I AM Who I AM

I have always been intrigued by the first chapter in the Revelation of Jesus Christ. It is within the pages of the book that we are re-introduced to some of the names and attributes of Jesus.

Open your bible, get a colored marker and a pencil and join with me as we identify Jesus in this first chapter.

Word of God – v. 2
Him who is and who was and who is to come – v. 4
Jesus Christ – v. 1, 5
The Faithful Witness – v. 5
The Firstborn of the dead – v. 5
Ruler of kings on earth – v. 5
To him who loves us
Him who “has freed us from our sins by his blood – v. 5
Made us a kingdom, priests to his God and Father – v.6
He is coming in the clouds – v.7
“I am the Alpha and the Omega,” says the Lord God, “who is and who was and who is to come, the Almighty.” – v. 8
Like the son of man. – v. 13
Clothed with a long robe and with a golden sash around his chest. – v. 13
The hairs of his dead were white, like white wool, like snow. – v. 14
His eyes were like a flame of fire – v. 14
His feet were like burnished bronze, refined in a furnace – v. 15
His voice was like the roar of many waters – v. 15
He holds seven stars in his right hand – v. 16
From his mouth came a sharp two-edged sword – v. 16
His face was like the sun shining in full strength – v. 16
I am the first and the last – v. 17
The living one – v. 18
I died, and behold I am alive forevermore – v. 18
I have the keys of Death and Hades – v. 18

That is quite a list and if you underlined or highlighted each one on this list, your first chapter of Revelation looks much different. Looking at the first chapter reveals quite a visual representation of the “revealing of Jesus Christ.”

To me, the secret to understanding “I Am”, concerning God and Jesus, is found in Revelation 1:4, 8, 17, 18.

Rev 1:4-8 John to the seven churches that are in Asia: Grace to you and peace from him who is and who was and who is to come…8“I am the Alpha and the Omega,” says the Lord God, “who is and who was and who is to come, the Almighty.”

Revelation 1:17 And when I saw him, I fell at his feet as dead. And he laid his right hand upon me, saying unto me, Fear not; I am the first and the last: 18 I am he that liveth, and was dead; and, behold, I am alive for evermore, Amen; and have the keys of hell and of death.

Who Is God?

First things first. Before we can understand the true meaning of “I AM”, we must understand who this God of Israel is.

He goes by many names:

God – Elohim: the supreme God. In Scripture, Elohim is used in a plural sense of the supreme God.

GOD/LORD – YEHOVAH/JEHOVAH is self-existent or eternal. It is the Jewish national name for God.

Jehovah/Yehweh Jireh – the Lord will provide (Gen. 22:14)
Jehovah/Yehweh Nissi – The Lord is my Banner – the One who fights for His people (Ex. 17:15).
Jehovah/Yehweh Shalom – the Lord is Peace – (Jud. 6:24)
Jehovah/Yehweh Sabbaoth – The Lord of Hosts – Lord is the commander of the armies of heaven (1 Sam. 1:3; 17:45).
Jehovah/Yehweh Maccaddeshcem – The Lord your Sanctifier – the Lord is our means of sanctification or as the one who sets believers apart for His purposes (Ex. 31:13).
Jehovah/Yehweh Ro’I – The Lord my Shepherd – Portrays the Lord as the Shepherd who cares for His people (Ps. 23:1).
Jehovah/Yehweh Tsidkenu – The Lord our Righteousness – The Lord is the means of our righteousness (Jer. 23:6).
Jehovah/Yehweh Shammah – The Lord is there – the Lord’s personal presence in the millennial kingdom (Ezek. 48:35).
Jehovah/Yehweh Elohim Israel – The Lord, the God of Israel – The God of Israel in contrast to the false gods of the nations (Jud. 5:3.; Isa. 17:6).

El – Strong one. As in:

El Shaddai – God Almighty –
El Elyon – The Most High God – stresses God’s strength, sovereignty and supremacy
El Olam – The Everlasting God – unchangeableness, He is inexhaustible
ELOHIM is the Hebrew word for the English “God.” It appears in the very first sentence of the Bible, “In the beginning, Elohim.” This name carries the idea of the One who created the heavens and the earth. Elohim separated the light from darkness, water from dry land, night from day with just His word. Elohim identifies His creative power, his authority and sovereignty.
Lord – ADONAY – Master/Owner – used only as a proper name of God.

