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 overtake it.
The poetry! The power! The mystery! The inscrutability! John says so much by saying so little.
I am in love with this passage from John’s Gospel. Out of all the other Gospels, John captures the mystery of the Three-in-One concept of God. Well, maybe not capture it, but he channels the awesomeness and timelessness of the universe before creation.
I like to engage in a thought experiment. Was there a universe before the Big Bang? Was there anything at all before the Big Bang? What did it look like? Was there time as we know it? What initiated the Big Bang? Time and space only exist in relation to objects. If there were no substances, atoms, elements, anything tangible, there would be no space. The existence of those things would define space. If we imagine space as an empty room, the walls of that room are the defining factors of the space within. Can we imagine an empty room without walls? Such a thing cannot exist. My puny human brain can’t fathom it. But what it can fathom is that God is, was and ever will be Eternal, existing before and after the human concept of Time.
Looking at the first verse, it is nearly identical to the first verse of Genesis: In the Beginning. The Beginning of Life. The Beginning of Time. The “No-Time” before time. The beginning before the Big Bang. Before all of that was The Word. In Greek, “Word” comes from the word “Logos”, and it appears in the Greek New Testament 330 times. Depending on the reference, it can mean “a concept word in the Bible symbolic of the nature and function of Jesus Christ. It is also used to refer to the revelation of God in the world.” (Lexham Bible Dictionary), or simply “word,” “speech,” “utterance,” or “message”. I would venture to say that John intends “Word” to be Jesus, the Son of God.
The next section, “and the Word was with God, and the Word was God”, to me means that Jesus the Son is one and the same, indivisible, completely and totally in and of God, but is also distinct from the God of the Old Testament. Jesus was both IN (separate) and OF (the same) God.
Verse 3 affirms that God is the Creator of all that is, and all that will be. John doubles down on that fact: All things came into being through him, and without him not one thing came into being. No ifs, ands, or buts, but total completion of Creation. I believe that God is responsible for triggering the Big Bang, igniting the universe into existence. Similarly, nothing came into existence without God’s hand. The completeness of John’s assertion is, frankly, stunning. John sets down this fact in an indisputable yet simple phrase. It encompasses the idea of “Alpha” and “Omega.” God is the Beginning and the End.
Verse 4 begins in the middle of the last sentence of Verse 3. Perhaps John wanted to emphasize the fact that Jesus is both the Light and the Life of all that is: 4 in him was life, and the life was the light of all people. Light and Life are one and the same.
Imagine a time when you may have been depressed, sad, worried, or just were in a dark place. I’ve been there many times. Growing up my life felt purposeless, and my outlook was dark and hopeless. Everything felt heavy, like a dark cloud hovering over me, weighing me down. I felt powerless, helpless, useless, almost invisible. Through many years of therapy and medication, plus what I believe was God’s invisible hand in my life, I’m finally becoming aware of the Light and Life of Jesus. It may have taken my entire life to arrive at this point, but here I am, a beloved Child of God. So are you! Proof that 5 The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overtake it.
There is so much more to say about the Gospel of John, but I’ll leave that for another blog post. Let me know what you think!
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