John 1:1 - Lesson #2

One mistake made over the years has been to undertake a study of John thinking it to be the "easy" gospel. Nothing could be further from the truth. John intentionally wrote to give more Spiritual insight into Jesus Christ, and this will naturally lend itself to some difficult concepts.

John 1:1
"In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God."

"In the beginning was..." - this is our first challenging but important concept. As we stretch our human capacity to imagine a time before anything we see came into existence, a place and time we might call "the beginning," someone was already there. This is similar (perhaps intentionally so) to the first verse of the Bible, "In the beginning God..." (Genesis 1:1). In John's Gospel, he identifies the someone without beginning as "the Word," (Greek, Logos).

By using the term Logos, John acknowledged the deep reverence the Jews had for the word of God: "The grass withers, the flower fades, but the word of our God stands forever" (Isaiah 40:8), "As for God, His way is perfect; the word of the Lord is proven" (Psalm 18:30). Time and again, the prophets would state the authority of their message by saying "Hear now the word of the Lord" (eg., Jeremiah 42:15). For the Jew, the word had identity and power, and John was stating that this word always was.

But for the non-Jew, or gentile, the word also had deep meaning. Nearly 600 years before Christ, a Greek philosophy developed which said that all the world was in a constant state of change. And the only thing which kept the world from running completely out of control was the Logos of God. Though the early Greeks did not know the God of the Bible, they were in awe of the Logos which John now identifies as being with God and at the same time being God.

In one short verse, John brings us to that place of unity - before Jew or gentile, before rich or poor - and says, "Here is God! His Word that you revere and honor is with Him and cannot be separated from Him because the two are one. This is where you must begin." And so, this is also where we must begin.

There are many who will spend a lifetime studying and debating the "finer" points of Christian doctrine and yet never give a thought to the point of ultimate beginning. And yet, this truth can be the greatest comfort to our faith. If we can believe that He always was, we can also believe He always will be. And with this starting point we will see that God is in absolute control and has invited us to join Him for all eternity.

John will have much more to say about the Word in the following verses; but for now, the Word always was, the Word was with God, and the Word was God!

I read this text today with delight and felt a great warmth during that time. It is wonderful to recognise the importance of John's Gospel as universal and I agree that it is the most difficult to study. However it is my favourite and the first verse I believe is the crux of the Gospel. Your explaination was an inspiration and I thank you for this. The word is always difficult to understand, but placed in the Jewish context and the Greek context it is straightforward. I thank you for this and look forward to continuing with your study.

This is a powerful revelation of the study of the book of John. It brings us to the starting point where we get to understand who we are talking about. It brings us to the realisation that in the beginning of everything God deserves His place.