New Testament

God – THEOS – God – primary name used of God in the NT.
Lord – Kurios – the authority and supremacy of God
Master – When used of God, it carries the idea of ownership

He is the CREATOR

He is the FATHER of the Nation of Israel

He is the SAVIOR of the Nation of Israel

The Beginning

Background of Moses

From Favor to Slavery

Exe 1:8-14 Now there arose a new king over Egypt, who did not know Joseph. ⁹And he said to his people, “Behold, the people of Israel are too many and too mighty for us. ¹⁰Come, let us deal shrewdly with them, lest they multiply, and, if war breaks out, they join our enemies and fight against us and escape from the land…¹³So they ruthlessly made the people of Israel ^mwork as slaves ¹⁴and ⁿmade their lives bitter with hard service, in mortar and brick, and in all kinds of work in the field. In all their work they ruthlessly made them work as slaves. (ESV)

Out of Poverty a Leader is Born

Exodus 2:1-10Now a man from the house of Levi went and took as his wife a Levite woman. ²The woman conceived and bore a son, and when she saw that he was a fine child, she hid him three months. ³When she could hide him no longer, she took for him a basket made of bulrushes and daubed it with bitumen and pitch. She put the child in it and placed it among the reeds by the river bank. ⁴And his sister stood at a distance to know what would be done to him. ⁵Now the daughter of Pharaoh came down to bathe at the river, while her young women walked beside the river. She saw the basket among the reeds and sent her servant woman, and she took it. ⁶When she opened it, she saw the child, and behold, the baby was crying. She took pity on him and said, “This is one of the Hebrews’ children.” ⁷Then his sister said to Pharaoh’s daughter, “Shall I go and call you a nurse from the Hebrew women to nurse the child for you?” ⁸And Pharaoh’s daughter said to her, “Go.” So the girl went and called the child’s mother. ⁹And Pharaoh’s daughter said to her, “Take this child away and nurse him for me, and I will give you your wages.” So the woman took the child and nursed him. ¹⁰When the child grew older, she brought him to Pharaoh’s daughter, and he became her son. She named him Moses, “Because,” she said, “I drew him out of the water.”

Exe 2:1-10 – The birth of Moses – Moses mother and father were from the house of Levi.
At 3 mos. old – mother couldn’t hide the baby any longer…a daughter of Pharaoh becomes a mother. She names him Moses – “drawing out or rescued”

Father is Amram
Mother is Jochebed
Brother is Aaron
Sister is Miriam
Wife is Zipporah
Sons are Gershom and Eliezer

Moses Timeline

Age 40 – Acts 7:23-24 ESV When he was forty years old, it came into his heart to visit his brothers, the children of Israel. And seeing one of them being wronged, he defended the oppressed man and avenged him by striking down the Egyptian.

Age 80 – Acts 7:30 ESV Now when forty years had passed, an angel appeared to him in the wilderness of Mount Sinai, in a flame of fire in a bush.

Age 80 – Exodus 7:3 ESV Now Moses was eighty years old, and Aaron eighty-three years old, when they spoke to Pharaoh.

Age 80 – Number 32:13 ESV And the Lord’s anger was kindled against Israel, and he made them wander in the wilderness forty years, until all the generation that had done evil in the sight of the Lord was gone.

Age 120 – [dead]

From Prince to Murderer

Exe 2:11-12 One day, when Moses had grown up, he went out to his people and looked on their burdens, and he saw an Egyptian beating a Hebrew, one of his people. ¹²He looked this way and that, and seeing no one, he struck down the Egyptian and hid him in the sand.

Contrary to Cecile D. Demile, the Palace was always aware of Moses background. Moses “went out to his people” meaning he went to see the Hebrews. Moses sticks up for his fellow Hebrew and slays the offensive guard. He follows up by burying him.

From the Palace to the land of Midian

Exe 2:14-22He answered, “Who made you a prince and a judge over us? Do you mean to kill me as you killed the Egyptian?” Then Moses was afraid, and thought, “Surely the thing is known.” ¹⁵When Pharaoh heard of it, he sought to kill Moses. But Moses fled from Pharaoh and stayed in the land of Midian. And he sat down by a well.

¹⁶Now the priest of Midian had seven daughters, and they came and drew water and filled the troughs to water their father’s flock. ¹⁷The shepherds came and drove them away, but Moses stood up and saved them, and watered their flock. ¹⁸When they came home to their father Reuel, he said, “How is it that you have come home so soon today?” ¹⁹They said, “An Egyptian delivered us out of the hand of the shepherds and even drew water for us and watered the flock.” ²⁰He said to his daughters, “Then where is he? Why have you left the man? Call him, that he may eat bread.” ²¹And Moses was content to dwell with the man, and he gave Moses his daughter Zipporah. ²²She gave birth to a son, and he called his name Gershom, for he said, “I have been a sojourner in a foreign land.”

