Saturday in the Word | Jesus Prays – The Devotional Guy™

We are continuing today in our Simple Bible Reading Plan. The intent of this plan is to introduce you to God’s Word by providing you with an overview of the essential chapters of the Bible that help shape our spiritual growth. Whether you’re new here or whether you’re looking for something to ignite your Bible reading, I believe you’ve found the right place to sit and grow.

In the Bible, there are chapters you read and chapters that invite us to step into them quietly. John 17 is certainly the latter.

Read John 17 here (or in your hard copy of the Bible).

John 17 does not offer us a miracle scene, or a parable. There’s no confrontation with the religious leaders of the time or people who question who Jesus is. perhaps Jesus’ most intimate moment.

John 17 is a scene of intimate prayer between the Son and the Father. It features Jesus praying out loud before the atonement of the Cross.

The Disciples are listening, just as we are invited to listen.

“Father, the hour has come…”

There is no panic in His voice.

No scrambling.

No second-guessing.

Just surrender.

For someone like me who tends to analyze outcomes, anticipate loss, and brace for impact, this prayer feels steady. Grounded. Certain. Jesus knows suffering is hours away and yet His concern is not self-preservation.

It’s about glory. Specifically, the Father’s glory.

It’s about obedience and the reward of the Son’s obedience, not for Himself, but for us.

It’s about love. Unimaginable, abundant, never-ending l-o-v-e.

Jesus defines eternal life not as escape, but relationship:

“That they may know You…”

Not know about.

Know.

There’s a difference, just like there’s a difference between knowing God intellectually and knowing God because of His embracing us—hugging our souls—in the hour of our greatest need.

Jesus Prays for His People

What moves me most is this:

Before the Cross, He prays for us.

He doesn’t pray for comfort.
He doesn’t move for removal of His burden.
He doesn’t pray for His safety.

Instead, Jesus prays for unity.
He prays for protection from the Evil One.
He prays for our sanctification in truth.

Jesus doesn’t ask the Father to take His mockers, scorners, doubters, and persecutors out of the world. He asks that they be kept in it. That’s powerful.

Knowing that they will thrust a crown of thorns on His head—that they will spit in His face and nail Him to the Cross, Jesus prays for them and asks that they be spared.

As someone who has walked through trauma, anxiety, and the slow rebuilding of trust, I notice Jesus does not promise extraction. He prays for endurance. For anchoring. For being held. For the ability to stay.

“Keep them.”

I find there is something deeply steadying in knowing that He is for me, even when I’m not for Him, or even myself.

He Prays for Us

Then it gets personal.

“I do not ask for these only, but also for those who will believe in Me through their word…”

That’s us.

Across centuries.
Across cultures.
Across church traditions and fractured stories.

He saw ahead and prayed.

Jesus didn’t pray that we would be impressive or that we would win arguments. He didn’t pray that we would perform well spiritually.

But that we would be one.

Unity, not uniformity.
Oneness, not sameness.

For someone who has lived much of life feeling evaluated, measured, or misunderstood, that prayer feels like relief.

I don’t have to prove my belonging. Neither do you.

We are prayed for by God Most High.

“That the love…may be in them”

The chapter ends, naturally, with love.

Not strategy.
Not warning.
Love.

The same love the Father has for the Son, Jesus prays would be in us.

That’s staggering. That’s powerful!

For many, Saturday is often a day between what was and what will be; between questions and answers. It’s the day between last week and the week to come.

John 17 reminds us:

Before the suffering came,
before the silence fell,
before the stone sealed the tomb, Jesus prayed.

And we were in His prayer.

Friend, I encourage you to sit with that today.