John 17:11, commentary and pictures

Christ is leaving the world and returning to the Father while those the Father has given Him remain in a cold world of hate and temptation, and He asks the Holy Father to hold them secure through His own name so that they may be one as Father and Son are one. Being kept does not mean being taken out of the world but remaining in it separate from its evil, practices and spirit, sanctified through the truth and holding the word He gave while sent into the world as He was sent. They become one with one another, with Christ, and through Him with God, sharing the divine nature and the Father's love, yet without loss of individuality and without fellowship with the world. That oneness is unity of mind, judgment and action in love, sympathy and shared faith, possible only through the power of the Holy Spirit, and it requires cooperation in faith, watching, prayer and resistance to evil. Their sanctified harmony proves to the world that God sent His Son and brings many to conversion, while disunion dishonors God and frustrates His plan, so believers must answer by entire consecration, obedience to the truth and putting away all strife and division.

Setting of the Prayer

These words belong to the last time alone with the eleven in the upper chamber on the Passover night after Judas had withdrawn, spoken after the work given Him was finished and the instruction of John 13 to 16 was ended with strong hopeful words of comfort and counsel. Lifting His eyes to heaven He poured out the burden of His soul in prayer, having glorified God on earth, manifested the Father's name, and gathered those who would carry on His work among men. The prayer for the disciples came as He was leaving the world to come to the Father while they remained in it, asking the Holy Father to hold secure those given Him that they might be united as Father and Son are united. It was His precious last prayer before passing through the great agony in Gethsemane prior to crucifixion, His words of comfort, counsel and prayer before death.

It was offered just before betrayal into the hands of wicked men, trial, rejection, crucifixion and the last battle with Satan, as He went forth to meet it. It was spoken to prepare their minds for the separation shortly to take place, for trial, suffering and what they would see Him suffer, comforting them concerning the sufferings of their Lord. Their future work depended on divine power and their ministry had to be built upon a divine Christ. The instruction was given to strengthen them for trial by remembering His love.

The words were spoken to His faithful disciples alone, not for the multitude who could not understand such sacred truths. They were not fully understood or appreciated until after the resurrection and the descent of the Holy Spirit. Imprinted on mind and heart, they were repeated again and again by the disciples to stay their sinking hearts in great disappointment and trial and to steady one another. Through their testimony they have spread over all lands and lived through all ages to comfort the desponding and give peace and hope to thousands who believe.

In this verse He acts with divine authority as a consecrated high priest bringing the children of Adam before God, joining earth to heaven and finite people to the infinite God, and as a faithful shepherd gathering His flock under the shadow of the Almighty into a strong and sure refuge. The prayer identifies His interests with fallen humanity. As the disciples face need, danger and temptation He intercedes for them and seeks grace and strength from the Father, showing His care and dependence on the Father for fresh grace so He can strengthen them with assurance and hope and come from prayer prepared to teach and serve them.

The prayer gives the pattern of the intercession He carries on in heaven within the veil for all to the ends of the earth who receive Him, which He will continue to the end of the world. Standing at His Father's right hand and entered within the veil as Forerunner and High Priest, He stays linked to His people in closest sympathy by love and truth and ever lives to make intercession for them. He pleads His own merits and blood with power, holding out His bruised hands bearing the wounds of the cruel spikes in which He has graven His church, pleading for His church and its blood-bought rights. He pleads even for backsliders and rebels, and never loses a case committed to Him, even for the most lowly, oppressed, suffering and tried, so that His prevailing intercession keeps obedient believers from falling and because He lives they shall live also.

Leaving and Being Kept

Christ is now no more in the world and is coming to the Father, while the disciples remain in the world after He has finished the work given Him and gathered those who would carry it on. He speaks this as He is about to leave the world to return to the Father, just before His betrayal, trial and crucifixion, entrusting His followers to the Father's keeping as they stay behind. They are left in a cold world of hate, unbelief, temptation and persecution, facing life in the world without His visible presence. His request is that the Holy Father preserve them through His own name and make them one as He and the Father are one.

Those to be kept are those whom the Father has given to Christ, who belong to the Father and have been entrusted to the Son. They belong to Christ and must stand in God's strength, and He places the highest value upon them because He purchased them at the sacrifice of His own life. This calls for care and patience in how His followers treat one another.

He addresses God as Holy Father and asks Him to keep them through His own name and to hold them secure. The keeping is for those given to Him, that they may be guarded by God and united as the Father and Son are united. Their protection and unity are essential teachings for Christian life and eternal principles to be lived out.

