After Jesus had spoken these words, he looked up to heaven and said, “Father, the hour has come; glorify your Son so that the Son may glorify you,
since you have given him authority over all people, to give eternal life to all whom you have given him.
And this is eternal life, that they may know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent.
I glorified you on earth by finishing the work that you gave me to do.
So now, Father, glorify me in your own presence with the glory that I had in your presence before the world existed.
I have made your name known to those whom you gave me from the world. They were yours, and you gave them to me, and they have kept your word.
Now they know that everything you have given me is from you;
for the words that you gave to me I have given to them, and they have received them and know in truth that I came from you; and they have believed that you sent me.
I am asking on their behalf; I am not asking on behalf of the world, but on behalf of those whom you gave me, because they are yours.
All mine are yours, and yours are mine; and I have been glorified in them.
And now I am no longer in the world, but they are in the world, and I am coming to you. Holy Father, protect them in your name that you have given me, so that they may be one, as we are one.
While I was with them, I protected them in your name that you have given me. I guarded them, and not one of them was lost except the one destined to be lost, so that the scripture might be fulfilled.
But now I am coming to you, and I speak these things in the world so that they may have my joy made complete in themselves.
I have given them your word, and the world has hated them because they do not belong to the world, just as I do not belong to the world.
I am not asking you to take them out of the world, but I ask you to protect them from the evil one.
They do not belong to the world, just as I do not belong to the world.
Sanctify them in the truth; your word is truth.
As you have sent me into the world, so I have sent them into the world.
And for their sakes I sanctify myself, so that they also may be sanctified in truth.
“I ask not only on behalf of these, but also on behalf of those who will believe in me through their word,
that they may all be one. As you, Father, are in me and I am in you, may they also be in us, so that the world may believe that you have sent me.
The glory that you have given me I have given them, so that they may be one, as we are one,
I in them and you in me, that they may become completely one, so that the world may know that you have sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me.
Father, I desire that those also, whom you have given me, may be with me where I am, to see my glory, which you have given me because you loved me before the foundation of the world.
Righteous Father, the world does not know you, but I know you; and these know that you have sent me.
I made your name known to them, and I will make it known, so that the love with which you have loved me may be in them, and I in them.”
17:1 After Jesus had spoken these words, he looked up to heaven and said, "Father, the hour has come; glorify your Son so that your Son may glorify you."
After giving his disciples what was sufficient for their salvation and inciting them by fitting words and arguments to a more accurate understanding of his teachings, and after establishing that they are well able to fight in their trials and rooting courage in their mind, he immediately and profitably changes the form of his words and molds them into the form of a prayer. He allows not a moment of time to intervene between his address to them and his address to God the Father. Here too he suggests by his conduct the pattern of an excellent way of life. I think that those whose goal is reverence should not be unaware that it is completely fitting either to devote themselves to discussing what is profitable and necessary for the brothers or, when they happen not to be doing this, to employ the service of speech in supplications to God, so that no superfluous word may slip in between. In this way, the good conduct of the tongue may proceed with fitting speech.
[659] To whom is it not completely obvious that in vain conversation statements slip out that are not free from blame? As a wise man said, "When words are many, you will not escape sin, but if you restrain your lips, you will be prudent." 42
You may find something else to admire as well, which brings no small profit to us. The beginning of his prayer is for his own glory and that of the Father. After that, he includes and immediately introduces a prayer for us.
What is the reason for this? He is persuading the pious person who loves God and moving the doer of good works to prayer. Just as we should do good works and all things, not directing our energy to our own glory but to the glory of the Father of all (I mean God, for he says, "Let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father in heaven'43 so also when the occasion calls us to pray we should seek God's glory before our own, as Christ himself says: "Pray then in this way: Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name. Your kingdom come.
