Among Us (Advent 2024) 1: The Word is God
Notes
Transcript
Bookmarks & Needs:
Bookmarks & Needs:
B: John 1:1-5
N:
Welcome
Welcome
Good morning, and welcome to Family Worship with the church body of Eastern Hills. Whether you are here in the room, or online, thanks for being part of our celebration of Jesus today.
If you are visiting with us for the first time today, thanks for choosing to worship with Eastern Hills! We would like to be able to thank you for your visit and to pray for you, so if you wouldn’t mind, please take a moment during the sermon to fill out a visitor card, which you’ll find in the back of the pew in front of you. If you’re online, you can let us know about your visit by filling out the communication form at the bottom of our “I’m new“ page. If you’re here in the room today, you can get that card back to us in one of two ways: you can put it in the boxes by the doors at the close of service, or I would love the opportunity to meet you personally, so after service, you can bring that card to me directly, and I have a gift to give you to thank you for your visit today.
I wanted to take a moment this morning to say thanks to those who serve in our student ministry. As the former youth pastor, I know how important having great adult volunteers is. I also know that Trevor very much appreciates all of his student ministry adults. Thank you for your faithfulness in serving with our students.
Announcements
Announcements
LMCO: VIDEO, Given $6,511.95 through last Sunday, Goal: $32,500.
Opening
Opening
There are certain themes that work really well for the Christmas season, and I usually preach on those themes each December, coming at them from different vantage points in order to help us understand the wonder of the Gospel message and the importance of the birth of Jesus over 2000 years ago in Bethlehem. I wonder if, thinking back on my Christmas series over the past several years, you could come up with what those four themes are? They are hope, joy, peace, and love. Well, this year for Christmas, I’m still going to preach about those four themes, but not as directly as I have in years past. I’m going to preach on Jesus, and because of what He has done for us, we can’t help but talk about hope, joy, peace, and love! But this year, our Christmas series is going to come from perhaps an unlikely “Christmas” passage: the first chapter of the book of John.
In John 1, the evangelist sets up the message that he will be writing, telling his readers who Jesus is—Jesus whom John had spent years with, Jesus whom John had heard and seen and marveled at, Jesus whom John had seen crucified and then seen raised to life again. And whereas the Gospel of Matthew aims at a Jewish audience and opens with the Jewish lineage of the Messiah, and the Gospel of Luke aims at a Greek audience and opens with Luke’s research and writing methods, and the Gospel of Mark aims to tell the story as directly as possible (dropping us into the beginning of Jesus’s adult ministry by starting with His baptism), John’s mission is a little different. John’s goal is to provide an understanding of who Jesus is and what He has done to both the Jewish and Gentile, to give testimony of Jesus’s identity as the Messiah, and to show clearly that Jesus is in fact the Son of God in the flesh, who has come and lived among us in order to save us from our sins.
Since this is where John begins, it makes sense that it would be where we might begin as well. And let me just challenge you who haven’t trusted in Jesus as your Lord and Savior—if you want to know more about who Jesus is, read John. I pray that our look at the first chapter this month will start you on that journey.
For this morning, however, we begin with just the first five verses of chapter 1. This chapter through verse 18 is commonly referred to as the “prologue” to John’s Gospel. Verses 1 through 5 are an incredible statement of the fact that Jesus—the Word—is God.
So open your Bibles or your Bible apps to John chapter 1, and stand as you are able in honor of the proclamation of God’s Word:
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 All things were created through him, and apart from him not one thing was created that has been created. 4 In him was life, and that life was the light of men. 5 That light shines in the darkness, and yet the darkness did not overcome it.
PRAYER (Ulibarri family in the loss of Christy’s son tragically this weekend)
I really like Christmastime. We’ve already decorated at our house, so we’ve got the tree and the stockings and the pillows and the nativity and all of that out. My recliner had to be relocated to the garage for the season, but it’s totally worth it! We’ve started shopping, which has a whole new component this year because we have a grandson. We’re in gift exchanges and have a few parties on the calendar, so we are in the full swing of the holiday season!
But the season is a season for a reason. We talk about Christmas and call it Jesus’s birthday and all, and that’s not a wrong way of looking at it. But I don’t celebrate my birthday for four weeks leading up to it. I don’t decorate my house for over a month and sing songs about my birthday. No, Jesus’s birth is so great, so incredible, so important, that we dedicate weeks to preparing for it. This season is also called the season of advent. Your kids might have advent calendars where they get to open a little door for a surprise or piece of candy every day of December, but that’s not exactly accurate. Today is the first day of Advent: the fourth Sunday before Christmas Day. It happens to fall on the 1st of December this year, so your “December” advent calendars are actually correct for 2024, but won’t be again until 2030.
