John 17:24

John 17:24. Father, what thou hast given me, I desire that where I am they also may be with me, that they may behold my glory which thou hast given me, because thou lovedst me before the foundation of the world. Having prayed for the spirituality and unity of all His disciples, Jesus now, in the closing petitions of His prayer, passes to the thought of their complete deliverance from the troubles of the world, and of their entrance with Him upon that glory with which He Himself was about to be glorified. It is difficult to translate the Greek verb rendered ‘I will' in the Authorised Version. ‘I will ' is too strong; perhaps ‘I desire ' comes nearest to the original. The peculiar structure of the verse, in which the clause ‘what Thou hast given Me' is so remarkably thrown forward, arises from the fact that believers are viewed not so much distributively as in the unity immediately present to the Redeemer's mind. It is the perfect glory of Jesus not only as Son of God but also as Son of man that is spoken of, His glory shining forth in undimmed brightness in the heavenly world. There is the true home of His being; and hence not ‘I shall be,' but ‘I am,' as in chap. John 14:3. Again, however, we must remember that this ‘glory ' is not that of outward estate. It is the spiritual glory of perfect union with the Father, seen and shared in apart from the shadows of earth. Hence the last words of the verse do not contain a statement of the ground upon which Jesus prays for His own, but of the nature of the glory which they are to behold when the ineffable, everlasting love of the Father to the Son is seen by them poured forth on Him who has taken the human nature into perfect union with the Divine. That had not been beheld in the Man of Sorrows: it shall be beheld when His sorrows over, but His humanity as true as it had been upon the earth He is crowned with glory. The full, the perfect love of God will then be seen to have embraced humanity in its tenderest outgoings, and the joy of the redeemed in the vision and fruition of that love will be complete (comp. on John 17:22).