(Scriptures read: John 10:17-18: John 16:27-28; John 17:1-7, 10, 20-23.)
How blessed it is to see the Lord Jesus in the company of His disciples, speaking to them the loving thoughts of the Father. What heartfelt joy and delight we have in hearing the Lord say in the 17th verse of chapter 10, "Therefore doth My Father love Me." Other Scriptures tell us of the Father's love to the Son. In John 3:35, we read, "The Father loves the Son, and has given all things (to be) in His hands;" then in John 5:20, "The Father loves the Son and shows Him all things which He Himself does." Here the Son is in the deep consciousness of the Father's love, as giving the Father a special motive for loving Him. The motive is "Because I lay down my life that I may take it again." In the perfection of His love He lays down His life so that He might in resurrection take it again; and this He does in obedience to the will of the Father.
In John 16:27 the Lord Jesus makes known to His own, "The Father Himself has affection for you, because ye have had affection for me." How precious it is, beloved, to know that there has been wrought in our hearts an affection for this blessed Person, Who has come to make the Father known; telling out the depths of His heart of love, giving us to know the secrets of His counsels, and manifesting His wondrous grace. The One Who lay in His bosom could alone unfold these precious things. Is it any wonder that we have affection for Him? And our affection for the Son has given the Father a reason for loving us. Another reason for the Father's affection for us is that we have believed that He came out from God. The Father finds delight in those who have faith in His Son; in those who believe that He came forth from eternity, from God's own presence, to accomplish His will.
It was from the Father that He came forth, and He came into the world, that down here He might carry out all that was connected with the Father's will. He had been with the Father from all eternity, ever knowing the deep affections of the Father's heart, and all that was in His mind for the blessing of His own. How wonderfully does this verse unfold the divine glory of the Son, telling to us His eternal relationship with the Father, and introducing His great mission in the world. Having accomplished all that was given Him to do by the Father, He would "leave the world and go to the Father." In John 14 He speaks of going to the Father's House to prepare a place for His own; here, He is returning to the Father as having fulfilled His mission as the Sent One of the Father.
In John 17 we learn of the place that the Son will have in relation to the working out of all the Father's thoughts, as the One Whom He has glorified. We read in John 17:1, "These things Jesus spoke, and lifted up His eyes to heaven and said, Father, the hour is come; glorify Thy Son." He has done with the world, having overcome it, and the time has now come for the Father to set Him down in the place of glory. The Son desires to be glorified that He might continue to glorify the Father in the scene into which He would so soon go. This He would do as having received "authority over all flesh," in resurrection glory. He will fully exercise this authority publicly, in a day that is to come; but His great desire now is to give eternal life to those that the Father has given Him.
John 17:3 reads, "And this is the eternal life, that they should know thee, the only true God, and Jesus Christ Whom Thou has sent." The Father is the only true God; for God has been revealed to us as Father in the Person of the Son; and Jesus Christ has been made known to us as the Sent One of the Father. How sweet it is to think that in the joy of eternal life we have been brought into the place of intimacy, relationship, and divine affection with the Father and the Son. Only in eternal life, revealed in the Son, and now communicated to us, could we enter into this unique position and knowledge that the Son has given us.
Every step taken by that blessed One glorified God, so that He could say, "I have glorified Thee on the earth." In John 8 He said, "I do always those things that please Him." Does not the contemplation of these things affect our hearts? We have been brought into a place of intimacy and relationship, in the joy and power of eternal life, so that we might be able to enter into what is set forth in the Son. What an object for our hearts! What an example for us, as glorifying the Father. There was never a movement or act in the life of that blessed Man but what was in simple dependence on the Father Himself. When He heard of Lazarus being sick, He waited two days, not being moved by natural affection, but by the direction of the Father's will, that He might be glorified, and to make manifest what was inherent in Him. The same dependence marked Him at the grave of Lazarus, as He prays, "Father, I thank Thee that Thou hast heard me; but I knew that Thou always hearest me; but on account of the crowd who stand around I have said it, that they may believe that Thou hast sent Me." The resurrection of Lazarus was the greatest testimony to the Son as the Sent One of the Father; and how wonderfully it brought out the glory of the Father through Him, Who alone could say, "I have glorified Thee on the earth."
In John 17:4 the Lord also says, "I have finished the work which Thou gavest Me to do." Earlier, in John 4 He said, "My meat is to do the will of Him that sent Me, and to finish His work." He had come to secure worshippers for the Father; this was part of His work. First, He meets the woman just where she was, touching her conscience with His words; then He unfolds to her the precious truth concerning the worship of God the Father, and the effect is seen in the testimony she bears regarding Him. How blessed it is to see that blessed One gathering out from this world, a company that could worship the Father in spirit and in truth, as brought near to Him in intimacy and affection. But all that was given the Son to accomplish by the Father, He completed.
