John 1:14-18 - The Word Dwelt Among Us
The Gospel of John - That You May Believe • Sermon • Submitted • Presented
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The Word Read
The Word Read
Please remain standing for the reading of the Holy Scripture. Hear the Word of the Lord from:
14 And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth. 15 (John bore witness about him, and cried out, “This was he of whom I said, ‘He who comes after me ranks before me, because he was before me.’ ”) 16 For from his fullness we have all received, grace upon grace. 17 For the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ. 18 No one has ever seen God; the only God, who is at the Father’s side, he has made him known.
Behold, brothers and sisters, this is the Word of the Lord. Please be seated.
Exordium
Exordium
Beloved in Christ,
I invite you to open Holy Scripture to John 1:14-18 this morning.
This morning, we come to the end of John’s prologue, which encompasses John 1:1-18.. I believe you could sum up the entire prologue by saying, “The Word was with God, and the Word was God. This Word came to the earth, which was created through Him, so that people might believe and receive Him as He made known God to them.”
John’s introduction is glorious, displaying the incredible riches and glories of the Eternal Son of God. John makes much of Jesus in these first eighteen verses. This magnification of the Son is also a lesson for us, as we desire to make much of Jesus Christ. Do we not aim to glorify Jesus in all that we do, which means we also delight in the Father and the Holy Spirit? As we live for Christ, we find delight and devotion in the entire Trinity because the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit love those who are redeemed.
As a reminder, John was an Israelite, and this is evident in his writing of the Gospel. The following five verses are influenced by Exodus 33:7-34:35. In that passage, Moses intercedes on behalf of the Israelites. Moses asks the Lord to show him His glory. Yahweh tells Moses that he will be unable to see His face, for no one can see Yahweh’s face and live. The Lord puts Moses in a cleft on a rock and places His hand over Moses while His glory passes by, then Moses sees the back of Yahweh, but not His face.
After this event, Moses cuts two new tablets, and Yahweh rewrites the words that He had written on the first tablets. Upon this, the covenant is renewed with the people of Israel, revealing God’s incredible grace. Moses came down from the mountain, and his face shone because he had been talking with God. Moving forward, Moses would have to put a veil over his face because the Israelites were scared to come near him.
Here is why we see this influence: Moses went up to meet with Yahweh, whereas the Word has always been with God and is God. Moses intercedes for the people, whereas the Eternal Word had already promised to be the Mediator for the redeemed in eternity past. Moses asks to see Yahweh’s glory, whereas the Word shared glory with the Father already. The covenant is remade with the people through Moses, whereas the sacrifice of Christ Jesus institutes the New Covenant, truly saving sinners from sin and wrath. God rewrites the Law on the tablets, whereas the Son comes to fulfill the entire Law. Finally, Moses’ face shines because he has met with God, and now the people are afraid to go near him. However, the people of God are not scared to draw near to the Father because of Jesus, their High Priest. As we will see, the Lord gave the Law in grace, yet the grace that comes in Jesus is greater.
My thesis for these verses is that the Eternal Word condescended to earth in the fullness of grace and truth, making God known to us, so that we might receive great grace.
John 1:14 - The Incarnation of the Word
John 1:14 - The Incarnation of the Word
14 And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.
John uses “the Word” for the first time since verse 1. We are once again drawn into the majesty and beauty of the Eternal Son. As I read this verse over and over, this week, it was as if I was drawn into the celestial heavens looking for a glimpse of the Son. This is the mystery of salvation: the Eternal Son, the Word, became flesh and dwelt on earth. Images of the nativity flood our minds as we think about the Eternal Word taking on flesh. Matthew 1:18-23 comes rushing to our minds:
18 Now the birth of Jesus Christ took place in this way. When his mother Mary had been betrothed to Joseph, before they came together she was found to be with child from the Holy Spirit. 19 And her husband Joseph, being a just man and unwilling to put her to shame, resolved to divorce her quietly. 20 But as he considered these things, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream, saying, “Joseph, son of David, do not fear to take Mary as your wife, for that which is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. 21 She will bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins.” 22 All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had spoken by the prophet: 23 “Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and they shall call his name Immanuel” (which means, God with us).
