Title: Don’t You Know Me?
Scripture: John 14:9
9 Jesus answered: "Don’t you know me, Philip, even after I have been among you such a long time? Anyone who has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say, ’Show us the Father’? 10 Don’t you believe that I am in the Father, and that the Father is in me? The words I say to you are not just my own. Rather, it is the Father, living in me, who is doing his work.
When I graduated from high school back in, well, back before many of you had entered middle school :), there were a number of us in my class that had been together since the first grade. We knew by the time we were in the sixth grade, what our likes and dislikes were. We knew the parents, they knew us. Parents had been friends with other parents for 12 years, some of them longer, if they had other children in the school.
There were moms that always helped out, homeroom mothers they were called. They helped out at Christmas and Easter parties and at Valentine’s and birthday parties. Not to mention when we took those field trips to various theme parks. My mother always had to go along. I thought it was because she never had anything to do. Come to find out it was probably because she knew me a lot better than the teachers did.
Yes, 12 years is a long time. Football, basketball, track, field trips, and trips to the hospitals were all included in that time frame. Those years were sprinkled with good times highlighted by smiles and laughter and sometimes tears, and there were sad times too, mingled with tears and frowns. Every occasion solidifying friendships and bringing relationships closer.
There were always questions like, who was girl friend and boy friend today? Who had whose ring or wearing whose letter jacket? Who wrote whose name on their book cover? Don’t worry, my best friend would say, it’ll only last a week, he’d say. My answer would be: But she says the rest of our lives. Hey, I’ve got things to do.
Best friends forever, at least today anyway, would happen all the time. Predictions about the future didn’t always circulate, unless it was the immediate future. Guys always wait to the last minute to ask girls to the prom, because they can’t think that far into the future.
There was infrequent talk about:
what do you want to be when:
you grew up, and
when you graduate high school; and
when you graduate college.
There was talk about what career we would pursue, once we’d made a little money of course in something that pays high both in salary and time.
There never was really any talk about death, about the end of our lives. We didn’t really have that much in focus, nor did we really want to care. But, there are already some that have went before me, some that are teetering on that brink with this or that ailment, but I know their strength, I know their resolution and their constitution, though I may not have seen them for 30 years, I spent enough time with them to know them.
Jesus said,
"Don’t you know me, Philip, even after I have been among you such a long time? Anyone who has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say, ’Show us the Father’?
Don’t you know me? After all the teaching, after all the time spent talking together around camp fires, dinner tables, and bedrolls, don’t you know me? Doesn’t our relationship run much deeper than that?
What is Jesus asking of Philip? What is He asking of the rest of the disciples? And, ultimately, what is He asking of us?
First let’s look at this word ‘know,’ which in English doesn’t really have the implications as its Greek counterpart.
First of all,
Jesus is asking if Philip is aware of Who He, Jesus, is. He’s asking Him if he is really conscious of the fact of just Who Jesus is, and aware of Jesus’ life and purpose. Jesus is also asking Philip if he was aware of just where Philip was and what he had been doing physically before Jesus called Him to follow Him. Jesus is also asking Philip if he was aware of where Philip was and what he had been doing spiritually before Jesus called him to follow Him.
And, Jesus was not just talking to Philip. He was talking to the entire group of disciples. He was asking the entire group, “Aren’t you aware of Who and What I am? Aren’t you aware of who and what you were before you met me?”
What about you? Before you became aware of Jesus, what were you doing? How did you speak, how did you act, how did you treat others? Now that you’re aware of Jesus in your life, has anything changed? Has anything become better, or are you still following the same direction, or are is Jesus saying the same thing to you:
Don’t you know me ___________?
Put your name in the space, then provide an answer.
Jesus says, “Don’t you know me Philip?”
He’s asking Philip about his feelings. He’s asking Philip, “how does your knowledge about me affect your feelings?” Doesn’t your own personal knowledge of me make you feel something in your heart? Don’t you feel something in your spirit? What does your feelings through knowledge of Who and What I am tell you about me, if anything?
Don’t you know me Philip? Don’t you understand Me? Does your understanding of me tell you Who I am and what I am? Does your understanding of me reveal to you what I’m capable of doing? Do you understand me?
What about your perception? Are you awakened to the fact of what Jesus is all about? Philip appears to be one of the most intelligent of the group of disciples, yet, still Jesus asks this question.
Don’t you know me Philip? Again, what about the disciples? Rest assured, they knew, they understood, they perceived, that what Jesus was telling Philip was being told to them as well.
What about you? He’s talking to everyone and not just Philip. He’s calling into question all of our knowledge, all of our awareness, all of our understanding, all of our perception of Who and What
Jesus is.
Do you know Jesus? Even after He has been among us for such a long time, do we really know Jesus?
How long has He been ‘among you?’ How long has He been ‘among us?’ Is He among you?
In the next sentence, Jesus says, “anyone who has seen me has seen the Father.”
Several implications, several inferences can be drawn from this statement.
First of all look at the very first word of that sentence. Anyone!
The invitation to see the Father while Jesus was on this earth was open for all to see in Christ Jesus. Anyone and everyone had the opportunity to see, and to know, the Father through Jesus. Anyone and everyone today has that same opportunity to see and to know the Father through the Messiah. Anyone and everyone today can have a relationship with the Father even closer than this time when Jesus was standing right in front of the disciples, because we and Jesus should be one in spirit.
