Putting It Together - John 1:14
Many years ago, my daughters received a toy kitchen set for Christmas. My wife and I were shocked because it took about four hours to assemble it, and yes, we used the instructions to put it together! I can’t imagine what it might have been like without the instructions and the picture on the box. A word of advice: if you need to assemble something for Christmas morning, start early.
The toy kitchen is actually a fond memory, and it came to mind this week as I studied John 1. Over and over in the chapter, John refers to Jesus Christ with the Greek word “Logos.” We commonly translate it as “the Word;” John Calvin translated it as “the Speech.” John used “Logos” because Jesus reveals something, similar to how our words reveal our thoughts and who we are. Jesus revealed God’s wisdom, will, character and purposes. In a word, Jesus revealed, as verse 14 says, “glory as of the only Son from the Father.” Jesus showed the glory of God to mankind.
How did this remind me of the toy kitchen? It was actually a statement earlier in John chapter 1 that brought the kitchen to mind. John says that in Jesus “was life, and the life was the light of men. The light shines in the darkness. Throughout the Bible, “darkness” is symbolic of ignorance of God and the things of God, such as His character, ways, wisdom and purposes: all the things Jesus revealed about God.
We are naturally in such darkness. By nature, we don’t know God, although we create man-centered versions of Him to entertain our minds and soothe our consciences. But God has not left us in our ignorance. In Colossians 2 in the NT, the apostle Paul says that in Jesus the whole fullness of God dwells in bodily form.
My wife and I needed the words and the picture to put together the toy kitchen. Mankind needed the Word made flesh to tell us and show us who God is and what He is doing in the world. Without the revelation of God in the person and work of Jesus, we could never “put it together,” we could never know and understand God and His plans. Without “the light,” we remain in “darkness,” caught up in trivial, temporary things, ignorant of the things of God.
There is something about God in particular that verse 14 tells us we would never “put together” on our own about Him, something about God that Jesus fully revealed: Notice the end of the verse: John says that Jesus was “full of grace and truth.” This phrase harkens back to two words repeatedly used together in the OT to describe God. In Exodus 34, God renews His covenant with the people of Israel; He restates His commitment to establish them and to be their God despite their sin. God reminds them of who He is and what He is doing in the world and He tells them that He is “abundant in steadfast love and faithfulness.”
Many Biblical scholars recognize that another way of saying this would be to say that God is “full of grace and truth.” He is full of grace in that He is ever-gracious toward His people; His love is steadfast. He will not hold their sins against them. He will save His people from themselves. And He is full of truth in that he is faithful to what is true and what He says is reliable and sure. God is ever-faithful to the gracious covenant that He has made with His people.
My friends, Jesus Christ fully reveals the steadfast covenant love and faithfulness of God! And His revelation of God is perfect because, as John says in chapter 1, Jesus is God come to earth to reveal His wisdom and character.
The Scriptures proclaim and this church affirms that apart from Jesus Christ a person cannot know God. Without acknowledging and turning from your sin and placing faith in Jesus and continually looking to Him, you will search for meaning in life, you will pursue goals and chase dreams, you will look for peace of mind, but you’ll never find it.
You will seek hope, you will bear the burden of your mistakes, you will long for justice and long to feel justified, and you will hunger to understand the point of it all, but you will remain in darkness, and you will never, never put together who God is, not without the full revelation of God’s grace and truth in the person and work of Jesus Christ.
He came into the world to reveal God to us. Humble yourself before Him in repentance and faith, so that you may say with all of God’s people, “He has delivered us from the domain of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of his beloved Son, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.”
Let’s bow in prayer.