In that moment, the hypostatic union becomes a reality: the union of human nature and divine nature in the person of Jesus Christ. He was truly God and truly man, or as our forefathers wrote in Latin - vere homo, vere deus. We marvel at this truth, not because of theological, academic, or metaphysical aspects, but because, as Matthew 1:23 so clearly states, His name shall be Immanuel, which means God with us. We cannot help but be humbled by the Son’s incarnation. Humanity, all too often, tries to be like Babel in our hearts, building a tower to heaven with our works, attempting to show God that we are worthy of being saved. We were no different. Yet, the mystery of the redemptive plan is that God came to us. He took on human flesh and made his dwelling on earth. The incarnation is not a mere myth like the Gilgamesh, the Iliad, the Odyssey, or the Greek and Roman gods. The incarnation was a real historical event. The Son came to us, and God is with us.
The word for “dwelt” used in this verse means to “pitch his tent.” This can also mean that the Word tabernacled among us. The wording is intended to evoke images of the Shekinah glory of God dwelling in the Tabernacle and the Temple. This is what occurred when the Tabernacle was erected in Exodus 40:34-35:
34 Then the cloud covered the tent of meeting, and the glory of the Lord filled the tabernacle. 35 And Moses was not able to enter the tent of meeting because the cloud settled on it, and the glory of the Lord filled the tabernacle.
Or hear what happened when the Temple was completed in 1 Kings 8:10-11:
10 And when the priests came out of the Holy Place, a cloud filled the house of the Lord, 11 so that the priests could not stand to minister because of the cloud, for the glory of the Lord filled the house of the Lord.
Now this glory has dwelt or tabernacled in Christ Jesus. Not only has this taken place, says John, but they also saw His glory. All the hopes of the Old Testament find their yes and amen in Christ Jesus. All the prophecies of the Messiah become a reality in the God-man, Jesus. The explosion of Christology is palpable. You can almost sense John’s urgency in wanting people to understand that the glory of God resided in Jesus. I wonder every so often about those who cried out, “Crucify Him!” to Pilate. Did any of those people cry out in front of Pilate, only to find salvation weeks later during Pentecost? When they were saved, did they have the thought that they killed the King of Glory? Then I am reminded of my own sinfulness that caused the King of Glory to be slain for my sin.
This glory of the incarnate Word was as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth. There are three truths I want us to focus on here: 1) Jesus Christ is the unique Son of God, 2) The Father sent the Son, 3) The glory that fills the Son is full of covenantal love and faithfulness, or as it is written at the end of John 1:14, full of grace and truth.
Firstly, Jesus is the unique Son of God. In our passage last week, we saw that the Father adopts all who believe and receive Jesus. So, how can it be that the Eternal Son is the Father’s only Son? How can that be possible when those who are redeemed are all His sons and daughters? The word for “only” in this section carries the sense of being unique. The Eternal Son is the only Son who possesses the attributes of God, unlike us. He was with God in the beginning, and is Himself of the same substance of the Father. So, no other son or daughter can claim to be the Eternal begotten, only Son of God. We come through the only begotten Son to the Father because He is uniquely superior to His brothers and sisters.
We can think of this in terms of natural adoption. When a family adopts a child, or children, they are given the full rights of being an offspring of their parents. These children, who are adopted, do not need to go through anyone to reach their parents. If they have a need, they cry out to Dad and Mom seeking help. They come directly to Dad and Mom without any hesitation. However, we come to our loving Father through the Son, our High Priest, who constantly intercedes for us. We need the only Son to go to the Father. As John 14:6 states,
6 Jesus said to him, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.
Christ Jesus is the only, unique Son of God, whereby we freely come to the Father who so joyously loves us.
