In Exodus chapter 3, God calls Moses to lead the Israelites out of Egypt and Moses wants to know God’s name. And God replies, “I AM who I AM” (v. 14). And this is the name of God, YAHWEH, or in our English translations, LORD. Yahweh is the sacred name of God and it conveys this idea of absolute being and never changing.

So fast forward several thousand years to the time of Christ and John’s gospel. John writes his gospel to show that Jesus is from God, and IS God. “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word WAS God” (John 1:1). John writes his account in order to prove that Jesus was God (John 20:30-31).

Throughout John, Jesus uses the phrase “I AM” in 7 different statements. When Jesus uses the phrase “I AM” he is speaking to Jews. And Jews would hear the phrase “I AM” and they would make the connection back to Moses during the exodus, and continue the connection to YAHWEH. These Jews would recognize that Jesus is saying that he comes from God and IS God. All of it was to prove that Jesus is God and is worth believing in.

And so today we continue a series, where we examine the “I AM” statements of Jesus found in John. John shows us that Jesus is God in the flesh. He also shows that through the phrase “I AM” Jesus is the absolute being and that he provides us with all that we will ever need. But a decision must be made and that is a decision of whether or not we will choose to follow “I AM”.