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JOHN’S GOSPEL…IN THE BEGINNING -1

Bible Study, ,

John 1:1-2 NIV

“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning.”

John’s gospel, often called “the spiritual gospel”, is one of the richest sources on earth of both information and insight into the person of Jesus, the God-man. It is understood that John wrote his story years after the other three “synoptic” gospels which focus primarily on who He was and what He did on earth as a man. To Matthew…He was the king of the Jews, to Mark…the Servant of Yahweh, and to Luke…the Son of Man, but to John…Jesus is the Son of God. 

Even a superficial reading of John’s writing will show us that his record of Jesus’ life is different from the others. John must have taken time to ponder, and had experience of Jesus through the Holy Spirit that gave him much clearer insight than the earlier writers.

Jesus had promised…

“I have much more to say to you, more than you can now bear. But when he, the Spirit of truth, comes, he will guide you into all the truth. He will not speak on his own; he will speak only what he hears, and he will tell you what is yet to come. He will glorify me because it is from me that he will receive what he will make known to you.”

‭‭John‬ ‭16‬:‭12‬-‭14‬ ‭NIV‬‬

John’s theme was Jesus, the Son of God. Perhaps, during his exile on Patmos, he had gained the deeper insights of Jesus’ words and works through meditation, revelation, and prayer, which he used in his gospel to give us greater understanding of the divine nature of Jesus than we gain from the other gospels. 

So, John reaches back into the book of Genesis to explain the deity of the human Jesus. Jesus was much more than an unusual man who said and did amazing things. He was God! He was there with God before and when creation happened. Much more than that…He was the Father’s agent to make creation happen. 

“Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made.”

‭‭John‬ ‭1‬:‭3‬ ‭NIV‬‬

How did John know this? How could he have written these words  as fact with such confidence? Revelation! 

The book of Genesis tells us that the Holy Spirit was at work, brooding, like a hen incubating eggs, over the planet earth, bringing order out of chaos as God spoke. John adds that Jesus, the divine Son, was part of that creation event. He was and is the very Word in person that God uttered to bring the universe into being. 

All of this is a mystery to our finite minds. Since God’s Word is truth, we must receive this revelation by faith as the authoritative explanation of the holy Trinity’s combined involvement in creation.  

“By faith we understand that the universe was formed at God’s command, so that what is seen was not made out of what was visible.”

‭‭Hebrews‬ ‭11‬:‭3‬ ‭NIV‬‬

To the unbeliever, none of this makes sense so, he chooses to believe a theory more nonsensical than the Biblical record, that the entire universe, with all its beauty, intricacy, and complexity, came into being by chance!

The rest of John’s story can only make sense to us if it rests firmly on the foundation that Jesus’ interlude on earth was just that… It was a period in time in which Jesus set aside the privileges of His divine nature, was veiled and clothed in a human body, and lived among His people on earth to reveal the true nature of Father. 

Jesus was the bridge between heaven and earth. He said to Nicodemus…

“Very truly I tell you, we speak of what we know, and we testify to what we have seen, but still you people do not accept our testimony. I have spoken to you of earthly things and you do not believe; how then will you believe if I speak of heavenly things? No one has ever gone into heaven except the one who came from heaven—the Son of Man.”

‭‭John‬ ‭3‬:‭11‬-‭13‬ ‭NIV‬

As John’s story unfolds, his aim becomes clear. This man, Jesus, who had no beginning in time, no birth record, came into the earthly scene for one purpose. He came to redeem a broken humanity and to restore the Father’s alienated children to fellowship Him and to His predetermined purpose to be His forever family. 

“We proclaim to you what we have seen and heard, so that you also may have fellowship with us. And our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son, Jesus Christ.”

‭‭1 John‬ ‭1‬:‭3‬ ‭NIV‬‬

John’s gospel was aimed at presenting all the evidence humans need to put our trust in Jesus and to live under His authority. Why? …Because He is who He said He is, He did what He came to do, and He rescues all who trust in Him, forgives their sin and allows them to enter the realm of His kingdom. 

John admitted that his record was incomplete but what he had written was sufficient to convince his readers that Jesus is God’s Son and that faith in Him gives them eternal life. 

“Jesus performed many other signs in the presence of his disciples, which are not recorded in this book. But these are written that you may believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in his name.”

‭‭John‬ ‭20‬:‭30‬-‭31‬ ‭NIV‬‬

So, God momentarily left heaven, came to earth as one of us, and revealed the majesty of the Father    and the power of the Spirit in His coming. 

