3. Incarnation

What or who is the Word?
John first locates the Word in a period he calls the beginning. [In the beginning was the Word]. This means existence outside time, because the beginning is before the universe and days, months, years and light years were created. The Word is located as existing in the eternal past before any created things were made. (Genesis 1.1)

So, John’s first statement about Jesus who he followed around Israel, heard, touched, ate with, slept near to, walked with and listened to, is that he existed before created things, including time and space. He is not dealing with a mere man, he is speaking of an eternal one. Get that into your thinking. Get into your thinking that the man Jesus is vastly greater than you can imagine. He towers above every created thing – because he WAS before any of it existed. He is magnificent, uncontainable, irresistible, all-knowing and all powerful. Get that into your thinking about Jesus! Get Jesus out of church buildings, out of stained glass windows, out of “Jesus” movies, off CD covers, out of kid’s illustrations, off Xmas cards, out of political parties and off the WWJD bracelet – and in your understanding get him before everything and at the beginning of everything. If you are left only with a plastic Jesus, you will NEVER know God through him. If you are to know God, you MUST come to understand who Jesus really is.

So, first point: The Word has always existed and is not a created being. He was in the beginning. He has no starting point – he is the starting point of everything else!

In the beginning was the WORD! That is how John sets the scene to talk about Jesus Christ. He goes back before pregnant Mary and before the stable and manger and wise men. He introduces Jesus Christ as the forever past existing Word.

Let’s pause and find out what John’s purpose is in telling us about Jesus Christ. Here it is (look it up): John 20.30,31 Now Jesus did many other signs in the presence of the disciples, which are not written in this book; but these are written so that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of the living God, and that by believing you may have life in his name.
Clearly, John wants you to have a proper grasp of just who Jesus is – because if you are believing in a Jesus that is less that who he is – you will fail to possess the life he came to bring.
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So, to continue to answer the question: Who is the Word? …
John says that the Word was with God. So, in at least some important sense, he was distinct from God. You can’t be WITH someone if you ARE that someone. I am not with myself today – I AM myself.

But John doesn’t only say that the Word was WITH God but that he WAS God. [And the Word was God]. This is a category that is outside any other thing. This is a unique relationship that cannot be classified along with any other or likened to any other. You can’t, for example say that God and the Word are LIKE twins, or LIKE a person who is say a father and a school teacher (having two main roles in life). None of those categories fit the relationship between God and the Word. They are in a totally unique relationship – but that is not surprising, because we are speaking about the Originator of everything: God. It would be surprising and impossible if God was like a Fijian, or like a tiger, or like a school principal! He is the originator and maker of all these. You don’t compare a well-made set of stairs to the carpenter. They are totally different categories. God is his own category.

John says that the Word (whom he identifies as Jesus) existed before all things were made and that he was WITH God and WAS God. According to John, the Word is God and yet distinct from God. He shares the nature of God, and yet he has his own personality, because he was with God. That is different to being part of God or absorbed into God. He has his own personality and identity and yet he shares the life of God. He is God along with God. He is the Son of God. So John describes the Word (the Son of God) alongside God, the Father. Verse 18: No one has ever seen God; God, the only God, who is at the Father’s side has made him known.

Now we have our second main point: The Word is God and is with God. He has his own distinct identity and yet he shares the same nature as God. That nature is shared so intimately that it is correct to say that there is one God.

Be very careful how you think of Jesus. Be careful how you speak about him. Be careful to pay attention to him, for he is the Eternal God. The people of Jesus’ home town, Nazareth, were really offended by him when he spoke from the Scriptures. They actually drove him out of town and wanted to stone him to death. Why? Because they said: This is just Jesus the son of Joseph, we know his family, who does he think he is telling us to turn to God? They were familiar with Jesus, but they hadn’t paid attention to him. They hadn’t listened to him. They hadn’t considered that he was bringing the light of the truth of God to them.
In him was life and that life was the light of men. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not understood it. The true light, which enlightens everyone, was coming into the world. He was in the world and the world was made through him, yet the world did not know him. He came to his own, and his own people did not receive him. But to all who did receive him, who believed in his name, he gave the right to become the children of God, who were born not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God.

There is the exact point that you need to bring yourself to pause at. You need to stand in the spotlight that this Word is shining in a dark and blinded world: The light shines in the darkness. That light is Jesus Christ. It is he that holds life – your life in his hand. He is very great. He is God. He is God. Son of God means equality with God. You are not dealing with some plastic, storybook character. You are under his personal light that searches every person. What is your response?