Be still and know that I am God.
Psalm 46:10

Two weeks after moving to our new house, we were still getting acquainted with the place. “Where does this go?” Hiram queried at least once a day while putting away dishes in the kitchen. “Which way to the bathroom?” I wondered before answering my middle of the night call of nature. But day by day, the floor plan became more familiar and the contents of cupboards and closets made more sense. Every morning our house felt more like home as I settled into my comfy chair and study our pastor’s upcoming sermon text from John 1.

I suspect God is using our move to reveal truths from the first book of John that I’ve never noticed before. For some reason, the passage where Nathanial encounters Jesus makes me shiver with a delight that reaches to my very soul.

“How do you know me?” Nathaniel asks Jesus when they first meet. When Nathaniel learns that Jesus knew he’d been hanging out under a fig tree, he blurts out the truth he just realized. “Rabbi, you are the Son of God! You are the King of Israel!” To which Jesus replies, “You ain’t seen nothing yet! Stick with me, and you’ll see heaven opened, and God’s angels ascending and descending on the Son of Man.”

About now, you’re probably scratching your head and wondering, “What’s so delightful about that?” The delight flows from how Nathaniel’s exchange with Jesus reveals a basic truth about every believer’s relationship with him. While we are becoming acquainted with Jesus, he already knows everything about us and our children–more than we can ever hope to know about ourselves.

I see my own human frailty and self-absorption in this truth of Scripture. My perception is that I magnanimously allowed Jesus into my life at salvation, when in reality, he was already there. He’s always been there waiting for me to become aware of his presence. Waiting for me to engage in his relationship with me that is not about him making my acquaintance. It’s about him revealing who he is so that every day I can know him more intimately.

This relationship is available to all believers, an everlasting relationship that begins with salvation but doesn’t end with this life. Instead it continues in the life to come. In this world and the next, Jesus constantly reveals more about himself. Though he has known us completely since before time began, our knowledge of him will never stop growing. Throughout eternity, as Jesus shows us more of his character, those who love him will see the angels descending and ascending on him, and we will respond with shivers of delight, “You are the Son of God! You are the King of Israel!”

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