Where do we begin when we begin to read the Bible? At the begin? That's seems logical.
When I was a kid my folks were not "religious" people and no one could tell me what to do with the Bible. I wanted to read it but without any direction I started where anyone might think to begin reading a book…at the beginning.
As it turns out this is something of a major to deterrent to for a lot of people wanting to check out the Bible for the first time.
The story looses flow fairly quickly and you never seem to get to the "good stuff".
But that's because the Bible was written as code.
See the devil himself, with all his thousands of years of experience wasn't able to figure out what Messiah was, or what that would really look like and so his demise comes as he only just in the end figuring out that he made a major miscalculation.
Just like Rosh Hashanah, which discussed earlier is a new year that comes in the middle of the calendar. So the beginning the story kina comes in the middle of the book.
So…we begin and the real beginning, long before anything had even started, in the Gospel of John.
John 1:1 – 5 (Amp)
1 IN THE beginning [before all time] was the Word (Christ), and the Word was with God, and the Word was God Himself.
2 He was present originally with God.
3 All things were made and came into existence through Him; and without Him was not even one thing made that has come into being.
4 In Him was Life, and the Life was the Light of men.
5 And the Light shines on in the darkness, for the darkness has never overpowered it [put it out or absorbed it or appropriated it, and is unreceptive to it]. "God" appears first in the Greek word order in this phrase, denoting emphasis: so "God Himself."
That's heavy. That's a container stuffed with meaning, and before we go anywhere else we need to begin unpacking this thing.
1 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
In John's vision (Rev. 19), he sees Christ returning as Warrior-Messiah-King, and "the title by which He is called is The Word of God... and Lord of lords" (Rev. 19:13, 16).
Here we open with a mystery that has freaked people out for ages and defines orthodox and cult understanding of just who Jesus is. It is a truth that upon first hearing sounds crazy and yet when seen in proper light, explains everything.
Right from the very begin, that is the very beginning as we see from the begin from the middle of the book…though really we find it in the begin, begin as well, is that theological truth we call the Trinity.
For the Word was with God and the Word Himself, is in fact God also.
Now lotsa people have explanations for this and they talk about how water can be gas or ice or liquid and I have to tell you that if you use this example you’re really just confusing the issue because you're teaching something known as "modalism" which is a heretical view from the first century. God is not sometimes Father, sometimes Word, sometimes Spirit, but always all those things at once.
Some people like the example of a peanut…see the peanut has three pieces that are all the peanut and yet separate at the same time. But I don't like that example either because this is something of perception of components and I tend to think of the mysterious nature of God as something a bit more than that.
But what I believe is…another theological term, a Trichotomist. That is, someone who believes that we are literally Body, Soul and Spirit.
We who are made in the image of God are ourselves, three pieces, distinct and yet inseparable…however where there is perfect unity in the godhead, we tend to be at war with ourselves.
Remember Matthew 6:22 – 24 when Jesus is preaching the "sermon on the mount" and discuss this very thing, doesn't he…that the lamp of the body is the eye. And if your eye is single you'll be full of light, but if your eye is bad you'll be filled with darkness…well he wasn't saying if you have bad eyes you become a bad person. What he's saying here is that if you are duplicous in nature, i.e. attempting to love both God and this world, your soul will be filled with darkness.
It can't be done. We weren't wired that way. We can not choose love and selfishness. We must choose love or selfishness, and if we choose to love then that love that God has placed in our hearts is able to extend beyond God to loving others as well.
But that's not the point I’m making here.
The point I want to make is that I have a body, a soul, and a spirit…all three of which make up one living being, though each being distinct and with their own agenda.
This is the triune God, and John drops this thing on us so "matter of fact"ly like it's no big thing and immediately moves on to the next big thing.
3 All things were made through Him, and without Him nothing was made that was made.
So, Jesus is the creator of all things…granted, the incarnate Christ came to earth under unique circumstances that allow him to drop in the middle of history, but pre-incarnation, this is the one who was as we find described in Revelations, "before all things".
This is why we begin in the Gospel of John, so that we know just who we're talking about. And it is important to John that we get this out on the table first so that we have the proper context for the rest of our story.
Trip on this concept…we live in a universe with an establish sense of reason and order and that is because he has willed it to be so.
In extolling the virtues of Wisdom Solomon, inspired by the Holy Spirit speaks as Wisdom in the first person.
"The LORD possessed me at the beginning of His way, Before His works of old. I have been established from everlasting, From the beginning, before there was ever an earth. When there were no depths I was brought forth, When there were no fountains abounding with water. Before the mountains were settled, Before the hills, I was brought forth; While as yet He had not made the earth or the fields, Or the primal dust of the world. When He prepared the heavens, I was there, When He drew a circle on the face of the deep, When He established the clouds above, When He strengthened the fountains of the deep, When He assigned to the sea its limit, So that the waters would not transgress His command, When He marked out the foundations of the earth, Then I was beside Him as a master craftsman; And I was daily His delight, - Pv.8:22 - 30
In the art of systems engineering the rules are establish so that who ever the contributor might be everyone can be on the same page, using the same protocols, measuring with the same matrix, joining in together under a single set of predetermined conditions.
Love was the order we were all meant to conform to long before the first man was ever created.
4 In Him was life, and the life was the light of men. 5 And the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it.
This life that is in Christ is something that is beyond us. Though we were made with the intention of living out a life of faith, driven by love, join together as the Body of Christ. What was lost in the garden was that connection.
That link that tied our hearts directly to God was lost in a single act of disobedience so that those attributes that flow freely from the heart of God could no longer reach us.
And in that came gross insecurity and self-awareness so that Adam’s first act as an "enlightened" human was to grab a fig leaf and pretend that nothing was up.
So…insecure and several generation removed, men indulge in and hide their wicked ways hoping that no one will see them for who they really are…because apart from Christ, there isn't a whole beautiful going on.
Conclusion:
See, and this is why John wants to start here.
This whole story, this "gospel", really is good news!
In just a few short verse John give us who and what Jesus really is, and explains in deep, deep terms the contrast between where we are apart from him.
Now we can begin to discuss just what his ministry really was/is and what the ramification are of that.
Through out his telling, John will make certain assumptions about our understanding of the Judaism practiced in his day and we'll have to unpack a lot more stuff. But if there is a point to be driven home today it is that God's universe has always been a place intend for the sharing.
Jesus created this place, and he created it as a place where his creatures could experience and share the love that flows from Him.
His law is love, and his intentions towards us are to liberate us from the fears and insecurities that keep us from living out that love.
Deep in our heart of hearts that thing that we have all been looking for is exactly this. That we were wired for love, before the foundation of the earth were laid it had always been the plan.
And through Christ we can have and share this love.
