Judica

St. John 8:42-59

March 22, 2026

In anger, he struck a man down. It seemed justified. But we are not to take the law into our own hands.

So the murderer ran. He spends forty years in exile. He marries, becomes a father. He is content.

Then one day he sees something inexplicable. Fire engulfs a bush, yet the bush is not consumed.

It is a sign of the incarnation. In the Christ, divinity burns, but does not consume the man. Two natures are united in one person.

This One speaks to Moses from the bush. Moses is summoned to go back to the place where he is wanted for murder. “Go there and bring your people out of bondage.”

Like Jacob wrestling with the heavenly man, Moses asks for the name of this God, this One who burns yet is not destroyed. Jacob was not given the name. Moses is.

“They won’t believe me unless I have Your name,” Moses says. God reveals His name: I AM WHO I AM. We refer to this by the Hebrew YHWH: “He Is.”

This name—YHWH, I AM—is why the Jews take up stones against Jesus at the end of today’s Gospel. There they stand, in the temple of YHWH. And Jesus not only says the name, He applies it to Himself. “Before Abraham was, I AM.”

Now St. John the Evangelist by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit writes a Gospel so rich one can read it repeatedly and never plumb its depths. John has a series of seven signs in his Gospel, beginning with the Wedding at Cana. He also has a series of seven “I AM” statements, all with a predicate: “I am the Bread of life,” “I am the Light of the world,” “I am the Gate,” “I am the Good Shepherd,” “I am the Resurrection and the Life,” “I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life,” and finally, “I am the true Vine.”

Are these mere metaphors? Some would say, “Yes,” and proceed to argue that the Lord’s Supper therefore is purely symbolic. After all, Jesus isn’t really a vine or a door, and therefore, the word “is” doesn’t mean “is,” and what Jesus really means is “This represents My body.”

This doesn’t work for at least two reasons. First of all, the “I am” sayings are not grammatical parallels to the Words, “This is My body” and “This is my blood.” And the context is completely different.

But most people who believe the apostolic teaching about the Supper—that the bread is a communion with the body of Christ, and the wine is a communion with the blood of Christ—most will say these sayings in John are metaphors.

I don’t like it. I think it’s stronger than that. Here’s why. Jesus isn’t comparing Himself to things we need, like bread and light. No, Jesus is teaching there is no life apart from Him.

This was all set up in the prologue. “In the beginning was the Word; and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” “All things were made through Him, and without him nothing was made that was made. In Him was life, and the life was the light of men. And the light shined in the darkness, and the darkness comprehended it not.” Jesus is “the true Light which gives light to every man.” “The Word became flesh and dwelt among us.”

So when John tells us that the Logos is the Light, He is not saying, “Jesus is like the sun.” It’s the other way around: “The sun is like Jesus.”

The light exists before the light-bearing bodies. And behind the created light is the uncreated light. The Lord Jesus shines in glory and the disciples pass out. It’s too much.

This Light is the true Bread. You need bread, which is to say, you need food. But man does not live by bread alone, but by every Word that proceeds from the mouth of God. When Jesus tells us He is the living bread, He reminds us that the Jews who ate the manna all died. There’s a food beyond anything you can buy at the finest restaurant or get from the most organic farm. Jesus isn’t like food. He is the food by which we live.

Which is why He literally—and I mean literally literally—He literally gives us Himself in His Supper. You are what you eat, said Feuerbach. He meant it in a materialistic way. But it’s true at the Supper. You are drawn into communion with Jesus. We are becoming like Him who became like us. We are being transformed.

Without light we die. Jesus is the light of the world. He illumines. He dispels darkness. It’s all true. And these are all true statements, not mere metaphors.

He is the gate, the door. He’s not a piece of wood or iron, to be sure. But He is the portal, the entry, to the Kingdom of God. That’s a real thing, and no metaphor. Jesus is the only way in.

Jesus is the Shepherd, which is to say, the Guide and Protector.

He doesn’t provide resurrection and life – He is these things. They reside within Him. They are properties of God, and apart from God they do not exist. He is the way, He is the truth; and He is the true vine; the typical vine supplies life to branches, which must be attached to the source; that’s the metaphor, but He, Jesus, is the true one, the true source.

So don’t let anyone play grammar games with you, trying to outsmart Jesus and make His Words not say what they plainly mean.

And what they plainly mean to the Jews in today’s Gospel is that Jesus is making the claim to be the enfleshed, incarnate YHWH. “Before Abraham was, I AM.” They know exactly what this means. It’s no wordplay. And there are only three options when someone says something like this.

One, the guy is crazy. Make asylums great again.

Two, He’s lying. In their hatred, that’s what they believe. That’s why they determine to kill Him. It’s blasphemy. He’s making Himself to be God.

The third option is it’s true. Jesus is the incarnate God. And if that’s true—and it is—that changes everything for you.

First, it means your God took your nature, along with your struggles and your sorrows and your sins, and in that nature He died. For you.

Second, it means that how you see and live in this world now changes. The things you thought were bread and light, the things you thought were truth and life, it all has to be reoriented around Jesus.

All the things that claim to be so important – are they in harmony with your life as His disciple? Are you spending your money on the things that do not satisfy, the things that can never give life? Are you spending your time on worthless things, or the things that serve your neighbor, glorify God, and set your course towards His kingdom?

To you, Jesus says, “Before Abraham was, I AM.” He Is. He is everything. He is truth. He is Law. He is Life. He is Love. He Is.

He sets murderers free.

He illumines with the true light.

He transports those who fall asleep to Paradise.

He raises the dead.

All things exist in Him. He IS. +INJ+