John 8:58-59

⁵⁸"I tell you the truth," Jesus answered, "before Abraham was born, I am!" ⁵⁹At this, they picked up stones to stone Him, but Jesus hid Himself, slipping away from the temple grounds.

In v58, Jesus shows that Abraham had a beginning and claims for Himself to have had no beginning. It is a clear claim of eternal nature and divine power (Romans 1:18). He says, “I AM,” which is the name of God given to Moses in Exodus 3:14 (see also Hebrews 13:8). Jesus had formerly said that Abraham longed for His day with zeal; and as this seemed incredible to the Jews, He adds, that He Himself also existed at that time. We must understand that even then He was acknowledged to be the Mediator, by whom God was to be appeased.

When Jesus spoke to Nicodemus, He essentially said, “One of the characteristics of someone who isn’t a Christian, who isn’t born again, is that he doesn’t understand what I’m saying.” And Nicodemus replied, “I don’t understand what You’re saying.” And that’s exactly what’s happening here. This audience doesn’t get it, because they’re not born again, not God’s people. The shallow faith of the Jews is utterly exposed; but they see that He was calling Himself by the name of God, which amounted to blasphemy. Thus they who had professed faith in v30 pick up stones to stone Him, as they rightly should have done to one who was blaspheming in this way (Leviticus 24:16). But Jesus wasn’t blaspheming. And it is not yet His time to die. Calvin notes of the last verse, “I have no doubt that Christ rescued Himself by His divine power…Some manuscripts have the words, ‘And so Jesus passed through the midst of them’; which is borrowed from Luke 4:30.”

Derek Thomas said, “If you or I were to say the sort of things Jesus said, they would lock us up. They would give us sedatives and lock the door. They would nod their heads and say that we’re lunatics, and they would be right. So why is it that millions of people throughout the world gather to bow down and worship this Man? Because He’s God, I tell you; He is the Lord.” He went on tell this story: “Jon Krakauer wrote a book published just a few years ago called Into Thin Air. It’s about the story of the attempt to climb to the peak of Mount Everest in 1996. And many of those who attempted that expedition, including two of its leaders, Robert Hall and Andy Harris, died on that mountain. Krakauer had been to the peak of the mountain, but he and his group could only stay up there for about five minutes, because they didn’t have enough oxygen. There was evidence all around that many of the men, including some of the leaders, were suffering from oxygen deprivation, including Andy Harris, who on the way down from the mountain, was given an oxygen cylinder that had been left there for this very purpose, full, unused. And Andy Harris said over and over that it was empty, that they had used this oxygen, and they hadn’t. It really was full. And rather than use it, he insisted it was empty; he died on the mountain. And there are men and women that close to Jesus Christ and the message of the Gospel and are insisting on their own way.” How sad!

At the Feast of Tabernacles, Jesus makes some staggering claims, demanding that all the symbolism of the great religious feasts of the Jews be fulfilled in Him alone. Thus, He alone can pour out the life-giving Spirit upon all flesh, and He alone is the true Light of the world. Of course, this is too great a claim for a mere man to make of himself; but, as Jesus makes indisputably clear by the end of the feast, He is not merely a Man – He is also God Incarnate, who existed eternally, and in whom the forefathers of Israel placed their trust. This teaching caused much animosity among the Jews, which was only stirred up all the more by His equally unpopular claim that the reason they did not believe Him is that they did not belong to God, but to their father the devil, and they were therefore unable to believe the truth of God. The controversy that has begun between Jesus and the Pharisees is intensified and spread to the common people on this occasion. Soon, in God’s own timing, it will result in the atrocity of the cross, both the greatest crime and the greatest event, the truest act of love and mercy, in history.