The Word Made Flesh
Notes
Transcript
Text
Text
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.
Introduction
Introduction
What is the heart of the Gospel of Jesus Christ?
What is the heart of the Gospel of Jesus Christ?
That is our subject matter for this morning.
We have been in John 1 throughout the Advent season.
We have seen the pre-incarnate glory of the Word in v. 1-2
We have seen the creative and saving power of the Word in v. 3-5.
And last week, we saw the Witness to the World, along with the Rejection and Reception of the Word in v. 6-13.
This morning we are focused on just one verse—John 1:14.
And in this verse, we find the answer to our question.
We find the heart of the Christian Gospel.
Ever since Adam and Eve sinned against God in the Garden, man has been on the run from God.
Sin entered the world, separating man from fellowship with His Maker.
And they heard the sound of the Lord God walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and the man and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the Lord God among the trees of the garden.
This is what sin does—it creates a devastating spiritual separation between God and man, both now and forever.
There is a chasm. A gulf. A divide.
The Gospel, then, is the story of God making a way for humanity to know Him again.
This is the heart of the Gospel—God making a way for man to know God again.
For separated man to be reconciled to God.
For lost humanity to be found in God once more.
v. 14 tells us about how God made a way for man to know God again.
Outline
Outline
Here is our outline as we journey through it together.
1. The Word became flesh.
1. The Word became flesh.
2. The Word dwelt among us.
2. The Word dwelt among us.
3. The Word revealed the glory of God.
3. The Word revealed the glory of God.
Word Became Flesh
Word Became Flesh
We begin with that first point today:
1. The Word became flesh.
1. The Word became flesh.
The Incarnation
The Incarnation
This is the first way that we see God making a way for humanity to know Him in this passage.
The Word became flesh.
In v. 1-5, we are introduced to the Word.
And what we saw clearly is that the Word is divine in nature.
Everything made was made through Him.
He was already there in the beginning.
He was with God and He WAS GOD.
All of that implies or explicitly states that the Word is divine. The Word is God.
In v. 14, we see that this Word was made flesh.
Meaning, He is becoming something that He was not.
He was divine already, but He was not a man.
Yet, in becoming flesh, He became a man.
He did not cease to be God.
Instead, God became man, while remaining God.
Hypostatic Union
Hypostatic Union
This means that the baby born in Bethlehem is 100% God and Man.
The young, holy boy whose parents found Him in the Temple was 100% God and Man.
The innocent Teacher handed over by Pilate to be crucified around the age of 33 was 100% God and Man.
The One who rose from the grave three days later and then appeared to Peter, the Twelve, 500 men at the same time, James, the rest of the Apostles and Paul, appeared as 100% God and Man.
And when the One who was resurrected ascended into heaven to the right hand of the Father, He did as 100% God and Man.
When we talk about Christ being 100% God and 100% man, we are talking about the doctrine of the hypostatic union.
Hypostatic comes from the Greek word hypostasis.
Hypo = under
Stasis = substance or essence
The term basically means “foundational reality.”
So what is the foundational reality of Christ’s life? What is the hypostatic union?
Jesus is One WHO—One Person, with Two WHATS—Two Natures.
He is One Person with Two Natures that are unmixed, unconfused and united.
Fully God and Fully Man
The Messiah Must be Hypostatic
The Messiah Must be Hypostatic
This is the only way it could ever be for the Messiah.
In order for Him to fulfill all of the OT prophecies and promises about Him, He must be 100% human, as well as 100% God.
On one hand, the Old Testament prophecies tell us that the Messiah will be human like us:
He is to be:
The Woman’s Seed (Gen. 3:15)
A Prophet like Moses (Deut. 18:18)
A royal descendant of David (2 Samuel 7)
A Man of Sorrows (Isaiah 53)
In all of these prophecies, the Old Testament writers were telling us plainly:
The Conquering Prophet-King who will have the iniquity of us all laid upon Him is going to be a man
Yet, one the other hand, the Old Testament promises were also telling us that the Messiah would be divine:
He is to be:
the Branch of the Lord, beautiful and glorious (Isaiah 4:2)
Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Prince of Peace, Everlasting Father (Is. 9:6)
One whose coming forth is from of old, from ancient days or eternal days (Micah 5:2)
In all of these promises, the Old Testament writers were telling us just as plainly:
The glorious, eternal, Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Prince of Peace and Everlasting Father will be divine.
