Glory - John 17:1-2

It appears that they have made it to the Mount of Olives. Jesus knows the time line that he is following for the rest of his mortal life, and he knows that most of his disciples won’t see him in a position to speak freely again, so he begins a prayer that also doubles as His farewell speech, as pointed out in the article “The Great Intercessory Prayer of Jesus” on trusting-in-jesus.com. We’ve talked before about what we would want our last words to be to our loved ones if we knew it was our last chance to give them, this is what Jesus wanted his disciples to hear, both advice, comfort, and invoking the blessings of heaven on them.

The concept of “glory” is brought up first, “glorify thy Son, that thy Son also may glorify thee.” I’ve always struggled with this concept because of how our society has associated it with self-aggrandizement, which we know is toxic. We all know of politicians whose main goal is to be “remembered,” that sounds like glory hounding to me. I think it was Harry S. Truman who had a sign on his desk that read, “It is amazing what you can accomplish if you do not care who gets the credit.” To me, this is the perfect explanation of what “glory” is, who gets the credit. In fact, I really like that association, I’m going to use that from now on, “glory” = “credit”. So why would we be told to be humble and submissive to God, if Jesus then says “give me credit for what I’ve done and I’ll give you credit for what you’ve done.” That sounds pretty aggressive to me, and how would the Jesus that I know and love be the kind of person who cares about people knowing how amazing he is? There is a definite disconnect between those two perspectives.
We can remember that the glory of God is intelligence, and if we work that into these statements that Jesus is making, maybe the meaning will change. The article cited above also gives some insight, saying, “The word ‘Glory,’ as Jesus used it in His intercessory prayer, goes beyond the way it is usually used. In glorifying God, the Greek word ‘doxazo’ means, ‘To make known; to make or leave a favorable impression or opinion,’ and Jesus’ life did that.” There isn’t a simple word insertion that I can put into the Jesus’ statement that will automatically clear up any confusion to the meaning, which would be nice. It’s possible that Jesus could mean, “help others see me in a favorable light and I will help others see you in a favorable light.” Another interpretation could be, “I’ll help others get to know you, and you can help others get to know me.”
If it is the case that Jesus wants both the Father and Himself to be known and seen favorably, my question is why? Why do God and Jesus want people to know them? They are already perfected, they already have all the inner peace that is possible, surely the opinion of mere mortals doesn’t make or break anything they have or are, so why does our knowledge even matter to them? As I was typing that last sentence, I realized that our knowledge of them and their love for us is the beginning of a relationship between us and them. Why do they want a relationship with each of us so badly? Well, we are Heavenly Father’s spirit children, and I’d be sad if I didn’t have a strong relationship with my kids, if they hated me I would be sad about that. So they want a relationship because they don’t want to be sad? No, that doesn’t make sense.
They want a relationship with each of us because they both love each of us. This can be a difficult concept because our understanding of love is so limited by our mortal experience and perspective. It’s difficult for me to “love” others, sure we can be friends, we can be neighbors, we can help each other out, but for me to be willing to put in the time and energy it takes to build a relationship with someone where I am emotionally vulnerable enough to them to love them, that’s pushing it, and pretty uncommon for me. So the idea of having that emotionally vulnerable connection to every single person on the planet is totally overwhelming, like I can’t even imagine it really. Maybe that’s because I’m not really settled within myself, and that would be a fair assumption.
If we know God and at least view him favorably, that’s a huge win for him. I’m the perfect example of this because I spent so many years hating God and there are so many people that feel the same way I do. I would venture to guess that in the world, less people love God than hate Him, and less people believe in Him than don’t. That leaves a tiny sliver of the population who love God, but let’s look at their lives. For the most part, people who love God are happy, have an eternal perspective, look forward to the future, and are comforted during dark times. Those are all gifts to us, and what does God take in return? Nothing tangible, he doesn’t need or take our money, he doesn’t need or take our spirits. The only reward God gets for all he does for us is our gratitude and obedience, if we choose to give it to him. But he doesn’t need or take either, so that gift is just a bonus.
So why would it be important to Jesus that we know the Father, and why would it be important to the Father that we know Jesus? God loves us and so does Jesus. God created a plan to give us everything in the universe, and Jesus paid a horrific price so that we can make it back to God to get our rewards. If we don’t know how the plan and the path, then how are we going to get there? Heavenly Father and Jesus want us to know that they’ve created and implemented a plan so that we can spend eternity in pure joy, and they want us to know how to get there. We can’t realize the plan if we don’t know that there is one, which is billions of people on the planet, and we can’t be motivated by the greatness of the plan if we hate god and therefore hate everything associated with him, again, billions of people on the planet. That’s why our knowledge of a kind and loving God is so important, so that we will embrace His plan and be happy.
If we are God’s spirit children, there will be some parental desire for us to succeed, but why does Jesus care? He’s just our spirit brother. Love, that’s the only answer, he doesn’t stand to personally gain a single thing with our repentance, but he loves us and wants us to be happy, that’s the only thing that matters to him, that’s his only motivation. And maybe that’s a difficult concept for so many of us to relate to because we are so limited in our mortal understanding. The IM quotes Elder Russell M. Nelson as teaching, “(The Intercessory Prayer is) so named because the Lord prayerfully interceded with His Father for the benefit of His disciples… From this prayer of the Lord we learn how keenly He feels His responsibility as our Mediator and Advocate with the Father.” He is personally invested in our success and will do anything he can to help us get there.