"I have revealed You to those whom You gave me ..." (John 17:6)

"I have revealed You to those whom You gave me out of the world. They were Yours; You gave them to me and they have obeyed Your word." (John 17:6)

Whose Name is he referring to?

Jesus is continuing his prayer to the Supreme Being. The first phrase of this verse is ἐφανέρωσά σου τὸ ὄνομα. The first word, φανερόω (phaneroō) means "to make manifest or visible or known what has been hidden or unknown" and "to make known by teaching" according to the lexicon.

The key word in the next part of this phrase (σου τὸ ὄνομα) is ὄνομα (onoma). This word specifically means "name."

If we translated this phrase σου τὸ ὄνομα literally it would convert to "you the name."

While the more language-friendly translation might be "your name" we must not ignore the literal translation here. The fact is, Jesus is clearly glorifying God's Name in his prayer.

Why is this important? First, we must ask why the translators of the New International Version, and several other versions - including the New Living Translation and others - translated "your name" out of this verse?

Even the King James Version includes this:
"I have manifested Thy Name unto the men which Thou gavest me out of the world: Thine they were, and Thou gavest them me; and they have kept Thy word."
The reality is that sectarian translators and interpreters - even those who read from the King James and other versions that contain the correct translation - have ignored the importance of God's Names and the emphasis that Jesus put upon the need for us to praise God's Name in order to reconnect with God.

Did Jesus praise God's Name?

Jesus spoke of God's Name quite frequently. Consider these statements by Jesus:
"Pray like this: Our Father in heaven, may Your Name be kept holy [Hallowed be Your Name]" (Matt. 6:9)
"For I tell you this, you will never see me again until you say, 'Blessings on the one who comes in the Name of the LORD!'" (Matt. 23:39)

"Therefore, go and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the Name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit." (Matt. 28:19)
"For I have come to you in my Father's name, and you have rejected me. Yet if others come in their own name, you gladly welcome them." (John 5:43)
Jesus replied, "I have already told you, and you don't believe me. The proof is the work I do in my Father's Name." (John 10:25)
They shouted, "Praise God! Blessings on the one who comes in the Name of the LORD!" (John 12:13)
"Father, bring glory to Your Name." Then a voice spoke from heaven, saying, "I have already brought glory to My Name, and I will do so again." (John 12:28)
"Now I am departing from the world; they are staying in this world, but I am coming to you. Holy Father, you have given me Your Name; now protect them by the power of Your Name so that they will be united just as we are." (John 17:11)
"During my time here, I protected them by the power of the Name You gave me." (John 17:12)
"And I have declared unto them Thy Name, and will declare it" (John 17:26 - KJV - again mistranslated in NIV)
These quotes by Jesus indicate clearly the importance Jesus put upon God's Names.

And we cannot forget that as a crowd of Jesus students acclaimed Jesus in a procession as he entered Jerusalem:
Jesus was in the center of the procession, and the people all around him were shouting, "Praise God! Blessings on the one who comes in the Name of the LORD!" (Mark 11:9)
As we see here in the translation of the New International Version and others, as well as many sectarian teachings, we find that the assumption is that Jesus is referring to God's Name as a reference used when a person says something like "I will do this in your name" when they mean they will do something on behalf of another person. In this use of the language, to say "in your name" is equivalent to "for you."

However, this is not the context that Jesus is using. We can see this in Jesus' other statements. Consider the clear statement, later in Jesus' prayer, "During my time here, I protected them by the power of the Name You gave me;" as well as: "protect them by the power of Your Name" The use of "power of Your Name" indicates that Jesus was specifically detailing that God's Names had a special potency.

Did Jesus glorify God's Names elsewhere?

We can see that Jesus gave special importance to glorifying God's Name. Jesus emphasized praising God's Name in the prayer he suggested, often referred to as the "Lord's Prayer:"
"Pray like this: Our Father in heaven, hallowed be Your Name" (Matt. 6:9)
This means he specifically instructed his students to praise God's Name. The word "hallowed" specifically means to venerate or glorify.

We also see that Jesus' activities also prompted his students and those around him to praise God's Names. There are many statements like this to be found in the New Testament:
Immediately he received his sight and followed Jesus, praising God. When all the people saw it, they also praised God. (Luke 18:43)
This blind man near Jericho "followed Jesus" as he praised God. This indicated that praising God was part of following Jesus. Praising God was inseparable from following Jesus, and Jesus' activities prompted people to praise God's Names.

Now this teaching of the importance of God's Names is not an isolated or contrived teaching. The power and potency of praising, calling and reciting God's Names is taught throughout the Bible.

Why do so many sectarian institutions not follow Jesus' and the rest of the prophets' teachings regarding the importance of praising God's Names? Sure, many institutions will sing hymns about Jesus in church, and there is nothing wrong with that. But most of these are focused on Jesus. They are not following Jesus' prime teaching to focus our attention on the Supreme Being, and praise His Names.

Why is God's Name important?

When we approach anyone what is the first thing we do? We say their name. "Hi Bob," we might say. If we don't know their name, we will ask them their name, we will say, "my name is ___, what is your name?"

Why is a person's name so important? It communicates our commitment to honoring them. By saying someone's name, we honor them. We respect them.

This respect and honor are extended to God when we glorify His Name. By praising God's Name with sincerity, humility, and trust, we are invoking God's personal authority.

God's Name goes even further. The physical world is a place of duality - that is, we are not our names. This is evidenced by the fact that a person can change their name and still be the same person.

