John 1:1-18--The Word Became Flesh

John 1:1-18
English Standard Version

The Word Became Flesh
1 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2 He was in the beginning with God. 3 All things were made through him, and without him was not any thing made that was made. 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.

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

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.

​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.

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Today, we start a new book of the Bible.  The Gospel of John is unlike the other three gospels (Matthew, Mark and Luke) which are sometimes called the "synoptic" gospels, because they all basically tell the same events of Jesus' life, though they each tell them in their own unique way.  We'll see from the very beginning of John though that he starts off in a very different place, not at the baptism of Jesus like the Gospel of Mark, not at the announcement of John the Baptist, the forerunner or herald to the King of Kings, and not even at the genealogy of Jesus to establish Him as the King of the Jews like Matthew did.  No, John goes back much further to a place reminiscent of Genesis 1:1--"In the beginning....."

We very quickly see that we're going to be taking a deep-dive into theology in this gospel--it isn't for just some light reading.  In fact, that's why I've waiting so long to approach this book as I wanted to give some of you that follow this blog a chance to get grounded in solid doctrine and theology as we studied most of the epistles and some of the Old Testament together.  The Psalms are also an excellent source of good doctrine and theology, though not many think to look there for that.

Many things are said so quickly here, so let's see if we can break them down.  First, Jesus is eternal.  He was there "In the beginning," and that should tell us already that He is God since everything else was created and was not there "in the beginning."  However, John will make it very clear momentarily that we are talking about God in the flesh.  Next is a name that we don't normally think of as a name for God and we have a hard time thinking of places other than John 1:1 where the Bible says anything about "the Word," but the Old Testament is full of references to this when it says "The Word of the LORD came unto the prophet...…"  A quick search found the phrase "word of the LORD" 260 times in the Old Testament and 14 times in the New Testament.  This is separate from any other ways it could be said such as "the word of God" (which more often refers to the written Word, whereas the word of the LORD often refers to the act of inspiration).  So then how does this change our understanding of the Old Testament if the preincarnate Christ is the one who comes to the patriarchs and the prophets to tell them what is to come.

We know from our study in Gospel Foundations that Jesus was active in creation (see Colossians 1:16-17), and we also see here that the Word, the second Person of what we call the Trinity, has the same attributes as God and is God.  "The Word was with God, and the Word was God.  He was in the beginning with God."  We also see a very clear statement here in the Gospel of John that it is Jesus who is Creator of all things, "All things were made through him, and without him was not any thing made that was made."

Then John adds something else that will be a big them in the gospel of John (as well as the epistle of 1 John)--the theme of light and darkness and how God is light and in Him there is no darkness.  He is Light, that is His identity and nature.  Light reveals what is hidden, purifies, shows the way, and much more.  This will also be connected with the ideas of seeing and being blind, and we'll quickly find examples of blind men that see more clearly than the teachers of the Law who thought they could see clearly, but Jesus will call them "blind guides" and condemn them for being blind and not admitting it.  There is also a strong statement made in John 3 about "the verdict" that Light had come into the world, but men loved the darkness because their deeds were evil.  It's not just an issue of men being deceived or not understanding, but they make a willful choice to be part of the kingdom of darkness and refuse to come into the light for fear that their deeds and their nature will be exposed.  One day though this is exactly what will happen as heaven and earth will pass away and everyone will stand exposed before The Great White Throne and God's piercing Light will penetrate the darkness of our souls so that every motive, every thought, and every deed will be exposed and revealed.  However this is not something we need to fear--we'll get to that later though.

There is then a brief statement about John the Baptist.  He came to bear witness to the Light, but he himself was not the Light.  There's not really that much said about John the Baptist in the Gospel of John, even though John the Apostle was a disciple of John the Baptist before meeting Jesus.  However, we will still pick up on the special relationship between Jesus and John the Baptist in the Gospel more than we do in other gospels.  They were not only relatives, and they not only proclaimed the same message, "Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand," but they were close friends to the point where John saw himself like the best man whose job it was to make preparations for the wedding, to keep everyone's focus on the Bridegroom (the focus in that culture was the groom, not the bride), and to be happy for his friend.

