Continuing from last week…Jesus is with His disciples in the upper room where they gathered to eat together and for Jesus to tell them things they needed to hear before His crucifixion. He is still praying. At this point in the prayer we find a gentle shift from praying about His relationship to the Father to praying for His disciples. He said He had revealed God’s name to His followers. A name in this culture held a lot of importance. It signified a person’s character and inner nature. When Jesus revealed God’s name, He was showing them the truth of who God is—the Great I Am. It’s interesting to me that He says these followers have kept God’s word. Sadly, we know that the apostles weren’t always faithful. One would betray Him. Another denied Him three times. They all abandoned Him the night He was arrested. But the Son knew that the Father had been preparing them to respond to Jesus’s call, “Follow Me.” He knew, with the exception of one, they would be reconciled and go to serve in Jesus’s name when He had returned to the Father. I see a hint of Jesus’s compassion and ability to forgive in this part of His prayer. I am grateful for His loving character.