His Sonship

“All things are delivered unto me of my Father: and no man knoweth the Son, but the Father; neither knoweth any man the Father, save the Son, and he to whomsoever the Son will reveal him.” Matthew 11:27 (Luke 10:22)

“Matthew 11:27 (Luke 10:22) is by far the most important seat of the testimony which Jesus bears to His sonship. In fact it marks the culminating point of our Lord’ self-disclosure in the Synoptics. The Christology is so high that the words have a pronounced Johannine sound…In verses 25 and 26 the term “Father” was occasioned by the form of prayer there assumed by the discourse, but here in verse 27 its occurrence requires special explanation: it serves to account for the absoluteness and comprehensiveness of the task of the revelation entrusted to Jesus. Because God is His Father, and He is the Son of God, such a delivery of “all things” in the realm of revelation was possible. Here, therefore, the Messiahship on its revealing side (“all things were delivered”) is put on the basis of Sonship (“by My Father”). The two clauses next follow: “No one knows the Son except the Father, and no one knows the Father except the Son, and he to whomsoever He (the Son) wills to reveal Him (the Father), state explicitly what was contained in the preceding by implication: the Messiahship is of such a nature, even as to its revealing function, that it demands for its prerequisite a wholly unique relationship to God. That the Son possesses this is guaranteed by His name and dignity as Son. The intimacy is such that God alone can know Him, and that He alone can know God. The dignity involved in this lies far above the sphere of ordinary human acquaintance. It carries within itself a unique mutual cognition between Jesus and God. God knows Him and He knows God with an exclusive knowledge. Here also of course the correlative “Father” and “Son” are significant. Our Lord does not say, “No one by God knows me, and only I know God.” What He says is rather, ” No one but the “Father” knows the “Son,” and no one but the “Son” knows the “Father.” These terms are used because they add to the statement of the fact the explanation of the fact, namely that Jesus has this exclusive knowledge of God in virtue of His being the Son. God has this exclusive knowledge of Jesus in virtue of being His Father. It is a knowledge such as only a father can possess of a son, only a son of a father.” Vos, Geerhardus The Self-Disclosure of Jesus (Phillipsburg, NJ: P & R Publishing, 2002) pp. 144-149 quoted here