And God said to Moses, I AM THAT I AM. And he said, Thus shalt thou say unto the children of Israel I AM hath sent me unto you.
God sent Moses to a people who had lived for generations among Egypt's gods. Moses wanted to know what to say if they asked the name of the God who was sending him. God's answer does not describe what He does. It states what He is. Commentators find in that short phrase both the deepest truth about God and the most practical comfort for faith.
The request for a name was not idle curiosity. It exposed how far the nation had drifted during their years of slavery.
You know how they became slaves in Egypt. When Exodus, the second book of the Old Testament, opens, we see Abraham's descendants there. They were a great and mighty nation, but they were helpless slaves under the cruel rule of Pharaoh, Egypt's great king. But not only were they slaves, they had also forgotten the God who had chosen them and made them His own. They were idol-worshippers in Egypt (see Joshua 24:14). God's people had so far forgotten their God that they had even forgotten His great Name.
The reply says nothing about what God does. It only says that He is. Commentators tie it to the name Jehovah — a name Abraham knew, but whose meaning God had not yet explained.
God had made Himself known to Abraham as Jehovah (Genesis 15:7). But here He explains that name. Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob knew the name Jehovah, but they did not know what it truly meant. He reveals Himself as the Self-Existing One, THE I AM THAT I AM. He is the One who is, who was, and who is to come (Rev. 1:4). And this wonderful Name — the Unchanging, Living One, the Eternal, the Name too deep to search out — is the Name of our Lord who has redeemed us.
God's being never shifts. So nothing in Israel's later history could shift His purpose for them. Their record went on to prove it.
He made Himself known as the great "I AM" — the One self-existent, ever-existent, unchanging, and therefore always true to what He is in Himself. Israel would prove to be an unstable and stubborn people. If they had been dealing with anyone other than "I AM," judgment would soon have swept them away. God was patient with them, and He will still achieve all His purpose for them, because He is always true to Himself. We should remind ourselves of this. We now know God far more closely, since Christ has revealed Him. But we do not lose the value of these earlier revelations. The One whom we know as Father is still the "I AM" to us, as much as He was to Moses and the children of Israel.
The deliverance about to begin had no foundation in Israel's worthiness. Their only qualification was that they belonged to Him.
These words reveal a great and basic principle in God's ways. He always acts on the ground of what He is. "I AM" secures everything for "MY PEOPLE." He was never going to leave His people making bricks in Egypt, under the whips of Pharaoh's slave-drivers. They were His people, and He would act toward them in a way worthy of Himself.
God's other titles each answered one particular need. This one gathers them all up and stays open.
As we trace the different names God takes in Scripture, we find each one tied to the need of the people He was dealing with. "Jehovah-jireh" (the Lord will provide). "Jehovah-nissi" (the Lord my banner). "Jehovah-shalom" (the Lord sends peace). "Jehovah-tsidkenu" (the Lord our righteousness). All these gracious titles of His are unfolded to meet the needs of His people; and when He calls Himself "I AM," it includes them all. By taking this title, Jehovah handed His people a blank cheque for them to fill in for any amount... If we want life, Christ says, "I AM the life." If we want righteousness, He is "THE LORD OUR RIGHTEOUSNESS." If we want peace, "He is our peace."
A writer links this verse with words Jesus spoke to those who opposed Him.
We do not wonder that He claims to be the self-existent One, as in His words to the Jews: "Before Abraham was I AM" (John 8:58). This is the name that belongs to God alone, the name He used when He revealed Himself to Moses and to Israel: "I AM has sent me to you" (Ex. 3:14). He has always been the Word, the One who makes God known, so that older voice was His own. He is the Abiding, the Unchangeable, the Eternal.
Alongside this absolute name, God gave a second one. It ties Him to three named men.
"I AM" is His own essential name. But when it comes to how He rules the earth and deals with it, He takes another name. All generations are to remember Him as the God of Abraham, of Isaac, and of Jacob.
- Forgotten. Slavery in Egypt had cost Israel even the memory of God's name, so Moses had to ask what to tell them.
- Revealed. God names Himself the self-existent One — who is, who was, and who is to come. That is what "Jehovah" had always meant, though Abraham was never told.
