John 17:6-8 I have manifested your name to the men which you gave me out of the world: your they were, and you gave them me… I. ITS NATURE. The manifestation of the name of God. (ver. 6). In Himself invisible and incomprehensible (John 1:18; John 6:46; Job 11:7; Job 37:23; 1 Timothy 6:16), who and what He was must have remained a secret. (Genesis 32:29; Judges 13:18), had not God been pleased to make some disclosure thereof. This He did in creation (Psalm 8:1; Psalm 19:1-3; Romans 1:20), and still does in Providence (Daniel 4:34, 35; Romans 11:36; Ephesians 1:11). A further revelation He furnished to the Jews; but never till Christ came, who was the Image of the invisible God (Colossians 1:15; Hebrews 1:2); and who could say, "He that hath seen Me hath seen the Father" (John 14:9), was God completely manifested. Besides publishing to men the fact of the Divine existence, Christ unfolded. — 1. The nearness of God to man, and conversely man's nearness to God, a thought so little understood that even the Jews with Psalm 139, to guide them had no proper conception of God as a heavenly Friend. 2. The holiness of God — which, though dimly apprehended and vaguely believed in before the Advent, was never adequately comprehended until embodied in Christ (Hebrews 7:26). 3. The graciousness of God, which though referred to (Psalm 103:13; Malachi 2:10) was imperfectly realized until Christ taught men to say "Our Father." 4. The helpfulness of God. No one who looked on Christ healing the sick, pardoning the guilty, &c., could doubt that, if He was God's image, God could also relieve the needy. 5. The blessedness of God or, more correctly, the eternal life which is in God (1 John 1:1). II. ITS SUBJECTS. 1. The world. Although throughout this prayer a distinction is drawn between the world and the Church (ver. 6), and the Saviour's intercession is for the latter rather than for the former (ver. 9), yet Christ's manifestation of the Father's name has an outlook to the race no less than to believers. Of this perhaps a hint is furnished by the word "men" (ver. 6). 2. The Church. Christ describes those in whom His work took effect as persons who had been — (1) Separated from the race (ver. 6), i.e., in their characters as believers, while the world remained in unbelief (ver. 25, 7:7; 1 John 5:19), separated by grace, which alone made them to differ (1 Corinthians 4:7; 1 Corinthians 15:10), and separated unto the purposes of the gospel (Romans 1:1; Galatians 1:15). (2) Owned by the Father — "Thine they were" — as His creatures (Ezekiel 18:4), as being born of God (John 1:13), and so inwardly disposed to hear and obey God's voice (John 8:47; John 18:37). 3. Given to Christ — "Thou gavest them Me," (Ephesians 1:4, 5; John 6:45). III. ITS RESULTS. 1. The reception of Christ's words (ver. 8). This world had rejected Christ's words (chap. John 12:48): the disciples had believed them (John 16:27). A gracious soul desirous of learning the Father's name does not begin by criticising Christ's teaching, but with docility receives it into his understanding and heart (1 Samuel 3:9; Psalm 85:8; 1 Peter 2:2; James 1:29). 2. The recognition of Christ's words as the Father's (ver. 7; cf 7:17; 1 Thessalonians 2:13). 3. The preservation of the Father's words (ver. 6). To keep God's word means more than to remember it — viz., to enshrine it in the spirit, to give it a chief place in the affections, to subject to it the entire being, intellect, heart, conscience, will.Lessons: 1. Who would know God must study Him as revealed in Christ. 2. Who would be wise unto salvation must learn at Christ's feet. 3. Who would reach eternal glory must keep the Father's words. (T. Whitelaw, . D. D.) Parallel Verses KJV: 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. |
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