In the intimacy of the upper room (Jn. 13–14), the Lord instructed His disciples about many things they needed to know when He would no longer be with them. While walking with them to the Garden of Gethsemane, He told them, “In the world you will have tribulation; but be of good cheer, I have overcome the world” (16:33). Indeed, He was the great Overcomer, for He always relied on His Father.

Then Jesus lifted up His eyes to heaven as He began His matchless prayer, sometimes called the High Priestly Prayer. Christ’s free access to God is perhaps the reason for this term, but it falls short. The work of the cross enabled Him to function as High Priest, first on the cross and then in heaven. His prayer to the Father reflects the ever-existing intimate relationship between the Father and the Son, more than as a Man with God.

As we read John 17, we are privileged to listen to this conversation between the Father and the Son. John was one of the disciples who must have heard the Lord Jesus pray to the Father. Towards the end of his life, John was led by the Spirit of God to put this prayer into writing. Thus we have this “God-breathed” text of the communication between the Father and the Son. Six times Christ addresses God as “Father,” one of these as “holy Father” and one as “righteous Father” (vv. 11, 25). At the same time, John 17 introduces us to the mystery of Christ’s Person—God and Man in One, yet distinct—and also to the mystery of the divine Trinity. While we will never fully grasp these mysteries, we know them to be true and may worship the Father and the Son in spirit and in truth, now and forever.