What Does John 17:11 Mean?

(11) **And now I am no more in the world.**—The immediate future is still regarded as present. The words have a special reference to the interval between His death and the day of Pentecost, which would be for the disciples a time of darkness and danger, when they would have special need of the Father’s care. **Holy Father.**—Comp. John 17:1; John 17:24-25. There is a special fitness in the word “Holy” here, as in opposition to the world. The disciples were left in the world, but they were not of the world (John 17:14). These were spiritually God’s children, separated from the world (John 17:6), and He commits them to the Holy Father, that He may keep them from the evil of the world. **Keep through thine own name those whom thou hast given me.**—The reading is slightly doubtful, but if we take what would certainly seem to be the true text, the rendering should be, *Keep them in Thy name which Thou hast given Me.* (Comp. John 17:12.) The Authorised version renders the same words by “through Thy name” in this verse, and by “in Thy name” in John 17:12. The thought appears to be that the revelation of the nature of God by Christ to the world (John 17:6), was that which He Himself received from the Father. “I have not spoken of Myself, but the Father which sent Me, He gave Me a commandment what I should say and what I should speak.” (Comp. Note on John 12:49.) **That they may be one, as we are.**—This clause depends upon the words, “Keep them in Thy name.” They had so far realised the revelation of God that they had known Christ’s whole life to be the utterance of God to their spirits (John 17:6-8). He prays that they may be kept in this knowledge in order that they may so know the Father through Him, as to become themselves one with the Father.