The prayer spoken for the disciples then present was not for them alone but extends to all who would believe through their word even to the end of the world. It reaches His church on earth, including His church in the last days, and readers of Scripture in all time, and does not divide the apostles from later believers. The unity it seeks is realized by being blended in Christ, grounded in believers' unity with Him and expressed in sympathy, tenderness and love, while division and strife are contrary to it.

Meaning of Divine Keeping

To be kept is to stay in the world and not be taken out of it, yet to be guarded from evil and sin and from taking on the world's practices, values, maxims, dispositions and spirit. The keeping makes believers separate from the world as Christ is separate, sanctified through the truth and through God's word, holding fast the word He gave them even when hated for not being of the world. As He was sent into the world, so they are sent into it to share His self-denial, self-sacrifice and suffering. The prayer for this keeping belongs to His intercession before trial and crucifixion, asking the Holy Father to preserve in His own name those given to Him and to make them one as Father and Son are one, while He who had kept them in the Father's name when with them, losing none but the son of perdition that Scripture might be fulfilled, spoke these things in the world that His joy might be fulfilled in them. Their unity is a source of strength and a witness that the Father sent Jesus, and they must not live by the world's selfishness and pride but separate from whatever dishonors God's name.

The keeping concerns spiritual blessings rather than wealth or human preferment, and assures those who faithfully perform their duties that they may be kept as faithful subjects of heaven. It belongs to the personal experience of true believers who receive Christ's words and trust Him, and who are kept by God as learners growing in spiritual life. It is for those seeking salvation to cling to Christ who gave His life for them, and to receive power to become God's children and to overcome sin.

God's keeping does not remove human responsibility to remain in God's love and faith, for God does nothing without human cooperation. Believers cooperate by living in union with Christ, trusting His promises and gaining strength by looking to Jesus and beholding Him until changed into His likeness. They must pray earnestly, watch, humbly sense their weakness, resist evil practices and avoid the first wrong step, laying hold of the divine nature by faith so God can keep them by His power unto salvation. Carelessness, inattention, recklessness and self-confidence in guarding the soul leave it vulnerable to Satan, who exploits inherited and cultivated traits to blind eyes to needs and defects in order to sift as wheat. The one thus kept alive to God has a heart that cannot be changed or shaken, does not watch for slights, does not center imagination on self, and does not let little things destroy peace of mind, while striving for supremacy hinders spirituality.

The keeping assures His tried, suffering, tempted and persecuted people left in a world of temptation, a persecuting world seared and marred by the curse, that Jesus remembers them, looks upon them and will not forget them. He intercedes from within the veil, where He has entered as Forerunner and remains linked to His people in closest sympathy, ever living to plead His own merits and blood with power even for backsliders, rebels, and the most lowly, oppressed, suffering and tried, and never losing a case committed to Him. He prays to keep and shield them, to encourage, strengthen, confirm and preserve their unity, so that when left alone to face a cold and cruel world of bitter hate, unbelief and persecution, and the fearful test of His sufferings and death, their faith proves steadfast and they are not utterly overwhelmed with despair. In this they partake with Him in self-denial, self-sacrifice and suffering, receive all the divine resources of His sympathy and love, and have His joy fulfilled in them.

The verse sets Christ as the great Example in prayer, praying most earnestly to the Father in behalf of His people and for Himself. Through the night from the Mount of Olives, while the city was hushed and the disciples slept, He bowed in divine pleading that His disciples be kept from the evil influences they would daily meet, and His own soul was strengthened and braced for the duties and trials of the day. He prayed much and often, frequently continuing all night, leaving the busy city and noisy throng to seek a retired place without interruption, with strong crying and tears, though unsullied with corruption, a stranger to sin, Himself a source of blessing and strength who could heal the sick, raise the dead and command the tempests to obey. In this He identified Himself with human needs, weaknesses, failings and infirmities, as one tempted in all points as humans are, leaving unselfish devotion and much prayer as the need for success in labor for souls. Believers need to pray as He prayed, yet praying is one thing and living out prayers is another, and when need of help is felt and asked for, God is ever ready to supply wants from His abundant fullness so that the sincere prayer of faith is never sent up in vain and doing duty becomes a loved privilege done because right doing is loved. His prayer offered just before crucifixion is a help in every emergency for the truly penitent who offer earnest petitions for fresh grace, new supplies of strength, and the efficiency and power of the Holy Spirit promised to all who ask in faith.

Nature of Believers Oneness

The pattern that they may be one as we are reveals Father and Son as distinct persons in a real relationship, with Christ addressing the Father and going to Him. Their oneness does not erase individuality, and so the unity of Christ's followers with Him likewise preserves their individuality and identity. That unity never means surrendering conscience to another person, but standing in God's strength while retaining one's own identity. Nor does it mean joining in fellowship with the world, whose service and allegiance differ from theirs.