He makes an appeal to the Father in John 17:5, saying, "And now glorify Me, Thou Father, along with Thyself, with the glory which I had along with Thee before the world was." The glory that He now seeks has not in view the giving of eternal life to His own; He desires to enter into as Man the unique place that He ever had with the Father before time began. This place was rightly His, but in becoming Man He had come into the place of obedience and subjection to the Father's will, and in the perfection of His Manhood He asks for this glory from the Father. Nor does He seek to enter into this glory till He can say, "I have glorified Thee on the earth, I have completed the work which Thou gavest Me to do."
Earlier He had been speaking to the disciples about the Father, now, in John 17:6 He begins to speak to the Father about His own. How precious it is that He has unfolded to us all that the Father is, in order that we might reciprocate the love wherewith we are loved by the Father. So He says, "I have manifested Thy Name to the men Whom Thou gavest me out of the world." In divine counsel we ever belonged to the Father, and in love the Father gave us to the Son.
In receiving the words of the Father from the Son, the disciples knew that the Father was the source of all the things that were given to the Son. The Son came to carry out everything for the Father; all the wonderful things that lay in the Father's heart for the blessing of those He had given to the Son. All that we have been called to enjoy at the present moment, springs from the Father's love; He is the source of all.
John 17:10 says, "For they are Thine, (and all that is Mine is Thine and all that is Thine Mine,) and I am glorified in them." How blessed it is that we belong to the Father; but He has given us to the Son, and now the Son says, "They are Thine." What joy for us to know the place of affection we have in the heart of the Son and the heart of the Father! All the features of this blessed Man come out in the company that the Father has given Him. In a coming day, all the traits of the Son will come out in public display in those that the Father has given to Him; but even now the Father finds pleasure in beholding the features of His Son in those who are His own. It is in this way that the Son is glorified in those He loves.
When we come to John 17:20 we find this blessed Person praying specially for us. Verses 6-19 were spoken of those who were with Him at that time; now He adds, "Neither pray I for these alone, but for them also which shall believe on me through their word." The testimony rendered by the Apostles has come down to us in the written word, and in accepting it, we have believed through their word in the Son of God. Resulting from this testimony, the Lord desires that there should be a divine unity, "As Thou Father, art in Me and I in Thee." Herein is the secret and blessedness of the eternal life that is ours through the testimony that has come to us. We are here to express the life given to us by the Son, in all our ways, that the Father and the Son might find joy in us. We are not to have our interests in this world, but to manifest that we belong to heaven; having our part in the circle of divine affection, and taking our place in testimony for the glory of the Father.
We shall be associated, in a coming day, with a Christ Who will take up all the rights and counsels of God as the Son of His love; therefore does He say, "And the glory which Thou gavest Me I have given them; that they may be one, even as We are One" (John 17:22). There will be a divine unity in glory in that wonderful day of display. When the Son was down here, the Father was in the Son, and all that the Father said and did was through the Son; but the world refused this testimony. It is not therefore surprising that the world refuses our testimony today. In the display of the coming day, the Father will be set forth in the Son, and the Son will be set forth in the saints. The purpose of this is, "That the world may know that thou hast sent Me." What the world refused in testimony, it will have to accept in the display of that day.
When the world gazes on the saints in the company of the Son, it will also know that Thou "hast loved them, as Thou hast loved Me." The great company of the saints glorified along with the Son is there as the fruit of His work, and is therefore the proof of the Father having sent the Son; but as being in the same glory as the Son, the world is convinced of the blessed fact that the Father loves the saints as He loves His Son.
R. Duncanson.
The Father's love — so full, so free,
Declared, O blessed Lord, in Thee!
O joy divine O perfect rest
To ransomed hearts supremely blest!
True worshippers the Father sought,
True worshippers to Him are brought!
The Father's name, in love so free,
Declared, Lord Jesus Christ, by Thee!
E. L. Bevir.
The Grace of God.
Grace has to do with us in our weakness, failure, sorrow, and willingly brings the needed strength, restoration, comfort, and holy joy. It is the sweet and needed companion of the days of our humiliation. Oh! what a friend, what a companion, what a portion grace is for a soul in this world; and what an unspeakable blessing to know the grace of God in truth! "The Lord will give grace and glory." Forget not this, O my soul, reckon on both; on grace now, on glory hereafter. They can never fail.
A. Miller.