“Advent” comes from the Latin adventus, which means “arrival” or “coming.” We take these weeks to prepare our hearts for the celebration of the arrival—the advent—of Jesus. And while we do that, we also are reminded to prepare our hearts for His second advent—when He will come back as He promised to judge the world, to receive those who belong to Him, and to set all things right again.
What’s so important about Jesus’s first advent isn’t that a baby was born. It’s that THIS PARTICULAR baby was born, because this particular baby is none other than God in the flesh, who had come to earth to do what we could never do by living a sinless life, so that He could die in our place on the cross, taking the punishment for our sins on Himself so that we can be forgiven and reconciled to God, and rising from the grave victorious over death so that we can have eternal life with God through faith in Him.
Jesus could do those things because He wasn’t merely a man like you or me. He is God. He is the Beginning and the End, the Creator of all things, the giver and sustainer of life, and the light of the world. And John opens his Gospel by referring to Jesus as “the Word,” a term that would have struck both the Hebrew and Greek listener in a powerful way—the Jew with the recollection that it was through the Word of God that all things came into being, and the Greek with the concept that the Word was the the God’s divine revelation of Himself. And in these first five verses, we have the clearest declaration in Scripture that the Word is God.
Before we dive in though, I want to address a line of questioning that you might already have in your mind: “Why does it matter that Jesus is God? What does that have to do with Christmas?” It matters because if it’s not true that Jesus is God, then He could not save us from our sins. And if He could not save us, then it doesn’t really matter that He has come, and there’s no reason for us to celebrate. The incarnation is WHY we celebrate Christmas. The two “pillars” of the incarnation, if you will, are that Jesus really is God, and that Jesus really did come. Take away either, and the incarnation, and thus Christmas, collapse. We’ll address the former pillar this morning.
We’re going to just use four single words for our points today, each one reflecting one of the truths given by John in these first five verses. The first is:
1: Beginning
1: Beginning
The Bible begins with a statement about God’s eternality way back in Genesis 1:1. It starts by saying, “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.” It is certainly no accident that John borrows the same first three words as he begins his apologetic of Jesus as the eternal Word:
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.
In the Old Testament, we find that the word of God in Hebrew thought was a reference to God’s creative and restorative action. The term imaged the fact that God is active in creation, both from a physical perspective and a spiritual one. Physically, we see in Genesis 1 that each time God made another aspect of the created order, He simply spoke it into existence (until humanity according to Genesis 2). The psalmist would later testify:
6 The heavens were made by the word of the Lord, and all the stars, by the breath of his mouth.
The word of God is also active in the process of restoration and blessing from a spiritual perspective. When the people of Israel cried out in the midst of their distress, according to Psalm 107:
20 He sent his word and healed them; he rescued them from their traps.
So when John refers to God the Son as the Word, he is making reference to the fact that the Word actively participated in creation, and is still actively participating in the restoration of the world. Jesus said Himself that He was always working, just as the Father was always at work, and this correlation between Himself and the Father is what prompted the Jews to want to kill Him:
17 Jesus responded to them, “My Father is still working, and I am working also.” 18 This is why the Jews began trying all the more to kill him: Not only was he breaking the Sabbath, but he was even calling God his own Father, making himself equal to God.
We’re going to unpack this first verse of our focal passage kind of phrase by phrase, because it is such a rich statement of truth. In fact, this verse is a foundational confession of orthodox Christianity, because it is here that the doctrine of the Trinity basically begins.
“In the beginning was the Word...”
“In the beginning was the Word...”
This isn’t some statement saying that the first thing that happened at the beginning was that the Word was created. There is nothing here to suggest that the Word is anything other than eternal. When the Bible says, “In the beginning...” in Genesis 1:1 and John 1:1, it is saying that when the beginning of creation began, God was there, which assumes the fact that the Source of creation—God—and the Agent of creation—the Word—must necessarily preexist the beginning of everything. This is logical. If I were to make something, anything, I would necessarily have to exist before I make that something.
And the Bible is clear that the Word was there when the beginning began. In Colossians 1:17, Paul says it slightly differently, but with the same meaning:
17 He is before all things, and by him all things hold together.
He, Jesus, is before everything, and everything stays together because He makes it so. This is clearly a statement about His God-ness. So when John said, “In the beginning was the Word,” he was saying that the Word is eternal—that He always has been and will always be.
