Jesus Stayed With The Name

What Did Jesus Do?

Jesus said to them, “Whom do you seek?” They answered him, “Jesus of Nazareth.”
Jesus said to them, “I am he.”
John 18.4-5

When the posse which Judas had led out came to Gethsemane to arrest Jesus, the Lord did not try to flee or resist capture in anyway. In fact, Jesus took charge of the situation, knowing full well what was up. Yet, the Lord did not simply step forward and say, “You got me, coppers!” Instead, he played “dumb,” so to speak, asking who it was the soldiers were looking for, though there could have been no doubt in his mind who they had come to seize. Why did Jesus feign ignorance of what was going on? Well, I believe it had something to do with the name he shared with the Father, the name he had manifested to his followers (John 17.6). Essentially paraphrasing the words the Father had spoken to Moses more than a thousand years earlier (“I AM WHO I AM.” Exodus 3.14), Jesus stopped the mob in its tracks by revealing, “I AM He.” Rather than let the police blotter record that Jesus of Nazareth had been apprehended, the Lord stayed with the name, so that it would be known that the band which had come out with lanterns and torches and weapons had clapped irons on the great I AM.

There is no little significance in Jesus staying with The Name. For immediately, and persisting down to our present day, there have been those who insist that what occurred in Jerusalem was nothing more than the Sanhedrin eliminating a troublesome itinerant rabbi from the Galilee, or the Romans crucifying one of many insurrectionists whom they executed during the course of their occupation of Palestine. But it is hard to argue or support such a trifling explanation. And Jesus made it even harder to do so by staying with The Name. If they would take him in to custody, Jesus wanted to make sure the soldiers and their officers knew exactly who it was they were turning over to the chief priests and Pharisees. And they knew. For upon hearing the Lord's declaration, “I AM HE,” the mob drew back and fell prostrate (John 18.6). This spontaneous reaction of mixed awe, fear, and reverence would not have occurred if the platoon thought it was merely taking a common outlaw or rebel in for questioning and trial.

And it is very likely that no common outlaw or rebel would have meekly surrendered himself to his would-be captors, as Jesus did (John 18.8). But surrender was necessary if the lives of the disciples were to be preserved; and Jesus was determined that not one of them should be lost, (John 18.9).

Even when Simon Peter sought to mount a spirited defense of the Lord by striking out with a sword, Jesus would have none of it. He stayed with the name, the name he shared with the Father, and accepted the “cup” the Father had given him (John 18.11). Bitter as the cup was, it was only Christ’s confidence and trust in The Name that enabled him to take and drink it.

In light of these verses the folly of those who today would re-name or re-imagine God is amply evident, and believers who pursue such nonsense in fact trifle with their eternity. For, as Peter would later testify to the Sanhedrin, there is no salvation apart from The Name (Acts 4.12).

S.D.G.

Jim
www.jimwilkenministries.org
Marion, NC
PS 37.4