If ye had known me, ye should have known my Father also: and from henceforth ye know him, and have seen him.
This verse comes from a long, intimate conversation Jesus had with his twelve disciples on the night before his crucifixion, recorded in the Gospel of John. The disciple Philip had just asked Jesus to 'show us the Father' — meaning, give us a direct vision of God. Jesus responds with something that would have been extraordinary to Jewish ears: he tells Philip that seeing him is seeing the Father. For Jewish people, God was utterly transcendent — beyond form, beyond full human knowing. The claim that a person standing in the room with them was the full visible expression of God was a radical and deeply significant statement. Jesus is gently but firmly telling Philip: you have already received the answer you have been asking for.
Jesus, thank you that you didn't stay hidden. Thank you for being a God I can actually look at and begin to understand. Help me pay closer attention to your life — and let what I see there change how I see everything else. Amen.
Philip's question is one of the most honest things anyone says in the Gospels. He and the other disciples have been following Jesus for years — watching him heal people, hearing him teach in ways no one else taught, eating ordinary meals together — and Philip says: just show us the Father. That will be enough. There's something almost heartbreaking about it. He was looking past the answer that had been standing right in front of him the whole time. Jesus doesn't condemn him for asking. He just says: Philip. You've already seen him. You just didn't recognize it. We do this too. We ask God for signs and clarity while overlooking what he has already shown us in Jesus — the way he stopped for people everyone else was walking past, the things he said about who matters and why, the places he went when no one would have blamed him for staying away. If you want to know what God is actually like, look at Jesus refusing to condemn the woman everyone else was ready to stone. Look at Jesus weeping at his friend's grave even though he knew what was about to happen. You've already seen the Father. The question is whether you've been paying attention.
Why do you think Philip asked to see the Father even after years of walking with Jesus — what does that suggest about how easy or hard it is to recognize God when he is close?
In what ways have you personally come to understand the character of God more clearly through the life and actions of Jesus than through abstract ideas about God?
Jesus says 'from now on, you do know him and have seen him' — what do you think changes after that statement? What becomes available to the disciples that wasn't before?
If Jesus is the clearest picture of what God is like, how does that change the way you relate to the people around you — especially the ones who are easiest to overlook?
Where in your life right now are you asking God for more revelation, when the answer might already be visible in what Jesus has already shown you?
Who is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of every creature:
Colossians 1:15
For God, who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, hath shined in our hearts, to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.
2 Corinthians 4:6
Not every one that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; but he that doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven.
Matthew 7:21
And he is before all things, and by him all things consist.
Colossians 1:17
Believest thou not that I am in the Father, and the Father in me? the words that I speak unto you I speak not of myself: but the Father that dwelleth in me, he doeth the works.
John 14:10
That they all may be one; as thou, Father, art in me, and I in thee, that they also may be one in us: that the world may believe that thou hast sent me.
John 17:21
Jesus saith unto him, Have I been so long time with you, and yet hast thou not known me, Philip? he that hath seen me hath seen the Father; and how sayest thou then, Shew us the Father?
John 14:9
And these things will they do unto you, because they have not known the Father, nor me.
John 16:3
If you had [really] known Me, you would also have known My Father. From now on you know Him, and have seen Him."
AMP
If you had known me, you would have known my Father also. From now on you do know him and have seen him.”
ESV
'If you had known Me, you would have known My Father also; from now on you know Him, and have seen Him.'
NASB
If you really knew me, you would know my Father as well. From now on, you do know him and have seen him.”
NIV
“If you had known Me, you would have known My Father also; and from now on you know Him and have seen Him.”
NKJV
If you had really known me, you would know who my Father is. From now on, you do know him and have seen him!”
NLT
If you really knew me, you would know my Father as well. From now on, you do know him. You've even seen him!"
MSG