A Word in Season: The Finished Work (John 17:4)

The Meaning of “I’ve Finished”

I imagine that most of us use the words I've finished quite a lot. Perhaps if we're children, we might say to Dad or Mum, I've finished the work, I've cleaned my room up. Or perhaps you've been engaged in a project outside and you come in and you're sweaty and dirty and tired and you say, I've finished.

Maybe it's some sort of schoolwork, an essay or whatever else it may be. Or perhaps something else connected with a professional job where you're able to say at last, I've crossed every T, I've dotted every I, the work is over, the project is completed.

And there's a real sense of satisfaction. We can, as it were, turn our backs on the thing and walk away. But no one has ever been able to use that language the way our Lord Jesus used it in John's Gospel in chapter 17.

Christ’s Finished Work in John 17:4

He says at that point to his father in prayer that the hour has come. There's a sense of completion, a sense of finality now that is looming over him. He knows that a climactic moment is at hand. And in the fourth verse of that chapter, he says, I have glorified you on the earth.

I have finished the work which you have given me to do. He's not talking about a single project. He's not talking about a few hours or weeks or days or even a few years. He's talking about the entire course of his life.

He's referring to the entirety of his existence as the incarnate son. And he is testifying that every moment, every minute of that existence has been lived before the eye of God in the pure and perfect fear of the Lord, doing his will in everything.

That refers to the grandest scheme of his existence, the accomplishment of salvation, and within that to every moment of the life that he has lived. You remember perhaps when he was a child, he told his earthly parents, his mother and what we might call his stepfather, Joseph, didn't you know that I must be about my father's business?

And that really is the tone and the tenor of his entire life. Over and over again, he tells people that it is to do the father's will that he has come. And now as he contemplates the completion of that accomplishment with everything in its proper place, every arrow pointing as it were toward the cross, with the final act of obedience in his eye, he is able to say, I have glorified you on the earth.

The Obedience of Christ from Beginning to End

I have always lived for your honour. I have always lived to accomplish what you have given me to do. You commissioned me and I have carried out the commission. I have finished the work. Not I've almost done it.

Not I've tried to do it. Not I've done a few bits well, but there's a few bits that I've left out. But every single stroke has been accomplished. Every promise is being fulfilled. Every assertion is being carried out.

Every plan is being worked to the end. Every purpose is being fully and finally executed. Nothing is lacking. All is now complete. And then there's this sense in which the Lord Christ will step steadily and readily into those last few hours of his life in which he will lay down his life in order to save his people from their sins, and in so doing will gloriously accomplish all that the Father has given him to do.

That is the good news that we make known to the world. That's the declaration that we offer to men and women, boys and girls who are dead in their trespasses and sins, sunk in misery and unable to accomplish anything for the glory and honour of God.

We call people to trust in him who has done everything that he needed to do, not just for himself but on behalf of us. Here is the perfect righteousness with which we need to be clothed if we are to stand accepted with God.

And that's then not only the message that we bring, it's also the confidence that we have. Christ has finished the work. He has accomplished all that was needful for us, and this is where our souls rest, when we confess again that we have not done what we should, not even what we could.

Nevertheless, there is one who has glorified his Father on the earth, and who has done the work that he has been given to do.