To be continued…

JOHN’S GOSPEL…IN THE BEGINNING – 1

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Of the four gospel records of Jesus Christ’s life and death on earth, John’s gospel was known, in the early church, as the “spiritual” gospel. Why the spiritual gospel?

John doesn’t only present the story of Jesus’ life on earth. He also weaves into the story his understanding that Jesus, the man, was far more than a man. He was God incarnate, clothed in a human body, fully God and fully man, with all the attributes of God and man, yet completely submitted and obedient to the Father as a son.

Each of the four gospels tells the story of Jesus from a different perspective and for a different purpose. Together, they present a comprehensive picture of Him as the king of Israel, (Matthew), the Servant of Yahweh, (Mark), the Son of Man, (Luke), and the Son of God, (John).

Each story begins with and at the point of its purpose. For Matthew, Jesus was born to be king of the Jews. For Mark, as a servant, Jesus’ origins and birth were not recorded. His story begins with His arrival on the public scene to carry out His servant role. For Luke, as the Son of Man, Jesus was fully human, the son of Mary, with all the attributes and characteristics of a human. Yet, He was more than human. He was the Son of Man, the Messianic figure of Daniel 7.

However, to John, Jesus was first and foremost, the Son of God, existing eternally with the Father before time. He was sent from the Father to live as an obedient Son, always connected and accountable to Him, doing the Father’s will, revealing the Father’s true nature to His people, and fulfilling His mission as sacrifice and redeemer.

So, John begins to write… “In the beginning…”

John 1:1-3 NLT
[1] “In the beginning the Word already existed. The Word was with God, and the Word was God. [2] He existed in the beginning with God. [3] God created everything through him, and nothing was created except through him.”

In the beginning…the beginning of what? Echoing the first words of the Bible…

Genesis 1:1-2 NLT
[1] “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. [2] The earth was formless and empty, and darkness covered the deep waters. And the Spirit of God was hovering over the surface of the waters.”

John presents Jesus’ presence as the bridge between the Father and His creation. In a perfect expression of the unity between Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, the Three persons function together to produce the universe in all its splendour and detail. Assuming that the triune God created everything, the story of Genesis begins, not with nothing but with an earth that was created, then corrupted. This planet needed intervention to prepare it for human habitation.

In the Genesis 1 account of this process of restoration, the writer slips in two Hebrew letters, “aleph” and “tov”, in the middle of the first verse which are both untranslatable and seem to make no sense. The same two mysterious letters reappear many times throughout the original text of the Old Testament. The ancient rabbis, despite years of study, could not find a solution to the puzzle… until John reveals its secret to his readers.

Google says…

“In some interpretations, particularly within Messianic Judaism, the Aleph Tav is seen as a divine signature or placeholder, indicating the presence and authority of God or Yeshua throughout Scripture. This is often linked to passages in Isaiah and Revelation where God declares Himself to be the First and the Last.”

In the book of Revelation, which of course, John also wrote and which presents all of history as the unfolding story of Jesus, Jesus identifies Himself, at the beginning and the end of the book, as the Alpha and the Omega.

Revelation 1:8 NLT
[8] “I am the Alpha and the Omega—the beginning and the end,” says the Lord God. “I am the one who is, who always was, and who is still to come—the Almighty One.”

Revelation 21:6 NLT
[6] “And he also said, “It is finished! I am the Alpha and the Omega—the Beginning and the End. To all who are thirsty I will give freely from the springs of the water of life.”

Revelation 22:13 NLT
[13] “I am the Alpha and the Omega, the First and the Last, the Beginning and the End.”

The writer to the Hebrews, likewise, presented Jesus as the initiator and completion of our faith, the Alpha and Omega…

Hebrews 12:2 NLT
[2] “We do this by keeping our eyes on Jesus, the champion who initiates and perfects our faith…”

So, the secret of the “aleph” and “tov” is hidden in plain sight.

Jesus, the main character in the Bible story, was present and active in creation, directing the preparation of God’s people in history, and active in redeeming His people from the consequences of their rebellion. His signature, “Aleph Tov” puts Him in the centre of the book as the driver of the story.

Jesus was a Hebrew and would have spoken, in the main, in Hebrew. The Hebrew equivalent of “apha” and “omega”, the first and last letters of the Greek alphabet, are “aleph” and “tov”, the first and last letters of the Hebrew alphabet. John wrote in Greek, the common language of the Roman world. He would, therefore, have written aleph and tov as alpha and omega.

