“I AM. Do not be afraid.”

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The guy who showed up at our home Bible study once, and only once, could spout reams of Scripture. Yet he refused to follow the very simple approach we had adopted as a group.

Instead:

• He let us know how much of the Bible he had memorized.
• He announced how Spirit-filled he was.
• He assigned himself (as the only male there) the role of showing us women the correct way to do Bible study.

Ah, but the Scriptures the guy quoted freely and at length did not shed light on John 18, the passage at hand.

We tried gently, tactfully, to keep the discussion on track – until one unmistakable indicator made clear: Whatever this man was filled with, it was not the Spirit of God.

I AM Jesus of Nazareth

As John 18 begins, Judas the betrayer approaches Jesus in a garden called Gethsemane. With Judas come a company of Roman soldiers and some Jewish temple police sent from the Pharisees and chief priests. “They were carrying torches, lanterns and weapons.”

Jesus, knowing all that was going to happen to him, went out and asked them, “Who is it you want?”

“Jesus of Nazareth,” they replied.

“I am he,” Jesus said. (And Judas the traitor was standing there with them.) When Jesus said, “I am he,” they drew back and fell to the ground.

Again he asked them, “Who is it you want?”

“Jesus of Nazareth,” they said.

Jesus answered, “I told you that I am he. If you are looking for me, then let these men go.” (vv. 3-9)

The other Gospels tell us Judas entered the garden, went at once to his teacher and friend, and betrayed him with a kiss. John tells us the betrayer then brazenly stayed, and stood with those who had come out against Jesus in such force.

What’s more, John alone reveals the remarkable interchange we read above. His eyewitness account shows us:

Jesus took charge of the encounter with those intent on arresting him. He went out to them. He initiated the conversation. He asked the questions. He gave the orders.

Ah, but the most astonishing thing Jesus said and John recorded, many English translations do not convey. Though Jesus did identify himself, he didn’t say, “I am he.”

No. That dark night when all seemed lost, those with ears to hear and eyes to see … heard and saw I AM.

I AM the LORD

Centuries earlier, on the far side of a desert, a shepherd named Moses encountered God in a burning bush. When Moses asked God’s name, God answered:

I AM WHO I AM. This is what you are to say to the Israelites: “I AM has sent me to you.”

And also:

Say to the Israelites, “The LORD, the God of your fathers – the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob – has sent me to you.”

This is my name forever,
the name you shall call me
from generation to generation. (Ex. 3:14-15)

The name you shall call me

Such puzzling statements! For example. How can the Lord’s name be “the LORD,” written in all caps as if shouting?

Ah, Bible translators have a quandary here, for the name that God announced to Moses isn’t spelled out in the Hebrew text. Instead – here and throughout the Old Testament – only the four consonants appear. In English, they’re transliterated YHVH.

So wherever in Scripture you see the all-caps LORD, it basically means, “The very holy and incredibly important name we don’t know how to pronounce.”

Puzzling. How can an unpronounceable name be “the name you shall call me”?

My name forever

Also puzzling. When Moses asks God his name, God tells him two: I AM (haya in Hebrew) and YHVH.

Even more puzzling. Throughout Scripture, God’s names help us to know his nature and his ways. They tell us something of who he is. Yet these two words, in themselves, tell us little. They leave us wondering. Neither even begins to convey the height and breadth and depth of the character of God.

No name can. God doesn’t intend it. He does not casually reveal all. Rather:

When you search for me
with all your heart,
you will find me!
(Jer. 29:13 NCV)¹

God announced, “This is my name forever.” In the same breath, he uttered two “names” – so enigmatic, so open-ended and so linked as to point where we need to seek, to know him. In our Bibles, they may appear as:

I AM … the LORD

Wherever either or both occur – regardless how they may appear in a given translation – the Name acts as God’s treasure detector. By including it, he nudges us, Spirit-to-spirit:

→ Search for treasure here.
Notice the context in which you find the Name.
What am I saying,
what am I doing,
to show you the Lord I am?

As we pause, listen and look, God shows us what he wants us to know deep within.

As we receive what he reveals and learn to live in light of it, we honor who he always is. At such times, you might say: Our lives call our Lord by his forever name.

Emphatically, I AM

In John’s Gospel, Jesus uttered one Greek phrase more than 20 times. He said, “egoó eimi.” It means, I am.²

Ah, but it’s not the normal way people said, “I am.” It’s not the way Jesus himself said, “I am,” most of the time.

In Greek, the pronoun “I” doesn’t usually appear as a separate word. Rather, it’s understood from the verb form. The phrase that includes both words is reserved for times when someone wants to say, emphatically, “I am.”

Jesus used that phrase with one intent – to identify himself as the same LORD who had spoken to Moses centuries earlier.

John, the beloved disciple, bore witness. He heard it clearly and recorded it faithfully each time Jesus declared, “I AM.”

I AM the sevenfold blessing

Jesus uttered seven distinct I AM statements that reveal his nature and his ways. John recorded each mention of them.

Notice that each statement carries its own import, its own fragrance, if you will. It invites us to stop and deeply inhale. If we seek further, we realize something else. Each statement also calls for exhaling – an act of faith that opens us to experience the blessing he is.

I AM the bread of life.
I AM the bread that came down from heaven.
I AM the living bread that came down from heaven. (John 6:35, 48, 41, 51)

I AM the light of the world. (John 8:12)

I AM the gate. (John 10:7, 9)

I AM the good shepherd. (John 10:11, 14)

I AM the resurrection and the life. (John 11:25)

I AM the way and the truth and the life. (John 14:6)

I AM the vine. (John 15:1, 5)³

Believe that I AM

Eight times, Jesus simply, powerfully, called himself this name. John faithfully recorded those mentions too.

