1Jesus said these things, then lifting up his eyes to heaven, he said, “Father, the time has come. Glorify your Son, that your Son may also glorify you; 2even as you gave him authority over all flesh, so he will give eternal life to all whom you have given him. 3This is eternal life, that they should know you, the only true God, and him whom you sent, Jesus Christ. 4I glorified you on the earth. I have accomplished the work which you have given me to do. 5Now, Father, glorify me with your own self with the glory which I had with you before the world existed.
6“I revealed your name to the people whom you have given me out of the world. They were yours, and you have given them to me. They have kept your word. 7Now they have known that all things whatever you have given me are from you, 8for the words which you have given me I have given to them; and they received them, and knew for sure that I came from you. They have believed that you sent me. 9I pray for them. I don’t pray for the world, but for those whom you have given me, for they are yours. 10All things that are mine are yours, and yours are mine, and I am glorified in them. 11I am no more in the world, but these are in the world, and I am coming to you. Holy Father, keep them through your name which you have given me, that they may be one, even as we are. 12While I was with them in the world, I kept them in your name. I have kept those whom you have given me. None of them is lost except the son of destruction, that the Scripture might be fulfilled. 13But now I come to you, and I say these things in the world, that they may have my joy made full in themselves. 14I have given them your word. The world hated them because they are not of the world, even as I am not of the world. 15I pray not that you would take them from the world, but that you would keep them from the evil one. 16They are not of the world, even as I am not of the world. 17Sanctify them in your truth. Your word is truth. 18As you sent me into the world, even so I have sent them into the world. 19For their sakes I sanctify myself, that they themselves also may be sanctified in truth.
20“Not for these only do I pray, but for those also who will believe in me through their word, 21that they may all be one; even as you, Father, are in me, and I in you, that they also may be one in us; that the world may believe that you sent me. 22The glory which you have given me, I have given to them, that they may be one, even as we are one, 23I in them, and you in me, that they may be perfected into one, that the world may know that you sent me and loved them, even as you loved me. 24Father, I desire that they also whom you have given me be with me where I am, that they may see my glory which you have given me, for you loved me before the foundation of the world. 25Righteous Father, the world hasn’t known you, but I knew you; and these knew that you sent me. 26I made known to them your name, and will make it known; that the love with which you loved me may be in them, and I in them.”
Love (Gk. ἀγαπάω, agapao, ἀγάπη, agape). (17:26; Jn 3:16; Rom 5:8, 1 John 2:5, 15) Strong’s 26
The verb and noun forms of this word are each used well over 100 times in the NT, so it is a fairly common word. It is used commonly outside both the NT and Christian literature as well. In non-Christian literature, this word is used much like the term “love” in English, referring to affection for people, things, etc. Christians adopted this word, following Jesus’ use of it, and gave it a narrower and more particular meaning, “divine love.” It is always used in this particularly Christian way in the NT. Divine love is always sourced in God, and is an expected expression of a Christian’s love for God and other Christians. The essence of this divine love is that it affirms eternal and infinite value. When the NT forbids this love, it always has a temporal object in mind (e.g. honored seats, the world). When it encourages it, there is always an object of eternal and infinite value in view, that is, God or humans. Finite human beings are of infinite value simply because God created them in His own image, forever. God affirms that His image, a human being, is of infinite and eternal value (John 3:16). Christians, likewise, must make the same affirmation of love with respect to every human being, especially believers (1 John 4:7, 8).