We then get a preview of what's going to happen.  It sounds at this point like this is going to be an epic story of how Light conquers darkness and maybe Jesus is just going to show up on the scene and everyone will see the Truth and miraculously recognize Him and listen to Him, but that's not what's going to happen.  "He came unto His own, and His own received Him not."  Jesus came to the Jews who were the people who had been given the Law and the Prophets, and they had been given the entire gospel, though it was veiled so that most did not fully see or understand it, but we see glimpses in the Old Testament that a few of them did--Noah, Abraham, Job, Moses, and David along with others.  Though this is not just speaking of the Jews, because as the passage reminds us, Jesus is the Creator of all peoples, and this is one of the first indications in the book of John that maybe Jesus didn't come just for the Jews, but maybe also for the Gentiles--we'll see some clear references to this later, though the gospel of Luke focuses on this much more clearly.  John makes abundantly clear that all who receive Him are given the right (by adoption) to be called (and become) children of God, born not of flesh and blood, not physical descendants or a physical nation or kingdom like we've been so focused on in the Old Testament, but a those born of the Spirt who will be part of a spiritual kingdom, the kingdom of heaven, the kingdom of God.  This happens not by the will of man, but by the will of God.  He chooses us!

"And the Word became flesh and made His dwelling among us."  We've talked about this verse several times already as we discussed the Tabernacle and how this word used here means "to tabernacle."  It was a state of temporary dwelling and is not an idea of setting up permanent residence.  Jesus would be the Living Tabernacle of God dwelling among the people and Jesus would even refer to Himself as the Temple later, and the Jews would not understand, though the Spirit would reveal what Jesus meant to the apostles after the Resurrection.  There will be more emphasis put on the Temple and Jesus having authority over it in the book of John than any other gospel as we will see Jesus cleanse the temple twice--once in the beginning of His earthly ministry and once at the end of His earthly ministry.  There is so much wrapped up in this one sentence, but we'll try to unpack bits and pieces of it as we go throughout the book of John and the other books of the Bible that we have left to study.

"And we have seen His glory, the glory as of the only Son of the Father, full of grace and truth."  Don't read over this too quickly!  No man has been able to look upon the glory of the LORD and survive.  This was a departure from what we are aware of in the Old Testament where the LORD's glory was something fierce to be feared and that God would not even let Moses look upon before his death:


Exodus 33:17-23
English Standard Version17 And the Lord said to Moses, “This very thing that you have spoken I will do, for you have found favor in my sight, and I know you by name.” 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.”
But we now see John taking about this "glory" being "full of grace and truth."  This would be astonishing to John's readers as the glory of God was something that would kill you if you came in direct contact with it--like getting too close to the sun or looking directly into it.  That's not a good idea.  We've already studied in 2 Corinthians though that we as the Church reflect the glory of the Lord, and so we will see in the book of John this idea about Jesus being The Light of the World (like the Sun), and us being the light of the world (like the moon).

We come back to where we started now with John the Baptist preaching a message of the pre-existence of Jesus.  Even though Jesus was younger than John the Baptist in terms of when he was conceived and born to Mary (by about six months is all--they were roughly the same age), and culture would say that the older would outrank the younger, John the Baptist said that Jesus would outrank him because He was much older--as in existing before the beginning of time itself.  In fact, John would say that he wasn't even worthy to untie Jesus' sandals (the job of the lowest slave in the house), though Jesus would call John the Baptist the greatest man to ever be born among women (Jesus is excluding Himself of course).

So then John really focuses in on this contrast between the Law that came through Moses, the mediator of the Old Covenant, but how grace and truth come through Jesus, the mediator of the New (and Better) Covenant.  And as if there was any question to what we were saying about looking on God and living, John wraps up this short introduction by saying the only one who has ever seen God is the one who came from God.  He is the only one who can really tell us who God is because He has come from His side to so that He can make the invisible God known to us both by His words and His actions.  As Jesus would say later to Philip, "If you have seen Me, you have seen the Father."  Jesus is a different person of the Trinity, and He has a different role to play in history, but He is one in nature, character, essence, and attributes with the Father and Spirit.  They are all members of what we call the Trinity or the Godhead.  We'll see some of the interactions between the Father and the Son and the Son and the Spirit as we continue to study the book of John.

If you're like me, a video summary of the gospel of John might help you.  Here are two videos to help to that end.

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