After Jesus said this, he looked toward heaven and prayed…
The prayer Jesus prays in Chapter 17 is sometimes called “The Lord’s Prayer” (not to be confused with the prayer he taught his disciples to pray) or also “The High Priestly Prayer.” Jesus prays in front of his disciples. He prays to his Father in heaven.
Today we begin with the first part of the first verse of this prayer. Jesus “looked toward heaven” when he prayed. This catches my eye because as a child I was taught to bow my head when I prayed.
Bowing is what one does in front of royalty. Certainly, this is appropriate as we come before the God of all creation to praise him or ask for something. But Jesus has told us that we are in a different relationship with God now. In John 14: 20 we read:
”On that day you will realize that I am in my Father, and you are in me, and I am in you.”
In Jesus, we are allowed to be in a very close relationship to the Father. Perhaps we, too, are worthy of looking toward heaven when we pray.
Food for thought: What do you suppose Jesus was seeing when he looked toward heaven? Clouds or something else?
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I think He may have seen the same thing that we do from a physical perspective, but His mind was clearly with His Father, Posture means something. His posture showed the direction of His heart, if not His eyes.
Thanks Rich!
I’ve been thinking about Stephen in Acts 7:55 –
“But Stephen, full of the Holy Spirit, looked up to heaven and saw the glory of God, and Jesus standing at the right hand of God.” I wonder if Jesus, too, was seeing the glory of God.
It is certainly possible. I know standing and looking toward heaven was the normal posture of the day. Jesus may have seen that every time for all I know. While the text is not clear, I know His heart was with the Father and the Father was with Him. He certainly saw what we did not whether or not He saw something unusual to us