The implication is huge. Jesus’ signature, “Aleph Tov”, is repeatedly written into the pages of Scripture, reassuring God’s people throughout the ages that it He who is both author and subject of the book.

So, with confidence, John could begin his gospel record with the indesputable truth that the Jesus of history is, first, the God of creation. He was present and active with the Father and the Spirit, bringing forth the universe and shaping the earth to be the stage on which He played out the glorious plan of redemption.

The second person of the Trinity in eternity became the Son of God in history to put into action in history what the Trinity had planned in eternity.

JESUS, THE GOD-MAN – 1

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THE GOD-MAN, HIS ORIGIN

I enjoy writing series because, like painting a picture, little by little, a series builds a mental image of our topic and we gain knowledge and understanding as we go along.

I have entitled this series, “Jesus, the God-man” because nowhere in human history is there any other record of God coming to earth as a man except Jesus. There may be fanciful stories of such an event but no evidence that these stories are true. However, we have a book, an authentic book, rooted in history and brimful of the records of God interacting with humans, that tells us that such an event happened!

This story covers millennia of time. It is the story of, first, one nation, Israel, that spreads into all nations. It’s a complete story, yet open-ended, continuing on, mostly unwritten, in the lives of millions of people down the generations.

Despite the time it took to write this book, more that 2000 years, the number of contributors, more than 40, originating in more countries and continents than one, as well as a collection of different genres, this story ultimately has one central figure and one subject, the God-man, Jesus.

The Bible presents this Jesus from eternity to eternity. From before the first record of human history when the story of people begins and when the original pair decided to ditch their allegiance to their Creator for self-made rules, He was already present.

John 1:1-3 NIV
[1] “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. [2] He was with God in the beginning. [3] Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made.”

“The Word”, said John, “who is the God-man, that spoke the universe into being, became part of the creation He made”. He came from eternity to be part of His own creation, to share in its life, to suffer with and for those He had made. He was the bridge between heaven and earth, to reveal the true God to the world.

John 1:14 NIV
[14] “The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the one and only Son, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.”

However, long before the historical event of Jesus’ birth, our book gives us detailed hints about Him in the writings of His ancient people. This fact alone should alert us to the authenticity of this book. No one else can tell a story so accurately and in such detail before it happens as tgecstory of Jesus. Prophecy is God’s prerogative and ability alone, not ours.

God alerted His prophets to the promise of this God-human person in the types and shadows of His religious system as well as in the visions and impressions they received through the Holy Spirit.

These “hints” added up to the promise so accurate that, when the God-man came, His disciples were able to match picture and person, and conclude, as Peter, their spokesman, declared, when Jesus asked outright about His identity…

Matthew 16:15-16 NIV
[15] “But what about you?” he asked. “Who do you say I am?”
[16] “Simon Peter answered, “You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God.”

On the day of Pentecost, when the Holy Spirit came in power on the fledgling church, Peter was able, finally, to match prophecy and fulfilment.

Acts 2:14-17 NIV
[14] “Then Peter stood up with the Eleven, raised his voice and addressed the crowd: “Fellow Jews and all of you who live in Jerusalem, let me explain this to you; listen carefully to what I say. [15] These people are not drunk, as you suppose. It’s only nine in the morning! [16] No, this is what was spoken by the prophet Joel: [17] “ ‘In the last days, God says, I will pour out my Spirit on all people. Your sons and daughters will prophesy, your young men will see visions, your old men will dream dreams… “

In his masterful sermon, Peter put the story together. Finally, it was Jesus, the God-man, the one God had promised, described, and spoken about in His ancient writings who had come…and gone, leaving behind His Holy Spirit to continue the work He had come to do.

After thousands of years, our story ends where it began. Isn’t that amazing! It ends with the restoration of everything the first pair messed up when they decided to go it alone.

Revelation 21:1-4 NIV
[1] Then I saw “a new heaven and a new earth,” for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and there was no longer any sea. [2] I saw the Holy City, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride beautifully dressed for her husband. [3] And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Look! God’s dwelling place is now among the people, and he will dwell with them. They will be his people, and God himself will be with them and be their God. [4] ‘He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death’ or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away.”

Let’s look at the process…

In the beginning, the earth was good and everything worked perfectly.

Genesis 1:31 NIV
[31] “God saw all that he had made, and it was very good. And there was evening, and there was morning—the sixth day.”

Genesis 2:25 NIV
[25] “Adam and his wife were both naked, and they felt no shame.”

Isn’t this what God wanted the earth to be when He made it… God and man, living together on a perfect earth, in harmony and without shame?