Your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread."44 He fashions for us, then, a pattern for prayer. It was necessary— necessary—that Christ himself, not a presbyter or an angel, 45 should manifest himself as our leader and guide in all good things and in the way that leads up to God. We have been called, and we really are, as the prophet says, "taught by God." 46
And it would be fitting for us to examine with greatest care what he says to his Father. I think we should pay sharp attention to the investigation of his words [660] and diligently track down the precise meaning of his teachings. "Father," he says, "the hour has come; glorify your Son so that the Son may glorify you." As far as the form of words is concerned, one might think that the speaker is perhaps lacking in glory. But when one considers the dignity of the Only Begotten, I think one would easily avoid such a weak conclusion. To think that the Son lacks any glory or is without a share of the honor due him (despite the fact that he is the "Lord of glory" since the divinely inspired Scriptures call him this)47 is insane. In another place we may observe him saying to the Father, "Father, glorify me in your own presence with the glory that I had in your presence before the world existed."48 Therefore, who can doubt and who is so mentally stricken and opposed to all truth that they do not understand and confess that the Only Begotten lacks no God-befitting glory, as far as his own nature is concerned? Though he was in the form of God the Father and totally equal with him, he did not consider equality with God something to be exploited, but he descended into our humble state and emptied himself. 49 He bore this body, completely lacking in glory, and out of love he put on the likeness of human insignificance, so that when the appropriate time had come the time when, after he fulfilled the mystery, he put on once again his original and essential glory-he saved the whole world and secured life and the knowledge of God for those who were in it. Showing the Father to agree with him in this matter, he addresses him, saying that it was surely fitting for him to return back up to the dignity of his own nature.
And how does he ascend? He shows himself to carry out the works of the divine nature with his flesh, not as a servant [661] of someone else's activity but as the wisdom and power of God the Father. We should think that this is precisely the way he carried out the works of the divine nature with authority. After all, everything is from the Father but not apart from the Son. How could God the Father accomplish any of his proper functions without his wisdom and his power (I mean, the Son) being with him and carrying out with him those things in which the movement of activity is understood to be? That is why the wise Evangelist, who wrote this book, says at the beginning of his work, "All things came into being through him, and without him not one thing came into being."50 Therefore, since the principle of consubstantiality persuades us to conclude that all things are from the Father, through the Son and in the Spirit, and since after he killed death and decay and took away the tyranny of the devil he was about to enlighten the whole world under the sun with the illumination of the Spirit and thereby show himself to be true God by nature, it is appropriate for him to say, "Father, glorify your Son so that the Son may glorify you." No one with any sense would say that the Son is asking for glory from the Father (as, for example, one person asks from another) and that the Son is promising to give him glory in repayment, as it were. It would hardly be fitting, or rather it would be completely ignorant, to have such a conception of God. The Savior spoke these words, holding up his own glory as absolutely necessary to the Father, so that he may be known to be of the same substance. Just as it would imply a charge of dishonor for God the Father not to have the kind of Son, springing from him and begotten of him, who is what God from God by nature ought to be, so also I think it will redound to his glory and honor to have a Son who is in the condition in which he himself is understood and said to be. The Father, then, is glorified in the [662| glory of his offspring, as I just said. The Father gives glory to the Son when one realizes from the Son's deeds what kind of Father he has, and the Father receives glory in return, as it were, when one realizes what kind of Son the Father truly has. The essential and natural boast of glory, then, will go from the Father to the Son and from the Son to the Father.
If any should propose that because of the humility of the incarnation the Lord is speaking here in a manner inferior to his own position (since this was his custom), their explanation certainly would not be inappropriate, but they would not attain an accurate understanding. If he were merely asking for glory from the Father, it would not be unreasonable to ascribe that request to the limits of the human nature. But since he promises to glorify the Father in return, does it not clearly follow of necessity that we should eagerly embrace the view that we have just given? [663|
CHAPTER FOUR
The fact that he is said to receive something from God the Father will in no way damage the glory of the Son, since there is a godly reason for this fact.
17:2 "Just as you have given him authority over all flesh, to give eternal life to everything that you have given him."
Christ explains to us in these words the kind of glory with which God the Father will exalt and glorify his own Son, and with which he will be glorified in return by his own offspring. He expands on his statement and makes the meaning clear for our edification and profit. After all, God the Father knows all things. What need does he have of being taught the details of the request? He is invoking the Father's good will upon us. Since he is the high priest of our souls in that he became human even though he is by nature God with the Father, he makes a very appropriate request on our behalf, thus persuading us to believe that he is now the atoning sacrifice for our sins and the righteous Paraclete, as John says.51 That is why Paul too, wanting us to be convinced of this, writes, "For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who in every respect has been tested as we are, yet without sin."52 |664| Therefore, since he is a high priest in that he appeared as a human being, he offered himself to God the Father as a spotless sacrifice and a ransom for the life of all, as the first fruits of human nature that he may "have first place in everything," as Paul says.53 He also offers the reprobate earthly race, purifying it by his own blood and transforming it to newness of life through the Holy Spirit. Since, as we have often said, all things are brought about from the Father through the Son in the Spirit, he fashions a request for blessings for us, as a mediator and high priest, even though he is a cobenefactor and cosupplier with his begetter of divine and spiritual gifts.
