“I am the God of your father—the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.” And Moses hid his face, for he was afraid to look upon God.
Exodus 3:6 KJV
13 And Moses said unto God, Behold, when I come unto the children of Israel, and shall say unto them, The God of your fathers hath sent me unto you; and they shall say to me, What is his name? what shall I say unto them?
14 And God said unto Moses, I AM THAT I AM: and he said, Thus shalt thou say unto the children of Israel, I AM hath sent me unto you.
Who sent Jesus to us?
Moses relates one of the most remarkable encounters with the LORD which results in his leading God’s chosen from slavery to the promised land. Exodus records for us not only the genealogy of Israel, Isaac and Abraham, here we learn the Lord’s own Name:
הָיָה הָיָה
I AM that I AM – that is: the LORD IS the Existing One!
As we learned previously in Who May Judge Sin?, Jesus answers questions of the religious leaders of the Temple. They asked Him to judge a woman accused of adultery, but relented from stoning her when Jesus showed her mercy and challenged their motives.
They question Jesus legitimacy as the Messiah of God. Do you?
Essentially they want to prove that Jesus is not sent from God, even though this Son of Man has given many signs of His power and Authority from God.
These rabbis will go to any length and make any false argument against the legitimacy and authority of Jesus.
So what does the Messiah Jesus claim?
Jesus spoke to them again: “I am the light of the world.
John 8:12a CSB
What does this mean? It depends if you have ears to hear.
Who sent Jesus to the world twenty-one centuries ago is a matter of faith – also our question of who to believe.
So Jesus now speaks to two groups of Jews:
- Followers of Jesus – those called by faith, which includes some Jews who believe their Messiah; and also
- Those who judge Jesus, refusing to believe the very Word of God! These include some but not all of the Pharisees from the Court of the Jews.
Let’s dissect Jesus’ words as heard by each group, both then and now.
1. Followers of Jesus
Anyone who follows me will never walk in the darkness but will have the light of life.”
The promise of Jesus – John 8:12b CSB
14 … “My testimony is true, because I know where I came from and where I’m going.
I judge no one. 16 And if I do judge, my judgment is true, because it is not I alone who judge, but I and the Father who sent me.
29 The one who sent me is with me. He has not left me alone, because I always do what pleases him.”
30 As he was saying these things, many believed in him.
31 Then Jesus said to the Jews who had believed him, “If you continue in my word, you really are my disciples. 32 You will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.”
36 So if the Son sets you free, you really will be free.
42 Jesus said to them, “If God were your Father, you would love me, because I came from God and I am here. For I didn’t come on my own, but he sent me.
49 “I do not have a demon,” Jesus answered. “On the contrary, I honor my Father … 50 I do not seek my own glory; there is one who seeks it and judges. 51 Truly I tell you, if anyone keeps my word, he will never see death.”
Then the teachers of the Jews will follow with a question, the answer which divides the faithful from the deceitful.
But first let’s go back to the beginning of this testimony of the Gospel to stand beside Jerusalem’s religious elite who question the Messiah of God, determined to kill Him and preserve their own temporal glory among men.
2. Court of the Pharisees
Hear this same Messiah of Israel through ears refusing to listen to truth. These Pharisees feed the crowds of Jews they teach with their own dismissive words and questions of resentful doubt.
13 So the Pharisees said to him, “You are testifying about yourself. Your testimony is not valid.”
Jesus replied, “… But you don’t know where I come from or where I’m going. 15 You judge by human standards.
17 Even in your law it is written that the testimony of two witnesses is true. 18 I am the one who testifies about myself, and the Father who sent me testifies about me.”
19 Then they asked him, “Where is your Father?”
“You know neither me nor my Father,” Jesus answered.
21 Then he said to them again, “I’m going away; you will look for me, and you will die in your sin. Where I’m going, you cannot come.”
22 So the Jews said again, “He won’t kill himself, will he, since he says, ‘Where I’m going, you cannot come’?”
23 “You are from below,” he told them, “I am from above. You are of this world; I am not of this world. 24 Therefore I told you that you will die in your sins. For if you do not believe that I am he, you will die in your sins.”
Who are you?
25 “Who are you?” they questioned.
28 So Jesus said to them, “When you lift up the Son of Man, then you will know that I am he, and that I do nothing on my own. But just as the Father taught me, I say these things.
33 “We are descendants of Abraham,” they answered him, “and we have never been enslaved to anyone. How can you say, ‘You will become free’?”
34 Jesus responded, “Truly I tell you, everyone who commits sin is a slave of sin. 35 A slave does not remain in the household forever, but a son does remain forever.
Jesus, speaking to the Jews to whom He was sent, warns in the same manner He told many parables. The Father, His Father in heaven sent the Son to redeem them of their sins. He will become the Sacrifice God provides, just like the substitute for Isaac the Lord sent to Abraham.
A sinful man must sacrifice to the Lord because of man’s sin.
The Son remains in the Father’s house because He will inherit all that the Father owns. But a slave, even a chosen slave freed from Pharaoh, only lives freely if his sin does not shackle him to death once more.
Abraham believed God; but unbelief binds one to die as sacrifice only for yourself, a sentence of death for your own sin.
Descendents of Abraham
37 I know you are descendants of Abraham, but you are trying to kill me because my word has no place among you.
… so then, you do what you have heard from your father.”
39 “Our father is Abraham,” they replied.
“If you were Abraham’s children,” Jesus told them, “you would do what Abraham did. 40 But now you are trying to kill me, a man who has told you the truth that I heard from God. Abraham did not do this.
41 You’re doing what your father does.”
“We weren’t born of sexual immorality,” they said. “We have one Father—God.”
