Commentary, Questions, & Ideas on the Gospel of John

Remember to ask questions, give people time to think about each question, and do not give them answers. Let the text speak for itself. Don’t worry if you don’t know the answers to all the questions I have mentioned; just use them to get others thinking and talking. It doesn’t matter, at first, what everyone says as long as each person is taking part. Use your own open Bible and make sure that each person has one, too. Don’t use this book. You want people to get used to having a Bible in their hands and learning their way around in it as you have done.

John 1:1-18 ​

The entire Gospel is contained in these first eighteen verses. You should spend a lot of time reading and re-reading them alone before asking an unsaved friend to join you.

John 1:1 ESV

1 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.

What questions could you ask your friend from this verse?

Verse 1:

How does John prove the existence of God?

He doesn’t! He assumes that the reader believes in God’s existence. People cannot prove that God exists, nor can they prove that God does not exist. Either view require faith.

A translation student told me he didn’t believe in God, because he hadn’t had the experience of meeting him. I asked him if he had had all the experiences experiences of every person who had lived. He said no. Then I asked if it were possible that God lay outside of his experience. When he said yes, I told him that God lay inside my experiences, and that he should beware of assuming that something did not exist just because he didn’t know anything about it.

A small boy once turned on the light switch in his room and asked his mother, “Mommy, where does that light come from?”

She replied, “A man put wires in our house when it was built, and the electricity comes through the wires.”

He responded, “I don’t believe that a man put wires in our house. I believe the light and the switch were always there.” Many adults act like that little boy when they accept the fact that they can install electricity into a house but reject the fact that God made electricity. ​

Why does John call God the Word? What is a word? To what purpose do we use words?

We use words to communicate something to someone else.

What does God want to communicate?

The text does not say, “God had the Word,” but “God was the Word.” What is the difference between the two statements? If I came to you and said, “I have a word for you,” what would you think I meant? You would probably think that I had a message to give you. But what if I came to you and said, “I am the word for you.” You might think about calling the men in white jackets and having me hauled off for psychiatric help.

The difference is clear. If I say, “I am the word for you?” I mean I want you to know me personally. Does God want us to know him personally? Does God want to communicate Himself to you and to me?

God doesn’t just want to tell us facts, like a boring teacher in the classroom. He calls himself the Word. He wants to communicate himself to us, to you. Do we believe that? Is God really personal? If He is, isn’t it logical that God can communicate with us as we do with one another? How does a person speak with an impersonal force?

Read the second conversation in Chapter 6 again. The illustration about finding God in nature can be used effectively here in John 1.

An unsaved person might say that, even if God is personal, He doesn’t talk to us in the same way we talk to each other. How would you respond to that? Why, then, do we write letters if not to “talk” to one another?

Does God want to tell me about himself?

I asked a professor this question once, and he replied, “I can’t believe God wants to reveal himself personally to me. I’m a nothing, and He has far more important things to think about.”

I asked him if he wanted a God who concerned himself about each individual person. He responded, “Very much so, but that’s just a dream.” “Not if the Bible is true,” I added, and went on to the next question. This question and the answer will show our friends how easy the Bible is to understand. ​Some people will get philosophical and look for deep and difficult answers. Encourage them to think simply. I did not try to prove that the Bible is true. I just left him with that statement in his mind.

If God wants to communicate something to us, doesn’t it have to be very simple for us to understand? Can we imagine God sitting in heaven, looking down on us in disgust at our incredible ignorance? Out of his mercy, however, He stoops down and chooses two or three of the most intelligent of these advanced “apes”. He says to the first one, “Well, since you have a theological education, I’ll choose you.” To the second, He says, “You took so many tests while you were studying at the university that I might as well choose you, too.” To the third He says, “You’re not too bright, but you’re probably smarter than all of those other donkeys down there. I guess I’ll just have to make do and tell you three what I want all the rest of humanity to know.” Doesn’t that conversation sound ridiculous?

Many theologians will tell you that you need years of Greek and Hebrew and lots of theology before you can even begin to understand the Bible. But if God wants to speak to each of us, He, being far more intelligent than we are, would have to communicate with us very simply. If God has spoken to us through the Bible, then even the simplest of people should be able to understand it.

