John 1:1-18 1 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. 3 All things came into being through him, and without him not one thing came into being. What has come into being 4 in him was life, and the life was the light of all people. 5 The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overcome it. 6 There was a man sent from God, whose name was John. 7 He came as a witness to testify to the light, so that all might believe through him. 8 He himself was not the light, but he came to testify to the light. 9 The true light, which enlightens everyone, was coming into the world. 10 He was in the world, and the world came into being through him; yet the world did not know him. 11 He came to what was his own, and his own people did not accept him. 12 But to all who received him, who believed in his name, he gave power to become children of God, 13 who were born, not of blood or of the will of the flesh or of the will of man, but of God. 14 And the Word became flesh and lived among us, and we have seen his glory, the glory as of a father s only son, full of grace and truth. 15 (John testified to him and cried out, This was he of whom I said, He who comes after me ranks ahead of me because he was before me. ) 16 From his fullness we have all received grace upon grace. 17 The law indeed was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ. 18 No one has ever seen God. It is God the only Son, who is close to the Father s heart, who has made him known. 1
01.05.2014 Yes! I remember the first record I ever bought with my own money. I m talking vinyl 33 and 1/3, needle-on-a-spinning turntable record. This was the Eighties, long before itunes and the ipod made digital music as easy as clicking a button. There were these things called record stores. You actually had to leave your home and go to the record store to buy music. While perhaps not as convenient as downloading music, the record store experience was fun. Half the fun was flipping through the stacks of records. When I was younger I had received records as gifts from my older siblings, but being able to buy my own record was a coming-of-age moment for me. My best friend Dave and I rode our bikes across town to Graf-Wadman, the only record shop in town. I flipped through the stacks of records, unsure what I was looking for until I found it: the White Album by the Beatles. It was a double album, with four sides full of classic songs: Blackbird, Rocky Raccoon, Back in the USSR, Cry Baby Cry, Helter Skelter. I had been a fan of the Beatles since I was in elementary school. My family had only one Beatles record, a live record that was mostly young girls screaming. So most of my exposure to the Beatles was through the radio. The Beatles were one band you heard all across the radio dial: AM and FM stations, the lighter pop stations and the classic rock stations. Before buying the White Album, I had made several cassette tapes of Beatles songs that I taped off the radio. Do I need to explain this for the younger folk? When you knew a song that you liked was about to be played on the radio, you made sure you had a blank 2
cassette tape in the boom box and pressed record right before it came on. Trust me, this was state of the art in 1985. Around this time I saw a documentary on the Beatles that was filled with stories from the band members themselves and those who knew them well. One of the stories that has stayed with me was told by John Lennon. In his usual drily humorous way he spoke of how he came to meet his future wife Yoko Ono. John had reluctantly gone to an art gallery where Yoko was having an exhibition. I say reluctantly because in the interview he says that he thought that most artists were full of themselves, especially the avant-garde the more experimental artists. Yoko was one such experimental artist. One of her pieces featured a ladder that led up to the ceiling. On the ceiling she had written something that could only be read by climbing the ladder. Despite his reservations, or perhaps from curiosity, John climbed the ladder and found just one word written on the ceiling: Yes. In the interview John says that if Yoko had written the word no, then he would have carried on with his cynical attitude, but that one little word yes broke through his defensive wall. Yet it wasn t simply the word itself, for it s a common word, it was seeing it in that unexpected location, up on the ceiling, that won him over. At its best, art challenges us and surprises us in this way. It helps us to see things we don t normally see, or to see old things in a new way. That is what Yoko Ono did with that little word, yes. Yes is one of the most powerful words in the English language. It s the word that every high school senior hopes to hear from his or her college of choice. It s the word that every man hopes to hear when he asks a woman to marry him. It s a word that changes peoples lives. 3
Our Scripture passage today, although it does not contain the word, is God s clear, unambiguous yes to humanity. It is God s yes to entering the earthly realm by taking flesh and walking among us. It is God s yes to bestowing grace and truth and light amid darkness. It is God s yes to making himself known to us through Jesus Christ. [SLIDE] Since I ve been here, this is our first time reading the Gospel of John. John is quite unlike the other three gospels. It lacks many of the stories that they share in common while it contains several others that are found in none of them. Some of the most notable differences from the other gospels are that in John, Jesus spends most of his time in and around Jerusalem, not Galilee; Jesus does not tell any parables; and there is no account of the Last Supper. John s point of departure from the other gospels begins straight away with chapter 1, verse 1. Mark begins his gospel with John the Baptist announcing the coming of the Messiah. Matthew and Luke begin their gospels with the events surrounding the birth of Jesus. But John begins a little further back with the beginning of time. In the beginning John begins. This phrase may sound familiar, especially to those of you who began your one-year Bible plan with the book of Genesis, which begins with the exact same phrase. John is intentionally drawing a connection to Genesis, placing Jesus before the very act of creation. [SLIDE] Not quite as far back as the beginning of time, but way back last year, on Christmas Day, about two weeks ago, we read in the Gospel of Luke how Jesus was born in Bethlehem. In that account Luke emphasized the humanity of Jesus, of God taking on human flesh. Luke fills the nativity story with earthly details, from the name of the governor of Judea, to the fact that there was no room in the inn, to the infant Jesus resting in a manger. 4
