 |
||
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
|
|
|
 |
Tune
in to Grace Radio 24 hours a day!
John 1:1-18 "The Message of God"
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things were made through Him, and without Him nothing was made that was made. In Him was life, and the life was the light of men. And the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it. There was a man sent from God, whose name was John. This man came for a witness, to bear witness of the Light, that all through him might believe. He was not that Light, but was sent to bear witness of that Light. That was the true Light which gives light to every man coming into the world. He was in the world, and the world was made through Him, and the world did not know Him. He came to His own, and His own did not receive Him. But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God, to those who believe in His name: who were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God. (John 1:1-14)
The Heavens are Telling!
John starts his gospel with the very words that start
the Bible, "In the beginning". If we go back to the first
book of the Bible, Genesis, we read, "In the beginning God created
the heavens and the earth." John is not adding anything to Genesis
when he explains that in the beginning was the Word, and the Word was
with God, and the Word was God. Because we find in Genesis that the
way that God created was to speak. God said, "Let there be light";
and there was light." And so John tells us that all things were
made through the Word, and indeed as we read Genesis we find that nothing
came into being without God first speaking it so. Why didn’t God
simply think the world into existence? Why didn’t He make it silently?
Why use words, and more specifically, the Word?
Words are meant to communicate. When we speak to each other we communicate
ideas, information and emotions. When I write a sermon or a letter I
am very aware of who will be on the receiving end because the words
I write are meant to communicate. God also meant His Word to communicate.
Everything that God has done through His Word has been a communication,
a message. God’s creation of the heavens and the earth, of light
and seas and dry land and even the birds and animals and us, has been
an act of communication. These things that God has created still speak
loudly to pass along His message. The Bible tells us that "the
heavens are telling the glory of God." (Ps. 19:1) David wrote beautifully,
"Praise the Lord from the earth, You great sea creatures and all
depths; fire and hail, snow and clouds; stormy wind, fulfilling His
word; mountains and all hills; fruitful trees and all cedars; beasts
and all cattle; creeping things and flying fowl; (Ps. 148:7-10) All
these things that God created fulfill His Word, they are true to the
purpose for which God created them. Every single created thing speaks
loudly that there is a God and that He is a God of incredible wisdom
and power.
The Light Within
Every created thing has stayed true to its purpose except
for one. We human beings are the only ones who have rejected our Creator,
casting off the love of the One who made us, choosing to deface and
destroy anything that reminds us of Him. Instead of worshiping the Creator
we choose to worship the creation, and ultimately we choose to worship
only ourselves. David wrote, "I will lift up my eyes to the hills
– From whence comes my help? My help comes from the Lord, Who
made heaven and earth." Our vision seems to stop at the hills themselves.
Instead of being propelled Godward by the glory of what He has made,
at best we set those hills aside as a sanctuary and at worst we mine
them for the raw materials of our worship of self and leave them bare
and empty.
Yet even though the whole world were destroyed, or more likely, even
though we were cut off from it, imprisoned or worse, God’s message
would still reach us. John writes, "In Him was life, and the life
was the light of men." We ourselves are also part of the message.
When God created us in His own image He put the message inside of us
and so no matter how divorced we become from God’s creation we
still cannot seem to escape God. There is still a yearning inside each
one of us for God that we cannot deny. It is like a bright light shining
outside your bedroom window at night. The only way that you can ignore
it is to cover it up, block it out, burrow down deeper into the darkness.
And that is exactly what human beings have done to escape this light
within themselves.
God Persists
How frustrating it must be for God to have such an important message to communicate only to be ignored by those He is trying to send it to. Recently I frequent a pasta restaurant in Machida. The food and the prices are quite good but the service is trying my patience. I can never seem to get a waitresses’ attention. Even when the place is empty they are nowhere to be seen, and though one happens to appear they must be part deaf and blind. I have to stand up and wave my hands just to get noticed. And so it is for God as well. Even though there is an unmistakable witness in the created world, in the very life that we have inside us, God has to send to us people who will stand up and wave their hands and tell us the message that we refuse to hear. This was the role of the prophets in the Bible. Starting with Abraham and ending with John the Baptist, God sent His servants to draw back the curtains, pull back the blankets that we had crawled under and coax us gently, or not so gently to open our eyes to the Light. Every morning I go through this same routine with my son to get him out of bed and on his way to school. On some mornings he responds very similarly to the way that most people respond to God’s messengers. He rolls over grumpily and tells me to "go away". Other times he is more violent in his insistence that I leave him to sleep in peace. It is not surprising that most of God’s messengers, including John the Baptist were killed by those whom they were trying to reach. However sometimes the reaction is just the opposite. Instead of listening to God’s message through them we mistake the messengers for God Himself. Like the children of Israel we would rather deal with a Moses whom we know, than God whom we are afraid of. We tell the messengers to go and deal with God for us and there have been plenty of pretenders willing to fill that role for a price.
The True Light
So after man has refused to listen to the testimony of the creation, the inner light inside himself, or even to the messengers that God has sent, God chose to send the Word Himself. In the words of John, "And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth." Jesus Christ is the ultimate expression of God’s message to us set in human flesh, our language, so that we can finally understand what God would say to us. When we look at Jesus we see God in a way that we can comprehend. We can understand through Jesus that God is not only awesome and powerful and wise but that He is also love, light, and life. We see in Jesus the grace and truth that God wants us to know about Him. The good news of Jesus Christ, the message that God has been trying to communicate to us from the beginning is that "as many as receive Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God, to those who believe in His name"
And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth. John bore witness of Him and cried out, saying, "This was He of whom I said, ‘He who comes after me is preferred before me, for He was before me.’" And of His fullness we have all received, and grace for grace. For the law was given through Moses, but grace and truth came through Jesus Christ. No one has seen God at any time. The only begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, He has declared Him. (John 1:15-18)
No one has seen God. He is far beyond the ability of our
most powerful telescopes or magnifying lenses to capture. The simple
mechanics of light hitting the retina and passing along the signal to
the brain could not handle the fullness of God. There is not enough
bandwidth, to use an internet term. God would overwhelm any of our senses
if we got too close. But through Jesus Christ we are able to experience
the fullness of God, Jesus is the adapter that filters God into a format
that we can handle. However, be sure that just because we can handle
it does not mean that God is limited by us. We are tempted to be satisfied
with the first experience of God that we have. There have been many
prophets who unlike John, have figured out a small slice of God and
then set up shop to promote their view. But John said, "This was
He of whom I said, ‘He who comes after me is preferred before
me, for He was before me.’" John humbly submits himself to
Jesus, allowing Jesus to truly be God, rather than taking Jesus on his
own terms, or forcing Jesus to fit his expectations. "Of His fullness
we have all received, and grace for grace." This phrase "grace
for grace" means that the gift of God is unending. We receive one
blessing from God only to have it replaced by another and another. We
learn some new thing about God only to learn something more. We experience
the love of God, only to experience it again and again, each time new
and fresh because we are connected, linked, plugged in to Jesus who
is the one mediator, the adapter, the communication between God and
men. Jesus Christ is the message of God, the Word.
| I have a question... | I want to receive Jesus Christ! | I want to confess sin... |
| I need prayer... | I want to come to church... | I want to be a prayer partner |