My family went to Greece for two weeks one summer, and there we met a man there from Holland who taught Greek to ten- and eleven-year-olds. I asked him if they ever read New Testament Greek. He laughed and said, “The children read New Testament Greek as bedtime stories. That’s about the easiest Greek there is.” My wife commented to me afterwards, “Isn’t it interesting that God wrote his book so simply that even children can understand it?”

Going back to verse 1:

How could the Word be with God and be God at the same time?

The answer is quite simple. Jesus as a person was with God the Father in all of eternity past. Jesus is also God the Son, as He is called later in this gospel.

Don’t give the people at the Bible study this answer! Tell them that the answer is in John’s gospel, and they will have to find it for themselves. Tell them over and over that they must not come to depend on you, the Bible study leader, as their answer person. At the very first meeting, start instilling in them the need to find the answers for themselves from the text. This requirement will play a vital role in their own maturing process once they have become believers.

John 1:2 ESV

2 He was in the beginning with God.

What beginning is John talking about?

Our friends might say, “The beginning of time,” to which you could reply, “What existed before time?” They might say, “It was before anything existed,” to which you might ask, “Did God have a beginning?” It doesn’t matter what their answer is so long as you get them thinking about the verse. Do not give them your answers or opinions. After you have talked about this verse and their answers for a while, go on to the next verse.

John 1:3 ESV

3 All things were made through him, and without him was not any thing made that was made.

What does the word all in verse 3 mean?

We didn’t come together to discuss evolution versus the Bible, but we need to see from the very beginning that the Bible may not agree with everything the scientists want us to believe. The sciences, after all, are “observational”; that is, we build our laws of physics and biology on what we observe.  More often than not, the scientists have to revamp and rethink these fallible scientific laws because they turn out to be incorrect, due to newly discovered information. Every scientist realizes that the human race has not observed everything there is to observe.  There are big holes in our understanding of our universe. Any scientist who is honest will tell us that the more we learn about our universe, the more we realize how little we know.

If God did write the Bible (through men), then He should know more about this universe He planned and created. I’m not saying that the Bible is a science textbook, but when it does make statements about “our” sciences, we should be careful not to assume automatically that these statements are false because they seem to contradict our very limited knowledge of this universe. If there is a God who made the universe, He has had many a laugh at our arrogant announcements that we have finally discovered the secret of a certain aspect of science only to have to revise our “established facts” later and admit that they were only theories all along.

Even if we assume that evolution is correct, there remain two questions unanswered by this theory. Where did the material world come from in the first place, and how did dead matter turn itself into living matter? Neither of these questions can be answered by evolution.  The answers can only be assumed if we rely solely on our observational sciences. If, however, we take into account all of the evidence (information that comes from outside our own experience, that is, the revelation that God gives us in the Bible), then we have these two questions answered right at the beginning of John. God brought everything into existence and, according to verse 4, He turned dead matter into living matter.

John 1:4–5 ESV

4 In him was life, and the life was the light of men. 5 The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.

“In Him was Life.” What is life? Do we have life in us? Is a chair life? Are there different kinds of life?

For instance, is there a difference between plant life and animal life? Everyone will say yes to this question. Because this is so, why do most people assume that there is no difference between animal life and human life?

What is the difference between animal and human life, or are we just an advanced form of protoplasm? Are there levels of life below plant life? Most people would consider cells to be a form of life.

Are there levels of life above human life? How can we know if there is a life-form higher than we are? Do we have the same kind of life in us as God has in himself? Many people believe that God is simply an impersonal force.

Is God really personal? What is life? The opposite of death. What is death? Because there are different kinds of life, are there also different kinds of death? You might tell your friends that the Bible says that there at least two kinds of life and at least two kinds of death. “What are these kinds?” someone might ask. Our answer: “John’s gospel answers this very soon – before we finish chapter 6. Let’s keep reading.”

These questions are meant to make our friends think beyond their own limited ideas of life and death. The answers, at this point in the study, are not important. When you ask these questions, tell them that you don’t have all the answers but that the Bible says there is more to life and death than what most believe.

