Who do You Say that I Am?

I Am. I Am that I Am.

Moses needed a name. God was sending him to free the children of Israel who had been slaves for 400 years in Egypt. Moses was understandably overawed, both by what he was experiencing in that moment of his call and by what God was asking him to do. 

The Israelites had been slaves in Egypt for 4 long centuries. There were many gods in the world in which they lived and those gods had names and statues and huge sanctuaries and a vast panoply of state-supported ritual, magic and display to explain themselves. 

But this God addressing Moses was a single quiet voice in the desert who had attracted him by the device of a bush that was blazing flames of fire but was not being burnt by the fire. How could he hope to describe that to people who had lived for centuries as slaves in an idol-soaked empire? He couldn’t tell them the burning bush that didn’t burn sent me. At the very least, he needed a name. 

Who shall I tell them sent me? He asked.  

How does an eternal being describe Himself to a mortal? What name does the Creator of all existence give for Himself to His beloved but very limited child? 

We are finite. He is infinite. We are mortal. He is eternal. We are bound to live out our mortal lives inside bodies of flesh and bone that are caught in linear time and exist in one place, know one reality, at any given moment. He is outside existence as we know it. He is everywhere all the time. He knows everything, all at once. He can interact with each of us, individually, as if we alone were all of existence, and He can do it with of us all at once. 

Our concept of God is far too small to fit God inside of it. But we do the best we can and, if we are wise, we trust Him to know and forgive our failings in the matter. You know my frame, David once said to God in prayer, You know that I am but dust. 

Moses needed a name. What name does God give for Himself to us? 

God answered Moses. 

I Am that I Am. 

Tell them I Am has sent you. 

Thousands of years later, Jesus was in the Temple, speaking to devout Jews and He told them plainly that those who followed Him would have eternal life. That didn’t go over too well with his audience.  

How can you say that? they answered. Abraham died. And the prophets died. And You say that anyone who keeps Your Word will have eternal life? Are you greater than our father Abraham? Are you greater than the prophets? Who are you pretending to be? 

Jesus answered, Before Abraham was, I Am. 

They understood. They knew that Jesus was using the sacred name that God gave to Moses to describe Himself. They knew Jesus was saying that He was God and that He had existed eternally. The crowd was so outraged by this that they took up stones to stone Him. 

Later, Jesus was speaking with His disciples. Who do you say that I am? he asked them. 

You are the Messiah, the Son of the Living God, Peter answered. 

And Jesus agreed with Peter. Blessed are you Simon son of Jonah for this was not revealed to you by flesh and blood, but by My Father who is in Heaven. 

Still later, on that dark night when Jesus was taken, Caiaphas who was the high priest, the other priests, the scribes and the elders sought to condemn Him to death. 

The “court” they were subjecting Jesus to was a kangaroo court. It was entirely illegal by their own law which they, as priests, were supposed to protect and enforce. Not only was it improperly convened and conducted, but they were actively seeking and trying to use perjured testimony. 

But even in this kangaroo court these political priests needed some sort of charge and evidence. They wanted to kill Jesus, but they couldn’t do it on a charge of “We don’t like this man.” They needed something a little stronger than that. 

After a series of failed attempts to convict Him of something, Caiaphas said, I abjure You, by the name of the Living God, tell us if you are the Christ, the Son of God!

And Jesus answered, You say it, which, in the vernacular of the time meant “yes I am, you said it buddy.” Then Jesus doubled down on his “yes.” But I tell you from now on you will see the Son of Man seated at the right hand of Power and coming on the clouds of heaven. It was a most emphatic “yes, I am the Son of God. In fact, I am God.” 

That was enough, according to their law, to put Him to death. They understood that Jesus was saying directly that He was God and that was blasphemy, which was a death penalty crime according to their law. 

This leads us back to the First Commandment. I am the Lord your God. You shall not have any other Gods before me. You shall not bow down to them or worship them. 

Jesus Christ is God. He is the great I Am. 

As He put it I and the Father are One. 

If you do not feel humility before the mystery of the eternal, omnipresent, omniscient God, you haven’t thought about Him enough. 

God became human to help us understand and know Him. He gave us Himself in all the ways He could to open a doorway into eternity for us. He became the Way that leads to eternal life.  

I Am that I am. Tell them I Am sent you. 

Before Abraham was, I Am.

Who do you say that I am? You are the Messiah, the Son of God. Blessed are you, Simon, son of Jonah, for this was not revealed to you by flesh and blood, but by My Father Who is in Heaven. 

Are you the Christ, the son of the Living God? I Am. And you will see the Son of Man seated at the right hand of Power and coming on clouds of glory. 

Each person has to answer the question that Jesus asked His disciples. Who do you say that I am? 

I have answered that question and, with God’s grace, I will continue to answer it the same way until I see Him face to face. Jesus Christ is God. He is my God. I love Him with all my heart. I will not bow down before the gods of this world. I rebuke Satan and all his works. 

Who do you say that Jesus is? 

Note: I used a lot of Scripture in this post. I didn’t cite it as I was writing because it destroys the flow of reading when you do that. Besides, this isn’t a legal brief. Read: Matthew 26: 36-46 to learn about Jesus’ testimony before Sanhedrin. Read: Matthew 16: 16-17 to learn about Peter’s testimony of Jesus’ divinity. Read: John 8: 48-59 to learn about Jesus testimony that He is the I Am. Read: Exodus 3: 13-14 to learn about the Name God gave for Himself to Moses. There are other places in the Gospels where Jesus said He is the Messiah, the Son of God. I couldn’t use them all in one short post. See if you can find them.