John s emphasis, however, lies at the other end of the spectrum. John stresses the divinity of Jesus. John is not interested in telling the birth of Jesus again. Instead, he places Jesus with God the Father at the beginning of time. [SLIDE] In the beginning was the Word. By Word John doesn t mean the name Jesus or a word like we use to build sentences. Word is the translation of a Greek word logos. It comes from Greek philosophy where it meant the underlying nature of reality, the thing that holds everything together. For the Greeks, this meant reason, rationality. John, however, is using the word a little bit differently. For John, logos is not an abstract principle like reason, but God himself. In other words, to make sense of the world, John is saying, one must understand the Word, and by Word John means Jesus. The underlying principle that governs the universe is Jesus Christ. [SLIDE] In the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God John places the Word on the same level as God the Father. This would have been scandalous to Jews, for Deuteronomy says that God is one. It also would have been ridiculous to Greeks, who valued abstract reason free of emotions, not a personal God who becomes human. [SLIDE] In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. Now John says that the Word and God the Father are one. These two verses seem like a logical contradiction. How can the Word be with God and be God at the same time? In the same way that Jesus Christ can be fully God and fully human. The early church fathers crafted brilliant arguments to explain these matters of faith the Trinity and the two natures of Christ. I won t bore you with them now because I don t want be that pastor who throws around fancy terms that he learned in his first semester at seminary. If you re really interested, come to the Bible study. 5
Nonetheless, the doctrine of the Trinity and the dual nature of Christ are matters of faith. To some extent they are even mysteries of faith. Whenever we talk of the nature of God we reach the limits of human language. God knows this. That s why God s most important word for us is not written on a page in a book. God s most important word for us is not a word at all but the Word. God s word to us is God himself, revealed to us through Jesus Christ. [SLIDE] If we look back at verse 1 we see a stairstep pattern. In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. The stairs continue their descent through verse 14: And the Word became flesh and lived among us. Those stairs begin with God in heaven and end with Jesus Christ here on earth with us. [SLIDE] The doctrine of the Incarnation how God took human flesh and dwelt among us is one of the great mysteries of the Christian faith. It is God saying yes to joining us in all our brokenness, in all the misery we inflict on ourselves and one another. By saying yes to us, God refuses to leave us alone. To be sure, God speaks a no as well. God speaks a no to sin in all its forms. If God s yes is the Incarnation, then God s no is the crucifixion. God s no is a terrible no. Yesterday I attended the dawn prayer service with all of the other pastors and 전도사님. We read Ezekiel chapter 20 in its entirety all 49 verses. It s a difficult read, not so much because of its length, but because it lays out in harsh language much of the history of Israel s rebellion against God, including the consequences of that rebellion. Those consequences included exile from the land, estrangement from God, and death. These consequences, it should be noted, were self-inflicted. God harbored no hatred for the Israelites, who were, after all, the chosen people. The sad truth is that the Israelites were their 6
own worst enemies (and so are we), choosing over and over again to disobey God s commands given to them in love. Also, these consequences, we should note, are not evidence of God s wrath, but of God s restraint. In Ezekiel 20 God says repeatedly, Then I thought I would pour out my wrath, but each time, in mercy, God refrains from doing so. Here is the key point to remember: ultimately God s no is not directed at human beings but at God himself. God s no to sin finds its fullest and final expression on the cross with Jesus Christ. But God s no is not God s final word. At my old church, there was a large pipe organ that stood on the chancel the front of the church where the pulpit also stands. The pipes went up almost to the ceiling, which was quite high. High up the organ pipes was an inscription that read, We preach Christ and him crucified, which is a quote from Paul s first letter to the Corinthians. One day while I was in the main sanctuary by myself, a man came in with his grandson. They were visiting New York from Texas. The man told me that he was active in his church back home. He also mentioned that he was greatly interested in Christian doctrine and had some concern that churches believe in proper doctrine, which I took to mean however he defined it. Anyway, he took note of the inscription on the organ and asked if we still did that, meaning preach Christ and him crucified. My instinct was to be defensive, to challenge the assumptions he probably didn t even know he was making. As my body tensed I felt a sudden peace come upon me, and then I answered him. We do more than that, I told him. Pointing to the inscription, I said, That s only part of the story Christ and him crucified. The best part isn t even there. The story doesn t end on Good Friday. We preach Christ, Christ crucified, and Christ resurrected. He smiled as if to concede my point. 7
We shook hands and then he and his grandson went on their way. [SLIDE] Maybe I m a little proud that I avoided a theological argument with the man, who seemed so ready to challenge the faithfulness of a church that he didn t know, but I tell that story to make a larger point. The larger point is that God s first and final word to us is yes. God s first word to us is the yes of the Incarnation. Yes, God says, I am with you. Following that yes is the no of the crucifixion. In the crucifixion God speaks a firm and terrible no against the destructiveness of sin. But God s final word to us is another yes the yes of the resurrection. Yes, God says, the consequences of sin are real, but sin will not have the final word. The final word is the Word, Jesus Christ, who was from the beginning, and in whose fullness, as we read today, we have all received grace upon grace. 8