“Your father Abraham was extremely joyful to see My Day, and he saw it and was glad. And so the Jews said to Him, ‘You are not yet fifty years old and you have seen Abraham?’ Jesus said to them, ‘Amen, Amen, I say to you, before Abraham was, I AM.’” (St. John 8:46-59)
In the name of Jesus. Amen. The problem with Jesus’ words to the Jews in the Gospel for Judica Sunday is not Jesus’ claim to be eternal. They could have dismissed Him as just being crazy. Only a nut would possibly claim to be older than Father Abraham!
If Jesus was only referencing how old He was,He could have said, “Before Abrahams was, I was.” But the words that Jesus uses confess something so full of the Gospel that the Jews pick up stones to kill Him for saying it.
When Moses was standing before the burning bush in Exodus, chapter three, he asked the name of God. And God said to Moses, “I AM WHO I AM.” And He said, “Thus you shall say to the children of Israel, ‘I AM has sent me to you.’” (Exodus 3:14)
When Jesus says that, “Before Abraham was, I AM,” He is not only claiming to be older than Abraham, He is also claiming to be the Lord God Himself!
That Jesus is “I AM” means that He is the God that walked in the cool of the day in the Garden of Eden. He is the God of the burning bush, the God that brought the children of Israel out of the bondage in Egypt. He is the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob. He is the God of the Old Testament.
When Judas and the detachment of troops came to seize Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane,Jesus asked them whom they were seeking. The Scriptures say: “They answered Him, ‘Jesus of Nazareth.’ Jesus said to them, ‘I am.’ And Judas, who betrayed Him, also stood with them. Now when He said to them, ‘I am,’ they drew back and fell to the ground,” (St. John 18:5-6).
When they came to seize Him, He identified Himself as God, and they fell to the ground. That’s what we sinners do before God in His glory,we fall! After hey picked themselves up, they did seize Him and took Him away.
God Himself, I AM, took on our flesh, suffered for all the evil that we have done, and dies in our place. On Easter, we will celebrate that the One who died for us, God Himself, rose for us on the third day.
Listen to Jesus whenever He says the words “I AM”! He may be saying more than just “I am.” He may be confessing that He is God Himself!In the name of Jesus. Amen.
Higher Things Reflections are written by Rev. George F. Borghardt III, Assistant Pastor at St. Mark Lutheran Church, Conroe, TX.