The Eternal Word

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning. Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. In him was life, and that life was the light of all mankind. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.

John 1:1-5

This was not written about some mystic, divine being up in heaven. This was written to describe the identity of a Man who once walked this earth, who lived and breathed like we do. John knew this Man intimately. He ate with him and slept with him out in the open; touched him and handled him, heard him and followed him. These are the remarkable conclusions to which John has come as he has thought about the life, the death and the resurrection of that remarkable Man.

John wants us to understand that Jesus was the Word of God. What is a word, anyway? A word is an audible or a visual expression of a thought. Thoughts are incommunicable until they are put into words. Several times the Scripture asks, Who has known the mind of the Lord? The answer is, No one. Nobody knows what God thinks until he tells us. That is what John means here. When Jesus was among us as a man, he expressed what was going on in the mind of God. He told us the thoughts of God. He was God's utterance on earth. In the book of Hebrews we read, In many and various ways God spoke of old to our fathers by the prophets; but in these last days he has spoken to us by a Son (Hebrews 1:1-2a RSV).

Furthermore, that Word is from the beginning: In the beginning was the Word. The beginning of what? The beginning of everything. This Word of God is eternal; it always has existed. We do not have any history before we come to earth, but Jesus did. He could remember times when he was with the Father before the universe began. We cannot do that. But Jesus had a history before he came to earth, and John tells us it was that of the Word, the eternal Son.

But more than that, John says this Word was with God. The Word is distinct from the Father; two separate Persons, yet so close that the Word was intimately involved with the Father so that their thoughts and their purposes were one. Jesus said, I and my Father are one (John 10:30). He does not mean one and the same; they are two separate persons. When you think of persons in this sense, do not think of bodies. Bodies are not essential to persons. John declares here that the eternal Son, Jesus, was a person, and the Father was a person, and they were one in purpose and action.

Finally, John makes the blunt statement, And that Word was God. No doubt about it! Many religions deny this great truth that Jesus was God. But there is no other translation of this statement possible without violating the laws of Greek grammar and the statements of other Scriptures.

Father, thank you for speaking to us in the person of your Son, who was with you from the beginning and is the perfect representation of your mind and thoughts. Help me to listen to him. Amen.