If You've Seen The Son, You've "Seen" The Father

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John 14:8-14

8 Philip said to him, “Lord, show us the Father, and it is enough for us.” 9 Jesus said to him, “Have I been with you so long, and you still do not know me, Philip? Whoever has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say, ‘Show us the Father’? 10 Do you not believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in me? The words that I say to you I do not speak on my own authority, but the Father who dwells in me does his works. 11 Believe me that I am in the Father and the Father is in me, or else believe on account of the works themselves.

12 “Truly, truly, I say to you, whoever believes in me will also do the works that I do; and greater works than these will he do, because I am going to the Father. 13 Whatever you ask in my name, this I will do, that the Father may be glorified in the Son. 14 If you ask me anything in my name, I will do it.

 
 

From the prologue of his Gospel, John has been teaching us of the mysterious trinitarian relationship between the Father and the Son.

14 And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth….18 No one has ever seen God; the only God, who is at the Father’s side, he has made him known [John 1:14 & 18].

Here, Jesus tells Phillip the same thing:

9b Whoever has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say, ‘Show us the Father’? 10a Do you not believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in me? [John 14:9b–10a].

THOUGHT FOR THE DAY
Sometimes a son will look unmistakably like his father. That’s what Jesus says here to Phillip: if you know what I look like, then you’ll know what the Father looks like.

P.S. Jesus doesn’t tell them, “Ask for whatever you want and you’ll get it.” Rather, He says, “Whatever you ask in my name, this I will do.” The implication is that we are to pray as if we were Jesus—praying in the Jesus way.

P.P.S. The “greater works” the church will do (14:12) refers to what Jesus tells the disciples after the resurrection:

22 And when he had said this, he breathed on them and said to them, “Receive the Holy Spirit. 23 If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them; if you withhold forgiveness from any, it is withheld” [John 20:22–23].

What Jesus is talking about here is the incredible responsibility He has given His church to testify to the world of the reality of sin and the opportunity for repentance.

 

Insight Into The Trinity

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John 5:19-29

19 So Jesus said to them, “Truly, truly, I say to you, the Son can do nothing of his own accord, but only what he sees the Father doing. For whatever the Father does, that the Son does likewise. 20 For the Father loves the Son and shows him all that he himself is doing. And greater works than these will he show him, so that you may marvel. 21 For as the Father raises the dead and gives them life, so also the Son gives life to whom he will. 22 For the Father judges no one, but has given all judgment to the Son, 23 that all may honor the Son, just as they honor the Father. Whoever does not honor the Son does not honor the Father who sent him. 24 Truly, truly, I say to you, whoever hears my word and believes him who sent me has eternal life. He does not come into judgment, but has passed from death to life.
25 “Truly, truly, I say to you, an hour is coming, and is now here, when the dead will hear the voice of the Son of God, and those who hear will live. 26 For as the Father has life in himself, so he has granted the Son also to have life in himself. 27 And he has given him authority to execute judgment, because he is the Son of Man. 28 Do not marvel at this, for an hour is coming when all who are in the tombs will hear his voice 29 and come out, those who have done good to the resurrection of life, and those who have done evil to the resurrection of judgment.

 
 

Here, Jesus is explaining the life and love the Son shares with the Father, through the Spirit.

  • The result of the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus is that those who are in Jesus—i.e., those who trust and believe in Him—also share in His Sonship;

  • Jesus is the Son, who, through His loving obedience to the Father, carries out the Father’s will;

  • Through His death and resurrection, all who trust Him have been adopted into the family of God;

  • The love the Father has for the Son is now poured out on us through the Holy Spirit.

This is another way of thinking about salvation, with trinitarian language—the Son came to bring us back into the love of the Father, and the Father’s desire is to share the love He has for the Son, and the Spirit is the love They share.

QUESTION OF THE DAY:
How is our understanding of God changed by understanding that God is trinity?

 

Who Is Moses's Father?

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Exodus 3:6a

6 And he said, “I am the God of your father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.”

 
 

Moses’s father is never mentioned in the Bible, apart from this reference to his tribal identity:

“Now a man from the house of Levi went and took as his wife a Levite woman” [2:1].

Here we have Moses, the rootless man without a country, and look how the Lord addresses him:

“I am the God of your father” [v. 6]. The Lord specifically identifies Moses and makes it clear that the strange circumstances of his life are not an accident. This rootless man is given an identity by God.

We become who we need to be when we are defined by God’s word to us and not the words of the world. What matters is not what other people say about us, but what we know to be true about us from God’s word.