Believers are to be kept in God's name and made one as Father and Son are one, joined with one another, with Christ, and through Christ with God, blended in Him in close relation. Through grace they are united to Christ and to one another, share the divine nature, and escape the world's corruption caused by sinful desire. People changed from sin to holiness are loved by the Father as He loves His Son, with lives hidden with Christ in God as His chosen children sharing inheritance with Him. Jesus carries on the great process by which believers are made one with Him in this present life, to be one with Him throughout all eternity. God wants to keep them unspotted from the world, to forgive their sins, and to draw them to Himself, that they may step into the everlasting kingdom, all bound together by the golden chain of love let down from heaven.

That oneness is essential to spiritual life and power, to witness, and to proclaiming the gospel, for united believers receive the aid of the Holy Spirit and angels and advance in mission, while discord and strife misrepresent God's purpose. Christ gives His true disciples the glory of His character through the impartation of His Spirit, who abides in them and appears in their lives. When believers share one mind, selfish barriers disappear and many are converted. Their sanctified harmony shows the world that God sent Christ to save sinners, and it depends on giving up their own way for God's way.

Oneness does not mean everyone has the same disposition, the same temperament, thinks in the very same channel, possesses the same degree of intelligence, or has the same experience. It allows for different gifts and varied experiences, different characters and methods, and a great variety in management in temporal matters and in manner of labor without creating dissension, discord, and disunion. Each is to do his own given work while all work together with God in perfect unity and love, bearing fruit to God's glory. Like distinct branches of the true Vine they draw all sustenance from one Source, Christ Jesus, which requires daily emptying the heart of self and dependence on Christ so selfishness does not tarnish words and acts. Such unity is grounded in God's word and the Holy Spirit, calls to brotherly sympathy and love and to remove barriers of selfishness, color, and caste, and helps bring many more to conversion.

That oneness means not many independent atoms but unity of action among believers, a high standard that must be pressed toward without resting content short of it. It is the unity of God's people together, not a separate path followed by one or two apart from the body. It is possible and is put into practice when believers speak the same thing, have no divisions, and are joined in the same mind and judgment. It is answered when the teaching of 1 Corinthians 1 is taken into earnest life practice and lived without division. Believers answer it by seeking sanctification through the truth, using talents faithfully, loving God and one another, and overcoming divisions rather than standing apart.

The unity Christ prayed for is a oneness among believers like the oneness of Son and Father, to take the place of coldness and hardness of heart. It is to be expressed in love and shared faith and understanding of God's Word. It is lived out through Christ's love enabling them to love one another as He loved them, as His followers hear and obey Him. It means hearts blended together in perfect unity, sought in spirit, in understanding, and in faith, with sanctified ears and understanding, solidity of character, living faith, and love making believers representatives of Jesus and lights amid moral darkness. Drawing nigh to God individually brings believers nigh to one another, for none can draw nigh to God and come to the same cross without this unity.

In daily practice this oneness means cherishing love for one another, emptying the heart of selfishness and self-centeredness and taking out every thread of selfishness, seeking no human glory or kingly power. It means no longer accusing, backbiting, criticizing, or weakening one another's hands, but appreciating one another, esteeming others better than self, helping and strengthening one another, and speaking words of hope and cheer that make hearts glad. It calls believers to strive for unity, cultivate love, uproot suspicion, envy, jealousy and evil thinking and speaking, press together, work as one, be at peace among themselves, and put away spiritual pride and love of supremacy and become as little children. It means receiving the Holy Spirit and the transforming influence of Christ's grace so that Christ is revealed in spirit and words and acts, each doing his own appointed work with best effort and loving one another as Christ loved. Through this oneness God is glorified in believers as He is glorified in the Son, and God loves them as He loves the Son, with mutual love becoming divine credentials to the world as Christ speaks and works through His people.

This unity can exist only through the power of the Holy Spirit, and it is the union that will endure testing, requiring close Christian fellowship and devotion with others of like faith. It is the result of the influence of the grace of God upon human hearts, entered when every sin standing between them and God or between them and others is confessed and forsaken and every wrong is made right, beginning with leaving the gift before the altar of prayer so the blood of Jesus is efficacious in their behalf. That living union with God hates the sin that separates the soul from God, and when conviction comes reveals the light of the glory of God. It is the evidence to the world that God sent His Son to save sinners. When tempted and tried, believers can claim power in Christ's name, sustained by the truth as it is in Jesus and by faith that takes hold of God's promises and claims them as one's own.