So, He planned, prepared and sent His man to reset the earth and mankind to His plan.

So, what went wrong?

One wrong choice, one act of disobedience, and the unthinkable happened.

Romans 5:12 NIV
[12] “Therefore,… sin entered the world through one man, and death through sin, and in this way death came to all people, because all sinned…”

Poof! Gone in a moment! All the amazing things God planned and prepared for His children…gone!

But…take heart. God had it all prepared before it happened.

His plan? It starts with the whisper of a God-man, standing in the wings to fix the mess the first pair made. No names, no pack drill, just a hint of things to come.

To the initiator of the mess God said…

Genesis 3:15 NLT
[15] And I will cause hostility between you and the woman, and between your offspring and her offspring. He will strike your head, and you will strike his heel.”

The rest of the story unpacks, in detail, the careful preparation for this momentous event, when the God-man would come to set the earth and its destiny back in order.

To be continued…

GOD’S WORD – A PERSON

Apologetics, ,

There are so many things we can learn from God’s Word about His Word and what His Word does and reveals that it would take a lifetime and more to discover every facet. To cut a very long story short, let’s examine just one more claim that wraps up every part of this book’s remarkable nature and its power to transform lives as a divine/human book.

The Bible has been described as “the manifestation of God in another form”. If this is true, then we must realise that God and His Word are inseparable. He is both who He is and what He says.

However, even more amazing is that this Book, this Word came here as a person, God’s Word living as a human on this earth.

This truth can be, for us, just a philosophical idea or a life-changing reality, depending on how we receive it. If we regard what John wrote about the Word being a Person as an application of the Greek philosophical idea of the “logos” rather than God speaking to us by His Son, we will miss the whole point of what John was saying.

Again, let the Bible speak for itself.

Genesis 1:1 NIV
[1] “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.”

Hidden in this Hebrew sentence are the latters “aleph tov”, the first and last letters of the Hebrew alphabet. Although untranslatable, Jesus revealed their significance in the last chapter of Revelation.

Revelation 22:13 NIV
[13] “I am the Alpha and the Omega, the First and the Last, the Beginning and the End.”

“He (the Word) was with God in the beginning.”

Genesis 1:3 NIV
[3] “And God said, “Let there be light,” and there was light.”

John unpacks Jesus’ role in creation…

John 1:1-3 NIV
[1] “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. [2] He was with God in the beginning. [3] Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made.”

… and in the world…

John 1:4-5 NIV
[4] In him was life, and that life was the light of all mankind. [5] The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.”

Can you see how, under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, John understood that the Jesus who came from the Father is God and that He was the agent through whom creation happened and through whom God speaks.

Our limited human minds grapple with this revelation but, like all God’s truth, we must receive it by faith or reject it according to our attitude to revealed truth.

Point one, then…Jesus is God in human form and He is the one who partnered with the Father to create the universe, God’s spoken word through whom the universe came into being.

Point two, Jesus is the incarnation of God’s final message to the world. Throughout the history of Israel under the Old Covenant, God spoke to His people through His prophets. However, His message was completed in the life and death of His own Son.

Hebrews 1:1, 3 NIV
[1] “In the past God spoke to our ancestors through the prophets at many times and in various ways,
[2] but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son, whom he appointed heir of all things, and through whom also he made the universe. [3] The Son is the radiance of God’s glory and the exact representation of his being, sustaining all things by his powerful word. After he had provided purification for sins, he sat down at the right hand of the Majesty in heaven.”

Jesus not only spoke God’s Word, He came as the God’s Word itself. In other words, what Jesus did and said was not in His personal capacity as God in human form but rather as God’s Word doing and speaking. He could nevar speak or act outside of His unity with the Father because He was the Father’s voice to the world.

Consider His words…

John 12:47-50 NIV
[47] “If anyone hears my words but does not keep them, I do not judge that person. For I did not come to judge the world, but to save the world. [48] There is a judge for the one who rejects me and does not accept my words; the very words I have spoken will condemn them at the last day. [49] For I did not speak on my own, but the Father who sent me commanded me to say all that I have spoken. [50] I know that his command leads to eternal life. So whatever I say is just what the Father has told me to say.”

Jesus, the Word, is the standard by which God will judge humanity.

Whatever Jesus said was the Father speaking! It’s that simple! Hence, as a man, Jesus had all authority because He was God’s message to earth.

Jesus told His disciples clearly that His life, as the embodiment of the Torah, God’s instructions to His people, was not to do away with His law but to fulfil every detail in the way the Father intended.

