I have glorified *thee* on the earth, I have completed the work which thou gavest me that I should do it;
In John 17 the Son prays to the Father about His own work, and verse 4 is His report on it. Two questions press on the reader: how could He say this before the cross, and what was the work He calls finished?
Here the Son reviews His own service in the Father's hearing. Older translations word the verse "I have glorified you on the earth, I have finished the work," and one writer counts how often that "I have" sounds through the chapter:
Ten times over in this chapter Jesus says the words "I have," declaring the fullness of all He had accomplished. The first two are in verse 4, where He presses the completeness of His work in support of His request for glory... The work of the most eminent servants of God has been fragmentary and incomplete. And even if it were otherwise, not one of them would have dared to come to God, who searches hearts and ways, and pronounce on their own work. To declare its finished perfection would have been the worst kind of presumption. But here the Son is speaking, and for Him it was no presumption.
He glorified the Father not in heaven but "on earth." That place is the whole point:
What had the first Adam done? He had refused to recognise either the power or the goodness of God; he had denied all that God was towards him... What is precious is that it is man who has perfectly glorified God: He set out to do it, and He has done it. It needed to be done in man, for it is in man that God was dishonoured. It is there that Satan reigns and governs. It is there that the image of God is spoiled. It is there that God has been dishonoured in front of the angels. But it is there too that He has been glorified in Jesus — man — not by avoiding the evil but by placing Himself in the middle of it all.
When He prayed these words, the cross was still ahead of Him. He speaks of the work in the past tense anyway.
The work is viewed as already accomplished, and He says so... He had done all that He had come to do on earth. This is the position He takes. When He spoke these words He still had to accomplish the mighty work of redemption. The bitter cup was still full to the brim, and He had to drink it. But it was as certain to be done as though it had been done.
Most readers take the finished work to include the cross. One writer argues for a narrower reading, and admits it is not the common view:
What had He finished? Compare this last clause with the words "the works that the Father has given Me to finish." We take it to be His life-work in service, which had now come to an end. It does not include His death, which was not yet accomplished. We are aware, of course, that this is not the view commonly held. We put it before the reader, with the ground for our conclusion, so that he may judge for himself.
Others read the same words as resting everything the Son gives on Calvary:
If the Son gives eternal life, He gives it righteously... He gives it on the basis that He has glorified the Father here on earth and has finished the work the Father gave Him to do; that would take us to the cross... Here, being in His own spirit beyond the cross and looking back, as it were, taking account of some of the blessed results of it, He said, "I have glorified you on the earth; I have finished the work that you gave me to do."
Verse 4 leads straight into the request of verse 5. He puts forward the finished work, and the benefit does not stop with Him:
Here the whole path of Christ on earth, giving Himself up to obey and please His Father, is summed up. That is why it was all the more necessary to state its completion: "having finished the work which You have given Me to do."... And on that basis He asks the Father to glorify Him. He asks it not only because of His personal glory and relationship, but because of the work completed to His glory here below. In this way He might lay a valid and sure title for us to join Him in the same heavenly blessedness.
Look at where His service reached, and at what actually marked it:
The distinguishing feature of His service was not its extent. The sphere could hardly be smaller — Galilee of the Gentiles, Jerusalem, Samaria — while its effects take in the heavens, the earth, and all creation. But the great feature of it was that He always did the things that pleased the Father. He would not leave His place with the Father except to do His will, and could not return to it without having accomplished that will.
- Given. The Father handed the Son the work: "the work that you gave me to do." So finishing it was something to report, not to boast about.
- Done. He calls the work complete while the cup was still full and the cross still ahead. With Him, certain and finished are the same thing.
- Here. A man gave God glory on earth, the one place where God had been dishonoured. Evil did not drive Him out of the scene; He glorified God in the middle of it.
- Disputed. Commentators differ over what "the work" covers. Some limit it to His life of service up to that hour; most read it as reaching through to the cross.
- Ours. The finished work is the ground of His request for glory, and it lays a title for us to share that glory with Him. What made that work great was never its size, but that the Father gave it.
and now glorify *me*, *thou* Father, along with thyself, with the glory which I had along with thee before the world was.
This prayer reaches back before creation, asking the Father for something no creature could ever ask for. Two questions press on the reader: what is this glory the Son says He had, and why must He ask for what was already His?
The writers quote an older translation here: where the ESV has "in your own presence," it reads "with Your own self." One writer notes that the prayer itself settles who this Speaker is, because of what it dares to ask:
The eternal Son prays to the eternal Father. His making Himself equal with God was blasphemy in the eyes of the Jews, and deserving of death. As He prayed, "Glorify Me with Your own self," He declared Himself equal with the Father. What mere creature could look for that? What mere creature could ask for that in solemn prayer to the Father? But He could, and He did. He had a history before the world was. He had His part in essential divine glory before time began.
The wording rules out two ideas: that this glory began at some point, or that the prayer would create it.
The wording of this prayer will not let us think that the Speaker's glory was anything but eternal. It is not a glory He began to have at some point in the past. It is not a glory He would have for the first time when this prayer was answered. It is the glory which He "had" before the world was.
If He held glory before the world existed, then He existed before the world did. Another writer tells of a man whom that short phrase set free:
"'Before the world was,'" he cried, "settled the matter for me." May it settle it for the reader. If Christ had glory "before the world was," He existed "before the world was."
The Greek word behind "with" means alongside. The Son asks for glory at the Father's own side:
The Speaker asked the Father plainly and with emphasis ("You, Father") that He Himself might be glorified "along with [para] Yourself," at Your own side. And this glory was the very same glory the Speaker had "along with [para] You," at Your side, "before the world was."
The glory was His by right. But He had taken a servant's place, so He asks instead of taking:
He was Son before time began. So of course He had glory with the Father before the world was. But on earth He had taken the place of a servant as man. Now He asks the Father to glorify Him alongside Himself, with the glory He had with Him eternally. Man for ever, He would receive everything from the Father, though He is Son from eternity. And when He is glorified, it is so that He may glorify the Father. Such is perfect love and devotion.
The opening verses of the chapter give two reasons why the Son may ask for glory — one from who He is, one from what He has done:
He says, "Glorify Your Son, that Your Son also may glorify You." That is the title which His Person gives Him to this glory. And the other is, "I have glorified You on the earth"... "And now, O Father, glorify Me"...; that is, the Lord presents these two grounds on which He is asking for His glory as man. He is glorified in virtue of His Person, and then glorified in virtue of His work.
One writer draws attention to what the Son never says, even at this height:
He has just the same glory as the Father, but He never steps out of the place of humiliation on His own... So here He says, "I have glorified You," and now, "You glorify Me." But He never says, "I have glorified You, and now I will glorify Myself." He receives everything, and will take everything as receiving it from the Father.
The same writer separates two glories in this chapter. Only one of them is shared with us:
In John 17 there are two glories, so to speak; the glory as God and the glory as Man, and it is the latter He gives to us... It is a glorious thing to be God and to be one with the Father. But all that He has as man, we have. There is His unity with the Father, and we cannot have that. But as it is shown in man, we have it all.
- Before — the glory did not begin at some point, and this prayer does not create it. He had it. So He was there before the world was.
- Beside — the glory is at the Father's side. He does not ask for glory apart from the Father, but for glory with Him.
- Below — He came into manhood and the servant's place, so what was His by right He now asks for as a gift.
- Because — He asks on two grounds: who He is as Son, and the finished work by which He glorified the Father on earth.
- Beyond — He receives all from the Father and never glorifies Himself. Of the two glories in this chapter, His unity with the Father stays His own. What is His as Man He shares with His people.