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Jesus’ Power to give Eternal Life
… and I give eternal life to them, and they will never perish; and no one will snatch them out of My hand.
John 10:28 NASB

Power and Authority

From the Gospel John 17 we have begun to study the Lord’s High Priestly Prayer in The Hour Is Come and also recently addressed The Authority of Jesus, His Power over all flesh.

Jesus preached about eternal life in synagogues, on hillsides and in homes of the Jews. The Gospels also include several scenes where His authority over life and death had always been questioned by Jerusalem’s leaders.

The Jews then said to Him, “What sign do You show us as your authority for doing these things?”
Jesus answered them, “Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up.”
The Gospel of John 2:18-19 NASB

This temple of Jesus is not the fortress of flesh or whitewashed walls of symbolic religion, but the Living and Holy Image of the Son of God!

Interior of the Temple with High Priest facing the Holy of Holies

Jesus has never in-person entered the Holy of Holies. The Son of Man never entered the building as a temple priest with the sacrifice of worship.

Our Lord simply showed grace and clearly taught truth from the Temple’s public courtyards, Jewish gathering places walled in from the world and its gentile Roman captors, the public square of faithful Jews.

Jesus preached in Solomon’s portico, a place remote enough from a public face of the Sanhedrin’s seventy religious rulers.

POWER!

He came to His hometown and began teaching them in their synagogue, so that they were astonished, and said,
“Where did this man get this wisdom and these miraculous powers? G1411
Matthew 15:34 NASB

‘Who is this Jesus of Nazareth,’ the powerful religious leaders would have always asked as they had also of John the Baptist?

δύναμις – dynamis – strength power, ability
- Used here for both words: ‘miraculous’ & ‘powers’
- Also used in this way in Mark 6:14 where speaking of Jesus and His Disciples ‘…people were saying, “John the Baptist has risen from the dead, and that is why these miraculous ^G1411 powers ^G1411 are at work in Him.”
We are not talking political or military or religious power, but true and miraculous power over creation and the created – power of the Son of Man, the Messiah Jesus from the LORD God!

Authority

So many Jews had hoped that Jesus would use such power to overthrow Rome in Jerusalem, Judea and Galilee.

The image of a shepherd may be that of a powerful king like David or Solomon, but more commonly seen as one saving vulnerable sheep from wolves.

“I am the good shepherd; the good shepherd lays down His life for the sheep.
from the Good News of John 10:18 the promise of the Messiah Jesus

Although the Apostles knew their Lord and Master as a humble man, the Messiah Jesus also spoke of His authority as Master and Shepherd of His disciples many times.

John 10:

The Gatekeeper & the Shepherds – the Door

Parable of the Good Shepherd

14 I am the good shepherd, and I know My own and My own know Me, 15 even as the Father knows Me and I know the Father; and I lay down My life for the sheep…

ἐξουσία – exousia – authority

Jesus claims the authority to lay [His Life] down and also sais, “I have authority to take it up again.” This was a remarkable claim of Jesus that He had the authority to cause BOTH His own death and resurrection. (We have addressed ‘The Authority of Jesus’ in our introduction to John 17.)

“For this reason the Father loves Me, because I lay down My life so that I may take it again. No one has taken it away from Me, but I lay it down on My own initiative.
I have authority to lay it down, and I have authority to take it up again. This commandment I received from My Father.”
The words of the Messiah Jesus – John 10:17-18 NASB

19 A division occurred again among the Jews because of these words.

No wonder the Jews became divided because of these words about their Messiah’s authority.

Consider the common definition of authority Jesus coveys:
- power of choice, liberty of doing as one pleases
- physical and mental power
- the power of authority (influence) and of right (privilege)
  - (Here’s one no religious or political leader willingly gives up.)
- the power of rule or government (the power of him whose will and commands must be submitted to by others and obeyed)
  - (Again, Herod, Caesar, Pilate, Pharisees, Sadducees, Scribes, priests – all have a stake in maintaining their tenuous authority & limited power.)
Power over death and life

Cling to this fragile flesh; for what little power we exercise over it.

To some degree of authority: a king, our president, any judge of man’s courts — Rome’s Prefect, any governor and all authorities of man exercise power over other mortal men.

We have NO choice in some matters. Yet these authorities of the flesh cannot give life, but grant mercy in its extension.

Those who sought to seize Jesus of whom the crowds of Jerusalem had shouted, ‘Hosanna, Son of David; save us, blessed king,’ challenged many crowns. For the implied mortal and immediate authority of Caesar, of Herod, of Pilate, of Jerusalem’s political/religious leaders (the Sanhedrin, its priests and temple police) — all authority was threatened by the popularity Jesus.