Matthew 5:17-18 NIV
[17] “Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them. [18] For truly I tell you, until heaven and earth disappear, not the smallest letter, not the least stroke of a pen, will by any means disappear from the Law until everything is accomplished.”

It was only because Jesus lived in perfect obedience to the whole law, fulfilling every detail, that He could be the perfect sacrifice to atone for all humanity’s failure to achieve God’s perfect standard of righteousness.

In view of all we have considered concerning the Bible and what it has to say about itself, those who refuse to take it at face value and believe what is written must carry the burden and the consequences of their unbelief. Those who put their faith in what is written and live by its instructions will experience all the benefits and blessing of what God has promised because God has spoken His final Word in Jesus and has nothing more to say. To reject the Bible, then, is to reject Jesus because He is the Word in human form.

UNITY, LIFE, LIGHT

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THE GOSPEL OF JOHN – CHAPTER ONE

UNITY, LIFE, LIGHT

“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning. Through Him all things were made; without Him nothing was made that has been made. In Him was life, and that life was the light of all mankind. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.” John 1:1-5 (NIV).

Have you ever read Genesis 1 and wondered where the light came from in days one to three since God only created the sun, moon and stars on the fourth day? Or perhaps you hadn’t noticed!

John’s gospel begins somewhat differently from Matthew, Mark and Luke. Like the book of Genesis, he begins with “In the beginning…” The beginning of what? Certainly not the beginning of God because He was already there in the beginning. And so was the Word.

Who was the Word, and why was He called “the Word”? According to Hebrew thought, God’s Word is a manifestation of Himself in another form. So the Word can be written, as we have it in the Bible, or it can be a person; and that person was the second person of the Trinity who came in human form to speak to us about the Father and to show us what He is like.

The writer to the Hebrews put it like this: “In the past God spoke to our ancestors through the prophets at many times and in various ways, but in these last days He has spoken to us by His Son, whom He appointed heir of all things, and through whom He also made the universe. The Son is the radiance of God’s glory and the exact representation of His being, sustaining all things by His powerful word. After he had provided purification for sins, He sat down at the right hand of the Majesty in heaven.” (Hebrews 1:1-3)

John tells us that the Word was with God in the beginning and that He was God. Does that sound like He, the Word, and God were two separate persons and yet one? He did what God did — He created everything. In Genesis 1, God created the universe through His word. He spoke and creation happened. But Jesus is the Word. Through Him it all came into being. It’s a mystery, isn’t it? What was John trying to tell us?

If Jesus and God were in it together, creating the universe by speaking it into being, then they must be two separate persons and yet, since they were both doing the God-thing — creating — then they must both be God. Two, yet one? Not one person but one in nature, one in essence, one in power, one in purpose — what the Bible calls echad — unity, not two Gods.

Here’s a simple illustration: God created Adam — one person. Then He took a piece of Adam and from it He fashioned Eve – two people. Then He brought them together in marriage and told them that they were to become one flesh — echad — the same word as the Hebrew creed, “Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one…” — echad,  Deuteronomy 6:4 (NIV). They were to be a visual aid of unity because they were to be a reflection of the image of God — one.

John’s next theme is life. Life is much more than just being physically alive. It is the kind of life that willingly does what it can to make the lives of others better. It reflects the nature of God, is generous and kind and in touch with God and responsive to His will.

Now John introduces another theme — light, which is closely connected to life. Our first reaction is to think of visible light but again, Hebrew thought was different. They would ask the question, “What does light do?” Light reveals, exposes, illuminates and enables us to see pictures. Darkness is the absence of light. Again, according to Hebrew thought, light is everything that causes creation to function in unity while darkness is everything that disrupts unity and causes life to unravel.

When Satan was thrown down to the earth because of his rebellion against God, he brought to the planet both physical and moral darkness. “Now the earth was formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep…” Genesis 1:2 (NIV).

Before God created the first human, the potential for him to be influenced by the evil one was already on the earth. It makes sense that God would not leave human beings to live in the environment of Satan’s influence without being able to choose to live in the light. So, according to John, God assigned the Second Person of the Trinity, who was the Word, to be present on earth by His Spirit to teach Adam and his descendants to live God’s way, which is to live in the light.

The Word was not only present and active in creation, He was also continuously active on the earth to influence His human creatures to love and obey Him and to live in fellowship with Him so that all of God’s creation could live in echad as a perfect reflection of their Creator.

That was God’s intention from the beginning but things went horribly wrong…

Acknowledgement

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