The betrayer has just walked out the door, and Jesus has hours to live. That’s the moment — verse 31 — when he says, “Now is the Son of Man glorified, and God is glorified in him.” Now. Not after the resurrection, not at the ascension — now, with the arrest already in motion. In two verses John stacks the word “glory” five times, and Jesus aims every one of them at a Roman execution. He’d already told us what he meant back in 12:23: “unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone.” So when Jesus talks about glory, he’s not talking about a throne room. He’s talking about a cross. And then, in the same breath, he turns to the eleven: “A new commandment I give to you… just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another” (13:34). The command to love isn’t new — Leviticus said it. What’s new is the measuring stick: just as I have loved you. He’d just knelt on that floor with a towel, hours from the cross. If you want to know what Jesus means by love, look at what he calls glory.
