Jesus Revealed Pt. 8 - What Do You See?Намуна

Jesus - the I AM  

Thoughts on the Passage

When people cannot say anything else, they give insults. 

Samaritan, demon-possessed.  These are some of the worst insults that they can think of.  Jesus does not answer their insults.  He lets them go.  He just continues to affirm the truth.  That is a good thing to remember when people say evil things against us.  Just keep speaking the truth.  They will continue to speak evil of you and the truth you speak.  Expect it.

Truly, truly I say to you.

This is a special phrase that Jesus uses often and He does it twice here.  It means, “listen carefully, this is something very important”.  Jesus closes out this section by releasing these two final key thoughts.  

First, if we keep His word, we will not see death.  They think Jesus is talking physical death, but He is talking spiritual death.  They do not see that.  They know that the greatest people of their nation all died.  How could Jesus prevent anyone from dying?
Second, Jesus says He is the “I AM”.  This was the covenant name of God to Israel.  They get ready to stone Jesus because they see it as blasphemy.  We have actually seen Jesus call Himself this twice already and there will be five more times.  He calls Himself – I AM the bread of life (ch 6) and I AM the light of the world (ch.8).  They did not understand that He was giving additional understanding to the covenant name of God with these names.  Now, they begin to see it.

Do you and I see it as well?

Do you understand that Jesus calls Himself the covenant keeping God?

Application

Look at some of the covenant names of God today and let them resound in your heart today. Here are a few:

Jehovah Jireh – I AM the God who provides.

Jehovah Rapha - I AM the God who heals.

Jehovah Roi – I AM your Shepherd

Jehovah Eim – I AM the God who is here with you.

In John we read – I AM the Bread of Life

                                   I AM the light of the World

Time to Pray

Father, Jesus tells us to recognize that He is the I AM that made the covenant with the people of God.  That means so much to me today.  There is much that I need today.  I need Your strength and wisdom today.  I need You to be my Shepherd even as I try and lead Your people.  Many of them need Your provision – for jobs, for encouragement, for joy in the middle of difficult times, and peace.  Fill their lives with abundance, I pray.  May they always be thankful, always be generous with the blessings they receive.  Today, I need Your light as well to shine on my day.  Your light releases life to the world.  My world needs a lot of Your life.  Touch it with the light I pray.  May this light break through their darkness.  May it shine on the pitfalls we need to avoid.  May it reveal things that we would want hidden – but they need cleaning up.  Shine brightly so that everyone can see what You do in us – and others will want what we have.  In Jesus’ name, Amen.