Jesus’ High Priestly Prayer of intercession begins simply and humbly.
Even from the confines of a dark upper room in Zion which Judas has now left on the eve of Jerusalem’s great darkness, Jesus looks up to the light of a glory the Son once had – the glory of the LORD God our Father in heaven.
Glorify your Son
Father, the hour is come; glorify thy Son, that thy Son also may glorify thee…
John 17:1 b KJV
John 17:
When Jesus had finished saying these things, he looked upward to heaven and said,
“Father, the time has come.
… glorify your Son, so that your Son may glorify you— just as you have given him authority over all humanity, so that he may give eternal life to everyone you have given him.
John 17:1b-2a NET
Our eternal High Priest has much more to say in His prayer of high importance to sinners for whom He intercedes. These include eternal life and as previously mentioned who the Father has given to the Son.
Yet today let’s focus in on why Jesus prays for the Father to glorify the Son – His reason for entering the Holy of Holies beyond the veil of our distanced understanding, on behalf of these eleven witnesses and more.
What is GLORY?
The Apostle John, one of the Eleven remaining had previously witnessed the glory of Jesus.
Luke 9:
The Transfiguration
28 Some eight days after these sayings, He took along Peter and John and James, and went up on the mountain to pray. And while He was praying, the appearance of His face became different, and His clothing became white and gleaming…
… when they were fully awake, they saw His glory and the two men standing with Him… a cloud formed and began to overshadow them; and they were afraid as they entered the cloud.
35 Then a voice came out of the cloud, saying, “This is My Son, My Chosen One; listen to Him!”
δόξα – doxa –
From the base of δοκέω (G1380) – generally used meaning to ‘think.’
The LORD God is a thinking All-powerful, Ever-existing Being!
Think about it. As created and fragile beings our worship of the LORD God considers humbly our own humanity beneath His glory.
We who can think should glorify the LORD above all, but often we will not.
- δόξα dóxa, dox’-ah; glory (as very apparent),
- in a wide application (literal or figurative, objective or subjective):—dignity,
- glory(-ious),
- honour,
- praise,
- worship.
These humble acknowledgements so rare in men of flesh, yet plainly evident in all creation, reflect the glory of God. Therefore a soul who thinks about the LORD our Creator and glorifies Him is a worshiper, flesh and spirit looking up and bowing down to our Lord and God.
Jesus prays to the Father as a Son of Man.
Having been sent by the Father to the world He has completed the work for which He was sent by the Father. The hour now approaches for Him to return to His former glory.
His former GLORY with the Father
Never forget, beloved Christian disciple of Jesus, that He and the Father are One.
Prior to creation and in the early history of God’s chosen, Jesus had the same former glory. You have read of it. Yet so often we remain blind to the LORD’S glory. How rare the time men bow before it.
The GLORY of the LORD is perhaps as foreign to 21st c. christians as hebrew.
וַיִּשְׁכֹּ֤ן כְּבֹוד־יְהוָה֙ עַל־הַ֣ר סִינַ֔י וַיְכַסֵּ֥הוּ הֶעָנָ֖ן שֵׁ֣שֶׁת יָמִ֑ים וַיִּקְרָ֧א אֶל־מֹשֶׁ֛ה בַּיֹּ֥ום הַשְּׁבִיעִ֖י מִתֹּ֥וךְ הֶעָנָֽן׃
וּמַרְאֵה֙ כְּבֹ֣וד יְהוָ֔ה כְּאֵ֥שׁ אֹכֶ֖לֶת בְּרֹ֣אשׁ הָהָ֑ר לְעֵינֵ֖י בְּנֵ֥י יִשְׂרָאֵֽל׃
Exodus 24:16-17 WLC [click for translations]
כָּבוֹד
- כָּבוֹד kâbôwd, kaw-bode’; rarely כָּבֹד kâbôd; from H3513; properly, weight, but only figuratively in a good sense, splendor or copiousness:—glorious(-ly), glory, honour(-able).
Exodus 24:
15 Then Moses went up to the mountain, and the cloud covered the mountain.
16 The glory of the Lord rested on Mount Sinai, and the cloud covered it for six days; and on the seventh day He called to Moses from the midst of the cloud.
17 And to the eyes of the sons of Israel the appearance of the glory of the Lord was like a consuming fire on the mountain top.
18 Moses entered the midst of the cloud as he went up to the mountain; and Moses was on the mountain forty days and forty nights.
the GLORY of a consuming FIRE
Moses later confirms in Deuteronomy [ דברים 4 ]:
“You said, ‘Behold, the LORD our God has shown us His glory and His greatness, and we have heard His voice from the midst of the fire; we have seen today that God speaks with man, yet he lives.
This is the former glory the Messiah Jesus knew with the Father!
Later the prophet Isaiah would write:
Sinners in Zion are terrified; Trembling has seized the godless. “Who among us can live with the consuming fire? Who among us can live with continual burning?”
Isaiah 33:14
Jesus knew a former glory with the Father, a fearful and awesome consuming fire which refines and humbles men made of dust and ashes.
The writer of Hebrews, restating Moses warning of keeping the covenant, reminds of this glory:
Hebrews 12:
18 For you have not come to a mountain that can be touched and to a blazing fire, and to darkness and gloom and whirlwind, and to the blast of a trumpet and the sound of words which sound was such that those who heard begged that no further word be spoken to them. For they could not bear the command, “If even a beast touches the mountain, it will be stoned.”
21 And so terrible was the sight, that Moses said, “I am full of fear and trembling.”
Do you fear the LIVING GOD? And do you, O man, humbly bow down to the GLORY of the LORD?
What is the chief end of man?
Any teaching of faith must begin from the glory of God and consequent worship of God by man, for we are nothing more than a created being glorifying our Creator.
We have glanced at a Hebrew origin, then New Covenant Greek.
Moving beyond millenia of teaching from ancient latin we receive an English version of this elemental Christian teaching since the 1640’s during the Reformation.
The Westminster Catechism begins with God’s glory.
“Man’s chief end if to glorify God, and to enjoy him for ever.
Another foundational Protestant teaching, The Heidelberg Catechism, begins by asking, “What is your only comfort in life and in death?”
Perhaps the Disciples had wondered this often while following their Lord and Master Jesus for three years.
What is about to take place on the Cross will fully bring light to Jesus’ prayer to the Father asking Him to bring the Son His former glory along with the Father.
Jesus’ prayer for glory
4 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…
10 All mine are yours, and yours are mine, and I am glorified in them…
(John no doubt realizes that Jesus includes the Eleven here, but our Lord’s prayer of intercession goes much further than praying just for the Disciples in the room.)
22 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.
(Much to think about here even beyond the glory of the Lord.)
24 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.
High Priest of the New Covenant
Jesus intercedes as High Priest on our behalf — between the Father and all sinners given to Him
From here the Son our High Priest will move deeper into the unseen Holy of Holies where Jesus will present Himself as a living and acceptable Perfect Lamb of God that takes away the sins of the world.
To be continued...