That vital inward oneness in which Christ is formed within comes by eating the Word of God, which is His flesh and blood; receiving the Word is receiving Christ Himself, and through obedience the believer becomes a partaker of the divine nature. As temporal food must be eaten daily to renew blood, and as a branch must remain united fiber by fiber and vein by vein to the vine to bear fruit, so the Word must be eaten daily to maintain spiritual life and health. Its entrance gives light and understanding to the simple, nourishes healthful piety, renews the spirit of the mind, and causes growth up into Christ the living Head, the knowledge of whom is eternal life.

Witness to the World

Their sanctified harmony shows the world that God sent His Son to save sinners. That oneness is the evidence to be given to the world that the Father sent Jesus, convincing the world that Christianity is genuine and giving the divine credentials of mutual love. Christ speaks and works through His people when they are one in Him, leading others to know they have been with Jesus and bringing many to conversion. This unity does not erase anyone's individuality but is entered when believers give up their own way for God's way and live in unity with one another and with Christ. Christ gives His true disciples the glory of His character through the impartation of His Spirit, who abides in them and appears in their lives.

Their unity with Christ and with one another is essential to their spiritual life and power, their witness to the world, and their work of proclaiming the gospel. United, they receive the aid of the Holy Spirit and of angels and advance in their mission, while their unity is a source of strength though they are not of the world, may be hated by it, and need protection from evil. Those given to Jesus are to be kept in unity as He prepares to leave the world and return to the Father, reflecting the unity of the Father and the Son. This close relation to Jesus is entered when every sin standing between them and God or between them and others is confessed and forsaken and every wrong is made right as Christ commanded, beginning with leaving the gift before the altar of prayer so that the blood of Jesus Christ is efficacious in their behalf. Such oneness is the result of the influence of the grace of God upon human hearts, giving a living union with God that hates the sin that separates the soul from God and, when conviction comes, reveals the light of the glory of God.

Disunion dishonors God. God's people are to work together as a church, and disorganization and division into separate groups oppose His plan and frustrate it. Disunity that breaks the church into separate groups gives Satan cause to triumph. Disagreement among God's people shows that the lesson of Christ's prayer has not been given its due weight, and the prayer is ignored when those who have received light act in disobedience and ambition, bringing confusion, strife, and division into the church instead of the unity Christ prayed for. Satan understands the prayer better than church members and heads of families do and does not want God's people to understand it. He works to keep them in discord and strife over little misunderstandings and little differences, which when dwelt upon grow into variance and hatred, and if he keeps them divided they present before the world a showing exactly opposite to what God desires them to present.

Spiritual gifts are Heaven's appointed means to bring the church to that unity and perfection prayed for, that the Father keep His people and make them one as Christ is one with the Father. They lay the true foundation and platform of unity, securing and preserving that oneness and bringing the saints to unity of the faith, in contrast to human creeds which only produce sectarian division and shut out the gifts. Awareness that angels look on should make people less careless and indifferent, prompting them to talk less and pray more, with works done in God and careful speech that honors Him. Angels work to answer this prayer for the disciples' unity, which requires humility, freedom from selfish pride, and the cultivation of Christian love and Christlike character.

Answering Prayer in Life

John 17 as a whole is to be repeatedly studied from first verse to last, inwardly absorbed, read over and over, often repeated and carried into practical life to shape lives, habits and conduct. It presents the plan of redemption, what God desires to do for the race and the Father's provision, the fullness of Christ's mercy and love to the obedient and humble, and lessons that reshape minds as the words are received with new understanding. Those who believe and practice God's Word answer the prayer, and preserving the unity Jesus asks for brings God's love, the sinner's salvation and God's glory, joining believers to Christ in the work of saving a lost world. The prayer is a pattern for believers' lives, guarding against divided, one-sided development and showing each one his place in oneness with Christ and the Father through loving Christ and the truth.

Answering requires entire consecration, seeking unity, sanctification through the truth and obedience to God's commands, following on with simple faith taking God at His word and putting whole powers into living it with Christ glorified in wholehearted experience. Eternal life is kept in view and trials are met by trusting Him who saves to the uttermost, bringing purification, refinement, Christlike kindness and correction of thoughts, words and acts. The prayer holds great possibilities that strengthen faith and raise what a Christian may become, and its teachings are essential instruction for spiritual life and eternal principles for every church, marked by refining, purifying and unselfish principles. Christ's aim was to receive from the Father and give through teaching and unselfish service what would save people from sin and turn the rebellious toward righteousness, enabling Christian fellowship and effective service and showing the world the power of God's grace, with no one to be discouraged and those bearing heavy burdens to be encouraged.