Often, though, where Jesus said, “I AM,” translators have written, “It is I,” or, “I am He.” As you read the literal rendering of the name in the passages below, pause and ponder these gems too.

Twice, Jesus identified himself to his disciples as I AM.

The first time, the disciples were in a boat on a very rough sea. Imagine: Howling wind, crashing waves, Jesus in the midst of it all, walking on the water toward his wet, exhausted, terrified followers. In a voice heard distinctly above the storm, he spoke:

I AM. Don’t be afraid. (John 6:20)

The night before his crucifixion, Jesus told his disciples with great sorrow that one of them would betray him. He said:

I am telling you now before it happens, so that when it does happen you will believe that I AM.” (John 13:19)

Three times in John 8, Jesus identified himself to a crowd in Jerusalem as I AM.

If you do not believe that I AM, you will indeed die in your sins. (v. 24)
When you have lifted up the Son of Man, then you will know that I AM. (v. 28)
I tell you the truth … before Abraham was born, I AM! (v. 58)

The religious leaders in that crowd searched the old-covenant scriptures regularly and tried to follow them … religiously. They knew exactly what Jesus was claiming.

Did they, like their forefather Moses, take off their sandals and hide their faces when they found themselves standing before the LORD? No. They “picked up stones to stone him” (v. 58).

I AM who speaks to you

But perhaps the most remarkable of Jesus’ I AM statements in John’s Gospel are the first and the last.

The first mention is hidden in most English translations.

Before Jesus told his disciples, before he confronted the religious, he identified himself to a Samaritan woman who had come to draw water from a well. Her own people would not associate with her. Religious Jews would have utterly written her off. Even Jesus’ disciples were amazed to find him talking with her.

But he profoundly honored her.

The woman said, “I know that Messiah” (called Christ) “is coming.
When he comes,
he will explain everything to us.”
Then Jesus declared,
“I AM who speaks to you.” (John 4:25-26)

The people looking for Messiah believed he would be a man sent by the Lord. What they did not expect, Jesus revealed to a forsaken woman.

He saw her broken life. He heard her seeking heart and her words of genuine faith. And he called himself by the holy name that he had not yet spoken to anyone else.

In so doing, he told her, “I am the Messiah and I AM the LORD.”

The woman, who had been quite talkative up to this point, said not one more word. Stunned, she left her waterpot behind, ran back to her village and boldly, exuberantly, invited the folks who had shunned her to come meet who she had met.

I told you that I AM

We’ve already seen Jesus’ last two I AM statements, recorded in John 18. But let’s see them the way he said them. Let’s try to capture that stunning moment the way it happened.

As the Roman soldiers and Jewish temple guards stormed into the garden to arrest Jesus, he met them, and asked them, “Who is it you want?” They answered, “Jesus of Nazareth.”

“I AM,” Jesus said.

His words, “I AM,”
thrust every one of those well-armed, well-trained men away from him,
with such force that they all landed flat on their backs.

He repeated his question.
Struggling to get up,
they repeated their answer.

Jesus said: “I told you that I AM.”

With those two words, he declared, “I am Jesus of Nazareth and I AM the LORD.” When he told them to let his disciples go, they obeyed him.

After all that, they carted him off to trial and death, because he chose to go. He had said, and had already begun to prove:

I lay down my life –
only to take it up again.
No one takes it from me,
but I lay it down of my own accord. 
I have authority to lay it down
and authority to take it up again.
(John 10:17-18)

I AM has sent me to you

The guy visiting our Bible study read the same words the rest of us did. Yet he insisted that Jesus was the one falling backward, cowing down, conquered.

A man who claimed to have the Spirit of God literally could not see what the Scripture said. He repudiated the witness of the Son, the Spirit and the Word. He profaned God’s holy name.

You too may know lots of Scripture, or you may not be able to quote a verse. You may be moral and well-respected, broken and discarded or buffeted on a very rough sea.

Any moment of any day, you may seek to follow Jesus, to oppose him, to ignore him, to get something from him or to treat him as the people important to you expect.

Wherever you find yourself today, I AM has sent me to you, to challenge you to pause, listen and look. He who died and rose again has said:

I am with you always,
to the very end of the age. (Matt. 28:20)

Always, he has more of who he is to reveal to us.

And more than we can know hinges on how we respond when the Lord stands before us, and tells us his name.

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This post started as an e-column, published in August 2006 and titled, “I AM.” On June 6, 2021, I posted the first version to appear on this blog. November 6, 2023, I made a few edits and changed the name to, “I AM the one you seek.” But still, it felt like I had not fully understood what I needed to say. That’s always an issue when you’re trying to grasp mystery. Five months later, I grappled some more and rewrote a lot. I posted this piece again on April 20, 2024.

Image by enriquelopezgarre from Pixabay

See also

• Darkness, betrayal and the heartbeat of God
• God who loves fiercely
• God of the covenant Name
• The blessing of the Lord
• Sort of like frog gigging: How religion kills rest
• I will fear no evil: Resting in God’s very present help
• Now and forever: Resting in God’s love

Footnotes

1. See also Philippians 3:10-12; Matthew 7:7. ↩︎
2. The Greek phrase, “egoó eimi,” is pronounced eg-oh i-me. ↩︎
3. In this post, I’ve written Jesus’ “I AM” declarations in all-caps, as above, though the NIV doesn’t render them in that way. ↩︎