I AM

I AM!

The two words that describe God in his completeness, beginning with Exodus.  Throughout the Bible we see this statement from God repeated over and over.  There are seven Old Testament verses and seven verses from John’s Gospel.  When God wanted to let his children know him by name, he used this term.

In biblical Hebrew, the being verb hayah conveys not just existence but manifest existence.  It indicates the appearance, presence, or standing of a thing.  To state, “There was (yehiy,  a form of hayah) light” (Gn 1:3) is to announce the manifestation, not just the existence, of light.  (copied from “The Biblical Mind” by Dr. Michael LeFebvre.

There is no limit to God’s intention to let his people know who he is and to prove this through the understanding of what man can see and recognize as beyond himself, yet cannot doubt what God is always presenting to him.  

By the time God was ready to release his people who had been in captivity when he grew angry with them, by removing Israel from his presence, and gave them over to their sinful desires and stopped intervening in their nation, he called Moses to be the one who would lead them back to himself.  (See 2 Kings 17: 23).  Then move ro Exodus and the newest prophet, Moses, would come upon the scene and the “I AM” who is God would intervene and this title would become our understanding of how an omnipotent and benevolent God would be forever ours.

“Behold the days are coming, says the Lord, when I will raise up a righteous shoot to David; As king he shall reign and govern wisely, he shall do what is just and right in the land.  In his days Judah shall be saved, Israel shall dwell in security.  This is the name they give him:  The Lord our justice.”  (Jer 23: 5 - 6).

“I am the bread of life; whoever comes to me will never hunger, and whoever believes in me will never thirst.”  (Jn 6: 35).  Jesus spoke to them, again saying, “I am the light of the world.  Whoever follows me will not walk in darkness, but have the light of life.”  (Jn 8: 12).  “Amen, amen, I say to you, I am the gate for the sheep.  All who came before me are thieves and robbers, but the sheep did not listen to them.  I am the gate.  Whoever enters through me will be saved, and will come in and go out and find pasture.”  (Jn 10: 7 - 9).  “Jesus told Martha, I am the resurrection and the life; whoever believes in me, even if he dies, will live, and everyone who lives and believes in me will never die.”  (Jn 11: 25).  Jesus said to him, “I am the way and the truth and the life.  No one comes to the Father except through me.”  (Jn 14:6).  “I Am the vine, and my Father is the vine grower.  He takes away every branch in me that does not bear fruit, and everyone that does he prunes so that it bears more fruit.”  (Jn 15: 1 -2). 

These are the seven I AM verses from John’s Gospel and is the premise of how God as he IS is the light and life of the world through Christ, his Only Son.  We may stand on this Truth which is our guarantee to our salvation when we believe.  

Ralph B. Hathaway