I wish to notice in this beautiful chapter, chiefly, the footsteps of our adorable Lord, as the
Shepherd going before His sheep, part of that blessed example which He has left us, that we
should follow His steps.

First, then, there are seven distinct petitions in this chapter. Another thing in connection with these
seven, which we will go over briefly, there are four different ways in which our Lord addressed
His Father. Is it not then, at least, suggestive for our hearts, who often, doubtless, as His disciples
long ago, desire, "Lord, teach us to pray," that we may be led to address the Father similarly?

Taking the last point mentioned, first, the four ways are these:In the first and twenty-fourth
verses, when it is simply addressing the Father, prayer, asking for something, whether for Himself
or His beloved people He says "Father." Next, when pressing His claim, as it were, in
supplication. He says, "O Father," fifth verse. Then, in reference to His people committed to His
Father’s care, to be kept from the evil of the world, He puts His character hi contrast to it, and
says, "Holy Father," eleventh verse. And finally, when viewing in contrast the world and the men
given to Him out of it, He says, "O righteous Father," twenty-fifth verse. These are not
distinctions without a difference, we may rest assured, and while the Lord would not have us
under bondage as to the names we use when we pray, one name or another in different relations,
yet He would have us duly exercised that so we may "pray with the Spirit and the understanding
also."

Then there are these seven petitions to consider. First, however, let us note our Lord’s position
in prayer. How beautiful! He "lifted up His eyes to heaven," thus recognizing the One from whom
all blessing comes, who is also to be before our hearts thus too. He who came from heaven
recognizes that all good comes from there. He is thus before us in the fitting attitude of lifting up
His eyes to heaven. He takes the place of dependence He would lead His people into. Thus He
has left us an example that we should follow in His steps, as to its spirit at least. He has shown
us, therein, whence all good cometh, "that every good gift and every perfect gift cometh down
from above, from the Father of Lights," and our true place in dependence and reverence before
Him.

What, then, does He ask for first? His first petition is for glory. What for? That He may use it for
His Father. What a contrast in this with every man that went before Him, repetitions as we are,
of our common father, "The first man, Adam." He had glory as "set over the works of God’s
hands," yet grasping for the further glory of being as God, he lost both; here is One who had
glory and left it to take the path of lowly obedience, and now claims glory at God’s hands and gets
it; claims it only that He may use it for another. "Father .. . glorify Thy Son, that Thy Son also
may glorify thee."

The second petition, at first sight, looks like the same, but it is not in a most important respect.
First verse, He is asking for glory in which He may give His people, at least in a measure, to
share with Him. Fifth, verse, He is praying for glory into which He cannot lift His beloved
people, glory that was His ere He came in grace, the glory which He had with the Father before

the world was, and to which, in virtue of who He is, He is now about to return. The first is a
glory that He has earned as man, that He can lift His people up to share with Him, acquired glory,
fruit of His work upon the cross; but there is also a glory which He had as the eternal Son of God,
which He can share with none, but which, through grace, we shall behold and adore Him in, and
shall enjoy seeing Him in exclusively and forever. The first petition is for glory, and the second
for glory also; the first that He may glorify His Father in it; the second, that He asks the Father
that He may go back into. He will not even take what is His by right and title as One who is
Divine, we can see, except the Father gives Him it. What a blessed example for us! Then, His
next petition is for the Father’s care of us amid the evil of the world. First, He asks for glory,
earned as the fruit of His obedience here, that He may glorify His Father in it. Second, He asks
for the glory that He had with the Father to be given Him again.

And now third, He looks at the little struggling band around Him, "the men given Him out of the
world," and commits them to His Father’s care, saying, "Holy Father, keep through Thine own
name those whom Thou hast given Me, that they may be one, as We are." This is for the Father’s
care that we may be kept one. But He desires us to be kept too in a double way, kept one with
each other as He was with the Father and the Father with Him, kept also from th» evil of the
world we pass through, both positive and negative separation, we may say. The fifteenth verse
at first sight looks like a repetition of the third request, but it is not, but another phase of it, first
kept in unity, then kept from the evil of the world, and then the seventeenth verse shows the
means of it and a further result. In the eleventh verse thus it is our relation to each other; fifteenth,
our relation to the world; and, seventeenth, our relation to God. Mark the points:we are to be
kept on, kept from the evil, and kept for God. Kept one as His people, kept from surrounding
evil, and kept for the exclusive will of God.

The eleventh verse is now widened out in the sixth petition, twentieth verse to all that believe, so
that we in later days were also part of the burden upon our Saviour’s heart in that sad hour. He
looked on to the end, and contemplated all the way, and all that would be called to walk in it, and
thus made His gracious provision for us all. Adored be His holy name for such tender pitying
grace! But these verses might seem to us not to have their fulfillment; they no doubt present to us
what we should practically be, to convince the world around us, and what we practically have not
been. Of all this, however, we get a glimpse at Pentecost, but how soon it faded out of sight! But
thank God, that all that is lost by the way is kept for the end. We will yet be displayed as one in
glory, entirely free from the world’s last soil, and "His servants shall serve Him," however feeble
or transient the pledge fulfillment here. Thus, if our Saviour’s cry has not yet had its fulfillment,
it will yet have, and the world will see the display of it, and then "shall know that the Father has
sent Him."

The seventh petition, twenty-fourth verse, is for His own again, but now for the end rather than
the way, that they may be with Him, sharers of His glory, and yet beholding Him too in what they
can never share, that in this, as "in all things He may have the preeminence."

Finally, as our gracious Lord takes His farewell look at the scene around Him, the last address
to His Father is not a petition but review, of the world that have not known the Father, Himself
the Son who has, and these that share it with Him, and His avowal that what He has done,
"declaring the Father’s name", that still would He do, until the Father’s love and Himself, the
object of it, were fully known to them.

Lord, help us then to learn of Thee how to pray aright, and in coming to "make known our
requests," to learn Thy way of praying, Father; when supplicating His grace, O Pettier; when we
think of ourselves in the midst of evil, Holy Father; and when in contrast with the world and in
our changeless connection with the Father and Thee His beloved Son, "righteous Father." Be it
so, for our blessing, and the glory of His worthy name!

FRAGMENT
"The Lord is righteous in all his ways, and holy in all his works."
Psalm 145:17