Secondly, the Son was sent by the Father. There was a game created when I was growing up called “Don’t Wake Daddy.” The premise of the game was that you were a child attempting to sneak to the refrigerator for food after Dad had fallen asleep. The purpose was to get from your spot to the food without waking Dad. If he woke up, you lost the game. I think, in some ways, our flesh and Satan have convinced us that this is God the Father. The lie is that we must try really, really hard to live perfectly because we do not want Dad to wake up and punish us. When He awakes, there will be wrath and fury. So, we walk around hoping that we don’t sin, as if that will ever happen, because we do not want the discipling eyes of the Father upon us.
Have we forgotten that the Father loves us? As Psalm 103:13 states,
13 As a father shows compassion to his children, so the Lord shows compassion to those who fear him.
Or 1 John 3:1:
1 See what kind of love the Father has given to us, that we should be called children of God; and so we are.
Have we forgotten John 3:16-17?
16 “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. 17 For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him.
Have we forgotten that the Father sent the only begotten Son because he loved the world? The only Son, the unique Son, the eternal Son, was sent by the Father to redeem His people. The Father is not one who cannot be bothered by His adopted children. He is the One who initiated the plan of redemption in love so that He could be with His children.
Finally, the glory that filled the Son was full of grace and truth. As I mentioned earlier, these verses are influenced by the passages in Exodus 33-34. This grace and truth are meant to draw us back to Exodus 34:5-7, where Yahweh is revealed as a covenant-keeping God. God continued to be faithful to His covenant, and the ultimate display of this is by sending the Son into the world.
As one reads the prologue, we are drawn into the glory and love of the Father and the Son. The Father so lovingly sent the Son so that we might have eternal life. The Son, in utter humiliation, takes on flesh, lives a perfect life under the law that we could not live, and dies a death that satisfies the wrath of God, a death that we could not die.
John 1:15-18 - The Uniqueness of the Son
John 1:15-18 - The Uniqueness of the Son
15 (John bore witness about him, and cried out, “This was he of whom I said, ‘He who comes after me ranks before me, because he was before me.’ ”) 16 For from his fullness we have all received, grace upon grace. 17 For the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ. 18 No one has ever seen God; the only God, who is at the Father’s side, he has made him known.
Now, John elaborates on the uniqueness of the Son, which flows from John 1:14. You might even read John 1:15, which is in parentheses in the ESV, and think, “Why is this seemingly parenthetical note placed here?” The purpose is to reveal how John the Baptist declared the uniqueness of Christ Jesus, the only Son of God. John, pointing to Jesus, says, “This is the man who outranks me because He came before me.” There is the prophet heart of John, yet John is not heralding as one who is looking for the Messiah in the future; he is looking at the Christ, for He has finally come.
Now, coming out of that parenthetical note, “For from his fullness we have all received, grace upon grace.” This fullness is the fullness of covenantal faithfulness from the Eternal Son. From His fullness we have received grace upon grace. This may seem like a peculiar statement, because what does it even mean to say that we have received grace upon grace? The answer is actually given to us in verse 17: “For the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ.”
There are several points I want to make in relation to this verse. First, the giving of the Law at Sinai was an incredible gift of grace by God. When we read through the Pentateuch, do we read the giving of the Law as a gift of grace? Unfortunately, I’ve heard a few Christians state that the giving of the Law was not grace, and in an extreme case, that the Israelites should not have agreed to the covenant at Mount Sinai. Such people view the Law as negative, not understanding that the Law is good. Paul writes these words in Romans 7:12-14:
12 So the law is holy, and the commandment is holy and righteous and good. 13 Did that which is good, then, bring death to me? By no means! It was sin, producing death in me through what is good, in order that sin might be shown to be sin, and through the commandment might become sinful beyond measure. 14 For we know that the law is spiritual, but I am of the flesh, sold under sin.
The Law is holy, righteous, and good. Thus, the giving of the Law is indeed gracious as it 1) reveals God’s righteousness and our unrighteousness, 2) restrains evil in the world by the use of fear and punishment, and 3) reveals to believers how to live in a way that is pleasing to the Lord. So, this giving of the Law to Moses is the first aspect of grace upon grace.