Anyone who has seen me…
Have you seen Jesus? Have you seen Jesus in your relatives, in your Bible Study teacher, in your pastor, in your mother and father, in your brothers and sisters? Have you seen Jesus in yourself? Have you seen Jesus in your words and deeds? Have you seen Jesus in your compassion and consideration of others less fortunate than you?
Anyone who has seen Jesus has seen the Father…
Next we see that He and the Father are one. Jesus is God. We talked about that last week and we quoted from John 1.
John 1:1
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
Anyone who has seen Jesus has seen the Father, have you seen the Father? Have you seen the glory of the Father working in and through others by and through the mighty power of His Spirit
Have you seen the Father in people in faraway places, that if wasn’t for Jesus, they wouldn’t have anything? Have you seen the work of God in remote places, that if it wasn’t for the intercession, wisdom, and mighty power and grace of God, they would not be alive today?
“How can you say, ‘Show us the Father’?” Jesus asks. Anyone who has seen me has seen the Father. Meaning, all He ever lived to say or do was pre-ordained by the Father and on behalf of the Father in heaven ages before it took place, ages before these bewildered disciples said, “Lord show us the Father and that will be enough…”
Jesus says, Philip, the Father is standing right here before you. Are you disciples so blind to the last three and half years you have to ask for further explanation?”
Meaning, it was all Jesus in God that performed miracles, both natural and supernatural. It was all Jesus in God that healed, walked on water, fasted, cooked and smiled and laughed at them when they tripped or cracked a joke. It was all Jesus in God that taught them the way and encouraged them to be beacons of light on a hill for all to see and follow to God. Just as Jesus did. Anyone who has seen Jesus in me, in you, in others, has seen the Father, so, how can we sometimes say with smugness in our hearts that it was our power that enabled that team to win, or that building to be built, or that surgery to heal, or that soldier to accept Christ, or even that food to be put on the table? We can’t. It was Jesus that others saw in us, that did it. And God alone deserves the glory for that.
Our next portion of scripture provides a summarization for us.
John 14:
10 Don’t you believe that I am in the Father, and that the Father is in me? The words I say to you are not just my own. Rather, it is the Father, living in me, who is doing his work.
Can you believe it, Philip? Can you believe it, Peter, John, James, Andrew…?
Don’t you believe that I am in the Father….?
Jesus is not boasting about His teaching of the twelve. He’s not trying to smother them with arrogant or conceited nonsense. He’s the truth, and He’s speaking the truth.
For three and a half years He endlessly labored with these men so that they might be able to go out on their own and bring all men unto Him, Jesus Christ. And, now, pleadingly, He’s telling them that every step He took, every parable that He spoke, every healing that took place should be enough to answer that question without it even being raised!
Don’t you believe me? Don’t you see what is happening? Can’t you understand what is going on?
There’s some strong words that are said here, but I know in my heart they were said in a loving and compassionate manner. Jesus is pleading with them here, and He’s pleading with you as well.
Don’t you know the Spirit of God that is working in and through you? Don’ you know, really know, the Jesus that is living in your heart?
I want to recite from Philippians 2:1-11, Paul’s summation of Jesus living in his heart and what it should mean to us as well:
2:1 If you have any encouragement from being united with Christ, if any comfort from his love, if any fellowship with the Spirit, if any tenderness and compassion, 2 then make my joy complete by being like-minded, having the same love, being one in spirit and purpose. 3 Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility consider others better than yourselves. 4 Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others. 5 Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus: 6 Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, 7 but made himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. 8 And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient to death-- even death on a cross! 9 Therefore God exalted him to the highest place and gave him the name that is above every name, 10 that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, 11 and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.
And, then my favorite verse from Colossians 1:27b…
Christ in you, the hope of glory.
The picture that you have of Jesus in you is based upon that relationship that you have with Him. If your relationship is meager and weak, then your picture of Him in you is meager and weak. If your relationship with Him is not based on His power and sustenance, you’re your picture of Him in you is powerless and malnourished. If your relationship with Him in you is lacking, then your picture of Him in you is lacking.
John 14:9
9 Jesus answered: "Don’t you know me, Philip, even after I have been among you such a long time? Anyone who has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say, ’Show us the Father’? 10 Don’t you believe that I am in the Father, and that the Father is in me? The words I say to you are not just my own. Rather, it is the Father, living in me, who is doing his work.
Many years ago, in the 1820’s and 30’s, many men fought and died for the independence of Texas. One such place is known as "The Alamo." Where many gave their lives for freedom, many of them were not even from Texas. One such man, was James Butler Bonham.
((Bill Morgan?)) says that
On a wall near the main entrance to the Alamo in San Antonio, Texas, is a portrait with the following inscription: "James Butler Bonham--no picture of him exists. This portrait is of his nephew, Major James Bonham, deceased, who greatly resembled his uncle. It is placed here by the family that people may know the appearance of the man who died for freedom." No literal portrait of Jesus exists either. But the likeness of the Son who makes us free can be seen in the lives of His true followers.
1 Corinthians 13:12
Now we see but a poor reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known.
