John 17:26

And I made known unto them thy name, and will make it known; that the love wherewith thou lovedst me may be in them, and I in them.

Made known unto them thy name ... The threefold employment of this clause, here and in John 17:11-12, raises the question of what, exactly, is that name. "Jesus Christ" is the great compound name of the Lord, used here for the first time on earth; and it is impossible to separate repeated references to "the name which thou hast given me" from that very compound title of the world's only Saviour. (See under John 17:3 and John 17:11.) This alone can adequately explain the apostolic preference for "Jesus Christ," as used so many times in the New Testament. It is simply unbelievable that the apostles themselves contrived this name, made it their favorite designation of the Lord, and that one of them (John) erroneously ascribed it to Jesus near the end of the first century. No. Christ spoke in John 17:3, as John quoted him.

Love ... in them, and I in them ... There persists to the very end of this sacred prayer the concept of all spiritual blessings being "in Christ" (Ephesians 1:3). Thus John joins the apostle Paul in the superlative importance attributed to being "in Christ." Paul used the expression "in Christ," or its equivalent (in him, in whom, etc.) no less than 169 times in his epistles.[23] To be "in Christ" is everything with regard to salvation. Thus it is clear that the revelation of the plan of salvation formed a part of Christ's purpose in this prayer. Anderson said:

This great prayer of Christ is similar to a final report of work accomplished, the most important of which was to reveal the Father's love and his plan of salvation for all men. That Christ's work was successful is indicated in John 17:8.[24]

It was the accurate memory of the apostle John, aided by the Holy Spirit, that produced the record of this amazing prayer, and not his philosophical imagination that did it. It is a passage which "surpasses all literature in its setting forth the identity of being, power, and love, in the twofold personality of the God-Man."[25]

As Reynolds said:

The supposition that some unknown writer of the second century excogitated such a prayer out of the synoptic narratives, the Pauline epistles, and the Alexandrian philosophy, refutes itself.[26]

The conviction of every devoted Christian who studies this prayer resolves into this: that none but Jesus Christ our Lord could have prayed it, and even he, only in the torture of those pressure-events leading up to the cross. That a person who lived long afterward, and did not even know the Lord, could have composed such a prayer and then have ascribed it to Jesus is only a ridiculous imagination.

Having followed our Lord's thoughts through this sublime prayer, we may exclaim with Peter who, upon another occasion, said, "Lord ... we have believed and know that thou art the Holy One of God."

[23] John Mackay, God's Order (New York: Macmillan Company, 1953), p. 67.

[24] Stanley F. Anderson, Our Dependable Bible (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Baker Book House, 1960), p. 157.

[25] H. R. Reynolds, op. cit., II, p. 340.

[26] Ibid., p. 353.