I have manifested thy name to the men whom thou gavest me out of the world. They were thine, and thou gavest them me, and they have kept thy word.
Here Jesus turns from praying about His own glory to speaking about His friends. He sums up His whole life among them in one line: a name made known, people given to Him, a word kept. Each phrase raises a question. Which name? Why these people? And in what sense did they "keep" the word?
The name He made known is not a title of power. It is the name of a relationship.
"I have manifested your name to the people whom you gave me." The whole of this chapter speaks of the Father's name. It is not the Almighty, Jehovah, or Most High, the names He will bear in the millennium, "most high over heaven and earth." It is the Father, putting us in the place of sons.
The verse says He manifested the name, not that He declared it. One writer draws out the difference between showing and telling.
What is manifested is meant to be seen. What is declared is meant to be heard. Jesus both manifested and declared the Father's Name. What He did showed what the Father is, making visible what His Name represents. Those in whom the Spirit has worked can appreciate the heavenly grace of God made visible in the Lord Jesus.
The verse names these people by where they came from and who they belong to. Nothing about it was accidental.
They are described as "the people whom you gave me out of the world." So from the very start they stand clearly apart from the world. The Father took them out of it and gave them to the Son. They were the Father's according to His purpose before time began. But He gave them to the Son, so that the Son might bring them to know the Father by manifesting His Name to them.
By the world's standards these men were nobodies. The Father valued them differently.
They were poor and despised and of little account in the world. People despised them all the more because they had been drawn to Christ. They were not the great and noble of the earth, but the Father considered them a good gift for His Son. Their being drawn after Jesus was no mere accident. The Father had drawn them to His Son and had given them to Him, and He had received them. He loved them and gave Himself for them, and He never intended to part company with them.
They were the Father's before they were given to the Son. That short phrase also widens the circle beyond Israel.
The revelation of all that the Father is, as expressed by His Name, and these communications, are not given to the world. Nor are they given simply to a Jewish remnant out of Israel. They are given to the men that the Father gave to Christ "out of the world." Such belong to the great company of God's elect, for the Lord can say "Yours they were." So the language He uses leaves the way open for others, besides the godly remnant of Israel, to come into all this blessedness.
That is a bold thing to say about the disciples. One writer explains what the words do and do not measure.
Though they had been the Father's possession, only the Son had made the Father known to them. Of them He says, "they have kept your word." He is not speaking of how fully they kept it, but of the fact, which is true of every believer.
Jesus ties their obedience to the Father, not to Himself.
"And they have kept" — not My, but "your word." All this is the grace that ties the disciples to the Father, and shows Him as their Servant… This was not Christ, the Son, acting apart from or separate from the Father.
There was a purpose behind all this showing and telling.
He showed the disciples the Father in all His attributes, and passed on the Father's words. His aim was to bring them into the same position before the Father that He as a Man enjoyed. So the Lord makes it possible for us to walk knowing the Father's love, revealed in the Son. He also makes it possible for us to share the mind of the Father through what the Father told the Son.
- The Name — What Jesus revealed was God as Father, not Almighty or Most High; that name places believers as sons.
- The Gift — These men were the Father's first, then given to the Son out of the world. The Father counted them a good gift, and the Son will never part with them.
- The Showing — Declaring is for the ears, manifesting is for the eyes. Jesus did both, so His life showed what the Father is.
- The Word — "They have kept your word" states a fact true of every believer, not a score for how well they did. And it is the Father's word, for the Son is never separate from Him.
- The Point — All of it brings us where the Son stood as Man: sure of the Father's love, and let in on His mind.
Now they have known that all things that thou hast given me are of thee;
At the heart of this verse is a small phrase that could look like a repetition: what the Father gave is from the Father. Commentators press on the word to show it carries the whole weight of relationship.
At first glance this looks like a repetition, but the thought is "from you" as Father. Martha had said, "even now I know that whatever you ask from God, God will give you," but now He had declared the Father's name, and they were to know that all He had was the Father's gift: relationship was brought out.
Others watched the same life and drew other conclusions. They did not learn new facts. They learned where everything came from.
They had entered into the secret of which the world knew nothing: the Father was the source of all that was given to the Son. Some wondered at His works and His words. Others hated Him, and said that what no man could do came from Satan — a blasphemy. The disciples had learnt that all these things were from the Father, as the Son wanted them to.
Knowing Jesus as the promised King was not the whole of it.
This is more than knowing Him as Messiah. They knew the Father, and Christ the object of the Father's heart, and all the counsels of God about Him.
Darby weighs what that knowledge was worth.
They saw the Father's glory in the hands of the Son. The Father was shown to them, and that was enough. Nothing more could be, except the actual glory itself. They knew that they were really the Father's. It was glorious knowledge.
They did not work this out for themselves. It came through the words the Son passed on, and it reaches to everything Christians enjoy now.
When they received the Father's words from the Son, the disciples knew that the Father was the source of all the things given to the Son. The Son came to carry out everything for the Father. He came to carry out all the wonderful things in the Father's heart for the blessing of those the Father had given Him. All that we have been called to enjoy at the present moment springs from the Father's love; He is the source of all.
Nothing was held back. What the Father communicated to the Son in that relationship, the Son handed over.