- Unchanging. He is always true to what He is, so judgment did not wipe out a stubborn nation. His purpose outlasts their failure.
- Given. Deliverance rests on what He is, not on what they were: "I AM" secures everything for "My people."
- Filled in. The name is a blank cheque — life, righteousness, peace — and the One who signed it said, "Before Abraham was, I AM."
And God said moreover to Moses, Thus shalt thou say unto the children of Israel Jehovah, the God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, hath sent me unto you. This is my name for ever, and this is my memorial unto all generations.
At the burning bush God gives Moses two names: the "I AM" of the previous verse, and then this one, tied to three men who had already died. The second is the one He calls His name forever — so why does God tie Himself to three human lives, and how long does "forever" last?
The two names answer two different questions. One says what God is in Himself. The other says who He is to people on earth — and where that leaves Israel.
This name expresses the essential being of God — His name as the self-existent One. So it affirms His eternal being... But this is not all. After revealing what He is in His own essential existence, He adds... This is pure grace on the part of God. "I AM" is His own essential name. But when it comes to His rule over the earth and His relationship with it, His name is the God of Abraham, of Isaac, and of Jacob — the name all generations are to remember Him by. This gave Israel a very special place under His name. It points to their being chosen by the sovereign grace of God, and to their being loved for their fathers' sake. It also reveals that Israel will always be the centre of God's ways and the key to His purposes on the earth.
(The writers quoted here use older translations. Those read "this is my memorial unto all generations," and print God's name as "Jehovah" where the ESV has "the LORD".)
God does not keep the towering name as His permanent title. Kelly sees the choice itself as the kindness.
How infinitely gracious of God! The name He takes forever in connection with Israel is not the one that reduces every other creature to its own nothingness. It is not the one that makes everything merely the result of His word and His will. He loves and cherishes the name in which He has bound up the objects of His choice with Himself.
Who were these three? Darby sums up their whole standing in one phrase.
So God made Himself "the God of Abraham, of Isaac, and of Jacob" — heirs of the promises, and pilgrims upon earth.
"Forever" is not a decorative word here. Mackintosh notes what God refused to add to it.
This statement contains a very important truth — one many professing Christians seem to forget. God's relationship with Israel is an eternal one. He is just as much Israel's God now as when He visited them in the land of Egypt... He does not say, "This is my name for a time, as long as they continue what they ought to be." No. He says, "this is my name forever, and this is my memorial to all generations." Let my reader think about this. "God has not rejected his people whom he foreknew." (Rom. 11:2) They are His people still, whether obedient or disobedient, gathered together or scattered abroad.
A memorial name is something later generations can appeal to. Darby follows that use of the name into Israel's worst failure, the golden calf.
In Exodus 3:14-15, His name is the memorial for His people forever. He remembers His covenant with the fathers (2:24), and His name is pledged on behalf of His people. And in the utter failure of the people soon after (Ex. 32), where they practically give up God, Moses pleads the name, the revealed character of the Lord.
The rescue from Egypt is what filled the name with meaning.
Israel's deliverance was meant to show what the name Jehovah means, and so make it His memorial name for all generations. And in it Israel would find their lasting ground of confidence.
Death raises a question about this name. Darby presses it: a name is worthless if it points to nobody.
Suppose Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob had ceased to exist. Could God still have taken their names — the name of nothing — to describe Himself to Israel? He might have said, I am He who was with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, when they existed. Even then it would have been a completely unworthy relationship... He is not the God of the dead, but of the living. But this truth went further. As far as soul and body go, Abraham was dead. Though living for God, he was not what God meant him to be... He was to be complete, and so raised from the dead.
- Two names. "I AM" tells what God is in Himself. "The God of your fathers" tells whom He has joined Himself to — and that is the name He calls His forever.
- Chosen, not required. He passes over the name that reduces every creature to nothing. He keeps the name that ties His people to Himself.
- Forever, unqualified. He never says "for a time, so long as they behave." So the bond survives Israel's disobedience and scattering.
- A name to plead. It is a memorial name. Moses could appeal to it after the golden calf, and Israel could rest on it.
- A name that outlasts death. God cannot be the God of people who no longer exist. So Abraham, Isaac and Jacob must rise.