In the Old Testament, Jehovah -- once -- calls Himself "I AM". In Hebrew, the word is אֶהְיֶה , meaning "being", or "coming into being". This naming occurs in Exodus, when God appears to Moses in a burning bush, in the wilderness of Mount Horeb. It is one of the main spiritual turning points in the Bible, and the source of one of its deepest statements about God.

In that story, the descendants of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob had become enslaved in Egypt. They are numerous, but their connection with their forebears and with the land of Canaan is tenuous. The Pharaoh of that time "knew not Joseph". Their spiritual progress had stalled out.

Jehovah chooses Moses, herding sheep in the desert, to go back to Egypt and lead his people to freedom.

"And Moses said to God, 'Behold, I come to the sons of Israel, and say to them, The God of your fathers has sent me to you; and they shall say to me, What is His name? What shall I say to them?' And God said to Moses, 'I AM WHO is I AM'; and He said, 'Thus shalt thou say to the sons of Israel: I AM has sent me to you'." (Exodus 3:13, 14)

"I AM". It goes right to the very core of existence. Bigger than space, beyond time, uncreated.

Then, after many hundreds of years, with some people in Judea and its neighborhood still waiting for the promised Messiah, Jesus -- this maverick teacher and healer -- says the same thing. People sit up and take notice.

Here are the examples...

The disciples are in a small boat in a storm-wracked sea. Jesus comes to them, walking on the water:

"But straightway Jesus spoke to them, saying, 'Have confidence; I am; be not afraid'." Matthew 14:27

Jesus is talking with a Samaritan woman at a well:

The woman says to Him, "I know that Messiah comes, who is called Christ; when He has come, He will announce to us all things." Jesus says to her, "I am, who speaks to thee." John 4:25, 26

Jesus is talking with his disciples:

"I said then to you that you shall die in your sins; for unless you believe that I am, you shall die in your sins. Therefore they said to Him, Who art thou? And Jesus said to them, The Beginning, who also am speaking to you. John 8:24, 25

Later, in the same chapter, Jesus says again to the disciples,

"Amen, amen, I say to you, Before Abraham was, I am." John 8:58

Near the end of his physical life, Jesus is talking with the disciples at the Last Supper:

"From henceforth I tell you before it come to pass, that when it has come to pass, you may believe that I am." John 13:19

Finally, when Jesus is being arrested, there's this powerful scene:

"Judas then, having received a band of soldiers and attendants from the chief priests and Pharisees, comes thither with lanterns, and lamps, and weapons. Jesus, therefore, knowing all things that were coming on Him, went out and said to them, Whom do you seek? They answered Him, Jesus of Nazareth. Jesus says to them, 'I am'.

And Judas also, who betrayed Him, stood with them. When therefore He had said to them, I am, they went away backward, and fell on the ground. Again, therefore, He asked them, Whom do you seek? And they said, Jesus of Nazareth. Jesus answered, I told you that I am; if then you seek Me, let these go away, that the word which He said might be fulfilled, Of those whom Thou gavest Me I have lost none. John 18:3-9

These "I am" statements by Jesus are not the same as the seven "I am" statements that are often listed -- those are also very interesting, but on a different track. The ones listed here are places where Jesus is declaring that He is God, that he is "I AM".

This is hugely important.

Isaiah prophesied that the Christ child would be God Himself, in human form:

"For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given: and the government shall be upon his shoulder: and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counseller, The mighty God, The everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace." Isaiah 9:6.

Jesus is saying that same thing. Internally, He is "I am". And as he gradually puts off or purifies the more external human elements he took on so that He could walk among us, the internal shines through more and more.

6876. 'And saying to them, The God of your fathers has sent me to you' means that He who was the God of the Ancient Church will be with those belonging to the spiritual Church. This is clear from the meaning of 'the God of your fathers' as Him who was the God of the Ancient Church, 'fathers' being those who belonged to the Ancient Church, see 6050, 6075, 6846; from the representation of the children of Israel, to whom 'you' refers here, as those who belong to the spiritual Church, dealt with immediately above in 6875; and from the meaning of 'being sent' as going forth, dealt with in 2397, 4710, 6831, here as the promise that He will be with them, for it is talking about Him who was the God of the Ancient Church, promising that He will be in the spiritual Church, which is represented by the children of Israel.

[2] The God of the Ancient Church was the Lord in respect of His Divine Human. The Ancient Church acquired this perception of God from the Most Ancient Church and also from the consideration that whenever Jehovah appeared to them He did so in a human form. When therefore they thought about Jehovah they did not think of Him as the Being present in all things everywhere, of whom they would have had no conception. Rather, they thought of Him as a Person who was Divine, on whom they would then be able to focus their thought. For in this way they were able both to think about Jehovah and to be joined to Him in love. Those who belonged to the Ancient Church, and especially those who belonged to the Most Ancient Church, were far wiser than people are in our own day, and yet they could not think of Jehovah in any other way than as a person whose Humanity was Divine. Nor did their thinking have any Unseemly desires entering it - ideas taken from the natural man, from what is imperfect and bad there. Rather the ideas about Him were altogether holy. The angels themselves, whose wisdom is so much greater than man's, cannot think of the Divine in any other way either, for they see the Lord in His Divine Human. They know that an angel, with whom all things are finite, cannot begin to form any idea of the Infinite except through what bears resemblance to the finite.

[3] The fact that people in ancient times venerated Jehovah under the form of a Person who was Divine is perfectly clear from the angels who appeared in human form to Abraham, and also after that to Lot, as well as to Joshua, and to Gideon and Manoah. Those angels were called Jehovah and were venerated as the God of all things. If at the present day Jehovah were to appear in the Church as a person people would be offended and would think that because what they saw was a person. He could not by any means be the Creator and Lord of the Universe. Furthermore they would not then have any other kind of idea about Him than what they have about an ordinary human being. Thinking in this way people at the present day believe that they are wiser than the ancients, unaware of the fact that by thinking in that way they are completely out of touch with wisdom. For when one's mental resources are spent on envisaging the completely incomprehensible Being present everywhere, they can discern nothing and are squandered. And ideas about nature, to which every single thing is attributed, arise instead. This is why nature-worship is so common at the present day, especially in the Christian world.