But the spiritual realm is different. In the spiritual realm there is no duality. In the spiritual realm, God's Name is inseparable from God's person. There is unity between God and His Name. There is unity between anything that references or symbolizes God personally and Himself.

In other words, God's Names are His personal manifestation within the physical world.

Singing or otherwise repeating God's Names is ridiculously easy. At any time, place, and circumstance we can glorify His Names:

We can pick a song and repeat them.
We can repeat them while we breathe deep and meditate.
We can repeat them while we take a walk in the woods or on the beach. 
We can repeat them while we shower.
We can repeat them while we are falling asleep.
We can repeat them while we are waiting in line.
Or while we are driving.

There are no hard and fast rules for praising God's Names.

We can also pick one or multiple Names of God according to our faith or preference. These include God, Jehovah, Abba, Yahweh, Jah, Eloi, Great Spirit, Creator, Supreme Being, and many others from many different languages and faiths around the world. All of these Names honor the one Supreme Being that loves each of us.

We can see by Jesus' statement that Jesus' main purpose for his appearance was to promote the praising and repeating of God's Names.

Why are we not with God now?

People challenge God all the time - "if you exist, appear before me" - and then He seemingly doesn't appear. And some will then say, "He must not exist then."

Many seek to see God - but for most of us, our physical eyes cannot "see" God. Yet God appears within the physical realm through His Name.

Why is this? Why can't the Supreme Being appear to our physical eyes - just appear before us and walk around with us?

This is not His choice. God would gladly walk with us and be seen at any time if we really wanted to see Him.

It is us who have chosen not to see God. We do not want to really see God. We do not want to be with God.

The reality is that He is the Supreme Being - the Creator, Owner and Controller of all that exists. Therefore, being seen is still ultimately His choice. It is not that we can spy on God.

But God will manifest Himself for those who truly seek Him. We make that choice, but ultimately, God makes the choice of whether He will manifest Himself.

Therefore, in order to see Him we would need to also be prepared to accept that God is the Supreme Being. That God is ultimately our Master. That God is Superior to us and will always be superior to us.

The problem is that we don't want anyone to be superior to us. This is why we all act like we are superior to others: We want to be superior. We think we know it all. We think we are the boss. We think that we are in charge.

We don't want to feel that someone else is superior to us. We don't want to feel that someone knows more than us. We don't want someone to be the boss of me - and we can do nothing about it.

In other words, we do not want to surrender ourselves to God. We don't want to be in our natural role of God's servant. We want others to serve us. We want to be master.

This is our disease, and this is why we are here in the physical world in the first place. This is why we were given temporary physical bodies that are not equipped to see God - because we do not want to see God. We want to escape from God. We want to ignore God.

Even many who claim to be religious still want to be in charge. This is easily seen by the content of our prayers.

Some like to pray like this:

"God, give me this" - "God, give me that" - "God, make me rich" - "God, don't let my father die" - "God, make me win" - and so forth.

This is putting God into the role of servant. We order things up from Him, and He fetches it for us. In other words, when we supposedly become religious, we think that God exists specifically to do our bidding. He gets stuff for us and makes us famous and wealthy and makes us a winner.

This is simply a mirage. God is no one's servant. God is the Supreme Controller and the Supreme Being. We are His servants. This is why Jesus was so emphatic about serving God:
"For it is written: 'Worship the Lord your God, and serve Him only.'" (Matt. 4:10)
"No one can serve two masters. Either you will hate the one and love the other, or you will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and money." (Luke 16:13)
"Not everyone who says to me, 'Lord, Lord,' will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven." (Matt. 7:21)
"For whoever does the will of my Father in heaven is my brother and sister and mother." (Matt. 12:50)

What does doing the will of someone mean?

To do someone's will means to serve them. But we don't want to do someone else's will. We want to do our own will, and we want God to do our will. This is why those who consider themselves religious will so often ask God for stuff. We want God to do our will.

This is why we don't see the Supreme Being in our daily lives. We don't see Him because seeing Him is seeing Him for who He really is: Our Master, Best Friend, Beloved.

But even if we don't see Him we can still invoke His Names. He has provided us with this means of contact because by invoking God's Names we are able to gradually purify our consciousness through contact with Him. We are able to slowly and gradually change our consciousness from being all about us to being about Him.

Then Jesus states that "They were Yours; You gave them to me." This indicates that Jesus sees himself in the role of servant and representative of God. Those students that Jesus taught belong to God - Jesus does not claim authority over them. But he acknowledges that the Supreme Being authorized Jesus to represent God and God's teachings to these students.

We might compare this to a teacher at an elementary school who recognizes that the school that hired them to teach has allowed - "given" - the teacher the authority to teach to that particular classroom of students. The students didn't just appear magically in the classroom. The school assigned the students to the class that the teacher was teaching. This would, in a practical way, mean the teacher was given the students, and given the authority to teach them.

He follows that by praising those students before God - acknowledging his students that have heard and followed Jesus' teachings.

We can thus know from this that Jesus understood his position as God's servant. He understands that the authority he had was given to Him and the ability to help others was given by God, whom He loved and cherished.


*Here is the translation of this verse from Jesus' prayer from the Lost Gospels of Jesus:
"I have revealed Your Name to the people You have entrusted to Me from the material world: They were Yours and You entrusted them to me, and they have followed Your Teachings.” (John 17:6)