Whoever Has Seen Me

Observe. Jesus tells the disciples that if they really know him they will know the Father as well, and that from now on they do know him and have seen him. Philip responds by asking Jesus to show them the Father, saying that will be enough. Jesus answers with a question about how long he has been with them, then states that anyone who has seen him has seen the Father. He grounds the claim in his words, which are not his own, and his works, which the Father does through him. He asks them to believe the words, or at least to believe on the evidence of the works.

Interpret. Philip wanted a direct vision of God, the kind Moses asked for on the mountain. Jesus does not deny that such a desire is good. He says it has already been met. The Father is not somewhere beyond Jesus, requiring a separate revelation. He is in Jesus, and Jesus is in him. To know what God is like, look at what Jesus said and did. The offer to believe on the evidence of the works is a gracious concession to weak faith.

Apply. Many believers still carry a picture of God that is harsher, more distant, or more arbitrary than the Jesus of the Gospels. This passage corrects that picture at the root. When you imagine God, does the face you picture look like Jesus? What would change in your prayers if you took seriously that the Father is exactly as Jesus showed him to be? And which of Jesus' works, remembered this week, gives you ground to believe when belief feels thin?