Christ distributes the Spirit to whomever he wishes according to his own will and authority.
That is how these matters stand. Our discussion must now investigate what the form of the prayer means to communicate. "Father," he says,
"glorify your Son so that your Son may glorify you."54 How then or in what manner will what I said happen? I desire, he says, that just as "you have given me authority over all flesh," so also "everything that you have given me may have eternal life." The Father glorified his Son by subjecting everything under the sun to his rule, and the Father himself was glorified in return by him. The Son was glorified by the Father when everyone was convinced that he was the offspring and fruit of the Almighty, who easily subjected all things to the yoke of his reign. And the Father was glorified in return, as it were, by his own offspring. Since his offspring was known to accomplish every mighty deed with case, the splendor of his reputation extends to his Father as well. Therefore, he says, just as you glorified and were glorified by giving him authority and lordship over all (in the way that was just described), [665] so also I desire that nothing of what was given to me may be lost. This glory runs from the Father to the Son and back from the Son to the Father. It was necessary necessary that everything under the authority and control of the almighty Word of God, once it was saved, remain in perfect blessedness so that it may no longer be tyrannized by death and overcome by decay and sin and be subject to the original evils.
But since the statement "You have given him authority over all flesh" is likely to trouble some of the simple, let us make a few profitable remarks on this, not shrinking back in the face of this need even though all language is too feeble to explain these matters. The Lord's statement is especially appropriate for the form that he assumed, I mean the form of his humiliation and the limitations of human nature. Listen to the argument: if we blush when we hear that he is called a slave for us, even though he is the Lord of all with the Father, and that he was installed as "king on Zion, his holy hill,"55 even though he can rule the universe in his own nature without receiving the rule from someone else, then we will have to blush if he says that he receives anything as a human being. But if we marvel at his willing submission in these matters, since we are not unaware of the essential dignity that is his by birth, why would we not marvel at it also in this statement? Though he possesses everything as God, he says that he receives it as a human being, for whom rule is not essential but given. The question
"What do you have that you did not receive?"56 applies to the state of originate beings. Christ is originate in that he became human, even though he is unoriginate by nature in that he came from God. All good things are understood to be and truly are in God properly and by nature, but they are in us by adoption and are supplied by divine grace. Therefore, when he says that as a human being he has been appointed to rule over us and has been given "authority over all flesh" by the Father, [666] let no one be offended in any way. We must keep the oikonomia in mind. But if you think it is right to take the words in a more God-befitting way, then keep in mind what the Lord said to the Jews, "Truly, truly I say to you, no one can come to me unless drawn by the Father who sent me."51 Those to whom the Father wants to give life he brings to his own offspring (who is his own life-giving power), and he empowers them and makes them wise through his Son. In fact, if he wants to bring any into subjection to his rule, he calls them in no other way than by the living and omnipotent might by which he rules the universe, I mean his own offspring. Human beings, who have no power of themselves to accomplish deeds that are above them, borrow from God that which can bring others into subjection. Through him kings reign, as it is written, and rulers rule the earth through him. 58 The God of the universe, who did not receive this power from anyone else, subjects the human race to himself together with all thingsthe human race that had fallen away from love toward him and had shaken off the yoke of his rule. He grants, as it were, authority over them to his own power, through which he subdues whatever he wishes. God the Father subjects them to his Son as to his own power. Through him, completely and in no other way, everything that exists becomes his willing subject. Just as he makes all things wise and gives them life through his Son, so also he rules all things through him.
We must further note that the grace of his heavenly love for humanity is not restricted to Israel alone, but it extends to "all flesh." After all, whatever falls under the authority of the Savior surely also will participate in his life and grace as well. [667]
CHAPTER FIVE
The Son will not be excluded from being true God, even though he calls the Father "the only true God."
17:3 "And this is eternal life, that they may know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent."
