Before The Beginning Series

What is implicit in Genesis becomes explicit in John’s Gospel. What is hidden in Genesis is revealed in John’s Gospel: “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.” (John 1:1-2) The God who was at work creating everything was the Triune God. Within the one Godhead is God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit. What does this mean? It means at least two very practical things…

2.1 The Priority of Relationships

Had God been there from the beginning and He was alone, there would be nothing or no one for Him to love. But God was not alone. Instead, we see that everything that was created was created by the Trinity – God the Father, God the Son, and God the Spirit. Again, what was hidden in Genesis is clearly revealed in John’s Gospel: “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.” (John 1:1-2) The Bible tells us at least three facts about God.

God is Three Persons

And each person is fully God

There is One God

Scripture is clear that there is one and only one God. The three different persons of the Trinity are one not only in purpose and agreement in what they think, but they are one in essence. They are one in their essential nature: “Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one.” (Deuteronomy 6:4) And because God is Three Persons, each member of the Godhead experienced love before any human being was created. “And now, Father, glorify me in your own presence with the glory that I had with you before the world existed.” (John 17:5)

“I do not ask for these only, but also for those who will believe in me through their word, 21 that they may all be one, just as you, Father, are in me, and I in you, that they also may be in us, so that the world may believe that you have sent me. 22 The glory that you have given me I have given to them, that they may be one even as we are one, 23 I in them and you in me, that they may become perfectly one, so that the world may know that you sent me and loved them even as you loved me.” (John 17:20-23)

If God were alone, then God could not have loved. Why? Because love only happens between people. But God was not alone, God was Three and yet One. God loved with a perfect love before any one human was around.

So love was before creation itself. So love is priority and relationships are a priority. If there is no God, then the reason you and I are here is through violence and power … the strong eating the weak. But power isn’t the ultimate reality. Love is the ultimate reality for love was around before anything else.

Tom and Susan were married 29 years ago this June. Tom travels about 60% of the time for his job in the high-tech industry and Susan has returned to work as a nurse after their 4th child entered high school. When their third child entered college, Tom sought a promotion that was accompanied by a healthy raise. You didn’t have to be particularly close to either parent to hear them complain about the costs of college: “College costs so much and we want to give our kids a debt-free start to life.” They meet themselves coming and going with little space in life for life. Don’t place your career first or your achievements first in your life. Instead, place relationships ahead of all this. By examining God before anything else existed, we see the primacy of relationships. When we look back before creation, not only do we learn the priority of relationships but we learn something else…