John 1:1-5 - An Introduction

 

I have always been particularly drawn to the book of John, even to this day. I’m not sure the exact reason why, but it has led me to read the beginning of John a number of times, probably more than any other passage in the Bible. What I have learned from reading and studying these first few verses time and again is just how profound they are. Eternity past is recounted in the first four words. The hope of our future is presented before the first chapter ends. The baptism of the Holy Spirit is mentioned, which is a cornerstone of our faith. All this and more are packed in a few verses.

Let’s start with the first four words. “In the beginning was”. Stop, pause, halt. “In the beginning”. The beginning of what? Us. Everything. Our existence, this world, this creation and everything we see. That’s the beginning being spoken of in the first three words. And catch that fourth word, was. Was. The beginning was happening, when everything was coming into existence, and Someone came out of eternity past and met us there.

Who was it that came out of eternity past? Let’s keep reading. “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” Here’s Who came to meet us from eternity past. God. But not just God, but also the Word. Two clearly identified beings, and yet they are clearly shown as being one. “The Word was with God” is defining that there is a distinction between these two. “The Word was God” joins these two together into the same being. This introduces a key cornerstone of the Christian faith, which is the Trinity. The Trinity is an incredibly confusing subject, one I can’t even come close to explaining in a way that fully makes sense to me. But I feel that leaving this section without at least presenting the Trinity to the best of my abilities would be wrong, so please bear with me.

The Trinity is the three-in-one Godhead. The Trinity is portrayed as The Father (God), the Word (or the Son, Jesus, also God), and the Holy Spirit (also God). Each one is distinct, identifiable, and yet the same being. This isn’t like a split personality, nor is the Trinity like three different beings that rule in a collaborative effort. The Father is God, the Word (Son) is God, and the Holy Spirit is God. The Word is not less than God for being the Word and yet being God does not mean He can no longer be identified as the Word. This concept is something we as humans can’t understand. We can’t attribute something we know to this concept, because there’s only one thing that is this way, and that’s God. And we have to remember that just because we can’t comprehend it doesn’t mean it isn’t real. We are living in the created world which was made by God. God is greater than His creation, and so when we try to apply created logic to the being Who made creation, we’re trying to bring God down from His place. We’re mistakenly confining, in our own minds, God to His created universe and all that we can understand. God exists beyond this created universe, and we must remember that when wrapping our head around the Trinity (as best we can).

That was a singular verse, in case you lost track of where we are. Verse one presents the beginning, God existing before the beginning, and the fact that God exists in a way beyond our comprehension. A lot packed into a small package.

Let’s keep moving to verse two. “He was in the beginning with God.” He, in this verse, refers to the Word, which is Jesus, Who is part of the Godhead. I reiterate this point because it is important and because it is confusing. I believe that if we actively think of God not as three distinct beings but as the Godhead, it will help a lot as we study the Bible.

This verse also begins with the word “He”. In Greek, the word used here is houtos, which is a masculine word. I bring attention to this because God, while a spiritual, non-physical-as-we-understand-it being, is clearly identified as a “he”, as a masculine being. This tells us that, while we can’t fully understand God, it is proper to identify Him in a masculine term. In fact, doing otherwise I believe would be against Biblical teaching. One reason for that statement is in Genesis, in which man is made “in the likeness of God”. Adam was made in the likeness of his Creator (which is a study all of its own for another time).

Now I’m going to pause and clarify that I’m not taking this stance in order to say that men are superior or any of that. The reason I’m bringing attention to the masculine form in which we refer to God is because of recent views I’ve heard of in which certain people believe God should be referred to as gender neutral or some other non-male gendered form. As I mentioned before, I believe this is unscriptural and should not be done. Through thousands of years of writing, in which God spoke through His Spirit and even directly to His people, God is referred to as “He”. I do not believe we should look to change that purely because of political or social pressures to create more “inclusive” environments. Rather, I would say Christianity is the most inclusive religion there is. In God’s eyes, we are all sinners, all in need of a Savior. Gender, color, ethnicity, and culture have nothing to do with it. God looks at us and sees a fallen, broken world that He gave His Son to save.