“…and the Word was with God...”
“…and the Word was with God...”
This is where we might struggle a bit with the Trinity, which is okay: the Trinity is a mystery, because we don’t know how God can be three and One at the same time, but it’s what Scripture teaches, and what Jesus proved by His resurrection, so we can believe it, even if it makes our brains squishy.
Here John writes that the Word was with God. This means that there is some distinction between the eternal Word and God the Father. It also shows us that the Word and God were eternally in relationship with one another.
Jesus spoke in His high priestly prayer in John 17 about the eternal relationship that He has with the Father:
5 Now, Father, glorify me in your presence with that glory I had with you before the world existed.
He was about to be crucified, then rise again, and finally ascend to be at the Father’s right hand in glory. But it was a place that He was returning to. The Son, the Word, had been in a completely glorified state with the Father prior to coming to earth as a man. So the Word was “with God.”
“…and the Word was God.”
“…and the Word was God.”
Some who misinterpret the Scriptures (such as the Jehovah’s Witnesses) take this to say that the Word was “a god,” meaning that He was just kind of one of many, or that He was divine, but not at the same level as God Almighty. But either He is God or He is not. The Scriptures are true in this respect or they are not. There is no middle ground. And this verse clearly asserts that while the Word is distinct from the Father in personality, the Word is God Himself in essence and authority. The church father John Chrysostom summarized it as clearly as it can be put: The New Testament teaches that the Father is God, the Son is God, the Spirit is God, and God is One.
Again, this is a Trinitarian mystery, but John 1:1 isn’t the only place where Jesus’s divinity is set forth. Notice, for example, what the author of Hebrews had to say about Jesus’s identity as God:
3 The Son is the radiance of God’s glory and the exact expression of his nature, sustaining all things by his powerful word. After making purification for sins, he sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high.
There is a sameness—the Son is the radiance of God’s glory and the exact expression of His nature—while at the same time there is a distinction—He sat down at the right had of the Majesty on high.
But at the same time, Jesus is worthy of the same praise as the Father in Scripture. In the book of Revelation, God the Father and the Word (the Lamb) are given the same level of honor and glory, together:
13 I heard every creature in heaven, on earth, under the earth, on the sea, and everything in them say, Blessing and honor and glory and power be to the one seated on the throne, and to the Lamb, forever and ever!
Jesus even said that if you’ve seen Him, then you’ve seen the Father:
9 Jesus said to him, “Have I been among you all this time and you do not know me, Philip? The one who has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say, ‘Show us the Father’?
If you’ve seen Jesus, you’ve seen the Father. And you can’t escape that Jesus also said that He is one with the Father in John 10:30:
30 I and the Father are one.”
The clear testimony of the Scriptures is that the Word is God.
“He was with God in the beginning.”
“He was with God in the beginning.”
While this is a restatement of the points we’ve just looked at, it brings one additional wrinkle. For those who are struggling with the fact that I am already declaring that the Word and Jesus are the same, even though we haven’t reached verse 14 yet:
14 The Word became flesh and dwelt among us. We observed his glory, the glory as the one and only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.
This verse, and every verse from here to verse 14 that references the Word using a pronoun uses “He” to refer to the Word. Not “It.” “He.” The Word is a Person. Now, to be completely theologically precise, the Word—God the Son—is eternal. He has always been and will always be. There never was and never will be a time when the Word was or is not. However, there was a time when the man Jesus was not, because He had not become incarnate yet. He took on flesh and dwelt among us at a particular time and place, which we will look at more closely next week. But for today, we need to keep in mind that John is writing this with a post-resurrection perspective. He knows what he’s writing about and Whom he is writing about. He always has Jesus in view in his Gospel.
And the “He” to whom John is referring in verse 2 is the Word, and the Word is Jesus in John’s view.
What we decide about Jesus is absolutely crucial: is He God in the flesh, or not? John obviously believes so. And he goes on to paint some other connections between the Word and God.
2: Creator
2: Creator
Not only is the Word clearly God in John’s Prologue, but as God, He is also the creator of everything that exists. Now, that’s not to say that we don’t create things, and our doing so makes sense given the fact that we bear God’s image. It means that everything that exists in the created order was created through Him: we just rearrange what He’s already created when we make something, and even our ability to create anything at all comes from His own nature:
3 All things were created through him, and apart from him not one thing was created that has been created.
John states this point twice for effect, in both a positive and negative sense. All things, literally everything that exists, were created through His creative action. This doesn’t just mean “the universe.” The way it’s phrased is a reference to each and every thing. Not only that, but it refers to every single created thing, which would include the heavenly host.
