THE FATHER’S SON

When Jesus came into the coasts of Caesarea Philippi, he asked his disciples, saying, Whom do men say that I the Son of man am?

And they said, Some say that thou art John the Baptist: some, Elias; and others, Jeremias, or one of the prophets.

He saith unto them, But whom say ye that I am?

And Simon Peter answered and said, Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God.

– Matt. 16: 13-16 –

Scripture references are to the Authorised Version (KJV), unless stated otherwise.

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IN HIS DAY some regarded Jesus merely as the child of Joseph, the local carpenter (Matt. 13: 55, 56).

Others thought He must be one of the prophets or even John the Baptist!

As Jesus and John the Baptist were contemporaries, this bizarre identification of Jesus as the Baptist was most likely a rumour set in train by the guilt-ridden Herod; he had had the Baptist beheaded, and evidently believed in the transmigration (transfer) of the soul of one to the other.

See Mark 6: 14-16 (‘Herod . . . said, That John the Baptist was risen from the dead, and therefore mighty works do shew forth themselves in [Jesus]’).

These opinions and speculations were wide of the truth, and Jesus passed over them, His silence refuting them as wild imaginings.

‘But’, He pressed the disciples, ‘who do you think I am?’ Peter, bursting to speak, replied with conviction, ‘the Christ, the Son of the living God’.

Thus we see that Peter equated ‘Son of Man’ with ‘Son of God’. (For an explanation of ‘Son of Man’ see the Q&A on that topic elsewhere on this site.)

Philip and the other Apostles probably agreed with Peter, looking to him as the natural leader of the band.

Now they were entrusted with that foreknowledge of the Saviour’s identity, but Jesus charged them that they should tell no one about it.

And so it was in the passing months of His ministry that the Twelve observed with increasing wonder the Master’s unique relationship with that living God whom they yearned to know more intimately. Show us the Father!

An audacious expectation? It was to be John who would record the details of that request, and the Lord’s response (John 14: 9, 10):

9 Jesus saith unto him, Have I been so long time with you, and yet hast thou not known me, Philip? he that hath seen me hath seen the Father; and how sayest thou then, Show us the Father? 10 Believest thou not that I am in the Father, and the Father in me? the words that I speak unto you I speak not of myself: but the Father that dwelleth in me, he doeth the works.

It was enough. But to emphasis that Jesus and the Father were not one and the same person, the Apostles under no such illusion in due time amplified the relationship of the Father and His Son, throughout the New Testament.

It was John, ‘the beloved disciple’, who seemed to manifest a deep insight into matters too difficult for the natural mind to grasp (John 1: 18, 14):

18 No man hath seen God at any time, the only begotten Son . . . hath declared him. 14 . . . (and we beheld his [Jesus’] glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father), full of grace and truth.

Though the Jews already knew that the Eternal God was fundamentally uncomprehended by human senses, the Word (Greek, Logos), in the person of the man Christ Jesus, had come to earth to reveal His Father in the sight of men in a manner never before grasped by human intelligence.

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