"I have given them the words that you gave me." He had put them into the same place and relationship He Himself was in as a man on earth with the Father. So whatever the Father had told Him in that relationship, He passes on to them. He brings them into all the blessing — into all the brightness of the hope — and brings us now into the full awareness of that relationship.
The words handed on were not a set of rules.
The Lord handed over to His disciples the intimate communications of grace that the Father gave to Him. It was no longer a question of the ten commandments given through Moses — the measure of man's responsibility, given to prove his sin and ruin, which he neither admitted nor felt.
There is a gap here between what they knew and what they could say.
They were able to trace things to their source, however little they might have been able to put their knowledge into words. They had received the words that the Father had given to the Son, and had known for certain that He had come from the Father, and that the Father had sent Him. This the Lord could say of them, though they might not have been able to say it of themselves.
This was deliberate on His part, not an oversight.
It is true that before they received the Holy Spirit they gained little from what He told them about the Father. But what they might have gained from was there in front of them. Sadly, they never once understood what the Lord said to them. He does not speak here of how little they understood. He speaks of the revelation itself that He had made to them, and He credits them with all its value.
- Source. The verse turns on one word. What the Son holds is from the Father — a gift inside the Father-Son relationship, not a general gift of God.
- Secret. The world watched the same works and either wondered or blasphemed; only the disciples traced them home to their source.
- Beyond Messiah. Knowing Him as the promised King is less than this — they knew the Father, and knew the Son as the object of the Father's heart.
- Passed on. They learned it through the words the Son gave them, so that everything Christians enjoy today still springs from the Father's love.
- Credited. The Lord says of them what they could not say of themselves, speaking of the revelation given rather than of how little they grasped.
for the words which thou hast given me I have given them, and they have received [them], and have known truly that I came out from thee, and have believed that thou sentest me.
On the night before the cross, Jesus tells the Father what He did with what He was given. The Father's own words He passed straight on to His disciples — and they received them, even though within hours they would fail Him.
The verse says "words," in the plural. The "word" and the "words" are not the same thing.
Not only had the Lord declared the Father, but He had given to His disciples the "words" which the Father had given Him. He shared with them the messages He had received from the Father. So they learn not only who the Father is in all His love and holiness. Through the "words" they also learn the Father's mind. If the "word" reveals who He is, the "words" reveal His mind and thoughts.
These sayings came to the Son inside His own relationship with the Father. He did not treat them as private property.
Notice in verse 8 how far He goes with us. "I have given them the words that You gave Me." That is, He had put them into the very place and relationship He Himself was in as a man on earth with the Father. So whatever the Father had told Him in that relationship, He passes on to them. He brings them into all the blessing — into all the brightness of the hope. He brings us now into the full awareness of that relationship.
"They have received them" sounds like a report of complete success. Kelly reads it as grace counting what is real, not how much was grasped.
Since He had given them the words the Father gave to Him, the disciples did receive the truth, though no doubt imperfectly. So they came to know for certain that Christ the Son came out from the Father. And they believed as well that the Father sent Him. This is how grace reckons: it does not measure degrees, but makes much of what is real. He can well do this, for His love gives, deepens, and secures from first to last.
Within hours these same men would show cowardice and deny Him. That makes the Lord's description of them all the more striking.
This was very touching, for think what these men had been, how slow, how dull, how unresponsive! And think what they were on the point of showing themselves to be. What cowardice, what denials, in a few hours! But the Son saw them in the light of God's purpose. He knew that the Father had power in the end to bring about in them all that He had purposed. So He credited them with having in fullness what they as yet realized only in a very feeble measure. And does He not treat His saints today, and pray for them, in just the same way?
The verse names knowing and believing as separate steps, with different objects. Grant hears two sides of one truth in them.
They had received them. In some cases this came with confusion and questions, yet they had done so in real, living faith. That gave them absolute confidence that Christ had come out from the Father (v. 8). Notice that this wording shows the Son's own energy and initiative in coming forth. Then He adds, "they have believed that You sent Me," and this shows the Father's initiative. Both are true, for Father and Son are One.
Kelly adds why the second half matters.
To know for certain that the Son came out from the Father does not satisfy His heart. That alone would prove no more than His own love in coming. But the disciples believed the further truth that the Father sent Him — the proof of His own love to them.
Everything the Lord goes on to ask for His people rests on one simple thing.
It is most comforting to us that our Lord bases all these glorious desires for the saints on one thing alone. They had received the Son's testimony about the Father, and they had firmly believed in the Father's love.
What began as sharing words does not stop there.
Our blessed Lord would have us share with Himself "the words" — the divine communications — which the Father gave Him. He also gives us His own peace — that calm, untroubled state which always flowed from confidence in the Father's love… And, to crown it all, He will share His glory with us.
- Given. The Father gave the Son words; the Son gave those same words away rather than keeping them.
- Opened. The "word" shows who the Father is. The "words" open His mind and thoughts, so that the disciples stand where the Son stands.
- Received. Faith took them in — imperfectly, but really. Grace makes much of what is real and does not measure degrees.
- Credited. He describes men who would deny Him hours later by what the Father purposed for them. He treats His people the same way now.
- Result. On that reception alone He bases all He asks — and the sharing widens from His words to His peace, His joy, and His glory.