Paul agrees, saying that everything, even intangible things like positions of authority such as in governments, owe their existence to the Son of God—the Word:
16 For everything was created by him, in heaven and on earth, the visible and the invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities— all things have been created through him and for him.
36 For from him and through him and to him are all things. To him be the glory forever. Amen.
6 yet for us there is one God, the Father. All things are from him, and we exist for him. And there is one Lord, Jesus Christ. All things are through him, and we exist through him.
Over and over in the Bible, we find this to be the case. When the Word came to earth in the incarnation that we celebrate every Christmas, it was that the very Creator Himself was stepping into His creation in order to redeem it, to restore it, to rescue it. In my opinion, the three most important events in all of creation’s history since its creation are centered on this one man: His birth, His death, and His resurrection. Each of those events were a necessary part of the full restoration, or more correctly, a re-creation which is still to come when He returns and makes all things new. We celebrate the first of those most important events each advent, and we look forward to the final culmination of His work in the future as we wait.
And while we have the restoration of all things to look forward to, what we often fail to realize is the fact that Jesus came to bring life to our spiritual deadness, which is our third point:
3: Life
3: Life
If you think about it, life is not an essential quality of creation. Our triune God could have made creation with nothing alive in it. And without His breathing life into His creation, there would be nothing alive in it. If you look at it this way, life is an essential quality of God—it is part of His very nature. In the beginning, when He made everything, it was teeming with life! You see it all through the creation narrative of Genesis 1. And it was life in harmony with the rest of creation and more importantly, with God Himself. But tragically, humanity rejected this gift of life, and chose instead to go our own way of death. In our rebellion, instead of becoming like God, we became completely unlike Him—we became spiritually dead in our sin, and would become physically dead as well.
Paul explained it this way in Ephesians chapter 2:
1 And you were dead in your trespasses and sins 2 in which you previously walked according to the ways of this world, according to the ruler of the power of the air, the spirit now working in the disobedient. 3 We too all previously lived among them in our fleshly desires, carrying out the inclinations of our flesh and thoughts, and we were by nature children under wrath as the others were also.
But John writes that the Word who is God has brought this life back in His incarnation:
4 In him was life, and that life was the light of men.
This life that is in the Word is true life, because He is the source of life. He came into the world, God Himself, the creator of everything, and provided the means of our being delivered from our deadness in sin. He had life in Himself, and came so that we could have that life again ourselves:
26 For just as the Father has life in himself, so also he has granted to the Son to have life in himself.
10 A thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy. I have come so that they may have life and have it in abundance.
You might be here or online listening this morning, and you might have never thought of yourself as spiritually dead. But apart from Christ, that’s what we are. It is only through believing in what Christ has done for you, trusting in His sacrifice in your place, that we receive that abundant life.
24 “Truly I tell you, anyone who hears my word and believes him who sent me has eternal life and will not come under judgment but has passed from death to life.
This eternal life isn’t just a “living forever” kind of life. It’s living forever in a reconciled and restored relationship with God Himself—knowing God the way that we were meant to in the beginning.
3 This is eternal life: that they may know you, the only true God, and the one you have sent—Jesus Christ.
We are brought into this state of knowing God through surrender in faith. We stop going our own way in sin, and surrender our lives to God, trusting Him for our forever. God has offered this eternal life in Christ to us freely. We cannot save ourselves. We need Jesus to save us. The Word has life in Himself, and if you have Him, you are spiritually alive. If you don’t have Him, you are spiritually dead.
11 And this is the testimony: God has given us eternal life, and this life is in his Son. 12 The one who has the Son has life. The one who does not have the Son of God does not have life.
Have you ever trusted in Christ for your salvation, and surrendered to Him as Lord? Faith in Him is the only means of eternal life. Would you surrender to Him right now in this moment, right where you are, and receive the gift of eternal life?
