The Other Lord’s Prayer

Passage: John 17

A friend of mine used to say, “Its fun to hear, but its more fun to overhear.”

That’s what John 17 is, it is a God-given, Holy Spirit inspired opportunity to eavesdrop on a conversation, a conversation like no other, between two members of the Godhead.

This other Lord’s Prayer, the so called High Priestly prayer of Jesus, stands alone among the prayers of the Bible.  There is nothing else like it.  We know Jesus prayed often, we hear a few very brief prayers of His like in the Garden of Gethsemane and on the cross.  This is the only long prayer of His the Holy Spirit recorded in Scripture.  We have lots of sermons, parables, teachings and conversations, but only this prayer.  It is the longest prayer in the NT.

The prayer is about 625 words, it takes less than four minutes to read it, but it takes a lifetime to fully comprehend and plumb the depths.  If the great English pastor Martyn Lloyd Jones is any gauge, he preached 50 sermons on this one chapter.  It is safe to say there are words, phrases, thoughts, expressions, ideas in this prayer that no one has yet fully unfolded.