Glorify Your Son, that Your Son also may glorify You

 

 Jesus spoke these words, lifted up His eyes to heaven, and said:  "Father, the hour has come.  Glorify Your Son, that Your Son also may glorify You, as You have given Him authority over all flesh, that He should give eternal life to as many as You have given Him.  And this is eternal life, that they may know You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom You have sent.  I have glorified You on the earth.  I have finished the work which You have given Me to do.  And now, O Father, glorify Me together with Yourself, with the glory which I had with You before the world was.  

"I have manifested Your name to the men whom You have given Me out of the world.  They were Yours, You gave them to Me, and they have kept Your word.  Now they have known that all things which You have given Me are from You.  For I have given to them the words which You have given Me; and they have received them, and have known surely that I came forth from You; and they have believed that You sent Me."

 

- John 17:1–8 

 

 In yesterday's reading, we were given Christ's parable of the Pharisee and the Tax Collector.  He spoke this parable to some who trusted in themselves that they were righteous, and despised others:  "Two men went up to the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector.  The Pharisee stood and prayed thus with himself, 'God, I thank You that I am not like other men -- extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even as this tax collector.  I fast twice a week; I give tithes of all that I possess.'  And the tax collector, standing afar off, would not so much as raise his eyes to heaven, but beat his breast, saying, 'God, be merciful to me a sinner!'  I tell you, this man went down to his house justified rather than the other; for everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted."

 

  Jesus spoke these words, lifted up His eyes to heaven, and said:  "Father, the hour has come.  Glorify Your Son, that Your Son also may glorify You, as You have given Him authority over all flesh, that He should give eternal life to as many as You have given Him."  As the lectionary continues to prepare us for the Lenten journey (which begins this week in the West, and for the Armenian Apostolic Church), today we're given the beginning of what is termed Christ's High Priestly Prayer (John 17).   In it, He prays for Himself, after He has addressed His disciples at the Last Supper (John 14 - 16).   This prayer contains the basic elements of a prayer which a priest would offer to God when a sacrifice is about to me made.  As my study Bible explains it, these elements comprise glorification (verses 3-5, 25), remembrance of God's words (verses 2, 6-8, 22-23), intercession on behalf of others (verses 9, 11, 15, 20-21, 24), and a declaration of the offering itself (verses 1, 5).  Here His words bear witness to Christ's divinity, and His filial relationship with the Father.  My study Bible comments on Christ's words here that the hour has come signifies Christ is Lord over time.  To glorify refers to the redemption of all creation that will be accomplished through this voluntary mission of the Cross and Resurrection; in fact, the purpose for which He was sent into the world by the Father.  In this redemption, my study bible adds, the Father and the Son are glorified.  This is why the Cross, which is a sign of death, is glorified in the Church as "life-giving" and the "weapon of peace."

"And this is eternal life, that they may know You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom You have sent."  The knowledge of the only true God is far more than intellectual understanding, my study Bible comments here.  This knowledge is, in fact, participation in God's divine life and in communion with God.  So, therefore, eternal life is an ongoing, loving knowledge of God in Christ and the Holy Spirit.  

"I have glorified You on the earth.  I have finished the work which You have given Me to do.  And now, O Father, glorify Me together with Yourself, with the glory which I had with You before the world was."  My study Bible says that Christ's work can never be separated from His identity.  This verse, it notes, is a statement which each believer can make at the end of life, regardless of how long or short that life may be.  

"I have manifested Your name to the men whom You have given Me out of the world.  They were Yours, You gave them to Me, and they have kept Your word.  Now they have known that all things which You have given Me are from You.  For I have given to them the words which You have given Me; and they have received them, and have known surely that I came forth from You; and they have believed that You sent Me."  Here Jesus prays for the men whom You have given Me out of the world.  These are the apostles.  My study Bible explains that these are the ones through whom God's word comes to us.   This handing down of God's word to successive generations is what is called apostolic tradition.  My study Bible says that Isaiah prophesied that in the days of the Messiah, the knowledge of the Name of God would be revealed (Isaiah 52:6).  Your name:  In the times of the Old Testament Scriptures, the phrase "the Name" was reverently used as a substitute for the name of God "Yahweh" (after the Hebrew letters which represent the name given to Moses in Exodus 3:14), because the Name was considered too sacred to pronounce.  The  fuller revelation of the Name, my study Bible explains, was given to those who believe in Christ, for Christ manifested the Name not simply by declaring the Father, but by being the very presence of God and sharing the Name with God.

If we take a close look at the overall theme of these verses of Christ' High Priestly Prayer, we see that it is all connected within the understanding of the fullness and completion of His mission into the world.  It is therefore inseparable from the Father and the aims of the Father.  Additionally, it also encompasses not simply the relationship between the divine Persons of Father, Son, and Spirit but also includes believers, "the men whom You have given Me out of the world."  Actually in the Greek, this is possibly more literally translated as "those whom You have given Me out of the world."  Therefore, this is about Christ's faithful believers.  Certainly it was most relevant to those at the Last Supper, but Christ's prays for all whom the Father has given to Him, and this is a process which is still ongoing.  So both the fullness of Christ's manifestation, and glorification encompasses all the communion of saints, the fullness of the Church even including in its ultimate sense, and the divine Persons of the Trinity.  In this way, all is inseparable from Christ's mission, which Jesus now goes forward to complete in the Cross and the Resurrection.   This beginning of Christ's High Priestly Prayer invites us to consider what "glory" means, and how this glory is interconnected to Christ's manifestation of the fullness of the Father, which also includes in time and in eternity the fullness of the Church.  But this kind of glory is completely different from worldly notions of personal glory.  If we can get an idea of what this type of glory is truly like, we will come to understand also what it means when we read in the Gospels the notion of the fulfillment or completion of joy.  At the Last Supper, Jesus tells the disciples, "These things I have spoken to you, that My joy may remain in you, and that your joy may be full" (John 15:11), and He compares their imminent suffering to that of a woman in labor, who rejoices once her child is born (John 16:20-22).  This understanding of joy is linked to Christ's glorification, because both are bound up in the fulfillment of Christ's mission, in the fulfillment of the will of the Father, and each of our roles in that fulfillment.  It is the same with John the Baptist, when he declares, "He who has the bride is the bridegroom; but the friend of the bridegroom, who stands and hears him, rejoices greatly because of the bridegroom’s voice. Therefore this joy of mine is fulfilled" (John 3:29).  This fulfillment of joy is one that is found not simply as an individual, or in a self-centered way, but one that comes in the completion of communion, a joy found in the sharing of the life in Christ, and the fullness of mission in this sense.  If we, also, are to find this fulfillment of joy, then we look to Christ's understanding of glory, and how it is found in the life that God prepares and asks us to fulfill in our own faithful living, through the light that Christ gives us for this path in each of our lives.  Joy becomes a part of the glory of God in which we might share and play our own roles, an expansion of the heart that cannot be contained in selfish and limited versions of worldly glory or renown.  Let us consider this integral, expanded, deep understanding of joy, and how it is connection to the ways we find ourselves in Christ, to the life of faith we're offered.  For the joy in our hearts comes from the fire of love (Luke 24:32), which which begins with God who is love and which Christ has manifest to us so that we also may participate in this life, and in His joy.