Your father, the Devil
43 Why don’t you understand what I say? Because you cannot listen to my word.
44 You are of your father the devil, and you want to carry out your father’s desires. He was a murderer from the beginning and does not stand in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he tells a lie, he speaks from his own nature, because he is a liar and the father of lies. 45 Yet because I tell the truth, you do not believe me.
47 The one who is from God listens to God’s words. This is why you don’t listen, because you are not from God.”
48 The Jews responded to him, “Aren’t we right in saying that you’re a Samaritan and have a demon?”
Demons and Samaritans
Do not dismiss quickly their accusation of demons. Many will accuse Jesus of having a demon or evil spirit, even though the Messiah has done no evil.
And later, confirming the signs of the Messiah some Jews ask, “Can a demon open the eyes of the blind? ”
The Pharisees knowing from scripture that the Messiah will come from Bethlehem only know the Son of Man as ‘Jesus of Nazareth,’ and we know their contempt as Judeans for Samaritans (and Galileans as well).
49 “I do not have a demon,” Jesus answered.
51 Truly I tell you, if anyone keeps my word, he will never see death.”
[How can that be, anyone must wonder. Never see death?]
52 Then the Jews said, “Now we know you have a demon. Abraham died and so did the prophets. You say, ‘If anyone keeps my word, he will never taste death.’
A Convicting Question
53 Are you greater than our father Abraham who died? And the prophets died. Who do you claim to be?”
Who could be greater than David, King of Israel a thousand years before Jesus?
In the new traditions of the Pharisees of a rebuilt temple certainly Moses, who was given the Law and brought them out of Egypt, would be revered most.
Some prophets like Elijah might be seen as great because of great signs they performed, along with Jacob and Abraham as first fathers of the promise of the Lord to the Hebrew people.
So the question of the Pharisees to Jesus comparing Him to Abraham and the prophets is meant to convict.
Who do you claim to be?
Note that they do not ask, “who are you,” but “who do you claim to be.” Jesus’ unequivocal answer will claim His very deity!
Jesus’ Glorious Answer
Even before Mosheh (Moses)
Returning to Scripture as these rabbis would well know as background:
וַיִּשְׁכֹּ֤ן כְּבֹוד־יְהוָה֙ עַל־הַ֣ר סִינַ֔י וַיְכַסֵּ֥הוּ הֶעָנָ֖ן שֵׁ֣שֶׁת יָמִ֑ים וַיִּקְרָ֧א אֶל־מֹשֶׁ֛ה בַּיֹּ֥ום הַשְּׁבִיעִ֖י מִתֹּ֥וךְ הֶעָנָֽן׃
The glory of the LORD rested on Mount Sinai, and the cloud covered it for six days; and on the seventh day He called to Moses from the midst of the cloud.
Exodus 24:16 WLC; NASB
The context of the hearers, fellow Jews like Jesus, connects their question to Jesus’ answer. (You must know scripture (Old Testament) as they knew scripture. The Torah of Moses includes the Lord’s promise to Abraham’s descendants.
And to the eyes of the sons of Israel the appearance of the glory of the LORD was like a consuming fire on the mountain top. Moses entered the midst of the cloud as he went up to the mountain; and Moses was on the mountain forty days and forty nights.
Exodus 24:17-18 NASB
Their Hebrew forefathers witnessed the glory of the LORD more than once.
Now, returning to the Gospel, Jesus gives witness to a glory which preceded Moses who received the Law directly from the LORD.
54 “If I glorify myself,” Jesus answered, “my glory is nothing. My Father—about whom you say, ‘He is our God’—he is the one who glorifies me. 55 You do not know him, but I know him…”
And now the Son of Man, who must say only truth, does so even though the depth of Jesus’ words do not immediately sink in.
“… If I were to say I don’t know him, I would be a liar like you. But I do know him, and I keep his word…”
Jesus the Son knows the Father unlike ANY son of man, even the Prophets, any of the fathers of Israel or Moses.
“… Your father Abraham rejoiced to see my day; he saw it and was glad.”
The Messiah Jesus to Rabbis of Judah – John 8:56 CSB
Think of the context of Jesus’ witness of Abraham in the timeline of centuries before the Son of God – the Word – coming to a manger in Bethlehem of Judea.
57 The Jews replied, “You aren’t fifty years old yet, and you’ve seen Abraham?”
Jesus said to them, “Truly I tell you, before Abraham was, I am.”
Witness of the Messiah – John 8:58 CSB
“before Abraham was, I am
59 Then they took up stones to throw at Him; but Jesus hid Himself and went out of the temple, going[b] through the midst of them, and so passed by.
Other places in the Gospel add explanation to this.
Why did religious officials determined to kill this man claiming to be God not successfully seize the Lord Jesus and stone Him to death?
For his time had not come.
- So then they tried to seize Jesus, but no one laid a hand on him, because his time had not yet come. – John 7:20 NET
- (Jesus spoke these words near the offering box while he was teaching in the temple courts. No one seized him because his time had not yet come.) – John 8:20 – a small detail of the Gospel we have just read
When, then, would the time for Sacrifice of the Messiah for sin occur?
Do you see the significance of the substitution of the acceptable sacrifice to the Father?
For the LORD provided a sacrifice in the place of Isaac for Abraham, an early sign of what must take place to fulfill God’s plan of redemption of sinful man.
No man can come to me, except the Father which hath sent me draw him: and I will raise him up at the last day.
I am the living bread which came down from heaven: if any man eat of this bread, he shall live for ever: and the bread that I will give is my flesh, which I will give for the life of the world.
John 6:44,51 KJV
NEXT: More Signs
Abraham is standing before God pleading for mercy for the people of his nephew Lot’s city. It is a city and a place full of sin on which God will rain down His Almighty wrath and judgment – the city of Sodom.