The text is one of those rare passages in which Jesus Christ appears to stand upon His own dignity, in which the Lowly, the Humble, the Unresisting Son of man asserts His high origin, claiming to be God, for it amounts to no less: God from everlasting. "Before Abraham was, I am."
I. Abraham rejoiced to see the day of Christ. He had a glimpse of that day of the birth of Jesus Christ, born of the Virgin Mary, as He had a glimpse also of the manner in which Jesus Christ should work out our redemption. He took his son Isaac and offered him up on Mount Moriah that Isaac so exceedingly dear, of whom it was said, that "in Isaac shall thy seed be called." He offered him up, his one hope of becoming the father of many nations. And that act of Abraham that act of faith, was counted unto him for righteousness; and he is held up for ever as the father of the faithful. To him, as St. Paul writes, "The Scripture foreseeing that God would justify the heathen through faith, preached before the Gospel,saying, In thee shall all nations be blessed."
II. Jesus Christ Himself lived before Abraham was born. Whenever God is spoken of as holding communion and as being visible to man, it is in the Second Person of the Holy Trinity, God, the Son, Jesus Christ. It is He who declares to us the Father. It is He who represents God to us, and is Himself God, even Jesus Christ. This was He who talked with and was called the friend of Abraham. It was He who was the Giver of the Law to Moses, it is He by whose agency the worlds were made, God the Supreme Deity dwelleth in the light which no man can approach: but Jesus Christ who is the image of the Invisible God, hath manifested, made known, declared to us, what God is; how good, how gracious, how ready to forgive, and how rich in mercy to those who call upon Him. It follows, then, that we should honour and worship Him as God, we should draw near with all reverence, with all holiness, with bowed heads and bowed hearts, to present our supplication before Him.
R. D. B. Rawnsley, Village Sermons,3rd series, p. 62.
References: John 8:58. G. T. Coster, Christian World Pulpit,vol. xvi., p. 88; C. Kingsley, All Saints' Day, and Other Sermons,p. 116. John 8:59. J. Keble, Sermons from Septuagesima to Ash Wednesday,p. 34 3 John 1:8 :59. A. P. Stanley, Three Hundred Outlines on the New Testament,p. 79; Plain Sermons by Contributors to "Tracts for the Times,"vol. vii., p. 57. John 9:1. T. Birkett Dover, The Ministry of Mercy,p. 12 3 John 1:9 :1. Homiletic Magazine,vol. xii., p. 103; S. G. Matthews, Christian World Pulpit,vol. xiv., p. 266; J. Keble, Sermons on Various Occasions,p. 475.