Take a moment to think about the use of the Law in your own salvific story. Didn’t the Law show you the righteousness of God, while simultaneously revealing to you your unrighteousness? When we looked into the Law, weren’t we alerted to our wretchedness and God’s holiness? As the Spirit of God began to work in our hearts, wasn’t it evident there was a massive canyon between us and the Lord? The Law pointed our own hearts to Christ, just as Paul wrote in Galatians 3:24:
24 So then, the law was our guardian until Christ came, in order that we might be justified by faith.
A second point from these verses, which will surprise no one, is that the Gospel of Jesus Christ is a gift of grace. Let us look at what Paul writes in Ephesians 2:5:
5 even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved—
I recall attending the county fair in our area as a child. I wasn’t a huge fan of attending the county fair each summer, but nevertheless, my parents took me. The only aspect of the fair I enjoyed was, not surprisingly, getting funnel cakes covered in confectionery sugar and cherry-covered apples. Every year we went, it seemed that there was always a booth with a man handing out tracts, asking people, “Do you know if you are going to heaven?” I loathed walking past this booth. First, I wasn’t saved, so no doubt the Holy Spirit was convicting my heart of my sin. Second, my my perspective, it seemed as if there was a mere push for a decision. Again, I wasn’t saved so the flesh was reacting negatively to the true Gospel being proclaimed.
Yet, how often do we hear this mentality of decision-making in the Church today? “Come down and make a decision for Jesus.” “Give your yes to Jesus.” “Give your yes to Jesus and He will fill that hole in your heart.” This flimsy and flippant salvific decision-making culture that has, unfortunately, filled the evangelical church is not what Paul writes about in Ephesians 2:5. We were dead in our trespasses. Have you ever been to a cemetery and one of the dead bodies comes back to life and walks around in front of you? Of course not! Why? Because they are dead. There is no hope of life because they have passed away and their souls have departed from their bodies.
So, this flippant decision-making culture doesn’t get to the truth of salvation: You were spiritually dead, and it was only by the grace of God in Christ Jesus that you became spiritually alive. This is the tremendous grace of the Gospel of Jesus. Here is how we know this is the superior grace that God gives: all the promises and all the covenantal faithfulness found in the Old Testament find their fulfillment in Christ. This is why Paul writes in 2 Corinthians 1:20:
20 For all the promises of God find their Yes in him.
This truth of spiritual death to spiritual life is our story. We were the spiritually dead who had no hope of salvation. Yet, Christ in His great mercy caused us to come alive - saved by the extraordinary gift of grace.
We move our attention to John 1:18, where we are told an incredible truth: “No one has ever seen God.” Once again, we should be drawn back to Exodus 33. This is where Moses asks the Lord to show His glory. The scene is captured in Exodus 33:18-23:
18 Moses said, “Please show me your glory.” 19 And he said, “I will make all my goodness pass before you and will proclaim before you my name ‘The Lord.’ And I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and will show mercy on whom I will show mercy. 20 But,” he said, “you cannot see my face, for man shall not see me and live.” 21 And the Lord said, “Behold, there is a place by me where you shall stand on the rock, 22 and while my glory passes by I will put you in a cleft of the rock, and I will cover you with my hand until I have passed by. 23 Then I will take away my hand, and you shall see my back, but my face shall not be seen.”
Moses, the greatest prophet of the Old Testament, the mediator and intercessor of the people of Israel, is unable to see the glory of Yahweh. Yet who can know the glory of the Lord? The Eternal Word for He is God.