God Hears the Cry of Israel

Exe 2:23 During those many days the king of Egypt died, and the people of Israel groaned because of their slavery and cried out for help. Their cry for rescue from slavery came up to God. ²⁴And God heard their groaning, and God remembered his covenant with Abraham, with Isaac, and with Jacob. ²⁵God saw the people of Israel—and God knew.

The Creator and the Burning Bush

Exe 3:3 Now Moses was keeping the flock of his father-in-law, Jethro, the priest of Midian, and he led his flock to the west side of the wilderness and came to Horeb, the mountain of God. ²And the angel of the Lord appeared to him in a flame of fire out of the midst of a bush. He looked, and behold, the bush was burning, yet it was not consumed. ³And Moses said, “I will turn aside to see this great sight, why the bush is not burned.” ⁴When the Lord saw that he turned aside to see, God called to him out of the bush, “Moses, Moses!” And he said, “Here I am.” ⁵Then he said, “Do not come near; take your sandals off your feet, for the place on which you are standing is holy ground.” ⁶And he said, “I am the God of your father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.” And Moses hid his face, for he was afraid to look at God.

God Reveals His Nature

Exe 3:7 Then the Lord said, “I have surely seen the affliction of my people who are in Egypt and have heard their cry because of their taskmasters. I know their sufferings, ⁸and I have come down to deliver them out of the hand of the Egyptians and to bring them up out of that land to a good and broad land, a land flowing with milk and honey, to the place of the Canaanites, the Hittites, the Amorites, the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites. ⁹And now, behold, the cry of the people of Israel has come to me, and I have also seen the oppression with which the Egyptians oppress them. ¹⁰Come, I will send you to Pharaoh that you may bring my people, the children of Israel, out of Egypt.” ¹¹But Moses said to God, “Who am I that I should go to Pharaoh and bring the children of Israel out of Egypt?” ¹²He said, “But I will be with you, and this shall be the sign for you, that I have sent you: when you have brought the people out of Egypt, you shall serve God on this mountain.”

¹³Then Moses said to God, “If I come to the people of Israel and say to them, ‘The God of your fathers has sent me to you,’ and they ask me, ‘What is his name?’ what shall I say to them?” ¹⁴God said to Moses, “I am who I am.” And he said, “Say this to the people of Israel: ‘I am has sent me to you.’ ” ¹⁵God also said to Moses, “Say this to the people of Israel: ‘The Lord, the God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, has sent me to you.’ This is my name forever, and thus I am to be remembered throughout all generations.

I AM WHO I AM

’Ehyeh ’asher ’ehyeh is God’s statement as he revealed his preferred form of address to be Jehovah/Yehweh (Ex 3:14–16). ’Ehyeh is the first person form of the Hebrew verb meaning “to be.” God may have spoken ’ehyeh ’asher ’ehyeh as a name in answer to Moses’s request in v. 13, but he certainly reduced the words to the name ’Ehyeh, or I AM (v. 14). Jehovah/Yehweh seems to be an ancient form of the third person form of “to be.” The third person may have been most suitable for Israelites considering their God. Some scholars interpret Jehovah/Yehweh as a causative form like “He Causes To Be,” but ’ehyeh ’asher ’ehyeh favors a meaning like “He Is.” Such a translation agrees with the NT portrayal of Christ as the eternally present One (Jn 8:56). I AM WHO I AM suggests God’s sovereign freedom to be what he chooses to be.

The significance of the name of God given in verse 14, I AM THAT I AM, constitutes the idea that the “I AM” in Exodus 3 reveals God as the Being who is absolutely self-existent, and who, in Himself, possesses essential life and permanent existence. To the Hebrew, to be does not just mean to exist, but to be active, to express oneself in active being. God is the One who acts. The imperfect tense of the verb becomes clear. God’s manifestation to Israel is yet future at the time of the burning bush incident. The “I AM” or “I will be” is God’s promise that He will redeem the children of Israel. ^[1]

Conclusion

Confrontations with God are:

Holy -“take your sandals off your feet, for the place on which you are standing is holy ground.” (Exe 3:5)
Challenging – “I will send you to Pharaoh that you may bring my people, the children of Israel, out of Egypt.” (Exe 3:10)
Equip – Moses was sent by God and then says, “…when you have brought the people out of Egypt, you shall serve God on this mountain.” (Exe 3:12)

^[1] King James Version Study Bible., electronic ed. (Nashville: Thomas Nelson, 1997), Ex 3:7.