John 14:9

9 Jesus answered, ‘Don’t you know me, Philip, even after I have been among you such a long time? Anyone who has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say, ’Show us the Father’?


Jesus answered, I thought you would have known me better by this time, Philip. After _ years of being together, and yet you don’t realize who I am yet. After all the conversations we’ve had and after seeing all the demonstrations of God’s power and hearing all the teaching and witnessing all the miracles, and still you do not know me…….what more will it take?
You claim if you could just see the Father that would be enough. I AM ENOUGH! I’ve given you all that you need and I’ve shown you all you need to see. Are you not paying attention? Are you as dull as the Pharisees who are ever learning and never coming to the knowledge of the truth? Who are seeing but remain blind? Who are listening but remain deaf?
You have had the privilege of watching, observing, & listening long enough to know that I am authentic. This is no hoax.
Your request to be shown the Father reveals your lack of understanding. I know men’s hearts, so I am not surprised, but I am saddened. For your sake, it is essential that you grasp the full implications of what I am telling you. I am telling you as plainly as I can that I am equal with the Father. Your understanding of this truth would result in a peaceful calm confident heart rather than a troubled heart.
Do not fear the plan of God even though it includes my leaving you. His plan includes difficult things for Him, for me, and for you. My betrayal, suffering, death, burial, and resurrection are not easy things to endure, but they are necessary things.
While I am bound in this humble body of flesh God the Father is greater than I, but when I return to heaven, I will be exalted and will resume my rightful place at the right hand of God. I will return to the place I left before I laid aside my glory and emptied myself to come to earth.
In a few years, my Apostle, Paul will describe me by writing that I am the perfect representation of God, that His fullness dwells in me, and that the glory of God is revealed in me.
How can you say Show us the Father when you are already staring him in the face? Hearing his voice? Watching him heal? Sleeping and eating and walking with him? Is it not obvious that no man could do the things I am doing unless God was working in him? Has anyone ever done the things I have done? No mere human can do the things I do.
If I were able to do these things on my own, independently of the Father, then I would be another God! Moses wrote, The Lord your God is One. Either I am one God and the Father is another God, or, we are the same God, working in perfect harmony and unity. The only explanation is that we are the same Divine Personhood.
Consider the implications of what I am telling you. God is good. What He does is good. Always. Therefore, my leaving you can only be good. Trust that God’s plan is good even though it includes my death.
I will return. I will take you to be with me, and that is as good as it gets! There is nothing better than that – to live with God and enjoy Him forever.