Answering means preserving sacred unity in mind and work rather than remaining separate, with oneness a sacred responsibility to preserve in unity and confidence in one another. Believers echo the prayer in thoughts and petitions, seek it with earnest prayer and live so God can answer, giving up criticism, petty differences, dissension, strife, unkind talk, judgment and self-assured conversation that defiles, hurts souls and spoils God's work, helping those who err, avoiding actions that stir prejudice, protecting others from stumbling, and acting faithfully and truly with Christlikeness. They must not frustrate the prayer through perversity, carelessness, indifference or drawing apart, since division displeases God and even privately harboring enmity or feelings against fellow believers violates the sacred trust, while unity binds hearts in confidence and those at variance cannot be branches of the True Vine.

The instruction is to be practiced first in the home and households, where God measures members by home conduct. Parents and children are to be brought into right relation to God through the Word and the Spirit without dissension, and obeying Christ's words there extends influence to the church, keeps the home from grieving the Spirit, and makes the lamp burn brightly for those in darkness. Unity is the badge of discipleship revealing the love that binds His children heart to heart after the pattern of His own life, uniting them in one great work with combined consecrated effort and tender respectful regard that recovers sinners, so that in love and unity they are on earth a symbol of the family in heaven. Parents can direct children to Christ and what He suffered, helping prepare them for heaven, while righteous principles gain power over the life to soften and subdue the natural disposition in the testing time when God is proving who is worthy of admittance into His family.

The unity must hold among workers of different nationalities, characters, temperaments and methods, who through grace put self aside and work in harmony, each doing his own given work while all work together with God. This embraces ministers and people and the ministry with medical missionary work and physicians, who must labor together in love without envy, jealousy, distrust or enmity over methods of practice, strengthening one another as brethren, for becoming one with fellow believers brings God's love and power into the soul while separation shows the Holy Spirit is not working upon hearts. Like distinct branches of the true Vine they draw all sustenance from one Source, Christ Jesus, to produce the best fruit, which requires daily emptying the heart of self and dependence on Christ so selfishness does not tarnish words and acts. This oneness governs public ministry so that ministers believe and live John 13-17, do not make the daily of Daniel 8 a test, do not bring controversy-arousing subjects into discourses or agitate differences of opinion, but confine efforts to united lines of clear light, center on the essential city work, and speak the sacred testing truths and the binding claims of God's law with earnest simplicity.

Living the prayer in practical life forms a strong defense against Satan's attacks and enables standing the shaking test and severe conflict and troublous times ahead through sanctification in the truth and perfect union, whereas dissension and seeking the highest place leave weakness. God's standard of unselfish love with every thread of selfishness taken out, no glory given to man and all dissension and strife ceasing, must be believed and practiced until reached though not yet reached, with hearts blended together in perfect unity by drawing nigh to God individually and thereby nigh to one another at the same cross. Where unity is preserved God will love believers as He loved His Son, save the sinner, glorify Himself and at warfare's end make them members of the royal family, children of the heavenly King, with union with Christ an enduring privilege and source of happiness surpassing earthly pleasures, while neglecting the call for unity and love risks removal of the candlestick.

Each claimant must make individual effort to answer by being one as Christ was one with the Father, working earnestly for harmony in service and seeking oneness with one another in Him. This means accepting the offered wholeness in Him apart from whom there is deficiency, allowing no divisions to disrupt peace, living in unity of faith and understanding of God's word where division and strife oppose Christ's desire, purging selfishness and speculative theories so witness bears truth, and refusing to honor fault-finding self-exaltation but faithfully reproving it. Such unity lets God's love and power flow in, and when followers are united in love they are a holy and powerful people, while accepting accusations against fellow believers and letting love die works against that unity.

The prayer calls for God's reviving influence rather than conformity to the world's display and fashion, with truth put into practice sanctifying the soul and followers denying themselves and taking up the cross. It is a message for Christians in every setting and needed in every home, teaching how to receive Christ's grace and warning that refusing its conditions leaves unreadiness to meet Him when He comes in glory, presenting the obligation to acknowledge God in all ways and to seek ever-growing knowledge of Him. It asks grace to follow His example and continue the work He began, and is valued by the truly converted, transformed in character, more highly than all the favors the world can offer. It reveals earnest longing, tenderness, compassion and aims to save perishing souls, which those passed from death to life share by wearing His yoke in self-denying service and continual sacrifice to win souls, praying the same prayer as Christ prayed, for loving as Christ loved requires entreating and pleading for the erring as He in soul struggle entreated for rejecters.