ALL could have lost their power of the day IF Jesus is crowned the “King of the Jews!”

It MUST NOT HAPPEN.

Therefore, show the crowds that THIS KING JESUS is no MAN of authority — for this claimant of Power from one High cannot even save His own mortal life (let alone that of the Jews). These same crowds will turn on Him when we have demonstrated our Authority over HIM.

High Priest before the Altar of the LORD

From an upper room in Jerusalem, Jesus prays to the LORD GOD our Father for many things. Yet the Lord’s purpose is not to preserve any MORTAL life, but to SAVE select SOULS for ETERNAL LIFE.

Though praying from an upper room in Jerusalem, Jesus enters the most sacred place on our behalf – the Holy of Holies as our High Priest before God. Jesus stands before us praying for His authority to grant eternal life!

From Death to Eternal Life

Does this Jesus, Son of Man, really have such authority before the LORD GOD?

For if He does, the Messiah of God IS everything He says that He IS.

John 17:

The High Priestly Prayer

Jesus spoke these things; and lifting up His eyes to heaven, He said,

“Father, the hour has come; glorify Your Son, that the Son may glorify You, even as You gave Him authority over all flesh, that to all whom You have given Him, He may give eternal life.

This is eternal life, that they may know You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom You have sent.

… Holy Father, keep them in Your name, the name which You have given Me, that they may be one even as We are…

ἀγάπη

I have given them the glory you have given me, so that they may be one as we are one. I am in them and you are in me, so that they may be made completely one, that the world may know you have sent me and have loved them as you have loved me.
John 17:22-23 CSB

The Love that is the Glory of Eternal Life

Aug -awp’-ay — agapē one of several Greek words for LOVE we fail to understand as men of flesh and as spirits given life by God. Yet Jesus Christ uses it on our behalf in His closing High Priestly Prayer.

“…that the love ^G26 wherewith thou hast loved me..” from the English of the King James Version: Jesus states the Father’s love for His only Son — this is the love for which Jesus intercedes for us in eternal life.

And Jesus had recently told the Apostles, “Greater love ^G26 hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends.
- affection, good will, love, benevolence, brotherly love
- love feasts
An eternal life of relationship: Personal Relationship like that of Jesus with the Holy Father God — a glory of festive love as personal as the wedding, where the love of the bride and groom are celebrated by all who are invited to the feast.

Christ Jesus our High Priest intercedes and asks His blessing on what is about to take place.

Will you take up your cross and follow Him?
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To be continued...
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June 27, 2020
The Authority of Jesus, His Power over all flesh
He said, “Father, the hour has come; glorify Your Son, that the Son may glorify You, even as You gave Him authority over all flesh…
John 17:1b-2a NASB

Let us pray:
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LORD, help us to understand the Person of Your Son Jesus Christ through His prayer to the Father.
Amen.
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We have begun our look at Jesus’ High Priestly Prayer made corporately before the Eleven just prior to the Lord’s departure for Gethsemane where He will be betrayed. The Hour Is Come – Glory to the Son AND the Father

Jesus stands before the Apostles, looks up (probably with His arms extended as later they would be on the Cross) and His open hands of flesh turned heavenward and prays,

“Father the hour has come … glorify your Son, so that your Son may glorify you—

Jesus, the faithful only Son of God always prayed to the Father; but listen once more to a most familiar prayer and hear along with this High Priestly Prayer a connection you may have missed.

For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, for ever.
Amen.
Jesus’ closing from ‘The Lord’s Prayer’ – Matthew 6:13b KJV

Did you catch that Jesus connects ‘the power‘ to ‘the glory’ of the LORD God – a glory we examined at some length previously in our study of John 17:1?

Our prayer to Heaven’s King

Now beloved believer, you will not have had much cause to consider so far anything less than glorifying this humble Servant Son of God made flesh; for Jesus epitomizes everything peaceful in mankind. Our Lamb of God is submissive in His love of God and approachable by His fellow man.

But this temporal nature of Emmanu-El, born humbly in Bethlehem, though His humble nature will continue to the Altar of the Cross, Jesus will not continue as servant until the judgment of the world, but ultimately as its ruler and Lord!

We pray to GOD because HE IS THE LORD GOD, and the humble must confess that we are NOT.
- Does your daily life witness your own humility to bow down to GOD in prayer as did Jesus the Son?
- Will the created acknowledge the authority of Jesus, WHO WITH THE FATHER IS the creator of all things and Judge of all flesh?
This is why we pray.

