Pastor Jonny brought us the first message in our new series, I AM, all about who God is. As Christians it’s really important we know who Jesus is, not just facts about Him.
In the Bible, Jesus tells His followers who He is, and thanks to God preserving His Word, we also can see who Jesus is!
Jesus uses the phrase “I AM” a lot. Both the Old and New Testaments point to Jesus. In the Old Testament, every time we see LORD in all capitals, it’s an English translation of the Hebrew word YHWH, which is Yahweh, which is Hebrew for “I AM”.
Let’s have a look at God revealing Himself to Moses:
9Look! The cry of the people of Israel has reached me, and I have seen how harshly the Egyptians abuse them. 10Now go, for I am sending you to Pharaoh. You must lead my people Israel out of Egypt.”
11But Moses protested to God, “Who am I to appear before Pharaoh? Who am I to lead the people of Israel out of Egypt?”
12God answered, “I will be with you. And this is your sign that I am the one who has sent you: When you have brought the people out of Egypt, you will worship God at this very mountain.”
13But Moses protested, “If I go to the people of Israel and tell them, ‘The God of your ancestors has sent me to you,’ they will ask me, ‘What is his name?’ Then what should I tell them?”
14God replied to Moses, “I Am Who I Am.d Say this to the people of Israel: I Am has sent me to you.” 15God also said to Moses, “Say this to the people of Israel: Yahweh,e the God of your ancestors—the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob—has sent me to you.
This is my eternal name,
my name to remember for all generations.
(Exodus 3:9-15)
So here, God reveals Himself to Moses. Moses one of the best and most humble leaders in the Bible, and we see that Moses and God had an intimate relationship. This is a very intimate moment recorded for us; God is answering Moses’ question. And that answer He gives to Moses’ question is "I AM" - He revealed His plans for the Israelites to Moses, that He would lead the Israelites out of slavery and into the Promised Land. God is the creator and has always eternally had power, and He will still do so long after all of us are gone.
We live in a world of self-identification, where we are supposed to believe people’s self-identity even if it doesn’t match up with reality. In truth, only God can identify us. Only God can self-identify Himself. We don’t have the right to shape God into who we want Him to be, we need to take God at His Word, who He identifies Himself as in the Bible.
In the New Testament, Jesus also uses "I AM" identifications:
22The next day the crowd that had stayed on the far shore saw that the disciples had taken the only boat, and they realized Jesus had not gone with them. 23Several boats from Tiberias landed near the place where the Lord had blessed the bread and the people had eaten. 24So when the crowd saw that neither Jesus nor his disciples were there, they got into the boats and went across to Capernaum to look for him. 25They found him on the other side of the lake and asked, “Rabbi, when did you get here?”
26Jesus replied, “I tell you the truth, you want to be with me because I fed you, not because you understood the miraculous signs. 27But don’t be so concerned about perishable things like food. Spend your energy seeking the eternal life that the Son of Manf can give you. For God the Father has given me the seal of his approval.”
28They replied, “We want to perform God’s works, too. What should we do?”
29Jesus told them, “This is the only work God wants from you: Believe in the one he has sent.”
30They answered, “Show us a miraculous sign if you want us to believe in you. What can you do? 31After all, our ancestors ate manna while they journeyed through the wilderness! The Scriptures say, ‘Moses gave them bread from heaven to eat.’g”
32Jesus said, “I tell you the truth, Moses didn’t give you bread from heaven. My Father did. And now he offers you the true bread from heaven. 33The true bread of God is the one who comes down from heaven and gives life to the world.”
34“Sir,” they said, “give us that bread every day.”
35Jesus replied, “I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never be hungry again. Whoever believes in me will never be thirsty.
(John 6:22-35)
"I am the bread of life."
The Bible is one big story, and so we see Jesus is self-identifying to His disciples just as He did to Moses in Exodus.
Jesus had just fed the Five Thousand and withdrew from the crowds because the people were going to try and make Him into an earthly King against the Romans. His plan all along was to go to the Cross, but the people caused issues by trying to force Him into a role He wasn’t purposed to fulfil, that of a King of this world. The people only saw Jesus for earthly means, not only as a King, but as a miracle worker. They only followed Jesus because they wanted comfort and wanted to be fed, but Jesus told them they needed full hearts instead of full stomachs.
When we look at the big picture, we can see that Jesus came to fulfil us, not to feed us. He came to die on the cross for our sins. The crowds chased after Him for miracles, but we should chase after God for who He is, not what He can do.
We should challenge ourselves this week and check the motivations of our hearts.The world wants Jesus’ power but not the Person. They want the miracles but not the man who performed the miracles. They want the crown but not the cross. They want the blessing but not the burden. They want the glory but not the suffering.
In truth, Jesus didn’t come to feed us food, He came to bring us the Bread of Life, Himself, for us.
This week, please acknowledge that Jesus is the Great I AM, who wants to reveal Himself to you and wants you to fully know Him in an intimate relationship.