in John 17?
· After his initial
two-fold prayer to the Father to ‘glorify’ the Son (17:1,5), Jesus offers two
main petitions, both in the form of urgent imperatives:
17:11 ‘Holy Father, keep them in your name….’
17:17 ‘Sanctify them in the truth….’
· Jesus repeats
each of these petitions in a different form, underscoring their centrality in
his whole prayer:
17:15 ‘My
prayer is not that you take them out of the world, but that you keep them from the evil one….’
17:19 ‘For
them I sanctify myself, that they too may be truly sanctified.’
· It is Jesus’
stated objective that, through the Father’s answering these two petitions, the
disciples and those who believe in Jesus through their message ‘may be one’,
and that, such unity being ‘perfected’, the world may ‘know’ the fact and
purpose of his mission (17:11, 21, 23).[1]
· In other words, the unity of the church for which Jesus prays is the result or goal of the disciples’ being: 1) kept or guarded in the Father’s ‘name’, and 2) sanctified in the ‘truth’, that is, in the Father’s ‘word’ (Jn 17:17).
· The preservation of the faithful in God’s name (his word taught in its truth and purity) and their sanctification in the truth are therefore the appointed means whereby the unity of the church is achieved and perfected and the saving mission of the Son to the world accomplished.
Dr Adam G Cooper
[1] This is shown by the use of the Greek word hina, which in 17:11,21,23 indicates purpose or result.