John 17:2 Commentary and Bible Study

This is a verse which requires just a little explanation. Verse one says, ‘Glorify thy Son, that thy Son also may glorify thee: as thou hast given him power’; it connects with verse two. We could read it in this way – Glorify thy Son that thy Son also may glorify thee in accordance with his commission. Christ prays to be glorified in accordance with the commission that he was given by God the Father. Why does the Saviour have power over all flesh, when the crucial statement is that he may save the elect out of the world? Why does he require power over all flesh in order to save his elect? Well, of course he does. If he did not have power over all flesh, the unregenerate, unbelieving world would never let the gospel be heard. It would be entirely supressed. There would be no message of grace in the world at all. Christ has power over all flesh in order to bring about the salvation of his elect. They will not be able to deter or prevent the free course of the Gospel and the salvation of the elect of God.The Lord throws down empires when they obstruct his purpose. We have seen mighty empires thrown down. Empires today are different from the empires of years ago. They are ideological empires. You could even speak of (if it is legitimate) internet empires – great conglomerations, organisations that are bent on spreading materialism and curbing spiritual light. And it would not surprise us as Christians, however long it takes, to see some of these mysteriously and amazingly overthrown just as the Egyptian and Assyrian and Chaldean empires in due time were overthrown, because they were developing an anti-moral, anti-spiritual stranglehold on the minds of millions of youngsters and so on. He has power over all flesh in the interests of the salvation of his elect, and nothing can withstand his invincible power.There are two ‘givens’ and one ‘give’ in the verse and those three terms, given and give, are really all you need to know about the doctrine of divine election. Grace is entirely a given thing. It is not given to all the Jewish race. Many Jews will be converted, but it is not a racial matter. It is as many as thou hast given him out of all flesh, every land and nation, every ethnic group. It is not about national reformation, it is about international salvation of the people of God.