What Is the Sign That We Have Come to Know Jesus?
“You still do not know me?”: A Devotion on John 14:6–9
In this passage we are often (and rightly) drawn to Jesus’s statement of exclusivity in John 14:6. He is not a way among many but the way. He is not a truth but the embodiment of the truth. There is only one way to the Father, and that is through Jesus alone.
But can I draw your eyes to the question in verse 9? In curious exasperation, Philip responds to Jesus’s claim with the request, “Lord, show us the Father, and [that will be] enough for us” (v. 8). In other words, Philip wants it to be irrefutably clear: We’ve seen your miracles and heard your words and believe that you’re the promised Messiah. But can you convince us one more time? He’s asking Jesus to settle the matter once and for all.
And Jesus looks at him and responds with a gentle yet chiding question. I can imagine him shaking his head, smiling but with a hint of sadness embedded into the smile. The kind that creeps into the corners of the eyes. Like the face of a patient friend who keeps showing up for you after you made a mess of things again. Like that of a parent whose stressed-out teenager just shouted, “You don’t know what I’m going through!” because they have a big assignment due the next day. Like that of the Savior who knows that tomorrow he will do the blood-spilling work of his saving.
“Have I been with you so long, and you still do not know me, Philip?” (v. 9)
You see, this is why Jesus came: so that we may know him. Do you know him?
An exercise I’ll often do when reading Scripture is to emphasize a different word in the phrase or sentence I’m mulling over. It’s like turning around a beautiful gem and watching it catch the light from various angles. Why don’t you take a few moments and slowly turn those four words over in your mind?
Do you know Jesus?
Do you know Jesus?
Do you know Jesus?
To not know him, or to pretend to know him, is the greatest of dangers. At the end of his famous Sermon on the Mount in Matthew 7:21–23, Jesus warns that there will be “many” who claim to have prophesied in his name, cast out demons in his name, and done many great works in his name. And on the final day, Jesus will say to them, “I never knew you; depart from me, you workers of lawlessness” (v. 23). Not that he had known them once upon a time and then something came along and severed their relationship. Jesus says of these people that he never knew them, and therefore they never truly knew him. You see, it is possible to know a lot about Jesus and not know Jesus.
It is possible to do a lot for Jesus and not know Jesus. Yet to truly know him is the greatest of all joys and most precious of all treasures. It is why God said through the prophet Jeremiah, “Let not the wise man boast in his wisdom, let not the mighty man boast in his might, let not the rich man boast in his riches, but let him who boasts boast in this, that he understands and knows me” (Jer. 9:23–24). Is there anything greater? When all is said and done, only one thing matters.
Do you know him?
Here’s one way we can be sure that we do know Jesus: we long to know him more. Our hearts say with the apostle Paul—who, after enjoying, worshipping and faithfully serving Jesus for around three decades, near the end of his life declared this—“My goal is to know him and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of his sufferings” (Phil. 3:10 CSB). For to know him and be known by him is the ultimate relational reality, which we will spend all of eternity marveling over and delighting in. And it is a gift not only for your future but for this very moment—right now, right where you are.
This article is an excerpt from Truly, Truly, I Say to You: Meditations on the Words of Jesus from the Gospel of John by Adam Ramsey (©2023). Published by The Good Book Company. Used by permission.
Adam Ramsey is the author of Truth on Fire, pastor at Liberti Church and the network director for Acts 29 Asia Pacific. He and his wife Kristina have five kids.