How can you reconcile these two sets of promises from the Old Testament?
Were the writers contradicting themselves in saying that the Messiah would be human and yet also divine?
Well, what we find out from John 1:14 is that there is no need to fret about how to reconcile them.
They are reconciled in Christ.
For in Christ, we truly have the God-Man.
We truly have One who are, slept, cried and taught.
And we truly have One who is self-existent, eternal, omnipotent, omniscient and omnipresence
Indispensable Implications of the Incarnation
Indispensable Implications of the Incarnation
And in terms of our salvation, this is hugely important. For if Christ were God and not man or man and not God, we would have no eternal hope.
The heart of the Gospel is God making a way for man to know Him again.
And buried right in the center of that heart is Jesus Christ—the One Mediator between God and Man.
See—God and humanity were enemies.
Humanity declared war on God when Adam, our federal representative, transgressed God’s law and rebelled against Him.
This put God at odds with us.
We would be destined for deserved wrath for the way we have played our part in carrying on this war between God and man with our sin.
The war will only end with reconciliation.
And reconciliation will only come about with a Mediator to bring us back to God.
Christ is that Mediator.
And He is uniquely qualified to perform this duty because of the hypostatic union.
For with the Word becoming flesh—the Word may now die on a Cross.
With the Word becoming flesh—the Word can identify with us.
God came and breathed our air.
He endured our fallen world.
When we groan to Him, He understands.
With the Word becoming flesh—The Word now leaves us an example.
If we want to know what it looks like to know God and walk with Him, we only need to look to Christ, who has done it perfectly.
These are indispensable implications of the Incarnation for our souls.
If Christ does not die for us, we have no Substitute.
If Christ cannot identify with us, we have no Advocate.
If Christ cannot leave an example for us, our only examples are other sinners.
In other words...
If He is not the God-Man, we have no salvation.
If He is not the God-Man, we have no confidence of our prayers being answered.
If he is not the God-Man, we have no footsteps of perfection to try and walk in.
What a dark existence this would be.
A world without redemption.
A world without answered prayer.
A world without Christlikeness.
You can see how the Word becoming flesh changed everything.
Dwelt Among Us
Dwelt Among Us
Let’s move to our second point.
The Word not only became flesh...
2. The Word dwelt among us.
2. The Word dwelt among us.
When v. 14 says that the Word “dwelt” among us, it literally means that he “tabernacled among us.”
He “pitched his tent” with us.
While this may conjure up memories of camping, that is not what is being referred to here.
Instead, the Greek word that translates to “dwelt,” is one that is packed with Old Testament meaning.
The Tabernacle
The Tabernacle
When John wrote v. 14, he wants the reader to immediately jump backward in redemption history to the time in which the people worshipped God in the large tent known as the tabernacle.
To understand how the tabernacle even came into play, here is a brief historical sketch:
God’s people had become enslaved in Egypt and God delivered from Pharaoh and enslavement.
The freed Hebrew people then begin making their way through the wilderness to Mat. Sinai, where God makes a covenant with them in Exodus 19.
As covenant is made, God gave His people specific instructions on the Tabernacle—a portable tent of sanctuary, where God would dwell with His people as they journeyed.
In Exodus 40, the tabernacle was erected.
The Tabernacle itself was 45 feet long, 15 feet wide and 15 feet high.
It had a wooden skeletal sort structure with gold overlay.
There was no solid roof.
In the back of the Tabernacle, was the Most Holy Place.
This was a 15 ft. cube, containing the ark of the covenant.
This is where Yahweh would descend in a cloud of glory to meet with His people.
And this is where the High Priest would enter in once a year to make atonement for the people.
Foreshadowing Christ
Foreshadowing Christ
Compared to the Temple that came after it, the Tabernacle was humble in its appearance.
