Ancient Israel knew so much about the invisible God through His revealed names, which were many, and were revealed over time in response to His people’s needs. Then, after 400 years of prophetic silence (between Malachi and Matthew) He made Himself known in the person of His Son Jesus, who was “the image of the invisible God.” (Colossians 1:15; 2 Corinthians 4:4; I Timothy 6:16; I John 4:12)
Jesus told the Samaritan woman, “We Jews know what we believe.” (John 4:22) Christians are right in saying the Jews do not know God as intimately as we do, in that their rejection of Jesus their Messiah limits them to knowing Him only through His descriptive names, not His Son as well, whom the names describe perfectly!
For 2000 years, Jews have largely rejected Jesus as their Messiah, but had the church taught that Jesus was the Son of God through his divine nature, who knows how many Jews might have believed? From the time of Moses, God had made Himself known to them as “My son.” (Exodus 4:22, 23)
It was Jesus who first called God “Father” in the personal sense, and taught his disciples to pray collectively, “Our Father, who is in heaven…” (Luke 11:2)
In I John 5:19, 20, the Apostle John records three things that believers in Jesus know: “And we know that we are of God, and the whole world lies in wickedness. And we know that the Son of God has come, and has given us an understanding, that we may know him that is true, and we are in him that is true, in his Son Jesus Christ. This is the true God, and eternal life.” (I John 5:19, 20)
The NT Greek word John uses for “know” is “ginosko”, which means, “to come to know” (progressively). John’s doubly emphatic “we know that we know” in I John 2:3 indicates how certain John is about what the believer knows!
In dealing with issues of idolatry in the church at Corinth, the Apostle Paul includes this unambiguous statement: “As concerning therefore the eating of those things that are offered in sacrifice to idols, we know that an idol is nothing in the world, and that there is no other God but one. For though there be that are called gods, either in heaven or in earth….
“But to us there is but one God, the Father, of whom are all things, and we in him; and one Lord Jesus Christ, by whom are all things, and we by him. However, that knowledge is not in every man…” (I Corinthians 8:4-7) Although that knowledge was not in the Greeks, the fatherhood of God was crystal clear to the Jews.
The Apostle Paul called his natural kinsmen “Israelites”, adding that to them belonged “the adoption, and the glory, and the covenants, and the giving of the law, and the service of God, and the promises…” (Romans 9:4, 5)
In sharp contrast, the Greeks, who were totally ignorant as to the identity of the True God, worshipped a pantheon of pagan gods. The Athenians even included (as spiritual insurance, perhaps) a memorial to “the Unknown God.” (Acts 17:22-31)
When the Apostle Paul commanded a man who had never walked to “stand upright on your feet” — he leapt and walked! The pagans of Lystra shouted, “The gods have come down to us in the likeness of men!” Promptly identifying Paul as their wing-heeled, messenger and so-called god Mercury. (Acts 14:8-18)
The Thessalonians “turned to God from idols to serve the living and true God…” (I Thessalonians 1:9) Idolatry was pandemic in the Roman Empire — the only cure for it being faith in the One True God and His Son, Jesus Christ.
The confession that Jesus is “the Christ, the Son of the living God” is the “rock” of revealed knowledge on which the Lord builds his church (Matthew 16:16-18). That Jesus is the Christ, the Son of the living God, is not revealed by “flesh and blood” (human knowledge) but by God the Father alone.
Most Christians quote Peter’s confession frequently, knowing how essential this revelation “portal” is to genuine salvation. But the importance of Thomas’ confession: “My Lord and my God!” is less understood. It is, however, as essential to those who would know the Father as Peter’s confession is to those who would know the Son. Seeing the Father in the Son is a revelation ‘portal’ that we need to pass through to know Him as well as His Son (John 20:28).
After Judas Iscariot went out into the night to betray Jesus, Philip asked Jesus, “Lord, show us the Father, and that will satisfy us.” (John 14:8)
Jesus answered him, “Have I been with you [all] so long, and yet you, Philip, have not known me? He who has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say, Show us the Father? Do you not believe that I am in [union with] the Father, and that the Father is in [union with] me?”
Peter had “seen” that Jesus was the Christ, the Son of the living God”, but Thomas what Philip hadn’t seen: he “saw” God in Christ (2 Corinthians 5:19). He “saw” that Jesus was, as the Apostle Paul would later put it, “the image of the invisible God” — and the glory of the vision caused him to exclaim, “My Lord and my God!”
Every Christian understands the significance of Peter’s confession that Jesus was “the Christ, the Son of the living God”, but how many understand Thomas’ exclamation that his “lord” was his God: the Father revealed in the Son? “No man has seen God at any time; the only begotten Son, which is in the bosom of the Father, he has declared — “unfolded” — Him.” (John 1:18)
“God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself.” (2 Corinthians 5:19)
“For God, who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, has shined in our hearts, to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God, in the face of Jesus Christ.” (2 Corinthians 4:6)
Jesus said that his Father was like him! “He who has seen me has seen the Father.” No doubt the Holy Spirit has revealed to you that Jesus Christ is “the Son of the living God”; but have you also seen the Father in the Son? No man has ever seen the invisible God, but the Son of God is the very {NT Greek: “the very stamp”) image of his Father!
Knowing this helps us to better understand 2 Corinthians 3:18, John 17:22-23, 1 John 5:20, and the misunderstood John 10:30. But these will form the subject of another post…