and most terrible of things we see is not out of his control. Even satan still answers to God. Nothing “slips by” God.

The ones who have been given to Christ by the Father will receive eternal life

John 6:37–39 ESV

37 All that the Father gives me will come to me, and whoever comes to me I will never cast out. 38 For I have come down from heaven, not to do my own will but the will of him who sent me. 39 And this is the will of him who sent me, that I should lose nothing of all that he has given me, but raise it up on the last day.

Ephesians 1:3–6 ESV

3 Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places, 4 even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him. In love 5 he predestined us for adoption to himself as sons through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of his will, 6 to the praise of his glorious grace, with which he has blessed us in the Beloved.

God chooses us individually, not because of anything in us that is worthy of salvation, but because of his own divine purpose and choice. This doctrine of election is key in understanding God’s sovereignty.

God The Father chooses the elect

God the Son purchases their salvation

God the Spirit applies salvation to them by effectually calling them to it

Verse 3: Eternal Life

John 17:3 ESV

3 And this is eternal life, that they know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent.

Not only is Christ the one who has purchased salvation for us by his act of dying for us on the cross but he also is the only way to eternal life.

Eternal life is only achieved by grace through faith in the name of Jesus Christ

Many people claim their are many ways to God or that all roads lead to God. By Jesus is only way to God. He claims this here.

John 10:9 ESV

9 I am the door. If anyone enters by me, he will be saved and will go in and out and find pasture.

Verse 4-5: The Father Glorified by the Son

John 17:4–5 ESV

4 I glorified you on earth, having accomplished the work that you gave me to do. 5 And now, Father, glorify me in your own presence with the glory that I had with you before the world existed.

Jesus glorified God on earth (verse 4)

Jesus’s incarnation was a display of God’s glory!

Unlike the pharisees, Jesus did the work of the Father here on earth

Jesus will go to the cross and complete the ordained task!

John 17:1–5

To be sure, historically speaking, he had not yet suffered on the cross, but he has a right to speak as if also this suffering has already been endured, so certain is it that he will endure it! It must have given comfort to the disciples to hear Jesus say in his prayer that in the accomplishment of the mission to save sinners the Father is glorified! In this work all his glorious “excellencies” are displayed most radiantly

Jesus will be glorified because he was the lamb who was slaughtered (v.5)

Revelation 5:9–12 ESV

9 And they sang a new song, saying, “Worthy are you to take the scroll and to open its seals, for you were slain, and by your blood you ransomed people for God from every tribe and language and people and nation, 10 and you have made them a kingdom and priests to our God, and they shall reign on the earth.” 11 Then I looked, and I heard around the throne and the living creatures and the elders the voice of many angels, numbering myriads of myriads and thousands of thousands, 12 saying with a loud voice, “Worthy is the Lamb who was slain, to receive power and wealth and wisdom and might and honor and glory and blessing!”

Verse 6-10: God’s People

Verse 6: God’s name manifested to the elect

John 17:6 ESV

6 “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.

D.A Carson:

The Gospel according to John a. Jesus’ Grounds for This Prayer (17:6–11a)

These people for whom Jesus now lifts his voice in prayer are those whom the Father has given to the Son (vv. 2, 6; cf. notes on 6:37). This gift was not rooted in anything intrinsic to the people themselves. They were part of the wicked world (cf. notes on 1:9), but God gave them to Jesus out of the world—apparently functionally equivalent to the fact that Jesus chose them out of the world (15:19). Thus in a profound sense they belonged to God antecedently to Jesus’ ministry (They were yours; you gave them to me).

God’s “name” embodies God’s character; to reveal God’s name is to make the God’s character known

The ones that Jesus prays for are the ones who belonged to God. The Lord has chosen these people and given them to the Son, who has manifested God’s name to them.

The disciples did not know every detail about Jesus but they were commited to Him in obeying Him as Lord and messiah

Verse 7-8: Everything given to the Disciples is from God

John 17:7–8 ESV

7 Now they know that everything that you have given me is from you. 8 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.

Hebrews 4:12 ESV

12 For the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and of spirit, of joints and of marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart.

The disciples accepted Jesus’s words as true revelation from God. In the same way we should take the words of scripture to heart as true revelation as well.

Verse 9-10: They are yours

John 17:9–10 ESV

9 I am praying for them. I am not praying for the world but for those whom you have given me, for they are yours. 10 All mine are yours, and yours are mine, and I am glorified in them.

We are God’s! Let that sink in a minute!

The all powerful Holy God who spoke the universe into existence considers you his.

John 10:27–29 ESV

27 My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me. 28 I give them eternal life, and they will never perish, and no one will snatch them out of my hand. 29 My Father, who has given them to me, is greater than all, and no one is able to snatch them out of the Father’s hand.

Verse 11: In the World

John 17:11 ESV

11 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.

Christ is no longer in the world, but we are! Therefore we should live our lives for Christ.

Take this comfort along with you as go along in your life that you as a Christian have been given the task of caring on the name of Jesus. Now you are not alone because you have the God of the universe on your side.

Remember earlier when we discussed that God has all authority. If this is true then what do we really have to fear?

Loss of Comfort? Our comfort is in have Christ as savior and Lord

You are not equipped? The spirit is the one who equips, the flesh does nothing

Death? our savior has already defeated death