I once saw a religious tract that had a list of events followed by a question. It said that man is born, he grows a little, goes to school, becomes a teenager (tough!), picks a profession, gets married and has children, grows old and retires, and dies. Is that all there is to life?

“And the life was the light of men.” What is light? The physicists cannot define light! They can only describe its qualities. Sometimes they say it is waves. However, it often acts like particles. From where does light come? The sun? A physicist would say, “Yes, but not always.”

A physics student once told me about a phenomenon known as “prime,” or “original,” light, which is light that has no known source. If light doesn’t have to come from the sun, then where does it come from? Genesis tells us that God created light before he created the sun. A person might choose to reject the explanation given in Genesis, but the question of “prime” light is still left open. If we assume that God made the universe and us, then why did He make our physical light source 93 million miles away? He gave us eyes with which to see, but they are useless without light. Why didn’t he place a light source within each one of us, like fireflies? We’ll answer this question in John 11.

Coming back to our text, what does the light of men mean?  Is this light the physical light of the sun, or does light refer to something else? What? Does this light come from men or is this light for men? Since the “life” is speaking of the Word, we can safely assume that this light is for men. Why do people need light?

If you entered a dark room, and you had never been in the room before, why would you turn on the light? You would want to see what was in the room; if you had no light, you might run into a table and hurt yourself. Likewise, if we cannot recognize reality and if he can’t tell the difference between what is real and what is unreal, he could get hurt in more ways than one. ​

People also use light to show them the right path, to guide them through the darkness, so they won’t stumble along the way. Does the physical aspect of wandering around in darkness have a parallel in the spiritual realm? Do people need a guiding “light” through this world of meaningless darkness to give them meaning and purpose and a goal along life’s path so they won’t stumble and irrevocably hurt themselves?

(Could God have put the sun 93 million miles away from us as an example for us spiritually, that our spiritual light source – which shows us how to live properly – has to come from outside of ourselves, rather than from inside, i.e., our own reason or feelings)?

From where do most people get meaning in life? Money, power, humanitarianism, good deeds, friends, happiness? How many people do you know who claim to get their meaning in life solely from God? Is this possible?

Where are you going in life? In the next life? What things do men need to see? The answer lies in verse 5.  Where does this light shine? In the darkness.

Can we see any parallel between for men and in the darkness?

Is mankind’s nature basically good? If so, how do we explain the past five thousand years of constant wars? Is mankind completely evil? If so, why does he seem to do good deeds at times?

By what measurement do we say that some of a person’s deeds are good? What is God’s assessment of a person’s nature and so-called “good deeds”?

The last half of verse 5 presents us with two options. Either the darkness did not comprehend or understand the light, or the darkness did not overcome or overpower the light. What could these options mean? We normally think of light and darkness as inanimate states but understanding and overpowering speak of personality.

How can inanimate darkness comprehend or overcome something else? Why would darkness want to overcome (overpower, destroy) the light? Did the darkness succeed? What compatibility is there between light and darkness? Could it be that when people come into contact with the life of the Word (God) this illuminates men? Let’s keep this thought in mind as we read the next few verses.

The main ideas to point out in verses 1-5:

The Bible teaches that God is personal, not an impersonal force, that He has a message for all, and that the message is Himself.

God made everything; He brought the material into existence and made living matter out of dead matter.

Each person needs light to see. There are two kinds of light: the physical sun for physical seeing and an inner light for seeing deeper things.

Darkness, as portrayed by the Bible, is more than an inanimate condition. It is more than an absence of light. There seems to be a parallel between man and darkness. We have asked the question, “What is man, by nature?”

John 1:6 ESV

6 There was a man sent from God, whose name was John.

John 1:7–8 ESV

7 He came as a witness, to bear witness about the light, that all might believe through him. 8 He was not the light, but came to bear witness about the light.

John 1:9–13 ESV

9 The true light, which gives light to everyone, was coming into the world. 10 He was in the world, and the world was made through him, yet the world did not know him. 11 He came to his own, and his own people did not receive him. 12 But to all who did receive him, who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God, 13 who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God.