He defines faith as the mother of eternal life and says that the power of the true knowledge of God will cause us to remain forever in incorruption and blessedness and holiness. And we say that knowledge of God is true if it is free from the charge of turning aside to something else and of running after what it should not. Some have worshiped "the creature rather than the creator"59 and have honored a piece of wood, saying, "'You are my father,' and to a stone, 'You have begotten me." Those wretched people sank to such a level of ignorance that they gave the divine name in all its fullness to senseless blocks of wood and invested them with the ineffable glory of the essence that is above all things. He calls the Father "the only true God," then, to contrast him with the spurious gods and to distinguish, as it were, the true God from those who are erroneously called gods. This is the intent of his statement. After saying to our great profit that the Father is one and
"only," he also mentions his own glory, saying, "and Jesus Christ whom you have sent." [668] That is because the only way one can attain perfect knowledge of the Father is if the knowledge of his offspring, that is, the Son, comes along with it and is intimately connected with it. Whoever knows what the Father is surely also knows the Son at the same time.
Therefore, when he says that the Father is the one true God, he does not exclude himself. Since he is in him and from him by nature, he too will be the true God and the only God in the only God. Besides him there will be no other "only true God." "For the gods of the Gentiles are demons."& The creature is a slave. I do not know how some people worship it, falling into faulty and sensuous knowledge. There are many who are deceptively thought to be gods in this world and who obtain that name illegitimately, but they stand in contrast to the only true God and to the Son who is in him and from him by nature, both distinct and connatural with him by their natural unity. He is distinct because he is understood to exist on his own. He is the Son, after all, not the Father. He is connatural because he who is from his Father by nature will surely be joined with the existence of his parent.
The Father and the Son are together, since he is and is understood to be Father because he is known to have begotten [the Son].
Then he says, "This is eternal life, that they may know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent." In response, those who are eager to listen and zealous in their serious pursuit of divine dogmas will ask, Do we say that knowledge is eternal life and that knowing him who is really true God by nature will suffice to secure our hope with nothing else needed? How then is faith without works dead?62 When we say "faith," we mean nothing other than knowledge about the true God, since knowledge comes through faith. The prophet Isaiah testifies to this when he says to certain people, "Unless you [669] believe, you will not understand."63 But I think we can see from the following that the Holy Scriptures show us that the knowledge consisting merely of concepts is utterly worthless. One of the holy disciples said somewhere, "You believe that God is one; you do well. Even the demons believe and shudder." 64 What then shall we say to this? How can Christ be telling the truth when he says that knowing the one true God and Father, along with his Son, is eternal life? I think we must respond that the Savior's statement is certainly true. Knowledge is life because it is pregnant with the full power of the mystery and it brings participation in the mystical blessingS by which we are joined to the living and life-giving Word. That is why I think Paul says that the Gentiles have become fellow members of the body and fellow participants in Christ&6 in that they have partaken of his holy body and blood. Thus our members should be understood to be the members of Christ. 61 Knowledge, then, is life that also brings the blessing of the Spirit. He dwells in our heart, reshaping those who receive him into adopted children and remolding them into incorruption and piety through the gospel way of life. Our Lord Jesus Christ, therefore, knowing that knowledge of the one true God is the supplier and matchmaker, as it were, of the aforementioned blessings, says that it is "eternal life" in that it is the mother and nurse of eternal life because it is pregnant, as it were, in its own power and nature with those things that cause life and lead to it.
I also think we should pay eager attention to the way in which Christ says that the perfect knowledge of the only true God is fulfilled in us.
Notice how it does not come about without contemplation of the Son, and it is clear that [670] it does not come about without the Holy Spirit. That is how each person is understood and believed to be in the Trinity, according to the Scriptures. The Jews were led by the commandments of Moses to reject the many false gods and were persuaded to devote themselves to the worship of the one true God. "Worship the Lord your God," the law says,
"and serve only him." 68 But since those who have worshiped and are now devoted to the one true God do not have perfect knowledge of the one they worship, they are now called to that knowledge by the Savior's words, that they may learn that the one true creator of all is not unitary but that he is a Father and he has begotten a Son, or rather that they may now behold him accurately in his exact image, that is, the Son. Through the imprint, one may quite easily proceed to complete contemplation of the archetype. Our Lord Jesus Christ, then, most appropriately said that those who have been called by faith to adoption and eternal life must learn not only that God is one and true but also that he is a Father. And they must learn whose Father he is, namely, the one who became flesh for us and was sent to set right the corrupt rational nature, that is, the human nature. [671]
CHAPTER SIX
The Son was not stripped of God-befitting glory, even though he is found saying to the Father, "Now glorify me with the glory that I had," etc.
17:4-5 "I glorified you on earth by finishing the work that you gave me to do. So now, Father, glorify me in your own presence with the glory that I had in your presence before the world existed."