It was God’s dwelling place with His people.
It was the place where God met with man.
It was the place where atoning sacrifice was made.
And for all of these reasons, John rightfully draws a straight line from the tabernacle to Christ.
He sees the purpose of the Tabernacle...
He sees the Messiah, Jesus...
...And he connects the two directly.
And he does it with the use of that simple word “dwelt.”
If the Tabernacle was pointing beyond itself to a greater reality to come—Jesus certainly fits the bill.
Like the Tabernacle, Jesus was humble in His appearance.
For he grew up before him like a young plant,
and like a root out of dry ground;
he had no form or majesty that we should look at him,
and no beauty that we should desire him.
Like the Tabernacle, Jesus is place where the fullness of deity of dwells.
For in him the whole fullness of deity dwells bodily,
Like the Tabernacle, Jesus is the place where God men with man.
For there is one God, and there is one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus,
Like the Tabernacle, Jesus is where atoning sacrifice is made.
In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins.
Nearness in Christ (And the Tabernacle)
Nearness in Christ (And the Tabernacle)
Tabernacle
Tabernacle
What the Tabernacle shows is the desire of God to be near to His people.
He is under no obligation to be near to them.
He could have delivered them and remained remote from them.
But God wanted His people’s fellowship, not just their freedom.
He wanted intimacy with them, not just their independence from Egypt.
Temple
Temple
The same idea is found in what came after the Tabernacle—the Temple.
When the Tabernacle is erected in Exodus 40, God’s glory fills the Tent:
Then the cloud covered the tent of meeting, and the glory of the Lord filled the tabernacle.
In 1 Kings 8, when the Temple is dedicated by Solomon, the same thing happens:
And when the priests came out of the Holy Place, a cloud filled the house of the Lord, 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.
The fact that the same glory fills the Temple that filled the Tabernacle was a sign that the Temple was now the place where God would meet with his people.
Christ
Christ
But while the temple was more permanent than the Tabernacle, it was not actually permanent.
It was still a building capable of falling—something it would do in 70 AD.
If God was to truly meet with His people and be near to them, there must something more fixed. Something that cannot be moved.
Or maybe Someone...
Of course, this is how we end up back at John 1:14.
In Christ, God has come and dwelt with us.
He has tabernacled with us.
See—what God promised His people was HIS PRESENCE WITH PERMANENCE.
I’ll say that again:
God promised His people His presence with permanence.
The promise was never that He would be their God for a season...
The promise was never that He would be their God for a dispensation...
The promise was not even that He would be their God to the end of history...
...Instead, the promises to God’s people regarding God’s presence were eternal in their nature.
My dwelling place shall be with them, and I will be their God, and they shall be my people. Then the nations will know that I am the Lord who sanctifies Israel, when my sanctuary is in their midst forevermore.”
“Forevermore...” —that is a level of permanence that the Tabernacle and the Temple could not provide.
But understand this church—when Jesus came, the One whom the Tabernacle and Temple were pointing to all along—there was One through whom all the promises of permanence could be fulfilled.
Christ came, born of a woman, under the Law
Christ came and lived a perfect life according to the Law.
Christ came and died an atoning death according to the Law.
And when that happened, an amazing act of supernatural force took place in the temple.
The curtain that divided that Holy of Holies from the rest of the Temple was torn in two:
It was now about the sixth hour, and there was darkness over the whole land until the ninth hour, while the sun’s light failed. And the curtain of the temple was torn in two.
The tearing of the curtain into two spoke to a new reality.
No longer would the people only be able to meet with God through a High Priest.
No longer would worshippers be on the outside looking in.
No longer would a certain sacred space define what it means to meet with God.
Now, the blood of Christ speaks a better word.
His blood is not like the blood of bulls and goats that had to be poured out over and over, year after year, bloody sacrifice after bloody sacrifice.
His blood has done something permanent.
He has no need, like those high priests, to offer sacrifices daily, first for his own sins and then for those of the people, since he did this once for all when he offered up himself.
He has no sins of His own.
And when it comes to the sins of others, He has paid for them once for all.