One of the great themes of the book of Hebrews is that Jesus is superior to all things. The author of Hebrews goes to great lengths to prove that the Son is superior to angels, the high priests, Aaron, Melchizedek, and, yes, even Moses. The author of Hebrews writes this in Hebrews 3:1-6:
1 Therefore, holy brothers, you who share in a heavenly calling, consider Jesus, the apostle and high priest of our confession, 2 who was faithful to him who appointed him, just as Moses also was faithful in all God’s house. 3 For Jesus has been counted worthy of more glory than Moses—as much more glory as the builder of a house has more honor than the house itself. 4 (For every house is built by someone, but the builder of all things is God.) 5 Now Moses was faithful in all God’s house as a servant, to testify to the things that were to be spoken later, 6 but Christ is faithful over God’s house as a son. And we are his house, if indeed we hold fast our confidence and our boasting in our hope.
Moses held significant importance in the Old Covenant, yet Christ is worthy of much more glory. Christ is faithful over the Church as God’s only Son. This Son has seen the Father unlike Moses.
Like Moses, we are unable to see the radiant glory of God on our own. As 1 Timothy 6:16 states, God dwells in unapproachable light, whom no one has ever seen or can see. His holy splendor is far too great for mere mortals to see. The people of Israel trembled in fear as they met with God at Mount Sinai. They told Moses to speak with God on their behalf. Yet, because of Christ, we can come into the presence of God. Not because we are worthy on our own, but because Christ is a perfect Mediator. Remember that we, at this very moment gathered as the Church, spiritually sit in the heavenly temple, in the presence of the Father, because the Spirit has brought us into His glorious presence THROUGH the mercies of Christ, the Eternal Son. Christ joyfully brings us to the Father.
This leads us to the close of John 1:18, “the only God, who is at the Father’s side, he has made him known.” The reiteration that Jesus, the Word, is the only God is a powerful reminder that Jesus did not only have a human nature. He was the God-man.
He is at the Father’s side, or literally, “in the Father’s bosom.” That wording reveals the intimate relationship between the Father and the Son. The closeness that Jesus has with the Father is similar to the closeness that we have with Jesus. John uses the same phrase when describing how he reclined on Jesus at the Last Supper. John 13:23:
23 One of his disciples, whom Jesus loved, was reclining at table at Jesus’ side (or in the bosom of Jesus)
As Jesus lies in the bosom of the Father, so we lie in the bosom of Jesus. Christ is not distant from us. Even as we have seen this week, when immense and incomprehensible tragedies befall us, we are in the bosom of Jesus, who Himself rested in the bosom of the Father. So, when personal, familial, national, or international catastrophes occur, we remember where we reside and who our hope is in: nothing in this world but Christ Jesus.
Finally, it is Jesus who made the Father known to the world. We did not stumble upon God by mere happenstance. Christ showed us the Father. As Christ says in John 14:9:
9 Jesus said to him, “Have I been with you so long, and you still do not know me, Philip? Whoever has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say, ‘Show us the Father’?
Furthermore, Jesus delighted in revealing the Father. The perfect, holy, and righteous Son has a perfect, holy, and righteous Father. It was the Son’s delight to reveal the Father to His disciples. Jesus aimed to please the Father as recorded in John 8:29. The Son knew the love of the Father, and because of the Son’s death, burial, and resurrection, we now know the love of the Father. As the great hymn “How Deep the Father’s Love for Us” states:
How deep the Father's love for us,
How vast beyond all measure!
That He should give His only Son,
To make a wretch His treasure.
If we are in Christ, we should worship the Father, for He has unmeasured love for us. We should worship the Son, for He has joyfully redeemed us and revealed the Father to us. We should worship the Spirit, for He convicted us of our unrighteousness, pointing us to the Son. The triune God is a God of great love, mercy, grace, and covenantal faithfulness.
Closing
Closing
This morning we come to the end of John’s introduction. We should be drawn up into the majesty of the Eternal Word. The Eternal Word who was with God in eternity past, and He was God. He shines in the darkness, and no amount of darkness could ever stop the light of Christ from shining. The Word is the light, and the great Father of lights adopts all who believe and receive the Son. And this Word, in humiliation, became flesh and dwelt among us. It is through the Son, Jesus, who has made known the Father, that grace pours into our hearts.
