In the Gospel of John there are wonderful revelations concerning the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, and much regarding the divine blessings that have come to us in the Person of the Son. With the coming into the world of the Son of God the children of God were able to take their place in the family of God, and to learn of the eternal life which belonged to heaven, a life that was manifested in the Son, and that was to be communicated to those who believe in His Name. Since the fall of man had brought into ruin the first creation, the Father had been working in view of a new creation into which sin could not come, and the Son had come to be a workman in this world with this same new world in view. All these wonderful revelations have come to light in the Son of God, and have their centre in Him.
The Eternal Word
The Gospel of John opens by presenting the divine glory of the Son of God as the Word in eternity. Men have taken the occasion of the incarnation to dishonour the Son of God, but the Holy Spirit, in such Scriptures as John 1 has shown how jealous God is of the honour of the Son. This Name of Jesus, “The Word,” presents Him as the One who is the expression of all that God is in His nature, His mind, His will, and all His thoughts; and it is in Him and through Him that we can learn what God is, whether it be God’s eternal power and divinity in creation, or His love and grace in the incarnation and death of our Lord Jesus Christ.
How very simple, yet profound, are the words “In the beginning was the Word” (verse 1). The words are dignified and sublime, eminently suited to express what the simple believer can apprehend, yet presenting what is beyond the grasp of the greatest natural mind. Let the mind go back as far as it is able to go, and there it will find Him who is designated “The Word.” We are carried back in thought right into eternity, back to the beginning of anything that had a beginning, and when we get there we find Him who is the originator of all, the eternal Word. Every true believer in the Son of God will apprehend that the Spirit of God is telling us in these words that Jesus is eternal in His being, and overthrowing for the true believer every wicked thought of man that would make Him a creature of time.
The second statement of the Gospel is, “and the Word was with God.” Here is the clear affirmation that the Son has a distinct personality in the unity of the Godhead. In Genesis 1:25 it is written, “And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness,” and the great secret of the Trinity that lay hidden in these words could not be disclosed until the coming into manhood of the Son of God. Now in John 1:1 we learn something of the divine secret, which further unfolds in this chapter, where the Son is brought before us as the One in whom the Father is made known. In the Old Testament it had been plainly declared that there is One God, and this is confirmed in the New Testament where we read that “God is One,” (1 Tim. 2:5), but although God is One in His being, there are three Persons in the Godhead, and it is the distinct personality of the Son that is clearly and simply stated in the words, “and the Word was with God.”
The third statement, “and the Word was God,” declares the full and absolute Godhead of Jesus the Son of God. Many attempts have been made by the enemy to corrupt the simplicity of this sublime Scripture, but each attempt only serves to expose the source of the opposition to the divine glory of the Son. Many other Scriptures in the New Testament, as well as the Old Testament, give this same precious truth both directly and indirectly, guarding the divine glory of the Son as the flaming sword of old guarded the way to the tree of life.
Jews as well as Gentiles, in deadly hatred of Jesus, and in bitterest opposition to Him who brought nought but blessing to mankind, have sought to deny His divine glory, hatred and opposition that will so blind them that while refusing Jesus His divine glory they will give divine honours to him “who opposes and exalts himself above all that is called God, or that is worshipped; so that he as God sits in the temple of God, showing himself that he is God” (2 Thess. 2:4).
In verse 2 there is another simple but remarkable word, “The same was in the beginning with God.” This emphatically states that the distinct personality of the Son of God existed eternally, guarding against the heretical notion of the Sabellian and others who would deny the truth of the Trinity as belonging to eternity. These four simple but profound statements accepted by the believer as they are written will guard his heart and mind against very many of the assaults the enemy has made on the glory of the Son of God.
Following these simple and powerful presentations of the divine glory of the Son is His creatorial glory in the words, “All things were made by Him; and without Him was not any thing made that was made” (verse 3). Nothing can exceed the comprehensiveness of the words “All things.” When creation is attributed to the Son of the Father’s love in Colossians 1 it is first stated that “by Him were all things created,” then particular things are given, “the things” that are in heaven, and that are in earth” (verse 16), for these are specially in view when reconciliation is before the writer. In Hebrews 1 the worlds are made by the Son, but in John nothing is left out, all things that have been made have been made by the eternal Word, and as if to close the door against the heartless quibble of human reason, the Spirit of God adds, “and without Him was not anything made that was made.”
