What does it mean to speak of the Father as Holy? The only reference in all of Scripture to “the Holy Father” is in John 17:11. Because of the singularity of this – a statement that is made once in the world of literature – it is profoundly challenging to learn what Jesus means when he addresses God as “Holy Father”?

This may be the most infrequently employed expression as prayer as addressed to God. We are endangered by exploring what it means that Jesus addresses God as “Holy Father” and then to prayer, “May your name by hallowed.”

The Gospel of John divided fairly neatly into two halves. There comes a point in the twelfth chapter where Jesus withdraws from the world and does no more signs. The Book of the Signs (1-12). The Book of Glory (13-21). He begins to bring his disciples into the mystery of who he is.

The Trinity is the least speculative doctrine in the Bible and at the end of the day is the most practical. If the language had not been abused elsewhere, we could write over John 13 – 17, “The Sacred Heart of Christ.”

It begins with a physical descent in John 13: “He riseth from supper.” It ends with the most remarkable ascent as he comes to his father and prays that he may be able to glorify his father’s name and his father may be able to glorify him, and that his disciples (John 17:24) will be able to behold his glory.

Here is the link to us – when he rises in the early morning of his resurrection he charges one: “Go and tell my brothers that I am ascending to my father.” In his resurrection he is beginning to gather from all the ends of the earth children into the worldwide family of God, to come and say far more frequently than we want to do: “O Holy Father.”

What does it mean for the Lord of Glory to come to the father and say, “Holy Father.”

There are two dimensions: from all eternity within the Trinity there has been this response of the eternal son to his eternal father. For something to be an attribute of God it must have been an action before all worlds. It must have been in the most intense and dynamic forum expressed in the fellowship. The wrath of God cannot be an attribute of God. God expresses wrath, but the wrath of God has no place in the Holy Trinity for the expression of the wrath of God. What he says here opens the heart of the Son from all eternity. The meaning of holiness cannot be separation. It becomes separation to creation and to the sinner, but within the blessed fellowship of the Holy Trinity cannot mean separation.

It may mean purity. It may mean the infinite intensity of God’s expression of all that he is in the unity of his fatherly being with reference to His Son.
We go to Isaiah 6 and we Isaiah responding to the expression of divine holiness.

The Father is in the Son and the Son is in the Father. Jesus gives expression in his incarnation to the relationship He has with the Father. He longs that we may be there to see him where he is (v. 24).

Two Insights in Jesus Relationship With His Father

John 5: “The Son can do nothing of his own accord, but only what He sees His Father doing.”

John 10:17 – “For this reason the Father loves me because I lay down my life that I may take it again.”

1. If when we pray “Our Holy Father,” then that means that Church which he purchased with his own blood is the Holy Family. Some of our churches are good at family. Some of our churches are good at holiness, but too few of our churches are good at being the Holy Family.
2. Since he is the Holy Father, he has set his heart on making all of his children like his holy Son.

The Cost to the Son: “Holy Father, smite the Shepherd.” He smote the Shepherd in order that the sheep might be gained.