Jesus addresses his Father in prayer here with the title “Righteous Father”. This is a unique way of address which, according to the New Testament record, Jesus uses nowhere else. I believe Jesus uses this address to God here because what distinguishes the world from the believer is that the believer seeks righteousness and approves righteousness, and therefore is drawn to God, and in contrast the world is basically unrighteous and therefore does not know God or seek God. The world has a concept of God, and the world’s appetite for religion shows the world seeking God, but this God they say they see is not the Righteous Father, but a figment of imagination, and always falls short markedly from true righteousness, and therefore is not God in any way whatsoever.

In contrast Jesus could say truly, in a way that is unique, that he knows God, and the peculiar life he gives to believers is the perception of the Righteous Father which we are given to see in Jesus, so that we know Jesus comes from God, the righteous Father.

What makes this difference between the world and the believer? It is the gracious work Jesus does for us and in us. We know God because Jesus has made God known to us, and continues to make him known. Here Jesus sums up all the content of salvation which he provides and gives to his disciples. It is through his work for us that Jesus makes God accessible to us, and makes us able to be reconciled to God. It is by his Spirit that Jesus brings us to receive his work for us as this is shown in that he works repentance from sin in us and gives us to be able see, in him and his doing and dying, the remedy for our sin. It is through the gift of faith that he gives that joins us to Christ and brings us into the experience of new life, and joins us to himself and the Father. We know what true righteousness is through this work. We hunger after this true righteousness because of Christ’s work for us and in us. We rest in his perfect righteousness which is imputed to us, by which we know God looks on us with love and favour, and we see the image of God new created within us which is to be like God in righteousness and true holiness. This makes us different from the world. Whereas the world does not know God, we know God, the righteous one, because Jesus has made him known to us.

It is the goal of this saving work that is so wonderful and amazing. Here we enter again the glory of this oneness that Jesus has been praying for. Jesus continues to make God known to us so that we may be one with God - to be in God and God in us and Jesus in us.

How does Jesus speak of this here? Jesus speaks “I make you known in order that the love you have for me may be in them, and that I myself may be in them.” I would urge you to dwell on these words long and deeply, and again and again. Words are not able to describe what the Spirit is saying to us deep in our minds and hearts, though I must try and express in words something of this glory and joy.

God loves Jesus. This love is the greatest and purest and most delightful and most intimate love that ever could be. The love which the Father has for the Son is the most wonderful love of all. It is perfect. It is the greatest.

Love, even in our fallen earthly existence, when it is at is highest earth can express it, is the greatest experience of joy we can know on earth. Writers and poets have extolled it. Every human being hungers for it and longs for it. But human love is but a poor reflection of God’s love, and particularly God’s love for Jesus.

Now what is the goal in the heart of Jesus for which he is praying for us his disciples? He prays that the love the Father has for him may be in them, and further that he himself, with all his love, may be in them.

This is totally heavenly. Through Christ and his work for us we are given a love which passes all understanding - the love of God, the deep love he has for Jesus, in us and filling our hearts, so that we know we are loved by God, and dwell in God, and have his love filling our whole being, so that it overflows from us.

When two people in marriage love one another deeply, they become one in a deep relationship of unity bound together with that love. Jesus is describing an ever more blessed and wonderful unity of love between God, himself and the believer. We are made one with the Father and the Son through this love in us. We are moulded to God so that we become like him in all things in character and loveliness. We are filled with an ecstasy of joy and completeness in this heavenly blessing.

Jesus has made God known to us so that we have begun in the oneness, and have begun to experience this blessed union of love. He goes on making God known to us so that this oneness in love with God ever deepens. Jesus will go on making the Righteous Father known to us for all eternity that this love of God may be in us, and that his love may be experienced more deeply by us, so that the joy of heaven will be deepening into infinity.