What more could be said to bring out the fulness of the Godhead glory of the eternal Word? One thing more is added, “In Him was life” (verse 4). Life is essentially in the Son of God, and every living creature, the great angelic beings of heaven, and the inhabitants of earth, derive life from Him who is the creator and sustainer of all things. Life in all its various forms comes from Him who is the originator of life, but in the Son there was manifested a life that had never been manifested on earth before, the life that “was the light of men.” This is the eternal life of which the Son of God spoke so much, and which was set forth in His own Person before men.
The Incarnate Word
How very wonderful it is that the One who inhabited eternity, who, in His own Person, is the expression of all that God is, and of all the thoughts of God, should come down into Manhood that men might have the knowledge of God. God had been hidden in the thick darkness of Sinai, though His voice had been heard from the midst of the flames of fire, a voice that struck terror in the hearts of Israel, and that caused Moses to “exceedingly fear and quake.” In Jesus “the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us (and we behold His glory, the glory as of the only-begotten of the Father) full of grace and truth” (verse 14).
It was the same blessed Person that was in the beginning that came down as a Man to dwell among men that men might know the God who dwells in light unapproachable, whom no man has seen or can see. There is no mention of the birth of the Son of God in John’s Gospel; His coming is presented as if He had just stepped out of heaven into Manhood’s form, the incarnate Word. The reality of Christ’s Manhood is given to us in John’s Gospel although His birth is not given, for He is found wearied with His journey in chapter 4, and asking for a drink from the woman of Sychar. Indeed, there were none who called in question His true Manhood while He was on earth, what the Jews did deny was His Godhead glory.
Of old God had come down to speak to Moses from the midst of the burning bush, and there He proclaimed Himself to be the “I AM,” and now the same blessed Person was on earth, not hidden in the flame of the bush, but a real Man that men could see with their eyes, and hear with their ears. The Evangelist here speaks of Him as the Word become flesh, in John 8:58 He says, “Before Abraham was I AM.” The eternal Word, the great I AM, was in this world so that men could not be in any doubt as to God’s disposition towards them.
Although a true Man, in all that pertains to Manhood, He was a unique Man, for in Him there was no sin, so that He could say to the Jews, “Which of you convinces me of sin?” (John 8:46). Of necessity there must remain the great mystery of how there was united in Him the fulness of Godhead and the perfection of Manhood, but no true believer should find the least difficulty in accepting the fact of it. The rejection of it is the evidence of the darkening influence of the god of this world over the minds of men.
While the Son of God was on earth the Jews refused His testimony and to acknowledge who He was, for when He spoke to them of His Father they took up stones to stone Him, giving as their reason “For a good work we stone Thee not; but for blasphemy; and because that Thou a Man, makest Thyself God” (John 10:31–33). They had no difficulty about Him being a real Man; but soon after the Lord had gone to heaven, the enemy called in question the reality of Christ’s Manhood. Among the many heresies today we have those who deny the true Manhood of Jesus, and others who deny His deity.
Although the leaders of Israel, and those under their influence, were blind to the glory of Jesus, there were those who contemplated His glory, the glory as of an only-begotten with a Father. God had prepared a remnant with opened eyes to see shining through the veil of humanity the divine glory of His Son. It was not the glory that brought terror to the hearts of men, as at the giving of the law, but the attractive glory that showed the goodness of God active for the blessing of men.
God, in the law, demanded righteousness from men, which they were incapable of producing, though man in his ignorance of his own weakness undertook to keep the law, but in the Word made flesh God was making known His grace, and revealing Himself as a God who offered blessing, not as One demanding from men. Grace and truth were found in perfect blend in Jesus, the truth that made God known and showed man’s true state before Him, that told out what God is in His nature of love, and that He sought to bless men with the richest of heavenly blessing. Man could not have what the law offered on the ground of law, but God offered him what was infinitely better as the free gift of grace through faith in His Son.
If God’s grace in the incarnate Word was refused by the nation and its leaders, there were those who were willing to receive the Son and the blessing He brought with Him, so that John could write, “And of His fulness have all we received, and grace for grace” (verse 16). The fulness of grace and truth left room for nothing else. There was no admixture of law; man had nothing to do but accept what God offered in His Son if he would be blessed of God. The rich blessings of the Gospel, as unfolded in this Book, teach us of the abundance of grace brought to us by the Word made flesh.
As born of God we can now take our place in God’s family, knowing that the eternal life manifested in the Son is ours, having been made available to us through His death. His God is our God, His Father our Father, and He had given to us His Holy Spirit through whom we can enjoy all the divine blessings God has given us, and know the fulness of the blessing that awaits us in association with the Son in the glory of His kingdom, and in the rest of the Father’s house.
R. 16.1.69