And this is possible because as the Word made flesh, He has lived a perfect life and then died in the place of sinners.
Meaning—He took their punishment when He laid down His perfect life.
On the Cross He was judged by the Father as if He had committed our sin.
And what He offers the sinner is perfect righteousness.
In His death, He paid for your sin.
If you believe in Him who died, He will give you His perfect standing before God.
Christ gets your sin.
You get His righteousness.
Once this happens, there is no separating the sinner from God.
In God’s eyes, they are not sinners any longer.
Because they have repented of their sin and believed, their lives are hidden in Christ and all God sees is the perfection of His Son.
And as those who have been made perfect, they will never be cast out.
He is our God. We are His people.
And it is this way forever IN CHRIST, the One who came and dwelt among us.
The heart of the Gospel is for God to know humanity again.
Jesus Christ is the meeting place where this happens.
In and through Christ, God knows His redeemed people forever.
In and through Christ, those redeemed people know God.
The Word Revealed the Glory of God
The Word Revealed the Glory of God
So the Word became flesh.
The Word dwelt among us.
Here is our final teaching point this morning:
3. The Word revealed the glory of God.
3. The Word revealed the glory of God.
This is the final way that we see God making a way for man to know Him again.
In the Lord Jesus Christ, God has revealed His own glory.
This is what the end of v. 14 is telling us:
The glory of the Word is glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.
The Glory of God
The Glory of God
Now before we go much further, let’s ask this: What is the glory of God?
That is a word we throw around a lot, but may not totally understand.
The Hebrew word that translates to glory in the OT is kabod.
The Greek word that translates to glory in the NT is doxa.
Both of these words are meant to convey the weight and value of who God is.
In short, God’s glory is the shining brilliance that comes from the weight of His attributes and character.
And this is a brilliance that God loves to communicate. In fact, we could even say that it is His nature to communicate it.
One of the great realities of Scripture is that God is the most glorious Being and the highest Good in all existence.
We also know from Scripture that God is love and there is no one who loves better than Him.
So track with me —if God is the most glorious One and the highest Good in all existence AND He is Love—what is the most loving thing God can do for humanity?
The answer is to reveal Himself.
For what else can God reveal that will do as much good for our hearts?
What else could God reveal that would fix my problems of sin and sorrow?
This is why it is in God’s nature to reveal Himself and to shine His brilliance.
His nature is to reveal because His nature is to love.
There is nothing more loving God could do for us than to show us who He is.
And this is what He has done for us in Christ.
He has loved the world by showing it His glory in His Son.
He has done this in Creation.
The heavens declare the glory of God,
and the sky above proclaims his handiwork.
He also did this in Old Testament history.
We have already seen the way His glory filled the Tabernacle and the Temple.
We see the glory of God in Matthew 17 in the Transfiguration.
Jesus takes Peter, James and John to a high mountain and he is transfigured before them.
He seems to display the glory of God in a way they have not yet seen.
His face shines. His clothes are radiant.
And they see Jesus speak with Moses and Elijah—the great representatives of the Law and the Prophets.
And listen to what Matthew says:
He was still speaking when, behold, a bright cloud overshadowed them, and a voice from the cloud said, “This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased; listen to him.” When the disciples heard this, they fell on their faces and were terrified.
The cloud is another visible manifestation of the glory of God.
Now who would not want to be Peter, James and John?
Who would not want to be those Old Testament worshippers who caught sight of the glory in the Tabernacle or the Temple?
Who would not want a picture of what it was like when God said, “Let there be Light,” and His glory was revealed in the Light that was created?
Who would NOT want to SEE the glory of God?
Well here is the point of John 1:14—you HAVE seen the glory of God!
You saw it in His Son.
There has been no better visible representation of the glory of God for Christ showed us the exact imprint of His nature.
You want to know about the attributes of God?
You want to know about the goodness of God?
The power of God? The kindness of God? The mercy of God?
John says, “Just look at Jesus. You can see it all.”
The Lord our God wants us to know Him and He has shown us Himself—the full weight of His divine self-expression—in His Son, Jesus.
The only Son.
