⁹ Jesus said to him, “Have I been so long with you, and yet you have not come to know Me, Philip? He who has seen Me has seen the Father; how can you say, ‘Show us the Father’?”

Gently reproving Philip, the Lord challenges him that he should already know these truths about Christ. How could Philip ask a question like that when he had been with Jesus for so long? But like us all, the disciples were slow to learn. However, it may not be that the Lord is disappointed in Philip, as it may seem on the surface. Rather, being the master teacher that He was, this chiding was a means to forcing them to think back over His teaching the previous three plus years. His present Upper Room interaction sheds much light on His earlier training sessions with them.

In hindsight, we can see His enlightening words in a new way. Everything Jesus did should now be starting to make sense to them. He had been doing the very things that God does—the resemblance to deity certainly raised their suspicions in that direction, but the implication of their Master being God was almost too much for their monotheistic minds to go there.

What did they think when Jesus forgave the sins of the paralytic deposited through the roof into His presence? “The scribes and the Pharisees began to reason, saying, ‘Who is this man who speaks blasphemies? Who can forgive sins, but God alone?’ ” (Luke 5:21). What were the disciples, his close followers, thinking when that happened? They were not deterred from following Christ, but were still clinging to their monotheistic belief.

This wasn’t just a one-time deal that could be misinterpreted. Remember the time when Jesus was a dinner guest of a Pharisee named Simon? A woman of ill-repute had washed His feet with her tears and hair, and as a result Jesus forgave her of her sins? The other dinner guests aghast exclaimed, “Who is this man who even forgives sins?” (Luke 7:49). This would be shocking for any monotheistic Jew to hear concerning a mere mortal. Or what about when Jesus walked on water? It was the disciples who wondered, “What kind of a man is this, that even the winds and the sea obey Him?” (Mt 8:27).

The most obvious scenario was when Jesus had told the Jews that, “I and the Father are One” (John 10:30). When the Pharisees tried to stone Him, He asked them why. “The Jews answered Him, ‘For a good work we do not stone You, but for blasphemy; and because You, being a man, make Yourself out to be God’ ” (John 10:33).

Yes, there had been plenty of evidence that Jesus was God. Jesus is God!

Lord Jesus Christ, You are my Lord and my God. And I praise You.