2 Peter 1:16-17: The Father Said It Himself

For we did not follow cleverly devised stories when we told you about the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ in power, but we were eyewitnesses of his majesty. He received honor and glory from God the Father when the voice came to him from the Majestic Glory, saying, “This is my Son, whom I love; with him I am well pleased.”

2 Peter 1:16-17 (NIV)

The Father Said It Himself

On the back bench of a courtroom, a woman waits to hear her own name. Everything said at the front of the room gets said carefully. People are described here by where they were standing and by what they can be shown to have known, and most of it is read off paper by men who’ve never met them. Nobody in that room says what he actually thinks of anyone, and it isn’t the place for it.

Peter writes about a voice that came from the Majestic Glory. It belonged to the Father, and the Father was talking about his Son. Jesus received honor and glory from God right there, given by his own Father, in a place where other men were close enough to hear it. “This is my Son, whom I love; with him I am well pleased.”

The Father names two things: he loves his Son, and he is pleased with him. Those are a father’s words, and the voice came to the Son himself while other men stood there. The honor comes from the one person whose opinion of a son settles anything, and it asked nothing of the men who heard it.

Defending him is its own kind of work, and the people who take it up know what it costs. The Father spoke as a father, and he wasn’t offering testimony. Put your case down and take the Father’s word for him.

The clerk calls a name. A man three rows up stands, buttons his jacket, and goes through the gate. The woman still waiting for her own name smooths the paper in her hands flat again, and reads down it one more time to see how she comes out on it.