Once again he combines the human with the divine, and his statement sort of mixes them together, looking at both, neither raising the person of the speaker to the full authority and glory of God, nor allowing it to stay completely within the confines of human nature. No, he mixes both into one, which is foreign to nothing in the statement. Our Lord Jesus Christ thought he should teach the believers not only that he is the only begotten God but also that he became human for us69 so that he might obtain everyone for God the Father and transform them to newness of life, purchasing humanity with his own blood and putting himself in danger for the life of all. He, though one, is more precious than all. He says, then, that he glorified the Father "on earth by finishing the work" that he gave him.
Come, then, let us consider a double path, as it were, of interpreting these statements [672] and discuss how this statement was made both in a human and a God-befitting way. If he said this as a man, you should understand it as follows: Christ is our type and source and image of the divine way of life, and he shows us clearly how and in what way we should live. That is why the authors of the divine Scriptures give a very subtle explanation of the matter. He is teaching us, then, through what he says here that when each of us fulfills our commanded service and carries out God's commands to their completion, we surely glorify him by our works, not as though we were giving him something he did not have (since the divine and ineffable nature is full of glory), but we cause those who see the works and benefit from them to praise him. "Let your light shine before others," he says, "so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father in heaven."70 When we are courageous and willing to do good works for God, we are not seeking a good reputation from this for ourselves, but we are winning a good reputation for the honor and glory of him who rules over all. When we live a loathsome life that is out of harmony with God so that we nullify his ineffable glory, we are rightly called to account and make our own soul subject to punishment, as we hear through the voice of the prophet, "Because of you my name is continually blasphemed among the Gentiles."71 In the same way, I think, when we practice the most illustrious virtue, we are then surely preparing ourselves to be praised. When we have carried out the work given to us by God, we will then with complete justice ascend to the bold speech fitting for genuine children and ask for equal glory in return, as it were, from God, who was glorified by us. "As I live,
[673] declares the Lord, I will glorify those who glorify me, and whoever despises me will be despised."12 In order to show us that we may fittingly ask the only God for glory (I mean the eternal glory to come) when we have shown him blameless obedience in all things and are found to be scrupulous keepers of his commands, Christ says that he has glorified the Father "by finishing the work on earth" that he had given him. He then asks to be given glory in return not a glory that is foreign or external to him, as ours is, but rather his own honor and glory. We needed to ask for it, but he did not.
Notice how he restores boldness to our nature in himself and through himself in two ways. In him first and through him, we have been enriched both with the ability to carry out what God has entrusted to us for our restoration and the duty to make a bold request for the honor that is due to those who are esteemed. Long ago, because of the sin that ruled over us and the apostasy that happened in Adam, we did not have the ability to do anything that makes for virtue, and we were as far removed as possible from boldness before God. In fact, God, out of his great kindness, raised us up to that boldness by speaking through the voice of the prophet, "Do not be afraid because you have been ashamed, and do not be confounded because you have been put to shame."73 Therefore, just as our Lord Jesus Christ is the first fruits and gate and way for all the other blessings, so he is here as well.
Now if the Savior is asking for his own glory that he had before the world existed, and we take the meaning of his statement and apply it as a pattern for us and maintain that we too should do with great zeal what is pleasing to God, thus asking with boldness for the glory from above, let no one think [674] that we are saying that people should in imitation of Christ ask for some ancient glory from before the world existed as if it were due them. Rather let us realize that it is most appropriate to ascribe to each what is proper to each. If Christ is understood to have only a human nature, like we do, then let him only make statements that are fitting to those who are earthborn, and let him not transgress the limits of human nature. But if the Word, being God, became flesh, then when he says anything God-befitting it will apply to him alone and not to those who are not like him.
So if we think of the statement in a more human way, we will understand the meaning of the passage in the sense we gave above. But if we recall the God-befitting honor of Christ, then we will have good reason for thinking that the meaning exceeds human nature. In that case we say that he glorified his Father by carrying out the work that he received from him, but not as a servant or as one who had the status of underling. This point is necessary so that the Lord of all does not seem to be on our level or on the level of the creature, which serves as a slave. Servile subjection and slavelike submission to the divine will are characteristics of humans and angels. But he perfectly accomplished our redemption, which was entrusted to him, because he is the power and wisdom of his begetter, just as the divine psalmist certainly says to us as he explains the meaning of the mystery in the Spirit: "Command, O God, your power; empower, O God, that which you have wrought in us."14 In order to offer clear proof that the Son is the power of the Father, though not separate from him (I mean as far as their identity of essence and nature is concerned), he first says,
"Command your power," introducing two persons (I mean the one who receives the command [675| and the one who gives the command). Then he immediately unites them in natural unity by ascribing the outcome of the action to the divine and ineffable nature by saying in all wisdom, "Empower that which you have wrought in us." The Son, then, is entrusted with or receives from his Father "the work" concerning us.
