2022-11-13 Explaining the Unnexplainable Greatness of Christ

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 EXPLAINING THE UNEXPLAINABLE GREATNESS OF CHRIST (John 1:1-3) Date: ____________________ Read John 1:1-3 -- John begins his gospel by trying to explain the ultimately unexplainable greatness of Jesus Christ. These 18 vv are holy ground. He is taking us where no man has gone before or since, describing in sublime language the greatness of Christ without ever being able to fully explain it. Now, let's get our bearings. You've been taught the Logos is Jesus. Partially true. But every person who ever lived had just one human nature, Jesus is unique. He had both a human and a divine nature. That doesn't mean He is half man and half God. It means He is truly man and truly God. It is the divine nature - His Godness that is described here. Not til v. 14 do we get the whole Person: "And the Word became flesh." That's Jesus' birth. After that the total Person is in view. But 1st, John introduces us to the physically hidden divine nature of Christ who not only existed prior to Jesus' birth, but who had no beginning at all! Stunning! But we must grasp Jesus' deity. In Prince Caspian, 2nd book of the Narnia Chronicles, Lucy meets up again with Aslan the Lion, Christ in the books. He says, "Welcome, child. "Aslan," says Lucy, "you're bigger." "That is because you are older, little one," he answers. "Not because you are?" "I am not. But every year you grow, you will find me bigger." Every believer finds Jesus growing bigger with each new encounter. John's account here greatly helps know Him better. I. Christ is Eternally Existent John's opening is staggering: "In the beginning was the Word." "Was" is imperfect, continuous past action. Literally: "In the beginning already was the Word." Even bolder. There is no "the" before beginning. John is saying, "In beginning - before anything, the Word already was." Before matter - before time - the Word already was. One person stated it this way: "Christ always was wasing!" Jesus' divine nature had no beginning; He just always was! Think on that; it will boggle your mind. Think on that and you'll realize - that can only be true if the Logos is God. So John's first statement sets the stage for what he wants us all to know before he is done - to "believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in his name." That 1st phrase is a great start in that great endeavor. But - there's more! The word "beginning" (ἀρχή) has multiple meanings. John uses words with multiple meanings too often not to be deliberate. Aρχή is such a word. One meaning: the commencement of something - here, the commencement of everything - except God. But it also means beginning in the sense of first cause. So, John's saying Christ is not only eternally existent, but also the cause of all that follows. He is before the beginning and He is the cause of the beginning. So, five Greek words into his book, John has presented the supremacy of Christ in unbelievable and unmistakable terms. This means Christ is the answer to the most basic philosophical question of all: "Why is there not nothing?" Nothing in human experience explains why there is anything. We know something cannot come from nothing. So why is there a universe at all? Why is there not nothing? John's answer: There is not nothing because there is Christ. Or positively, there is something bc there is Christ. He is the cause and sustainer of all things. Col 1: 16 For by him all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities-all things were created through him and for him. 17 And he is before all things, and in him all things hold together." His greatness is revealed in that He made everything we see! John makes this explicit in v. 3: "All things were made through him, and without him was not any thing made that was made." This points to Gen 1:1: "In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth." How did He create? Nine times in Gen 1 we find, "And God said". How did God create? By His Word - His Logos, who already was prior to the beginning. In that original creation we have light and darkness and flesh and life - all themes John will develop as he describes a new creation - the answer to the tragedy of a fallen creation. The Logos will take on flesh, enter His own creation, and redeem a fallen race. Aren't you glad that "In the beginning was the Word"? And now He's become flesh to provide a way for flesh to get back to the Father. God's plan is always amazing, isn't it? This is why no genealogy in John's gospel. Matthew and Luke established the humanity of Jesus. John emphasizes His deity which has no genealogy. His greatness is that He is truly God and truly man at one and the same time. But John spotlights his deity, shown by His eternal existence, His creation of time and all that is. He is greater than all bc He is before all and Creator of all. In trying to explain the unexplainable, Tozer wrote: "The mind looks backward in time until the dim past vanishes, then turns and looks into the future till imagination collapses from exhaustion; and God is at both points, unaffected by either. Time marks the beginning of created existence, and because God never began to exist it can have no application to Him. "Began" is a time-word, and can have no personal meaning for the high and lofty One who inhabits eternity." John's point is what's true of the Father is also true of the Son. Only the Son has climbed into time to bring timeless life. Eternal life. But it all begins with the eternal existence of Christ. II. Christ Is Eternally with God "And the word was with God." Not only was the word already existing in the beginning, but He was with God. He was beginninglessly with God. "With" is προς = toward, in a face-to-face relationship. Tells us 3 more things: First, He was distinct from God. So, there are two Gods? No - not two Gods, but two personalities of the same God. This brings us to the Trinity. In the NT, God sometimes means the entire Godhead - Father, Son and HS - and sometimes just the Father as distinct from the others. In this case, God refers to the Father. John begins the epistle of I Jn almost like the gospel. I Jn 1:1-3: "That which was from the beginning (Christ) . . . which was with the Father . . . we proclaim to you." So, by saying the Word was "with God" John shows us Father and Son as distinct. Father and Son are in some way distinguished from each other. The Word has a conscious existence distinct from the Father - as you are distinct from me when we meet. The second thing we learn is that while distinct, they are equal to each other. Face-to-face. Same level. One is not more important than the