John 17:4 - Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible

I have glorified thee on the earth: I have finished the work which thou gavest me to do. I have glorified thee on the earth: I have finished the work which thou gavest me to do - or, keeping to the strict sense of the tenses here employed, 'I glorified Thee on the earth: I finished the work which Thou hast given Me to do' х edoxasa (G1392) ... teleioosas (G5048) dedookas (G1325)]. Observe here, first, the light in which Jesus presents Himself and His work before His Father's view. His whole life here below was, He says, a glorification of the Father; but in this He only did, He says, a prescribed work-a work "given Him to do." But observe, next, the retrospective light in which He speaks of this. He refers to the time when He was "on the earth," as a past time: His glorification of the Father was now completed; the "work given Him to do" was a "finished" work. Manifestly the work meant was not so much of His work merely as was over at the moment when He now spake; for the great consummating surrender of His life was yet to come. It is His entire work in the flesh of which He speaks as now finished. And in the sublime and erect consciousness that He was presenting before the Father's eye a glorification of Him in which He would see no flaw, a finished work in which would be found nothing lacking, He now asks the fitting return.