And finally, verse 4 says that the life that Jesus brings is the “light of men.” Apart from Jesus, we walk in not only in spiritual death, but in spiritual darkness. But the advent of the Word brought light into the darkness, as the prophet Isaiah had predicted hundreds of years before:
2 The people walking in darkness have seen a great light; a light has dawned on those living in the land of darkness.
Which brings us to our last point this morning and verse 5:
4: Light
4: Light
The concepts of light and darkness are nearly universal religious symbols for good and evil. Think about it. The references to these symbols are even found in our cultural stories: Star Wars (light side of the Force are the good guys, dark side of the Force are the bad guys); The Lord of the Rings (it’s kind of everywhere throughout); and The Chronicles of Narnia are just a few examples. John uses that same imagery in verse 5 when expanding on the fact that the life that is found in the Word is the light of men:
5 That light shines in the darkness, and yet the darkness did not overcome it.
Not that this is surprising at this point, but we find a similar light/darkness contrast at the very beginning of Scripture in the creation narrative of Genesis as well.
2 Now the earth was formless and empty, darkness covered the surface of the watery depths, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the surface of the waters. 3 Then God said, “Let there be light,” and there was light.
The earth was without form, without life, and without light. In short, it didn’t exist. And God through His all-powerful Word speaks creation into existence by declaring, “Let there be light.” Suddenly, there is some thing instead of only God. There is some where for light to be, and it fills the universe. There is some time contained in the vastness of eternity, and days can begin to be marked off. All of this came through Christ. And God declared that the light was good in verse 4, because light comes from Him. In fact, like life, light is an essential characteristic of God. He is light, since He is the source of light:
5 This is the message we have heard from him and declare to you: God is light, and there is absolutely no darkness in him.
Again, light is something that He gives, and which we receive. In his very good commentary on the Gospel of John, Gerald Borchert agrees:
“Light” according to the Prologue does not belong naturally to humanity. It is a gift or a power from outside the human situation that confronts the world.”
—Gerald L. Borchert, The New American Commentary, Volume 25A: John 1-11
So light is, like life, something that is given to us from God. A gift. In the case of the incarnation, a Christmas gift.
And John here in verse 5 of the first chapter of his Gospel agrees with the light good/darkness evil symbology, but he speaks of it in a very interesting way. He says that the light shines (present tense) in the darkness, but the darkness did not (past tense) overcome it.
Back to my earlier reminder that John’s is a post-resurrection perspective, he knows that the light continues to shine, and that though the darkness attempted to extinguish the light, it was unable to do so. The battle is already won. The darkness wasn’t able to overcome the light of the Word, and it will never be able to do so, because the light continues to shine.
So while movies and tv shows and books might couch the light vs. darkness battle as having some cosmic, eternal scale, this is just not the case. There will come a time when the conflict will be fully resolved. That doesn’t mean that the conflict isn’t real. Look at your own heart. The conflict between light and dark, good and evil, is still very much raging there, even for the Christian.
But Jesus makes it clear that He is the light, and that if we walk with Him, we will walk in the light, and have His life within ourselves as well.
12 Jesus spoke to them again: “I am the light of the world. Anyone who follows me will never walk in the darkness but will have the light of life.”
This is a message of great hope! We don’t have to walk in darkness, because if we follow Jesus, we will have the light of life. Paul added in 2 Corinthians 4:6:
For God who said, “Let light shine out of darkness,” has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of God’s glory in the face of Jesus Christ.
What a blessing we have in walking with the Lord! What peace is available to us because we have the light of life in Him! What better time to discover that hope and peace than now, at the beginning of advent!
Closing
Closing
So this is where Christmas begins—way before baby Jesus was placed in that manger—it starts before the beginning of creation, with the almighty Word, who was eternally with God and who eternally was God, the maker of all that is, and the bearer of life and light. And it’s right for us to celebrate His coming, to rejoice and sing praises to Him, to bow in worship before Him.
And I want you to join in that celebration! If you’ve never trusted in Jesus, never believed the Gospel, then we’ve just seen that you’re dead in your sin, you’re walking in darkness. Surrender to Jesus as Savior and Lord right now, and receive the gift of salvation from Him.
Baptism
Church membership
Prayer
Giving
PRAYER
Closing Remarks
Closing Remarks
Bible reading (Finished Song of Songs yesterday, catch up day today, only reading Psalm 149. Psalm 150 tomorrow. Then starting Isaiah and Proverbs on Tuesday)
Pastor’s Study tonight: continuing in Ephesians 6
Prayer Meeting this Wednesday
Instructions for guests
Benediction
Benediction
9 He has saved us and called us with a holy calling, not according to our works, but according to his own purpose and grace, which was given to us in Christ Jesus before time began. 10 This has now been made evident through the appearing of our Savior Christ Jesus, who has abolished death and has brought life and immortality to light through the gospel.