The unique Son.
The Son who has been eternally brought forth.
And the Son who let out a human, pitiful cry in a manger, as He emerged from Mary’s womb.
From the cradle to the carpenter’s bench to Cana and the miracle with the wine to a Cross in Jerusalem...
...In all of this, we have seen the glory of the Father in the Son.
In all of this, we have a sense of the weight of God’s attributes and character.
The Word is Christ. Christ is God.
And Christ has shown us God.
Full of Grace and Truth
Full of Grace and Truth
And what do we find when we take a look at the glory as of the Son from the Father?
John says we find grace and truth.
John probably has more of the Old Testament in mind here.
I think his use of “grace” and truth,” are meant to call our minds back to Exodus 33-34.
In that passage, Moses makes a request of God—
Moses said, “Please show me your glory.”
God responds and says that he will put him in the cleft of the rock and as God’s glory passes by, God will cover Moses with His hand.
When God takes His hand away, Moses would only see God’s back.
The next day, Moses gets up early to make two new tablets of stone since he broke the first and when he does, listen to what he says happened:
The Lord descended in the cloud and stood with him there, and proclaimed the name of the Lord. The Lord passed before him and proclaimed, “The Lord, the Lord, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness,
Going back to John 1, we can make some connections.
First of all, we have a passage where Moses wants to see God’s glory.
This is the same glory John is writing about in John 1:14.
Secondly, we have a passage where God proclaims His name before Moses and says he is “The Lord, Lord...abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness.”
In John 1, The Greek word for grace is charis.
The Old Testament equivalent is hesed.
Both are words that speak to the steadfast love and favor that God pours out on His children
In John 1, the Greek word for truth is aletheia.
The Old Testament equivalent is emet (emeth).
These two words speak to God’s faithfulness, reliability and integrity.
So you can see that as John describes what is found in the glory of God, he reaches for words from Exodus 33-34, where Moses wants to see God’s glory and God reveals Himself to Moses.
John’s point is this:
The very glory that Moses desired to see—the glory of the Father—is revealed in the glory of the Son.
Moses found God to be filled with steadfast love and faithfulness.
Any who come to God through Christ will find Him to be filled with the same grace and truth.
In other words—this is the God of the Ages.
This is the God of Moses.
This is the God of creation.
This is the God of the Tabernacle.
This is the God of the Temple.
This is the God who said, “This is my beloved Son...”
And this is the God who has put Himself on display for the whole arena of humanity to see in His Son, Jesus Christ, so that through him...humanity may know God again.
CONCLUSION
CONCLUSION
Sometimes it seems like with each passing year, Christmas becomes less “Holy, Holy” and more “Holly Jolly.”
With each passing Christmas, it feels like we are more about “a few of our favorite things,” than “the First Noel.”
It feels like we are more about celebrating a story about a jolly man from a cold town than the story of the baby born in David’s town.
It feels more “holiday” than “holy day.”
I don’t say that to say that we should all throw out our inflatable snowmen and do live nativity reenactments in our front yard.
More power to you if the Lord leads...
...We won’t make that an official Seaford Baptist event...
...But we will pray for you.
I do say it to say that of all people during this time of the year, we should be the last ones to miss the heart of Christmas.
For the heart of Christmas is not reindeer and sleigh bells.
The heart of the Christmas is the heart of the Gospel.
The Word was God and the Word became man.
Took on flesh.
Dwelt among us.
And we have indeed seen His glory—the glory of the Son showing us the Father.
God has a heart that desires to be known by the people who fell away from Him.
And God’s heart made a way for this to be the reality.
He sent His Son.
We are a handful of days away from the big day.
Maybe you are missing the target because your Christmas celebrations are missing the heart of the Gospel.
Home Alone is fine and good, but there is no Gospel there.
Rocking Around the Christmas Tree is fine and good, but there is no Gospel there.
But in Bethlehem—a baby is born.
And there—in HIM—we find the Gospel.
We find God’s way for humanity to know Him again.
Recover a heart of worship this Christmas and you put the heart of the Gospel back into the heart of Christmas.
