Jesus starts His prayer with the declaration that He is God. Jesus’ authority was established, tested, and now complete. With complete authority, Jesus was ready to sacrifice it all. So, His first request was simply, “Glorify Me, so that I can glorifyYou!” In short, Jesus was asking the Father that all that they had accomplished not be done in vain. The coming sacrifice need not be remembered in any other way than God demonstrating His love for us in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us! Romans 5:8.
Jesus had not missed a step, nor had he taken any glory for Himself. Instead, in His ministry, Jesus was careful to demonstrate God’s true character. He showed God’s deep desire to love people right where they were. God was not concerned with heritage, social standing, or even race, sex, or life circumstance. Instead, Jesus demonstrated that God healed the sick, lifted the ones that had fallen, cleansed the lepers, freed the demon possessed, and even raised the dead.
Now, Jesus was asking that this mission would not be be marginalized or worse – forgotten. Instead, Jesus prayed that His sacrifice would accomplish the restoration between God and man – the return to the personal relationship the Father had always desired and intended to be in place. Jesus was asking the Almighty to give people eternal life. There would be no more sacrifices, no more waiting in the arms of Abraham’s bosom. Men would again be able to have direct and eternal access to their creator and Heavenly Father.
What a shame it is for anyone that hears the message of salvation to walk away from God’s gift. The truest expression of God’s loving and selfless nature is this – Jesus became a man, demonstrated the true character of God, and now was laying down His life so that God and men could again walk together. Jesus was calling on God to highlight the truth of the mission.
God Bless You
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, 2 even as You gave Him authority over all flesh, that to all whom You have given Him, He may give eternal life. 3 This is eternal life, that they may know You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom You have sent. 4 I glorified You on the earth, having accomplished the work which You have given Me to do. 5 Now, Father, glorify Me together with Yourself, with the glory which I had with You before the world was.
6 “I have manifested Your name to the men whom You gave Me out of the world; they were Yours and You gave them to Me, and they have kept Your word. 7 Now they have come to know that everything You have given Me is from You; 8 for the words which You gave Me I have given to them; and they received them and truly understood that I came forth from You, and they believed that You sent Me. 9 I ask on their behalf; I do not ask on behalf of the world, but of those whom You have given Me; for they are Yours; 10 and all things that are Mine are Yours, and Yours are Mine; and I have been glorified in them. 11 I am no longer in the world; and yet they themselves are in the world, and I come to You. Holy Father, keep them in Your name, the name which You have given Me, that they may be one even as We are. 12 While I was with them, I was keeping them in Your name which You have given Me; and I guarded them and not one of them perished but the son of perdition, so that the Scripture would be fulfilled.
Walking With God 