Now we must investigate and explain how or in what way God commands his own power, as far as it is possible to explain matters that exceed our understanding in a human way. Let us take, for example, a man like us and imagine that he is skilled in the art of making bronze. Let us further imagine that he undertakes to make a statue or to restore one that is damaged or mutilated. How then will he work, and how will he restore it as he decided to do? Clearly he will entrust the task that he has decided to accomplish to the power of his hands and the wisdom of his skill. But even though his wisdom and power seem to be conceptually distinct from him, as it were, they are not really distinct from him since they are included in the definition of his essence. So also you should think that something like this is the case with God, though you should not take the illustration to be precise in every aspect. Since God transcends everything, he should be understood to transcend this illustration as well. The same point may be made by taking the sun and fire as an illustration. The sun commands, as it were, the light that pours out of it to illuminate everything, and it gives to its rays the power of heating whatever receives them as their "work," so to speak. Similarly, fire commands and orders, as it were, the property of its own nature to carry out what is proper to it. But we do not for this reason say that the rays and the light are in the position of servile underlings to the sun, [676] or the activity of burning is in service to the fire. Each one carries out its own activities that it has by nature. Even if they somehow seem not to be works of the sources themselves, still they are not distinct from their sources by nature. You should understand something like this to be the case with God the Father and the Word, who was begotten from him by nature, whenever he is said to be entrusted with work to do regarding us.
Furthermore, the Father's wisdom and power, that is, Christ, glorified God the Father on earth "by finishing the work" that he gave him to do.
And as he brings his work to a fitting conclusion, he asks for the glory that he always had and requests the resumption of his original glory, now that the occasion calls for it. What work, then, did he finish by which he says he glorified the Father? Being true God, he became human by the good pleasure and will of the Father, desiring to save the whole world and to renew the fallen earthly race to eternal life and the true knowledge of God. And this was indeed accomplished by the God-befitting power and authority of Christ, who destroyed death, overturned the usurped dominion of the devil, took away sin and demonstrated pure love toward us by taking away the accusation that stood against everyone and by enlightening those who erred so that they now know the one true God. When Christ restored these things by his own power, the Father was glorified by all, that is, by everyone in the world who understood his wisdom and power and his gentleness and love toward humanity. He has shown forth and revealed himself in his Son, the image and imprint of his own nature, and the tree has been made known by its fruit, as it is written.75 After his works are accomplished and his plan for our salvation is carried to its fitting conclusion, he ascends to his own glory and assumes his ancient honor.
[677) But since he is still clothed in human form, he fashions his question as one asking for what he does not have, since for humanity everything comes from God. Although he was not bereft of God-befitting glory (especially since he was begotten as God from God the Father), nevertheless, since he diminished that glory somewhat at the time of his oikonomia for us by taking on this body that has no glory, there is good reason for him to ask as one who truly has no glory. When he says this he is speaking as a human being. Paul himself is thinking something like this when he writes to us concerning him, "Let the same mind be in you," he says, "that was in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not regard equality with God as something to be exploited, but emptied himself, taking the form of a slave, being born in human likeness. And being found in human form, he humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death even death on a cross. Therefore, God also highly exalted him and gave him the name that is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bend, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father."76 Though the Son is exalted, in that he proceeded as God and Lord from the Father, nonetheless the Father is recorded exalting him as a human being, for whom the humility of his nature surely brings about the need for exaltation. Therefore, he is asking for resumption of his glory with the flesh as well. He is surely not bereft of his glory, even if he were to ask without receiving, since the Word, being true God, was never excluded from his own honors. Rather, he is raising his own temple 11 to the glory that he always had, or rather he is raising himself with his flesh
-the flesh that was the reason for the period of dishonor. So that he may not seem to some to be asking for a strange and unusual glory that he did not have in ancient times, [678] he shows that it is "before the world" and
"in the presence of" the Father himself. The Son was never excluded from the glory of the Father. He always reigns with him and is hymned and worshiped with him by us and the holy angels as God from God and in God and with God. This is what I think the divinely inspired Evangelist John is teaching when he says, "In the beginning was the Word. And the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning."78
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