Jesus now prays for us as the Perfect High Priest. The Messiah Jesus therefore intercedes before the Father for those who willingly seek eternal life with Him in glory — disciples in spirit seeking grace for a dying flesh from dust rather than the judgment we deserve of sinners refusing the authority and mercy of the LORD God.

Christians of these last days speak lightly of grace given as if any claim of Jesus is fruit of a sinful spirit saved. Yet does our witness of Christ glow in the glory of His High Authority?
Roger Harned – talkofJesus.com

Authority

Jesus is not praying about anything new here, for authority in relationships both earthly and between the created and Creator appear throughout Scripture.

When the godly are in authority, the people rejoice.
But when the wicked are in power, they groan.
When the wicked are in authority, sin flourishes,
but the godly will live to see their downfall.
Proverbs 29:2 & 29:16 NLT

The authority between those on earth ought to be immediately evident since Jesus provided much guidance and many examples to the Disciples and crowds of Jews so well schooled in the discipline of Scripture.

In this prayer, however, Jesus speaks directly to God the Father not only as their Authority but about His and the Apostles authority.

John 17:

Jesus spoke these things, looked up to heaven, and said,

“Father, the hour has come. Glorify your Son so that the Son may glorify you, since you gave him authority over all people, so that he may give eternal life to everyone you have given him.

What does our Lord and High Priest pray?

Glorify your Son; that is, Jesus prays in essence, ‘Father glorify Me!’ Yet what reason does Jesus offer?

Jesus prays that HIS glory will be necessary “so that [He, Jesus] the Son may glorify you [the Father]. The Lord restates His own authority recalling an action of the Father which had already taken place.

Jesus then offers through this granted authority a higher reason for His intercessory request:

“… So that he [Jesus] may give eternal life…”

Note that Jesus does not promise eternal life to all, but to only to those the Father has already given to the Son our Savior. He becomes our perfect Priest and Sacrifice.

As for those who refuse Christ? Justice will find the dust and ashes of unrepentant souls who will stand before Jesus’ authority at the judgment.

Authority of The Word

John opens his Gospel with Jesus’ preeminent authority.

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
John 1:1 KJV

14 And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, (and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father,) full of grace and truth.

John 5 excerpt:

[We shall stick with the King James Version for the moment to remind our long-lost 21st century perception of the authority and appropriate approach of a king.] – RH

For as the Father raiseth up the dead, and quickeneth them; even so the Son quickeneth whom he will.

For the Father judgeth no man, but hath committed all judgment unto the Son:

Verily, verily, I say unto you, The hour is coming, and now is, when the dead shall hear the voice of the Son of God: and they that hear shall live.

You with ears to hear, LISTEN to this previous proclamation of Jesus our King! Jesus clearly proclaims:
- God the Father raises the dead to life (quickeneth).
- Jesus the Son gives life (quickeneth) to whom He will.
- The dead will hear the voice of Jesus, Son of God.
- Those dead souls who Jesus chooses shall live again.
Did we overlook one point of power of the Lord Jesus’ authority?

In our too-near familiarity with the humble Lamb of God made man we often lose His authority to come in the wrath of God:

and He [the Father] gave Him [Jesus] authority to execute judgment, because He [Jesus] is the Son of Man.
John 5:27 NASB
- The Father gave Jesus authority to execute judgment!
WHY? Because He IS the “Son of Man,” as well as the “Son of God.”

Returning to the Upper Room

Do you recall what Jesus had said after Judas left the room to go to Jerusalem’s religious leaders to betray his Lord?

Therefore when he had gone out, Jesus said,

“Now is the Son of Man glorified, and God is glorified in Him; if God is glorified in Him, God will also glorify Him in Himself, and will glorify Him immediately. – John 13:31 NASB

Now in His High Priestly Prayer Jesus prays, “you gave him authority over all people.

“I have revealed your name to the people you gave me from the world. They were yours, you gave them to me, and they have kept your word.

(or from the more formal King James Version🙂

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. – John 17:6 KJV

Power over all flesh

Once again returning to the kingly language of the King James Version as introduction once more to Jesus’ High Priestly Prayer:

As thou hast given him power over all flesh, that he should give eternal life to as many as thou hast given him.
And this is life eternal, that they might know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent.
Prayer of Jesus Christ from the Gospel of John 17:2-3 KJV

Jesus prays of His Power over all flesh, over creation, over you and me, even power over all authority of this world.

Is Jesus your Lord, a High Priest interceding for your sinful flesh before the HOLY LORD GOD ALMIGHTY?
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To be continued... 
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June 11, 2020
The Hour Is Come – Glory to the Son AND the Father
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.
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To be continued...
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June 1, 2020