The gospel passage describes the conversation Jesus has with his Father about the disciples. Jesus asks that the Father protect the disciples with His immense power, help them be closely united as the Father and the Son are intimately united, that their sufferings will be turned into joy, that they be guarded from the prince of the world and that they be consecrated, like Jesus, in total dedication to God's service which will be a mission to the world. At the core of Jesus' prayer for his disciples is his confidence in his Father's love in all His activity.

The Father's response to the prayer of Jesus is evidenced in the gathering of the one hundred and twenty disciples after Jesus' ascension. Through prayer, and by inspiration of the Holy Spirit, Peter and the other apostles chose Judas' replacement. Even though they had faced a crisis in that one of Jesus' closest disciples had betrayed him, confident of God's love for them, and as witnesses to the resurrection, they proceeded with the task that Jesus had commissioned them with. In his letter, John writes that because God loves us, we too are called to love one another. God's love generates ours. God's love for us and our love for Him and for one another should give us confidence, for just like Christ, we have overcome the world. It is in Jesus as Saviour of the world and as Son of God that we can and should fearlessly profess our faith through the Spirit to the world.