other. They meet as equals. They have been endlessly on equal footing. This is the nature of the relationship between God and the Word - between Father and Son. Third, we learn that this is an unbelievably tight personal relationship. God is not stoic. There is a relationship between Father and Son - and, as we know, the HS. It a love relationship. Complete harmony. Father and Son are "toward" each other - complete alignment. But it's deeper than that. I John 4:8: "God is love" - not God loves, but "God is love." For someone to love, there must be another someone, right? For God, those someone's are Father, Son and HS. They've shared incredible love forever. When the Bible says, "God is love," it's not theory. It's an experiential, personal fact. And here's something that will blow your mind. Jesus prays in John 17:23b: "so that the world may know that you sent me and loved them even as you loved me." And He ends His prayer this way: John 17:26: "I made known to them your name, and I will continue to make it known, that the love with which you have loved me may be in them, and I in them." So, the Word was always with God. Now He wants us to experience the same love He's had from all eternity. That is beyond priceless, isn't it? To be loved by the Father with the same love He has for the Son - and yet, it is true. But that love came at a price. For the Son who was with the Father to bring us to the Father, He first had to be forsaken by the Father. That's the cross where God's love was displayed by interrupting that eternal relationship as the Son suffered eternal death in our place. To reject that love is unthinkable. A little boy was always late home from school. At dinner one night he found only a slice of bread and a glass of water. His father's plate was full of food. The boy knew exactly why and was crushed. But Dad quietly took the boy's plate and replaced it with his own. Later, as a man, that boy said, "All my life I've known what God is like by what my father did that night." I hope you see what God is like. This is amazing - the love of the Trinity is ours. A love that was with the Father, but He left the Father, to bring us to the Father. III. Christ Is Eternally God Now the paradox. Not only was the Word with God - "the Word was God." Those 4 words (θεὸς ἦν ὁ λόγος), are maybe the clearest affirmation of the deity of Jesus Christ in Scripture. How can someone be both with another person and also be that person? Humanly impossible, but that is exactly what John says was true of Christ. He is both with God and at the same time is God! Heretical groups have twisted this simple phrase to diminish Christ. "God" in this phrase does not have the definite article ("the") so they claim it should be translated "the Word was a god" or "the Word was divine" meaning He was extraordinary, but He was less than God in essence. This diminishes Christ. A little grammar. But John's Greek phrase won't allow that. Greek scholar, Robt L. Reymond notes, "No standard Greek lexicon offers 'divine' as one of the meanings of theos." Further, John has put the word "God" first - for emphasis. The Word is GOD! But God is not the subject of the phrase. "The Word" is the subject. "God" is the predicate nominative. The only way to place "God" first in the phrase (emphasis), and yet make "God" the predicate nominative is to use "the" before Word, but not before God. So John chose precisely the right wording to indicate in unmistakable terms the deity of JC. He could not have stated it any other way with the same precision. To a 1st century Jew, this concept was difficult. All they'd ever heard: Deut 6:4: "Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one." They were strict monotheists. Yet here comes a man who claims to be God; claims God's name: I AM; claims to forgive sins. He makes predictions only God could make, raises people from the dead, speaks with divine authority, and accepts worship (Jn 20:28). So what gives? What gives is they'd seen the Trinity - one God in three persons. Unexplainable, yet clearly true! Explain the Trinity? I cannot. But accept it as true? Crucial for eternal life. The greatest indication of the truth of Xnty is the resurrection of Christ. Close on its heels is that devout Jewish monotheists were turned into Trinitarians by their time with Christ. An incredible development - unexplainable from a natural standpoint. So John begins His gospel by explaining the unexplainable greatness of Christ. He was eternally existent. He was with God while at the same time being God. Explain it we cannot; believe it, we must. Our eternal existence rides on what we do with this truth. John 17: 3 And this is eternal life, that they know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent." You can't separate Father and Son and still have eternal life. Can't be done. Peter says we are ransomed: I Pet 1: 19 with the precious blood of Christ, like that of a lamb without blemish or spot. 20 He was foreknown before the foundation of the world but was made manifest in the last times for the sake of you 21 who through him are believers in God, who raised him from the dead and gave him glory, so that your faith and hope are in God." This one who was "in the beginning with God", allowed Himself to be separated from the Father to pay for our sin so we could, thru Him, be with both Father and Son forever. John wrote this so that "you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing you might have life in His name." (20:31). Conc - The world has seen its share of megalomaniacs, hasn't it? But any who made claims like John makes here for Jesus were consigned to institutions. How could he get away with this? Bc it's true - it's all true! Tim Keller says, "Jesus Christ [made such claims, and yet] lived a life of such moral beauty that he got hundreds of people who lived with Him -- Jews, the last people on the face of the earth who would ever believe God could become human, to believe in him. How do you explain claims like that and a life like that? You can't. It's unexplainable. Over the years, millions of people have looked and looked and looked and looked and said, "This is inescapable. He must be who he said he is. He must. There's no other explanation." That is the unexplainable greatness of Christ. Wouldn't today be a good day to come to Him, to believe in Him, to receive eternal life - here and now? Jesus said, "Truly, truly I say to you, whoever hears my word and believes in him who sent me has eternal life. He does not come into judgment but has passed from death to life." You don't have to be able to explain it all; just believe it. Let's pray. DONE 7
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