John 8:28, ‘When you have lifted up the Son of Man, then you will know that I Am, and that I do nothing from myself, but [that I] speak just as the Father has taught me.’
The revelation that Jesus is I Am comes precisely in that He does nothing on His own authority, but speaks (and here, His death is implicitly presented as His climactic speaking) only what the Father has taught Him. So, Jesus is known to be the image and revelation of YHWH God, precisely in the radical and complete obedience of His self-outpouring on Calvary…The Son IS Himself precisely in His obedience…This is because it is in His perfect and continual obedience to the Will of the Father, that He is the perfect and continual image of the one whom He obeys (just as the mirror becomes our image in the perfect ‘obedience’ of its reflectiveness). Christ’s obedience is His revelation of the Father. And the climactic and cumulative obedience to the Father—which is climactic and cumulative revelation of the Father—happens in the paschal sacrifice of Himself for His wayward Bride.
This is the obedience for which creation exists, the obedience that lies at the genesis and telos of all things, the obedience which is the eschatological goal of reality (Phil.2:6-11, Rev.5:6-14). Yes, because IF the death and resurrection of Jesus is the supreme revelation of God, and IF reality exists that God might be thus revealed (i.e., glorified), and IF this revelation is achieved in Christ’s obedience, THEN reality exists to form the context wherein this obedience can be carried out.
And it is this obedience that enables, and—in a sense—IS every other obedience. That is the point of today’s picture. All true obedience of Christ’s people is an obedience carried out by virtue of union to Him in His supreme Obedience on Calvary and so becomes an outworking or fruit or expression of THAT obedience within our particular contexts. All of our obediences are rays of the great sun of obedience that blazes on the cross, rivulets of the great stream of obedience that flows from the stricken Rock, from the opened tomb, and from the throne of God and of the Lamb—which is also the altar of His self-giving obedience of love.
