So maybe you’ve heard it said, ‘read your bible’ so you tried and failed. Our hope as leaders is that all of us will pick up God’s word and come to understand the true nature of God. After all, the bible is God’s Word curated over centuries detailing His nature, His will, the meaning of life and humanity’s historical interactions with Him. The Bible details the hidden keys to the Kingdom. Hence, the reason we are reviewing a new book each week.
This week we move to the second of the four gospels entitled “John.” As the video highlights, the book’s larger message is to provide an orderly account of the life, death and resurrection of Jesus. The first three gospels focus on the events in the life of Jesus. The book of John emphasizes the meaning of these events. All of which lead us to the conclusion: God is in love with us to such an extent he would sacrifice himself for us so we can have the opportunity to exercise our free will to love him or reject him. It reminds me of author Richard Bach's famous line, “If you love someone, set them free. If they come back they're yours; if they don't they never were.”
God set us free through the gift of Jesus. A gift many have not ever reflected on. It reminds me of a story.
There was a little incident that took place in Mainz in 1456 when Gutenberg was printing the first printed Bible. The printer had a little daughter, Alice, who came into the printing press and picked up a discarded sheet with only one line of print. That line of print read: “God loved the world so much that he gave…” Now, those were times when popular religion was a matter of living in fear and trembling before the awesome wrath of God. So Alice put the paper in her pocket and kept on thinking of the fact of God being so loving, and her face radiated with joy. Her mother noticed her changed behavior and asked Alice what was making her so happy and Alice showed her mother the sheet of paper with the printed line. Her mother looked at it for some time and said, “So, what did God give?” “I don’t know,” said Alice, “but if God loved us well enough to give us something, then we need not be so afraid of Him.”
Alice’s story emphasizes the big idea presented by John in the first chapter of Good news he wrote. These scriptures are not traditional for this time of year. However, they make the cute stories of a baby in a manger so much more meaningful. So let's open to John 1.
As you find your way, let me pray for us…
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2 He was with God in the beginning. 3 Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made.
Those first three words “in the beginning” take us to Genesis one. The purpose of which is to highlight that God existed before our concept of time. When a child asks, what came before God? The answer is simply “nothing.” God was, is and always will be, present. Then when a child asks who was with God? Was God alone? The answer is no because “He is God and the term Word, with its capitalization, means Jesus with God.” God and Jesus are one in the same. A heady concept worth meditating on the next time you think God, Jesus and the Holy Spirit are not big enough to handle your issues or feel He doesn’t care about you.
Seriously, when you contemplate the full implications of God becoming a man, while still being God, every issue in our lives seems small. The churchy term we use is incarnate. It’s the act of grace whereby Jesus took our human nature into union with his Divine Person, became man. Christ is fully both God and man. The Westminster Shorter Catechism, a document written to confirm, non negotiable Christian truths, put it this way:
“There are three persons in the Godhead; the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost; and these three are one God, the same in substance, equal in power and glory.”
If you find this concept difficult to understand, you are not alone. It is a mystery how God can be one and yet three.
Let’s continue…
4 In him was life, and that life was the light of all mankind. 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 testify concerning that light, so that through him all might believe. 8 He himself was not the light; he came only as a witness to the light.
9 The true light that gives light to everyone was coming into the world. 10 He was in the world, and though the world was made through him, the world did not recognize him. 11 He came to that which was his own, but his own did not receive him.
In five verses, John uses the term “LIGHT” eight times to refer to the reason God came to earth as Jesus. Light and its opposite (darkness) are used a number of times in John’s gospel. People love one or the other. It’s this “love” that directs their words and deeds. Those who believe in light are considered the “sons of light” (John 12:35-35). The first creation began with the words “let there be light!” and in the same way acceptance of Jesus in the heart of the believer brings a new light to our soul.
A literal translation of the Greek for verse 5 would add the words “or understood it.” It would read “The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it or understood it.” As the bible project video emphasized, every time Jesus spoke many came to know him and others rejected or opposed Him. For those whose darkness could not be overcome, they had interpreted his teachings literally or in a material or physical way. The spiritual truths were unfathomable for them. But there were some who did come to understand. Let’s keep going…
12 Yet to all who did receive him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God— 13 children born not of natural descent, nor of human decision or a husband’s will, but born of God.
What a promise! ANYONE (say it with me). Anyone who receives Jesus as Lord and savior will be born again and enter into the family of God. Your physical birth is less important than your spiritual birth because the spiritual is forever, comes with an inheritance of grace, mercy and forgiveness. It comes with creating, redeeming and sustaining power along with a spiritual guide for your journey. While every baby is born with a glow, true glow comes in the moment you invite the light of Jesus Christ into your heart. It's the reason He came to earth and it changes everything. As John wrote:
14 The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the one and only Son, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.
As John clarifies in John 3:16,
16 For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. 17 For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him.
John 3:16 is a scripture that offers one of the greatest short answers to the question, why did God break into the world? Why not just change the rules he put in place about faith and let everyone into heaven? He is God after all. It can be a bit of conundrum if a person thinks about it from a human perspective. Man changes his mind all the time usually to do something selfish, self-centered or prideful. However, man is flawed. God is perfect.
If God were to change the rules midstream, it would mean he’d be selfish and self centered. He would be flawed like us and be just like any of the other God’s or Goddesses people strive to get the attention of.
REPEAT John 3:16-17
So why did God send Jesus?
To reveal himself to the world and to each of us. John 14:9 says, “if you have seen Jesus you have seen the Father.” In Jesus, we begin to get a clear picture of our God. It’s this revealing, we see and experience a God who loves more than we can imagine. Look at Romans 5:8 “But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.”
When God sent Jesus into the world, the Son of God took on human flesh and provided a better sacrifice for sin and a better covenant with God’s people than those previously offered. As Romans elaborates: “Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus” (Romans 8:1).
God sent Jesus To Destroy the Works of the Devil. It’s spelled out in 1 John 3:8: “The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the devil’s work.” It was a divine mission, executed with the precision of a well-planned military strike.
God came to earth as Jesus to offer an Example of a Holy Life. Peter tells us that Christ has left us “an example, that [we] should follow in his steps” (1 Peter 2:21). All those who follow Christ ought to conduct themselves just as Jesus conducted Himself (1 John 2:6). We are to be holy as God is holy (1 Peter 1:16), and Jesus is our template or rubric.
So what’s the illuminating message this week… Jesus is the gift of illumination that sheds light in a dark world and in so doing, evil doesn’t stand a chance.
Communion
References: Quest Bible Overviews p:1552-53,1556
The Bible Exposition Commentary (Wiersbe) Volume I, p. 284-291, 296
https://www.gotquestions.org/why-God-sent-Jesus.html
https://stories4homilies.wordpress.com/2012/03/16/gods-love/