If I haven’t lost you, let’s move on to verse three. “All things were made through Him, and without Him was not anything made that was made.” Again, Him here refers to the Word (Jesus). Jesus plays an integral part in the creation of the world. In fact, it’s stated that without Him “was not anything made that was made”. That’s a pretty important part in the creation, if you ask me.

Verse four: “In Him was life, and the life was the light of men.” This life is eternal life. Our earthly lives, of course, are also in God’s hands. But through Jesus (the Word) we have eternal life. This is life beyond this life, the promise that when we pass on from this life we don’t just expire, but move on to the next life, and that the next life isn’t a life of punishment but of joy. I feel a clarifying point that should be made is that eternal life is something we all have, it’s just a matter of what that life looks like. When an unrepentant sinner expires from this earthly life, they aren’t snuffed out of existence. Now, what happens to them is a study for another time, but I can say that God passes righteous judgement on all, and if you have not accepted Jesus as your Lord and Savior and thereby accepted that He has paid your penalty on the cross, God’s righteous judgement falls on you.

This leads into the second part of verse four, “the life was the light of men”. Light shows the path and shows us what we’re walking on, whether it’s solid ground or quicksand. During His ministry, Jesus says “I AM the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except by Me.” If we want a light that points us to the Father, we need Jesus in our lives.

This reminds me of a bit of world history. During World War 2 and the Battle of the Philippine Sea, there were a lot of American airmen flying home from a bombing run in the dark. They were running low on fuel and their only safe landing zones were the decks of American carriers. Admiral Mitscher realized this fact and did something daring, something completely against code. He said, “Turn on the lights!” In the pitch black, the American ships turned on every light they had. Search lights scoured the skies and gave a beacon to American airmen. But that same beacon could be used by the enemy. The darkness was protecting the sailors from attacks from aircraft, submarines, and naval vessels. The admiral’s gamble paid off; American airmen who were lost found their way home, and his fleet was safe from enemy attack.

Now, it should be said that no enemy can defeat God. It’s simply impossible. How can anything defeat the One that created everything? But God cannot simply forget sin. Sin must be dealt with, and Jesus, sent to take away the sin of the world, dealt with and defeated sin. When God said, “Turn on the light!”, it was no gamble for Him. It was victory.

I will close with verse five. “The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.” Darkness in our world is the absence of light. If there’s no light, there’s darkness. In this sense, Jesus being light means that darkness is the absence of and opposition to Jesus. That darkness is the old nature, the sinful nature. It’s Satan and his attempts to rule your life through sin. Satan realizes that he can’t win so long as the light (Jesus) is in the world, and so he attempts to eradicate that light. Christians, churches, the faith as a whole are all under attack daily by Satan and his followers. Don’t believe me? Just take a look at the modern culture we live in. Songs are full of sex, drugs, violence, and profanity. Shows and movies are full of sexual and sensual scenes. There seems to be a competition going among “influencers” of who can show the most skin without showing every inch of skin they have. Science tries to prove that God didn’t create everything by attempting to proving we exist by mere chance. All of this pulls us away from Jesus. It’s an attack on the Christian faith without explicitly saying it’s an attack on the faith. You’d have to ignore most of the world to not see the attacks being made on Christianity today. And yet, just as was said nearly two thousand years ago, we can say today that “the darkness has not overcome it.” Jesus still reigns, and He will never stop reigning.

Thank you for taking this time to study through these first five verses with me. I’ll do my best to tackle more verses in fewer words as time goes on. The opening of John is just too important to take lightly. The entire Bible is too important to take lightly. And I will do my best to share the Word with you.

Now, until we meet again, may the peace of Jesus dwell with you and within you.

Jon